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- Pet forum for dogs cats and humans
Tragic news for 2 dog families
March 30th, 2006, 09:10 AM
Mother was walking her sons 2 pitbulls on leash, (both played well with the grandchildren, the dog had been around other dogs and was fine in the past), normally at that time no other dogs are out walking, and felt the pits might have been startled by the owner with the greyhound walking by also on leash. The pits broke loose and ended up attacking Magic the greyhound those details are in the article, As of this time Magic is still not stable, but doing better, he has lost one ear , has multiple wounds along his body and if they can get stabilize will be amputating his leg later today The lady that had been walking the pitbulls feels absolutely horrible by what happened and I have not heard any more on the remaining pitty. I know both families can use some prayers.
March 30th, 2006, 09:38 AM
Heavens... such a tragedy for all. My thoughts are with the families.. this is an ordeal that will take a long time for all to recover from. So sad. | [] |
Spanish silver and gold coins found near Jupiter Inlet | Video
JUPITER -- There are a lot of treasure hunters up and down the coast. The crew of the Seahunter in Jupiter does not consider themselves one of them, but call themselves "treasure finders" and say it's their passion.
"It's got nothing to do with money, it's about finding treasure. The treasure's not fun after you get it, it's the finding it, it's the going out there with your buddies and diving and the adventure. The sense of adventure, that's what it's all about." says Scott Thomson, the captain of the Seahunter.
A 350-year-old Spanish ship sank off the Jupiter Inlet. Thomson says it's the "San Miguel De Arcangel that wrecked in the winter of 1659/1660 and had about 100 people on board."
There's silver and gold in the water. Over the past week, the crew found more than 50 Spanish colonial coins.
"We found gold for the first time in the last 10 or 15 years, and we also found a 1659 Lima-2 Star that was double struck so it has two sets of the words and two sets of the pillars and its quite a rare coin," Thomson said.
Daniel Mendoza, a coin expert from the International Coin Collectors Association, deals with buying and selling artifacts
"You're probably holding one of the only known in that condition with that much detail through it after so many years being down," he says. "You're probably holding the only known specimen which, if that's the case, it could take it into the 6 figures."
And that's not even the full bounty. Thomson says, "We're following a trail out to where the ballast pile is. When we get there that ballast pile should be 80 feet long, 20 feet wide and three feet tall with just treasure, with just treasure all underneath it."
If you're thinking about going out and "helping yourself" to the treasure, it's too late... legally. It's already been claimed by Jupiter Wreck Inc. | [] |
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Remote Authentication in SharePoint Online Using Claims-Based Authentication
SharePoint 2010
Summary: Learn how to authenticate against Microsoft SharePoint Online in client applications using the SharePoint client-side object models.
The decision to rely on cloud-based services, such as Microsoft SharePoint Online, is not made lightly and is often hampered by the concern about access to the organization's data for internal needs. In this article, I will address this key concern by providing a framework and sample code for building client applications that can remotely authenticate users against SharePoint Online by using the SharePoint 2010 client-side object model.
Note Note
Although this article focuses on SharePoint Online, the techniques discussed can be applied to any environment where the remote SharePoint 2010 server uses claims-based authentication.
I will review the SharePoint 2010 authentication methods, provide details for some of the operation of SharePoint 2010 with claims-mode authentication, and describe an approach for developing a set of tools to enable remote authentication to the server for use with the client-side object model.
In Office SharePoint Server 2007, there were two authentication types: Windows authentication, which relied upon authentication information being transmitted via HTTP headers, and forms-based authentication. Forms-based authentication used the Microsoft ASP.NET membership and roles engines for managing users and roles (or groups). This was a great improvement in authentication over the 2003 version of the SharePoint technologies, which relied exclusively on Windows authentication. However, it still made it difficult to accomplish many scenarios, such as federated sign-on and single sign-on.
To demonstrate the shortcomings of relying solely on Windows authentication, consider an environment that uses only Windows authentication. In this environment, users whose computers are not joined to the domain, or whose configurations are not set to automatically transmit credentials, are prompted for credentials for each web application they access, and in each program they access it from. So, for example, if there is a SharePoint-based intranet on intranet.contoso.com, and My Sites are located on my.contoso.com, users are prompted twice for credentials. If they open a Microsoft Word document from each site, they are prompted two more times, and two more times for Microsoft Excel. Obviously, this is not the best user experience.
However, if the same network uses forms-based authentication, after users log in to SharePoint, they are not prompted for authentication in other applications such as Word and Excel. But they are prompted for authentication on each of the two web applications.
Federated login systems, such as Windows Live ID, existed, but integrating them into Office SharePoint Server 2007 was difficult. Fundamentally, the forms-based mechanism was designed to authenticate against local users, that is, it was not designed to authenticate identity based on a federated system. SharePoint 2010 addressed this by adding direct support for claims-based authentication. This enables SharePoint 2010 to rely on a third party to authenticate the user, and to provide information about the roles that the user has.
Because computers are designed to accommodate multiple users, authorization has always been a challenge. At first, the operating system validated the user. Then, the operating system told the application who the user was. This was the very first claim, made by the operating system to the application. The essence of this claim was the identity of the user. The operating system had determined who the user was, probably through a password that the user provided. The application did not have to ascertain who the user was; it simply trusted the operating system.
This authentication process worked well until it became necessary for a user to use applications on systems that they were not logged in to. At this point, the application had to perform its own authentication. Applications started with the same approach that operating systems had used—requiring the user's name and password. Authentication works well this way, but it requires that every application validate the user name and password. Maintaining multiple separate authentication databases became problematic, because users would want to use their same user names and passwords across applications.
Creating accounts with the same user name and password is a manageable problem. However, as the concern for security grew, the requirement for users to periodically change their passwords created an unmanageable situation, where the users would find it difficult to keep their passwords synchronized between different applications. Shared authentication mechanisms were developed to solve this problem. Once again, an application could rely upon a third party for authentication of the user.
The most popular approach for a shared authentication database is one that uses the Kerberos protocol. The Kerberos protocol provides mechanisms that enable a user to authenticate against a centralized server and then convey his or her identity through a ticket signed by that server. The advantage of this approach is that the centralized server is the only one that must know the user's password or other identifying information. This works well for providing authentication information, but it relies on a single store for user identities.
Today, some of the users of your application are using identities that you do not control. Consider an organization that provides payroll or retirement plan services for other companies. These organizations may need to accept users who belong to many other companies, and have no requirement to authenticate them individually. They have to know only that the organization that they have a contract with can identify the user. In these cases, the centralized server for authentication does not exist; there is no centralized entity that can validate every user.
Similarly, if you have an extranet website that is designed to work with multiple partners, you may not want to manage user accounts for all of your partners' employees, or even let the partners manage them. Instead, you just want to take the remote server's claim of the user's identity.
This is one of the great features of a claims-based login. Another system, which your system trusts, provides a claim of the user's identity.
There are many standards, such as WS-Federation, WS-Security, and WS-Trust that define how this sort of arrangement should work. WS-Federation is the most relevant because it describes a specific approach for the exchange of federated authentication. SharePoint 2010 implements the WS-Federation standard, as do many other Microsoft and non-Microsoft products. This means that the SharePoint claims implementation can talk to many other systems.
In addition to the authentication information described previously, there is the capability for the infrastructure to make other claims about the user, including profile properties such as name and email address. The claim can also contain the roles, or groups, that a user belongs to. This opens the door for applications, including SharePoint 2010, to use what the claims provider (known as an issuing party) trusts about the user. Then, applications can set authorization to do something to the roles that are conveyed in the claims token.
The ability for a claim to convey more than just simple identity necessitates the requirement to enforce rules about what types of claims an application will accept from a third party. The WS-Trust standard supports the idea that one party may rely on another party, as described previously. In addition, it also allows for a chain of trust, where the application, such as SharePoint 2010, trusts an internal provider such as Active Directory Federation Services (AD FS) 2.0, which in turn trusts another party or even multiple other parties. AD FS 2.0 creates its own claims token for SharePoint, based on the information that it received from the issuing party that it trusts. This is particularly useful because AD FS 2.0 is a claims transformation engine. That is, it can change one claim, such as a property, into another claim, such as role membership. AD FS 2.0 can also filter the claims made by a third party, so that the third party cannot pass a claim to the application that a user is an administrator for.
Now that you have learned about the advantages of claims-based authentication, we can examine what actually happens when you work with claims-based security in SharePoint. When using classic authentication, you expect that SharePoint will issue an HTTP status code of 401 at the client, indicating the types of HTTP authentication the server supports. However, in claims mode a more complex interaction occurs. The following is a detailed account of the sequence that SharePoint performs when it is configured for both Windows authentication and Windows Live ID through claims.
1. The user selects a link on the secured site, and the client transmits the request.
2. The server responds with an HTTP status code of 302, indicating a temporary redirect. The target page is /_layouts/authenticate.aspx, with a query string parameter of Source that contains the server relative source URL that the user initially requested.
3. The client requests /_layouts/authenticate.aspx.
4. The server responds with a 302 temporary redirect to /_login/default.aspx with a query string parameter of ReturnUrl that includes the authentication page and its query string.
5. The client requests the /_login/default.aspx page.
6. The server responds with a page that prompts the user to select the authentication method. This happens because the server is configured to accept claims from multiple security token services (STSs), including the built-in SharePoint STS and the Windows Live ID STS.
7. The user selects the appropriate login provider from the drop-down list, and the client posts the response on /_login/default.aspx.
8. The server responds with a 302 temporary redirect to /_trust/default.aspx with a query string parameter of trust with the trust provider that the user selected, a ReturnUrl parameter that includes the authenticate.aspx page, and an additional query string parameter with the source again. Source is still a part of the ReturnUrl parameter.
9. The client follows the redirect and gets /_trust/default.aspx.
10. The server responds with a 302 temporary redirect to the URL of the identity provider. In the case of Windows Live ID, the URL is https://login.live.com/login.srf with a series of parameters that identify the site to Windows Live ID and a wctx parameter that matches the ReturnUrl query string provided previously.
11. The client and server iterate an exchange of information, based on the operation of Windows Live ID and then the user, eventually ending in a post to /_trust/default.aspx, which was configured in Windows Live ID. This post includes a Security Assertion Markup Language (SAML) token that includes the user's identity and Windows Live ID signature that specifies that the ID is correct.
12. The server responds with a redirect to /_layouts/authenticate.aspx, as was provided initially as the redirect URL in the ReturnUrl query string parameter. This value comes back from the claims provider as wctx in the form of a form post variable. During the redirect, the /_trust/default.aspx page writes two or more encrypted and encoded authentication cookies that are retransmitted on every request to the website. These cookies consist of one or more FedAuth cookies, and an rtFA cookie. The FedAuth cookies enable federated authorization, and the rtFA cookie enables signing out the user from all SharePoint sites, even if the sign-out process starts from a non-SharePoint site.
Note Note
If there is only one authentication mechanism for the zone on which the user is accessing the web application, the user is not prompted for which authentication to use (see step 6). Instead, /_login/default.aspx immediately redirects the user to the appropriate authentication provider—in this case, Windows Live ID.
SharePoint Online Authentication Cookies
Note Note
For SharePoint Online, the FedAuth cookies are written with an HTTPOnly flag. However, for on-premises SharePoint 2010 installations, an administrator could modify the web.config file to render normal cookies without this flag.
The starting point for using the SharePoint client-side object model for remote authentication is getting a ClientContext object. It is this client context object that ties the other operations in the object model to the server and specified site. In a Windows-based HTTP authentication scenario, the client context behaves as Internet Explorer behaves; it automatically transmits credentials to the server if the server is in the Intranet zone. In most cases, this works just fine. The server processes the credentials and automatically authenticates the user.
In a forms-based authentication environment, it is also possible to use the FormsAuthenticationLoginInfo object to provide forms-based authentication to the server. However, this works only for forms-based authentication. It does not work for federated-based claims scenarios because SharePoint does not own the actual authentication process.
Creating an authenticated ClientContext object is a multistep process. First, the user must be able to sign into the remote system interactively. First, the user signs into SharePoint through the federated authentication provider, and SharePoint must issue its authentication cookies. Second, the code must retrieve the authentication cookies. Third, those cookies must be added to the ClientContext object.
Enabling User Login for Remote Authentication
The .NET Framework includes a System.Windows.Forms.WebBrowser object that is designed to enable the use of a web browser inside of an application. To enable the user to log in to the federated authentication provider, this object must be created and displayed. The goal, however, is to retrieve the authentication cookies issued by SharePoint Online. To determine when the login process is completed, you must register a handler on the Navigated event. This event fires after the browser has completed navigation. This event handler watches for the user to be returned to the URL that they started navigating from. When this occurs, the code knows that the user has completed the login sequence.
Fetching the SharePoint Authentication Cookies
Because the FedAuth cookies are written with an HTTPOnly flag, they cannot be accessed from the .NET Framework. To retrieve the cookies, a call must be made to the WININET.dll. The .NET Framework can call COM-based DLL methods through PInvoke (platform invoke). In this case, the method to be called is InternetGetCookieEx. This can return regular cookies and those with the HTTPOnly flag. However, this method works only by starting with Internet Explorer 8. After the cookie is retrieved, it must be added to the client context.
For more information about PInvoke, see Calling Native Functions from Managed Code.
Adding the SharePoint Authentication Cookies to the ClientContext object
The final step is to retrieve the authentication cookies from the user's login and to attach them to the client context. Unfortunately, there is no direct way to add the cookies to the request. However, there is an event, ExecutingWebRequest, which is called before the ClientContext object makes a request to the server. By adding an event handler to this event, you can add a new request header with the authentication cookies. After this is complete, the ClientContext object can be used normally, and the rest of the code is completely unaware that the authentication is based on a federated authentication.
The code sample that accompanies this article demonstrates this technique of adding the SharePoint authentication cookies to the ClientContext object. It provides a set of classes that you can use to perform federated user authentication. You can start with the sample program to see what changes you must make when using this code compared to using an HTTP authenticated web server.
The Sp_Ctx SharePoint Authentication Sample Client Application
The Sp_Ctx project is a command-line program that uses a SharePoint ClientContext object to retrieve information about the web that the context is pointed to.
Note Note
When using the Sp_Ctx sample, you must specify the web URL as an https request. Specifying the web URL as an http request will result in an exception.
The project refers to the ClaimsAuth library but is otherwise the same. In fact, the main code looks almost identical to the code that you would find in a standard client application.
01: static void Main(string[] args)
02: {
03: if (args.Length < 1) { Console.WriteLine("SP_Ctx <url>"); return; }
04: string targetSite = args[0];
05: using (ClientContext ctx = ClaimClientContext.GetAuthenticatedContext(targetSite))
06: {
07: if (ctx != null)
08: {
09: ctx.Load(ctx.Web); // Query for Web
10: ctx.ExecuteQuery(); // Execute
11: Console.WriteLine(ctx.Web.Title);
12: }
13: }
14: Console.ReadLine();
15: }
In this code, the only difference from code you would find in a standard client application is in line 05. Instead of creating a new ClientContext, we call ClaimClientContext.GetAuthenticatedContext. The big difference is that calling ClaimClientContext.GetAuthenticatedContext displays a form to enable the user to supply his or her credentials to the remote system, captures the authentication cookies needed to authenticate requests, and adds that header to the client context.
ClaimClientContext in the SharePoint Online Authentication Sample
Examining the next layer of the code, notice the ClaimClientContext object that was being called. It exposes two methods, the one used in the sample, GetAuthenticatedContext and GetAuthenticatedCookie. GetAuthenticatedCookie is called by GetAuthenticatedContext. In fact, GetAuthenticatedContext calls GetAuthenticatedCookie to get the cookies and wraps those in a context.
GetAuthenticatedCookie opens the dialog box that displays the website, and watches for the authentication request to complete so that the authentication cookies can be retrieved.
ClaimsWebAuth in the SharePoint Online Authentication Sample
The ClaimsWebAuth class gets the authentication cookies. It encapsulates a form and a WebBrowser object. The first step, which is performed during object construction, is to gather the login and end navigation pages. This is done through the GetClaimParams method, which makes a web request with an HTTP OPTIONS method.
When the Show method is called, the WebBrowser object is created, and an event handler is added for the Navigated event. This event is called every time the WebBrowser object is finished navigating. The event handler detects when the web browser has reached the navigation end URL. The event receiver makes the call to CookieReader, which in turn reads from WinINET to get the HTTPOnly FedAuth cookie.
With the event receiver in place, the WebBrowser is navigated to the login URL and the authentication process occurs. When it is finished, the authentication cookies are returned to the caller.
CookieReader in the SharePoint Online Authentication Sample
The final piece of the sample code is the CookieReader class, which contains the call to WinINET.dll and a helper function to get the cookie. The helper function, named GetFedAuthCookie, returns a string that represents the cookie in the form of "Name=Value." GetFedAuthCookie calls the WinINET.dll method InternetGetCookieEx to fetch the cookie.
InternetGetCookieEx returns false if the size of the string buffer that is passed in is not large enough. It also sets the size parameter to the size of buffer it needs. As a result, GetFedAuthCookie may have to call InternetGetCookieEx twice to get the value of the cookie, if the initial buffer is too small.
This article describes how to perform claims-based authentication for Microsoft SharePoint Online in client applications by using the SharePoint 2010 client-side object models. SharePoint Online provides a compelling and flexible option for companies that want the powerful collaborative platform of SharePoint, without the operational costs that are associated with hosting software on-premises. And, with the techniques discussed in this article, developers can use the SharePoint client-side object models to create client applications that are capable of remotely authenticating against SharePoint Online.
Robert Bogue has been a part of the Microsoft MVP program for 8 years. Robert’s latest book is The SharePoint Shepherd’s Guide for End Users. You can find out more about the book at http://www.SharePointShepherd.com. Robert blogs at http://www.thorprojects.com/blog. You can reach Robert at [email protected].
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Currently I have some theoretically background in regular expression, but I have almost never used them.
I am trying to develop some classes for general input validation, and I have being writing methods without any use of regular expressions. I recently read this Jeff's article, and now I am wondering if I should refactor some of the methods to include regexp inside them.
I thought that regular expressions were used to build front-ends for applications like parsers and anything else, but apparently they are used for much more than that.
I realize that not all validations can or should be done with regular expressions, but are they a good practice to validate inputs?
share|improve this question
9 Answers 9
up vote 4 down vote accepted
Regular expressions are just one way to match text against a pattern. There are other ways to do the same thing without using a regex. You shouldn't think of regular expressions as a buzzword that you must include in your code. Use whatever tool works the best.
For input validation just be sure whatever tools you're using let you specify exactly what kind of text you want to accept and reject everything else by default. Regular expressions let you do this easily and concisely for certain kinds of input, which is why many people use them.
share|improve this answer
Regular expressions usually let you build a pretty solid input validation that's fairly readable in a very short space of time.
Something that does the right job, is maintainable and lets you get onto other things is good in my books.
As always, apply common sense and if a regex is a bad tool for the job, don't use it.
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Using regexp validation is a good idea provided that you don't branch off into applying more than besic regular expressions:
If you find yourself validating potentially complex structures such as Michael Ash does in his attempt to verify a date you are off the beaten path and asking for trouble:
Your code will suffer maintenance problems.
share|improve this answer
You're exactly right on that one, but for things that need to be exactly a certain way (for example social security numbers, phone numbers (to some extent) and emails), using regular expressions can be helpful.
But do not rely on them. For example I have a pretty good email regular expression check but I also have a list of obviously bogus domains (example.com and some others i've seen in our database (mostly local stuff)) to match against.
share|improve this answer
Yes - regular expressions work very well for input validation. However, often times it's a very good idea to abstract these things away as much as possible as other methods - or even sometimes special validator objects.
Remember that regular expressions can often introduce a lot of trouble, but on the whole, input validation is a case where they fairly unconditionally shine.
share|improve this answer
The answer to your question really depends upon the purpose of your code. Yes, regular expressions are great and I agree, with all the previous answers (that I have read).
Using regular expressions, is a handy, quick and sleak way to validate certain inputs but perhaps what you need to remember what makes good code and apply the regular expressions in the correct places. I read the article you posted, and I thought the subject matter was about more about using regular expressions in the correct manner i.e. don't just use them for a solution because you know it will be quick to type up and it will work but in turn produces un-readable, lengthy and horrible looking code.
I wouldn't take it from what is written that regular expressions are "bad practice." I guess, he just wanted to put accross that sometimes you can spend a few more minutes considering design and come up with a better concept to implement or just conclude that regular expressions are that concept!
share|improve this answer
I don't know that I'd call it a best practice, but I certainly use regex for validation of things like email adresses and ops, among other things. If not a best practice, it's certainly a common practice.
share|improve this answer
You should validate on both the client and server sides. Regular expressions are very good for making sure that a string has a valid format (e.g, e-mail addresses, phone numbers, etc.), but the server should not depend solely on that. The server should check on its own and also validate business correctness (e.g., like the answer above that checked for bogus addresses in a database).
Once is not enough. There are different degrees of "valid".
share|improve this answer
If the input you are validating is in a regular language, then a regular expression is the right tool to validate it.
share|improve this answer
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Steppe change
An election turns ugly
See article
Readers' comments
I just came back from a week in Mongolia for work - and my work involves meeting with Government officials, business people and others... I would strongly object to ariunbold's conspiracy theory, and even to the article's (and newgenerate's and buural's) strong linking of the riots to the election results and to politics. The political demonstration had essentially ended when rioting started, and rioters were clearly drunk, unemployed and disoccupied young men. Mongolia has a slums problem, a youth employment problem, a "sharing the dividends of growth" problem. This said, the country is generally rather on a good track and it can probably address them. Its politics are pretty OK by most standards, and most people there were outraged at the riots. The city was completely calm afterwards, and the "State of Emergency" was pretty soft (except for the vodka ban! a tough measure!!). Let's hope this will not be a real departure from 15 years of peaceful politics, but just an incident, as many countries can face (like France, Britain, the US and countless democracies which have known riots...)
Stuffing of ballot box, fake vote papers, mass print of excessive vote papers, fake registration of National IDs on people who deceased, abroad, and migrated to the cities, and all other tricks were the cunning character of Mongolian People's Revolutionary Party at the 2008 parliamentary election. Lots of rumors and scandals suggest that MPRP has been advised by Black PR group from abroad and used their methods of rigging the election.International observers were present, unfortunately, they have been misinformed and cheated by the election officials, who showed cooperation on the surface and violated the election rules behind. Many people on the street say that their votes were to Democratic Party, and if the election proceeded fairly, the DP would have been a majority winner without question to the parliament.Most Mongolians are not happy with the election result that would restate MPRP for another 4 years of its fraud and corruption which were inherent practice of MPRP for last 18 years since Mongolian democratization in 1990. MPRP has always been seen as old styled backward political force that is divided within its party members and only unite for power and bribe interests. I did not like the name of this article "Steppe Change," considering Mongolian political context now being foreseen and perceived as backwardness and persistent corruption if MPRP becomes majority. The riots and protests amid at election aftermath, some say, are the deliberate attempt of MPRP to hide and cover its election fraud, by enraging and intensifying protestors and pushing them to burn its headquarter building, and to enrage the public against its political rivals and get support from the society the MPRP may have purposefully ordered its intelligence agencies to burn down the Art Gallery that Mongolians cherished. Generally speaking, the MPRP purposefully escalated the peaceful protest into widespread violence to cover its rigged election conducts and found an scapegoat over its rival parties therefore, gaining much needed political support from angry yet peace loving public. The outcome of this election is important to decide which party will get hold of Mongolian vast mineral reserves, their rights to transfer to third countries. Western countries, except Russia, may largely be held out of this divide of Mongolian mineral reserves and its exploitation rights as MPRP is close ally of Russian government.
Ben Reffell
I have to admit that Mongolia is one of the few Asian countries I do not know much about. If the International Observers were happy then we have to assume that the elections were fair, as that is the rule by which we judge all other countries elections.
It's sad that we all haven't fully woken up to Elbegdorj's unethical acts. It's even more sad that human lives were wasted and irreplaceable art collections (in the National Gallery) had to burn to ashes - victim to unworthy 'acts' instigated by him.
Elbegdorj should be ashamed of himself. Instigating violence by sweet-talking a drunken crowd into vandalizing and looting public property is not only grossly irresponsible but also shows lack of character and moral fiber.
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New York AG Nabs CVS, Rite Aid Selling Expired Products
• Vicks for chest congestion? If it is VapoRub it should last for years. I have a "new" plastic opened jar and it is fine. The experation date, Nov 1999. The old jar ,preplastic glass, is also pre exteration dates. I would guess 15 years old. It is fine too.
The govt. wants experation dates, so they put them on. Since they have to test the product to that date they only go out about a year as it is costly to test for 15 years and the test would not be done yet. There is an older story in the WSJ about the Army testing how long stuff can last and for most stuff it is much more than most people think.
Sounds like a very smelly NY politician trying to make a name for himself.
The sad part is poor African nations don't get good drugs and suppies because aid will not take them if they are with in months of experation dates. So they get nothing.
I used to buy at a cloesout drug store and when a item got close to experation it was a deal. As for milk I watch that experation date, but even then temprature is everything.
• does cvs expect thier emplyees to constantly check for outdates when they have 2 employees working on any given shift??? Seems like to many chiefs in corporate trying to run stores without ever going in one. Lets put more hours in the stores so they can be run properly and issues like this wont happen.
p.s. It takes more than 6 hours (W.M.)to check your entire store for outdates!
• I've seen a lot of old milk being sold in CVS.
• Does it really matter, who shops at a drug store anyway?
• Tons of people shop at drug stores!!! Its not like CVS is purposly selling out dated items. I hardly believe that these stores' goal are to sell expired products to thier customers. I agree with "how in the world." I work in retail and there is plenty to do on top of to try and keep up with being under staffed and waiting on customers.
• Sounds like a politician trying to get some votes. Get his head out of his posterior and worry about the drug issues in NY, the unemployment in NY, the HIGH gas prices, and his mistress.
• retract the mistress comment, very unprofessional and uncalled for. I apologize!
He is to represent us in NY and I feel there should be more of a concentration on larger issues here in NY.
• cvs has a program where every month you have to check the store for out dates it is up to the manager to follow through with the procedure
• I would have to agree it does happen but by no means there being sold purposely it a matter of lack of hours yea i would love to see someone to complete the 22 categories in 6 hrs. Gotta love it.... Mr. Ryan we need more hours bottom line!!!
• I feel quite certain that CVS and Rite Aid were not the only violators so let's not just pick on them, or is there some axe to grind in the matter? Release the entire report and get on with something a little more important than this.
• i work for cvs and they have outdated items pulled every month. its a pain to go through all the items and check but it gets done per company policy. customer should be checking milk because milk vendors will bring it in expired already so cvs shouldnt be at fault for that.
• To Ed: When you go to a closeout store, you normally get a discount, and you also know that these are closeout items.
If the products are old or expired, then at least CVS could separate them from remaining stock and mark them down.
• cuomo is try the same tricks splitter did as atty. and is cuomo doing the same as his buddy??? what about the oil co. and their high prices that are un-called for instead of picking on good companys
• Right after this story hit, all CVS stores in the nation were instructed to go and pull ALL of their outdates in every section of the store. Last night at the store I work at we pulled $3,000 worth of out-dated merch.
• Outdates are bad.
However, one thing people need to keep in mind regarding these stores is that their payroll often times allows for only bare minimum staffing. Literally. There are many many cases in drugstores across the country where 85% of the day only has 2!!! people working on the entire front end of the store. With such minimal staffing allowed, customers may blame the people at store level, but ultimately these companies do not give the resources needed to Do all the tasks. From Recalls, to changing prices, to stocking shelves, making schedules, assisting customers, setting planograms, washing windows, mopping the floor... etc...
None of these tasks are difficult... but they do take time.
There is simply a lack of hours allowed by these companies to do every task as in depth as they should be done. Until companies give up the "single greatest controllable expense is payroll" line of thought, there are always going to be issues with outdated items, customer service issues and theft.
• Also I agree with how in the world. There is just not enough workers to do these things on top of their other tasks. I know from experience.
• I work at CVS as a Pharmacist and I understand how hard it is for the front store staff to pull out of dates b/c they just don't have enough hours alotted by corporate to allow someone to do it. However, as a consumer, I always check dates on products as I take them off the shelf to purchase them. I have an infant too and have baby formula out of date in every store I have ever purchased it. I usually just set the expired can on the floor to call someone's attention to it. We routinely check prescription bottles for out of dates and send them back but I have many hours alotted to do that in addition to filling prescriptions.
• Opportunistic politicians...I can't believe this is what they are spending our money and their time on! What a crock!
All the B.S. that's going on and they're worried about outdated Vick''ve seriously got to be kidding me!
As a taxpayer, this saddens me.
• my fear is that I will go into the CVS for my Synthroid and be handed pills from the year of the flood. how can I tell if these pills are good or not? Is there a telltale sign or color to determine the "age" of the pill or do I just rely on the faith of the
pharmaceutical staff???
sour milk I can return. what about those pills?
• I'll have to carry a magnifying glass with me to check the dates on all the drug items from now on. I think they print those things that tiny so that you SHOULDN'T be able to read them!
• I work for a cvs/pharmacy in Indiana, and i understand whats going on. We check our outdates once a month, but with soo few hours, its just not possible to do every section with every item. We have to get cleaning, planograms, customers, all that stuff done, and naturally it seems outdates fall behind. At my store we do go through once a month, and take two full days to do it, but mistakes happen. however, we ALWAYS get the medicine/food/baby as the first priority. Mr. Ryan....WE NEED MORE HOURS to run our store effectively.
• I think as an investor this will give customers the confident to continue to shop at rite aid .
• they treat their customers the same as their employees
• I too work for CVS as a shift manager. During the day we usually have 1 manager and 1 clerk. The manager is doing the daily stuff that management gives us to do, while the front cashier runs the photo lab, runs the register, answers the phone, and helps customers. Then at change of shift, again usually 1 manager and 1 cashier. If hours are over even the slightest at the end of the week, we get our butts chewed. Then we also get chewed out for not being caught up on planograms, workload assignments, out of dates, etc. We each only have 2 hands and 2 feet. We are not super people. Mr. Ryan....If customer service is a priority to you then give us the hours to take care of them in every way needed!!!!!!
• Im an assistant store manager for a cvs. I agree with the person above. I work at a 24 hour store so we have more payroll than most but we are high volume and end up needing more help. Everyone one gets burnt out fast! MORE HOURS!! by the way we checked outof dates and had very little.
• Big chains like CVS and Rite Aid have incredible multi-million-dollar computerized inventory systems that record all the prescriptions physicians write which they resell to Health Information Organizations like Verispan and IMS) for billions of dollars. So please, CVS, Rite Aid, Walmarts, etc: PLEASE do not insult our intelligence by telling us you don't know when products, esp. drugs expire on your shelves. Every day, your pharmacy computers should be alerting your staff as to when particular inventory is about 1 month from expiration and then 1 day from expiration so it can be pulled off the shelves. By selling expired meds to people and then collecting payment from their insurance companies, YOU ARE COMMITTING HEALTH FRAUD in violation of federal and state False Claims Laws. I hope the AGs go after you all as aggressively as they have gone after physicians who render shoddy or no treatment and bill Medicare and insurers for it.
• It'll be interesting to see if the feds and the state AGs charge these chain pharmacies with False Claims charges for selling expired meds to patients then charging their insurances, Medicare or Medicaid for it. If the feds/states did, they would find a whole wellspring of false claims revenue (through paybacks, fines, etc.) that would go back to government, aka "taxpayer" coffers. Good luck!
• out of dates is not good, but with cut hours...what needs to be done doesnt get finished, or at least NOT on time. these things take time, which we have none of now!!!!!!!!!!! if customer service is important we need more hours!!!!!!!! and to the person above (no excuses) i dont know what exactly you read or what exactly you think you know, but we do not have a computer system that tells us when stuff goes out of date! it is clear that you have never worked in retail and are just talking out of your ass because you have nothing better to do. but its a really good idea why dont you go and invent it.
• If you're busy screaming abuot false claim charges, why don't you look at the article again. It was purely front end stock they checked, not prescription drugs. If they wanted to know about prescription drugs, they would need to do an inspection, not just purchase items - after all, how many prescription bottles tell you the expiration date? They don't - you're told to throw them out after 1 year at the latest if you haven't used it. An inspector would have to come look at the dates on the bottles you're dispensing from. Outdates are never good but I agree with several people above - if they want stores to be able to keep up on everything they want them to do (including the new things they're constantly adding), they need to look at the payroll they're providing to do it. I'm aware of a couple stores in my area that do not even have payroll to have 2 people in the store at all times - they have to schedule a cashier an hour after they open many days to meet their budget. Yet customer service is a priority! Along with everything else they expect to have done! It leads to burn-out and unhappy employees to go along with issues such as outdated product.
• Retail employees are paid a minimum, & at chains like CVS & Rite Aid, they're paid less than comparable jobs at stores like Target or Walmart. This doesn't apply to Pharmacists of course, but, they have nothing to do with anything outside the pharmacy - it's treated at both CVS & Rite Aid almost as a separate store within a store.
Both CVS & Rite Aid say employees should be cycling stock on the shelves, and getting rid of expired products - but that's just one very small part of a long list of demands including things like setting up sale ads & keeping the shelves full - and those last 2 are where the district mgmt really paid attention.
Having outdated merchandise on the shelf was entirely predictable. Now that the District mgmt can't rely on the excuse that "they were told", instead of working on keeping shelves stocked and prices current, hourly employees will focus on outdated merchandise for the next week or two. If this had gotten more press, I'd also have expected a flurry of coupons for switching prescriptions to competitors, but without that it's really a flash in the pan that'll just boost the NY coffers once it's settled.
• Instead of constantly changing every planogram once or twice a year, that take numerous hours every week to complete, lets just update the ones we have, Get rid of half (or maybe 2/3) of the 'planogram staff' and put those hours in the stores. In fact you could probably get rid of half the jobs at the corporate level and it would not hurt the buisness. Have you looked at the millions of dollars in stock options our upper management have been cashing in?? $177,000,000, yeah $177 million! in the last year alone WOW!! Meanwhile Walgreen...around $10 million. I guess thats one reason why cvs makes for good pickin on.
• I,ll tell you strait.Every time this type of news comes to light there is something behind it. Who do you think is behind this.?Over paid union bosses taking there cut out of $7 an hour cashiers!! like 1199/.....
• I work for CVS and I must say though this is not suprising to me everyone needs to realize that this in fact is a very hard subject to keep up with. To "NO EXCUSES" although you may think computers run our store they dont, we dont have a super computer keeping track of outdates etc. As for pharmacy outdates are checked very often and nothing is ever filled with old drugs! On to Tom Ryan my CEO yes we do need more hours in our stores but with the economy the way it is and oli prices the way they are it is very hard to do the company would be losing major profit. One more thing, A year ago Walgreens was targeted by the media for having un trained employees working in the pharmacy and CVS/Rite Aid were left out of it. I have a feeling something more then just public safty sparked this, just saying, why werent other retailers targeted. I also worked for walgreens and they dontdo anything different...
• Here come another training module, ivr call, compliance sign off, on how to spot outdated merchandise while...sweeping, dusting, cleaning, fronting & facing, backing up the rx dept., doing a p.o.g., unloading a warehouse truck & putting out the merchandise, scanning outs, pushing overstock, doing price changes, product withdrawls, new item cut in's, amm labels, putting up ad signs, taking down ad signs, taking a break or lunch, running the photo lab, answering phone, checking in vendors, or even while helping out at other store during an inventory or remodel. Oh I almost forgot....waiting on customers.(yeah we still try to give good service, THEY are the reason WE have jobs)
• I am a store manager for CVS and I have to agree it is very hard with no hours in the stores we litarally are running on two people a shift and sometimes one. Its sad to see when you got to a fast food establishment and they have more people behind the counter in one shift then we do in one whole day to run a store. WE NEED MORE HOURS.
• i work at cvs and we had to pull outdates today because of this.....we had 3 carriages of food full of outdates. and two baskets of vitimins amoung more.
• I work for CVS in a very small store with limited hours and a handful of employees. While most of my time is spent in the pharmacy, I do occasionally work in the front store and like the many who have posted before me.....THERE ARE NOT ENOUGH HOURS!!! We have a manager and 1....that's right....1 cashier all day. That 1 lonely cashier is suppose to do price changes, cycle counts, wait on customers, do new item cut in's, wash the windows, vacuum, front and face etc...
We are lucky if we have more than 4 employees in the whole store in a whole day and that is including the Pharmacist and the store manager!
Maybe outdated merchandise wouldn't be a problem on our shelves if we had the extra hours in our stores so that someone could specifically do that on a daily or weekly basis. Sometimes the trouble is getting outdated merchandise from the warehouse, but that is few and far between and if so it never gets put out on the shelf in our store.
As for the outdated drugs in the pharmacy, they are checked quarterly and sent back before the end of the month. CVS would never knowingly or intentionally sell outdated merchandise or drugs just for a profit.
• Nice to see CVS finally get caught. I live in NJ. I brought expired merchandise up to the counter, told them it was expired and that it should be removed. Same expired product was back on the shelf next day. CVS is getting what they deserve, bad publicity.
• They got it coming to them. What do they think happens when they cut payroll and still expect more from their employees and more to get done?
Glad it's biting them in the rear. Maybe they'll realize less employees/payroll is not the best way to run a business.
• CVS isn't trying to "put one over" on anyone. Unfortunately, things may slip by and that is still no excuse. Everyone must try to do a better job and it is a serious matter, but it sounds to me that Cuomo has a hidden agenda and has singled out two of the biggest pharmacy chains.
• The main issue is that there aren't hours to be given out to employees to get things done. And why are CVS and Rite-Aide the only ones being targetted here? You can't tell me that Walgreens and Giant and Walmart, etc don't have expired things on the shelf. As for the milk, CVS is not at fault for that. At my store, we have the laziest milk vendor I have ever seen. He will leave expired milk in the coolers and give us expired milk. There are so many things to be done in the front of a store and there just aren't the hours to get everything done. And whoever created that task in the workload manager that it would 1 person 6 hours, has lost their mind. Come work at an understaffed store (which it sounds everyone is) when you've got shoplifters to catch, price changes, cycle counts, customers, sale signs, cleaning, etc to do and then tell me how long it takes and how many people are needed to do it. More hours please Mr. Ryan!!!
• It's pretty stunning that these stores don't have more staff, b/c the front end sells at least half the amount of stuff that a large supermarket sells, and the pharmacy banks a large enough margin to hire more people. Some of the larger supermarkets have at least 1 stocker per aisle, even with its razor-sharp margins. Oh well, typical short-sighted, greedy CEO you are, Tom Ryan.
• Outdates, outdates, we're talking about outdates. Let's talk about a corporate culture that seems obsessed with squeezing blood from a stone. It's constant shananigans and wink and a nod procedures will eventually do it in. It takes people and time to run a successful store. Until Tommy Boy figures that out, we will continue to be the Black Sheep whipping boy of the Drugstore industry.
• I have never worked for a company that forces people to do so much with so little. They do not care about their patients, their customers, or most importantly there people. I have worked in stores where people got no breaks or lunches because they had no relief. In this area we went through a string of robberies because stores had to open with just one person because their hours were so limited. There is not time to check outdates, do LP quizzes, do certifications, run photo, push sales, review reports, train employees, face, unload a truck box by box, respond to email, take conference calls, deal with customer and employee issues, etc. with 2 people per shift. Why does Walgreens have fewer stores but make more money? You be the judge. Engage that!
• You know what's even worse, and I know this isn't a wage forum, but, for what we do, and the responsibility CVS workers maintain, even the lowest-paid workers, we deserve much much more. I just graduated from college, and I'm still making 6.50 an hour, the same amount I made around a year an a half ago. This is only slightly more than the new minimum wage that will be implemented soon. And, to better all that, I just graduated from college! I've never seen a company that expects so much from their workers yet never rewards them for good work or accomplishment.
• As a CVS Pharmacist and former Walgreens RPh, I can tell you that none of these major drug chains are giving the alloted payroll to complete simple tasks. If Cuomo is worried about outdated merchandise on the shleves he should also be worried about all the possible deadly errors that could occur in the pharmacies. CVS is a great company, but Mr. Ryan and the rest of the executives are fooling themselves if they think we have enough manpower to fulfill any tasks other that run around like maniacs with no break for 14 hours. They expect us to create a culture of engagement and emotional connections with people. WHATEVER!! CVS is full of it, they take away all of my overlap pharmacists hours and give me an increased budget. They always expect you to do more with less. Good luck with your "Man on the moon" Mr. Ryan (he'll know what that means). I feel for the Front Store management
• I feel for the front store management, they get crapped on and then they expect them to stop everything they are doing to check outdated product that should only take 6 hours!!! Come on Mr. Ryan, get into a store and listen to your people. Screw Wallstreet and the earnings they want us to meet. You want to b e the employer of choice, you have got to show the people on the front lines you care. Spend some money on payroll. We can give better service than any other drugstore out there. WE JUST NEED MORE HELP!!! You wan to do patient care right, give us the money to take care of our paitents. That includes the front store as well. Tell Rikard to get on the ball with this. We need you guys. Your kidding yourself if you think morale is good in the stores. Am I getting my point accross to you yet!!
• When I go to your stores there is never anyone to help because there aren't any employees there. Maybe this is the reason why you have so many outdates?
• You are exactly right CVS customer!! Make sure you check your medications before leaving. These pharmacists are overworked, they are asking us to fill over 500 prescriptions per day with no overlap pharmacist help. I would hate to be the patient that is script # 500. We are playing with peoples lives Mr. Ryan. Listen to your people!! NOT WALLSTREET!!
• Once again we have kicked ourselves in the rear. Payroll control, payroll control, payroll control. There has to be a limit. I think we have found it. We cannot hire and train good people because we don't have the hours to bring them in. Any manager from an outside company would quit in a month because they are probably used to managing not checking and stocking and all the projects suited for employees that, whoops we don't have the hours for. Now field management has the nerve to pin this on the stores? I would like to see Tom run a store on 200 hours a week! Maybe if more time and attention was spent on the Front Store we could avoid things like this. What shady money saving scheme is next, we've had the omeprazole scam, now the outdate scandal, what next I ask? Answer this Tom, and do not dare place the blame for this on the stores. Your ivory towers are tarnished, and don't by CLR from CVS it's outdated!
• Does anyone wonder why we have outdated merchandise on the shelves???? I would love to see Tom Ryan, Larry Merlo and David Rikard along with all the other EVP's, SVP's and AVP's get into the stores and try working one shift in the front and one on the pharmacy. You guys wouldn't make it one minute. Yes, Ryan and Merlo are pharmacists. I would love to see you guys work a day wothout lunch or even going to the bathroom and still smile!! Get real, HELP US!!
• I m with you Fed up and done with it. Help out the teams in your stores. Give us payrol help and we will give you engaged teams without any divide between FS and Rx.
• I am a former Osco customer and my store was converted to a CVS. Overall the same people are there, and the atmospere is the same, but the level of service is less. It has to be because there are so few people there now. The people there are great but I don't see how they can handle such a huge store. Kudos to the management and employees at the store, but I think its time to take my business elsewhere.
• I am happy to see people are understanding the core issues but CVS uppermanagement don't care what a handful of managers and pharmacist think. It's Wal-mart lite.
• Run as fast as you can to Walmart. They pharmacy system is better than ours and they have more pharmacists per shift. AND they have over 400 generic drugs for $4. You may to wait in line their too, they are not big believers in FS payroll either, but they are spending it in the pharmacy. CVS is lucky they have a huge mail order business, because they are going to lose all of their retail stores soon if they do not invest in them to add more help. I guess it makes more sense to get sued and pay a multi million dollar settlement than give that money to your stores to increase manpower.
• The copied email from another CVS employee below explains the assigned tasks most of the employees I have ever met working for CVS do. It will never change until the corporate leadership understands that customer service will pay bigger dividends in return business than the demands placed on all store level employees to cut costs to the bare minimum so corporate can enjoy huge bonuses, stock options or retirement packages. The District and Regional Managers will cover themselves by having task sign off sheets of who inspected each department and threating to fire them if something slips through. While the entire store operation was put on hold because of this alert. I nor my fellow employees would ever want to sell outdated items, however, there is not but 24 hours in a day we can work. And as some District Manager's will tell their store managers that they are salaried so "make it happen." By District and Corporate Supervisors not working in a store from time to time they lose all touch with reality with what goes on in a store and how stupid some of the assigned task are.
I look forward to see my customers come in my store and am embarrassed when they tell me about an out of date item because they could have become ill through my staffs or my lack of attention to detail. That's unacceptable. However there is no way to cover down on most assigned task with 2 staff people in the front store most of the time. This will continue as long as we are understaffed and from District Mangers to Tom Ryan get out of the mindset that there are more $7.00 per hour people wanting to enter the labor force or get the employee discounts so why fix it? Make no mistake about it, if this was a top priority as you will here from Woonsocket, Rhode Island (CVS) it would be fixed. Not by firing good store managers and staff but by putting their stinking money where their mouth is. In properly staffing those store who need additional staff members. It's real easy to send out your public affairs spokes person and make a plea for the public to help us fix our problem, and we value their input but watch, this is nothing but "eye wash" because nothing will change at the store level. How many of those stupid commercials have you started seeing again. It's there to move you past your first bad thoughts hearing about this incident.
I have found in my life experiences that in most cases the people at the bottom and top agree and want to do the right thing. It's the middle management brown nosers that would twist, change, or undermine their boss because they are working on their bonus and then blame everyone else when the wheels fall off the wagon.
It used to take about three or four hours to set next weeks sale, now you have to take down this weeks sale signs, or if it's this first of the month take down the monthly extra care buck signs down too, clear this weeks end caps put up all the regular sale signs, the buy two get one free sale, the extra care buck back sale, the rectangular extra care signs, the compare and save signs, (which have created so much confusion by customer not reading the entire label), and set next weeks end caps, make signs for the end caps, big sale signs for the paper products, put up any sale items on the outdoor sign, completely vacuum the store, clean the bathrooms, clean the break rooms, completely face the entire store, check in any vendors dropping off Coke or Pepsi's, completing any film processing, waiting on customers, changing filters in the GrayTag machine because of customers coming in on Sunday from all the party's and cookouts the day before to process their film, count and close out the nightly deposit, all on Saturday before closing. On most days with two employees.
On most nights after working at my store I remember turning out the light when I go to bed but I don't remember it getting dark in the room because I'm so tired. I give CVS a good return on their investment but I can't do it all. And you'll hear "you need to properly train your staff or get them more involved and hold them accountable. Some forget that this company is made up of some great dedicated members and the actions of a few or inactions shouldn't cast that same shadow on all of us. We just need additional staffing, not time and motion studies that determined we could canvass our store in 6 hours. How stupid! I would invite the brain surgeon who came up with that "nugget" to come to my store and show me how I could have accomplished that task.
In an old saying I heard long ago, "never mind the horse, keep loading the wagon."
Below is from another employee who framed it well. Thanks for your insight.
"Here comes another training module, ivr call, compliance sign off, on how to spot outdated merchandise while…sweeping, dusting, cleaning, fronting & facing, backing up the rx dept., doing a p.o.g., unloading a warehouse truck & putting out the merchandise, scanning outs, pushing overstock, doing price changes, product withdrawls, new item cut in’s, amm labels, putting up ad signs, taking down ad signs, taking a break or lunch, running the photo lab, answering phone, checking in vendors, or even while helping out at other store during an inventory or remodel. Oh I almost forgot….waiting on customers.(yeah we still try to give good service, THEY are the reason WE have jobs)"
Frustrated at the Bottom!
• You're right upper management wont care, but they will when we keep losing customers and money. It may not happen today, but dont kid yourselves, we cannot continue like this. And for all of you Walgreens people reading this and thinking you are better than CVS. You are not, I worked there. It's the same crap and even worse.
• I've never heard of this happening at Bartell's
• If all of you are so unhappy and think this company is so bad then quit. People who are willing to work and put in the time are ready to take your place.
• I have worked in the drug business for over a quarter of a century. There have always been challenges and there will continue to be more. It is a function of planning, time management and leadership. The people at these stores though we would love to pay them more, make the appropriate amount for the posistions they hold. Everyone needs to be accountable for themselves, it's called ownership. Though it is easy to bash and ridicule CEO's and VP's we are the ones making the calls that keep tens of thousands of people employed. Stand up take responsibility and accountability.
• I work at CVS and I agree with everyone. There arent enough hours. After this came out on Thursday my managers were calling us asking us to come in on our day off to check all of the items in the store. Most of us didn't show up. We feel unappreciated and didn't feel motivated or obligated to come in and help. There's regularly no hours for us, but we're supposed to run in on our day off to help out? Negative. I hope CVS gets their ass handed to them...I really do.
• Hey Go, this is the attitude of upper management. Just quit. You must have your head up your ass. Are you listening, these people love CVS, and stay because of it. We are just being treated like dogs!! Consider CVS the master illusionists, cut pharmacist hours to make it seem like we are fully staffed. Then threaten FS management to help the pharmacy and create engagement. All we are creating is enragement!! Keep buying abck stock to fatten your pockets! How bout payroll
• to go, and winner... Most arent complaining. Most are simply stating the facts of the job. They aren't asking for a raise for themselves... or even higher pay for the employees... Its a minimum/slightly above Minimum wage job.
What they are asking for is just more hours to hire more people to handle the tasks required.
In a low volume drug store, with only 2 people working for most of the day, it is simply just a matter of time. Very few, if any, aspects of the job are difficult... but they are time consuming. No one is saying they dont want to do the work-- there just are not enough hours in the day to get all the tasks done properly. Some things should be outsourced to other companies... probably things you dont even realize the staff is doing... the staffs of the store clean the bathrooms, mop the floors, wash the windows, take out the trash.. etc.
• I've read many of the comments. As a disclaimer, I have not worked for the company since 2001, however I worked at various stores from 1989 until then. It was always in our training to check for outdated merchandise and always stock new merchandise behind old. That said, there is always something missed. However, in looking at the detailed list, it appears the most in any store was 7 or 8 units. Do you know how many units of dated merchandise is in an average store? The training is there, management needs to reinforce it.
• I work for cvs and we have plenty of staff. It is a twentyfour hour store and we have enough hours. The real blame is on the store manager and no one else. Our manager is so lazy and doesn.t care one little bit. He has retired people doing all his work and does not care about his employees. He has done some bad things in the past but middle management refuses to move this guy out. Everyone in the store loves their job but wants to leave because of him. Outdates? If it wasn't for two old people in our store who work their but off, we would of been one of those stores. Upper management needs to get off their ass and stop accepting subpar store managers. Make the changes for the better. Every store manager should be held accountable and the district manager needs to act.
• Hey Stock Holder, what planet are you on?? You are one of 6300 stores that claims to have enough hours. Maybe thats where all our payroll went. You are right about holding people accountable. My DM and Pharmacy Supervisor are great and do an incredible job. But the fact of the matter is that corporate wants to only spend about 9% of their total sales on payroll. Thats ridiculous when you are doing over $80 billion in sales. Keep cuting payroll and you will not need to be a stockholder!!
• I have worked for cvs for 11 years. I am a shift supervisor, photo lab supervisor, cashier and I run the cosmetics department. We are also expected to sit in on conference calls, go to meetings and not go over hours. We have always been told that if our sales go up that so will our hours. How do you get your sales up in a community that has no money? We run our store on 164 hours. We are open 80 hours a week. I have to work two 12 hour days a week just to make sure that we have management on duty. How do you take a lunch or go to the bank without leaving someone by themselves? I don't think it is fair to expect the Manager (who gets paid only for 45 hours) to work 60-70 hours a week. It is easy to say quit but there is no one hiring now. I enjoy the people I work with. We are like a family. Everyone that works in my store has been there for 10 or more years. They could hire 2 part-timers who make a lot less than we do and things will still not get done. Corporate just needs to get of their lazy butts and put in a couple of hours to see how hard it is to run these stores on no hours. Every time we turn around there is something new to add to our workload. All the while we have to make our customers happy or our triple s scores go down. Which in my district we get chewed if we are not at our goal. Happy employees = Happy customers!!
• AMEN CVS Shift!! Have you gotten the is your team engaged, what is the culture like in your store speech yet? We could be the best company on the world, if we just realized where our shortcomings are. Its unfortunate
• We have a great team at our store. I can only imagine what we could be if we had the hours. We just got our employee engagement survey. They should make those things about CVS as a company not as a store. I know that because I have to be on register for most of my day that I am not being used to the best of my ability. We just hired a new manager at the end of last month. For 3 months we ran without one. I was putting in tons of hours just to keep our heads above water. We were still expected to get everything done on time. So the VP's and CEO's should stand back and watch the monster you created. Because until you do something about the hours in the stores the monster will keep growing. Give us hours and watch your stores become the best!
• This comment is mostly directed towards "Go" and "Winner": The point that most of the posted comments are making is that we are not dissatisfied with the job or what we do as a career. In fact, quite the opposite. I too have over two decades in retail and ten years in foodservice before that. Those of us who have chosen a customer service industry as a career strive to be the best at what we do, and take great pride in doing it. The frustrating and disappointing thing is when we are unable to take care of the customer as we would like. This company has spent millions of dollars building a business, sparing no expense on so many aspects of the business, yet fall short when it comes to its employees. A company's greatest tool, asset and resource is its employee's. Yet, this is the "most controllable expense", so they cut back to skeleton crews and expect the world. There are only so many hours in the day, and a few people can only accomplish so much. "When the sales go up, payroll will then be added." I feel that you have to spend money to make money. And when the company is not willing to spend the money on its greatest asset, its people, then it is destined for failure. The economy is in crisis. People are very selective about where and how they spend their money. Competition is high. So we promote superior customer service over the competition to draw in customers. When the customer comes into our store and is not delivered the customer service and overall shopping experience they were promised, they not only leave dissapointed, but feeling betrayed and deceived. Bad news travels faster than good news, so how long before we lose customers, and with it sales. The Extracare card is designed to garner repeat business, but that will only go so far when our competition offers similar cards, coupons and offers to entice them to shop elsewhere. No matter what effort we put into the job, if we can't be there when the customer needs us, whether to help find a product, view the correct price on the right stack of merchandise, or offer them a fast and courteous checkout, they will go elsewhere. We can't afford to lose customers. It hurts us on a personal and company level. We don't like feeling that we let the customer down, and the company doesn't like losing the business. All we ask is to help us do our job better, by giving us what we need most.....the employees to make everything happen. All we are accomplishing now is a short-term quick fix for good numbers on reports, and a dividend to the stockholders. That and watching our future business go down the street to our competition, who actually have enough people working today to accomplish the assigned tasks and help the customer. I checked, and yes, I felt like I received fine customer service when I went in there today. All of the planning and time management in the world won't do a bit of good if the management is the one on the cash register because we don't have enough payroll to have more than two people on a shift. If we would only invest in the payroll, tasks would be accomplished more accurately and timely, customers would be happier, and I can't help but believe that the sales would go up and we would feel better about the job we do.
• will cvs change their ad from expect something extra to " expect something expired"
• You are right Retail Manager,
I do love my job. That is why at my store we have all been here 10 years or more. We pride ourselves on being the best. But that is hard to do when you can't help but get behind. I just hope that someone at corporate is reading these comments.
• I don’t know about Rite Aid but I suspect that, despite their pharmacy licenses, CVS is ultimately being run by people who have no background in retail or pharmacy.
Someone may want to clue whoever is in charge at CVS (and stockholders) to the need to increase their pharmacy lighting budget.
A few years ago, we had a wave of thunderstorms during the summer. By September, the pharmacy section of my local CVS pharmacy had overspent their LIGHTBULB budget. It got to the point where CVS managers started telling the pharmacy staff to bring in their own lighting source from home. So, one of the pharmacy techs devoed out a flashlight from CVS front stock, and s/he and started using a flashlight to pull prescriptions from stock.
If CVS does have issues with expired dispenses, maybe the pharmacy staff can’t read the expiration dates because they (and potentially others at CVS) are working in the dark.
• Most of all, I love my job! I pride myself on the level of dedication that I share with my cvs team. I will not complain about the tasks that we are expected to do. The majority of these tasks are not difficult, nor do they require thriving intellect to accomplish. Our benefits and health package is far better than the majority of the companies in our area. We work in clean environment, but..... I work in a very small cvs store in an okay neighborhood. We run 14 hours a day, 7 days a week on 162 crew hours. To have the manpower to put up our weekly shipment, I am alone in the front of the store for one hour every morning. It is okay by CVS standards since the RPh is all the way in the back of the store alone as well. They cannot see us, nor us them. We are alone while we cover each other's lunches, bank trips, trash runs, and potty breaks. Talk about a loss prevention nightmare!!!!!!!Our loss prevention screams to monitor internal theft.......uhhhhhh....yeah, ill do that.....while doing the other 37 events other than the regular store activities in my workload planner....watching for shoplifters that i cannot stop since i have no one else to escort them to a safe zone while waiting on police!!! OH YEAH, DID I MENTION THAT WE NEED HOURS!!!! Wait, forget hours, just give me a camera system so that when we get shot dead in our tracks, the police have a clue!! all in all: Tom ryan, would you allow your child or wife to work in a store with no help, no hours, no coverage, and NO CAMERAS?????!!!!! We needed help four years ago, and we need loss prevention to update all stores with cameras if we are not going to get more hours. We are asked about how is our "dedication" all of the time...IF WE WERE NOT DEDICATED, WE WOULD NOT WANT MORE HELP, WE WOULD NOT CARE!!! What does it take???
• I check the dates in every store I shop in, especially the supermarkets. I always find expired products. Take a few moments and check before you buy it.
• What are you griping at!!! just do what we tell you to do!!! We dont care if managers have to put in 60+ hours a week, or if our customers have to look for a cashier so they can check out, this buisness is about script counts! Just pull the outdates and shut up!!! We can handle the rest from here. If you start getting more hours at store level then they may cut ours and then I might have to work a weekend off the clock ot miss my tee-time....oh the horror!!!! Just sell more stuff and beat your budget and you can have a couple more hours. Beside's we put the workload planner in for YOU and you did just get a big raise right!?!?(around $2 a day after ins. went up around $1 a day....Thanks for nothin') Well I have to take a flight to my favorite district now (could drive it in 3 hours but....) So I can check for outdates and make sure the endcaps are how I like em'.
• It is refreshing to see the level of engagement in the topics outlined. I am exhausted in listening to what i have to try to accomplish in a day!!!
• Our store was one of those 'caught' by investigators for outdated items. This was by no means a surprise, as a customer returned expired baby vitamins to me just two days prior to this scandal hitting the media. However, up to that point I was not aware of outdated merchandise being on the shelves. It is sad that this problem has come to a head, but it makes so much sense that it has. With payroll hours in the front store, and to an extent in the pharmacy, being cut to levels that allow less than 2 hours/hour of store being open, it is no wonder basic tasks like pulling outdates are neglected. Also when store teams are consistently being shouldered with more and more frivolous responsibilities such as conference calls, useless internal paperwork, worrying about generic efficiency percentages (something pharmacies really have no control over), and the brand new PCI (basically calling patients on the phone and asking them to fill prescripitions without giving them the chance of calling them in themselves just to make more money for the company, under the guise of making peoples 'lives' better) there is no opportunity to do the basic tasks that actually made CVS a successful business in the past. Such things as helping customers, putting up stock (which takes about 4-5 days to put up the weekly truck in our store), working outdates, cleaning the store, etc. All of these frivolous tasks do nothing but give middle and upper management something to do so they can be the first in line to kiss the ass of the manager(s) above them in ladder of command and tell them how great their store is compared to the others. Until CVS stops firing good managers, as we had until recently, allow more hours to be utilized for personnel stop trying to create new tasks for stores to take on, and get back to basics, the company will continue to decline in the quality of service it provides and eventually will lead to its unraveling and possible demise. Wake up CVS, listen to the people in your stores. For the most part they are not greedy employees looking to get ahead by putting someone else down, but just have pride in their store and their work, and want nothing more than to be given the resources to do their job effectively, and not constantly undercut by added responsibilities and selfish corrupt management. If CVS could do this, it could easily be a company envied by the pharmacy and retail world, and would be solid, strong, and successful for the LONG TERM, not just for what the stock price is going to be tomorrow.
The anonymous person who posted this three days ago was right. Our region manager sent an e-mail orderng store managers to guarantee there was absolutely no more outdates on the shelf. CVS higher-ups are trying to shift the blame squarely onto the store managers.
• Actually, MR. BIG WHIG CVS raises a couple of interesting points. They DON'T care if the manager has to work 60+ hours a week in order to "make it happen". Managers are only paid on a 45 hour workweek, yet we are measured, and tested, on our dedication by the amount of overtime we have to put in, and not be a "clockwatcher". With payroll reduction, we end up having employees who are begging for hours, hours that we are not able to give them, but yet we are killing ourselves with plenty of under-compensated overtime to try to accomplish all the tasks. Our employees will eventually get frustrated and quit, leaving us with nobody to call in if our one scheduled cashier calls in sick. And somewhere along the way, we will be reminded of how much time we are NOT spending with our families, friends and loved ones, until they graduate from high school or you take off work to attend your parents funeral. Then you are left wondering what the phrase "quality of life" means and why upper management doesn't want to hear it mentioned. We could discuss it with our families if we weren't so exhausted from our 60-70 hr week. Another point in response to the numerous posted comments: there is no computer program to tell us when product is outdated. This is something that has to be checked by people. People are only human, and humans make mistakes. That, and with the fact that not every category in the store is checked every month (how could it be?), no matter how thorough we are, something is going to slip by at some time. This goes for all businesses that sell any product that could expire, not just drugstores. Everyone is quick to put the blame on the store manager. But really folks, let's face it......if the manager is the one doing all of the tasks involved in the store including running the cash register half of the time, how is that person being a manager? Who are we managing? It seems to me that at the corporate level there are "too many chiefs and not enough indians", but at the store level we have "too many indians and not enough chiefs". To be an effective manager, you must have people to manage, partaking in a process that involves effectively knowing what needs to be accomplished, creating a timeframed and responsibility driven plan to accomplish the tasks, and follow-up including training so that in the future tasks are completed in a more timely and accurate manner. As it is now, all we do is run around like chickens with our heads cut off just trying to keep up and hope we don't miss something, or get "on a list".
• What ever happened to the consumer checking the dates before he or she purchases the item? I agree that stores need to be responsible and diligent on not leaving outdated items on the shelf, but people aren't robots. Many products have codes on them that no one can decipher. I feel the state should stop trying to hold everybody's hand and let the consumer take some responsibility. And if a customer should find something out of code, tell the manager and he or she will take care of it immediately. It's really very simple. This is nothing but a way for Cuomo to make a name for himself in an election year. Much bigger issues exist in New York State and if this is his focus, then I don't want him for governor. He's lost my vote.
• What happened to looking for people with expired VISAS? How about safety of the country. Hopefully the AG is putting equal energy into finding down terrorists.
• This is what it all comes down to. Businesses attempt to make money, efficiently. They need a high return on their invested capital. Payroll cost and cost associated with employees are very high. Health care, 401K matches, sick days, disability, etc., these are some of the biggest cost of business. Is this the fault of CVS? All companies that suceed control payroll and associated cost. All sucessful companies grow. All growing companies hire new people. All working Americans spend money. All the money they spend puts money into everyone's pockets. Being "self interested" as opposed to selfish(negative conitation innapropriatly applied) is good for everyone. CVS is not bad for limiting hours in its stores. It is responsible, it is creating more opportunites for more people by doing so. The fault here lies in the fact that we live in a hyper sensitive society that wants to sue, when a store misses outdates, when a pharmacist makes a mistake, when they spill hot coffee on themselves. People get a grip! No store that has over 1 million dollars worth of products will be free of outdates, NONE, ZERO, NUNCA, NADA, ZILCH! Have you checked your house for outdates. If you have some smart bueracrat in NY may be ready to sue you, because there are outdates there. Maybe we should call child protective services? Let's drop the investigative local news reports drama please. By the way Ray Cortipasi says "Is the Internet Killing Your Kids?", lets sue Micheal Dell. This is all a big joke. To make the easily manipulated masses forget about anything that actually matters. Do you want moral outrage? Sue insurance fraud grifters that drive all of our premiums up, sue politicians that scream family values and cheat on their wives, sue the people crying about the sky falling and breating our precious are but outdates? Outdates? I wonder if Bill O'Riely is behind this? I hear he wants to sue A Current Affair:)
• I am a manager for CVS, I checked my store for outdates. I had outdates, I expected to find outdates. That's why we check,DUH! It happens. Would I like more payroll? Once again, Duh. Yes, but these are some of the challenges we face. There are stores that make it work. Yes I work over 50 hours a week. So does my brother a radiologist, so does my uncle an engineer, so does my boss, so do most proffesional people who give a damn about their career. This is life folks. To see so many Rph's complain it makes me snicker. They work 40 hours a week, read magazines, eat at their workstations, call in sick, get paid for any and all overtime, refuse to help customers outside of their box, complain about anything extra they have to do, and make over 6 figures and have no worries after they leave their little box. I appreciate them but look, we all have to work for a living, you either deal with it, hit the lottery, marry well, or keep it to yourself.
• I don't like cops!
• My Pharmacists come out on the floor and work on truck, P-O-G's, outdates, sale signs and anything else we need. I may have a rare store but we couldn't do it without them. So even if we all work together with very little hours it still doesn't work. We are not saying that you shouldn't put in some extra time but when is enough, enough? This company doesn't appreciate their employees. We get a whopping 30% off a couple times a year. We aren't celebrated when we do something good. Only ripped when we don't make budget or go over hours.
• My boss was told at the district meeting that if any store is caught with an outdate by the attorney general's office from now on, the manager wil be fired outright by order of the area VP. I suggest all the managers update their resumes unless they are able to handle each and every item personally each week when they put up truck. Outdates happen. There is no malicious conspiracy by CVS to profit from selling outdated goods. With very few man hours, the managers are doing their best to find all the outdates, yet they will be the ones fired. One was already fired in Syracuse. Expect more of the same.
• A corporation this large would not would not put their entire company in jeopardy by selling out dated items to consumers, out dated eggs?! CVS is not intentionally cheating consumers by selling them out dated items. Consumers should always check if the item is outdated or not before making the a purchase anyways. Other pharmacies such as Walgreen's are intentionally cheating by improperly switching patients' prescription drugs to more expensive ones in order to increase its reimbursement from Medicaid, the U.S. Justice Department announced today. These are our tax dollars that they have been cheating. We consumer had no control over this but we do have control over checking for outdated items. We can go to any store and find out dated items. Why bash just is everywhere.
• I was so happy to find this blog because I felt alone in my thoughts of what was at the cause of this issue. Lack of hours. I've worked for CVS for 11 years. We are now running are store at 55 hours a week less than what we once had. That's alot of outdates that could have been checked. Some of us take alot of pride in the job and never want to see anyone at risk for things that we haven't been able to do. It has only been a matter of time before something severly went wrong. Thank goodness someone wasn't badly hurt. I was on a conference call this week when they talked about the seriousness of the situation and in the next breath talked about not going over in hours. Did anyone know that shampoo, bar soap and diapers expired before this week. It's all out of control. I just hope something good comes out of it and I'm not going blind checking dates for nothing. Why can't they just make the dates clear and easy to read.
• I think its funny how are so called loving company if full of bull. we feed customers all this bull in are adds but treat are staff like dirt. are CEO made 1.7 million more than last year are stores are cutting hours and we never have enough staff to do the full job. I mean really what do you expect people want so much for so little. we do what we can with what we have. a customer wants to pay so little and expect that they will get the best... what you pay is what you get. as for are company as I hear it no one go more than a 3% raise this year so you got over worked and underpaid employees checking for out dates. of course they are going to do the bare amount. they never get the whole job done. I hope the AG's all get in this and every tv channel. Lets not forget that when we have mice and bugs on overstock in the back it still ends up on the shelves because no manager wants it to come out of there shrink is any one checking for that???? think no. have fun and enjoy. Oh and yes its another great day at CVS
• It seems we all agree what is going on at CVS. The question is what can we all do to fix it. Is there really anything? I don't see anyone of any importance commenting on this. Over 6000 stores in this company you would think we could have an impact somehow. And why is no one at Rite Aid speaking up?
• It just shows that the employees of cvs really do want to make a difference. We do care what happens. I have been in Rite Aid in my town and they are not as friendly as those in our cvs. They don't look as happy. The people who wait on me at cvs are always polite and friendly. It is alarming to hear all the comments about the things that are going on behind closed doors. I can't imagine how the CEO's and VP's keep their employees. I would quit. When I asked why the employees stay the cashier told me because they love the customers and the people they have helped. That is why I shop at my local cvs. Keep up the good work. Maybe someone important is reading these comments.
• To "Concerned customer"
Thanks for your support! We appreciate it. I hope you are right. I hope someone is reading and actually listening. Someone that can help us do our jobs the way we really want to do them. We would all be beter off, including CVS.
• Its amazing how I read some of these comments and some saying its the mangers fault and we all have challenges and have to suck it up and do it. I agree we all have challenges and sometimes it does get really tuff and we do have to deal with it, BUT when we have over 6,000 stores in the same boat with the same problems all needing more hours to do what is asked of us, maybe it isnt the store manager. CVS wanted bigger earnings, and they got it, but look at what cost. I dont think we have over 6,000 bad and lazy managers, but I do know we have over 6,000 exhasted and tired managers trying to there very best with what little we go to do it with.
• Store Manager-
I agree. I give 100+% every day and go home tired and defeated, as probably do too. It certainly isn't for lack of long. How long before we all give up? Many already have. I've seen many good managers leave.
• I work for cvs, and our store dont check anything at all. We have customers bringing back outdated things all the time and the store manager don't take them back. I feel this is wrong and that it could cause harm to the customer. When I took back something that was outdated I got wrote up! I will testify that they don't care about the customer just the money
• Just worked our truck overnight this weekend. Outdates came in on truck. A lot of stuff came in with worse dates than what was on the already on the shelf. They are not rotating in the warehouse, yet we are getting blamed.
• AMEN!!!
• who cares about outdated items, it happens. all these employees are complaining about no hours and all that crap, to bad. all it takes is 1 day a month at most to check, so instead of complaining about no hours and tom ryan just do it. no ones forcing u to stay at cvs so leave if your not happy. its funny that all it takes is some outdated cookies or milk to get people complaining, like thats our biggest problem in life.take a minute and think about it
• ..... there isn't any real reason for having out dates, especially in baby formula. Maybe some employees need to realize one task is more important then the others. Yes there are a ton of things I could be doing like photo but maybe checking a sections out dates is more important then a one hour 6.99 roll of film. Yes it is common sense for a consumer to check the dates as well, but that shouldn't be a requirement. Let's face it, almost every thing expires. You could turn a 1 hour grocery trip into a 4 hour job if you checked all your dates. As a consumer I expect all products to be in date, as an employee of RA I make sure my products are in date. I've spent many 10 hours shifts doing out dates alone. Payroll is a reason things don't get done but then there is another, like the lazy employee who reads a magazine the whole shift.
Some people don't realize but Eckerd hasn't been Eckerd in years. It was sold to JCPenny's then Brooks Pharmacy and now Rite Aid. JCP just wanted the right off, Brooks well they really got a sweet deal. Eckerd/Brooks/Rite Aid in all three acquisitions have had one constant problem. The upper management (corporate levels) isn't changing. So the people who drove Eckerd into the red, continue to sit at the steering wheel. I envision Rite Aid will be selling off some stores in non core markets (total BS).
• where is all are money going
• Hey Chris-
Get real! I couldn't check all the outdates in my pantry and medicine chest in one day. You have no idea. And if you think you can, you wouldn't be doing a good job. Most of us see the reality of this issue. It sounds like the CVS mind set all over again. Like giving us 3 hours to complete a cough and cold plano. And that should include checking outdates too. There are very unrealistic expectations.
• When CVS starts to treat their employees like the employees are expected to treat the customers - maybe this company would be a good company to work for. Where I am, good luck trying to find an Americcan pharmacist as they have held hostage the people here on VISAs. A few Regional Managers (RD in the SE) are completely insane and with fish rotting from the head, well expired foods aren't going to be the worst of CVSs problems.
• The money for RA is being spent for all these conversions and grand openings they're doing. A full store paint, powder & replanogram (3rd party company). I went through 2 weeks of the PPR and a week later went into the Grand Opening Month. The IT conversion alone has to be a small country. All register systems went from the archaic to the elite in every store bought by Rite Aid. They've been spending more money then what they make & what is the most commonly cut expense.. payroll. To top it off every planogram got redone barely two months ago, in the last week I've done 17 again and more show up daily. One Pharmacist's annual pay could pay the entire FE payroll (managers included) for a year and there would be money left.
• Comments by imbittered former employees are not allowed.
• I agree with all the comment made. This not only happen in CVS; the same thing happens in Rite Aid. A store manager,assistant manager of superviser has to run his or her store under staff. Because the store does not have enough hours; usually open the store with one person and only have 2 to 3 employee for the entire day. Usually each store has 9-15 aisle per store. The store needs many tasks to be complete price changes, stock the store, check the recalls, face the entire store, map and, take care of the customers (which are upset because they can't find help on the sale floor), clean the bathroom and keep organize the stock room. Only one cashier and the lines never end; because, their is not enough help at the register. Also, "the outdate" how it could be pull of the shelves if there is no payroll and 3 people in a store can't do everything that is require. It is really sad that corporate don't care how their store are presented and don't offered the help that the stores really need. The district manager only says make happens like 3 people could do miracles.
• So I just read that they went back to stores and found that 50% of cvs stores are still selling out of date! where is it all coming from if stores pulled it 2 weeks ago? I guess some d.m.'s did not "make it happen". Managers are expected to manage thier stores but in all actuality are just glorified stockboy's/stockgirl's. I have a pile of paperwork 6 inches high in my office that I can't even get to. Oh well gota go empty the trash out front and check the bathrooms for toilet paper.
• They should hire the AG's people to come to the stores and pull out dates. They seem to be able to find them all. How many people do they send into a store at a time to find 1 or 2 more things? It cant't be just one person.
• Sounds to me like the drug stores need to update their technology a bit. They use barcodes to scan for price and deplete from stock on hand, which in turn triggers ordering when minimum levels of stock are released. Why not switch from barcode to scatter code where more info would be stored/read, including expiration date? The store would scan in the items with XX expiration date into stock, then when the item is sold, it is depleted from stock. When XX date arrives on the calendar, the inventory system would then print out a report showing which items, and how many need to be pulled off the shelf. The store employee would then go to only those items listed to pull stock. No more pawing through items that haven't reached their expiration date.
Another technology that could help in this area, would be Radio Frequency Identification (RFID). Each item could have an RFID affixed that would show (through a scanner) its expiration date. Employees could bulk scan a shelf area and if their were outdated items present, the scanner would notify them as such. The cost of this system would probably be higher than of implementing expiration dates in the scatter codes.
• How do they expect the managers at Rite Aid to keep up with all the resposibilities they have if they keep getting called to the register for manager approval for every little transaction? And they stress that if there are 3 people in line, cashiers are supposed to call to open another register. Who are you supposed to call if there is no one there but cashier and manager?
• Again it's great to see some people with ideas. CVS has been sending people from other states to assist in checking again. Now they are pulling another month or two that weren't pulled prior. These people are making comments how everone in the store should be fired. That really helps. Go back to where you came from if you want to talk that way.
• Outdates sucked. The store i worked in however spent over a week touching every item in the store with the exception of picture frames and blank CD's....
Our reward? A couple Lazy stores in New York decide this isnt that big a deal.... so i get to spend the next 2 weeks rechecking every store in my entire region. No extra day off because of the holiday. No Concievable way to work less than 60 hours.
Thanks Stores that couldnt be bothered./
• I work for one of these companies and yes, I agree that this is a big issue. However, I would like to know why other drug stores are not being checked like ours. If you go into any store there will be SOMETHING that is out of date. Also, if these investigators are so concerned with the welfare of people then why did they NOT tell us of the outdates that they found in their initial investigation? I read in a newspaper article the other day that they had an undercover investigation where they bought outdated products from stores back in March. We heard NOTHING about this until this entire story broke. And you care about the welfare of people?! If that was the case then you would have IMMEDIATELY notified the management of the store where these items were purchased so that they could pull the items off the shelf. This was not done! Instead they waited months! Does this sound like concern for public safety? I think that it is unfair that our stores are being targeted while others are not even being checked. Why were we not informed of the outdates when they were found and why are our competitors not being checked? Something else is going on here and everyone in this industry knows it but no one has the balls to say it!
• I know you are upset, but your caps lock key will be confiscated(along with your 1/! key) unless you refrain from abusing them.
Thank you.
• Most of the drug outdates really don't matter, but this is what I expect from the oversized and understaffed chain drugstores. If there is an Independent Pharmacy in your community-support it! These chains deserve to be smacked, but not only because of this headline-grabbing nonsense. Clearly Mr. Cuomo would rather go after low-hanging fruit than take on serious crime in his community.
• i can use caps whenever i want. who are u to confiscate my caps lock key and my ! key. im just stating my opinion. its a free country deal with it buddy. and i can say whatever i want too.
• First of all we are not buddies. Secondly you are allowed to state your opinion, just please don't look uneducated when you do so. It makes your opinion look insignificant. We are just looking out for you kind sir.
• This issue is just the tip of the iceburg. As I have been wit hCVS for a while now I have experienced many things. Talk about middle management and their bonus. I was instructed that i could not give a 10 year employee a 4.5% raise because they were at the cap. I asked superiors to show me the cap so i know for the next time. "Well it is not written any where" I was forced to a 2% raise to give because the employee MADE TO MUCH MONEY! Way to engage
• Come on this is how business works. There is a cashier in my district that makes 17.00/ hour because nobody enforced the cap. That is ludacris! Most of the commentors should get a job at a not for profit, because they obviously don't like making money.
• Thanks for letting me know what I can expect in my raise this year. There is no cap on what they can increase how much we pay for our health care benefits. My raise doesn't even touch that.
• If that person makes $17 an hour it is because he/she has been with the company a long time probably. Doesn't longevity or company loyalty account for anything? I suppose that person should consider themself lucky they haven't been nudged out and replaced with a minimum wage part-timer who spends half their shift text messaging their friends
• You are right. There are many days I feel like if I didn't show up the doors wouldn't open. The kids have no concerns for what happens when the don't feel like working. There is a never a way to get back hours lost. The clock just keeps on ticking towards the next missed deadline. I wish I made $17.00 to be a cashier. I know that their commitment is important but I also know that in spite of the fact that I'm always there and am actually doing work 100% of the time I'm there that the raise I got last year was a lower % than a lot of other people received. I guess that was because I the 2nd highest hourly person in the store. The shift A's in the stores all know what it is like to run a store just like an assistant but with NO BONUS. The price you pay for not having an assistant in your store. Just as much is expected of you.
• don't forget about the kmarts, targets and walmarts of the world. Too many discount stores cannibalizing each other and its employees.
• I work for one of the Rite Aid Distribution Centers. Last week they (management) started checking dates. This is something that should have been done by the Inventory Control Dept. I know that there are expired product in these stores. I work for these people and I won't even shop there. They need this to open there eyes. I think they have been getting away with this type of thing for years. Some needs to be held accountable, yes customers should check the products but they shouldn't be on the shelves in the first place.
• Save CVS managers!!! they are the life line of the stores!! CVS has front store policies in place which require code pulls every week that pull product which has one month in advance of present date. have special agents check out the CVS warehouses. the store managers have enough on their plate as it is. Yo special agent man let me see if you can last one week in a cvs store environment,balancing payroll, schedules, price changes hundreds of daily price changes, customer service issues emails,banking,DM visits, vendor deliveries,pharmacy ego's photo lab, inventory,audits,theft,certifications training just to mention a few no overtime for the managers thats right a 75-80 hour week in a 40 hour salary. you think you have it tough?
• Even hourly people are under the same pressure if they care at all. But don't you get it? No one is listening to how hard we work on how much we care.
• Can you believe Rite Aid stores are open all day on July un-American....or should I say how money hungry is Mary Sammons?
• CVS is open all day July 4th as well. Christmas too.
• Get the Distric Managers and the other Head Honcho's that do nothing and let them pull the products from the shelves in their assigned stores!
• We had 5 people in our store last week 2 days. Went over our budget 50+ hours. Now they have an outside agent doing audits. Thousands and thousands of merchandise distroyed, much of which still had several months left. When I think of this all for just one store, the cost has to be out of this world. Yes CVS has policies in place but again does not invest in the hours to implement them. This is where it cost them this time. Where will it be the next time? Now the focus is outdates. Something else will have to be pushed to the rear.
• I am a store manager for CVS, and I am ashamed of this report. It does not inspire confidence in the consumer to continue to shop our stores. Even if we don't have enough hours, even if there is only 2 people on each shift, that is no excuse for having outdates on your shelf. Sure it may take quite awhile to check for these outdates, but that is your job to do. If you don't like it, them go somewhere else. Have some pride in your job!!
• I totally resent your comment. You have no idea how much I and others have given to this company if you feel that way! This is not an excuse. Out dates and confidence are extremely important. I too take pride in my job and in my store. I'm just saying that had CVS invested the hours in their stores in the begining all this money would not have been wasted to recover the damage done. Again, it is just a shift in priority again. Will only having 2 people in a store be an excuse when some stores get robbed and someone gets hurt or worse? Maybe then we'll finally stop calling it an excuse and call it the reason.
• You are right about the hours, but that does not give us the right to have outdates on the shelf! It's very simple to just check your outdates when you are putting up truck. That way when the 20th of every month comes around, it won't take that long. By no means did I intend to offend anyone by my comment, I just feel that outdates are a very important part of our job to get done. If that means that I have to stay a little longer to get it done, well then that's what I'll do. It's alot easier to do the outdates that to explain to a customer why you have an outdated product on your shelf.
• There is nothing wrong with this practice. If someone wants to buy an item like this they should be able to do so. Lawsuits over this kind of thing just drive up costs for everyone. The AG needs to be sanctioned for driving our costs up.
• CVS and Rite Aid and all other stores should be ashamed of themselves for being open all day on a holiday.....July 4th was INDEPENDENCE DAY....unfortunately we are all slaves to the almighty dollar. We have to go back to putting family first and spending time with family is important..not shopping
• CVS treats its store employees like dirt.The salaried people "manager and Assistant manager" are paid paid a measly salary for working around 60 hours weekly.Bonus is negligible,if any.They need help.The corporate is running an organized slavery show.Most managers at CVS have only high school diplomas.CVS knows that and they exploit it to their full advantage.By giving the around 45K (in texas) they bait them with enough money that they will think hard before quitting.But then they saddle them with infite back braking work,long hours,no holidays and NO HELP.
• Get a job as CVS store manager if,
1.You hate your family
2.Dont mind getting paid 45 hours salary for 60+ hours of work,weekly.
• I posted earlier about the hours things... but now its just people complaining. Any manager routinely working 60 hours a week is not working smarter. Sure some weeks 55 hours happens, and other weeks its 45 (RA managers are 50 hour work week).... I am a manager of a low volume store (the types with the real staffing issues) and still rarely put in over 53 hours. My store is also the best in the district in Customer Service Scores and maintaining all the weekly tasks...
If some of you managers would come out of your office and actually help with doing the work on the floor, I bet your hours worked would go down too.
• The problem with businesses (not only RA and CVS)today is that they expect workers to multi-task but they don't multi-pay and that is why quality is down. A pat on the back doesn't pay the bills
• Why would the Attorney General
Office only investigate CVS_ And Rite Aide- Maybe someone should investigate this- There are many other Drug Stores so target all in your investigation and don't just try to put down two chains to promote your polital contributing back pocket investors to boost your own pockets- It is a good idea that customers can now read the outdates , they should check them and if they should find one bring it to a store attendant's attention so it can be removed. I do not work in Retail nor do I critisize but I usually get alot of care and concern from CVS employees and I've bought out dated dairy product at numerous locations, I took it back and got new ones- no fuss - Once I got bad meat a grocery store and took it back, late at night and saved the store because the refrigeration unit was not working properly and they were able to have it fixed the next day- I came in a few nights later and was told Thank You and that made me feel important- one they recognized me as customer, 2 they took the time to thank me for letting them know right away, 3 they explained the problem and that it was repaired that next day. So why destroy a reputation when it could have been just as easily remedied by notifying the company rather than making it all about two brands of stores!!!!
• Expired out of dates can be mostly taken care of by rotating your stock. New stock to the back old stock to the front. Employee should be trained to follow that. Also outside venders should also be checking their dates also. Some out of dates can be lessen also by reducing you merchandise. If a product doesn't sell then don't re-order so many. I work as a CPhT at a CVS. Yes we are very very busy. But good training pays off big time. When I take a drug off the shelf I check the date quickly even if the bottle is opened. Only takes a quick glance not hours. Yes I have found out of dates. But if everyone employed followed those 2 simply rules rotate and quick glances some problems could be avoided. I work truck day and putting up alot of bottles does take time. But if you put new ones to the back and if out of dates do get put on the shelves then a quick glance before filling can catch those ones. Also drugs don't go bad like mold on food. When a drug expires it just loses it's potence or in other words it's strenght. But that happens slowly not right at the very minute it expires. And that's why you should only get a month at a time for prescription drug's and take all the medicine unless the doctor tell's you to stop. If you have medicine in your cabinet that is prescrition look at the fill date if it is over a month throw it out if you don't intend to take it anymore. With can goods unless the can is dented then your alright. Can food was found in German bunkers 10 years after the war and when opened was found to be just fine. But use consumer common sence "when in doubt, throw out". The only gripe I have about CVS is the breaks that we get or don't get. If we work 6 hours or over we MUST take a half hour. But since we don't start breaks until 12 noon and 3 of you started at 8am and we have to take turns then the last going end's up eating lunch at around 2pm. I end up skipping eating because I don't want to eat so close to supper at 6pm. Also our store manager won't let us have our 2 other breaks that we should be paid for. You know those 2/15 minutes one. He said it's 2/10 minutes and that if we should gripe about taken them then every time we have to go to the bathroom we have to do it on those 2/10 minute breaks. I wonder if upper managment and CEO's follow those rules. If any of them are reading this I work at store 7745 in Ringgold, Georgia.
• I love the notion that rotating stock is the solution to all the outdated problems.
For rotating of stock it has to be done at ALL levels- not just store level, or it doesnt work at all.
Just for kicks, last week i kept track of everything i put up with an expiration date.
73% of the items with dates... the "new ones" that came in on the truck had a date that is sooner that what was already on the shelf.
• I work for Rite aid and just in our store alone, after taking everything past expired, and things expiring in the next 3 months off the shelf we had over 10 totes. Annoying thing is, on stock day, some things come IN expired.
• I know it is wrong to sell expired merchandise, but the public has to remember the item doesn't go bad on the exact expiration date. They should be as vigilant in their own homes as they want us to be.
• I have worked for cvs for many years and one of the problems I see is the upper management always notifies local management when they are coming and then everyone has to clean and overstaff when they come so no one can see the real problem of understaffing. They also make lie about how it really is on a day to day basis when you work long hours with no breaks and you work alot of hours for no pay because you don't want to leave your coworkers when their so busy in the pharmacy with no help. They should be investigated for labor law practices.
• I agree with all the payroll issues, we are struggling severely. If you have such a tight schedule, there is no flexibility to cover vacations, or people out sick. But wouldn't it make sense for the manufacturers to shoulder some of the responsibility for their product? Couldn't they be required to clearly and boldly print the expiration dates on the items, rather than have them hidden in tiny print, or just engraved, where you have to turn the package just so to read it? Big, bold, black type would make them much easier to identify, even just in passing/facing, etc...And as for date CODES, we asked for list of how to read these, and were told there was no such list in the works. How can we be held responsible for outdates on items with codes we cannot identify? At a district meeting, we were told, yes, inspectors would know how to read them, but we would not. Once again, thanks for the assistance. And if I didn't have to spend half of my time entering the same sku into the RF to "count" it three more times, even though I do not have this many locations, as my store is small. Or spend the other half on the phone with Retail Imaging trying to get our state of the art photo equipment up and running properly...
• Can someone explain to me how stores like Rite Aid expect to make money when they have sales with the Single Check rebates where customers get the item for free after rebate? I assume they think the customers buy other items as well but this is NYC. Customers only come in for the freebees and buy more than 1(probably to sell for full price in their $.99 stores)....each on a single receipt causing a long line at register and aggravating the people behind them. And when you ask the cashier if there is another register they say no one is there.
• To all the CVS employees complaining about thier jobs and hours. Just do your job and stop complaining. Fix the problem. if you do it on a monthly basis you wont have a bigger problem later on. Lead by example.Take pride in your store. Do you keep outdated merhandise in your house? It takes more time to complain and blame it on hours,the economy and each other. No matter where you work,as long as that establisment sells consumeables there will be outdates. Have you forgotten our vission,mission and values. or SSS. wht it really means. take a step back,look at it through a customers eyes. so stop complaining and do your job. Its amazing we have CVS employees. including members of managemnt bashing the company that has given them a career.In todays economy you should be happy you have a job.
• of something painful, just for being a douche.
• I work for riteaid and i tell you, two people a shift is a joke(and ones a cashier) who they expect to do a bunch of stuff in between customers. Then, if its so busy the task couldn't get done, the cashier gets the blame. Oh, i was moving too slow. Im sorry, i was wasting my time feeling the beer over and over and over then by time im done with that i have another whole line of customers, im forever moving in an arrobic pace, if i moved any faster, i would be running.
• About the rebate thing, i think the manufacture reimburses Riteaid. Its usually a way to promote a new item.
• Allen, I also work for Rite Aid. I know the manufacturers use the rebates to promote sales of their items and hopefully bring business into the store. But, like Confused said, a lot of the times that is all they buy. From what I see, people make a business out of it. Buy the product that is free after rebate and also use a coupon. So in essence they are being paid to buy the product. Then a few weeks later they return the product for a refund. Therefore it is costing Rite Aid money to process the sale, rebate and return. And try explaining the rebate concept to people who don't speak English and can only read FREE or whatever the price is after rebate and want it for that price. Or when they find out it isn't at the rebate price at the register and they get mad and throw the item at the cashier.They don't want the item and the sale has to be voided, which means you have to call the manager. People waiting in line then become disgusted and leave the store. Do you wonder why Rite Aid's stock is way down?
• I just bought a bottle of Sino Fresh from Rite-Aid. I didn't see an expiration date on the box after I got the box home so I called Sino Fresh and gave them the "lot #" and was told the product expired--TWO YEARS AGO!! Does anyone know who I can report Rite-Aid to I had already used it before I found out the expiration date!
• I was trying to make this point in an earlier post. We can check for outdates on a daily basis, but if we are not told by the manufacturer how to read the "code", how do we know it's outdated? Why isn't there something in place to force manufacturers to list an actual expiration date on their product? How can we be held responsible for having outdated merchandise on the shelves, when we are not told how to read the lot # and know that it's outdated? I have been told the FDA is working on making all manufacturers list an actual expiration on their products, but it is like any other red tape, going to take time to put it in effect.
• Why are manufacturers allowed to put expiration dates in codes and in strange places. We were doing outdates and to find an expiration date we had to hold package on an angle in a certain light to see it. It is so easy to miss and takes longer.
• who do I call if I buy expired products? Russian stores do that all the time. My wife is pregnant and everything could happen.
• You CVS employees forget about that wonderful saying you hear on the PA every 5 mins. ("Manager to the front, Manager to the front, for customer assistance") I mean that just never gets old huh? Key scans for just about everything other than scanning an item....oh ya the power we hold with our key tags like a light saber...oh that got old after the first day that got activated for me... Maybe in 10 yrs or so they will finally understand what needs to be done to fix all of this. Intill then...hang on to the 14 high totes that just keep on coming and don't fly out the door with the ad's that just dont' stay on that stand @ the front door. ; seriously, the sad part is you do need to start looking for a new job. Nobody is going to offer it to unless you take the time on your days off and look. Dont' wait to sink with the ship or just stay miserable. It's not going to change anytime soon. There is better jobs out there that pay even more.. you have to be aggressive and look. I don't plan on staying with CVS much longer.
• Yes I know some grammar errors with my post. This isn't school right? Anyways to add to what I was saying. CVS isn't a bad company. It's not hard to figure out, the FS needs more hrs yes. But that's easy to say. It really does depend on your Store manager and yes THE HOURS YOUR's a combination of depends on how your manager manages his or her building. You have to have a game plan when you try to accomplish anything...there are countless tasks to be done @ CVS I know all about it..from setting an ad to making sure there are store use labels on all the items in the office and break room etc...but seriously I was saying earlier. It's a major problem they have like some other retail companies and It's not goint to change now, especially with the economy the way it is. It's kind of sad...hearing "increase your sales and watch your hrs go up" How can your sales go up, when you cut hrs? That means less gets done and you want more blood out of a stone? No it's called invest money and see if money makes money....GOT IT STOCK HOLDERS??????????????????????????????????????????? RING A BELL NOW? CAT GOT YOUR TONUGE? GIVE ME A BREAK! OH THAT'S RIGHT 1/2 IS TOO MUCH....i'll take my 5 mins drink my meal thru a least i see it's not just me going thru this nonsense. Goodluck CVS employees!
• People need to stop complaining that there is not enough hours allowed at store level to check for outdates. Even if hourly employees feel checking outdates is beyond their scope, management shouldn't. Rite Aid managers and assistant managers are salary and are required to work a minimum of 50 hours a week. I have seen very few of them actually do it. Even if they did, then they need to stay that extra 6 or 10 hours to check outdates if no one else can get it done. That's why you're salary people! If you don't like it, you're in the wrong job! I worked for Rite Aid and just after this big "scare" about outdates happened I was helping out at another store. There had been a huge emphasis on checking the whole store for outdates from corporate. Apparently, this store had complied. You would not believe the outdates that I found and they had already gone through the store! This is typical for Rite Aid. Mismanagement is the only thing I can say. After all, Rite Aid was one of the few companies that was so unethical that the government took action and signed into law the Sarbanes-Oxley Act. What else is there to say about a company that needs the government to step in and tell them to be ethical?
• I currently work for Rite Aid, I'm appauled at the lack of some policies. True, there are only 2 employees working on most shifts, plus a management member, or supervisor, and there's not a lot of time to check for outdates let alone, straighten out the store. I don't agree with corp tying the hands of cashiers, or with the lack of employees scheduled to ensure out dates are being checked. One of the major faults I've found, is that when shipment arrives, NO ONE rotates stock!! Including the manager!! I found outdates as far back as 07.
Another major pet peeve, is that Rite Aid does not recycle!! Everything is thrown into the trash. Unexcusable, unacceptable. You should be ashamed of yourselves Rite Aid.
• It's really sad to read all the negative comments. I'm right there with all of you in your frustrations, and with the customers also. I hate the rebates, or freebates as we call them in the NW. There's the regulars who will be lined up at the door tomorrow morning, and you know dang well they do not use all these products. Yes, they purchase them to sell at their stores for a higher price. And then get upset with us because a rebate wasn't honored.. why, because they didn't bother to READ the sign. So now our time is wasted by having to do returns. It's all a scam.
And to AMAZED who posted earlier this year, who says "just be happy you have a job"... that is the Wrong attitude to have. Why enable the corporate world to screw every employee any way they can? I was laid off for over a year, I haven't been able to find a company who wants to pay me what I was making. So I've taken a job for $4 an hour less, various shifts, split days off, no benefits.. and I'm supposed to be happy about it??? No, I've "Settled". I've taken what I can just to attempt to put food on the table for my kids, while the CEO's make the big money, and don't have to work holidays so THEY can be home with their families.
Retail isn't about Family, none of these companies care about family time for their employees.. it's all about making a dime.
It's the world we chose to get into.
• I work at Rite Aid and I just hate having to pack out the perishable goods like candy. The mgrs aren't in control of some items we are shipped. They are just sent to us by the whse. I am sick and tired of getting the same box of candy each delivery when we haven't sold 1!!!No wonder there are so many outdates. This stuff comes in every week!
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Advice re unauthorised days absence in year 10
(15 Posts)
lborolass Sun 15-Sep-13 17:33:21
I don't normally condone holidays in term time but in your case you've done the right thing, asked and been told it will be unauthorised so afaik you still go ahead but face the consequences of a possible fine
As your children will be there are morning registration it's only 1/2 a day each so max £120 surely.
At my childrens school I'm pretty sure they do actually do work on the day before half term, I don't think they'd be watching videos in year 10 would they?
tywysogesgymraeg Sun 15-Sep-13 17:27:30
I think they should take the whole day off, as it won't be possible (or will be difficult) to get them out of school once they've got there in the morning.
Learn by your mistakes! Next time - don't ask, just call in sick (but don't tell DCs, as will set the wrong expectation).
BTW, I would never condone this at any other time other than the day before a holiday, when nothing ever happens in school anyway. From experience, they just watch DVDs in most lessons, on subjects loosely connected to the lesson they are in.
The rules now are that you will be fined. £60 per child per parent per day. So as long as you can absorb the £240 fine just go.
Don't lie.
Just inform the school that they will be taking unauthorised absence for part of the day.
lljkk Sun 15-Sep-13 16:04:33
It's a lot of paperwork to fine people, they are likely to only pursue repeat offenders. I would just go.
RiversideMum Sun 15-Sep-13 14:25:27
I'd just write back and say that you understand the school's position, but that you will be going anyway and they DCs won't be in school that day.
Whathaveiforgottentoday Sun 15-Sep-13 11:51:43
Go, school will have to mark it down as unauthorised but 1 half day in a year is not going to affect anything.
You may get fined if you're very unlucky but nothing else should happen.
Will you take the whole day off or make them go in for 2 periods? If they do go in the morning, what reason will you give for them leaving early? Keep it low key, just give them a note saying they are being picked up for family reasons. If questioned, they can tell the truth, most staff will be sympathetic especially if your twins have normally good attendance. Remember its not the school that has enforced this ruling. (not that i disagree with it in principle - just that a blanket rule makes life difficult for situations like this)
BoundandRebound Sun 15-Sep-13 07:43:08
Go, but take whole day off
They will have an unauthorised absence on attendance
If the rest of their attendance is fine nothing will happen
5madthings Thu 12-Sep-13 17:19:35
Just go, they aren't even missing the whole day, I would probably have signed them out early saying they had a medical appointment or something, but you can't do that now.
Our school has said our holiday will be marked as unauthorized but we won't be fined.
If their attendence is generally fine it shouldn't be a problem.
FeetUpUntilChristmas Thu 12-Sep-13 17:17:34
I'm not a fan of term time holidays especially for Secondary school pupils, however we are talking about 1 day (or part of a day) at the end of the term, which is in my mind acceptable.
I had to do his last year at Easter, mine only do a half day on the last day of term and the only flights I could get were on that day, I didn't ask the school for permission, I wrote to them and told them.
As you have already asked and been defined all I would do is to go on holiday and enjoy.
kizzie Thu 12-Sep-13 17:15:51
Ps we can't reschedule the flights otherwise we'd end up needing time off at the other end of the holidays. It's either a cancel completely or go situation.
kizzie Thu 12-Sep-13 17:11:26
Thanks for replies. Id feel very uncomfortable ringing in as ill after having it turned down as they'd 'know'. Such a good two shoes !!!
meditrina Thu 12-Sep-13 17:07:21
I think an "illness" on a day you have requested absence will be absolutely blatant to the school, and it's not fair for the DC to lie either.
If you are unwilling to reschedule flights, then just go. The absence will be marked as unauthorised, but if it's really just one day in an otherwise complete attendance record it's unlikely to go further. The worst that could happen would be a fine. But unless it's a lengthy absence or a whole series of short absences (like every Friday afternoon), it's pretty unlikely they'd do that.
ItsDecisionTime Thu 12-Sep-13 17:03:03
Phone up on the day and say the twins are ill. They can't fine you for that and won't even bother following it up. It is only one day and I wouldn't be saying it if it were for a week but one day, jeez.
kizzie Thu 12-Sep-13 16:59:01
DC twins have very good attendance records and they've never taken off time for holidays before but we have a special family trip planned for October half term and the only way we could get the flights to work was to go on the friday before half term.
There were only a few seats left so booked during summer hols. Put the absence request in first day back.
(Its actually not for full day - they would go in for first two lessons and then leave after first break. DC1 normally leaves at 1 on a friday anyway. DC2 has lessons till 3)
Anyway had a letter today to say no exceptions to rule in year 10 so not authorised.
Problem is that I dont actually know what this means blush (Ive led a sheltered 10 years !!! - theyve usually just turned up on the days they were meant to...)
So does it mean cancel the flights you cant go, a fine, prison, go ahead but we dont like it ???
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Adam Davidson | The Guardian Latest news and features from, the world's leading liberal voice en-gb Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. 2014 Thu, 25 Dec 2014 10:51:16 GMT 2014-12-25T10:51:16Z en-gb Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. 2014 The Guardian Adam Davidson: The banking crisis was caused by too much money It's a weird idea, but consider this: the roots of the financial crisis lie in the fact that there was simply too much money in the world<p>One of the strangest things about the <a href="">financial crisis</a> is that anyone ever believed it wouldn't happen. For years, we now know, banks were lending money to people who couldn't afford it so they could buy houses that should never have been built. The banks then turned the mortgages on those houses into <a href="">ever-more complex financial instruments</a> that are now nearly impossible to value. Then the banks sold all that bad debt all around the world and made sure they got into every nook and cranny of the global economy. <br /> <br />We're told that the US Congress and Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson are close to a deal: they <a href="">have a working plan</a> that will give the Treasury that $700bn budget of taxpayer money to buy up all of those assets, that seem, clearly to anybody, to make no sense whatsoever. It seems impossible but, yes, there was a time – not that long ago – when these weird assets seemed entirely sensible (at least to some), and it was trivially easy to place a clear value on them. <br /> <br />In these overheated Fall days, it's worth going back to that period, roughly 2003 to early 2007, when all this insanity actually seemed to make some sort of sense. The world economy was acting in very odd ways. For the last several centuries, for the most part, most of the wealth in the world stayed in Europe, then started moving to the United States. Then some started popping up in Japan and Australia. Most of the rest of the world had almost nothing. Then, in a blink, this skewed balance of wealth suddenly changed. China joined the world trading system, oil prices hurtled upwards. The result: as <a href="">we reported in this episode</a> of <a href="">This American Life</a> on <a href"http:="""">National Public Radio</a>, huge piles of money appeared in east Asia and a handful of oil-rich states, particularly in the Arab world and Russia. Suddenly, government bureaucrats and the instantly rich in these previously-poor emerging economies were looking for places to park their new-found money. <br /> <br />According to the IMF, in 2000 there were about $36tn in fixed-income investments. By 2007, that number had nearly doubled. There was twice as much money looking for investments, and there were not twice as many investments. That $70tn was looking for a home somewhere – anywhere on Earth – in which it stood a fair chance of finding a nice return. The problem was, hardly any market was growing fast enough to accommodate all that new money. Japan was stagnant; Europe was growing too slowly. The emerging economies that had received all this wealth from abroad simply didn't have many places to go. <br /> <br />There was one market, however, that seemed to be growing faster than any other: the <a href="">US sub-prime housing market</a>. <br /> <br />There is plenty of blame to go around, of course: out-of-date, slow-footed regulators, poor risk management at banks, a sometimes-compliant personal financial press pushing the idea of easy home ownership. We will spend the next few years assessing blame and punishing at least some of those responsible. But when you picture trillions of new dollars pouring into a market at a rate never before matched in history, it is a bit easier to understand how so many were able to convince themselves that everything was working just fine and why so few stopped to wonder: hey, does this make any sense?</p> <a href="">Continue reading...</a> Credit crunch US news US housing and sub-prime crisis Economics Business Banking Financial crisis Thu, 25 Sep 2008 20:03:18 GMT Piet Mall/Getty Well noted: $1 dollar bills Adam Davidson 2008-09-25T20:03:18Z | [] |
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Metoposcopy is a form of divination in which the diviner predicts personality, character, and destiny, based on the pattern of lines on the subject's forehead. It was developed by the 16th century astrologer and physician Jerome Cardan. The 16th century astrologer Giovanni Antonio Magini also concerned himself with this subject.
Metoposcopy is prominently featured in the Zohar.[1]
Criticism Metoposcopy is described as a form of divination, in which the expert obtains their information from other-worldly or supernatural sources. This alone makes it clear that the practice of Metoposcopy is not supported by science, but is pseudoscience. The regular combination of this practice with astrology and it’s comparisons to palm reading further establishes metoposcopy within the realm of pseudoscience. These techniques rely on methods that cannot be disproven and lack any scientific merit. With confirmation bias, a rare correct prediction is used as confirmation of their abilities. However, the numerous incorrect predictions are minimized through assertions that every prediction can’t be 100% accurate, or as an inability to tap into one’s gifts at that moment. This increases the believability of the expert and their predictions, since no-one is perfect. Also making it difficult, or impossible, to disconfirm or falsify these claims, as the only ‘evidence’ is confirmatory.
The idea that one can ascertain a person’s character and temperament as well as predict a person’s destiny simply by reading the lines on their forehead is incredible. Furthermore, the association of these wrinkles with astrological points is even more unbelievable. The lines and wrinkles on a person’s forehead are the result of a combination of genetics, diet, habits (i.e. sun exposure), past experiences and overall lifestyle (i.e. stress level). These factors change over a person’s lifetime as does an individual’s appearance. Taking all these aspects into account, an individual’s predicted personality and future would be in a state of constant change. Predictions made at one point in time would no longer be valid after any significant period of time had passed.
Metoposcopy’s lack of reliability, falsifiability and testable proof draws attention to the need for scientific value. In addition, as with other pseudoscientific practices, the lack of scientific methodology forces the individual to trust in the expert’s divine gifts, in lieu of actual evidence.
1. ^ Matt, Daniel, "Zohar, Vol.4"
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This is the first of a series of three questions about morality:
There are sets of moral standards within any given society. What one society deems as acceptable may be deemed as abhorrent in another. This concept lends itself to the idea that some aspects of morality are learnt and not innate within an individual.
Which morals are universal across the species?
The second question: What is the psychology of morality?
The third question: How is individual morality linked to psychological profiling?
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3 Answers
up vote 6 down vote accepted
This is a partial answer to your question.
According to "Only Humans Have Morality, Not Animals", (Guldberg, 2011), claims that morality is something unique to humans. Basically the author concludes with:
A key argument made in the article is that there is a great difference between instinctual connections and actions and human empathy and morality.
Further, according to the article "Is Morality Innate?" (Prinz), proposes that:
Morality is a byproduct—accidental or invented—of faculties that evolved for other purposes.
and proposes a somewhat negative, yet true conclusion:
Nonhuman animals are often violent, but their potential for bad behavior may be lower than ours. Because we can reason, there is a great risk that human beings will recognize countless opportunities to take advantage of our fellows.
Essentially, it seems that perhaps morality is unique to humans owing to our abilities to reflect, reason as well as react.
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There is a famous Ted talk on the topic of fairness, by Frans de Waal. It does not really address the question of whether the moral of fairness is universal across all species, but makes a very interesting case that fairness might be "universal" across primates at least:
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I can think of a view.
1. Love toward ones' offspring. That's pretty universal.
2. Not harming others, especially those that can hit back. Lions don't attack stronger lions. Weaker chimps obey stronger chimps. Peasants obey their tyrants while both self deceive themselves that it's for some higher purposes. Basically both sides realize that mutually assured destruction sucks that both choose the higher road.
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Disclaimer: I own nothing.
Truth and Lies
People know I have secrets; I wouldn't be human if I didn't. The number of secrets I have, and the intensity with which I keep them buried, is perhaps not quite as clear, but still. It is known that I have secrets.
Here are some of the secrets I've never even dared whisper aloud to an empty room; I fear death. I fear growing old alone. I fear hurting the people I love the most. I fear a lot of things. People think of me as brave, or – perhaps more accurately – reckless, due to the amount of times I put myself in danger, take unnecessary risks, do stupid things that result in me having guns and knives waved in my face on an increasingly regular basis. But people don't know about my fears. I'm scared to let my daughter grow up, because I know soon my little girl will be gone forever. I'm scared to tell the woman I love how I feel. I'm scared to let people see me for who I really am.
People don't know that I sometimes jump when I see shadows on the wall; that when I wake to the sound of water clanging in the pipes I often think, for a few moments, that it is actually the sound of my mother downstairs, chopping vegetables; that my obsession with the truth derives from my inability to embrace it myself.
Being a master of liars makes you a master of lies.
I seek answers to unwritten questions, tell people what they want to know before they even know they want to know it, look for reason where there is none, invade people's privacy without invitation, and, more than anything, try to peel back the layers of every lie I see, until all that remains is the hard, bitter truth.
It can provide a lot of things; justice, power, hope, condolence, satisfaction. A lot of the time, more pain than comfort. One thing truth can never do, however, is undo the past. This is a hard lesson to learn.
Perhaps the hardest lesson to learn, though, is that when you look in the mirror, the person staring back at you is the only person you can't escape. And when it's just you and your reflection, labels don't seem to matter. Ex-husband. Father. Boss. Lie-detector. The definitions of your life dissipate, and all that is left is the things you know about yourself, and the secrets you try to keep.
I spend my life exposing lies so I don't have to admit the barest truth of all; that my entire life has become one. | [] |
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The std::basic_string class template has member functions find_first_of and find_first_not_of.
The <algorithm> header, however, contains only a generic find_first_of.
Question1: Is the absence of
std::find_first_not_of(Iter1 first1, Iter1 last1, Iter2 first2, Iter2 last2)
just an oversight (as for example copy_if) or is it intentionally omitted because the behavior can be achieved with another standard function?
Of course I could write my own find_first_not_of, but
Question2: Is there a ready workaround somewhere in <algorithm>? For example, the absence of copy_if is compensated by the presence of remove_copy_if
Thanks in advance
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You know better than to write "thanks", Armen! – Lightness Races in Orbit Jul 27 '11 at 14:25
@Tomalak: Why does it bother you so much? It's not as if my thanks takes up 50% of my question] – Armen Tsirunyan Jul 27 '11 at 14:26
Oh, don't you start. – Lightness Races in Orbit Jul 27 '11 at 14:26
@Tomalak: I've seen your post in meta. I'm not going to roll it back, since you'll call a moderator, but still I am wondering why that bothers you so much :P – Armen Tsirunyan Jul 27 '11 at 14:28
I have never thought about it, but this answer clarifies a few things: meta.stackoverflow.com/questions/98149/… – karlphillip Jul 27 '11 at 19:14
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4 Answers
I had this same problem, the short answer to your question: it's not possible with the standard stl libraries (although it is possible with boost::phoenix).
However, you can write your own closure surrounding the sequence iterators that accepts a parameterized 'Value' variable and returns a bool result.
template<class Iterator> struct is_not_in_range
Iterator const begin;
Iterator const end;
is_not_in_range(Iterator const& b, Iterator const& e)
: begin(b)
, end(e) {}
template<class Value> bool operator()(Value & v)
return std::find(begin,end,v) == end;
Then you can do this
std::find_if(begin1, end1, is_not_in_range<Iterator2>(begin2,end2));
Alternatively, you can write a version that uses less branching, but requires a break->continue (approximated with a goto statement)
template<class Iterator1, class Iterator2> Iterator1 find_first_not_of
( Iterator1 const& begin1
, Iterator1 const& end1
, Iterator2 const& begin2
, Iterator2 const& end2 )
for(Iterator1 mid1 = begin1; mid1 != end1; ++mid1)
for(Iterator2 mid2 = begin2; mid2 != end2; ++mid2)
if(*mid1 == *mid2)
goto FOUND;
return mid1;
FOUND: ;
return end1;
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It's easy to write one:
pos = std::find(search_list.begin()...)
if (pos!= npos)
pos = std::find(black_list.begin()...)
if (pos!= npos)
continue search
found !!
not found
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I know it's easy to write one, thank you. But my question is a bit different :) – Armen Tsirunyan Jul 27 '11 at 14:21
well ... it is simulated using 2 std:find calls :) Maybe can be simulated by using other calls but will be something similar. – cprogrammer Jul 27 '11 at 14:27
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I'm not sure about your first question but I think the best you can do is find_if:
template <class Iter>
class Check
Check(Iter first, Iter last) : first_(first), last_(last) { }
template <class T>
bool operator()(const T& item) { return std::find(first, last, item) == last; }
Iter first_;
Iter last_;
find_if(first1, last1, Check<Iter2>(first2, last2));
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I think I would write my own find_first_not_of with less characters than this. :) – Armen Tsirunyan Jul 27 '11 at 13:59
@Armen: Fewer :) – Lightness Races in Orbit Jul 27 '11 at 14:24
@Tomalak: It's a pity you cannot edit others' comments, isn't it? :))) – Armen Tsirunyan Jul 27 '11 at 14:25
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There are new functions added in latest STL (Jump to).
all_of, any_of, none_of, find_if_not, copy_if etc.
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find_if_not and find_first_not_of are completely different – Armen Tsirunyan Jul 27 '11 at 13:26
My reply should be considered as work around! :) – Ajay Jul 27 '11 at 13:28
How would you use find_if_not to achieve what find_first_not_of is supposed to be for? And also, that is all about C++0x, what about doing it in C++03? – Armen Tsirunyan Jul 27 '11 at 13:29
@Ajay: Armen Tsirunyan considered it as a workaround and found yours flawed (reason indicated by his comment). – nightcracker Jul 27 '11 at 13:29
@Armen: OK, then new functions in TR1 are no help even if they did the job. And I think there's a semi-colon missing in my code, should be });});! – Steve Jessop Jul 27 '11 at 13:33
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Slam DanceSynopsis
In this off-beat and stylish mystery by director Wayne Wang, C.C. Drood (Tom Hulce) is an underground cartoonist who is separated from his wife Helen (Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio) and daughter Bean (Judith Barsi). When his lover Yolanda (Virginia Madsen) is found murdered, Drood is the main focus of the police investigation. When Drood uncovers a sex scandal involving police chief Gilbert (John Doe) and Detective Smiley (Harry Dean Stanton), he realizes he is being made the fall guy for the crime. Singer Adam Ant plays Drood's buddy Jim. ~ Dan Pavlides, Rovi
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How to interpret your dog's barking
Last updated 05:00 13/01/2013
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WOOF JUSTICE: Devonport vet and barking expert Elsa Flint with 13-year-old River.
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How much barking is too much barking?
In an effort to determine what is normal woofing, an Auckland animal behaviourist has bugged the houses of 60 dogs and recorded how much they barked when their owners were out.
Maggie, Brodie, Rastus and Jezebel (breeds unknown) were the kind of dogs anyone would like to have next door, barking infrequently and not for very long.
Emily, Jasper, Scarr and Jock were not so good neighbours though: Emily barked more than 20 times in a week for about three minutes each time; on one occasion Jasper barked for about 15 minutes straight.
The study's author, Dr Elsa Flint, said the average amount of barking for a home-alone dog over an eight-hour period was 4.3 times, with an average of about 30 seconds per bout.
The study participants came from two Auckland vet practices, on the North Shore and in Howick.
All were aged one to 14 and were ordinary, well-cared-for dogs, exercised off-property for at least 30 minutes per day, and living in suburban houses with gardens.
Sixty dogs began the study but only 40 returned data as tape recorders were lost or damaged or owners withdrew from the study.
The noisiest dogs were female and younger.
The question, though, is why do this research?
Flint, in her work as a behaviourist, has seen complaints about barking dogs increase over the years as population density increased. Auckland Council alone fielded 8876 complaints in the 2011-2012 financial year.
But it wasn't always the dog that was at fault, Flint said. "In a lot of cases there was some bad feeling between neighbours and they were using the dog to get back at each other."
Councils were in a difficult position because they didn't have a benchmark for inordinate barking.
The other worrying factor was that concerned owners often turned to electric collars that shocked the dog when it barked, Flint said. "That really upsets me. The dog doesn't know what's happening. I've seen results where the dogs are terrified to move. They just go into shut-down mode."
Flint said in one extreme case owners came home to find their dog hiding under a bed in a pool of its own excrement, fearful of moving because it wasn't sure what was causing the shocks.
Flint said she could hear whether barking was territorial guarding or separation anxiety and most of the dogs she recorded were territorial guarding.
Problem barking required an evaluation of the many factors that could be creating the behaviour, she said.
In one case, she filmed two dogs in a backyard and the problem was that the older dog was going into their joint kennel and preventing the younger one from getting in. A second kennel solved the problem.
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In Our Nature, with Nicola Toki
The cost of losing nature | [] |
The Blog
Fuzzy Deficit Math
Budget wonk Keith Hennessey to the rescue!
10:34 AM, Jul 8, 2011 • By MATTHEW CONTINETTI
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Quick, go and read super-wonk Keith Hennessey's dissection of the fuzzy math surrounding a possible budget deal. The numbers being tossed off are staggering: $4 trillion in savings over 10 (or is it 12?) years, $2 trillion over 10 years, etc. But what are these "savings" being measured against? Hennessey writes:
Neat trick! But also one that's totally unserious about reforming America's spending habits before it's too late. "The best way to evaluate the deficit impact of a budget deal, if one occurs," Hennessey goes on, "is to look at the budget deficits that would result over the next decade, measured as a share of the economy." How will that number compare to the historical deficit-to-GDP average of 2 percent? Will the number hold the debt-to-GDP constant? And will future deficits as a percentage of GDP decline or increase in the future?
Republican lawmakers, please read Hennessey—and also protect defense—before agreeing to any deal. Because right now it seems as though the White House is doing its best to pull the wool over our eyes.
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How can I find the OS's architecture using Dart on the server side?
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1 Answer
up vote 2 down vote accepted
You can use the Platform class:
import 'dart:io';
main() {
If the Platform class is not enough, you could also create a new process and execute some command to see if it returns something meaningful (like execute ps to retrieve processes, etc.).
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Stephen Jones: my Saturday job
The hat maker extraordinaire describes how a seasonal postal job led him to deliver a Christmas package with a difference
Hat maker Stephen Jones learned of the value of supportive workmates as a postie
I was a temporary postman for a few Christmases while growing up in Maidenhead, Berkshire. The regular postman used to have two or three people to help cover his normal round and he would sort the post into piles for us to deliver. Most of the houses had names rather than numbers and so you needed to know the district. Off I'd go on my old bicycle with a basket on the front, filled with piles of letters to post.
My main recollection is of delivering a letter bomb, but accidentally delivering it to the wrong address. T his was in the early 1970s when there was lots going on with the IRA. It had sent out 50 or 60 letter bombs to various people; some of them were primed and some weren't. They were all in A3 envelopes with "The Fisherman's Calendar" printed on the outside. How I remember this when I can't remember my own phone number, I'll never know.
There were two houses next to each other, Weir House and Weir Cottage. But the postman had put the envelope in the wrong pile, so I delivered it to the house instead of the cottage. There was this old boy who lived there. He'd been reading about the letter bombs in his Daily Telegraph, then his wife had brought in the post and on top was one of these calendars.
The first I knew about it was when I was cycling back to the sorting office and suddenly it was like a movie scene with police cars everywhere. I'll never know if the envelope did have explosives in it, but I recall having to fold it in half to get it through the letterbox.
I had to miss a bit of work because of it all but the postal workers' union was very kind and allocated me an extra four days' work. And I learned about the value of supportive workmates, they were great at the sorting office, asking me if I was OK. I really valued the camaraderie there.
Stephen Jones's Drifting and Dreaming collection will be showcased in the Royal Ascot daily fashion show on 14-18 June.
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Dr. David P. McFadden for President
I am running for President and my platform is EMPLOYMENT AND THE ECONOMY.
My first day as President, I will meet with the Secretary of the Department of Transportation and the Secretary of the Department of Energy. We will initiate implementation of the following system that will break our oil addiction, create many jobs and improve our economy.
I believe it is time for us to break our addiction to oil. We should keep the money we have been sending abroad for foreign oil within the US to support jobs and our economy.
Let’s acknowledge that battery electric vehicles (BEVs) will not be a major mode of transportation due to capacity problems and recharge time.
I propose an electric rail system where two parallel electric rails are embedded only in limited access expressway lanes, flush with the road surface so they do not interfere with traditional traffic. BEVs would have two electricity pick-up devices that contact the rails and an automatic steering control system with sensors to maintain the electricity pick-up devices in contact with the electric rails.
These vehicles would OPERATE AND CHARGE SIMULTANEOUSLY while on limited access expressways, extending their range tremendously. These BEVs could also have an optional small petroleum generator to extend their range further than their batteries’ capacity when not traveling on limited access expressways.
Rails would only be on limited access expressways, resulting in less human proximity to electric rails compared to a typical electric train station. Electric rails would be separated by 4-5 ft, further minimizing risk to humans and animals. In addition, this system would be designed with circuit breakers on short segments to facilitate stopping the current in case of an accident or other situation to minimize human risk. Of course these BEVs would continue to operate on battery power through expressway segments without rail current, just as they would operate when they are not on limited access expressways.
Electricity production for this system could be primarily from renewable sources, such as solar, wind, etc. This would substantially increase employment for renewable energy companies, manufacturers, installers and for maintenance.
By converting much of our automobile and truck energy use from oil to renewable electric sources, this will decrease the demand and price for oil, resulting in positive impacts throughout our economy. The decrease in vehicle emissions will have a positive impact on our air quality.
We can either continue sending billions of dollars abroad to maintain our oil addiction, or we can develop a system that will keep this money in the US, supporting employment and our economy, improve the quality of our air, save lives due to fewer accidents with the automatic steering control on limited access expressways, and make driving long distances much easier.
David P. McFadden Ph.D, D.A.B.T.
Springboro, Ohio
Video of the System Described Above
A short video of this system described is below.
YouTube Video
You can also find this video at the following link:
This video can also be located on You Tube by simply searching davidpmcfadden on You Tube.
If I have any spare time as President, I do NOT play golf.
I will spend any free time personally reviewing visa applications from leaders of OPEC nations trying to visit the US to increase their oil sales. | [] |
Psychology Wiki
Knowledge acquisition
34,114pages on
this wiki
See also knowledge based system
Knowledge acquisition is a method of learning, first proposed by Aristotle in his seminal work "Organon". Aristotle proposed that the mind at birth is a blank slate, or tabula rasa. As a blank slate it contains no knowledge of the objective, empirical universe, nor of itself.
("Knowing subject" is often the description of a mind with acquired knowledge; but while no such page exits per se on Wikipedia, the use of the phrase[1] is found throughout Wikipedia, and in the writings of David Hume, Karl Popper, and many others. [See also subject-object problem]. Therefore, a human mind cannot be a "knowing subject" until it has "acquired knowledge". "Acquired" in this sense can be either an adjective, as in "that which has been acquired"; or a verb, as in the act of acquisition.)
As a method, it is opposed to the concept of "a priori" knowledge, and to "intutition" when conceived as religious revelation.
It has been suggested[2][3]that the mind is "hard wired" to begin operating at birth, beginning a lifetime process of acquisition through abstraction, induction, and conception.
The acquisition of empirical knowledge, which begins the process of filling the tabula rasa, is thus by means of the experience of sensation and perception. Though sensation and perception are described elsewhere in Wikipedia as parts of "psychology, and not [of] anatomy or physiology," they belong to cognitive science. [See also cognitive revolution and philosophy of perception.]
The "five senses" referred to by the word sensation [see sense] are metaphorically the interface between empirical (sensate) reality and the consciousness of the knowing subject. A knowing subject for the purpose of this discussion of knowledge acquisition may be defined as any conscious creature capable of deriving direct and immediate sensate data from its environment.
Sensate data, or sensation, are distinct from perception. Perception is the recognition within the knowing subject of the event of having had a sensation. The tabula rasa and must learn the nature of sensation as the awareness of something which is outside itself. Commonly recognized sensory systems are those for vision, hearing, somatic sensation (touch), taste and olfaction (smell). [See sensory system]
Perception is the retention of a group of sensations transmitted through the sensory system(s), which gives the knowing subject the ability to be aware, not only of the singularity of stimuli presented by sensation itself, but of an entity, a thing, an existent. [1]
Retention of percepts allows the human mind to abstract information from the percepts. The abstraction is considered the extensional definition of the percept. An extension is "every object that falls under the definition of the concept or term in question." [2] This is the same as a universal (metaphysics) or genus or denotation, or class (philosophy).
Once a universal (class) has been identified, then the next step in the acquisition of knowledge is the abstraction of the intension, which is the particular, the species, or the connotation. Connotation as its meaning as particular is "the assertion that at least one member of one class of things is either included or excluded as a member of some other class." [3] This means, for example, that a poodle is the particular in a class or universal concept called "dog" or "canine".
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I am trying to figure out a way to query a property feature lookup table.
I have a property table that contains rental property information (address, rent, deposit, # of bedrooms, etc.) along with another table (Property_Feature) that represents the features of this property (pool, air conditioning, laundry on-site, etc.). The features themselves are defined in yet another table labeled Feature.
pid - primary key
other property details
fid - primary key
id - primary key
pid - foreign key (Property)
fid - foreign key (Feature)
Let say someone wants to search for property that has air conditioning, and a pool and laundry on-site. How do you query the Property_Feature table for multiple features for the same property if each row only represents one feature? What would the SQL query look like? Is this possible? Is there a better solution?
Thanks for the help and insight.
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You can actually drop the "id" column on Property_Feature table and make pid and fid a combined primary key. – Mats Fredriksson Jun 18 '09 at 16:32
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3 Answers
up vote 1 down vote accepted
In terms of database design, yours is the right way to do it. It's correctly normalized.
For the query, I would simply use exists, like this:
select * from Property
exists (select * from Property_Feature where pid = property.pid and fid = 'key_air_conditioning')
exists (select * from Property_Feature where pid = property.pid and fid = 'key_pool')
Where key_air_conditioning and key_pool are obviously the keys for those features.
The performance will be OK even for large databases.
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This is fairly unfriendly, isn't it? Are you expecting him to memorize keys? Why not use joins so you can just name the feature instead of trying to remember what could potentially be an identity column? – Eric Jun 18 '09 at 16:30
Eric, because he's doing it in the context of a program obviously, and the key is probably near hand. I prefer the EXISTS because are cleaner and easier to build, specially if the number of conditions is variable. – tekBlues Jun 18 '09 at 16:32
Joins do tend to get a bit messy with variable numbers of conditions...I'll have to think about how to do that cleaner...and as a challenge, I want to do it a bit differently than you have :) – Eric Jun 18 '09 at 16:45
Thanks for the help. I was stumped. – stillLearning Jun 18 '09 at 19:17
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Here's the query that will find all the properties with a pool:
property p
inner join property_feature pf on
p.pid = pf.pid
inner join feature f on
pf.fid = f.fid
f.name = 'Pool'
I use inner joins instead of EXISTS since it tends to be a bit faster.
share|improve this answer
Thanks Eric I completely overlooked the EXISTS keyword. – stillLearning Jun 18 '09 at 19:18
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You can also do something like this:
FROM Property p
WHERE 3 =
( SELECT COUNT(*)
FROM Property_Feature pf
, Feature f
WHERE pf.pid = p.pid
AND pf.fid = f.fid
AND f.name in ('air conditioning', 'pool', 'laundry on-site')
Obviously, if your front end is capturing the fids of the feature items when the user is selecting them, you can dispense with the join to Feature and constrain directly on fid. Your front end would know what the count of features selected was, so determining the value for "3" above is trivial.
Compare it, performance wise, to the tekBlues construction above; depending on your data distribution, either one of these might be the faster query.
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I appreciate the feedback. All of these solutions I will try. – stillLearning Jun 18 '09 at 19:18
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Is it possible to replace newlines with the <br> tag, but to ignore newlines that follow a </h1> tag?
So for example I want to change this block:
<h1>Test</h1> \n some test here \n and here
To this:
<h1>Test</h1> some test here <br /> and here
share|improve this question
Why would you have that kind of code at the first place? It just seems that your orginal situation itself is a problematic. – newbie Mar 5 '10 at 22:17
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2 Answers
up vote 1 down vote accepted
$subject = "<h1>hithere</h1>\nbut this other\nnewline should be replaced.";
$new = preg_replace("/(?<!h1\>)\n/","<br/>",$subject);
echo $new;
// results in:
// <h1>hithere</h1>
// but this other<br/>newline should be replaced.
Should work. This says \n not preceeded immediately by h1>
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Using string functions instead of regular expressions, and assuming the </h1> tag can be anywhere on the line (instead of just before the newline):
foreach ($lines as $line) {
if (stristr("$line", "</h1>") == FALSE) {
$line = str_replace("\n", "<br />", $line);
echo $line;
which, for your example, results in:
some test here <br />and here<br />
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Take the 2-minute tour ×
Possible Duplicate:
python .rstrip removes one additional character
What is the problem here? it seems that rstrip removes more than necessary in the one to the last line of code.
s = 'LedArray.py'
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marked as duplicate by SimonJ, 一二三, Constantinius, zoul, Cat Plus Plus Jan 5 '12 at 11:15
2 Answers
up vote 0 down vote accepted
rstrip takes "characters to remove", not "exact substring to remove" argument. .py and y.py are equivalent as sets. In fact, you could do y.p and it'd still remove the same characters.
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Notice that the second argument to rstrip() is a set of characters, not a sequence. The characters to be removed do not need to occur in the order given.
This also means that rstrip('y.py') is exactly the same as rstrip('.py'), a character can't be in the set twice.
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Adversity breeds strength -- and perhaps human intelligence
I. Life on the Chaotic Savanna
Tanzania Gorge
II. Adversity Breeds Evolved Intelligence
human intelligence
[Image Source: Pace J. Miller]
Sources: PNAS [1], [2]
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RE: more propaganda
By heerohawwah on 12/28/2012 2:56:43 PM , Rating: 0
You should really seek help for your personal issues, whatever rage and hate you have it has nothing to do with me. You are simply a religious racist who doesn't think for himself and only wants to re-enforce his own hatred. Which is actually quite normal, most evolutionists don't believe in evolution for any scientific reason, they believe because they want to justify their hatred of other people and other beliefs. Racism and Evolution are practically the same, history shows this clear as day, even Darwin himself wrote that black people weren't human, he said the same about Asian people and everyone who wasn't white. His science was only skin deep, based on observation only, and what observations he made he manipulated to fit his prejudices. (a technique he probably learned from all the religious bigots he came across while at seminary, Darwin's primary education was theological, and his methods of manipulating science closely mirror those used by corrupt theologians and their selfish ambitions... his own wife never believed in his idea, I'm guessing she knew him too well and that he had become everything he hated about other religions) Evolutionary science today hasn't really changed, still only superficial and discriminative. The fact that no one has given me a single answer proves that well enough. You want to get to the truth behind evolution, you simply have to ask simple questions like, How do you know how old that fossil is? How did you confirm that? Can you show me those test results? You'll find quite quickly that not only can no one answer your question, people actually bubble up and explode at you for even asking...
So you go on harboring your rage and hate, the rest of us who deal with our emotional issues in a healthy way and think for ourselves will get along just fine. But if you do want to be a better person and learn a bit, I'd suggest you get a few books about the history of evolution and racism behind it.
RE: more propaganda
RE: more propaganda
It was a very interesting show.
RE: more propaganda
RE: more propaganda
RE: more propaganda
Tsoukalos hair really makes you think LOL
RE: more propaganda
No shit! That is one crazy lookin dude! :D
RE: more propaganda
RE: more propaganda
"Some of its a bit crazy"
Yeah like that one guys hair! LOL
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What is a FAQ Bounty?
A FAQ Bounty is essentially a contest in which a gift certificate will be awarded to the first person who contributes a full guide for one of the listed games on the FAQ Bounty page. Games are added to the bounty list all the time, but bear in mind that bounties eventually expire if nobody has claimed it in time.
How do I claim a FAQ Bounty?
Once you have written, submitted, and had posted a complete guide for a bounty game (complete guides are marked with a full blue dot instead of an open or half-filled one), you can then visit the Enter Contribution Contest form. You will only be able to enter contests you have met the requirements for. | [] |
Research Article
Bayesian Computation Emerges in Generic Cortical Microcircuits through Spike-Timing-Dependent Plasticity
• Bernhard Nessler mail,
Affiliation: Institute for Theoretical Computer Science, Graz University of Technology, Graz, Austria
• Michael Pfeiffer,
Affiliations: Institute for Theoretical Computer Science, Graz University of Technology, Graz, Austria, Institute of Neuroinformatics, University of Zürich and ETH Zürich, Zürich, Switzerland
• Lars Buesing,
• Wolfgang Maass
• Published: April 25, 2013
• DOI: 10.1371/journal.pcbi.1003037
The principles by which networks of neurons compute, and how spike-timing dependent plasticity (STDP) of synaptic weights generates and maintains their computational function, are unknown. Preceding work has shown that soft winner-take-all (WTA) circuits, where pyramidal neurons inhibit each other via interneurons, are a common motif of cortical microcircuits. We show through theoretical analysis and computer simulations that Bayesian computation is induced in these network motifs through STDP in combination with activity-dependent changes in the excitability of neurons. The fundamental components of this emergent Bayesian computation are priors that result from adaptation of neuronal excitability and implicit generative models for hidden causes that are created in the synaptic weights through STDP. In fact, a surprising result is that STDP is able to approximate a powerful principle for fitting such implicit generative models to high-dimensional spike inputs: Expectation Maximization. Our results suggest that the experimentally observed spontaneous activity and trial-to-trial variability of cortical neurons are essential features of their information processing capability, since their functional role is to represent probability distributions rather than static neural codes. Furthermore it suggests networks of Bayesian computation modules as a new model for distributed information processing in the cortex.
Author Summary
How do neurons learn to extract information from their inputs, and perform meaningful computations? Neurons receive inputs as continuous streams of action potentials or “spikes” that arrive at thousands of synapses. The strength of these synapses - the synaptic weight - undergoes constant modification. It has been demonstrated in numerous experiments that this modification depends on the temporal order of spikes in the pre- and postsynaptic neuron, a rule known as STDP, but it has remained unclear, how this contributes to higher level functions in neural network architectures. In this paper we show that STDP induces in a commonly found connectivity motif in the cortex - a winner-take-all (WTA) network - autonomous, self-organized learning of probabilistic models of the input. The resulting function of the neural circuit is Bayesian computation on the input spike trains. Such unsupervised learning has previously been studied extensively on an abstract, algorithmical level. We show that STDP approximates one of the most powerful learning methods in machine learning, Expectation-Maximization (EM). In a series of computer simulations we demonstrate that this enables STDP in WTA circuits to solve complex learning tasks, reaching a performance level that surpasses previous uses of spiking neural networks.
Numerous experimental data show that the brain applies principles of Bayesian inference for analyzing sensory stimuli, for reasoning and for producing adequate motor outputs 15. Bayesian inference has been suggested as a mechanism for the important task of probabilistic perception [6], in which hidden causes (e.g. the categories of objects) that explain noisy and potentially ambiguous sensory inputs have to be inferred. This process requires the combination of prior beliefs about the availability of causes in the environment, and probabilistic generative models of likely sensory observations that result from any given cause. By Bayes Theorem, the result of the inference process yields a posterior probability distribution over hidden causes that is computed by multiplying the prior probability with the likelihood of the sensory evidence for all possible causes. In this article we refer to the computation of posterior probabilities through a combination of probabilistic prior and likelihood models as Bayesian computation. It has previously been shown that priors and models that encode likelihoods of external stimuli for a given cause can be represented in the parameters of neural network models [6], [7]. However, in spite of the existing evidence that Bayesian computation is a primary information processing step in the brain, it has remained open how networks of neurons can acquire these priors and likelihood models, and how they combine them to arrive at posterior distributions of hidden causes.
The fundamental computational units of the brain, neurons and synapses, are well characterized. The synaptic connections are subject to various forms of plasticity, and recent experimental results have emphasized the role of STDP, which constantly modifies synaptic strengths (weights) in dependence of the difference between the firing times of the pre- and postsynaptic neurons (see [8], [9] for reviews). Functional consequences of STDP can resemble those of rate-based Hebbian models [10], but may also lead to the emergence of temporal coding [11] and rate-normalization [12], [13]. In addition, the excitability of neurons is modified through their firing activity [14]. Some hints about the organization of local computations in stereotypical columns or so-called cortical microcircuits [15] arises from data about the anatomical structure of these hypothesized basis computational modules of the brain. In particular, it has been observed that local ensembles of pyramidal neurons on layers 2/3 and layers 5/6 typically inhibit each other, via indirect synaptic connections involving inhibitory neurons [16]. These ubiquitous network motifs were called soft winner-take-all (WTA) circuits, and have been suggested as neural network models for implementing functions like non-linear selection [16], [17], normalization [18], selective attention [19], decision making [20], [21], or as primitives for general purpose computation [22], [23].
A comprehensive theory that explains the emergence of computational function in WTA networks of spiking neurons through STDP has so far been lacking. We show in this article that STDP and adaptations of neural excitability are likely to provide the fundamental components of Bayesian computation in soft WTA circuits, yielding representations of posterior distributions for hidden causes of high-dimensional spike inputs through the firing probabilities of pyramidal neurons. This is shown in detail for a simple, but very relevant feed-forward model of Bayesian inference, in which the distribution for a single hidden cause is inferred from the afferent spike trains. Our new theory thus describes how modules of soft WTA circuits can acquire and perform Bayesian computations to solve one of the fundamental tasks in perception, namely approximately inferring the category of an object from feed-forward input. Neural network models that can handle Bayesian inference in general graphical models, including bi-directional inference over arbitrary sets of random variables, explaining away effects, different statistical dependency models, or inference over time require more complex network architectures [24], [25], and are the topic of ongoing research. Such networks can be composed out of interconnected soft WTA circuits, which has been shown to be a powerful principle for designing neural networks that can solve arbitrary deterministic or stochastic computations [22], [23], [25]. Our theory can thus be seen as a first step towards learning the desired functionality of individual modules.
At the heart of this link between Bayesian computation and network motifs of cortical microcircuits lies a new theoretical insight on the micro-scale: If the STDP-induced changes in synaptic strength depend in a particular way on the current synaptic strength, STDP approximates for each synapse exponentially fast the conditional probability that the presynaptic neuron has fired just before the postsynaptic neuron (given that the postsynaptic neuron fires). This principle suggests that synaptic weights can be understood as conditional probabilities, and the ensemble of all weights of a neuron as a generative model for high-dimensional inputs that - after learning - causes it to fire with a probability that depends on how well its current input agrees with this generative model. The concept of a generative model is well known in theoretical neuroscience [26], [27], but it has so far primarily been applied in the context of an abstract non-spiking neural circuit architecture. In the Bayesian computations that we consider in this article, internal generative models are represented implicitly through the learned values of bottom-up weights in spiking soft-WTA circuits, and inference is carried out by neurons that integrate such synaptic inputs and compete for firing in a WTA circuit. In contrast to previous rate-based models for probabilistic inference [28][30] every spike in our model has a clear semantic interpretation: one spike indicates the instantaneous assignment of a certain value to an abstract variable represented by the firing neuron. In a Bayesian inference context, every input spike provides evidence for an observed variable, whereas every output spike represents one stochastic sample from the posterior distribution over hidden causes encoded in the circuit.
We show that STDP is able to approximate the arguably most powerful known learning principle for creating these implicit generative models in the synaptic weights: Expectation Maximization (EM). The fact that STDP approximates EM is remarkable, since it is known from machine learning that EM can solve a fundamental chicken-and-egg problem of unsupervised learning systems [31]: To detect - without a teacher - hidden causes for complex input data, and to induce separate learning agents to specialize each on one of the hidden causes. The problem is that as long as the hidden causes are unknown to the learning system, it cannot tell the hidden units what to specialize on. EM is an iterative process, where initial guesses of hidden causes are applied to the current input (-step) and successively improved (-step), until a local maximum in the log-likelihood of the input data is reached. In fact, the basic idea of EM is so widely applicable and powerful that most state-of-the art machine learning approaches for discovering salient patterns or structures in real-world data without a human supervisor rely on some form of EM [32]. We show that in our spiking soft-WTA circuit each output spike can be viewed as an application of the -step of EM. The subsequent modification of the synaptic weights between the presynaptic input neurons and the very neuron that has fired the postsynaptic spike according to STDP can be viewed as a move in the direction of the -step of a stochastic online EM procedure. This procedure strives to create optimal internal models for high-dimensional spike inputs by maximizing their -likelihood. We refer to this interpretation of the functional role of STDP in the context of spiking WTA circuits as spike-based Expectation Maximization (SEM).
This analysis gives rise to a new perspective of the computational role of local WTA circuits as parts of cortical microcircuits, and the role of STDP in such circuits: The fundamental computational operations of Bayesian computation (Bayes Theorem) for the inference of hidden causes from bottom-up input emerge in these local circuits through plasticity. The pyramidal neurons in the WTA circuit encode in their spikes samples from a posterior distribution over hidden causes for high-dimensional spike inputs. Inhibition in the WTA accounts for normalization [18], and in addition controls the rate at which samples are generated. The necessary multiplication of likelihoods (given by implicit generative models that are learned and encoded in their synaptic weights) with simultaneously learned priors for hidden causes (in our model encoded in the neuronal excitability), does not require any extra computational machinery. Instead, it is automatically carried out (on the scale) through linear features of standard neuron models. We demonstrate the emergent computational capability of these self-organizing modules for Bayesian computation through computer simulations. In fact, it turns out that a resulting configuration of networks of spiking neurons can solve demanding computational tasks, such as the discovery of prototypes for handwritten digits without any supervision. We also show that these emergent Bayesian computation modules are able to discover, and communicate through a sparse output spike code, repeating spatio-temporal patterns of input spikes. Since such self-adaptive computing and discrimination capability on high-dimensional spatio-temporal spike patterns is not only essential for early sensory processing, but could represent a generic information processing step also in higher cortical areas, our analysis suggests to consider networks of self-organizing modules for spike-based Bayesian computation as a new model for distributed real-time information processing in the brain.
Preliminary ideas for a spike-based implementation of EM were already presented in the extended abstract [20], where we analyzed the relationship of a simple STDP rule to a Hebbian learning rule, and sketched a proof for stochastic online EM. In the present work we provide a rigorous mathematical analysis of the learning procedure, a proof of convergence, expand the framework towards learning spatio-temporal spike patterns, and discuss in detail the relationship of our STDP rule to experimental results, as well as the interpretation of spikes as samples from instantaneous posterior probability distributions in the context of EM.
In this section we define a simple model circuit and show that every spiking event of the circuit can be described as one independent sample of a discrete probability distribution, which itself evolves over time in response to the spiking input. Within this network we analyze a variant of a STDP rule, in which the strength of potentiation depends on the current weight value. This local learning rule, which is supported by experimental data, and at intermediate spike frequencies closely resembles typical STDP rules from the literature, drives every synaptic weight to converge stochastically to the log of the probability that the presynaptic input neuron fired a spike within a short time window , before the postsynaptic neuron spikes at time :(1)
We then show that the network model can be viewed as performing Bayesian computation, meaning that every spike can be understood as a sample from a posterior distribution over hidden causes in a generative probabilistic model, which combines prior probabilities and evidence from current input spike trains.
This understanding of spikes as samples of hidden causes leads to the central result of this paper. We show that STDP implements a stochastic version of Expectation Maximization for the unsupervised learning of the generative model and present convergence results for SEM. Importantly, this implementation of EM is based on spike events, rather than spike rates.
Finally we discuss how our model can be implemented with biologically realistic mechanisms. In particular this provides a link between mechanisms for lateral inhibition in WTA circuits and learning of probabilistic models. We finally demonstrate in several computer experiments that SEM can solve very demanding tasks, such as detecting and learning repeatedly occurring spike patterns, and learning models for images of handwritten digits without any supervision.
Definition of the network model
Our model consists of a network of spiking neurons, arranged in a WTA circuit, which is one of the most frequently studied connectivity patterns (or network motifs) of cortical microcircuits [16]. The input of the circuit is represented by the excitatory neurons . This input projects to a population of excitatory neurons that are arranged in a WTA circuit (see Fig. 1). We model the effect of lateral inhibition, which is the competition mechanism of a WTA circuit [33], by a common inhibitory signal that is fed to all neurons and in turn depends on the activity of the neurons. Evidence for such common local inhibitory signals for nearby neurons arises from numerous experimental results, see e.g. [16], [34][36]. We do not a priori impose a specific functional relationship between the common inhibition signal and the excitatory activity. Instead we will later derive necessary conditions for this relationship, and propose a mechanism that we use for the experiments.
Figure 1. The network model and its probabilistic interpretation.
A Circuit architecture. External input variables are encoded by populations of spiking neurons, which feed into a Winner-take-all (WTA) circuit. Neurons within the WTA circuit compete via lateral inhibition and have their input weights updated through STDP. Spikes from the WTA circuit constitute the output of the system. B Generative probabilistic model for a multinomial mixture: A vector of external input variables is dependent on a hidden cause, which is represented by the discrete random variable . In this model it is assumed that the 's are conditionally independent of each other, given . The inference task is to infer the value of , given the observations for . Our neuronal network model encodes the conditional probabilities of the graphical model into the weight vector , such that the activity of the network can be understood as execution of this inference task.
The individual units are modeled by a simplified Spike Response Model [37] in which the membrane potential is computed as the difference between the excitatory input and the common inhibition term . sums up the excitatory inputs from neurons as(2)
models the EPSPs evoked by spikes of the presynaptic neuron , and models the intrinsic excitability of the neuron . In order to simplify our analysis we assume that the EPSP can be modeled as a step function with amplitude , i.e., it takes on the value 1 in a finite time window of length after a spike and is zero before and afterwards. Further spikes within this time window do not contribute additively to the EPSP, but only extend the time window during which the EPSP is in the high state. We will later show how to extend our results to the case of realistically shaped and additive EPSPs.
We use a stochastic firing model for , in which the firing probability depends exponentially on the membrane potential, i.e.,(3)
which is in good agreement with most experimental data [38]. We can thus model the firing behavior of every neuron in the WTA as an independent inhomogeneous Poisson process whose instantaneous firing rate is given by .
In order to understand how this network model generates samples from a probability distribution, we first observe that the combined firing activity of the neurons in the WTA circuit is simply the sum of the independent Poisson processes, and can thus again be modeled as an inhomogeneous Poisson process with rate . Furthermore, in any infinitesimally small time interval , the neuron spikes with probability . Thus, if we know that at some point in time , i.e. within , one of the neurons produces an output spike, the conditional probability that this spike originated from neuron can be expressed as(4)
Every single spike from the WTA circuit can thus be seen as an independent sample from the instantaneous distribution in Eq. (4) at the time of the spike. Although the instantaneous firing rate of every neuron directly depends on the value of the inhibition , the relative proportion of the rate to the total WTA firing rate is independent of the inhibition, because all neurons receive the same inhibition signal . Note that determines only the value of the sample at time , but not the time point at which a sample is created. The temporal structure of the sampling process depends only on the overall firing rate .
This implementation of a stochastic WTA circuit does not constrain in any way the kind of spike patterns that can be produced. Every neuron fires independently according to a Poisson process, so it is perfectly possible (and sometimes desirable) that there are two or more neurons that fire (quasi) simultaneously. This is no contradiction to the above theoretical argument of single spikes as samples. There we assumed that there was only one spike at a time inside a time window, but since we assumed these windows to be infinitesimally small, the probability of two spikes occurring exactly at the same point in continuous time is zero.
Synaptic and intrinsic plasticity.
We can now establish a link between biologically plausible forms of spike-based learning in the above network model and learning via EM in probabilistic graphical models. The synaptic weights of excitatory connections between input neurons and neurons in the WTA circuit change due to STDP. Many different versions of STDP rules have emerged from experimental data [8], [39], [40]. For synaptic connections between excitatory neurons, most of them yield a long term potentiation (LTP) when the presynaptic neuron fires before the postsynaptic neuron , otherwise a long term depression (LTD). In our model we use a STDP rule in which the shape of the positive update follows the shape of EPSPs at the synapses, and in which the amplitude of the update depends on the value of the synaptic weight before the update as in Fig. 2. Specifically, we propose a rule in which the ratio of LTP and LTD amplitudes is inversely exponentially dependent on the current synaptic weight. LTP curves that mirror the EPSP shape are in accordance with previous studies, which analyzed optimal shapes of STDP curves under different mathematical criteria [41], [42]. The depression part of the rule in Fig. 2 is a flat offset that contrasts the potentiation. We will show later that this form of LTD occurs in our simulations only at very low repetition frequencies, and instead at natural frequencies our model gives rise to a form of STDP with spike-timing dependent LTD that is very similar to plasticity curves observed in biology [40], [43]. We will also analyze the relationship between this rule and a biologically more realistic STDP rule with an explicit time-decaying LTD part.
Figure 2. Learning curves for STDP.
Under the simple STDP model (red curve), potentiation occurs only if the postsynaptic spike falls within a time window of length (typically ms) after the presynaptic spike. The convergence properties of this simpler version in conjunction with rectangular non-additive EPSPs are easier to analyze. In our simulations we use the more complex version (blue dashed curve) in combination with EPSPs that are modeled as biologically realistic -kernels (with plausible time-constants for rise and decay of respectively ms).
We can formulate this STDP-rule as a Hebbian learning rule - with learning rate - which is triggered by a spike of the postsynaptic neuron at time . The dependence of on the synaptic activity and the current value of the synaptic weight is given by(5)
Since reflects the previously defined step function shape of the EPSP, this update rule is exactly equivalent to the simple STDP rule (solid red curve) in Fig. 2 for the case of the pairing of one pre- and one postsynaptic spike. The dependence on the presynaptic activity is reflected directly by the time difference between the pre- and the postsynaptic spikes. According to this rule positive updates are only performed if the presynaptic neuron fired in a time window of ms before the postsynaptic spike. This learning rule therefore respects the causality principle of LTP that is implied in Hebb's original formulation [44], rather than looking only at correlations of firing rates.
We can interpret the learning behavior of this simple STDP rule from a probabilistic perspective. Defining a stationary joint distribution over the binary input activations at the times of the postsynaptic spikes, and the binary vector , which indicates the source of the postsynaptic spike by setting one , we show in Methods that the equilibrium condition of the expected update leads to the single solution(6)
This stochastic convergence to the log-probability of the presynaptic neuron being active right before the postsynaptic neuron fires is due to the exponential dependence of the potentiation term on the current weight value. Log-probabilities are necessarily negative values, whereas for biological neural networks we typically expect excitatory, i.e. positive weights from the excitatory input neurons. The parameter shifts the range of the values for the weights into the positive regime for . For the sake of simplicity we assume that for the following theoretical analysis and we show in Methods that all results remain true for any positive value of .
In analogy to the plasticity of the synaptic weights we also explore a form of intrinsic plasticity of the neurons. We interpret as an indicator for the excitability of the neuron and apply a circuit-spike triggered update rule with(7)
Whenever a neuron fires, the excitability is increased and the amount of increase is inversely exponentially dependent on the current excitability. Otherwise the excitability is decreased by a constant. Such positive feedback through use-dependent changes in the excitability of neurons were found in numerous experimental studies (see e.g. [14], [45]). This concrete model of intrinsic plasticity drives the excitability towards the only equilibrium point of the update rule, which is . In Methods (see ‘Weight offsets and positive weights’) we show that the depression of the excitability can be modeled either as an effect of lateral inhibition from firing of neighboring neurons, or as a constant decay, independent of the instantaneous circuit activity. Both methods lead to different values , it is true, but encode identical instantaneous distributions .
Note, however, that also negative feedback effects on the excitability through homeostatic mechanisms were observed in experiments [13], [46]. In a forthcoming article [47] we show that the use of such homeostatic mechanisms instead of Eq. (7) in an, otherwise unchanged, network model may be interpreted as a posterior constraint in the context of EM.
Generative probabilistic model.
The instantaneous spike distribution from Eq. (4) can be understood as the result of Bayesian inference in an underlying generative probabilistic model for the abstract multinomial observed variables and a hidden cause . We define the probability distribution of the variables and , as shown by the graphical model in Fig. 1B, as . The parametrization of the graphical model consists of a prior on , and conditional probabilities for every .
The probabilistic model is a generative model and therefore serves two purposes: On the one hand, it can be used to generate samples of the hidden variable and the observable variables . This is done by sampling from the prior distribution, and then sampling the 's, which depend on and can be generated according to the conditional probability tables. The resulting marginal distribution is a special case of a multinomial mixture distribution.
On the other hand, for any given observation of the vector , one can infer the value of the hidden cause that led to the generation of this value for . By application of Bayes' rule one can infer the posterior distribution over all possible values of , which is proportional to the product of the prior and the likelihood .
We define population codes to represent the external observable variables by the input neurons , and the hidden variable by the circuit neurons : For every variable and every possible (discrete) value that can adopt, there is exactly one neuron which represents this combination. We call the set of the indices of all 's that represent , and we call the possible value of that is represented by neuron . Thus we can define an interpretation for the spikes from the input neurons by(8)
A spike from the group represents an instantaneous evidence about the observable variable at the time of the spike. In the same way every neuron represents one of the possible values for the hidden variable , and every single spike conveys an instantaneous value for . We can safely assume that all neurons - including the input neurons - fire according to their individual local stochastic processes or at least exhibit some local stochastic jitter. For the theoretical analysis one can regard a spike as an instantaneous event at a single point in time. Thus in a continuous time no two events from such local stochastic processes can happen at exactly the same point in time. Thus, there is never more than one spike at any single point in time within a group , and every spike can be treated as a proper sample from . However, the neurons coding for hidden causes need to integrate evidence from multiple inputs, and thus need a mechanism to retain the instantaneous evidence from a single spike over time, in order to learn from spatial and temporal correlations in the input.
In our framework this is modeled by postsynaptic potentials on the side of the receiving neurons that are generated in response to input spikes, and, by their shape, represent evidence over time. In the simple case of the non-additive step-function model of the EPSP in Eq. (2), every spike indicates new evidence for the encoded variable that remains valid during a time window of , after which the evidence is cleared. In the case that there is no spike from one group within a time window of length , this is interpreted as missing evidence (or missing value) for in a subsequent inference. In practice it may also occur that EPSPs within a group of input neurons overlap, which would indicate contradicting evidence for . For the theoretical analysis we will first assume that spikes from different input neurons within the same group are not closer in time than , in order to avoid such conflicts. We will later drop this restriction in the extension to more realistically shaped additive EPSPs by slightly enhancing the probabilistic model.
In our experiments with static input patterns we typically use the following basis scheme to encode the external input variables by populations of stochastic spiking neurons : at every point in time there is exactly one neuron in every group that represents the instantaneous value of . We call this neuron the active neuron of the group, whereas all other neurons of the group are inactive. During the time where a neuron is active it fires stochastically according to a Poisson processes with a certain constant or oscillating rate. The inactive neurons, however, remain silent, i.e. they fire with a rate near 0. Although not explicitly modeled here, such an effect can result from strong lateral inhibition in the input populations. This scheme certainly fulfills the definition in Eq. (8).
Here and in the following we will write to denote the input activation through the EPSPs of the network model, and to denote a variable in the probabilistic model, which models the distribution of over all time points . We will also use notations like , which refers to the variable in the probabilistic model taking on the value . We can then reformulate the abstract probabilistic model using the above population codes that define the binary variable vectors and , with s.t. as:(9)
Under the normalization conditions(10)
the normalization constant vanishes and the parametrization of the distribution simplifies to and . Even for non-normalized weights, the definition in Eq. (9) still represents the same type of distribution, although there is no more one-to-one mapping between the weights and the parameters of the graphical model (see Methods for details). Note also that such log-probabilities are exactly (up to additive constants) the local equilibrium points in Eq. (6) of the STDP rule in Fig. 2. In the section “STDP approximates Expectation Maximization” we will discuss in detail how this leads to unsupervised learning of a generative model of the input data in a WTA circuit.
Spike-based Bayesian computation.
We can now formulate an exact link between the above generative probabilistic model and our neural network model of a simplified spike-based WTA circuit. We show that at any point in time at which the network generates an output spike, the relative firing probabilities of the output neurons as in Eq. (4), are equal to the posterior distribution of the hidden cause , given the current evidences encoded in the input activations . For a given input we use Bayes' rule to calculate the posterior probability of cause as . We can identify the prior with the excitabilities of the neurons. The log-likelihood of the current evidences given the cause corresponds to the sum of excitatory EPSPs, which depend on the synaptic weights . This leads to the calculation(11)
This shows that at all times every spike from the WTA circuit represents one sample of the instantaneous posterior distribution .
The crucial observation, however, is that this relation is valid at any point in time, independently of the inhibitory signal . It is only the ratio between the quantities that determines the relative firing probabilities of the neurons .
Background oscillations and learning with missing values.
We will now show that for the case of a low average input firing rate, a modulation of the firing rate can be beneficial, as it can synchronize firing of pre- and post-synaptic neurons. Each active neuron then fires according to an inhomogeneous Poisson process, and we assume for simplicity that the time course of the spike rate for all neurons follows the same oscillatory (sinusoidal) pattern around a common average firing rate. Nevertheless the spikes for each are drawn as samples from independent processes. In addition, let the common inhibition signal be modulated by an additional oscillatory current with amplitude , oscillation frequency (same as for the input oscillation), and phase shift . Due to the increased number of input neurons firing simultaneously, and the additional background current, pre- and post-synaptic firing of active neurons will synchronize. The frequency of the background oscillation can be chosen in principle arbitrarily, as long as the number of periods per input example is constant. Otherwise the network will weight different input examples by the number of peaks during presentation, which might lead to learning of a different generative model.
The effect of a synchronization of pre- and post-synaptic firing can be very beneficial, since at low input firing rates it might happen that none of the input neurons in a population of neurons encoding an external variable fires within the integration time window of length of output neurons . This corresponds to learning with missing attribute values for , which is known to impair learning performance in graphical models [48]. Our novel interpretation is therefore that background oscillations can reduce the percentage of missing values by synchronizing presynaptic firing rates. This agrees with previous studies, which have shown that it is easier for single detector neurons learning with phenomenological STDP rules to detect spike patterns embedded in a high-dimensional input stream, if the patterns are encoded relative to a background oscillation [49], or the patterns consist of dense and narrow bursts of synchronous activity [50]. These results still hold if only a small part of the afferents participates in the pattern, or spikes from the pattern are missing, since the increased synchrony facilitates the identification of the pattern. Although we show in experiments that this increased synchronization can improve the learning performance of spike-based probabilistic learners in practice, it is important to note that background oscillations are not necessary for the theory of spike-based Expectation Maximization to hold. Also, brain oscillations have previously been associated with various fundamental cognitive functions like e.g. attention, memory, consciousness, or neural binding. In contrast, our suggested role for oscillations as a mechanism for improving learning and inference with missing values is very specific within our framework, and although some aspects are compatible with higher-level theories, we do not attempt here to provide alternative explanations for these phenomena.
Our particular model of oscillatory input firing rates leaves the average firing rates unchanged, hence the effect of oscillations does not simply arise due to a larger number of input or output spikes. It is the increased synchrony of input and output spikes by which background oscillations can facilitate learning for tasks in which inputs have little redundancy, and missing values during learning thus would have a strong impact. We demonstrate this in the following experiment, where a common background oscillation for the input neurons and the output neurons significantly speeds up and improves the learning performance. In other naturally occurring input distributions with more structured inputs, oscillations might not improve the performance.
Example 1: Learning of probabilistic models with STDP
Fig. 3 demonstrates the emergence of Bayesian computation in the generic network motif of Fig. 1A in a simple example. Spike inputs (top row of Fig. 3D) are generated through four different hidden processes (associated with four different colors). Each of them is defined by a Gauss distribution over a 2D pixel array with a different center, which defines the probability of every pixel to be on. Spike trains encode the current value of a pixel by a firing rate of 25 Hz or 0 Hz for 40 ms. Each pixel was encoded by two input neurons via population coding, exactly one of them had a firing rate of 25 Hz for each input image. A 10 ms period without firing separates two images in order to avoid overlap of EPSPs for input spikes belonging to different input images.
Figure 3. Example for the emergence of Bayesian computation through STDP and adaptation of neural excitability.
A, B: Visualization of hidden structure in the spike inputs shown in D, E: Each row in panels A and B shows two results of drawing pixels from the same Gauss distribution over a 28×28 pixel array. Four different Gauss distributions were used in the four rows, and the location of their center represents the latent variable behind the structure of the input spike train. C: Transformation of the four 2D images in B into four linear arrays, resulting from random projections from 2D locations to 1D indices. Black lines indicate active pixels, and pixels that were active in less than 4 of all images were removed before the transformation (these pixels are white in panel H). By the random projection, both the 2D structure of the underlying pixel array and the value of the latent variable are hidden when the binary 1D vector is encoded through population coding into the spike trains that the neural circuit receives. D: Top row: Spike trains from 832 input neurons that result from the four linear patterns shown in panel C (color of spikes indicates which of the four hidden processes had generated the underlying 2D pattern, after 50 ms another 2D pattern is encoded). The middle and bottom row show the spike output of the four output neurons at the beginning and after 500 s of unsupervised learning with continuous spike inputs (every 50 ms another 2D pattern was randomly drawn from one of the 4 different Gauss distributions, with different prior probabilities of 0.1, 0.2, 0.3, and 0.4.). Color of spikes indicates the emergent specialization of the four output neurons on the four hidden processes for input generation. Black spikes indicate incorrect guesses of hidden cause. E: Same as D, but with a superimposed 20 Hz oscillation on the firing rates of input neurons and membrane potentials of the output neurons. Fewer error spikes occur in the output, and output spikes are more precisely timed. F: Internal models (weight vectors ) of output neurons after learning (pixel array). G: Autonomous learning of priors , that takes place simultaneously with the learning of internal models. H: Average “winner” among the four output neurons for a test example (generated with equal probability by any of the 4 Gaussians) when a particular pixel was drawn in this test example, indicating the impact of the learned priors on the output response. I: Emergent discrimination capability of the output neurons during learning (red curve). The dashed blue curve shows that a background oscillation as in E speeds up discrimination learning. Curves in G and I represent averages over 20 repetitions of the learning experiment.
After unsupervised learning with STDP for 500 s (applied to continuous streams of spikes as in panel D of Fig. 3) the weight vectors shown in Fig. 3F (projected back into the virtual 2D input space) emerged for the four output neurons , demonstrating that these neurons had acquired internal models for the four different processes that were used to generate inputs. The four different processes for generating the underlying 2D input patterns had been used with different prior probabilities (). Fig. 3G shows that this imbalance resulted in four different priors encoded in the biases of the neurons . When one compares the unequal sizes of the colored areas in Fig. 3H with the completely symmetric internal models (or likelihoods) of the four neurons shown in panel F, one sees that their firing probability approximates a posterior over hidden causes that results from multiplying their learned likelihoods with their learned priors. As a result, the spike output becomes sparser, and almost all neurons only fire when the current input spikes are generated by that one of the four hidden processes on which they have specialized (Fig. 3D, bottom row). In Fig. 3I the performance of the network is quantified over time by the normalized conditional entropy , where is the correct hidden cause of each input image in the training set, and denotes the discrete random variable defined by the firing probabilities of output neurons for each image under the currently learned model. Low conditional entropy indicates that each neuron learns to fire predominantly for inputs from one class. Fig. 3E as well as the dashed blue line in Fig. 3I show that the learning process is improved when a common background oscillation at 20 Hz is superimposed on the firing rate of input neurons and the membrane potential of the output neurons, while keeping the average input and output firing rates constant. The reason is that in general it may occur that an output neuron receives during its integration time window (40 ms in this example) no information about the value of a pixel (because neither the neuron that has a high firing rate for 40 ms if this pixel is black, nor the associated neuron that has a high firing rate if this pixel is white fire during this time window). A background oscillation reduces the percentage of such missing values by driving presynaptic firing times together (see top row of Fig. 3E). Note that through these oscillations the overall output firing rate fluctuates strongly, but since the same oscillation is used consistently for all four types of patterns, the circuit still learns the correct distribution of inputs.
This task had been chosen to become very fast unsolvable if many pixel values are missing. Many naturally occurring input distributions, like the ones addressed in the subsequent computer experiments, tend to have more redundancy, and background oscillations did not improve the learning performance for those.
STDP approximates Expectation Maximization
In this section we will develop the link between the unsupervised learning of the generative probabilistic model in Fig. 1B and the learning effect of STDP as defined in our spiking network model in Fig. 1A. Starting from a learning framework derived from the concept of Expectation Maximization [31], we show that the biologically plausible STDP rule from Fig. 2 can naturally approximate a stochastic, online version of this optimization algorithm. We call this principle SEM (spike-based EM).
SEM can be viewed as a bootstrapping procedure. The relation between the firing probabilities of the neurons within the WTA circuit and the continuous updates of the synaptic weights with our STDP rule in Eq. (5) drive the initially random firing of the circuit in response to an input towards learning the correct generative model of the input distribution. Whenever a neuron fires in response to , the STDP rule increases the weights of synapses from those presynaptic neurons that had fired shortly before . In absence of a recent presynaptic spike from the weight is decreased. As a consequence, when next a pattern similar to is presented, the probability for the same to fire and further adapt its weights, is increased. Since becomes more of an “expert” for one subclass of input patterns, it actually becomes less likely to fire for non-matching patterns. The competition in the WTA circuit ensures that other -neurons learn to specialize for these different input categories.
In the framework of Expectation Maximization, the generation of a spike in a -neuron creates a sample from the currently encoded posterior distribution of hidden variables, and can therefore be viewed as the stochastic Expectation, or -step. The subsequent application of STDP to the synapses of this neuron can be understood as an approximation of the Maximization, or -step. The online learning behavior of the network can be understood as a stochastic online EM algorithm.
Learning the parameters of the probability model by EM.
The goal of learning the parametrized generative probabilistic model is to find parameter values , such that the marginal distribution of the model distribution approximates the actual stationary distribution of spike inputs as closely as possible. We define as the probability to observe the activation vector at some point in time (see Eq. (72) in Methods for a precise mathematical definition). The learning task can thus be formalized as the minimization of the Kullback-Leibler divergence between the two distributions, and . A mathematically equivalent formulation is the maximization of the expected likelihood of the inputs , drawn from . The parametrization of the generative probabilistic model is highly redundant, i.e. for every there is a continuous manifold of , that all define identical generative distributions in Eq. (24). There is, however, exactly one in this sub-manifold of the weight space that fulfills the normalization conditions in Eq. (10). By imposing the normalization conditions as constraints to the maximization problem, we can thus find unique local maxima (see “Details to Learning the parameters of the probability model by EM” in Methods).
The most common way to solve such unsupervised learning problems with hidden variables is the mathematical framework of Expectation Maximization (EM). In its standard form, the EM algorithm is a batch learning mechanism, in which a fixed, finite set of instances of input vectors is given, and the task is to find the parameter vector that maximizes the log-likelihood of these instances to be generated as independent samples by the model .
Starting from a random initialization for , the algorithm iterates between E-steps and M-steps. In the E-steps, the current parameter vector is used to find the posterior distributions of the latent variables , each given by .
In the M-steps a new parameter vector is computed, which maximizes the expected value of the complete-data log-likelihood function, subject to the normalization constraints in Eq. (10). The analytical solution for this M-step (compare [32]) is given by(12)
The iterated application of this update procedure is guaranteed to converge to a (local) maximum of [31]. It is obvious that fulfills the desired normalization conditions in Eq. (10) after every update.
Although the above deterministic algorithm requires that the same set of training examples is re-used for every EM iteration, similar results also hold valid for online learning scenarios. In an online setup new samples are drawn from the input distribution at every iteration, which is closer to realistic neural network learning settings. Instead of analytically computing the expected value of the complete-data log-likelihood function, a Monte-Carlo estimate is computed using the samples , drawn according to their posterior distribution . Even though additional stochastic fluctuations are introduced due to the stochastic sampling process, this stochastic EM algorithm will also converge to a stable result in the limit of infinite iterations, if the number of samples is increased with every iteration [51].
In order to simplify the further notation we introduce the augmented input distribution from which we can sample pairs and define(13)
Sampling pairs with from corresponds to online sampling of inputs, combined with a stochastic E-step. The subsequent M-step(14)
essentially computes averages over all samples: is the average of the variable ; is a conditional average of taken over those instances in which is .
The expected value of the new weight vector after one iteration, i.e., the sampling E-step and the averaging M-step, can be expressed in a very compact form based on the augmented input distribution as(15)
A necessary condition for a point convergence of the iterative algorithm is a stable equilibrium point, i.e. a value at which the expectation of the next update is identical to . Thus we arrive at the following necessary implicit condition for potential convergence points of this stochastic algorithm.(16)
This very intuitive implicit “solution” is the motivation for relating the function of the simple STDP learning rule (solid red line in Fig. 2) in the neural circuit shown in Fig. 1A to the framework of EM.
Spike-based Expectation Maximization.
In order to establish a mathematically rigorous link between the STDP rule in Fig. 2 in the spike-based WTA circuit and stochastic online EM we identify the functionality of both the E- and the M-steps with the learning behavior of the spiking WTA-circuit with STDP.
In a biologically plausible neural network setup, one cannot assume that observations are stored and computations necessary for learning are deferred until a suitable sample size has been reached. Instead, we relate STDP learning to online learning algorithms in the spirit of Robbins-Monro stochastic approximations, in which updates are performed after every observed input.
At an arbitrary point in time at which any one neuron of the WTA circuit fires, the posterior according to Eq. (4) gives the probability that the spike at this time has originated from the neuron with index . The pair can therefore be seen as a sample from the augmented input distribution . Hence, we can conclude that the generation of a spike by the WTA circuit corresponds to the generation of samples during the E-step. There are additional conditions on the inhibition signal that have to be met in order to generate unbiased samples from the input distribution . These are discussed in depth in the section “Role of the Inhibition”, but for now let us assume that these conditions are fulfilled.
The generation of a spike in the postsynaptic neuron triggers an STDP update according to Eq. (5) in all synapses from incoming presynaptic neurons , represented by weights . We next show that the biologically plausible STDP rule in Eq. (5) (see also Fig. 2) together with the rule in Eq. (7) can be derived as approximating the M-step in stochastic online EM.
The update in Eq. (14) suggests that every synapse collects the activation statistics of its input (the presynaptic neuron), given that its output (the postsynaptic neuron) fires. These statistics can be gathered online from samples of the augmented input distribution .
From this statistical perspective each weight can be interpreted as , where and are two local virtual counters in each synapse. represents the number of the events and represents the number of the events , i.e. the postsynaptic spikes. Even though all virtual counters within one neuron count the same postsynaptic spikes, it is easier to think of one individual such counter for every synapse. If we interpret the factor as a local learning rate , we can derive Eq. (5) (see Methods) as the spike-event triggered stochastic online learning rule that approximates in the synapse the log of the running average of at the spiking times of neuron . The update formula shows that is only changed, if the postsynaptic neuron fires, whereas spike events of other neurons with are irrelevant for the statistics of . Thus the learning rule is purely local for every synapse ; it only has to observe its own pre- and postsynaptic signals. Additionally we show in the Methods section “Adaptive learning rates with Variance tracking” a very efficient heuristic how the learning rate can be estimated locally.
Analogously we can derive the working mechanism of the update rule in Eq. (7) as updates of the log of a fraction at the respective points in time.
The simple STDP rules in Eq. (5) and Eq. (7) thus approximate the M-step in a formal generative probabilistic model with local, biologically plausible computations. It remains to be shown that these STDP rules actually drive the weights to converge to the target points in Eq. (16) of the stochastic EM algorithm.
We can conclude from the equilibrium conditions of the STDP rule in Eq. (6) that convergence can only occur at the desired local maxima of the likelihood subject to the normalization constraints. However, it remains to be shown that the update algorithm converges at all and that there are no limit cycles.
Proof of convergence.
Even though we successfully identified the learning behavior of the simple STDP rule (Fig. 2) in the circuit model with the E- and the M-steps of the EM algorithm, this is not yet sufficient for a complete proof of convergence for the whole learning system. Not only are the single updates just approximations to the M-step, these approximations, in addition, violate the normalization conditions in Eq. (10). Although the system - as we will show - converges towards normalized solutions, there is always a stochastic fluctuation around the normalization conditions. One can therefore not simply argue that Eq. (5) implements a stochastic version of the generalized EM algorithm; instead, we have to resort to the theory of stochastic approximation algorithms as presented in [52]. Under some technical assumptions (see Methods) we can state
Theorem 1: The algorithm in Eq. (5,7) updates in a way that it converges with probability 1 to the set of local maxima of the likelihood function , subject to the normalization constraints in Eq. (10).
The detailed proof, which is presented in Methods, shows that the expected trajectory of the weight vector is determined by two driving forces. The first one is a normalization force which drives from every arbitrary point towards the regime where is normalized. The second force is the real learning force that drives to a desired maximum of . However, this interpretation of the learning force is valid only if is sufficiently close to normalized.
The role of the inhibition
We have previously shown that the output spikes of the WTA circuit represent samples from the posterior distribution in Eq. (11), which only depends on the ratios between the membrane potentials . The rate at which these samples are produced is the overall firing rate of the WTA circuit and can be controlled by modifying the common inhibition of the neurons .
Although any time-varying output firing rate produces correct samples from the posterior distribution in Eq. (11) of , for learning we also require that the input patterns observed at the spike times are unbiased samples from the true input distribution . If this is violated, some patterns coincide with a higher , and thus have a stronger influence on the learned synaptic weights. In Methods we formally show that acts as a multiplicative weighting of the current input , and so the generative model will learn a slightly distorted input distribution.
An unbiased set of samples can be obtained if is independent of the current input activation , e.g. if is constant. This could in theory be achieved if we let depend on the current values of the membrane potentials , and set . Such an immediate inhibition is commonly assumed in rate-based soft-WTA models, but it seems implausible to compute this in a spiking neuronal network, where only spikes can be observed, but not the presynaptic membrane potentials.
However, our results show that a perfectly constant firing rate is not a prerequisite for convergence to the right probabilistic model. Indeed we can show that it is sufficient that and are stochastically independent, i.e. is not correlated to the appearance of any specific value of . Still this might be difficult to achieve since the firing rate is functionally linked to the input by , but it clarifies the role of the inhibition as de-correlating from the input , at least in the long run.
One possible biologically plausible mechanism for such a decorrelation of and is an inhibitory feedback from a population of neurons that is itself excited by the neurons . Such WTA competition through lateral inhibition has been studied extensively in the literature [16], [33]. In the implementation used for the experiments in this paper every spike from the -neurons causes an immediate very strong inhibition signal that lasts longer than the refractory period of the spiking neuron. This strong inhibition decays exponentially and is overlaid by a noise signal with high variability that follows an Ornstein-Uhlenbeck process (see “Inhibition Model in Computer Simulations” in Methods). This will render the time of the next spike of the system almost independent of the value of .
It should also be mentioned that a slight correlation between and may be desirable, and might also be externally modulated (for example through attention, or neuromodulators such as Acetylcholin), as an instrument of selective input learning. This might lead e.g. to slightly higher firing rates for well-known inputs (high ), or salient inputs, as opposed to reduced rates for unknown arbitrary inputs. In general, however, combining online learning with a sampling rate that is correlated to may lead to strange artifacts and might even prohibit the convergence of the system due to positive feedback effects. A thorough analysis of such effects and of possible learning mechanisms that cope with positive feedback effects is the topic of future research.
Our theoretical analysis sheds new light on the requirements for inhibition in spiking WTA-like circuits to support learning and Bayesian computation. Inhibition does not only cause competition between the excitatory neurons, but also regulates the overall firing rate of the WTA circuit. Variability in does not influence the performance of the circuit, as long as there is no systematic dependence between the input and .
Continuous-time interpretation with realistically shaped EPSPs
In our previous analysis we have assumed a simplified non-additive step-function model for the EPSP. This allowed us to describe all input evidence within the last time window of length by one binary vector , but required us to assume that no two neurons within the same group fired within that period. We will now give an intuitive explanation to show that this restriction can be dropped and present an interpretation for additive biologically plausibly shaped EPSPs as inference in a generative model.
The postsynaptic activation under an additive EPSPs is given by the convolution(17)
where describes an arbitrarily shaped kernel, e.g. an -shaped EPSP function which is the difference of two exponential functions (see [37]) with different time constants. We use 1 ms for the rise and 15 ms for the decay in our simulations. replaces in Eq. (2) in the computation of the membrane potential of our model neurons. We can still understand the firing of neurons in the WTA circuit according to the relative firing probabilities in Eq. (4) as Bayesian inference. To see this, we imagine an extension of the generative probabilistic model in Fig. 1B, which contains multiple instances of , exactly one for every input spike from all input neurons . For a fixed common hidden cause , all instances of are conditionally independent of each other, and have the same conditional distributions for each (see Methods for the full derivation of the extended probabilistic model). According to the definition in Eq. (8) of the population code every input spike represents evidence that in an instance should take on a certain value. Since every spike contributes only to one instance, any finite input spike pattern can be interpreted as valid evidence for multiple instances of inputs .
The inference of a single hidden cause in such extended graphical model from multiple instances of evidence is relatively straightforward: due to the conditional independence of different instances, we can compute the input likelihood for any hidden cause simply as the product of likelihoods for every single evidence. Inference thus reduces to counting how often every possible evidence occurred in all instances , which means counting the number of spikes of every . Since single likelihoods are implicitly encoded in the synaptic weights by the relationship , we can thus compute the complete input likelihood by adding up step-function like EPSPs with amplitudes corresponding to . This yields correct results, even if one input neuron spikes multiple times.
In the above model, the timing of spikes does not play a role. If we want to assign more weight to recent evidence, we can define a heuristic modification of the extended graphical model, in which contributions from spikes to the complete input log-likelihood are linearly interpolated in time, and multiple pieces of evidence simply accumulate. This is exactly what is computed in in Eq. (17), where the shape of the kernel defines how the contribution of an input spike at time evolves over time. Defining as the weight for the evidence of the assignment of to value , it is easy to see (and shown in detail in Methods) that the instantaneous output distribution represents the result of inference over causes , given the time-weighted evidences of all previous input spikes, where the weighting is done by the EPSP-function . Note that this evidence weighting mechanism is not equivalent to the much more complex mechanism for inference in presence of uncertain evidence, which would require more elaborate architectures than our feed-forward WTA-circuit. In our case, past evidence does not become uncertain, but just less important for the inference of the instantaneous hidden cause .
We can analogously generalize the spike-triggered learning rule in Eq. (5) for continuous-valued input activations according to Eq. (17):(18)
The update of every weight is triggered when neuron , i.e. the postsynaptic neuron, fires a spike. The shape of the LTP part of the STDP curve is determined by the shape of the EPSP, defined by the kernel function . The positive part of the update in Eq. (18) is weighted by the value of at the time of firing the postsynaptic spike. Negative updates are performed if is close to zero, which indicates that no presynaptic spikes were observed recently. The complex version of the STDP curve (blue dashed curve in Fig. 1B), which resembles more closely to the experimentally found STDP curves, results from the use of biologically plausible -shaped EPSPs. In this case, the LTP window of the weight update decays with time, following the shape of the -function. This form of synaptic plasticity was used in all our experiments. If EPSPs accumulate due to high input stimulation frequencies, the resulting shape of the STDP curve becomes even more similar to previously observed experimental data, which is investigated in detail in the following section.
The question remains, how this extension of the model and the heuristics for time-dependent weighting of spike contributions affect the previously derived theoretical properties. Although the convergence proof does not hold anymore under such general conditions we can expect (and show in our Experiments) that the network will still show the principal behavior of EM under fairly general assumptions on the input: we have to assume that the instantaneous spike rate of every input group is not dependent on the value of that it currently encodes, which means that the total input spike rate must not depend on the hidden cause . Note that this assumption on every input group is identical to the desired output behavior of the WTA circuit according to the conditions on the inhibition as derived earlier. This opens up the possibility of building networks of recursively or hierarchically connected WTA circuits. Note also that the grouping of inputs into different is only a notational convenience. The neurons in the WTA circuit do not have to know which inputs are from the same group, neither for inference nor for learning, and can thus treat all input neurons equally.
Relationship to experimental data on synaptic plasticity
In biological STDP experiments that induce pairs of pre- and post-synaptic spikes at different time delays, it has been observed that the shape of the plasticity curve changes as a function of the repetition frequency for those spike pairs [40]. The observed effect is that at very low frequencies no change or only LTD occurs, a “classical” STDP window with timing-dependent LTD and LTP is observed at intermediate frequencies around 20 Hz, and at high frequencies of 40 Hz or above only LTP is observed, independently of which spikes comes first.
Although our theoretical model does not explicitly include a stimulation-frequency dependent term like other STDP models (e.g. [53]), we can study empirically the effect of a modification of the frequency of spike-pairing. We simulate this for a single synapse, at which we force pre- and post-synaptic spikes with varying time differences , and at fixed stimulation frequencies of either 1 Hz, 20 Hz, or 40 Hz. Modeling EPSPs as -kernels with time constants of 1 ms for the rise and 15 ms for the decay, we obtain the low-pass filtered signals as in Eq. (17), which grow as EPSPs start to overlap at higher stimulation frequencies. At the time of a post-synaptic spike we compute the synaptic update according to the rule in Eq. (18), but keep both the weight and the learning rate fixed (at ) to distinguish timing-dependent from weight-dependent effects.
In Fig. 4A we observe that, as expected, at low stimulation frequencies (1 Hz) the standard shape of the complex STDP rule in Eq. (18) from Fig. 2 is recovered, since there is no influence from previous spikes. The shift towards pure LTD that is observed in biology [40] would require an additional term that depends on postsynaptic firing rates like in [53], and is a topic of future research. However, note that in biology this shift to LTD was observed only in paired recordings, neglecting the cooperative effect of other synapses, and other studies have also reported LTP at low stimulation frequencies [43]. At higher stimulation frequencies (20 Hz in Fig. 4B) the EPSPs from different pre-synaptic spikes start to overlap, which results in larger compared with isolated pre-synaptic spikes. We also see that the LTD part of the STDP window becomes timing-dependent (due to overlapping EPSPs), and thus the shape of the STDP curve becomes similar to standard models of STDP and observed biological data [43], [54]. For even higher stimulation frequencies the STDP window shifts more and more towards LTP (see Fig. 4B and C). This is in good accordance with observations in biology [40]. Also in agreement with biological data, the minimum of the update occurs around , because there the new -kernel EPSP is not yet effective, and the activation due to previous spikes has decayed maximally.
Figure 4. Relationship between the continuous-time SEM model and experimental data on synaptic plasticity.
A–C: The effect of the continuous-time plasticity rule in Eq. (18) at a single synapse for different stimulation frequencies and different time-differences between pre- and post-synaptic spike pairs. Only time-intervals without overlapping pairs are shown. A: For very low stimulation frequencies (1 Hz) the standard shape of the complex learning rule from Fig. 2 is recovered. B: At a stimulation frequency of 20 Hz the plasticity curve shifts more towards LTP, and depression is no longer time independent, due to overlapping EPSPs. C: At high stimulation frequencies of 40 Hz or above, the STDP curve shifts towards only LTP, and thus becomes similar to a rate-based Hebbian learning rule. D: Cumulative effect of pre- and post-synaptic burst stimulation (50 Hz bursts of 5 pre-synaptic and 4 post-synaptic spikes) with different onset delays of -120, -60, 10, 20, 30, 80 and 140 ms (time difference between the onsets of the post- and pre-synaptic bursts). As in [55], the amount of overlap between bursts determines the magnitude of LTP, rather than the exact temporal order of spikes.
Another effect that is observed in hippocampal synapses when two neurons are stimulated with bursts, is that the magnitude of LTP is determined mostly by the amount of overlap between the pre- and post-synaptic bursts, rather than the exact timing of spikes [55]. In Fig. 4D we simulated this protocol with our continuous-time SEM rule for different onset time-differences of the bursts, and accumulated the synaptic weight updates in response to 50 Hz bursts of 5 pre-synaptic and 4 post-synaptic spikes. We performed this experiment for the same onset time differences used in Fig. 3 of [55], and found qualitatively similar results. For long time-differences, when EPSPs have mostly decayed, we observed an LTD effect, which was not observed in biology, but can be attributed to differences in synaptic time constants between biology and simulation.
These results suggest that our STDP rule derived from theoretical principles exhibits several of the key properties of synaptic plasticity observed in nature, depending on the encoding of inputs. This is quite remarkable, since these properties are not explicitly part of our learning rule, but rather emerge from a simpler rule with strong theoretical guarantees. Other phenomenological [56], [57] or mechanistic models of STDP [58] also show some of these characteristics, but come without such theoretical properties. The functional consequence of reproducing such key biological characteristics of STDP is that our new learning rule also exhibits most of the key functional properties of STDP, like e.g. strengthening synapses of inputs that are causally involved in firing the postsynaptic neuron, while pruning the connections that do not causally contribute to postsynaptic firing [10], [13]. At low and intermediate firing rates our rule also shifts the onset of postsynaptic firing towards the start of repeated spike patterns [49], [50], [59], while depressing synapses that only become active for a pattern following the one for which the post-synaptic neuron is responsive. If patterns change quickly, then the stronger depression for presynaptic spikes with small in Fig. 4B enhances the capability of the WTA to discriminate such patterns. With simultaneous high frequency stimulation (Fig. 4C and D) we observe that only LTP occurs, which is due to the decay of EPSPs not being fast enough to allow depression. In this scenario, the learning rule is less sensitive to timing, and rather becomes a classical Hebbian measure of correlations between pre- and post-synaptic firing rates. However, since inputs are encoded in a population code we can assume that the same neuron is not continuously active throughout, and so even at high firing rates for active input neurons, the synapses that are inactive during postsynaptic firing will still be depressed, which means that convergence to an equilibrium value is still possible for all synapses.
It is a topic of future research which effects observed in biology can be reproduced with more complex variations of the spike-based EM rule that are also dependent on postsynaptic firing rates, or whether existing phenomenological models of STDP can be interpreted in the probabilistic EM framework. In fact, initial experiments have shown that several variations of the spike-based EM rule can lead to qualitatively similar empirical results for the learned models in tasks where the input spike trains are Poisson at average or high rates over an extended time window (such as in Fig. 3). These variations include weight-dependent STDP rules that are inversed in time, symmetrical in time, or have both spike timing-dependent LTD and LTP. Such rules can converge towards the same equilibrium values as the typical causal STDP rule. However, they will behave differently if inputs are encoded through spatio-temporal spike patterns (as in Example 4: Detection of Spatio-Temporal Spike Patterns). Further variations can include short-term plasticity effects for pre-synaptic spikes, as observed and modeled in [60], which induce a stimulation-frequency dependent reduction of the learning rate, and could thus serve as a stabilization mechanism.
Spike-timing dependent LTD
Current models of STDP typically assume a “double-exponential” decaying shape of the STDP curve, which was first used in [54] to fit experimental data. This is functionally different from the shape of the complex STDP curve in Fig. 2 and Eq. (5), where the LTD part is realized by a constant timing-independent offset.
Although not explicitly covered by the previously presented theory of SEM, the same analytical tools can be used to explain functional consequences of timing-dependent LTD in our framework. Analogous to our approach for the standard SEM learning rule, we develop (in Methods) an extension of the simple step-function STDP rule from Fig. 2 with timing-dependent LTD, which is easier to analyze. We then generalize these results towards arbitrarily shaped STDP curves. The crucial result is that as long as the spike-timing dependent LTD rule retains the characteristic inversely-exponential weight-dependent relationship between the strengths of LTP and LTD that was introduced for standard SEM in Eq. (5), an equilibrium property similar to Eq. (6) still holds (see Methods for details). Precisely speaking, the new equilibrium will be at the difference between the logarithms of the average presynaptic spiking probabilities before and after the postsynaptic spike. This shows that spike-timing dependent LTD also yields synaptic weights that can be interpreted in terms of log-probabilities, which can thus be used for inference.
The new rule emphasizes contrasts between the current input pattern and the immediately following activity. Still, the results of the new learning rule and the original rule from Eq. (5) in our experiments are qualitatively similar. This can be explained from a stochastic learning perspective: at any point in time the relative spiking probabilities of excitatory neurons in the WTA circuit in Eq. (4) depend causally on the weighted sums of preceding presynaptic activities . However, they clearly do not depend on future presynaptic activity. Thus, the postsynaptic neuron will learn through SEM to fire for increasingly similar stochastic realizations of presynaptic input , whereas the presynaptic activity pattern following a postsynaptic spike will become more variable. In the extreme case where patterns are short and separated by noise, there will be no big difference between input patterns following firing of any of the WTA neurons, and so their relevance for the competition will become negligible.
Experimental evidence shows that the time constants of the LTP learning window are usually smaller than the time constants of the LTD window ([40], [60]), which will further enhance the specificity of the LTP learning as opposed to the LTD part that computes the average over a longer window.
Note that the exponential weight dependence of the learning rule implies a certain robustness towards linearly scaling LTP or LTD strengths, which only leads to a constant offset of the weights. Assuming that the offset is the same for all synapses, this does not affect firing probabilities of neurons in a WTA circuit (see Methods “Weight offsets and positive weights”).
Example 2: Learning of probabilistic models for orientation selectivity
We demonstrated in this computer experiment the emergence of orientation selective cells through STDP in the WTA circuit of Fig. 1A when the spike inputs encode isolated bars in arbitrary orientations. Input images were generated by the following process: Orientations were sampled from a uniform distribution, and lines of 7 pixels width were drawn in a 28×28 pixel array. We added noise to the stimuli by flipping every pixel with a chance, see Fig. 5A. Finally, a circular mask was applied to the images to avoid artifacts from image corners. Spikes trains were encoded according to the same population coding principle described in the previous example Fig. 3, in this case using a Poisson firing rate of 20 Hz for active units.
Figure 5. Emergence of orientation selective cells for visual input consisting of oriented bars with random orientations.
A Examples of -pixel input images with oriented bars and additional background noise. B Internal models (weight vectors of output neurons ) that are learned through STDP after the presentation of input images (each encoded by spike trains for 50 ms, as in Fig. 3). C, D Plot of the most active neuron for images of bars with orientations from to in steps. Colors correspond to the colors of neurons in B. Before training (C), the output neurons fire without any apparent pattern. After training (D) they specialize on different orientations and cover the range of possible angles approximately uniformly. E: Spike train encoding of the 10 samples in A. F,G: Spike trains produced by the output neurons in response to these samples before and after learning with STDP for 200 s. Colors of the spikes indicate the identity of the output neuron, according to the color code in B.
After training with STDP for 200 s, presenting different images, the projection of the learned weight vectors back into the 2D input space (Fig. 5B) shows the emergence of 10 models with different orientations, which cover the possible range of orientations almost uniformly. When we plot the strongest responding neuron as a function of orientation (Fig. 5C, D), measured by the activity in response to 360 noise-free images of oriented bars in steps, we can see no structure in the response before learning (Fig. 5C). However, after unsupervised learning, panel D clearly shows the emergence of continuous, uniformly spaced regions in which one of the neurons fires predominantly. This can also be seen in the firing behavior in response to the input spike trains in Fig. 5E, which result from the example images in panel A. Fig. 5F shows that the output neurons initially fire randomly in response to the input, and many different neurons are active for one image. In contrast, the responses after learning in panel G are much sparser, and only occasionally multiple neurons are active for one input image, which is the case when the angle of the input image is in between the preferred angles of two output neurons, and therefore multiple models have a non-zero probability of firing.
In our experiment the visual input consisted of noisy images of isolated bars, which illustrates learning of a probabilistic model in which a continuous hidden cause (the orientation angle) is represented by a population of neurons, and also provides a simple model for the development of orientation selectivity. It has previously been demonstrated that similar Gabor-like receptive field structures can be learned with a sparse-coding approach using patches of natural images as inputs [61]. The scenario considered here is thus substantially simplified, since we do not present natural but isolated stimuli. However, it is worth noting that experimental studies have shown that (in mice and ferret) orientation selectivity, but not e.g. direction selectivity, exists in V1 neurons even before eye opening [62], [63]. This initial orientation selectivity develops from innate mechanisms and from internally generated inputs during this phase [63], e.g. retinal waves, which have different, and very likely simpler statistics than natural stimuli. Our model shows that a WTA circuit could learn orientation selectivity from such simple bar-like inputs, but does not provide an alternative explanation to the results of studies like [61] using natural image stimuli. Although beyond the scope of this paper, we expect that later shaping of selectivity through exposure to natural visual experience would not alter the receptive fields by much, since the neurons have been primed to spike (and thereby trigger plasticity) only in response to a restricted class of local features.
Example 3: Emergent discrimination of handwritten digits through STDP
Spike-based EM is a quite powerful learning principle, as we demonstrate in Fig. 6 through an application to a computational task that is substantially more difficult than previously considered tasks for networks of spiking neurons: We show that a simple network of spiking neurons can learn without any supervision to discriminate handwritten digits from the MNIST benchmark dataset [64] consisting of 70,000 samples (30 are shown in Fig. 6A). This is one of the most frequently used benchmark tasks in machine learning. It has mostly been used to evaluate supervised or semi-supervised machine learning algorithms [27], [65], or to evaluate unsupervised feature learning approaches [66], [67]. Although the MNIST dataset contains labels (the intended digit) for each sample of a handwritten digit, we deleted these labels when presenting the dataset to the neural circuit of Fig. 1A, thereby forcing the neurons on the output layer to self-organize in a completely unsupervised fashion. Each sample of a handwritten digit was encoded by 708 spike trains over 40 ms (and 10 ms periods without firing between digits to avoid overlap of EPSPs between images), similarly as for the task of Fig. 3. Each pixel was represented by two input neurons , one of which produced a Poisson spike train at 40 Hz during these 40 ms. This yielded usually at most one or two spikes during this time window, demonstrating that the network learns and computes with information that is encoded through spikes, rather than firing rates. After 500 s of unsupervised learning by STDP almost all of the output neurons fired more sparsely, and primarily for handwritten samples of just one of the digits (see Fig. 6E).
Figure 6. Emergent discrimination of handwritten digits through STDP.
A: Examples of digits from the MNIST dataset. The third and fourth row contain test examples that had not been shown during learning via STDP. B: Spike train encoding of the first 5 samples in the third row of A. Colors illustrate the different classes of digits. C, D: Spike trains produced by the output neurons before and after learning with STDP for 500 s. Colored spikes indicate that the class of the input and the class for which the neuron is mostly selective (based on human classification of its generative model shown in F) agree, otherwise spikes are black. E: Temporal evolution of the self-organization process of the 100 output neurons (for the complex version of STDP-curve shown in Fig. 1B), measured by the conditional entropy of digit labels under the learned models at different time points. F: Internal models generated by STDP for the 100 output neurons after 500 s. The network had not received any information about the number of different digits that exist and the colors for different ways of writing the first 5 digits were assigned by the human supervisor. On the basis of this assignment the test samples in row 3 of panel A had been recognized correctly.
The application to the MNIST dataset had been chosen to illustrate the power of SEM in complex tasks. MNIST is one of the most popular benchmarks in machine learning, and state-of-the-art methods achieve classification error rates well below . The model learned by SEM can in principle also be used for classification, by assigning each neuron to the class for which it fires most strongly. However, since this is an unsupervised method, not optimized for classification but for learning a generative model, the performance is necessarily worse. We achieve an error rate of on the 10-digit task on a previously unseen test set. This compares favorably to the error that we obtained with a standard machine learning approach that directly learned the mixture-of-multinomials graphical model in Fig. 1B with a batch EM algorithm. This control experiment was not constrained by a neural network architecture or biologically plausible learning, but instead mathematically optimized the parameters of the model in up to 200 iterations over the whole training set. The batch method achieves a final conditional entropy of , which is slightly better than the final result of the SEM approach, and shows that better performance on the classification task does not necessarily mean better unsupervised model learning.
Example 4: Detection of Spatio-Temporal Spike Patterns
Our final application demonstrates that the modules for Bayesian computation that emerge in WTA circuits through STDP can not only explain the emergence of feature maps in primary sensory cortices like in Fig. 5, but could also be viewed as generic computational units in generic microcircuits throughout the cortex. Such generic microcircuit receives spike inputs from many sources, and it would provide a very useful computational operation on these if it could autonomously detect repeatedly occurring spatio-temporal patterns within this high-dimensional input stream, and report their occurrence through a self-organizing sparse coding scheme to other microcircuits. We have created such input streams with occasionally repeated embedded spike patterns for the computer experiment reported in Fig. 7. Fig. 7D demonstrates that sparse output codes for the 5 embedded spike patterns emerge after applying STDP in a WTA circuit for 200 s to such input stream. Furthermore, we show in the Supplement that these sparse output codes generalize (even without any further training) to time-warped versions of these spike patterns.
Figure 7. Output neurons self-organize via STDP to detect and represent spatio-temporal spike patterns.
A: Sample of the Poisson input spike trains at 20 Hz (only 100 of the 500 input channels are shown). Dashed vertical lines mark time segments of 50 ms length where spatio-temporal spike patterns are embedded into noise. B: Same spike input as in A, but spikes belonging to five repeating spatio-temporal patterns (frozen Poisson spike patterns at 15 Hz) are marked in five different colors. These spike patterns are superimposed by noise (Poisson spike trains at 5 Hz), and interrupted by segments of pure noise of the same statistics (Poisson spike trains at 20 Hz) for intervals of randomly varying time lengths. C, D: Firing probabilities and spike outputs of 6 output neurons (z-neurons in Fig. 1A) for the spike input shown in A, after applying STDP for 200 s to continuous spike trains of the same structure (without any supervision or reward). These 6 output neurons have self-organized so that 5 of them specialize on one of the 5 spatio-temporal patterns. One of the 6 output neurons (firing probability and spikes marked in black) only responds to the noise between these patterns. The spike trains in A represent test inputs, that had never been shown during learning.
Even though our underlying probabilistic generative model (Fig. 1B) does not include time-dependent terms, the circuit in this example performs inference over time. The reason for this is that synapses that were active when a neuron fired become reinforced by STDP, and therefore make the neuron more likely to fire again when a similar spatial pattern is observed. Since we use EPSPs that smoothly decay over time, one neuron still sees a trace of previous input spikes as it fires again, and thus different spatial patterns within one reoccurring spatio-temporal pattern are recognized by the same neuron. The maximum length for such patterns is determined by the time constants of EPSPs. With our parameters (1 ms rise, 15 ms decay time constant) we were able to recognize spike patterns up to 50–100 ms. For longer spatio-temporal patterns, different neurons become responsive to different parts of the pattern. The neuron that responds mostly to noise in Figs. 7D did not learn a specific spatial pattern, and therefore wins by default when none of the specialized neurons responds. Similar effects have previously been described [59], [68], but for different neuron models, classical STDP curves, and not in the context of probabilistic inference.
For this kind of task, where also the exact timing of spikes in the patterns matters (which is not necessarily the case in the examples in Figs. 3, 5, and 6, where input neurons generate Poisson spike trains with different rates), we found that the shape of the STDP kernel plays a larger role. For example, a time-inverted version of the SEM rule, where pre-before-post firing causes LTD instead of LTP, cannot learn this kind of task, because once a neuron has learned to fire for a sub-pattern of the input, its firing onset is shifted back in time, rather than forward in time, which happens with standard SEM, but also with classical STDP [50], [59]. Instead, with a time-inverted SEM rule, different neurons would learn to fire stronger for the offsets of different patterns.
Such emergent compression of high-dimensional spike inputs into sparse low-dimensional spike outputs could be used to merge information from multiple sensory modalities, as well as from internal sources (memory, predictions, expectations, etc.), and to report the co-occurrence of salient events to multiple other brain areas. This operation would be useful from the computational perspective no matter in which cortical area it is carried out. Furthermore, the computational modules that we have analyzed can easily be connected to form networks of such modules, since their outputs are encoded in the same way as their inputs: through probabilistic spiking populations that encode for abstract multinomial variables. Hence the principles for the emergence of Bayesian computation in local microcircuits that we have exhibited could potentially also explain the self-organization of distributed computations in large networks of such microcircuits.
We have shown that STDP induces a powerful unsupervised learning principle in networks of spiking neurons with lateral inhibition: spike-based Expectation Maximization. Each application of STDP can be seen as a move in the direction of the M-step in a stochastic online EM algorithm that strives to maximize the log-likelihood of the spike input . This is equivalent to the minimization of the Kullback-Leibler divergence between the true distribution of spike inputs, and the generative model that is implicitly represented by the WTA circuit from the Bayesian perspective. This theoretically founded principle guarantees that iterative applications of STDP to different spike inputs do not induce a meaningless meandering of the synaptic weights through weight space, but rather convergence to at least a local optimum in the fitting of the model to the distribution of high-dimensional spike inputs . This generation of an internal model through STDP provides the primary component for the self-organization of Bayesian computation. We have shown that the other component, the prior, results from a simple rule for use-dependent adaptation of neuronal excitability. As a consequence, the firing of a neuron in a stochastic WTA circuit (Fig. 1A) can be viewed as sampling from the posterior distribution of hidden causes for high-dimensional spike inputs (and simultaneously as the -step in the context of online EM): A prior (encoded by the thresholds of the neurons ) is multiplied with a likelihood (encoded through an implicit generative distribution defined by the weights of these neurons ), to yield through the firing probabilities of the neurons a representation of the posterior distribution of hidden causes for the current spike input . The multiplications and the divisive normalization that are necessary for this model are carried out by the linear neurons in the log-scale. This result is then transformed into an instantaneous firing rate, assuming an exponential relationship between rate and the membrane potential [38]. It is important that the neurons fire stochastically, i.e., that there exists substantial trial-to trial variability, since otherwise they could not represent a probability distribution. Altogether our models supports the view that probability distributions, rather than deterministic neural codes, are the primary units of information in the brain, and that computational operations are carried out on probabilities, rather than on deterministic bits of information.
Following the “probabilistic turn” in cognitive science [3], [4], [69] and related hypotheses in computational neuroscience [1], [2], [5], probabilistic inference has become very successful in explaining behavioral data on human reasoning and other brain functions. Yet, it has remained an important open problem how networks of spiking neurons can learn to implement those probabilistic inference operations and probabilistic data structures. The soft WTA model presented in this article provides an answer for the case of Bayesian inference and learning in a simple graphical model, where a single hidden cause has to be inferred from bottom-up input. Although this is not yet a mechanism for learning to perform general Bayesian inference in arbitrary graphical models, it clearly is a first step into that direction. Importantly, the encoding of posterior distributions through spiking activity of the neurons in a WTA circuit is perfectly compatible with the assumed input encoding from external variables into spiking activity in . Thus, the interpretation of spikes from output neurons as samples of the posterior distributions over hidden variables in principle allows for using these spikes as input for performing further probabilistic inference.
This compatibility of input and output codes means that SEM modules could potentially be hierarchically and/or recurrently coupled in order to serve as inputs of one another, although it remains to be shown how this coupling affects the dynamics of learning and inference. Future research will therefore address the important questions whether interconnected networks of modules for Bayesian computation that emerge through STDP can provide the primitive building blocks for probabilistic models of cortical computation. Previous studies [23], [25] have shown that interconnected networks of WTA modules are indeed computationally very powerful. In particular, [24], [25] have recently shown how recurrently connected neurons can be designed to perform neural sampling, an approach in which time-independent probability distributions can be represented through spiking activity in recurrent neural networks. The question how salient random variables come to be represented by the firing activity of neurons has remained open. This paper shows that such representations may emerge autonomously through STDP.
A prediction for networks of hierarchically coupled SEM modules would be that more and more abstract hidden causes can be learned in higher layers such as it has been demonstrated in machine learning approaches using Deep Belief Networks [66] and more recently in Deep Boltzmann Machines (DBM) [70]. This effect would correspond to the emergence of abstract feature selectivity in higher visual areas of primates (e.g. face-selective cells in IT, [71]). The hierarchical structure, however, that would result from such deeply organized SEM-modules is more reminiscent of a Deep Sum-Product Network [72], a recently presented new architecture, which has a much simpler learning dynamics but arguably a similar expressive power as DBM. In addition, with a consistent input encoding, associations between different sensory modalities could be formed by connecting inputs from different low-level or high-level sources to a single SEM.
Importantly, while the discussion above focused only on the representation of complex stimuli by neurons encoding abstract hidden causes, SEM can also be an important mechanism for fast and reliable reinforcement learning or decision making under uncertainty. Preprocessing via single or multiple SEM circuits provides an abstraction of the state of the organism, which is much lower-dimensional than the complete stream of individual sensory signals. Learning a behavioral strategy by reading out such behaviorally relevant high-level state signals and mapping them into actions could therefore speed up learning by reducing the state space. In previous studies [21], [73] we have shown how optimal strategies can be learned very fast by simple local learning rules for reinforcement learning or categorization, if a preprocessing of input signals based on probabilistic dependencies is performed. SEM would be a suitable unsupervised mechanism for learning such preprocessing networks for decision making.
We also have shown that SEM is a very powerful principle that endows networks of spiking neurons to solve complex tasks of practical relevance (see e.g. Fig. 6), and as we have shown, their unsupervised learning performance is within the range of conventional machine learning approaches. Furthermore, this could be demonstrated for computations on spike inputs with an input dimension of about 1000 presynaptic neurons , a number that approaches the typical dimension of the spike input that a cortical neuron receives. A very satisfactory aspect is that this high computational performance can be achieved by networks of spiking neurons that learn completely autonomously by STDP, without any postulated teacher or other guidance. This could benefit the field of neuromorphic engineering [74][76], which develops dedicated massively parallel and very efficient hardware for emulating spiking neural networks and suitable plasticity rules. The link between spiking neuron models and plasticity rules and established machine learning concepts provides a novel way of installing well-understood Bayesian inference and learning mechanisms on neuromorphic hardware. First steps towards implementing SEM-like rules in different types of neuromorphic hardware have been taken.
Prior related work
A first model for competitive Hebbian learning paradigm in non-spiking networks of neurons had been introduced in [77]. They analyzed a Hebbian learning rule in a hard WTA network and showed that there may exist equilibrium states, in which the average change of all weight values vanishes for a given set of input patterns. They showed that in these cases the weights adopt values that are proportional to the conditional probability of the presynaptic neuron being active given that the postsynaptic unit wins (rather than the log of this conditional probability, as in our framework). [78] showed that the use of a soft competition instead of a hard winner assignment and corresponding average weight updates lead to an exact gradient ascent on the log-likelihood function of a generative model of a mixture of Gaussians. However, these learning rules had not yet been analyzed in the context of EM.
Stochastic approximation algorithms for expectation maximization [31] were first considered in [79], incremental and on-line EM algorithms with soft-max competition in [80][82]. A proof of the stochastic approximation convergence for on-line EM in exponential family models with hidden variables was shown in [29]. They developed a sophisticated schedule for the learning rate in this much more general model, but did not yet consider individual learning rates for different weights.
[54] initiated the investigation of STDP in the context of unsupervised competitive Hebbian learning and demonstrated that correlations of input spike trains can be learned in this way. They also showed that this leads to a competition between the synapses for the control of the timing of the postsynaptic action potential. A similar competition can also be observed during learning in our model, since our learning rule automatically drives the weights towards satisfying the normalization conditions in Eq. (10).
[83] present a network and learning model that is designed to perform Independent Component Analysis (ICA) with spiking neurons through STDP and intrinsic plasticity. The mixture model of independent components can also be formulated as a generative model, and the goal of ICA is to find the optimal parameters of the mixing matrix. It has been shown that also this problem can be solved by a variant of Expectation Maximization [84], so there is some similarity to the identification of hidden causes in our model.
Recently, computer experiments in [85], [86] have used STDP in the context of WTA circuits to achieve a clustering of input patterns. Their STDP rules implements linear updates, independent of the current weight values, mixed with a homeostasis rule to keep the sum of all weights constant and every weight between 0 and 1. This leads to weights that are roughly proportional to the probability of the presynaptic neuron's firing given that the post-synaptic neuron fires afterwards. The competition between the output neurons is carried out as hard-max. In [85] the 4 output neurons learn to differentiate the 4 presented patterns and smoothly interpolate new rotated input patterns, whereas in [86] 48 neurons learn to differentiate characters in a small pixel raster. [86] uses a STDP rule where both LTP and LTD are modeled as exponentially dependent on the time difference. However, the very specific experimental setting with synchronous regular firing of the input neurons makes it difficult to generalize their result to more general input spike trains. No theoretical analysis is provided in [85] or [86], but their experimental results can be explained by our SEM approach. Instead of adding up logs of conditional probabilities and performing the competition on the exponential of the sums, they sum up the conditional probabilities directly and use this sum of probabilities for the competition. This can be seen as a linear approximation of SEM, especially under the additional normalization conditions that they impose by homeostasis rules.
It has previously been shown that spike patterns embedded in noise can be detected by STDP [49], [50], [59]. Competitive pattern learning through STDP has recently been studied in [68]. They simulate a deterministic version of a winner-take-all circuit consisting of a fixed number of neurons, all listening to the same spiking input lines and connected to each other with a strong inhibition. The STDP learning rule that they propose is additive and weight-independent. Just like our results, they also observe that different neurons specialize on different fixed repeated input pattern, even though the repeated patterns are embedded in spiking noise such that the mean activity of all inputs remains the same throughout the learning phase. Additionally they show that within each pattern the responsible neuron tries to detect the start of the pattern. In contrast to our approach they do not give any analysis of convergence guarantees, nor does their model try to build a generative probabilistic model of the input distribution.
[87][89] investigated the possibility to carry out Bayesian probabilistic computations in recurrent networks of spiking neurons, both using probabilistic population codes. They showed that the ongoing dynamics of belief propagation in temporal Bayesian models can be represented and inferred by such networks, but they do not exhibit any neuronal plausible learning mechanism. [7] presented another approach to Bayesian inference using probabilistic population codes, also without any learning result.
An interesting complementary approach is presented in [90], [91], where a single neuron is modeled as hidden Markov model with two possible states. This approach has the advantage, that the instantaneous synaptic input does not immediately decide the output state, but only incrementally influences the probability for switching the state. The weights and the temporal behavior can be learned online using local statistics. The downside of this approach is that this hidden Markov model can have only two states. In contrast, the SEM approach can be applied to networks with any number of output neurons.
In [92] it was shown that a suitable rule for supervised spike-based learning (the Tempotron learning rule) can be used to train a network to recognize spatio-temporal spike patterns. This discriminative learning scheme enables the recognizing neuron to focus on the most discriminative segment of the pattern. In contrast, our generative unsupervised learning scheme drives the recognizing neuron to generalize and spike many times during the whole pattern, and thus learns the spatial average activity pattern. The conductance based approach of [92] differs drastically from our method (and the results shown in the Supplement) insofar as here only STDP was used (focusing on average spatial patterns), no supervision was involved, and the time-warped input pattern had never been shown during training.
An alternative approach to implement the learning of generative probabilistic models in spiking neuronal networks is given in [93], [94]. Both approaches are based on the idea to model a sequence of spikes in a Hidden-Markov-Model-like probabilistic model and learn the model parameters through different variants of EM, in which a sequence of spikes represents one single sample of the model's distribution. Due to the explicit incorporation of inference over time, these models are more powerful than ours and thus require non-trivial, non-local learning mechanisms.
Experimentally testable predictions of the proposed model
Our analysis has shown, that STDP supports the creation of internal models and implements spike-based EM if changes of synaptic weights depend in a particular way on the current value of the weight: Weight potentiation depends in an inversely exponential manner on the current weight (see Eq. (5)). This rule for weight potentiation (see Fig. 8A) is consistent with all published data on this dependence: Fig. 5 in [43] and Fig. 5C in [40] for STDP, as well as Fig. 10 in [95] and Fig. 1 in [96] for other protocols for LTP induction. One needs to say, however, that these data exhibit a large trial-to-trial variability, so that it is hard to infer precise quantitative laws from them. On the other hand, the applications of STDP that we have examined in Fig. 37 work almost equally well if the actual weight increase varies by up to 100% from the weight increase proposed by our STDP rule (see open circles in Fig. 8A). The resulting distribution of weight increases matches qualitatively the above mentioned experimental data quite well.
Figure 8. Ideal dependence of weight potentiation under STDP on the initial value of the weight (solid lines).
Open circles represent results of samples from this ideal curve with 100% noise, that can be used in the previously discussed computer experiments with almost no loss in performance. A: Dependence of weight potentiation on initial weight according to the STDP rule in Eq. (5). B: Same with an additional factor .
The prediction of our model for the dependence of the amount of weight depression on the current weight is drastically different: Even though we make the strong simplification that the depression part of the STDP rule is independent of the time difference between pre- and postsynaptic spike, the formulation in Eq. (5) makes the assumption, that the amount of the depression should be independent of the current weight value. It is this contrast between an exponential dependency for LTP and a constant LTD which makes the weight converge to the logarithm of the conditional presynaptic firing probability in Eq. (6). In experiments this dependency has been investigated in-vitro [40]. There it has been found that the percentage of weight depression under STDP is independent of the current weight, which implies that the amount of depression is linear in the current weight value. This seems to contradict the presented learning rule. However, the key property that is needed for the desired equilibrium condition is the ratio between LTP and LTD. So the equilibrium proof in Eq. (28) remains unchanged if is multiplied (for potentiation and depression) by some arbitrary function of the current weight value. Choosing for example yields a depression whose percentage is independent of the initial value, which would be consistent with the above mentioned in-vitro data [40]. The resulting dependence for potentiation is plotted in Fig. 8B. Since this curve is very similar to that of Fig. 8A, the above mentioned experimental data for potentiation are too noisy to provide a clear vote for one of these two curves. Thus more experimental data are needed for determining the dependence of weight potentiation on the initial weight. Whereas the relevance of this dependency had previously not been noted, our analysis suggests that such a contrast it is in fact essential for the capability of STDP to create internal models for high-dimensional spike inputs.
Our analysis has shown, that if the excitability of neurons is also adaptive, with a rule as in Eq. (7) that is somewhat analogous to that for synaptic plasticity, then neurons can also learn appropriate priors for Bayesian computation. Several experimental studies have already confirmed, that the intrinsic excitability of neurons does in fact increase when they are more frequently activated [45], see [97], [14] and [39] for reviews. But a quantitative study, which relates the resulting change in intrinsic excitability to its initial value, is missing.
Our model proposes that pyramidal neurons in cortical microcircuits are organized into stochastic WTA circuits, that together represent a probability distribution. This organization is achieved by a suitably regulated common inhibitory signal, where the inhibition follows the excitation very closely. Such instantaneous balance between excitation and inhibition was described by [34]. A resulting prediction of the WTA structure is that the firing activity of these neurons is highly de-correlated due to the inhibitory competition. In contrast to previous experimental results, that reported higher correlations, it has recently been confirmed in [35] for the visual cortex of awake monkey that nearby neurons, even though they share common input show extremely low correlations.
Another prediction is that neural firing activity especially for awake animals subject to natural stimuli is quite sparse, since only those neurons fire whose internal model matches their spike input. A number of experimental studies confirm this predictions (see [98] for a review). Our model also predicts, that the neural firing response to stimuli exhibits a fairly high trial-to-trial variability, as is typical for drawing repeated samples from a posterior distribution (unless the posterior probability is close to 0 or 1). A fairly high trial-to-trial variability is a common feature of most recordings of neuronal responses (see e.g. [99], Fig. 1B in [100]; a review is provided in [101]). In addition, our model predicts that this trial-to-trial variability decreases for repeatedly occurring natural stimuli (especially if this occurs during attention) and discrimination capability improves for these stimuli, since the internal models of neurons are becoming better fitted to their spike input during these repetitions (“sharpening of tuning”), yielding posterior probabilities closer to 1 or 0 for these stimuli. These predictions are consistent with a number of experimental data related to perceptual learning [102], [103], and with the evolution of neuronal responses to natural scenes that were shown repeatedly in conjunction with nucleus basalis stimulation [104].
In addition our model predicts that if the distribution of sensory inputs changes, the organization of codes for such sensory inputs also changes. More frequently occurring sensory stimuli will be encoded with a finer resolution (see [105] for a review of related experimental data). Furthermore in the case of sensory deprivation (see [106]) our model predicts that neurons that used to encode stimuli which no longer occur will start to participate in the encoding of other stimuli.
We have shown in Fig. 3 that an underlying background oscillation on neurons that provide input to a WTA circuit speeds up the learning process, and produces more precise responses after learning. This result predicts that cortical areas that collaborate on a common computational task, especially under attention, exhibit some coherence in their LFP. This has already been shown for neurons in close proximity [107] but also for neurons in different cortical areas [108], [109].
If one views the modules for Bayesian computation that we have analyzed in this article as building blocks for larger cortical networks, these networks exhibit a fundamental difference to networks of neurons: Whereas a neuron needs a sufficiently strong excitatory drive in order to reach its firing threshold, the output neurons of a stochastic WTA circuit according to our model in Eq. (3) are firing already on their own - even without any excitatory drive from the input neuron (due to assumed background synaptic inputs; modeled in our simulations by an Ornstein-Uhlenbeck process, as suggested by in-vivo data [110]). Rather, the role of the input from the -neurons is to modulate which of the neurons in the WTA circuit fire. One consequence of this characteristic feature is that even relatively few presynaptic neurons can have a strong impact on the firing of the -neurons, provided the -neurons have learned (via STDP) that these -neurons provide salient information about the hidden cause for the total input from all presynaptic neurons. This consequence is consistent with the surprisingly weak input from the LGN to area V1 [16], [111], [112]. It is also consistent with the recently found exponential distance rule for the connection strength between cortical areas [112]. This rule implies that the connection strength between distal cortical areas, say between primary visual cortex and PFC, is surprisingly weak. Our model suggests that these weak connections can nevertheless support coherent brain computation and memory traces that are spread out over many, also distal, cortical areas.
Apart from these predictions regarding aspects of brain computation on the microscale and macroscale, a primary prediction of our model is that complex computations in cortical networks of neurons - including very efficient and near optimal processing of uncertain information - are established and maintained through STDP, on the basis of genetically encoded stereotypical connection patterns (WTA circuits) in cortical microcircuits.
According to our input model, every external multinomial variable , with is encoded through a group of neurons , with . The generative model from Fig. 1B is implicitly encoded in the WTA circuit of Fig. 1A with excitatory neurons by:(19)
where is the binary indicator function of taking on value . In the generative model we define the binary variables and set if represents the value of the multinomial variable (with s.t. ) and , otherwise . The sets represent a partition of , thus and the form used in Eq. (9) are equivalent expressions. The value of the normalization constant can be calculated explicitly as(20)
This generative model can be rewritten as a mixture distribution with parameters and :(21)
In order to show how the constants cancel out we write the full joint distribution of and the “hidden cause” as the product of the prior and the likelihood :(24)
Under the normalization conditions in Eq. (10) the parameters of the mixture distribution simplify to and , since all and .
The generative model in Eq. (24) is well defined only for vectors , such that there is exactly one “1” entry per group . However, in the network model with rectangular, renewable EPSPs, there are time intervals where may violate this condition, if the interval between two input spikes is longer that . It is obvious from Eq. (24) that this has the effect of dropping all factors representing , since this results in an exponent of . Under proper normalization conditions (or at least if all have identical values), this drop of an entire input group in the calculation of the posterior in Eq. (11) is identical to performing inference with unknown (see ‘Impact of missing input values’). Eq. (11) holds aslong as there are no two input spikes from different neurons within the same group closer than , which we have assumed for the simple input model with rectangular, renewable EPSPs.
Equilibrium condition
We will now show that all equilibria of the stochastic update rule in Eq. (5) and Eq. (7), i.e., all points where , exactly match the implicit solution conditions in Eq. (46), and vice versa:(28)
Analogously, one can show that . Note that this result implies that the learning rule in Eq. (5) and Eq. (7) has no equilibrium points outside the normalization conditions in Eq. (10), since all equilibrium points fulfill the implicit solutions condition in Eq. (46) and these in turn fulfill the normalization conditions.
Details to Learning the parameters of the probability model by EM
In this section we will analyze the theoretical basis for learning the parameters of the generative probability model given in Eq. (9) from a machine learning perspective. In contrast to the intuitive explanation of the Results section which was based on Expectation Maximization we will now derive an implicit analytical solution for a (locally) optimal weight vector , and rewrite this solution in terms of log probabilities. We will later use this derivation in order to show that the stochastic online learning rule provably converges towards this solution.
For an exact definition of the learning problem, we assume that the input is given by a stream of vectors , in which every is drawn independently from the input distribution . In principle, this stream of 's corresponds to the samples that are observed at the spike times of the circuit. However, in order to simplify the proofs in this and subsequent sections, we will neglect any possible temporal correlation between successive samples.
The learning task is to find parameter values , such that the marginal of the model distribution approximates the actual input distribution as accurately as possible. This is equivalent to minimizing the Kullback-Leibler divergence between the two distributions:(29)
where is the (constant) entropy of the input distribution , and denotes the expectation over , according to the distribution . Since is constant, minimizing the right hand side of Eq. (29) is equivalent to maximizing the expected log likelihood .
We thus redefine the goal of learning more precisely as the constrained maximization problem(30)
This maximization problem never has a unique solution , because any permutation of the values of and their corresponding weights leads to different joint distributions , all of them having identical marginals . The local maxima of Eq. (30) can be found using the Lagrange multiplier method.
Note that we do at no time enforce normalization of during the learning process, nor do we require normalized initialization of . Instead, we will show that the learning rule in Eq. (5,7) automatically drives towards a local maximum, in which the normalization conditions are fulfilled.
Under the constraints in Eq. (31) the normalization constant in Eq. (21) equals , thus simplifies to - with - and we can define a Lagrangian function for the maximization problem in Eq. (30,31) by(32)
Setting the derivatives to zero we arrive at the following set of equations in and :(33)
Summing over those equations that have the same multiplier or , resp., leads to(35)
where is the shorthand notation for the equivalent expression . The identity , the identity the fact that , which follows from the definition of population encoding, and the constraints in Eq. (31) are used in order to derive the explicit solution for the Lagrange multipliers(37)
in dependence of . We insert this solution for into the gradient Eq. (33,34) and get(38)
from which we derive an implicit solution for :(39)
It is easily verified that all fixed points of this implicit solution satisfy the normalization constraints:(40)
Finally, in order to simplify the notation we use the augmented input distribution . The expectations in Eq. (39) nicely evaluate to(42)
which allows us to rewrite the implicit solution in a very intuitive form as:(46)
Any weight vector that fulfills Eq. (46) is either a (local) maximum, a saddle point or a (local) minimum of the log likelihood function under the normalization constraints.
An obvious numerical approach to solve this fixed point equation is the repeated application of Eq. (39). According to the derivations in the Results section this corresponds exactly to the Expectation Maximization algorithm. But every single iteration asks for the evaluation of expectations with respect to the input distribution , which theoretically requires infinite time in an online learning setup.
Details to Spike-based Expectation Maximization
We derive the update rule in Eq. (5) from the statistical perspective that each weight can be interpreted as , where and correspond to counters of the events and . Every new event leads to a weight update(47)
where the log-function is linearly approximated around 1 as . The factor is understood as learning rate in the additive update rule . If , i.e. if there is no postsynaptic spike, the update . In the case of a postsynaptic spike, i.e., , the update decomposes in the two cases and as it is stated explicit in Eq. (5).
As a side note, we observe that by viewing our STDP rule as an approximation to counting statistics, the learning rate can be understood as the inverse of the equivalent sample size from which the statistics was gathered. If the above rule is used with a small constant learning rate we will get a close approximation to an exponentially decaying average. If the learning rate decays like we will get an approximation to an online updated average, where all samples are equally weighted. We will come back to a regulation mechanism for the learning rate in the section ‘Variance Tracking’.
Details to Proof of convergence
In this section we give the proof of Theorem 1. Formally, we define the sequences , , , and for : For all we assume that is drawn independently from . The value of is drawn from the posterior distribution of the model (see Eq. (11)), given the input and the current model parameters . The weight updates , and , are calculated according to Eq. (5) and (7) with . The sequence of weight vectors is determined by the randomly initialized vector , and by the iteration equation(51)
The projection function represents a coordinate-wise clipping of to a hyper-rectangle such that (52)
The bound is assumed to be chosen so that all (finite) maxima of are inside of . For the sequence of learning rates we assume that(53)
Under these assumptions we can now restate the theorem formally:
Theorem 1: The sequence converges with probability 1 to the set of all points within the hyper-rectangle that fulfill the equilibrium conditions in Eq. (6). The stable convergence points among are the (local) maxima of , subject to the normalization constraints in Eq. (10).
The iterative application of the learning rule in Eq. (5) and (7) is indeed a stochastic approximation algorithm for learning a (locally) optimal parameter vector . We resort to the theory of stochastic approximation algorithms as presented in [52] and use the method of the “mean limit” ordinary differential equation (ODE). The goal is to show that the sequence of the weight vector under the stochastic learning rule in Eq. (5) and (7) converges to one of the local maxima of Eq. (30) with probability one, i.e., the probability to observe a non-converging realization of this sequence is zero. The location of the local maximum to which a single sequence of converges depends on the starting point as well as on the concrete realization of the stochastic noise sequence. We will not discuss the effect of this stochasticity in more detail, except for stating that a stochastic approximation algorithm is usually less prone to get stuck in small local maxima than its deterministic version. The stochastic noise introduces perturbations that decrease slowly over time, which has an effect that is comparable to simulated annealing.
We will use the basic convergence theorem of [52] to establish the convergence of the sequence to the limit set of the mean limit ODE. Then it remains to show that this limit set is identical to the desired set of all equilibrium points and thus, particularly, does not contain limit cycles.
Proof: In the notation of [52], the mean update of the stochastic algorithm in Eq. (51) is . The bounds imply that for all and .
For any set we define as the positive limit set of the mean limit ODE for all initial conditions :(54)
According to Theorem 3.1 in Chapter 5 of [52], the sequence under the algorithm in Eq. (51) converges for all start conditions to the limit set with probability one in the sense that(55)
We will now show that the limit set of is identical to the set of stationary points and does not contain limit cycles. It is obvious that is a subset of since for all initial conditions the trajectory of fulfills for all . Thus it remains to be shown that there are no other points in (like e.g. limit cycles).
We split the argument into two parts. In the first part we will show that for all trajectories of converge asymptotically to the manifold defined by the normalization constraints 31. This leads to the conclusion that . In the second part we will show that all trajectories within converge to the stationary points , i.e., . Both parts together yield the desired result that are the only limit points of the ODE .
The first part we start by defining the set of functions and for all to represent the deviation of the current from each of the normalization constraints 31, i.e.,(56)
The manifold is the set of all points where and for all . Furthermore, we calculate the gradient vectors and for each of these functions with respect to the argument . Note that many entries of these gradient vectors are , since every single function and only depends on a few entries of its argument . The nonzero entries of these gradients are(57)
We can now show that the trajectory of in any point always points in direction of decreasing absolute values for all deviations and :(58)
This shows that for all and . This implies that the limit set of all trajectories with initial conditions outside is contained in , or more formally . Note that the continuity and the boundedness of on implies and if for all . Therefore we can now conclude as the result of the first part(62)
i.e. the limit set of all trajectories starting outside the manifold of normalized weights is contained in the limit set of all trajectories starting within the normalization constraints. The equations (61) also prove that any trajectory with initial condition stays within , since all components of with directions orthogonal to the tangent space of in are for all , thus is in the tangent space in .
This immediately leads to the second part of the proof, which is based on the gradient of the Lagrangian as given in Eq. (33, 34). For any let be the linear projection matrix that orthogonally projects any vector into the tangent space of in . The projection of the gradient of at any points towards the strongest increase of the value of the objective function under the constraints of the normalization conditions. Thus, the value of increases in the direction of any vector within the tangent space of in that has a positive scalar product with . As is a tangent vector of in for all , the orthogonal component of the gradient is orthogonal to . Thus, the value of the scalar product with the projected gradient is identical to the value of the scalar product with the gradient itself :(63)
with equality if and only if , which is equivalent to . This shows that all trajectories with initial condition stay within forever and converge to the set of stationary points , i.e. . Combining the results of both parts as(64)
establishes the stochastic convergences of any sequence to the set with probability one.
Weight offsets and positive weights.
All weights in the theoretical model are logs of probabilities and therefore always have negative values. Through a simple transformation we can shift all weights into the positive range in order to be able to use positive weights only, which is the common assumption for excitatory connections in biologically inspired neural network models. We will now show that setting the parameter in Eq. (5) different from 1 leads to a linear shift of the resulting weight values by , without changing the functionality of the Spike-based EM algorithm.
Firstly, we observe that the application of the update rule in Eq. (5) with on a shifted weight is identical to the application of the update rule with on the original weight , since(65)
Secondly, we see that the relative firing rate of neuron remains unchanged if all weights are subject to the same offset , since(66)
In contrast, the overall firing rate increases by the factor . By our definition of the population coding for , this factor equals , where is the number of original input variables . An increase of the inhibitory signal by can therefore compensate the increase of overall firing rate. Using this shifted representation, a single excitatory synapse can take on values in the range , corresponding to probabilities in the range .
Similarly the consideration holds valid that it is mathematically equivalent whether the depression of the excitability in Eq. (7) is modeled either as an effect of lateral spiking activity or as a constant decay, independent of the circuit activity. In the first case, converges to the relative spiking probability of the neuron such that the sum of all is indeed 1 as described by our theory. In the second case, the really describe absolute firing rates in some time scale defined by the decay constant. In the logarithmic scale of this is nothing else than a constant offset and thus cancels down in Eq. (68).
Impact of missing input values.
The proof of theorem 1 assumes that every sample gathered online is a binary vector which contains exactly one entry with value 1 in every group . This value indicates the value of the abstract variable that is encoded by this group. As long as the spikes from the input neurons are closely enough in time, this condition will be fulfilled for every activation vector . For the cases in which the value of the abstract variable changes, the first spike from group has to appear exactly at that point in time at which the rectangular EPSP for the previous value vanishes, i.e., ms after the last preceding spike.
We will now break up this strong restriction of the provable theory and analyze the results that are to be expected, if we allow for interspike intervals longer than . We interpret the resulting “gaps” in the information about the value of an input group as missing value in the sense of Bayesian inference.
We had already addressed the issue of such missing values, resulting from presynaptic neurons that do not spike within the integration time window of an output neuron , in the discussion of Fig. 3.
A profound analysis of the correct handling of missing data in EM can be found in [48]. Their analysis implies that the correct learning action would be to leave all weights in the group unchanged, if the value of the external variable is missing, i.e., if all corresponding 's are 0. However, in this case the STDP rule in Eq. (5) reduces these weights by . This leads to a modification of the analysis of the equilibrium condition (28):(69)
where is the probability that belongs to a group in which the value of is unknown. We assume that the probability for such a missing value event is independent of the (true) value of the abstract variable and we assume further that the probability of such missing value events is the same for all groups and thus conclude that this offset of is expected to be the same for all weights. It can easily be verified, that such an offset does not change the resulting probabilities of the competition in the inference according to Eq. (68).
Adaptive learning rates with Variance Tracking.
In our experiments we used an adaptation of the variance tracking heuristic from [73] for an adaptive control of learning rates. If we assume that the consecutive values of the weights represent independent samples of their true stochastic distribution at the current learning rate, then this observed distribution is the log of a beta-distribution defined by the parameters and that were used in Eq. (50) to define the update of from sufficient statistics. Analytically (see supplement) this distribution has the first and second moments(70)
From the first equation we estimate . This leads to a heuristic estimate for the (inverse of the) current sample size based on the empirically observed variance :(71)
The empirical estimates of these first two moments can be gathered online by exponentially decaying averages using the same learning rate . Even though the assumption of independent samples for the estimates of the moments is not met, one can argue about two cases: In case of a stationary evolution of the weight, the strong dependence of consecutive samples typically leads to an underestimation of the variance. This in turn leads to a decrease of the learning rate which is the desired effect of a stationary evolution. In case of a directed evolution of the weight the variance will at least indicate the amount of the current gradient of the evolution despite the strong dependence and thus keep the learning rate high enough to support fast convergence towards the asymptote of the gradient.
An adaptive learning rate such as in Eq. (71) facilitates a spontaneous reorganization of the internal models encoded by the weight vectors of the output neurons in case that the input distribution changes (see Fig. S1 in Text S1).
Details to Role of the Inhibition
Biased sampling problem.
In this section we analyze the influence of the instantaneous output firing rate of the learning circuit and derive the analytical result that the output rate plays the role of a multiplicative weighting of samples during learning. We show how a theoretically optimal inhibition signal can compensate this effect and describe how this compensation is approximated in our experiments.
We start with the assumption that the input signal can be described by some stationary stochastic process. An empirical estimate of its stationary distribution can be obtained by measuring the relative duration of presentation of every different discrete value in a time window of length . The accuracy of this empirical estimate of the input distribution can be increased by using a longer time window , such that in the limit of an infinitely large time window the estimate will converge to the true stationary input distribution of , denoted by :(72)
where is a vectorized version of the Kronecker Delta with and , if .
However, even though the WTA-circuit receives this time-continuous input stream , the spike-triggered STDP rule in Eq. (5) and (7) updates the model parameters - i.e. the synaptic weights - only at those time points where one of the output neurons spikes. We denote by the (empirical) distribution that is obtained from the observations of at the first spike events :(73)
The distribution that is seen by the learning rule in Eq. (5) depends not only on the time-continuous input stream , but also on the concrete spike times of the circuit. The output spikes thus serve as trigger events at which the continuous input signal is sampled.
The spike times and the total number of spikes of the whole circuit within a time window of length are distributed according to an inhomogeneous Poisson process with the instantaneous rate . For any stochastic realization of and in the time interval to , we can derive the expectation of the function by taking the limit for and call this the expected empirical distribution . Thus(74)
where we divided the expectation into two parts. Firstly we take the expectation over the total number of spikes, secondly we take the expectation over the spike times , given . We now make use of the fact that for any inhomogeneous Poisson process , conditioned on the total number of events within a certain time window , the event times are distributed as order statistics of unordered independent samples from the probability density . The expectation over an arbitrary function is the integral , independent of the event number , thus(76)
Since the remaining term within the expectation operator is independent of we obtain the final result(79)
This shows that the output rate acts as a multiplicative weighting of the contribution of the current input to the expected empirical distribution , which is learned in the limit of by the simple STDP rule in Eq. (5) and (7).
It turns out that the condition of a constant rate is by far stronger than necessary. In fact, it is easy to see from a comparison of Eq. (72) and Eq. (79), that for all values of if and only if the relative weight for the input value , which is , is independent of in the limit . This is certainly true if and are stochastically independent, i.e. is not correlated to the occurrence of any specific value of .
Inhibition model in computer simulations.
In our computer simulation the inhibition is implemented by adding a strongly negative impulse to the membrane potential of all -neurons whenever one of them fires, which decays with a time constant of 5 ms back to its resting value. In addition, a noise term is added to the membrane potential that models background synaptic inputs through an Ornstein-Uhlenbeck (OU) process (as proposed in [110] for modeling in-vivo conditions) and causes stochastic firing. For each experiment, all parameters for the inhibition model are listed in “Simulation Parameters” in the Supplementary Material.
Details to Continuous-Time Interpretation with Realistically Shaped EPSPs
Let the external input vector consist of multiple discrete-valued functions in time , and let us assume that for every input there exists an independent Poisson sampling process with rate which generates spike times for the group of neurons with . At every spike time there is exactly one neuron in the group that fires a spike, and this is the neuron that is associated with the value . First, we analyze additive step-function EPSPs, i.e. the postsynaptic activation is given by the convolution in Eq. (17) where is a step-function kernel with for for a fixed EPSP-duration and otherwise. In order to understand the resulting distribution in Eq. (4) as Bayesian inference we extend our underlying generative probabilistic model such that it contains multiple instances of the variable vector , called , where is the total number of spikes from all input neurons within the time window . We can see every spike as a single event in continuous time. The full probabilistic model is defined as(80)
which defines that the multiple instances are modeled as being conditionally independent of each other, given . Let the vectors describe the corresponding spike “patterns” in which every binary vector has exactly one entry . All other values are zero, thus it represents exactly one evidence for , i.e. , with , s.t. , according to the decoding in Eq. (8).
Due to the conditional independences in the probabilistic model every such evidence, i.e. every spike, contributes one factor to the likelihood term in the inference of the hidden node . The inference is expressed as (81)
The identity reveals that the above posterior distribution is realized by the relative spike probability of the network model according to Eq. (4), where replaces in the computation of the membrane potential . Due to the step function the result of the convolution in equals the number of spikes within the time window from neuron . The factor , which has the meaning in the network model, is multiplied times to the likelihood.
The above discrete probabilistic model gives an interpretation only for integer values of , i.e. for functions such that is or any positive integer at any time . For an interpretation of arbitrarily shaped EPSPs - especially for continuously decaying functions - in the context of our probabilistic model, we now extend this weighting mechanism from integer valued weights to real valued weights by a linear interpolation of the likelihood in the log-space.
The obvious restrictions on the EPSP function are that it is non-negative, zero for , and , in order to avoid acausal or nondecaying behavior, and unboundedly growing postsynaptic potentials at constant input rates. We assume the normalization . Let again be the times of the past spiking events and be the indices of the corresponding input neurons. The output distribution can be written as(82)
which nicely illustrates that every single past spike at time is seen as an evidence in the inference, but that evidence is weighted with a value , which is between 0 and 1.
The analogous interpolation for continuous-valued input activations yields the learning rule in Eq. (18), which is illustrated in Fig. 2 as the “Complex STDP rule” (blue dashed curve). The resulting shape of the LTP part of the STDP curve is determined by the EPSP shape defined by . The positive part of the update in Eq. (18) is weighted by the value of at the time of firing the postsynaptic spike. Negative updates are performed if is close to zero, which indicates that no presynaptic spikes were observed recently.
The proof of stochastic convergence does not explicitly assume that is a binary vector, but is valid for any (positive) random variable vector with finite variance. Further, the proof assumes the condition that in every group the sum of the input activities is at all times or at least at those points in time at which one neuron of the WTA-circuit fires. The condition can be relaxed such that the sum per group does not have to be equal to but to any arbitrary (positive) constant if the corresponding normalization constraint is adapted accordingly. Due to the decaying character of the EPSP shape, this sum will never stay constant, even for very regular input patterns. If we only assumed a constant average activation within a group, allowing for stochastic fluctuations around the target value, it turns out that this condition alone is not enough. We need to further assume that these stochastic fluctuations in the sum of every input group are stochastically independent of the circuit's response . This assumption is intricate and may depend on the data and the learning progress itself, so it will usually not be exactly fulfilled. We can, however, argue that we are close to independence if at least the sum of activity in every group is independent of the value of the underlying abstract variable .
In our simulations we obtain the input activations by simulating biologically realistic EPSPs at every synapse, using -kernels with plausible time constants to model the contributions of single input spikes.
Details to Spike-timing dependent LTD
We formalize the presynaptic activity of neuron after a postsynaptic spike at time by , s.t. if there is a spike from neuron within the time window and otherwise. This trace is used purely for mathematical analysis, and cannot be known to the postsynaptic neuron at time , since the future input activity is unknown. Mechanistically, however, can be implemented as a trace updated by postsynaptic firing, and utilized for plasticity at the time of presynaptic firing [113]. Let us now consider the STDP rule illustrated by the red curve in Fig. 9, where a depression of the synapse happens only if there is a presynaptic spike within the short time window of length after the postsynaptic spike, i.e. if . The application of this STDP-rule in our neuronal circuit is equivalent to the circuit-spike triggered update rule(83)
which replaces Eq. (5). In analogy to Eq. (6) the equilibrium of this new update rule can be derived as(84)
under the assumption that and are sampled from a stationary distribution . This shows that the synaptic weights can be interpreted as the log-likelihood ratio of the presynaptic neuron firing before instead of after the postsynaptic neuron. In other words, the neuron's synaptic weights learn the contrast between the current input pattern that caused firing, and the following pattern of activity . Note that any factor (for LTP) or (for LTD) only leads to a constant offset of the weight which - under the assumption that the offset is the same for all synapses - can be neglected due to the WTA circuit (see Methods “Weight offsets and positive weights”).
Figure 9. STDP learning curves with time-dependent LTD.
Under the simple STDP model (red curve), weight-dependent LTP occurs only if the postsynaptic spike falls within a time window of length after the presynaptic spike, and LTD occurs in a time window of the same length, but for the opposite order of spikes. This can be extended to a more complex STDP rule (blue dashed curve), in which both LTP and LTD follow -kernels with different time constants, typically with longer time-constants for LTD.
Similarly to our analysis for the standard SEM rule, we can derive a continuous-time interpretation of the timing-dependent LTD rule. As we did in Eq. (17), we can define(86)
where is the same convolution kernel as in Eq. (17), and is an arbitrary but time-inversed kernel, such that for positive and for negative . The value of thus reflects a time-discounted sum of presynaptic activity immediately after the postsynaptic spike.
The complex STDP rule from Fig. 2, which models LTD as a constant time-independent depression, can be seen as an extreme case of the spike-timing dependent LTD rule. If is a step function with in the interval and everywhere else, then is just the average rate of presynaptic activity in the time interval following a postsynaptic spike. In the limit of this is equivalent to the overall spiking rate of the neuron , which is proportional to the marginal in the probabilistic model. Precisely, , where is the base firing rate of an active input in our input encoding model. The equilibrium point of every weight becomes , neglecting the offsets induced by the constants , and . It is easy to see that the probabilistic interpretation of the neuronal model from Eq. (4) is invariant under the transformation , since(87)
which proves that in our network model the complex STDP rule from Fig. 2 is equivalent to an offset-free STDP rule in the limit of an arbitrarily long window for LTD. In practice, of course, we can assume that the times between pre- and post-synaptic spikes are finite, and we have shown in Fig. 4 that as a result, very realistic shapes of STDP curves emerge at intermediate stimulation frequencies.
Supporting Information
Text S1.
Supplement. Derivation of Variance tracking, Adaptation to changing input distributions, Invariance to Time-Warping, Simulation Parameters.
We would like to thank Wulfram Gerstner for critical comments to an earlier version of this paper. MP would like to thank Rodney J. Douglas and Tobi Delbruck for their generous advice and support.
Author Contributions
Conceived and designed the experiments: BN MP WM. Performed the experiments: BN MP. Wrote the paper: BN MP LB WM.
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cover art
Series Premiere
Director: Alan Poul
Cast: Eric McCormack, Rachel Leigh Cook, Arjay Smith, Jonathan Scarfe, Kelly Rowan
Regular airtime: Mondays, 10pm ET
United States law enforcement is on the rocks. At least that’s the case on primetime television over the past decade, where cops are running so far behind the bad guys that they’re hiring consultants left, right, and center. These civilian employees offer insight of a particular kind, the mystic connection to the criminal act that no well-trained, hard-working detective could possibly achieve.
You might think professionals would be helpful in such outsourcing. But you’d be wrong. TV cops tend to seek out the fakes—the faux psychics, con men, art thieves, novelists, and one very tight-assed forensic anthropologist. You might also think the need for esoteric illumination would indicate more complex cases, but you’d be wrong about that too. Rather, the puzzles in these shows are reduced in difficulty, making the cops’ bafflement one more reason to disdain them and—apparently—welcome the outsider, as untrained and unlikely as he or she may be.
The latest recruit to the post-procedural cop show parade is Dr. Daniel Pierce (Eric McCormack), a brilliant neuroscientist who struggles with paranoid schizophrenia and needs a 24-hour-a-day minder to stay on track. Yet, as Perception premieres 9 July, we see that he also enthralls lecture halls full of the young and the privileged, and still has time to play guru for the FBI, at the request of his former student Kate (Rachel Leigh Cook).
To some aspirant Frankenstein in the backrooms of TNT, this mangled marriage of Monk and A Beautiful Mind might have seemed like a shortcut to winning summer ratings. But it is instead inept, and sometimes offensive, drivel, turning serious mental illness into a chic tic and woefully underestimating the intelligence of its audience. Even McCormack’s efforts to render a nuanced portrait of a talented scholar struggling to stay afloat cannot save this mess.
Despite McCormack’s efforts to humanize Pierce, but too often his hallucinations, struggles to still his frenetic mind, and escapes to visit with best friend Natalie (Kelly Rowan), who may or may not be real, are framed as if merely comic clowning. Worse, by denigrating both the acute pain mental illness causes and the exhausting struggle to sustain a professional life it entails, Perception diminishes Pierce as a sympathetic character. The show deepens this problem by its contradictory, romantic with a capital R, vision of intellectual brilliance, the cliché of genius and madness co-habiting in a single body, each a necessary condition of the other. Pierce is only valuable to the FBI because he is both brilliant and ill: he sees connections and patterns the healthy will never glimpse. The snag is that, while the tragic lives of a few mid-20th-century confessional poets gave a last shot of life to this early 19th-century myth, contemporary research on creativity has pretty much killed it. Somehow this show missed the death notice.
However problematic as protagonist, Pierce is, at least, a sketch of a character. The rest of the cast has one role only—to react to Pierce. Moretti gasps admiration, sometimes open-mouthed, while her partner, Agent Probert (Jonathan Scarfe), oozes petulant annoyance. Natalie dispenses wry wisdom, while his teaching assistant and live-in minder, Max Lewicki (Arjay Smith) perfects mildly exasperated affection.
To be fair, the plots are so formulaic that no other acting is required. A murder occurs. Pierce experiences a hallucination that hints at the core of the crime. When a killer taunts the police and Pierce with coded messages, a B-picture World WII British code breaker, complete with moustache and oiled down hair, appears. When a big-pharma exec is murdered, a lab rat conveniently pops up to prompt Pierce to recognize the culprit. (Even the hallucinations, surely the point where someone’s imagination might fly free of the predictable, are ploddingly literal.) The team makes a few wrong guesses, and maybe someone else dies, earning Pierce a few more visits from the hallucination of the week. Pierce agonizes, then leaps to the answer.
Perception lacks the wit, sidebar repartee or enigmatic withholding that makes shows like Monk, The Mentalist or Castle pleasant, if undemanding, viewing. In reworking the Sharona Fleming character from Monk as a young male student who lives with Pierce, the effect is discordant, as Max—the black character—serves as the body servant for the impolite and sometimes downright hostile Pierce. Max lays out Pierce’s clothes, prepares his meals, and supplies him with crossword puzzles.
When asked how he’ll manage when Max graduates, Pierce responds contemptuously that his TA has followed so many majors he’ll never graduate. Max, in turn, evidences all the blank-faced stoicism of the servant who needs his job. Even when he goes on strike over Pierce’s rudeness, he abandons him neither to his hallucinations nor to his everyday chaos. While the show suggests that Pierce’s indifference to others is a symptom of his illness, the pleasure he takes in Max’s perpetual dependence seems drawn from an earlier place and time—say, the US of the 1950s.
Perception marks the reductio ad absurdum of the brilliant oddball as criminal consultant genre. Or maybe its preposterousness helps us see the point of this expanding genre, where fantasies of problem-solving are enacted by backwards-looking citizen sleuths.
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Serious Sam HD Review: This Time It's Really SeriousS
Developer Croteam has ported its 2001 first-person shooter Serious Sam: The First Encounter to Xbox Live Arcade with Serious Sam HD. The game is a time capsule. A really, really shiny one. Covered in bloody body parts.
Plot-wise, Serious Sam follows Sam as he travels back in time to save humankind from the evil Mental baddies. Sam slogs through ancient Egypt picking up objects, pushing stones, opening doors and shooting enemies—lots and lots of enemies with lots and lots of different weapons. There's exploding and carnage and lovely views of ancient Egypt.
For its day, the game had solid graphics, but the main draw was and still is the number of enemies the Croteam's engine could throw onscreen at once. Keeping in mind that this is a high-definition upgrade, not a new Serious Sam, let's see how the title has aged and how the HD port looks.
It's...HD: In case the title did not give this away, this is Serious Sam in high definition. The new coat of paint makes everything a tad on the shiny, glittery side, but for those players looking for a spruced up version of Serious Sam, the game does not disappoint. And for those gamers who are only familiar with gaming since, oh, I dunno, 2006, this title should certainly pass mustard for a downloadable game.
Loads of enemies: There are moments in Serious Sam, which amazingly have not aged. Hordes upon hordes of enemies on screen; it's at once numbing and at the same time a testament to the game's engine. A few of the set pieces are truly dazzling and hold up nearly a decade later.
You Sound So Serious: The game's sound design is one Serious Sam HD's truly unsung heroes. With so many bad dudes out to get you, sometimes it's only screaming or the stomping of hoofs that tip you off as to where the enemies are coming from. It's rather compelling to play a game in which sound is so important. The sound can also get unnerving, but that might precisely be the point.
Too Much Bait: Many things in Serious Sam HD cannot be taken seriously. No, make that most things. But the fact that when items are laid out and when you take those items, it spawns enemies whose only goal is to decrease your health or weaponry, the point of those items seems null-and-void.
Dummy Enemies: A guy running at me with no head probably is not too smart. Okay, fine. But why is the default attack for pretty much every single enemy a rush-down? The first couple times it's exciting, sure, but as the game goes on and on, it starts to drag. And drag. And drag.
Back, Back, Strafe, Strafe, Shooting: That pretty much what you do all game. There are times when you swim and push blocks. And the final boss is another can of worms altogether, but generally, Serious Sam HD is about running backwards or to the side while shooting.
As a pure port, Serious Sam HD does the job. It's a nice looking port. But simply porting the game to HD, makes one wonder: Why not modernize some of the gameplay as well? Certainly, it would be another game, but a few tweaks here and there, and the game could really sing for today's audiences. A lot of the game feels like busy work — you must go over here and touch this and then all the way over there to touch that so that door over there will open. There isn't much motivation to do these actions other than stock gaming conventions. The graphical update is skin-deep — like a colorized version of an old black-and-white film. The argument against system, mechanic or gameplay tweaks, of course, is that Serious Sam HD would no longer be a pure port, which is a fair point.
That being said, Serious Sam HD is an intriguing game. It's a time capsule, showing how far first-person-shooters have come since 2001 and, at the same time, holding its own with some truly spectacular set pieces.
Serious Same HD was developed by Croteam and published by Devolver Digital for Xbox LIVE Arcade on January 13. Retails for 1200 Microsoft Points and $19.99 USD. A copy of the game was given to us by the publisher for reviewing purposes. Played through single-player campaign on the Xbox 360.
Confused by our reviews? Read our review FAQ | [] |
Take the 2-minute tour ×
(i) Are there limits on how many numbers must be in the set? { 1, 2 } or { 1, 5, 7, 8 , 9}
(ii) Are there limitations on how diverse or similar the numbers in the set can be? Coprime? Pairwise? { 1, 3, 9, 81 } (essentially powers of 3)
(iii) Is there any limitations on the relationship between the numbers of the set and the size of the knapsack?
(iv) If I were to make my own knapsack problem what strict criteria must I follow? For instance, is a knapsack of 3, and the set {1, 5, 6, 2} a legitimate knapsack problem? Meaning this example has a complexity class NP-Complete? I understand the concepts of weakly NP-Complete and pseudo-polynomial time...
(v) If one shows a problem to be a knapsack problem, and solves the problem with a psuedo-polynomial algorithm, is it possible that the same algorithm could not be used to solve all examples of knapsacks with limited sets of relatively small integers? If so, would this algorithm still be considered a solution to the Knapsack Problem or simply a solution to this unique instance of the Knapsack Problem?
(vI) Lastly, how important is it for the 'boxes' to have values and weights? It seems to me the subset sum, which is NP-Complete by reduction from the Knapsack Problem, only has weights and lacks the value variable? (As depicted in the wikipedia.org entry associated image)
I have read the wikipedia.org entry extensively as well as some arXiv entries on the subject and excerpts of books on Google Books along with other random online resources, but I was still left with these questions... Thank you
share|improve this question
try posting at math.stackexchange.com/questions?sort=newest – Will Jagy Aug 7 '11 at 22:33
Complexity Theory deals with families of problems. Hence, it does not even begin to make sense to say that a single instance of a problem is in NP or not. You need to get a hold of a good introductory book on complexity theory, I don't think wikipedia will be enough to learn all this. – Thierry Zell Aug 7 '11 at 22:55
I don't think the "set-theory" tag is appropriate here. – Quinn Culver Aug 7 '11 at 23:35
Edited tags to remove [set-theory] – David Roberts Aug 8 '11 at 0:10
Before you post to math.stackexchange, take Thierry's comment on board. – Gerry Myerson Aug 8 '11 at 1:31
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closed as not a real question by Will Jagy, quid, David Roberts, Andreas Blass, Gerry Myerson Aug 8 '11 at 10:56
1 Answer
up vote 0 down vote accepted
Let me try to give (very partial) answers. I think that your questions need some clarifications if you want more useful answers.
(i) I do not think your question is well-posed. As already mentioned in comments, you cannot fix the instance size and speak about NP-completeness. Nevertheless, you could define a new problem k-KNAPSACK where you are given a set of k integers, and where the measure of the instance size is the size of the integers that appear. My 2-cent guess is that this problem is solvable in polynomial time.
(ii) & (iii): These questions make sense, but I have no answer. The good way to find answers is to look at the reduction proving that KNAPSACK is NP-hard. (You can find it in [1] for example, but you must be able to find it via your favorite search engine.) If I am not mistaken, the reduction is a very basic one from PARTITION so you should need to look at PARTITION too, and then continue, to see whether you can modify it a bit to make your integers pairwise coprime for instance. I sort of remember that some restrictions of PARTITION still are NP-complete (though I do not remember what these are), so it should be possible to restrict a bit KNAPSACK so that it remains NP-complete. Note however that for instance if you fix a bound on the size of the integers in the set, then the problem has a polytime algorithm.
[1] Michael R. Garey and David S Johnson. Computers and Intractability: A Guide to the Theory of NP-Completeness. Series of Books in the Mathematical Sciences. W. H. Freeman, 1979.
(iv) I am not able to give a sense to this question.
(v) I am not sure what you mean by "a problem to be a knapsack problem". If you have a problem that can be reduced to KNAPSACK and if you have a good algorithm for this problem, you do not have a good algorithm for KNAPSACK: For, remember that any polynomial-time computable problem can be reduced to KNAPSACK... But in the converse sense it may work: if you can reduce KNAPSACK to a problem for which you have a pseudo-polytime algorithm, and if the reduction is very simple (when you say that a problem is a knapsack problem, it may be understood as "there exists a direct translation between both problems"), that is it is really a mere rewriting of the problem, then the algorithm should work on KNAPSACK. But once again, this really depends on what you exactly mean by "a problem to be a knapsack problem". N.B.: Speaking about pseudo-polytime does not make sense with "small instances", since an algorithm has to be able to handle with any size of input.
(vi) No importance since, as you correctly states it, if each element has the same weight as its value, this is SUBSET SUM.
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Thanks Bruno, my lingering question I suppose is what criteria needs to be met to give an instance of the Knapsack Problem the complexity class NP-Complete? – user17007 Aug 8 '11 at 10:22
From the wiki : Pseudo-polynomial time : "In computational complexity theory, a numeric algorithm runs in pseudo-polynomial time if its running time is polynomial in the numeric value of the input (which is exponential in the length of the input – its number of digits)." So am I reading this wrong in thinking it says that such a classification's running time depends on the number of digits, or size of values, or ... Further stating instances can run in pseudo-polynomial if the values of its digits are small enough, but nondeterministic polynomial time if the values have many digits? – user17007 Aug 8 '11 at 19:20
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Michael Robinton > Net-Connection-Sniffer-0.36 > Net::Connection::Sniffer
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Module Version: 0.36 Source
Net::Connection::Sniffer -- gather stats on network connections
use Net::Connection::Sniffer;
Net::Connection::Sniffer is a perl module to gather connection statistics by listening to ethernet traffic. Traffic is filtered using standard BPF notation as described in the tcpdump documentation and implemented using the standard pcap library to sniff packets on host network interfaces.
Create a directory with appropriate permissions for the pid file and the profile statistics dump file. Typical installation:
mkdir -p /var/run/nc.sniffer
Edit the nc.sniffer.pl.sample file to change or set the following:
my $config = {
# specify the directory for the pid file for this daemon.
# The directory must exist and have writable permissions.
# [required]
piddir => '/var/run/nc.sniffer',
# specify the directory for the statistics file for this
# daemon. The directory must exist and have writable
# permissions
# [required]
sniffer => '/var/run/nc.sniffer',
# BPF filter statement. See examples below.
# [required]
bpf => 'src host myhost.com and tcp port 80',
# size of the portion of packet to capture, defaults
# to the minimum size necessary to determine the
# source and destination IP addresses and port numbers
# [optional] ETH_head + IPV4_head + 4
# snaplen => 38,
# filter condition: payload must contain this string.
# case insensitive match of the payload data to this string.
# [optional]
# match => 'somestring',
# filter condition: payload must NOT contain this string.
# case insensitive match of the payload data to this string.
# [optional]
# nomatch => 'some.other.string',
# offset of the payload from the packet start
# typically at least 60 for tcp, 44 for udp
# [optional]... but [required] for 'match', 'nomatch'
# payload => 44,
# UDP listen port to trigger a dump file
# [optional]
port => 10004,
# HOST address on which to listen for dump request
# may be one of a HOSTNAME, IP address, or
# [optional] default == INADDR_LOOPBACK
host => 'INADDR_LOOPBACK',
# ALLOWED connecting host(s)
# may be HOSTNAME or IP address
# [optional] default
allowed => ['',],
To generate a web report to STDOUT with or without a cache file, edit the nc.sniffer.cgi.sample file to change or set the configuration parameters. See Net::Connection::Sniffer::Report::web_report or the sample file for details.
Usage: <!--#exec cmd="./nc.sniffer.cgi 0" -->
or <!--#exec cmd="./nc.sniffer.cgi 1" -->
where an argument of "0" produces a report ordered by /24 by usage and an argument of "1" produces a report ordered by subdomain by usage.
REMOTE CONFIGURATION, multiple hosts ^
To configure the reporting function to retrieve statistics from multiple remote hosts (and localhost) do the following:
1) read the config section of
2) read the config section of
On the remote host(s), install nc.sniffer.dump.pl in an appropriate sandbox account and install an ssh certificate to permit access to the sandbox ssh executable as well as the directory from which to rsync the stats file on that host.
nc.sniffer.dump.pl should be installed mode 755 or as appropriate to be accessed remotely by the ssh -e function.
On the web host, configure nc.sniffer.coalesce.cgi and place the execution cgi string in your web page to produce the report
nc.sniffer.coalesce.cgi should be SUID to the web user, not root, so that the web engine can safely execute the script. The ssh certificate must be generated for the web user and go in the nobody:nogroup/.ssh directory (or equivalent web user directory).
usage: <!--#exec cmd="./nc.sniffer.coalesce.cgi" -->
Launch the daemon with the command:
nc.sniffer.pl start
Syntax: nc.sniffer.pl start
nc.sniffer.pl stop
nc.sniffer.pl restart
nc.sniffer.pl status
nc.sniffer.pl dump
nc.sniffer.pl config
-d switch may be added to
redirect output to STDERR
On most systems it will be necessary to wrap a shell script around nc.sniffer.pl if the path for perl is not in scope during boot.
# shell script 'rc.nc.sniffer'
/path/to/nc.sniffer.pl $*
A sample shell script is included in the distribution as rc.nc.sniffer
To run multiple copies of nc.sniffer for data collection on various ports or IP's at the same time, name them:
start start daemon if not running, write pid file
stop stop a running daemon
restart do stop, then start
status report if daemon running or not
dump refresh/write statistics file
config print configuration to STDOUT
The statistics information will be written to the file specified in the configuration upon receipt of a SIG USR1
SIG TERM write stats file, terminate
SIG HUP write stats file, start over
SIG USR1 write statistics file
UDP listener -- statistics file dump ^
If the nc.sniffer daemon is configured for a UDP listen port, sending a message dump will produce the same result as SIG USR1. The daemon will respond OK timestamp, but this is NOT syncronized with the file dump and only indicates that the statistics file should not have a timestamp earlier that the epoch value returned. When either a dump or SIG USR1 is issued, you must check the ctime of the file to determine if it has been updated.
Net::Connection::Sniffer uses libpcap. The data collection is accomplished using a selectable capture device which is NOT SUPPORTED on Windows and some older BSD platforms. The next two paragraphs are from the pcap library and describe the platform limitations.
Some BPF ...devices do not support select() or poll() (for example, regular network devices on FreeBSD 4.3 and 4.4, and Endace DAG devices)...
...On most versions of most BSDs (including Mac OS X), select() and poll() do not work correctly on BPF devices. While a BPF file descriptor will be returned ...on most of those versions (the exceptions being FreeBSD 4.3 and 4.4), a simple select() or poll() will not return even after a... specified timeout expires... ...In FreeBSD 4.6 and later, select() and poll() work correctly on BPF devices...
BPF examples
The bpf entry in the configuration hash uses the standard language documented in detail in the tcpdump man(1) page. The bpf statement must contain at a minimum, 'host somename [or IP address]'. The host specification must be for a single unique IP address and be the first such specification if there are multiple src/dest host specifications in the statment.
Capture all traffic to/from a particular host:
bpf => 'host particular.host.com',
Capture traffic to/from your mail server:
bpf => 'host my.mx.com and tcp port 25',
Capture request traffic arriving at your DNS server:
bpf => 'dst host my.dns.com and udp port 53',
Capture response traffic leaving your DNS server:
bpf => 'src host my.dns.com and udp port 53',
Content MATCH/NOMATCH examples
The match and nomatch configuration entries can be used to further discriminate which packets to sniff. When the match entry is set, only packets which meet the BPF criteria AND have matching data within the packet capture buffer are selected for analysis. Conversely, when the nomatch entry is set, packets which meet the BPF criteria and match the nomatch string are unconditionally dropped. match and nomatch may both be set.
NOTE: that matches are made on a case insensitive basis.
Capture request traffic arriving at the DNS port with a query for somedomain.com. From RFC1035, we know that a datagram might need to use the domain names F.ISI.ARPA, FOO.F.ISI.ARPA, ARPA, and the root. Ignoring the other fields of the message, these domain names might be represented as:
20 | decimal 1 | F |
22 | decimal 3 | I |
24 | S | I |
26 | decimal 4 | A |
28 | R | P |
30 | A | 0 |
40 | decmial 3 | F |
42 | O | O |
44 | 1 1| decimal 20 |
64 | 1 1| decimal 26 |
92 | decimal 0 | |
Our examples somedomain.com would be represented in the datagram as follows:
20 | decimal 10 | s |
22 | o | m |
24 | e | d |
26 | o | m |
28 | a | i |
30 | n | decimal 3 |
30 | c | o |
30 | m | decimal 0 |
This translates to the perl string:
where 10 becomes hex \x{a}
$string = "\x{a}somedomain\x{3}com"
The offset of the query QUESTION is:
ETH header 16
IP header 20
UDP header 8
Query head 12
and the snaplen needs to be long enough to alway capture the domain name. There, our example configuration becomes:
match => "\x{a}somedomain\x{3}com",
snaplen => 90,
# eth head + ip head + udp head + query head
payload => 54,
The dump file is written in a format compatible with that produced by Data::Dumper. It may be imported for analysis using Perl's 'do' or by using File::SafeDO.
# start: 1145923212, Mon Apr 24 17:00:12 2006
# current: 1145923334, Mon Apr 24 17:02:14 2006
# hits: 3832 per minute
# bytes: 5927 per second
# users: 1234 users now
# device: eth1:1 non-promiscuous
# bpf: dst host my.host.com
# [optional if match/nomatch present]
# fragment: nn -- mm
# contains: match.string
# excludes: nomatch.string
my $dump = {
'' => {
B => 240,
C => 4,
E => 1145760699,
N => ['hostname1','hostname2','...'],
R => 723,
S => 1145757331,
T => 1145790478,
W => 43359,
Only one function is exported by Sniffer.pm. This function is called in the nc.sniffer.pl.sample script to launch the nc.sniffer daemon.
Launch the nc.sniffer daemon.
input: config hash
returns: nothing (exits)
The pcap library (libpcap) which is part of tcpdump and is included in most *nix distributions. Available from:
NetAddr::IP::Util which is part of distribution NetAddr::IP
There is a memory leak when run under Perl 5.0503 that has not yielded to debug attempts. This leak is not present in Perl 5.0601. Not tested in other versions. From reading through the Changes file for the transition between versions 5.005 and 5.6, I'm reasonably sure it is a scalar leak in Perl itself that was corrected with the updates to 5.6.
My recommend fix for now when running with Perl versions older than 5.6 is to restart the daemon daily to prevent excessive memory consumption.
COPYRIGHT 2004 - 2014 ^
Michael Robinton <[email protected]>
All rights reserved.
a) the GNU General Public License as published by the Free
later version, or
b) the "Artistic License" which comes with this distribution.
You should have received a copy of the Artistic License with this distribution, in the file named "Artistic". If not, I'll be glad to provide one.
Free Software Foundation, Inc.
59 Temple Place, Suite 330
Boston, MA 02111-1307, USA
or visit their web page on the internet at:
Michael Robinton <[email protected]>
man (1) tcpdump
man (3) pcap
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Vince Vaughn talks about his new film "Delivery Man" at the film's Hollywood premiere
Vince Vaughn arrives at the Los Angeles premiere of "Delivery Man" at the El Capitan Theatre. (Jason Merritt/Getty Images / November 3, 2013)
It's been a rough few years at the box office for Vince Vaughn.
Last summer, the actor reteamed with Owen Wilson in "The Internship" — an attempt to re-create the glory of their 2005 hit, "Wedding Crashers." But the comedy tanked at the box office, collecting just $44.6 million. It was the third flop in a row for Vaughn, after the failure of "The Watch" and "The Dilemma" — each of which grossed less than $50 million apiece.
The movies all had at least one thing in common: They were all bromances. (Vaughn was Kevin James' BFF in 2011's "The Dilemma" and fought aliens with Ben Stiller, Jonah Hill and Richard Ayoade in "The Watch" last year.)
PHOTOS: Billion-dollar movie club
Perhaps to try to change course, the 43-year-old leaves that genre behind in "Delivery Man," Ken Scott's remake of his French-Canadian film "Starbuck," which hits theaters Nov. 22.
In the film, which premiered at Hollywood's El Capitan Theatre on Sunday evening, Vaughn plays David Wozniak, a blue-collar meat delivery man who early in the film discovers he has fathered 533 children via copious sperm bank donations.
On the surface, it seems like Vaughn is doing more of the same — portraying a goofy, overgrown manchild who can't get his life together. But "Delivery Man" is designed to pull at the heartstrings more than much of his recent work, which tends to have him as the wise-guy opportunist half of a male duo. Vaughn's Wozniak may be absent-minded, but he's well-intentioned, serving as a self-proclaimed guardian angel over his kids. He saves one daughter from a possible drug overdose and visits a mentally handicapped son at a hospital.
On the set: movies and TV
So is Vaughn, who in August welcomed his second child, going ... soft?
The actor plays down the notion. “As much as this is a warm-hearted movie, it’s also very authentic,” the actor said somewhat defensively on the red carpet Sunday. “I wouldn’t describe it as a soft movie. It’s definitely not a polite movie.”
But just as Vaughn was selling the film's street cred, his co-star Chris Pratt was busy telling reporters how warm and fuzzy the film is.
"It does seem like an unusual premise for a family film," said Pratt, who plays Wozniak's schlubby lawyer. "But really, it's not the guffaw-type of movie that the premise would suggest. It really has a lot of heart."
He may not want to tell Vaughn that.
Box office: 'Ender's Game' moves only a few spaces
'Dallas Buyers Club,' 'Book Thief' angle for the 'passion vote'
'Ender's Game' producer: Don't throw out baby with the bath water | [] |
The cause of appendicitis isn't always clear. Sometimes appendicitis can occur as a result of:
• An obstruction. Food waste or a hard piece of stool (fecal stone) can block the opening of the cavity that runs the length of your appendix.
• An infection. Appendicitis may also follow an infection, such as a gastrointestinal viral infection, or it may result from other types of inflammation.
In both cases, bacteria inside the appendix multiply rapidly, causing the appendix to become inflamed, swollen and filled with pus. If not treated promptly, the appendix can rupture.
Aug. 13, 2011 | [] |
Take the 2-minute tour ×
We are having a memory allocation issues with a program running under Linux. We are using the top utility to try and determine the root cause of the problem. One thing that we have noticed is that one process has an excessively high value for shared memory (the SHR column in top).
Reading the MAN page for top leads me to believe that the SHR column represents the amount of memory for interprocess communications via shared memory. Is this correct?
If so, then does it make sense for ANY process to have allocated 50 - 60 megabytes of shared memory (X11 only allocates 11MB, which seems reasonable based on what it has to do).
share|improve this question
What program specifically? – John T Sep 28 '09 at 0:33
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2 Answers
up vote 3 down vote accepted
The SHR column simply represents the amount of shared memory used by the process. It can be used for interprocess communications, but a more common scenario is that this is memory used by shared libraries that an application has linked in.
From The Linux Kernel: Memory Management:
Shared Virtual Memory
Although virtual memory allows processes to have separate (virtual) address spaces, there are times when you need processes to share memory. For example there could be several processes in the system running the bash command shell. Rather than have several copies of bash, one in each processes virtual address space, it is better to have only one copy in physical memory and all of the processes running bash share it. Dynamic libraries are another common example of executing code shared between several processes.
Shared memory can also be used as an Inter Process Communication (IPC) mechanism, with two or more processes exchanging information via memory common to all of them. Linux supports the Unix TM System V shared memory IPC.
What the top man page says about this column:
t: SHR -- Shared Mem size (kb)
The amount of shared memory used by a task. It simply reflects mem‐
ory that could be potentially shared with other processes.
share|improve this answer
Thanks, this helps... – user7029 Sep 28 '09 at 3:46
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For example, Oracle tuning guides have recommended shared memory sizes of gigabytes.
That said, if the process is "cat", it probably doesn't make much sense.
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Your Answer
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Monday, March 17, 2014 AdarII 15, 5774
Posted In
Squeezing in a Studio
Thursday, July 25, 2013
Enlarge Image »
Dear Miriam,
I live in a wonderful studio in Center City. I really love my apartment, but it's small, obviously, and on several occasions recently, friends have come through town and asked to stay with me. I've told them the situation, and they've all said things like, "Oh, it's ok, I don't take up much space," or, "I don't mind being cramped for a night." They might not mind, but I do! How can I accommodate my friends without putting myself out?
Squeezing in a Studio
Dear Studio,
You should never be forced into having overnight guests who you didn't specifically invite to stay with you, so "no" should suffice on your end. Though it's totally understandable why you're "explaining the situation" to them, you're actually providing them with loopholes to find a reason that they should be able to stay with you after all. If the simple no really isn't enough, you could tell them that you (or your landlord, or your cat) have a policy of no overnight guests. For some reason the word "policy" often convinces people that the thing at hand is unchangeable.
Maybe there's a way that you can help them make alternate arrangements. Perhaps some local friends of yours have bigger apartments and would be willing to have guests, or maybe you know some people who are going to be out of town and have empty apartments while your visitors will be here. You can also say, "I'm sorry I can't help with sleeping arrangements, but I'd love to get together for a drink while you're in town." Then it's their responsibility to find a place to stay, but you're still being gracious. There also are (gasp) plenty of hotels in town, and some of them are even affordable.
The flip side is that if these are friends who are coming to town specifically in order to see you, you may need to be more helpful. Or, when you're making the arrangements about whether or not to have people visit you in your current city, this needs to be part of the initial discussion. Perhaps in these cases, you could make an exception and accept an overnight guest once in a while for one night at a time. Air mattresses aren't the worst thing in the world, and one night of being cramped to see a friend you really care about won't kill you. It may even bring back fond memories from your younger days and be kind of fun. Obviously, if it's never going to be fun for you under any circumstance, don't do it, but it could be worth looking at your own aversion in another light.
I can imagine that even if you're the most private, most guest-averse person out there, you might have one or two people in the world who you'd be comfortable having spend the night in your studio (sibling? best friend from childhood?), in which case, if they ever ask, feel free to say yes even if you've said no to everyone else. Your policy doesn't actually have to be immutable, but be prepared to explain the discrepancy if these people know each other. Also, none of this begins to take into account the potential presence of a significant other in life who might, sometimes, want to spend the night. I know that's not actually your question, but it's worth examining for yourself whether your studio living is a way to keep people at a distance. If it's really just a price thing, then enjoy your personal space and and enjoy your guests from whatever distance makes you happiest.
Be well,
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Need a passport? More investors are looking abroad (Mutual interest-Europe funds Q&A)
The Associated Press By The Associated Press The Associated Press
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on January 10, 2014 at 5:45 PM, updated January 10, 2014 at 5:46 PM
NEW YORK — Go west, investors. Oh, and east too. Stocks are back en vogue five years after the financial crisis, but the interest isn't universal: Investors are piling into mutual funds that own stocks outside the United States, whether it's from Asia to the west or Europe to the east. Last year, investors poured a net $137 billion into global stock mutual funds, according to TrimTabs Investment Research. That's more than seven times the $18 billion that went into U.S. stock funds.
The numbers look more balanced after including investments in exchange-traded funds, which hedge funds and other professional investors use more than traditional mutual funds, but the trend remains intact. A total of $195 billion went to global stock mutual funds and ETFs versus $156 billion to U.S.-only offerings.
The preference for foreign stock funds is a bit surprising, as investors often get criticized for chasing what's hot. Last year, U.S. stocks beat many other markets, and the Standard & Poor's 500 index had its best year since 1997. Edward Perkin, chief investment officer of international and emerging-markets equity at Goldman Sachs Asset Management, talked about what's attracting investors.
QUESTION: Foreign stocks have been scary in recent years, due either to the European debt crisis or slow growth in emerging markets. How much resistance is there from investors to foreign stocks?
ANSWER: I think six to 12 months ago, there was definitely resistance. There also tends to be a structural bias toward your home country. It's what you know. With the U.S., you can kind of get away with that because the U.S. represents 40 percent of the world's equity market capitalization. But we think you're missing a lot if you don't access non-U.S. stocks, and that message has been resounding increasingly over the last six months. Some of the fears around the sovereign debt crisis are abating, and people are getting more comfortable with the idea of putting money overseas.
QUESTION: So, Europe looks good?
ANSWER: There's a good story around Europe. European earnings are 35 percent below where they were in 2007, the peak year, so there's a lot of room to catch up. Expectations for 2014 are for 16 percent growth in earnings per share, and we think we're moving into a period when the next leg of equity market returns is going to have to come from earnings growth rather than from the price-earnings multiple.
QUESTION: Where's that growth coming from? Sales that European companies are making to customers in the U.S. and other countries? Or also European growth?
ANSWER: Both. The forecasts for European economic growth in 2014 are about 1 percent, which is not a heroic number. But the swing from minus to positive is more dramatic than people realize. The analysis we've done suggests that the biggest driver of earnings is not the absolute level of GDP but the rate of change. And if you look anywhere in the world, you're getting a bigger inflection point in Europe than anywhere else.
QUESTION: So Europe is by far the best place to be now?
ANSWER: We're overweight Europe in our global portfolio now, but I think Japan is interesting too. The thing that's really been missing in the global economy is animal spirits: CEOs and boards of directors being more willing to make aggressive decisions.
So we're on the lookout for signs of optimism and animal spirits. Where we're seeing that first is Japan. We've had a number of our portfolio managers go to Tokyo in the last two or three months, and they come back with stories of the hotel bars and restaurants being full of people - both locals and foreigners - with a buzz in the air and a positive spirit.
QUESTION: Emerging-market stocks struggled last year. Are they cheap enough to get you interested?
ANSWER: If you're a long-term investor putting money to work, you'll probably do alright. But versus the last 10 years, where emerging markets moved as a single asset class, you've got to be more selective. We're favoring the stuff that worked last year, and we're underweight what didn't work. We like anything facing the developed markets, export-oriented places like Korea, Taiwan, Mexico.
QUESTION: Do you think stocks are in a bubble?
ANSWER: I think any notion that there's a bubble is misplaced. You have too many people saying there's a bubble. If things were at an extreme, you'd expect to see more people explaining why it's not an extreme, which is maybe what I'm doing now. But there's sufficient debate about whether stocks are cheap or expensive and whether the economy is growing or not that it's healthy. When everyone is standing around saying there are no risks is when you need to worry.
--The Associated Press | [] |
Summary: Directly following the events in Jus In Bello, the Winchesters find themselves stuck in a small Minnesota town during
Summary: Directly following the events in Jus In Bello, the Winchesters find themselves stuck in a small Minnesota town during a blizzard, drawn into a hunt they are not prepared for.
This started as a simple tag for episode 3.12 JIB, and kind of rambled on from there. Mostly it's me taking out my frustrations about all the FRIGGIN' SNOW that has pounded the Midwest this year. I thought it would be nice to share it with our favorite demon hunters. I'm sure the boys appreciated it.
Thin Ice of a New Day
Sam shifted his focus to the threadbare brown carpet, the silence in the room oppressive to say the least. Ruby's parting words rang in his ears, his head formulating arguments to her accusations while his heart ached in acceptance of the blame. He could hear the harsh breathing of his brother and knew without looking that Dean had been hit hard by her rant as well.
His attention remained on the floor as Dean rose from the opposite bed and moved about the room. As the silence began to grate on his nerves, Sam shifted his eyes to his brother just in time to see the older man lash an arm out across the desk, sending the lamp situated there crashing into the opposite wall.
Sam held his breath, his sight taking in the broken shards of the light fixture that now lay shattered on the floor before returning to his brother's hunched form. Dean leaned against the desk, his left arm pulled in tight against his body, his eyes squeezed shut against obvious pain.
Sam started to rise, but a shake of his brother's head kept him from completing the move. Sam could only wait as Dean slowly straightened and made his way back across the room to his bed. Without a word, he lowered himself carefully onto the mattress and pulled his legs up, resting his injured arm against his stomach and throwing the other across his eyes.
Sam idly wondered if his brother was trying to block out the world or hide himself from it.
He took a deep breath and slowly exhaled. He knew he should probably take a look at his brother's bullet wound, but Dean's current position made it clear the older man was not in the mood for any kind of concern. Leaning forward, Sam placed his elbows on his knees and buried his face in his hands. "This is all so messed up," he mumbled.
Dean's laugh held no humor.
"Ya think?" Dean didn't bother to remove his arm from across his eyes. "We screwed up."
Sam shook his head, hating the defeat in his brother's voice. "Dean, we tried. We did everything we could –"
"Fat lot of good that did, Sammy. They all died anyway. Hendrickson, Nancy…"
Sam sighed, his shoulders slumped. "Dean. Don't do this." It was one thing to admit that their good intentions may have backfired, it was another to heap more blame on their shoulders in a fight where they were struggling just to stay above water.
Dean's head slowly moved back and forth under the shield of his arm. "She was right. We didn't help at all."
Sam stared at his brother. He'd never seen Dean give up. Even when Dad had dragged them around the country, never settling into anything resembling a home, Dean had kept the family together. He had kept them strong enough to continue the quest. But lately, Sam had to admit, this war, the costs had begun to take their toll on his larger than life big brother. Dean's cracks were becoming more and more obvious and his soul was becoming more and more weary. Throughout their entire lives, even when things seemed insurmountable, Sam could never remember hearing his brother sound so… small.
Dean had reacted in outrage when Ruby wanted to sacrifice Nancy for the greater good.
He had made it very clear that they would find another way, that they were not going to start picking and choosing who got to live and who was to be sacrificed in this hellish war they'd found themselves in.
At first Sam had been torn. He'd even been tempted to listen to Ruby, to let her kill the young virgin if it meant saving the rest… saving Dean. But Dean's voice had penetrated his confusion and showed him that they couldn't start ignoring their own humanity for the sake of winning. Like Dean said, if that's how you win a war, he didn't want to win. If that happened – if they allowed it to happen -- they'd already lost.
"No, Dean. She's wrong." Sam's voice was soft, but it held conviction. "Ruby was wrong."
Dean lowered his arm and stared in confusion at his brother. "How can you say that?" He pushed himself up onto the edge of the bed and leaned forward, his eyes locked onto his brother's. "I don't remember you exactly telling the bitch 'no deal' back there, dude."
Sam nodded, dropping his eyes to the floor as he felt a flush of shame color his face. "I know. I just…" He shrugged. "I just didn't know what else to do." He returned his gaze back to his brother. "But you did."
"Yeah. Great plan. They're all dead, Sam. All of them. I blew it. I failed."
The sudden slump of Dean's shoulders nearly broke Sam's heart. "No. We didn't fail. You were right." Sam waited until the older hunter raised his head, his eyes searching for a glimmer of truth in the statement. "We can't start sacrificing innocent lives. We can't play some kind of numbers game. It's our job to protect people."
Dean nodded, a sad smile on his face. "Yeah," he breathed. "We're doing such a bang-up job so far, huh?"
Sam leaned forward, catching his brother's eyes and holding them. "Dean, we have to put the blame where it belongs. On this Lilith. The demons. We saved those people. You saved those people."
Dean searched his brother's eyes and allowed himself to believe that maybe what Sam was saying was the truth. "Yeah, maybe. Doesn't make me feel any better, though."
Sam returned his sad grin. "Me either."
The muffled tone of Dean's phone sounded from his pocket and he leaned as he used his good arm to dig into his jeans and retrieve the device.
"Dean? You boys alright?"
Dean grinned at the concern in the older hunter's voice. "Hey, Bobby." He quickly glanced at his brother, seeing his grin mirrored at the mention of their old friend's name. "We've been better," he replied honestly.
"I just saw a report on the news. Some kind of gas explosion. Wouldn't've paid it no mind except it mentioned that Fed that's been on your tail. Hendrickson. You and Sam weren't involved in any of that, were ya?"
Dean shook his head even though the man on the other end of the line couldn't see the motion. "Nah. Hendricksn had already let us go."
"Let you go? Then you were there?"
Dean took a deep breath and quickly explained what had happened.
"You said the demons came right at you?"
Dean rubbed his eyes. "Yeah. It's like they were gunning for us, Bobby. Like they had some kind of contract on us or something."
"That don't sound right."
Dean snorted in agreement. "Tell me about it. And on top of every thing, this Lilith bitch apparently has the hots for Samantha here. I don't have a friggin' clue what's going on, but whatever it is, it's way the hell over my head."
"Well I've got something that may be a bit more along your pay grade."
"Bobby, I'm not sure –"
"I've got a lead on Bela Talbot."
Dean's head shot up and he stared hard at his brother. "You found the Colt?"
"Maybe. After we left Pittsburgh, I put out some feelers. A friend contacted me this morning and said that Bela was in Minneapolis."
"What's she doing there?"
"Hell if I know. But this guy is trustworthy. If he says it's her, it's her. You and Sam up to checking it out?"
Dean raised his eyebrows in question, knowing that Sam had been able to follow the conversation despite only hearing one side. At a nod from his brother, Dean answered.
"Yeah, Bobby. We'll call you when we find something."
The snow hadn't begun to come down hard until they were across the North Dakota border. They had habitually stayed off the major interstates, taking the back highways as a precaution against any chance sightings by the authorities. At the moment, Sam was pretty sure that was a really, really stupid idea.
There was no one he trusted more behind the wheel of a car than his brother, but the winter storm that was pummeling the Midwest was currently dropping about a ton of wet, slippery snow on top of an already frozen sheet of ice that made driving conditions hazardous at best. They hadn't run across another car for the last half hour, most of the locals obviously having better sense than to try and drive in the current mess that was Minnesota Highway 10.
Dean had been forced to use both hands on the wheel, his brow creased as the pain from his wounded shoulder took a back seat to his need to keep the big Chevy on what could still be considered a road. As the Impala fishtailed for the hundredth time on the slippery asphalt, Sam held his breath as his brother decreased their speed again until the vehicle was barely crawling along through the blowing drifts.
The wind had picked up as the sun began to set, causing the almost horizontal fall of the heavy white flakes to become a mesmerizing spectacle reflecting in the headlights of the classic car.
"Dean," Sam kept his voice level, not wanting to disturb his brother's concentration. "Maybe we should just find a motel and wait this out."
Dean didn't take his gaze from the road, his voice clipped as he answered. "Great idea, Sammy. Gonna wave our magic wand and make one appear any time soon?"
Sam held his tongue, knowing Dean's frustration was directed more at the situation than him… at least he hoped so.
The narrowing field of vision obscured a sharp turn in the road, forcing Dean to wrench the wheel to the right. The back end of the heavy car slid across the snow and ice covered road as Dean fought to right her. Sam gasped a breath, his hand flying out to brace himself against the dashboard as he felt the car begin to slide out of control. Before Dean could compensate for the slide, the Impala spun completely around, jarring both occupants as it plowed through the drifts accumulating along the edge of the highway, tipping precariously towards the driver's side as it came to rest half buried in the ditch.
Sam swallowed hard, his heart thudding in his chest, his breath loud in the confined space of the car as the engine stalled and the howl of the wind rocked the Impala on its haphazard perch. A quick look showed that they were stuck, trunk down in a three-foot ditch, the car listing slightly to the left. There was no way in hell they were going to be able to drive the heavy car out of it's current position. It would take a tow truck with heavy chains to get the Chevy back onto the road.
Taking stock, he drew a deep breath, noting that outside of a slight tingle brought on by the euphoric reaction to the shock of the crash, he was unharmed. The low moan from his left told him his brother wasn't quite as lucky.
The older hunter was pushed up against the driver's side door, his right hand gripping his left shoulder, his eyes screwed tightly closed against obvious pain.
"Hey, Dean," Sam slid across the slightly inclined seat, careful not to pin his brother and cause any further damage. "Man, you okay?"
"I freakin' hate snow."
Sam let out a relieved chuckle at the typically Dean response. "I guess that skiing weekend in Vermont is gonna have to wait then, huh?"
Dean finally lifted his head, giving his brother a weak glare. "Skiiing is for geeks who like to wear ugly sweaters, dude."
Sam shook his head in exasperation. "Are you okay?"
Dean leaned his head back against the window. "Yeah. Just bashed my shoulder against the door during our little Disney on Ice moment. I'm okay."
From the grunt of pain coming from his brother as he tried to shift away from the door, Sam didn't take much stock in Dean's idea of 'okay', but that was kind of par for the course when it came to the older hunter. As far as Dean was concerned, if he was breathing, he was okay. Sam had long ago realized that his job entailed the simple act of keeping his brother breathing. Everything else they could deal with.
He hoped.
Although the Impala was tilted into the ditch, Sam was able to wrestle the passenger door open, wedging it with his body as he pulled himself up and out. Sinking almost to his knees in the snow, he turned and held out a hand to his brother. Without the use of his injured left arm, Dean was forced to turn and push with his legs against the door, allowing Sam to wrap an arm around his waist and awkwardly hoist him up and out of the passenger door. Once they both got their feet under them, they were able to trudge through the still falling snow and climb back to the road.
"I hate just leaving her there," Dean said softly, his eyes squinting through the flying snow at the dark shape of the Impala. The snow was quickly covering her in a blanket of white and Sam hoped they would actually be able to find the car once the storm passed.
"It'll be okay, Dean. We'll find a tow truck in the next town and get her back on the road first thing in the morning."
Dean nodded, tucking his injured arm close to his body and pulling the collar of his coat closed with his other hand. "And just how far is this town exactly?"
Sam zipped his own jacket and shoved his hands into his pockets as he shrugged and squinted into the darkness. "If I read the map right, there should be a town called Perham about two or three miles east. If we stay on the highway, we should see a turn off."
"Great," Dean mumbled as he started to trudge east along the snow-covered road. "Why couldn't that bitch have been spotted in Arizona. Who the hell could possibly want to be in Minnesota?" | [] |
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We've been dutifully using Trac for several years now, and our "active tickets" list has grown to almost 200 items. These include bugs that are too low priority and too complicated to fix for now, feature requests that have been deferred, issues that have never really generated complaints but everyone agrees ought to be fixed someday, planned code refactorings and other design infelicities that we don't want to lose track of, etc.
As a result, with almost 200 of these issues, the list is almost overwhelming; it's no longer useful as a source of what needs to be worked on right now.
What's the best way to keep track of issues of this sort?
Part of the problem is that some of these issues are such a low priority that they may never get done. I hate to lose track of these items (similar to not wanting to throw something out of my house in case I might need it someday); do I need to throw them out regardless (by marking them as wontfix) and assume I can find them in the future if I ever do need them?
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200 for a whole team made me laugh. :-) I alone have 120 open issues, most of which I'll never come around to fix! -- So to sum up: great question! I was just about to ask the same. – Martin Ba Nov 9 '11 at 16:29
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4 Answers
up vote 3 down vote accepted
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Does Trac have a priority setting? Something like 1 for major show-stoppers and 5 or so for things that would be nice to have done sometime?
If you can sort on priority, you can disregard the lower priority stuff for now.
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Anything that is on the level of "nice to have done sometime" will never get done. Yank it out. – Aaron McIver Feb 8 '11 at 21:38
@Aaron: I'd rather keep it around in case we want to raise the priority sometime. Clearly, it will never get done at that priority, not unless the developers have far too much time on their hands (and have already made a gopher client for the software and made it haiku-compliant). – David Thornley Feb 8 '11 at 21:49
Trac does have a priority setting, although we've accumulated enough of a backlog that I've just about decided we still need a "yank it out" approach. – Josh Kelley Feb 11 '11 at 2:12
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read: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/5S_%28methodology%29
Put them in the attic, wait a year, then move house. That is what I do.
Seriously if you are not going to fix it them forget about it. See Extreme Programming.
But For items about code. You could put them in a code review system, as minor observations. This system can be set up to flag up issues when that part of the system is edited. I found this did not work as co-workers, thought this is what was expected and did not address review observations.
The only way to do it is ruthless prioritisation. Do it now or don't bother.
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This really depends on a few things.
1. How large is the team: If the team is large enough you can assign tickets in a fashion that would allow the lower priority items to get completed.
2. How often do you do releases: If the release cycle is long enough you can get away with adding more things or holding off on a release until you have all the tickets resolved.
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Mr. Singh lives a wealthy lifestyle in a palatial house with his only relative, a niece by the name of Nisha, who is unmarried and career-oriented in the family's business. Singh would like to see her get married, and whenever he comes across any handsome and eligible handsome man, he, quite comically, foresees him getting married to Nisha. So far he has met with an Advocate by the name of Bharat Sinha; a young man named Khanna; a tourist guide by the name of Viju; a lowly motor mechanic, Prakash; and two middle-classed young men, Suraj Singh, and Yeshwant Rao Bhonsle. All of these men… More | [] |
SpamAssassin Rule: BAYES_60
Standard description: Bayes spam probability is 60 to 80%
SpamAssassin includes a Bayesian filter that assigns scores based on the user's previous email history. This can assign both positive and negative scores. For instance, a user may receive a particular spam message several times via a relay identified in a DNSBL, so that SpamAssassin correctly identifies it as spam. If the user receives the same message via a new unlisted relay, the Bayesian algorithm will assign a high score to it based on previous experience.
Conversely, if a user receives a regular newsletter from a fitness club, and one issue makes reference to diet pills and weight loss (which would normally flage the message as spam), the Bayesian algorithm will assign a lower score to it.
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Is RGS too much of a hot house?
(32 Posts)
Lifesconfusing Wed 20-Feb-13 18:15:19
I have two sons and am thinking about RGS because they are quite bright and need stretching. It sounds like an amazing place academically. But is being the best school academically always the best thing for a kid? I know four grown men who left RGS during the last decade - one had a breakdown recently, three said they wouldn't ever send their own son there because they had been pushed too far and been miserable. The atmosphere strange because various boys asked to leave along the way because their results not good enough - would affect the league tables. Two said strangely that they hadn't realised how miserable they'd been until they left and realised what fun and hard work other boys had been having. I feel very confused. Is sending a boy to a school that is full of other very bright boys going to get them great results but mess them up - should we think about a school with a more varied academic intake?
rabbitstew Wed 20-Feb-13 18:19:15
Shouldn't you be a bit more specific? Do you mean Reigate Grammar School? Royal Grammar School, somewhere??? Somewhere else altogether???
nilbyname Wed 20-Feb-13 18:21:08
Hahahahaha! RGS, oh yes that very well known place!
you should visit the school, and others too, for yourself and talk to your kids, what would they like
Lifesconfusing Wed 20-Feb-13 18:25:14
I mean RGS Guildford, sorry - said I was confused!
Exactly - where?! For me, RGS means Royal Grammer School in Newcastle. You could mean somewhere very different...
Don't listen to people who left a school years ago dictate what you'd do for your children. When else in life would you pick solely on a reputation 20 years put of date? confused. Go and look round it. Do you like it? Will if suit them? If yes then all good, if not then look elsewhere.
Lifesconfusing Wed 20-Feb-13 18:36:25
The results look good, the school feels okay, it's close to us and ticks all logistic boxes. When you speak to parents currently with boys there, they all seem happy, but then, I tend to find no one ever speaks badly of a school they have children at themselves to anyone not at that school. The only thing we have to go about whether a hot house is okay or not, is these 20+ year olds who were there fairly recently. None of them related/know each other, all separate conversations. Through work and other places. All wouldn't send their kids there. Strange. Still confused. Should i ignore this info and make decision without it?
Labro Wed 20-Feb-13 19:27:46
With RGS, not sure whether its a hot house, but be aware that they do have a pretty intensive selection procedure. My ds is currently level 5/6, on accelerated learning programme at current school, yet didn't pass the entrance exam. So, in some ways, if its not the right sort of school then the choice will be made for you. DS himself said that it felt crowded and cramped (no reflection on RGS) which made me realise hes better suited to semi rural rather than a town centre school.
Lifesconfusing Wed 20-Feb-13 19:52:50
Thanks Labro and good point. I didn't mean to be misleading but should have said that my oldest DS has been offered a deferred entry place and am now trying to decide whether to take it or not. I'm worried that it might be too intense - the whole entrance exam process showed me just how intense it could be and made me start thinking about whether there are after-effects on the boys who go through a school that is as selective and hot house in its approach as it is. That's why I sought some points of view from old (but quite recent) RGS boys and sadly got negative answers. I guess I could do with hearing from some happy old RGS boys to balance it out - anyone got a hub who's been through the school with an opinion for me? I don't know why this seems important info to gather but I'm niggled now and need advice.
mummytime Wed 20-Feb-13 20:02:57
The boys I know there seem happy. Several decided to stay on into sixth form rather than go elsewhere although they did look. I don't really recognise it as a "hothouse". It is for bright boys, and they achieve but don't seem especially hot housed.
However if a boy just scrapes in he can go through feeling "thick" despite being one of the brightest in the general population.
It also advises boys to go to the best Unis for them not just Oxbridge or Medicine.
Labro Wed 20-Feb-13 20:08:32
I've got good friends both in their early 20's - one had a fantastic RGS experience, went on to Cambridge and is very confident, very much a 'public speaker' type. The other is much quieter, more musically orientated and felt somewhat battered by his experiences and has ended up as a perpetual student. Not sure if this helps you, though if your ds didn't accept RGS, where would he want to go?
Lifesconfusing Wed 20-Feb-13 20:29:27
Hmm. I think that 'thick' feeling Mummytime is a common theme - I guess when a boy has been top of his prep school which isn't that selective, always felt good and confident about himself, and then joins a population of very select boys who are all v bright, and turns out to be the 'thicker' one amongst them, it can be quite a knock. Even if the reality is that none of them really are 'thick' at all! Hopefully the school manage that well?? And if not, may be having a wider variety of academic levels around you is better and hothouse (for want of a better word ) is not the answer?
Lifesconfusing Wed 20-Feb-13 20:37:51
Thanks Labro for more on the 20+ ex pupil examples, all interesting and v helpful. May be I over-think things? I just want the boys to be happy in life after school too - but their school can make or break that sometimes. What a choice, and he's only 10! I'm not cut out for all these big decisions!
holidaysrcoming Wed 20-Feb-13 20:51:16
depends on your ds. Is he the sort to feel 'not quite good enough' and what effect will that have on him? will he lose self esteem/give up/shrug it off, or will it spur him on to do his best?
strangely enough, I have considered the girls local equivalent, academically my dd is likely to be of the standard but like you, I know several 'old girl' parents who are emphatic about not sending their dds there and for me, I know my dd is not resilient enough to cope with feeling mediocre when she has given her all.
Lifesconfusing Wed 20-Feb-13 21:32:11
Gosh those are great questions to ask yourself aren't they; thank you for the good approach to thinking about it holidaysrcoming.
It's tough because so far he's been lucky enough to be top in many things because his prep school is good but not extremely academic, and he hasn't experienced that mediocre feeling too often - I know it's coming though and he should experience it if he is to get a true feel for life! I think he enjoys competition but if he continually 'loses' he does actually back off - a sport/instrument/subject - and say he's rubbish at it, even if he's actually ok just not the best. In some instances competition does spur him on to do better but if his better doesn't work, he then gives up. That's not a good attitude I guess but it is what it is for now until we work on it. What to do - stick him in to RGS and hope I can teach him it's okay to be mediocre and keep his head down anyway, or let him feel good about himself elsewhere and learn the mediocre feeling when he gets to Uni/work instead? I guess by then, his hormones will have settled a bit and he'll be able to deal better with these tough feelings!?
Out of the now six 20+ year old ex pupils in my sample of old RGS boys (my 4 and labro's 2), 5 didn't cope with the above feelings and one did - would that be a fair conclusion? A few more to make it fair would be good!
Really grateful to you all, I'm going in circles with this alone and yes I know I'm boring and over-analyse...
Dededum Wed 20-Feb-13 21:40:41
Well my brother went there - last year of 11+, so long time ago.
He did well academically for O levels, left for A levels which he scraped through and then got a third class degree. Very smart but didn't learn how to motivate himself, think that might be an ongoing issue with private school kids though.
Not very helpful.
It is very difficult to get in though, so maybe keep an open mind and don't fix on one school. I know parents ho made RGS entrance there one aim, tough on the kids when they fail and end up at the very good local comp.
Happymum22 Wed 20-Feb-13 23:33:46
Son went there, it definitely is not a hot house. If your son is bright enough to get in comfortably then he will be fine, well more than fine- most likely thrive, have a lot of fun, great friends which are like-minded and an environment of total acceptance of each and every boy whether they are sporty, ladish, geeky, musical etc etc.
I said this previously on a thread about GHS and I think the same applies -it comes down a lot to the parents. I've seen it happening.
If the fact he is at RGS makes you become very pushy and put unnecessary pressure on your DS then he will feel pressured to do well and if you don't celebrate his achievements however big or small then he will lack self-esteem and feel he isn't doing well enough. Parents are the primary place academic children get reinforcement often. They want their parents pride and approval and this is what will give them the confidence and hence let them relax, enjoy their school and make the most of opportunities without worrying about failure.
Lifesconfusing Wed 20-Feb-13 23:59:01
Ok, point taken HappyMum22 :-) you're quite right, they take their lead from us in most things. Sounds like you're a happy mum of a happy 20+ year old ex RGS boy who's thriving - so I'll count your son as an RGS success in my sample :-)
One question if you have time and don't mind? Is it true that boys are asked to leave if their grades aren't good enough? I've heard this has happened a few times?
Labro Thu 21-Feb-13 00:04:26
when is the acceptance deadline? Maybe wait til nearer the deadline gives you a bit more time. What other schools are you looking st, also, presumably his current head recommended RGS?
racingheart Thu 21-Feb-13 11:09:37
Lifesconfusing - the boys you know who left - are they the only ones you know from RGS? Or do you also know some who were happy there?
Where did the other boys go to school who they said were happy and fulfilled? I bet you could find boys from those schools who had also been miserable. School days aren't perfect anywhere.
Can you directly ask the school if they get boys to leave if they achieve below expected level. Their reply is better than gossip and hearsay.
I am interested in your post, as DS has also got a place at RGS. It seemed to me a happy school, full of bright and rather eccentric, gentle boys. But as you say, it's not all about exam results. These are formative years and we want them to come away feeling happy and confident as adults.
Where's the wand that lets you see into the future? smile
IvySquirrel Thu 21-Feb-13 12:03:34
As I often post on RGS threads you may know I have DS1 at the school and DS2 has a 11+ place for September.
I would agree with Happymum22 - RGS is a place where boys can be what they want to be and all are accepted. At primary DS was called a nerd & geek for being academic - at RGS his friends genuinely applaud his achivements, and he theirs. He went there from state primary not knowing a soul, and now has a great group of friends. He often says he is really glad he went to RGS and it is worth the money!
As RGS has this reputation as a 'hothouse' people assume DS is slaving over hours of homework every night - more like an hour of homework & 2 hours of PS3...
racingheart Thu 21-Feb-13 13:06:32
IvySquirrel, thank you so much for posting.
I've heard feedback of such differing kinds, including quite a lot of negative comments recently: 'it sapped the fun out of my child'; 'it's not a fun school'; it's not a kind place to be'; 'it's very demoralising if you are bottom of the class.'
These comments really concerned me, as when we looked round the school (three times!) DS, DH and I all felt it was exactly the place you describe. It seemed warm and safe and a place where bright boys could be themselves without being sneered at for their keenness and geekery.
Happymum22 Thu 21-Feb-13 15:51:06
I can't think of any specific examples perhaps one boy from my sons year of 150 was reccomended he left after gcses. IMO though all good selective schools should be doing this with extremely low achievers compared to their average; if they realise a child isn't thriving and is much weaker than other boys then I'd hope they would identify the reasons and if they realise the environment and academic atmosphere of RGS isn't right for a boy to do a levels there, then they will advise where he should try and go which will be more suitable for that boy.
If my son had struggled with GCSEs (and it would have to be seriously not doing well (Bs and Cs probably)) then I would not want the school to allow me to blindly keep my son in an environment where he would not cope or get the type of teaching and support he needed.
I always find it frustrating when parents accuse schools (normally falsely) of 'chucking out those with bad results'. If it is a selective school to start with they are simply thinking of the child and whether they are being best catered for at that academic environment.
I know a boy who achieved bad results but this was because he'd lost his mother just before the exams. Even with special consideration he still came out with very low grades not reflective of his ability. The school supported him during sixth form to retake some and progress to A levels. Shows every case is considered and they definitely aren't thinking in any way just about their grade statistics.
IvySquirrel Thu 21-Feb-13 16:57:15
Glad to help racingheart!
I have never heard any of these sort of negative comments, which I think is probably because my boys were/are in state primary, hence only the pros & cons of the Guildford comps are generally discussed in my social circle! I imagine prep school mums' discussions are differently focused.
The comments certainly don't ring true with the RGS I have experienced in the last couple of years - there is plenty of room for fun & kindness.
I have not heard of anyone being 'asked to leave'.
Aboleyn Thu 21-Feb-13 17:37:04
My boy is going there in September and we are very happy about the choice. Friends with children at the school (current and past) have also been very happy. I did not get the hothouse feeling at all, like has been said on this site before, just the privilege of being with other bright children. All the private schools have a similarly rigorous entrance process, and as Labro said, they determine who will suit the school. If you come from a prep school, you have the added advantage of advice from your head as to whether they think your child should be suitable. I think most private schools will ask you to leave if not performing. I know a friend who is expecting all her 3 children to be asked to leave their school, where they have been since age 7, when they get to 6th form! That is life, unfortunately.
trinity0097 Thu 21-Feb-13 19:20:47
I work in a school where it is not the norm to ask pupils to leave if they are struggling. We would do all we can to help support the child to make progress within our setting. The only time that parents have been encouraged is if the child would be better suited to a special school rather than a mainstream setting, maybe one child every 5 years or so.
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Is "How long do I have to wait for my stuff" enough catchy for ya??
I ordered from MyProtein before and it was OK.
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3. I received the parcel despatched on 16th Nov AFTER TWO WEEKS since ordered but I am still wating for the one despatched on 11th Nov.
4. You better make up for this mess and put things right. I want my product and/or money back.
5. Why do I have to wait? You did NOT have to wait for me to wire you the money!
Marek´s profile
profile image of Marek
United States | [] |
Mathematicians! - Bayesian Models, reverse engineering, long term potential, very novel and fun work.
Closed - This job posting has been filled.
Job Description
We're creating a web hosted consumer software. I'm looking for someone who can reverse engineer a PDF that outlines an algorithm and work with me to begin:
1. Data-set Creation
2. Algorithm Based Solution
3. Analysis for Pattern Recognition Application
4. Algorithm Design
5. Artificial Reasoning
Very interesting work, with lots of potential for long term work as well as immense creativity. I'm looking to work with someone who can communicate in non-technical terms, someone who can come up with helpful ideas and can work as our budget will allow.
Key skills I'm looking for:
Bayesian Additive Regression Tree for Quasi-Linear model (BART-QL)
Data Mining
Predictive Distributions
If you're not familiar with Bag-Of-Words, you must be quick to learn.
Other open jobs by this client | [] |
I have a Pom mini poodle mix and was wondering why she doesn't have puffy curly hair. I've seen others if the exact bree
Asked by Member 1157202 on Feb 27th 2013 Tagged breed, pom, poodle, hair, curly, puffy, dog, puppy in Breeds
• Cast your vote for which answer you think is best!
You have a mix, not a breed, so there is no "right" look. You could have a pup that looks like a poodle, or a pom, or anything in between.
Member 904338 answered on 2/27/13. Helpful? Yes/Helpful: No 2 Report this answer
As Wiley stated, you have a mix, not a breed, and therefore, there is NO EXACT SAME BREED and NO pom/poodle mixes will have the exact same coat as it totally depends on what DNA they inherit from which parent.
Since poms have straight hair the laws of genetics say that AT LEAST 50% of these mixes will have straight hair, maybe short or maybe long. Because poodles are curly, again, at least 50% will have curly hair. Then, add the either short or long and you increase the differences once again by 50%.
As you can see, how the DNA falls leaves lots of different possibilities for hair type in each pup from the exact same parents.
Member 641257 answered on 2/27/13. Helpful? Yes/Helpful: No 0 Report this answer | [] |
WHO'S in charge here? As the jittery Socialist government of José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, Spain's outgoing prime minister, pushes through a constitutional change to cap budget deficits, it looks increasingly as if Mariano Rajoy, the leader of the conservative opposition, is already in the driving seat.
Demands for a German-style “golden rule” deficit cap have long been a mantra for Mr Rajoy's People's Party (PP). Hitherto, they have met with Socialist scorn. Now the two parties plan to write a cap into the constitution before parliament is dissolved on September 27th. It is the first big change since the document was drafted in 1978, three years after Franco died.
Soraya Sáenz de Santamaría of the PP solemnly announced the new cross-party agreement on what she called “one of the main structural reforms needed by the Spanish economy”. From tone and content, a first-time visitor might have divined that the PP was already in power—which, according to opinion polls, it will be after a general election due in November.
Mr Zapatero's latest U-turn, like previous pirouettes on pensions, labour reform and spending cuts, was a response to the markets and to Angela Merkel and Nicolas Sarkozy. The German chancellor and French president jointly demanded golden rules across the euro zone in August. Spain will now get there before France. Only Germany currently has a constitutional “debt brake” in its Basic Law. If Spain needs EU help to keep sovereign-debt yields down, it can at least tell suspicious Germans that it is an eager, obedient pupil.
In private, Mr Zapatero reportedly told Socialist critics this was the “least harsh” option left as sovereign-debt yields soared and the European Central Bank bought Spanish bonds in large quantities. But what will voters make of it? Some want a referendum. Opponents say the cap, which would limit the structural budget deficit to 0.4% of GDP from 2020, would tie the hands of future governments too tightly. Unions have called demonstrations.
But there are get-out clauses for recessions or national crises. And with the actual figure to be established by a separate—and more easily alterable—law, wriggle-room is guaranteed.
Socialists fear that Mr Zapatero has handed the PP an early electoral gift. But Spaniards remain Eurofanatics, and the socialists hope they will get credit for this step towards euro-zone economic integration. “If Europe is to adopt measures, we should be in the lead group,” says Alfredo Pérez Rubalcaba, the Socialist candidate for prime minister.
What the measure will not do is plug Spain's current deficit hole, likely to be 6% this year. Moreover, 2020 is light-years away in political terms, and with 21% unemployment Spain's more urgent need is for growth. Though Mr Rajoy has scored a victory, the economy needs much more than his golden rule. | [] |
February 19, 2013, 11:26 am
Content Cover Image
Mexican (or Brazilian) Free-Tailed Bats, Tadarida brasiliensis, emerging from Carlsbad Caverns, Carlsbad Caverns National Park, New Mexico. (Source: Nick Hristov)
The term endotherm refers to animals (birds, mammals, some fishes and insects, and even some plants) that are capable of generating sufficient amounts of heat energy to maintain a high core temperature (e.g. 37-40 °C in birds and mammals) by metabolic means – usually derived from aerobic activity of locomotor muscles in animals and by unique biochemical mechanisms in plants (e.g., skunk cabbage). Endotherms differ from an ectotherm because they typically have core temperatures above that of the surrounding environment, whereas the core temperatures of ectotherms depend on external sources of heat – primarily from solar radiation.
caption Brazilian free-tailed bat (Tadarida brasiliensis). (Photo: J.S. Altenbach)
Endothermic animals, birds, and mammals that regulate their core body temperature at a relatively constant level are referred to as homeotherms (Greek homeo = similar). To maintain a constant body temperature, a homeotherm must balance heat loss with heat production. Heat loss is minimized in most mammals by having a thick coat of fur or thick layer of subcutaneous (beneath the skin) fat, whereas heat loss is promoted by sweating, panting, or by seeking shelter in cooler environments.
Endotherms are sometimes referred to as "warm-blooded," but this term is inaccurate and misleading, as is the term "cold-blooded" for ectotherms. For example, the body temperature of a small tropical fish in warm water or desert lizard on hot sand (both of which are considered ectotherms) may have body temperatures higher than birds or mammals in the same environment-largely because of the insulation provided by feathers and fur and associated behavioral and physiological heat-dissipating mechanisms that prevent their body temperatures from increasing above critical temperatures.
Many ectotherms are able to regulate their body temperature behaviorally, by moving into and out of sunlight. Most endotherms are homeotherms, but by definition, some large reptiles (crocodiles and some of their extinct relatives-dinosaurs), as well as some large fish (tuna) and night-flying moths, are considered endotherms, because of the metabolic activity of skeletal muscles that generate large amounts of heat. However, because these endotherms lack a layer of insulation and do not have a thermostat that regulates either heat production or heat dissipation, they are considered poikilotherms (Greek poikolos = changeable). Some mammals and birds that at times have high and well-regulated body temperatures, but at other times they are more like ectotherms and are referred to as heterotherms (Greek hetero = different). Heterothermy is characteristic of small hibernating rodents and bats.
Further Reading
Kunz, T. (2013). Endotherm. Retrieved from http://www.eoearth.org/view/article/152422
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Chargers vs. Bengals: Storylines to Watch in AFC Wild Card Matchup
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When the Cincinnati Bengals went on the road to score a 17-10 victory over the San Diego Chargers in Week 13, the home team's playoff chances were as good as dead in the water.
At 5-7 and having lost four of their last five games, the Chargers' solid start was about to be undone by a terrible defense and inexcusable losses to teams like Washington, Houston and Tennessee. Philip Rivers was having his re-breakout, Danny Woodhead was thriving and Keenan Allen was surprising everyone. The possibility of a playoff berth was still flickering, but the team felt a year away.
Then everything broke the Chargers' way. And I mean e-v-e-r-y-t-h-i-n-g. San Diego watched on as Miami and Baltimore turned in professional choke jobs down the stretch, as the Chargers were winning four straight under some intense situations.
Even the biggest victory of their season required some luck—and one massive officiating mistake. The NFL admitted an illegal formation penalty should have been called against San Diego in its 27-24 victory over Kansas City last week when Chiefs kicker Ryan Succop missed a 41-yard field goal that would have won the game in regulation.
Succop should have received a second chance from 36 yards. Instead, the game went to overtime, and the Chargers took advantage.
Now, they'll get a rematch against the team who helped spark this run. Cincinnati went 11-5 during the regular season, en route to its first division title since 2009. Playing in their third straight postseason under Marvin Lewis, the Bengals hope to do something they couldn't in their other two chances—win a game.
With that in mind, let's check in on these two teams, specifically highlighting some storylines worth keeping an eye on.
Good Andy or Bad Andy? That Is the Question
Mark Zerof-USA TODAY Sports
Being a Bengals season-ticket holder should come with a free bottle of aged scotch. Anyone willing to watch Andy Dalton play quarterbacks in person eight times per season deserves it.
Taken as a whole, Dalton had a perfectly fine season—the best of his career even. He broke the franchise records for passing touchdowns (33) and yards (4,296). Cincinnati has made the playoffs in each of the past three seasons for the first time in franchise history—all of which came under Dalton. In only three years, Dalton is already the fifth-leading passer in franchise history.
Dalton took down the mighty New England Patriots and had one three-game stretch where he threw 11 touchdowns and another where he had a 9-0 touchdown-to-interception ratio. Good Andy Dalton is a very solid quarterback, one who you could even build a franchise around.
Bad Andy Dalton has a habit of making Tim Tebowian mistakes. He set a career-high this season with 20 interceptions, finishing fifth in the NFL. Only five times all season did Dalton go without an interception, and three of those came in that aforementioned hot stretch. Last week he threw four picks and looked to be begging the Ravens to win the game, only to be bailed out by the defense.
Dalton's numbers in his two postseason games: 41-of-72 (56.9 percent), 384 yards, zero touchdowns, four interceptions. Both losses to the Houston Texans. In 2011, you could excuse his interceptions because he was a rookie. A year later, people were wondering whether Dalton was simply not good enough to lead a Super Bowl contender.
Even Dalton knows people have been focusing on his performance.
"People can keep saying whatever they want because we haven't won a playoff game," Dalton said, via Joe Kay of the Associated Press (via Charlotte Observer). "You've got to win. That's what it comes down to. And for us to get where we want to go, we need to win. That's the way it works."
Those whispers are only going to get louder if Dalton throws up a stinker against San Diego. The Chargers defense was a nuclear wasteland in the first half of the season, and while it got better down the stretch, the improvements have only been marginal.
Per Football Outsiders' premium database, San Diego was 20th against the pass in the second half of 2013 after being dead last in the first.
Considering Houston boasted very solid defenses in each of the last two seasons, this will be the worst playoff defense Dalton has ever faced by a long shot. Let's see what he has in him.
Can Philip Rivers' Comeback Season Overcome Elite Bengals Pass Defense?
Christopher Hanewinckel-USA TODA
A year ago at this time, Rivers looked done. At least done as in having any faith that he could be anything but a slightly above replacement-level quarterback. The Chargers were terrible, and Rivers was mistake-prone and seemingly had his face permanently frozen in sourpuss mode.
Fast-forward a year, and Rivers may have been the best quarterback not named Peyton Manning in 2013. Swap out Norv Turner, swap in Mike McCoy and Rivers was almost instantaneously the same guy who had made four Pro Bowls before this year.
According to Pro Football Focus (subscription required), Rivers was the most accurate quarterback in football with a 78.8 accuracy percentage.
No one was better than Rivers under pressure either, which comes from experience by fire after being battered over the past couple years due to porous offensive lines.
He did this all while working with a receiving corps that was below-average to be kind. Keenan Allen is a stellar rookie receiver, and Antonio Gates just won't die, but those two just aren't the core of an elite passing offense in today's NFL. The fact that Rivers led this team to the playoffs should get him more MVP consideration than he'll actually receive.
Christopher Hanewinckel-USA TODA
One of Rivers' worst games of this season, however, came against this Bengals defense. San Diego managed only 10 points, as Rivers threw for 252 yards and a touchdown against an interception. The problem was that Rivers' performance was filled with empty yards. Whenever the Bengals wanted to make a stop they did with near impunity.
Speaking of miracles, by the way, when Leon Hall and Geno Atkins both went down with season-ending injuries, the Bengals' stout unit seemed guaranteed to go through an adjustment period. It isn't too often an elite unit can lose its best two players and keep the ship afloat.
But that's just what Cincinnati did against the pass. While there were some noticeable struggles against the run without Atkins, the Bengals somehow got better in the second half against the pass. They ranked a very solid ninth against opposing quarterbacks in Weeks 1-9 but skyrocketed to third the rest of the campaign, per DVOA.
They've done excellent job at getting to the quarterback, and multiple players in the secondary have thrived in increased roles. Again, good offense bests good defense nowadays. The rules make it that way. With San Diego and Cincinnati both ranking among the league's best in their respective units, this rematch should be an interesting chess match.
Will Playoff Experience Play Any Factor?
Andrew Weber-USA TODAY Sports
One of the biggest theories trotted out by our favorite talking heads is that regular-season football is different from playoff football. The intensity is different. Everyone is giving 100 percent effort at all times, as if putting your body through a human car crash every week doesn't take full participation to begin with.
You hear about quarterbacks, coaches and entire teams that aren't "clutch" enough to get it done. The biggest criticism of Manning is that he's a paper-stats champion, that when the weather gets cold and the bright lights come on he folds.
I've never been one to buy into those theories for the most part. NFL seasons as a rule are so variable, and the samples are so small that to take anything away from six or seven playoff appearances is patently unfair. But the NFL is a league of small samples, so the perception lives on—no matter how much scientific merit it actually has.
Christopher Hanewinckel-USA TODA
If the "playoff experience" gene actually means something, then the Bengals should be at a decided advantage in the sidelines. Marvin Lewis has made the playoffs four times in Cincinnati. Sure, he's lost all four of those opportunities, but he's been there. And he's due. Or something.
Mike McCoy, meanwhile, is a baby-faced playoff freshman. Even McCoy's playoff experience as an assistant is limited to five appearances with the Broncos and Panthers. Lewis cut his teeth with the Steelers and Bengals—perennial fixtures in January football.
Going down the roster is more difficult because of the NFL's turnover factor, but a majority of the core in Cincy are heading into their third straight postseason appearance. They know what to expect—or, again, so goes the theory.
I'm not sure I buy any of that. I'm more agnostic when it comes to things like momentum, clutch and other things that cannot be independently verified. But for those who ardently believe in that stuff, this should be at least a fun test study.
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July, 2012
• The Old New Thing
Reading the output of a command into a batch file variable
It's Day Two of Batch File Week. Don't worry, it'll be over in a few days.
There is no obvious way to read the output of a command into a batch file variable. In unix-style shells, this is done via backquoting.
The Windows command processor does not have direct backquoting, but you can fake it by abusing the FOR command. Here's the evolution:
The /F flag to the FOR command says that it should open the file you pass in parentheses and set the loop variable to the contents of each line.
for /f %%i in (words.txt) do echo [%%i]
The loop variable in the FOR command takes one percent sign if you are executing it directly from the command prompt, but two percent signs if you are executing it from a batch file. I'm going to assume you're writing a batch file, so if you want to practice from the command line, remember to collapse the double percent signs to singles.
I'm cheating here because I know that words.txt contains one word per line. By default, the FOR command sets the loop variable to the first word of each line. If you want to capture the entire line, you need to change the delimiter.
for /f "delims=" %%i in (names.txt) do echo [%%i]
There are other options for capturing say the first and third word or whatever. See the FOR /? online help for details.
Now, parsing files is not what we want, but it's closer. You can put the file name in single quotes to say "Instead of opening this file and reading the contents, I want you to run this command and read the contents." For example, suppose you have a program called printappdir which outputs a directory, and you want a batch file that changes to that directory.
for /f "delims=" %%i in ('printappdir') do cd "%%i"
We ask the FOR command to run the printappdir program and execute the command cd "%%i" for each line of output. Since the program has only one line of output, the loop executes only once, and the result is that the directory is changed to the path that the printappdir program prints.
If you want to capture the output into a variable, just update the action:
for /f %%i in ('printappdir') do set RESULT=%%i
echo The directory is %RESULT%
If the command has multiple lines of output, then this will end up saving only the last line, since previous lines get overwritten by subsequent iterations.
But what if the line you want to save isn't the last line? Or what if you don't want the entire line?
If the command has multiple lines of output and you're interested only in a particular one, you can filter it in the FOR command itself...
for /f "tokens=1-2,14" %%i in ('ipconfig') do ^
if "%%i %%j"=="IPv4 Address." set IPADDR=%%k
The above command asked to execute the ipconfig command and extract the first, second, and fourteenth words into loop variable starting with %i. In other words, %i gets the first word, %j gets the second word, and %k gets the fourteenth word. (Exercise: What if you want to extract more than 26 words?)
The loop then checks each line to see if it begins with "IPv4 Address.", and if so, it saves the fourteenth word (the IP address itself) into the IPADDR variable.
How did I know that the IP address was the fourteenth word? I counted!
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 11 13 14
10 12
That's also why my test includes the period after Address: The first dot comes right after the word Address without an intervening space, so it's considered part of the second "word".
Somebody thought having the eye-catching dots would look pretty, but didn't think about how it makes parsing a real pain in the butt. (Note also that the above script works only for US-English systems, since the phrase IPv4 Address will change based on your current language.)
Instead of doing the searching yourself, you can have another program do the filtering, which is important if the parsing you want is beyond the command prompt's abilities.
for /f "tokens=14" %%i in ('ipconfig ^| findstr /C:"IPv4 Address"') do ^
set IPADDR=%%i
This alternate version makes the findstr program do the heavy lifting, and then saves the fourteenth word. (But this version will get fooled by the line Autoconfiguration IPv4 Address.)
Yes I know that you can do this in PowerShell
foreach ($i in Get-WmiObject Win32_NetworkAdapterConfiguration) {
if ($i.IPaddress) { $i.IPaddress[0] }
You're kind of missing the point of Batch File Week.
• The Old New Thing
Raymond's subjective, unfair, and completely wrong impressions of the opening ceremonies of a major athletic event which took place recently
Like many other people, I watched the opening ceremonies of a major athletic event which took place a few days ago. (The organization responsible for the event has taken the step of blocking the mention of the name of the city hosting the event and the year the event takes place, or the name of the event itself except in editorial news pieces or journalistic statements of fact, of which this is neither, so I will endeavour to steer clear of the protected marks.)
I wish somebody had let me know in advance that the opening ceremonies came with a reading list. I hope that at least the British history majors enjoyed it.
NBC, the media organization which obtained the rights to broadcast the event in the United States, explained that they were not streaming the opening or closing ceremonies live because they "do not translate well online because they require context, which our award-winning production team will provide." And now we learned what sort of contextualization their award-winning production team provided: For Tim Berners-Lee, their valuable context was, "I don't know who that guy is." (The Guardian provides a snarky backgrounder.)
During the entry of the various national teams, the standard activity is to make fun of their outfits.
Dear Czech Republic: Spandex shorts and blue rain galoshes? It's as if you're trying to look hideous.
Dear Germany: Wha??? I'm speechless.
Dear United States of America: I hope you enjoy your shore leave. (Somebody seriously has a navy fetish going on.)
Dear Sweden: I know it's late, but you're not supposed to wear your jammy-jams to the opening ceremony. Jag säger bara...
Dear gracious hosts: Oh, now I get it. It's the 100th anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic. But still, you could've chosen a better tribute than wearing dresses from 1912.
• The Old New Thing
Why don't any commands work after I run my batch file? I'm told that they are not recognized as an internal or external command, operable program, or batch file.
I sort of forgot to celebrate CLR Week last year, so let's say that CLR week is "on hiatus" until next year. To fill the summertime time slot, I'm going to burn off a busted pilot: This week is Batch File Week 2012. Remember, nobody actually enjoys batch programming. It's just something you have to put up with in order to get something done. Batch programming is the COBOL of Windows. (Who knows, if people actually like Batch File Week [fat chance], maybe it'll come back as a regular series.)
We'll open Batch File Week with a simple puzzle.
A customer reported that after running their batch file, almost no commands worked any more!
C:\> awesomebatchfile.bat
... awesome batch file does its work ...
C:\> reg query "HKLM\Software\Clients\Mail" /ve
'reg' is not recognized as an internal or external command,
operable program or batch file.
Wha? Maybe I can run regedit.
C:\> regedit
'regedit' is not recognized as an internal or external command,
operable program or batch file.
C:\> notepad
'notepad' is not recognized as an internal or external command,
operable program or batch file.
Okay, first, sit down and take a deep breath. Maybe take a Chill Pill.
My first question was "Does awesomebatchfile.bat modify the PATH variable?" (This was, strictly speaking, a psychic debugging question, but a rather obvious one.)
The customer replied, "Nope. Here, I'll send you the whole thing."
And there it was, right there at the top of awesomebatchfile.bat:
set path=C:\awesomedir
if NOT "%1"=="" set path=%1
cd /d %path%
echo Awesomeness commencing in the %path% directory!
The customer figured it would be convenient to have a variable called path, unaware that this variable has special meaning to the command interpreter. The customer didn't make the connection that their seemingly private variable called path was connected to the system variable of the same name (but by convention capitalized as PATH).
• The Old New Thing
Psychic debugging: Why your IContextMenu::InvokeCommand never gets called
A customer reported a problem with their shell context menu extension.
If the menu IDs do not lie in the range you described by the return value from IContextMenu::QueryContextMenu, then when the user chooses the menu item, the item ID will not map to your shell extension. In our sample composite context menu, observe that CCompositeContextMenu::ReduceOrdinal relies on the component context menu handlers putting their menu IDs in the range idCmdFirst through idCmdFirst - return_value - 1. If the two don't line up, then CCompositeContextMenu::ReduceOrdinal won't realize that the menu item the user selected corresponds to you.
• The Old New Thing
A brief and also incomplete history of Windows localization
The process by which Windows has been localized has changed over the years.
Back in the days of 16-bit Windows, Windows was developed with a single target language: English.
Just English.
After Windows was complete and masters were sent off to the factory for duplication, the development team handed the source code over to the localization teams. "Hey, by the way, we shipped a new version of Windows. Go localize it, will ya?"
While the code that was written for the English version was careful to put localizable content in resources, there were often English-specific assumptions hard-coded into the source code. For example, it may have assumed that the text reading direction was left-to-right or assumed that a single character fit in a single byte. (Unicode hadn't been invented yet.)
The first assumption is not true for languages such as Hebrew and Arabic (which read right-to-left), and to a lesser degree Chinese and Japanese (which read top-to-bottom in certain contexts). The second assumption is not true for languages like Chinese, Japanese, and Korean, which use DBCS (double-byte character sets).
The localization teams made the necessary code changes to make Windows work in these other locales and merged them back into the master code base. The result was that there were three different versions of the code for Windows, commonly known as Western, Middle-East, and Far-East. If you wanted Windows to support Chinese, you had to buy the Far-East version of Windows. And since the code was different for the three versions, they had different sets of bugs, and workarounds for one version didn't always work on the others. (Patches didn't exist back then, there being no mechanism for distributing them.)
If you ran into a problem with a Western language, like say, German, then you were out of luck, since there was no German Windows code base; it used the same Western code base. Windows 95 tried out a crazy idea: Translate Windows into German during the development cycle, to help catch these only-on-German problems while there was still time to do something about it. This, of course, created significant additional expense, since you had to have translators available throughout the product cycle instead of hiring them just once at the end. I remember catching a few translation errors during Windows 95: A menu item Sort was translated as Art (as in "What sort of person would do this?") rather than Sortieren ("put in a prearranged order"). And a command line tool asked the user a yes/no question, promting "J/N" (Ja/Nein), but if you wanted to answer in the affirmative, you had to type "Y".
The short version of the answer to the question "Why can't the localizers change the code if they have to?" is "Because the code already shipped. What are you going to do, recall every copy of Windows?"
At least in Windows 95, the prohibition on changing code was violated if circumstances truly demanded them, but doing so was very expensive. The only one I can think of is the change to remove the time zone highlighting from the world map. And the change was done in the least intrusive possible way: Patching four bytes in the binary to make the highlight and not-highlight colors the same. You dare not do something like introduce a new variable; who knows what kinds of havoc could result!
Having all these different versions of Windows made servicing very difficult, because you had to develop and test a different patch for each code base. Over the years, the Windows team has developed techniques for identifying these potential localization problems earlier in the development cycle. For a time, Windows was "early-localized" into German and Japanese, so as to cover the Western and Far-East scenarios. Arabic was added later, expanding coverage to the Mid-East cases, and Hindi was added in Windows 7 to cover languages which are Unicode-only.
Translating each internal build of Windows has its pros and cons: The advantage is that it can find issues when there is still time to make code changes to address them. The disadvantage is that code can change while you are localizing, and those code changes can invalidate the work you've done so far, or render it pointless. For example, somebody might edit a dialog you already spent time translating, forcing you to go back and re-translate it, or at least verify that the old translation still works. Somebody might take a string that you translated and start using it in a new way. Unless they let you know about the new purpose, you won't know that the translation needs to be re-evaluated and possibly revised.
The localization folks came up with a clever solution which gets most of the benefits while avoiding most of the drawbacks: They invented pseudo-localization, which simulates what Michael Kaplan calls "an eager and hardworking yet naïve intern localizer who is going to translate every single string." This was so successful that they hired a few more naïve intern localizers, one which performed "Mirrored pseudo-localization" (covering languages which read right-to-left) and "East Asian pseudo-localization" (covering Chinese, Japanese, and Korean).
But the rule prohibiting code changes remains in effect. Changing any code resets escrow, which means that the ship countdown clock gets reset back to its original value and all the testing performed up until that point needs to be redone in order to verify that the change did not affect them.
• The Old New Thing
One way to make sure you pass an array of the correct size
Another entry in the very sporadic series of "very strange code I've seen." The code has been changed to protect the guilty, but the essence has been preserved.
class Store
// Retrieve "count" colors from item "itemId" into "values"
bool GetItemColors(int itemId, int count, COLORREF *values);
// Set "count" colors from "values" into item "itemId"
bool SetItemColors(int itemId, int count, const COLORREF *values);
bool CopyUpToFourColors(Store *store1, Store *store2, int itemId, int count)
COLORREF size1[1];
COLORREF size2[2];
COLORREF size3[3];
COLORREF size4[4];
int *buffer = ((count == 1) ? size1 :
((count == 2) ? size2 :
((count == 3) ? size3 :
((count == 4) ? size4 :
if (buffer == nullptr)
return false;
if (!store1->GetItemColors(itemId, count, buffer))
return false;
if (!store2->SetItemColors(itemId, count, buffer))
return false;
return true;
• The Old New Thing
Taking flexitarianism to another, perhaps unintended, level
Our cafeteria has been trying to encourage flexitarianism, which it defines as eating one meat-free meal per week. But in their effort to make the concept more appealing, they may have lost sight of the goal.
Italian Sausage Calzone
(The "Vegetarian Option" magnet was probably intended for the Asparagus, Mushroom and Spinach Pizette just above it.)
One of my colleagues suggested that the sign was applying the transitive property of vegeterianism: "If you eat that which eats plants, you too eat the plants."
Fool me twice: The following day, the "Vegetarian Option" magnet was placed on the sign for the meatball pizza. Maybe they're trying to make vegetarians sick?
Resolution: The cafeteria people apologized for the misplaced magnets (which ended up in the wrong place due to the slow but persistent force of gravity). They implemented an immediate short-term solution of simply changing the order of the items on the menu so that the vegetarian option is at the bottom. (That way, a sliding magnet still ends up in the right place.) The long-term solution is to print the "Vegetarian Option" marker on the menu itself.
• The Old New Thing
What's the story behind the WM_SYNCPAINT message?
Danail wants to know the story behind the WM_SYNCPAINT message.
The documentation pretty much tells the story. When a window has been hidden, shown, moved or sized, the system may determine that it needs to send a WM_SYNCPAINT message to the windows of other threads. This message must be passed to DefWindowProc, which will send the WM_NCPAINT and WM_ERASEBKGND messages to the window as necessary.
When you call the SetWindowPos function, the window manager updates the window size, position, whatever, and then it goes around repainting the windows that were affected by the operation. By default, the SetWindowPos function does a quick-repaint of the windows before returning. After the function returns, the normal WM_PAINT message does the real work of painting the window. The quick-repaint is done so that there is immediate feedback that the window did change its size, position, whatever.
This quick-repaint is done by sending a WM_NCPAINT and WM_ERASEBKGND message to the windows that were affected by the SetWindowPos operation. This normally happens without incident, but if one of the windows affected by the SetWindowPos operation belongs to another thread, the window manager needs to get into the context of that other thread to finish the job. That's where WM_SYNCPAINT comes in. The WM_SYNCPAINT message means, "Hey, I was going around quick-painting a bunch of windows, but I couldn't quick-paint you (or any other windows on your thread) because I was on the wrong thread. Could you finish quick-painting yourself (and all the other windows that need quick-painting)? Thanks."
Another way of looking at this is that it is a way for the window manager to teleport itself into another thread so it can finish its work. "Lah di dah, quick-painting all the windows, oh crap, I can't quick-paint that window because it's on the wrong thread. Let me inject myself into that other process [trivial, since I'm the window manager, I'M IN YR PROCESS REEDING YR MSGS], and now I can send a message to myself [WM_SYNCPAINT], and when that other copy of me receives it, he'll finish where I left off."
If you don't like any of this teleportation or multiple-copies-of-yourself imagery, you can say that the WM_SYNCPAINT message means, "Quick-paint this window as part of a quick-paint operation begun on another thread."
If you don't want this quick-paint to take place, you can follow the instructions in the documentation and pass the SWP_DEFERERASE flag to suppress the WM_SYNCPAINT message.
• The Old New Thing
The format of icon resources
It's been a long time since my last entry in the continuing sporadic series on resources formats. Today we'll look at icons.
Recall that an icon file consists of two parts, an icon directory (consisting of an icon directory header followed by a number of icon directory entries), and then the icon images themselves.
When an icon is stored in resources, each of those parts gets its own resource entry.
The icon directory (the header plus the directory entries) is stored as a resource of type RT_GROUP_ICON. The format of the icon directory in resources is slightly different from the format on disk:
typedef struct GRPICONDIR
WORD idReserved;
WORD idType;
WORD idCount;
GRPICONDIRENTRY idEntries[];
typedef struct GRPICONDIRENTRY
BYTE bWidth;
BYTE bHeight;
BYTE bColorCount;
BYTE bReserved;
WORD wPlanes;
WORD wBitCount;
DWORD dwBytesInRes;
WORD nId;
All the members mean the same thing as in the corresponding ICONDIR and IconDirectoryEntry structures, except for that mysterious nId (which replaces the dwImageOffset from the IconDirectoryEntry). To unravel that mystery, we need to look at where the rest of the icon file went.
In the icon file format, the dwImageOffset represented the location of the icon bitmap within the file. When the icon file is converted to a resource, each icon bitmap is split off into its own resource of type RT_ICON. The resource compiler auto-assigns the resource IDs, and it is those resource IDs that are stored in the nId member.
For example, suppose you have an icon file with four images. In your resource file you say
42 ICON myicon.ico
The resource compiler breaks the file into five resources:
Resource type Resource Id Contents
GRPICONDIRENTRY[0].nId = 124
GRPICONDIRENTRY[1].nId = 125
GRPICONDIRENTRY[2].nId = 126
GRPICONDIRENTRY[3].nId = 127
RT_ICON 124 Pixels for image 0
RT_ICON 125 Pixels for image 1
RT_ICON 126 Pixels for image 2
RT_ICON 127 Pixels for image 3
Why does Windows break the resources into five pieces instead of just dumping them all inside one giant resource?
Recall how 16-bit Windows managed resources. Back in 16-bit Windows, a resource was a handle into a table, and obtaining the bits of the resource involved allocating memory and loading it from the disk. Recall also that 16-bit Windows operated under tight memory constraints, so you didn't want to load anything into memory unless you really needed it.
Therefore, looking up an icon in 16-bit Windows went like this:
• Find the icon group resource, load it, and lock it.
• Study it to decide which icon image is best.
• Unlock and free the icon group resource since we don't need it any more.
• Find and load the icon image resource for the one you chose.
• Return that handle as the icon handle.
Observe that once we decide which icon image we want, the only memory consumed is the memory for that specific image. We never load the images we don't need.
Drawing an icon went like this:
• Lock the icon handle to get access to the pixels.
• Draw the icon.
• Unlock the icon handle.
Since icons were usually marked discardable, they could get evicted from memory if necessary, and they would get reloaded the next time you tried to draw them.
Although Win32 does not follow the same memory management model for resources as 16-bit Windows, it preserved the programming model (find, load, lock) to make it easier to port programs from 16-bit Windows to 32-bit Windows. And in order not to break code which loaded icons from resources directly (say, because they wanted to replace the icon selection algorithm), the breakdown of an icon file into a directory + images was also preserved.
You now know enough to solve this customer's problem:
I have an icon in a resource DLL, and I need to pass its raw data to another component. However, the number of bytes reported by SizeOfResource is only 48 instead of 5KB which is the amount actually stored in the resource DLL. I triple-checked the resource DLL and I'm sure I'm looking at the right icon resource.
Here is my code:
HRSRC hrsrcIcon = FindResource(hResources,
MAKEINTRESOURCE(IDI_MY_ICON), RT_GROUP_ICON);
DWORD cbIcon = SizeofResource(hResources, hrsrcIcon);
HGLOBAL hIcon = LoadResource(hResources, hrsrcIcon);
void *lpIcon = LockResource(hIcon);
• The Old New Thing
Why do some font names begin with an at-sign?
It was a simple question.
For some reason, my font selection dialog (CFontDialog) shows a bunch of font names beginning with the at-sign (@). These fonts don't work correctly if I use them. Any idea what they are? (I tried searching the Internet, but search engines don't seem to let you search for @ so it's hard to make much headway.)
(And that's why I wrote "at-sign" in the subject instead of using the @ character.)
Fonts which begin with an @-sign are vertically-oriented fonts. They are used in languages like Chinese, Japanese, and (less often) Korean. The idea is that if you want to generate vertical text, you start with the horizontal version of the font and compose your document, then switch to the vertical version for printing.
x x x
I wasn't able to detect that your browser supports the @SimSun font, so I'll give an example with fake Chinese characters. Pretend that the shapes and Latin letters are actually Chinese characters. First, you compose your document with the horizontal font:
When it's time to print, switch to the vertical version of the font.
Hm, it looks like the Chinese characters got rotated 90° to the left, so they're all lying on their side. The result is not really all that readable, but wait, here's the trick: After the paper comes out of the printer, rotate the paper right 90°:
Notice that the vertical version of a font does not simply rotate every character 90°. Non-CJK characters typically remain in their original orientation (which means that when you turn the paper, they will come out rotated). And some CJK characters change form between horizontal and vertical variants, like the period in the example above, so it's not a simple rule like "rotate all CJK characters and leave non-CJK characters alone."
This is basically a hack to get rudimentary vertical font support in software that doesn't support vertical text natively. (Web browsers support vertical text natively with the proposed writing-mode property.)
If you don't want vertical fonts to show up in your font dialog, pass the CF_NOVERTFONTS flag. Of course, if you pass that flag, then your users won't be able to use the vertical-font trick any more.
Supplemental reading which served as the source material for this article:
Bonus head-to-head competition: You can read how Michael Kaplan blogged this exact same subject in his own Kaplanesque way.
Page 1 of 3 (24 items) 123 | [] |
Judy S Wrote:
Mar 24, 2013 4:10 PM
The final outcome is that regardless of where you stand on abortion...part of your money paid will be supplied to pay for abortions. If you can live with that, great. Since there are those who believe that abortion is nothing more than legalized murder, part of the insurance money that they pay will go to pay abortions against their own personal beliefs. If I were a part of that group, I'd have a heck of a time justifying my money paying for the murder of a fetus. And since no one cares how far along its development is, some would call it a term fetus or a baby who would otherwise survive outside the womb. Money for irresponsibility...great value ! | [] |
Sins of the father: Wrestling with Abraham's parenting skills
Article Scripture and Theology
The suspect actions of Abraham should give us pause about what makes him one of the heroes of the Bible.
By anonimus ([1]) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons
Most of us grew up mentally supplying a retroactive halo to the protagonists in the Bible. Churches have been named for the "proto-saints," as holy ones of the Old Testament are called. Michelangelo comfortably added prophets' likenesses to the Sistine ceiling as if their sanctity was beyond reproach. I'm not suggesting reproach is a better response to those who embraced God's offer to participate in salvation history. It's a tough gig, as anyone who dares to say "yes" when God comes calling can vouch.
That halo, however, can blind us to the reality of the limitations and sometimes blood-curdling choices of these women and men. When we christen everything biblical heroes say and do as holy simply because they appear in our most holy book, we open ourselves to some really dangerous theology. Religious abuse often comes from taking a few legitimate words from scripture and using them to perverse ends. Forgiving the inhabitants of scripture everything because of the territory they're standing on invites such abuse.
Is it really OK for people in the Bible to do things we would arrest our fellow citizens for doing? Does their doing it in the name of God make it any more decent? When we find ourselves willing to consecrate all biblical activity as divinely inspired and approved, we open chasms in our idea of God.
Abraham might be viewed as a dangerous dad. If we've never imagined that Bible heroes might also be mortal sinners, this idea will be profoundly uncomfortable.
Yet those physically or emotionally abused by their parents know the peril that results when love and violence emanate from the same essential source. It's not psychologically safe or healthy to entertain that sometimes God wants parents to behave this way.
It can never be honorable that Lot was willing to barter his daughters' bodies for the sake of the peace as he did in Sodom (Gen. 11:8). It can't be right that Jacob openly preferred Joseph to his brothers and inflamed sibling rivalry to deadly levels (Gen. 37:3). We can never accept that Jephthah, a judge of morality, killed his daughter as a sacrifice of thanksgiving to God (Judg. 11:34-40). And we must be fundamentally unnerved at the thought that God might ask Abraham to desert his son, Ishmael, and his mother, Hagar (Gen. 8:12). Or to take his other beloved son, Isaac, and slay him in cold blood to prove his loyalty (Gen. 22:2). Or that Abraham would be willing to do so without protest.
If we convince ourselves that such actions must be a form of piety that God alone understands and we must accept, then what other terrors will we condone in the name of God and religion?
The rabbis are never so forbearing of biblical personalities as we Christians are. Jewish scholars deal with citizens of the Bible on their own terms and by their own merits, leaving God out of the equation. After all, we can't hide behind God anymore than we can claim "the devil made us do it."
With this perspective in mind, we tread on highly significant ground in following the actions and motivations of Abraham, father of nations. In the 21st century, it's fair to call Abraham the most important figure in biblical studies. Abraham stands at the crossroads of the three great religions of the Middle East: Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. Abraham is the only religious figure with enough stature to provide common ground for the interfaith dialogue upon which the hope of peace and understanding across much of the world is pinned.
Abraham, whether he appreciated it or not, really did father three spiritual nations that now must learn to live together. Otherwise we will tear the world apart, persisting with the stubborn attitude that brought so many biblical families to ruin: namely, that our heavenly Father must love one more than the others, that only one is acceptable and deserves to survive.
With so much at stake, it seems relevant to ask: What does it mean for interfaith dialogue that Abraham, the man who holds all the cards, is nonetheless a dangerous dad?
New choices and directions are always viable, even in the story of this great ancestor. In the birth of Isaac, a kinder season seems to visit the new first family of faith. Everyone is reborn: Sarai and Abram become Sarah ("princess") and Abraham ("father of nations") at last. Isaac means "laughter," and it looks like there might finally be some room for joy in their story.
Yet the happiness is short-lived. Sarah's jealousy for her son's future ironically banishes the laughter forever, as Isaac's older brother is shunned and abandoned. Soon enough, the mountain of Moriah casts its shadow over this family with its dark demands, as Abraham feels compelled to satisfy God with the ultimate loyalty oath.
Have the covenant of fire and blood been forgotten? How about the personally wounding marks of circumcision? Why does the God of originally easy promises morph into a pitiless and demanding deity, like the gods Abram left behind in Ur?
If the change in God seems inexplicable, the difference in Abraham is equally mystifying. This is the man who once questioned God fearlessly, asking for proof of divine intentions when they seemed cloudy. This is the uncle who rescued Lot time and again, even though this nephew of his was not apparently worth a further investment of resources. This same Abraham vigorously debated the Lord God over vile Sodom, arguing that when divine justice demanded the lives of the innocent along with the guilty, then it was hardly justice and beneath God to extract it.
But now Abraham does not raise a single question when God asks for the unutterable: the life of his son. Abraham does not speak a word in defense of innocence or talk of justice. Abraham's silence on this matter is as eerie and incomprehensible as the request. With love, but without protest, Isaac's father takes a terrible journey, intending his son's destruction with every step.
I've never met a parent who would do this, not even for God. Abrahams willingness to sacrifice Isaac is the most brutally discordant story in the Bible, next only to the Crucifixion in its ruthless logic. Rabbis suggest that after abandoning Ishmael, Abraham could not hold his other son close to his heart.
Paternity, the central motivation of Abraham's life, had been exposed as an unworthy goal. Trust in sons was pointless. There was only God. There would be nothing but God. Natural love must end where obethence to God begins. And yet, incredibly, the darkness is lifted. Isaac survives.
Of all the dark mysteries surrounding Abraham, that all his children survive their father's worst intentions is the greatest. Late in life, with his last wife, Keturah, Abraham will have six more sons, all of whom he'll banish to make room for Isaac. The father of nations lived up to his name. God kept the promise.
In fact, God keeps both promises: for land as well as heirs. Abraham remained the lifelong "wandering Aramaean" that Moses later calls him--a perpetual resident alien on the land his flocks graze. Yet at the story's end Abraham forces his neighbors to sell him a single patch of ground--to bury Sarah.
Ishmael and Isaac will finally reunite when they bury their father at this same spot, the only land he ever owned, his grave. Abraham made it to Canaan, which is more than his father did before him. But it's always up to the children to heal what the last generation broke.
This article appeared in the March 2010 issue of U.S. Catholic (Vol. 75, No. 3, pages 44-46). | [] |
Take the 2-minute tour ×
Our printer (Brother HL-5340D) does not print correctly on Ubuntu 12.10/13.04. Almost every print-job looks like this:
example of faulty print job
As you can see, the printer is possessed :). Despite that, everything works fine on 12.04 and older versions. The drivers (Brother HL-5350 DN Br-Script3) are the same for 12.04 and 12.10/13.04.
Test-pages are printed correctly. Sometimes we also get an extra page that looks like this:
How can I fix this behavior?
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4 Answers
I was hitting this exact same issue today when trying to print PDFs. I was also using the Br-Script3 driver but switched to the Brother MFC9840CDW Foomatic/Postscript driver.
I would rather use the (correct) former driver, but it appears to be an issue that has not been resolved and this is an adequate workaround for my purposes.
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I have the HL-5250DN, and I've run across this myself. It's a pain. I haven't had the time (and I usually just use my windows box instead), but you might try one of the HP PCL drivers instead. They've worked for me on Windows when I've had a PC that didn't have the brother drivers installed, and not a lot of time. The older the PCL driver is, the better your chances will be (but fewer features will be supported)
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For us, on Ubuntu 12.10 it wouldn't print anything (not even test page) and would blink red/orange the bottom 4 lights when we tried to print. We resolved it by switching drivers to a generic driver (the linux ones listed on Brother's website 1 did NOT appear to work, maybe I messed up the install) and even double-side printing works now! Ubuntu seems to recognize the printer and automatically add using the Br-Script3 driver. To change it, since I have cinnamon, I went into cinnamon-settings (gnome-control-center does NOT appear to let you change the driver associated with an automatically recognized printer), Printers> HL-5340D > right click, Printer Properties > Settings, Make and Model, Change ... > Select Printer from Database, Generic, Forward > PCL 6/PCL SL > Generic PCL 6/PCL XL Printer -CUPS+Gutenprint v5.2.9.
I have included a screenshot of the appropriate settings. Cinnamon Settings is what you want, on the left/bottom. Gnome-control-center on the right does not work. Actually I don't have enough reputation so instead it is linked 2.
Edit: my friend got it to work without cinnamon by going to localhost:631 and then roughly do the same procedure (select the printer, Administration - Modify Printer, ...).
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Java Desktop System Email and Calendar User Guide
Deleting Messages
When you delete a message, the following events occur:
If you need to retrieve a message from Trash, you can undelete the message. When you undelete a message, the message is restored to the folder from which you deleted the message.
You can expunge a folder to remove permanently from the folder the messages that you deleted.
You can empty your Trash folder to delete the contents of Trash permanently. That is, when you empty Trash, you expunge all your folders.
To Delete a Message
Select the message that you want to delete in the message list, then choose Edit -> Delete.
To Undelete a Message
Select the message that you want to undelete in the Trash folder, then choose Edit -> Undelete.
To Expunge a Folder
To delete permanently the messages from a folder, open the folder, then choose Actions -> Expunge.
To Empty Trash
Choose Actions -> Empty Trash. | [] |
Take the 2-minute tour ×
I have a module as following,
module Main
include Dad::Mam
in dad.rb:
module Dad
module Mam
puts "Mam is saying you are very lazy..."
How can I name this file? dad.rb is right?
but when running
$ ruby main.rb
I am getting an Error like,
main.rb:2:in <module:Main>': uninitialized constant Main::Dad (NameError) from main.rb:1:in'
I need to show the sentance inside the puts under Mam module while running ruby main.rb,
I am confused about using ruby's modules, please anyone help me and guide me..
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1 Answer
up vote 1 down vote accepted
In this case, since you're just writing a simple script, use #require_relative
require_relative 'dad'
module Main
include Dad::Mam
For an actual app or library, you would want to manage the load path (a global variable holding an array that tells ruby where to look for files) and then use a normal require
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thanks a lot cheek.... – abhilash Sep 7 '12 at 7:34
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Tork: Prehistoric Punk– Review
Brad Gallaway's picture
Do I like games that push the envelopes of design and creativity? Most definitely. There are few pleasures like sitting down with a title that does the unexpected, that blows my mind with a unique twist, or shocks me with some radical re-interpretation of existing standards. Can every game achieve these lofty aspirations? It might be nice to wish for, but my gut tells me that it's not likely. So, when a game finds itself lacking brilliant new concepts, it's a fact that solid mechanics and good production values can get it pretty far. Tork: Prehistoric Punk is one of these games.
Boiling it down, Tork strikes me as a bit of a mix between former platforming superstar Crash Bandicoot's early games and the first Sly Cooper. Those titles were designed with a strong focus on simplicity and forward motion that appealed to many players, myself included. Tork shares that same feeling with related tones in pace and level design.
The story is nothing remarkable. Basically, it's about cave boy Tork on a quest to rescue his kidnapped father. Don't look much deeper, because there isn't anything there. This is hardly surprising, and not really something I'm docking the game for, since thin stories are par for the course when talking about platform action games. If you can live without heavy drama, the game does have it where it counts—the gameplay.
Our horned hero comes equipped with the requisite jump and double-jump, as all good platform heroes should. He can also attack with his bolo weapon, up close or at a distance. Rounding out his repertoire, Tork can transform into a yeti, an armadillo, and a flying squirrel, the animal shape taken depending on which area he's in. Mostly used to access side areas with goodies, each of these alternate forms also possesses a screen-clearing super-attack and slightly different moves.
So far this disc might not sound very special, but it's the way those things come together that makes Tork: Prehistoric Punk such a pleasant little game.
Foe example, everything about the game sports an absurdly high level of production. The graphics are extremely well-done, being smooth and finely polished. It's a gorgeous effort, with no rough edges to be seen. Between this game and Scaler, there seems to be a renaissance of absolutely beautiful budget-priced platformers going on.
Controlling the little cave-kid is as smooth as silk, and his animations flow as well or even better than a lot of blockbuster stars' do. (I'm looking at you, Prince of Persia: Warrior Within. Oh, how the mighty have fallen…) The camera is also quite nice, usually providing a very good view of Tork and his surroundings, though it may be zoomed out a bit too far at times.
The level designs deserve special praise. The progress in each area is fairly linear, but numerous side paths and hidden nooks to explore give them a very open, unrestricted feeling while also avoiding the potential for getting lost. My favorite was a tall, crumbling castle being struck by lightning. It was a joy to play through, leaping around terraces of falling stone while scaling grey brick heights. Further in, Tork finds himself on the back of a huge train, hopping from car to car while I watched an industrial city roll by in the distance. Those are just two examples, but every level is just as fleshed-out as the last. Besides being a treat to look at, the game also rewards the time and effort taken to fully cover these areas, so there is some replay potential for people who care about high scores and such.
Evidence of the developers' love for the game (raising it above the level of a phoned-in bargain title) is shown by the novelty missions thrown in to spice things up. In one area, Tork must chase down a giant medieval war wagon, taking it apart bit by bit. Another challenge puts him atop a pterodactyl's back for some decent airborne shooting action. Little segments like this pop up often to keep the game from getting stale, and even the standard "run forward and bop enemies" stages are better than average, coming stocked with plenty of prescripted elements and small surprises here and there. The bosses are well-done too, each one requiring a fair effort and some decent hand-to-eye skills while never feeling cheap or aggravating.
There's not much else to say about Tork: Prehistoric Punk except that it's smooth, I enjoyed playing it very much, and I would definitely recommend it to anyone craving some upper middle-class platforming. It won't set the world on fire, but if it had hit the Xbox way back when it was announced a few years ago, it would have had a much better chance of making a name for itself. There's no shame at all in putting out a solid effort like this. The only "bad" thing that could be said about it is that it's not revolutionary. Even so, this bargain-priced horned kid ended up being worth every penny.Rating: 7.5 out of 10
Category Tags
Platform(s): Xbox
Developer(s): Ubisoft
Publisher: Ubisoft
Genre(s): Adventure/Explore
ESRB Rating: Everyone
Articles: Game Reviews
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Evaluating the Pros and Cons of Transferring to an FCS School
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Evaluating the Pros and Cons of Transferring to an FCS School
Streeter Lecka/Getty Images
Last Friday, the college football world was rocked with the announcement of Tyrann Mathieu being kicked off the LSU football team. In the spring, Michael Dyer was kicked off the Auburn football team after several run-ins with the law.
Obviously, reports of transferring to an FCS program seemed ideal for Mathieu and Dyer. A chance to start anew, focus on grades and evaluate the problems that landed you at a new school with an inferior football program.
But the good news is that Mathieu has elected to go and stay in rehab and elected to not go to school according to ESPN.
Dyer, also according to ESPN, has also elected to not to play this season and attend school in Arkansas. But transferring to an FCS school was on both players' radars.
On paper, it's an understandable alternate route for a troubled athlete to clear his head. But, what could be the pros and cons of a transfer to the FCS division or even lower?
Division One football is the toughest, most watched and most prestigious college sport in all of collegiate competition.
Each year, many football athletes excel among the expectations and succeed for their respective teams.
Whether it's performance excellence on the field, or performance as a student-athlete, many football players shine as they tackle the responsibilities that were granted to them as high-school recruits.
Chris Graythen/Getty Images
Of course, there are those that can't fulfill those promises that the coaches stipulate and sometimes they just have to leave to compete somewhere else.
Trouble with the law, excessive drug use and behavioral problems usually are kryptonite to a talented athlete. Once a coach reaches the end of his patience level with an athlete, usually it's over and the athlete has to find somewhere else to play.
For the pro of this scenario, the player could go, get his head cleared in a new environment and try to succeed on the football field for the upcoming season.
Getting your name out of the cross hairs the way Janoris Jenkins did makes transferring to a lower division of football a relaxing and beneficial decision.
Maybe the program wasn’t suited for the player and it’s not mentally for him. A player could react positively to less discipline or stricter discipline. But at the same time, the behavior problem needs to be addressed.
So for instance, if Mathieu did decide to transfer to an FCS school this fall, would that have really changed whatever behavioral problem he had?
Does the potential FCS coach really care about his well-being? Or does he just care about an increased chance to make the playoffs?
This particular topic should make anyone wonder and with that said, this will bring our subject to the cons. First, the troubled athlete gets to just move a step down and play immediately with no repercussions.
The former FBS player moves on without learning his lesson the way a player with a normal transfer to a FBS team would.
Additionally, a job will be lost once the former FBS transfer walks on campus. Possibly, a well-deserved player who spent all spring and summer fighting to win or keep his position will no longer have his spot.
So while it could be a grand idea on paper, there will always be a lower division player that will lose his job. What if that player who lost his job was one of the finest young men the coach has ever come across? No easy way to explain how status is now above humility.
In the bitter end, maybe an athlete is better off staying at his school or transferring to another FBS to get his grades, behavior and skills together. If that is done, he will have an equal opportunity to compete for a starting spot just as the next man does.
So transferring to FCS has its pros and cons. But maybe a rule change will better suit the college football landscape in the future
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Quick Nip
A character ingests intoxicants — usually, but not always, alcohol from a hip flask — casually, without interrupting whatever else he's doing, without commenting on it, and sometimes without drawing comment from other characters.
This versatile bit of business turns up in both comedy and drama and, depending on context, can say any number of things about a character. It may be used to portray him as pathetically dependent; or, conversely, to establish him as a low-grade Bad Ass, Immune to Drugs; or, if it's not habitual, to emphasize that he's under unusual stress. Or the focus may be on the other characters' lack of reaction: they know this guy so well, they're used to it.
In Blacksmith Scene, the first film ever, the characters share a beer before getting back to work, making this Older than Television.
Contrast Bottled Heroic Resolve. May be prone to declaring "No More for Me" on seeing something too weird to handle.
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Anime and Manga
• In the second season of Darker than Black, perhaps because she's become freelance, April has replaced her former can of beer with a more quickly accessible drink from a hip flask. Hei also is shown drinking from a hip flask, although in his case, it seems to indicate that he's become an alcoholic, another manifestation, along with Wild Hair and Perma Stubble that he's gone through a lot since the Time Skip.
• Attack on Titan: Dot Pixis' tendency to regularly reach for his pocket flask during important conversations is one of his Character Tics, and one of those little quirks that make him the Bunny-Ears Lawyer that he is.
Comic Books
• Ralph Dibny slowly descends into alcoholism and madness in 52 as he tries to revive his murdered wife Sue. Throughout the series he takes quick nips from a hip flask. It's all an act to fool Felix Faust. The flask is actually filled with Gingold, the extract that grants Dibny his stretching powers.
• In Charade, when Bartholomew is introduced, he is rubbing dry-cleaning solution into his tie as he talks to Reggie. When he finishes, he gives the rag a quick sniff, stuffs it in his pocket, and keeps talking as though nothing had happened. In retrospect, she should've known he was no good.
• Clive Owen's character from the movie Children of Men has a small bottle of whiskey that he keeps on his person. He stands on the street and dumps a slug of it into his coffee before going to work, and no one seems to notice.
• Sky Captain (played by Jude Law) from Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow (2004). In a subversion, he's actually drinking Milk of Magnesia for his stomach ulcer.
• Travis Bickle in Taxi Driver.
• Jayne takes a drink like this at least once in Serenity.
• In Unforgiven, William Munny takes a drink of whiskey just before going in to fight the assembled lawmen in the saloon. This was probably to demonstrate a return to the lawbreaking ways he followed before marrying his late wife, who had convinced him to give up alcohol.
• The second thing Eddie Valiant does after his first appearance in Who Framed Roger Rabbit is take a swig of Wild Turkey. He acts as though it's a case of I Need a Freaking Drink (he does it after disgustedly muttering "Toons" under his breath), but the film is quick to establish that he is in fact The Alcoholic.
• In Reign of Fire, Van Zan has one of these that he carries around and drinks from for most of the movie. It's subverted near the end when he gives the protagonist a drink.
"Hey, this is just water!"
• Ghostbusters. After they're thrown out of their university laboratory, Peter Venkman tries to sell Ray Stanz on the idea of going into business for themselves. While talking, both of them take a drink out of a bottle of an alcoholic beverage.
• The dance instructor in Shall We Dance takes sips from a flask during classes as a sign she considers the numbskulls she is teaching to dance something she needs a shot of whiskey to get through. Eventually the class grows better at dancing and become friends and she has a moment where she goes to take a sip, shrugs, and puts it away untouched.
• The Comedian drinks from a flask at least once during the Watchmen movie adaptation. It is commented on in this case; another character suggests that maybe there should be a rule about drinking at meetings. The Comedian just laughs.
• In Empire Records, Corey occasionally pops a pill when under stress, which turn out to be speed, hence her ability to stay up studying and making cupcakes and so on. However, later in the film Gina confronts her over it.
• One of the passengers -a cook- in Titanic as it goes down does this as he and the protagonists hang on for dear life on the upturned bow of the ship. Considering his position, it'd probably be his last chance to do so.note
• In Cheech and Chong's Up In Smoke, during their trial for possession, Man is severely messed up, due to trying to eat the evidence. Despite the judge's protests, Pedro goes up to get him a glass of water from her pitcher. Man takes a swig, then spits it out, and says, "It's fucking vodka!"
• Toyed with in Back to the Future. Before asking Lorraine to the dance, George McFly orders, "Lou... give me a milk. Chocolate." He takes one swig, then goes to try his luck.
• The main character in Bad Lieutenant Port Of Call New Orleans does this all the time. In one scene, he pauses from interviewing a suspect to light up a joint...with almost his entire squad sitting on the other side of a closed door.
• Alastor "Mad-Eye" Moody in the Harry Potter series is well known for drinking only from a flask (of juice, mind) he carries at his hip. This is a result of Moody's paranoia and fear of attack resulting from a long, enemy-gaining career as an Auror. (In Goblet of Fire Barty Crouch Jr. used this quirk of Moody's to full advantage, filling the flask with the potion that allowed him to assume Moody's appearance and drinking it once an hour to maintain the effects.) They neglect to mention the motivation behind always drinking from a flash in the movie version, making him look like an insane alcoholic instead.
• In Mike Carey's The Devil You Know, this is how the murderer is found.
• Discworld's Nanny Ogg keeps her hipflask hidden away in TrouserKnicker Space.
• In Joe Abercrombie's Best Served Cold, Nicomo Cosca, an alcoholic, tries for a long time to do this and later does once he becomes Captain General of the Thousand Swords again.
Live Action TV
• House has been known to pop Vicodin while diagnosing patients. Justified by it being prescription medication for chronic pain that he needs to take at somewhat regular intervals.
• Mason, a Reaper from Dead Like Me, carried a hipflask with alcohol, except during that time when he actually was off the drugs and booze. (He got back on the booze at the start of the second season after he had to reap a family father during the man's daughter's birthday party, but tried to keep it a secret from the others.)
• TNA wrestler ODB brings a hip flask with her to the ring, and takes a nip from it just before the match starts. She'll take another nip just before making her big face comeback at the end of the match.
• In Los Simuladores' Mexican remake (a show about people who make a living pulling Batman Gambits to help people), Maximo Santana once cleverly posed as an antiacid guzzler in order to leave the place by faking a terrible reflux once he runs out of "antiacid".
• Oliver does this in the first episode of Slings and Arrows.
• Whenever Hawkeye Pierce of Mash isn't up to his elbows in somebody's gut (or using both hands to carry out this episode's Zany Scheme), there's a fifty percent chance that he's carrying around a Martini Glass.
• Mrs. Slocombe of Are You Being Served? often sips from a hip flask behind the counter.
• The Wire: Jimmy McNulty, whenever he gets really attached to a case. Or just makes one up.
• In Life On Mars Gene Hunt keeps alcohol in his office and regularly drinks from a hip flask. Lampshaded when he gets shot and pulls a dented flask from his coat to demonstrate why he's unhurt; a relieved Sam asks rhetorically, "What are the chances?" and Gene replies, "Pretty good, actually," as he pulls out several more flasks.
• On A Bit of Fry and Laurie, the characters John and Peter are perpetually discussing some kind of unspecified business crisis in their boardroom, shouting, swearing, cursing their Arch-Enemy Marjorie... and drinking. They refill their glasses over and over in a five-minute sketch; they slam them dramatically onto hard surfaces; they make huge gestures that result in liquid flung across the room (which probably explains some of the refilling); once, John says a line that ends with wordless liquid burbling because he decided to take a sip while he was still talking.
• Gossip Girl: Chuck Bass frequently does this, on occasion with flasks.
• A subversion in an episode of Veronica Mars features a poker game where one of the players periodically takes a swig from a bottle of Jack Daniels he keeps with him. Later in the same episode, Veronica (a very small blonde teenager, and the ex-girlfriend of the player in question) grabs the bottle and takes a long draw, much to the shock of everybody present. She then remarks on his abysmally low alcohol tolerance, and explains that the bottle contains tea.
• On The Big Bang Theory, Rajesh takes a nip from a flask. When the others notice, he explains that it's cough syrup (he was nursing a cold at the time), which he finds just as effective as liquor.
• The Colbert Report: Stephen Colbert does so in this segment (towards the end).
• A frequent habit of Colonel Tigh in the Battlestar Galactica remake. Even while on duty.
• Spike occasionally does this on Buffy the Vampire Slayer.
• Dean Winchester from Supernatural in "Houses of the Holy" and through most of season 7.
• In Doctor Who NS S4 E3 "Planet of the Ood", Klineman Halpen kept taking quick nips, which was commented on by others. He explained that it was "hair tonic". He believed it was hair tonic, but instead it turned him into an Ood, one of the very aliens he had enslaved.
• In an episode of Good Eats that was about meat pie (and parodied Sweeney Todd of all things!), "Mrs. Lovett" asks for "a quick nip" from a flask produced by Alton. He hands it to her, and she takes a swig...only to spit it out. It turns out the substance in the flask is Worcestershire sauce.
Tabletop Games
• In Feng Shui, the iconic Renegade Cop character was a hard drinker who was kicked off the force. He was found drinking himself to death in a gutter, but was recruited into the heroic Dragons and given purpose to rebuild his life. He was notable for his hip flask that he would still take a swig from even in a gunfight with zombies from the future. After his death, a friend found his hip flask and tried to take a drink from it, only to find it was filled with water, and had been for a long time.
• In William Gilette's Sherlock Holmes play, Holmes, while talking to Watson (in fact, finishing up a Sherlock Scan), produces a syringe, fills it with his beloved seven percent solution of cocaine and injects it into his left arm. As in "The Sign of the Four", Watson eventually grows embarrassed enough about Holmes's habit to ask about it, and Holmes suggests to Watson that he try it himself.
• Dr. Einstein in Arsenic and Old Lace is constantly reaching for his hip flask.
Video Games
• Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney:
• Detective Marshall regularly takes swigs from his hip-flask to punctuate his speech.
• Godot and his coffee don't really seem to apply to this trope, at least until you learn exactly why he drinks so much.
• Final Fantasy X: Auron, although being dead, it probably doesn't have an effect on him.
• Eternal Darkness: Edward Roivas starts with a flask of "liquid courage" in his inventory; quick nips raise his sanity. (That's right, getting drunk makes him more sane.)
• In Batman: Arkham Asylum, Officer Boles is seen taking a nip from a flask as Joker is taken to his cell. This turns out to be important later.
• In Team Fortress 2, the scout and his crit-o/Bonk cola seems to be like this. While it is important, he only takes a quick second to drink it. The demoman will also do this with his bottle, and some other things like a frying pan, so you wonder if he really just gets drunk by breathing.
• Or he might just already be so staggeringly drunk that he thinks he's drinking from a bottle, not a frying pan.
• Fallout: New Vegas has the DLC item, the Vault 13 canteen. While in the player's inventory, the Courier will take periodic swigs from it. Possibly subverted, because it contains plain-old water, which, in Hardcore mode, helps slow down the effects of dehydration.
Web Comics
• No matter what he's doing, as long as he's in a semi-private place (like his office), Sanderson of Something Positive is always, always seen with whiskey in his hand. Davan can sometimes be seen with a hip flask, which he once left unattended for several months, leading to his roommate, father, and foster sister accidentally mixing him a Gargle Blaster.
Western Animation
Playing DrunkHard Drinking TropesA Round Of Drinks For The House
Psycho SerumThis Is Your Index on DrugsSex, Drugs and Rock & Roll
Putting On My Thinking CapCharacterization TropesQuintessential British Gentleman
Permissions beyond the scope of this license may be available from
Privacy Policy | [] |
Forty-three percent, respectively, voted that Roy Gardner was a Gilbert wannabe, or else, going to die if one of the voters met him; while the other twelve percent agree that Roy is a pouf. (Fortunately, the option "Anne's One True Love" was left blank.) The new poll inquires as to your top two favorites of the "Anne" books.
If you've seen the second movie, and have looked at the chapter title, you already know exactly why you'll enjoy this final installment!
Chapter Thirty: Pitching and Mooning
"I feel as if I had opened a book and found roses of yesterday, sweet and beloved, between its leaves."
-L.M. Montgomery, Anne of the Island
"How do you think a mother would feel if she found her child tattooed all over with a baking powder advertisement?" queried Anne. She sighed, a long, deep exhalation that blew over her entire being, ruffling the lace on her blouse and causing the petals of the flowers in her basket to quiver indignantly. "I love my story, and I wrote it out of the best that was in me." Anne's limpid, huge eyes searched Gilbert's face, eager for encouragement or at least solace.
Poor Anne, thought Gilbert sympathetically, as he led Braveheart patiently along behind them, it's no wonder she's so anxious. She's been tossed about by crowds and had pencils and pamphlets flung in her face all day, and I guess it must be embarrassing to know that people think the best you could get to publish your story was an advertisement for baking powder, of all the prosaic nonsense. "Ah, you're just tired," he reassured her, putting a friendly arm around her shoulders.
Anne stiffened and sped up, causing Gilbert's arm to fall limply back to his side.
Nothing daunted, Gilbert continued, "Besides, why should you care? A hundred dollars is more than either of us would make in two months' teaching, anyway!"
"Blood money," groaned Anne. "And Josie Pye and Tillie Boulter can't wait to pounce on it."
"They're spiteful old cats!" Gilbert scoffed. "You're just the first person in poky old Avonlea who's tried anything like that." To make his point…as he had done several years ago as Anne limped around the corner of the Spurgeon house…Gilbert squeezed her elbow…
And Anne moved away again! She knelt in the side of the road, heaping lilacs into her basket…which was very odd. Anne was not fond of lilacs.
Somewhat daunted this time, Gilbert was also less confident about his encouraging Anne. "All pioneers are considered to be afflicted with moonstruck madness," he said lamely.
"I'm mad," came a voice from somewhere in the middle of the lilacs' heady, cloying scent, "to think I can write anything better than a baking powder advertisement! This has dampened any spark of ambition…! I shall never write another story again!" Anne, who had risen and now stood with her back to Gilbert, sounded dangerously close to tears.
"Well, I wouldn't give up altogether," persisted Gilbert. "Maybe…if you just let your characters speak everyday English…instead of all that high-faluting mumbo-jumbo…?"
Anne turned to face him, looking like the muse of tragic poetry…if there was one. Wasn't there? Gilbert couldn't remember. "You think my story's full of faults, too, don't you?"
"'Wilt thou give up thy garter, o fairest of the fair?'" Gilbert quoted at Anne…who flushed, either from embarrassment or from surprise that Gilbert remembered the story well enough to quote. "Anne, nobody speaks that way."
Inspiration struck. "Look at that sap, Percival, who sits around mooning the entire time! He never even lets Averil get a word in edgewise." Gilbert shook his head over the vagaries of old-fashioned heroes, probably clothed in knee breeches and tights, and armed with blunt epées. "In real life she'd have pitched him."
"His poetry would win any girl's heart!" hissed Anne, stalking away in a manner that suggested Gilbert was having very bad luck with hers.
The deuce—not AGAIN! Gilbert was so mad he didn't even realize he had cursed, even mentally, for the first time where Anne was concerned. Striding quickly after her, he sputtered, "Well—if you want my opinion, Miss Shirley, I'd write about places I knew something of, and people who spoke everyday English—instead of these—these—silly schoolgirl romances!"
"I don't share your opinion!"
Now Gilbert and Anne had both developed a habit, over the past few years of friendship, of whacking the other with whatever came to hand if they were being ridiculously irrational—or irrationally ridiculous, for that matter. At this moment Gilbert had his riding crop in his right hand; and, aiming for her shoulder, dealt Anne a whap upon her…er…Gilbert recoiled visibly as Anne screeched to a halt and whirled to face him, her eyes ablaze.
"I am not your horse, Mr. Blythe!" she shrieked indignantly.
"I was just trying to give you a bit of friendly advice!" Gilbert protested.
"Is that so?" asked Anne sarcastically.
Gilbert ignored her scathing query. "Take the hundred dollars, and write a real story—about the people you care about—right here in Avonlea!"
"Well, you certainly wouldn't be one of them!" cried Anne, flinging herself down upon a convenient tree stump and beginning to cry dismally.
Gilbert barely had time to stand around awkwardly—unsure of what to do—before Anne sat up abruptly and turned to survey him. "Pitching…? and mooning?!
"You know," she continued between sobs, "you're about as intellectual as Charlie—and Moody—and—and FRED!"
Gilbert was really alarmed now. He sat down next to Anne.
"—and all the rest of the boys, who only think of finding some silly girl to marry and keep house for them!" finished Anne tragically.
Gilbert lost his temper now. What kind of person did Anne think he was?!...Oh, that's right. Unintellectual. He certainly thought of a great deal more than winning Anne's hand in marriage…he had thought of her, up until now, as far above the ranks of a silly girl…or even of building a home of dreams with—not delegating the task solely to—Anne!
"Well, you can cry and feel sorry for yourself all you want," he snapped. "But it won't help you write a better novel."
And then Gilbert's eyes met Anne's tear-stained ones; and she was looking at him so sorrowfully that his heart melted despite himself.
He sighed. "Will you still come with me to Fred and Diana's engagement clambake next Tuesday?"
But the mention of Fred seemed to anger Anne again. She sniffled, stiffened and shook her head, a firm no.
"Listen, Anne…" Gilbert got off their perch and onto his knees on the dirt road, touching Anne's hand, a shamed knight beseeching pardon from his fair queen. "I'm sorry. Will you let me walk you back?" Receiving no reply, he flung the question out of his way and went on. "I was just trying to be helpful! You know you get my back up sometimes," he added, half-smiling.
Anne stared hard at him as if to say Me? Get your back up? Ha!, but remained silent.
Gilbert squeezed his best friend's hand. "Listen, I'm sorry! What else can I do?!"
It happened in a heartbeat: The next thing Gilbert knew, he had been hit very hard in the face with…something…his precarious position squatting on the ground caused him to fall over backwards into the dirt. Breaking his fall with the palms of his hands, Gilbert peered up at Anne, who had risen and was standing over him, empty basket in hand—her weapon? Well, the flowers were strewn half-way across the road—looking for all the world like an avenging angel who had misplaced its fiery sword, but certainly not its seething fury. "Let ME get a word in EDGEWISE once in a while before I PITCH YOU!!"
"Bit late for that," muttered Gilbert ruefully, gingerly inspecting his face for cuts, breaks or abrasions; finding none, he realized Anne was halfway to Green Gables.
He couldn't just let her go like that. Gilbert scrambled to his feet and charged off in the opposite direction to mount Braveheart.
Despite the assistance of his faithful steed, Gilbert galloped up to Green Gables yelling "Anne! I'm sorry! What about—" before she had stumbled, outraged, inside, slamming both doors behind her.
In his frustrated state it took Gilbert a moment to notice that, not only was Marilla sitting on the porch swing, peering alarmed after Anne's angry escape, but…Gilbert's own father was just before Gilbert at the gate, perched atop the wagon and looking from Gilbert to the still-quivering door in amused interest. Gilbert shrugged off his father's questioning look, feeling a surge of anger: How could his father laugh at a time like this?
And then, "The apple doesn't fall far from the tree, I see," chuckled John Blythe. "G'day, Marilla."
And Mr. Blythe motioned the wagon-horse on, leaving Gilbert on Braveheart no choice but to catch up, Braveheart trotting a little to keep level with the wagon.
"…Dad?" queried Gilbert quietly, after they were out of sight of Green Gables.
"Yes, Gilbert?"
"What did you mean…back there? About apples and trees?" Gilbert asked hesitantly. He knew what the saying meant—like mother, like daughter.
But Anne and Marilla weren't related.
Mr. Blythe took a long time to answer. "Well, you see, Gilbert…when I was a little older'n you are now, Marilla Cuthbert and I were best friends—had been best friends since school. We went everywhere and did everything together." He sighed. "Everyone thought we were bound to end up married."
"And you?" asked Gilbert, quietly, but surprised. Marilla and his father! "What did you think?"
"I thought so, too." Gilbert's father frowned, removed his hat and ran a hand through his hair. "I was in love with her, and I wanted to marry her."
"Was…was Marilla in love with you, too?"
His father smiled ruefully. "I never found out.
"One day we were quarreling over something—something so trivial, so silly, I can't remember what it was about, nor even who started the fight. Next thing I knew she'd fled the scene, so I went home, furious.
"The next week found me in a more penitent mood, and I returned to Green Gables, desperate, not only to apologize, but to tell her how much I really cared. Her mother told me Marilla'd locked herself in her room and never wanted to speak to me again, and to please come back, because Marilla was just being headstrong, we both knew how she could get, etc.
"And I was going to go back to Green Gables someday soon. But first I took Jennifer Pearce for a buggy ride, in the hopes it would get round to Marilla and make her jealous. One ride became two, three, ten…and I eventually married Jennifer instead."
Gilbert was having a bad night of it.
At dinner, he had sat, not hungry, at his place at table, furtively scrutinizing Jennifer Pearce Blythe, his mother.
It was not that he did no love his mother any more. Of course he did. He had always loved his mother; she was a very kind, friendly, warm, motherly person.
But he could not help but imagine what if Marilla Cuthbert was my mother?
Marilla isn't a very motherly person. But mightn't she have been—once—before my father…forgot about her…?
No wonder she is all angles and lines.
Would we have needed a hired boy, with me around? If we did, and Anne came by mistake—which was what the story was about Anne's precipitate arrival in Avonlea—wouldn't we have lived under the same roof?
Gilbert chuckled a little over that last revelation. If he and Anne had been thrown into the same household, it was doubtful that he would still be alive at this moment in time!
"Gil?" Someone touched his hand.
Gilbert jumped, staring wildly at his mother. Of course it would be his mother, wouldn't it?
"Gil, you're not paying attention to what I was saying—"
"I'm sorry," Gilbert interrupted, rising and pushing back his chair, "but I feel ill. I think I'll go to bed. Forgive me."
At seven o' clock in the evening, he had retired early, under pretence of illness—well, it was true, just not in the way his mother assumed, not physically.
The small clock on Gilbert's bedside table ticked quietly away, its ink-black hands now indicating a quarter to midnight; he had lain gazing at the ceiling for close to five hours.
Gilbert sat up in bed, pushing his tousled hair back from his forehead, and stared at his reflection in the mirror. The curls were a little longer and easier tamed these days; the cheeks still maintained the vestige of baby fat which had taunted him ever since he was too old to have it; the eyes were become more discerning and serious; the mouth more thoughtful and less cocky, and still with the uneven quirk on one side that suggested the eyes did not believe what they saw.
Six years ago, Gilbert had trotted off to Avonlea School for the first time in a long time, unknowing that that day he would have a slate cracked clear across his head by the new girl in town…never dreaming that he would spend the nest few years hopelessly in love with her…oblivious that the girl he fell in love with would evade even his advances of friendship for a long time…never thinking that their friendship would be so turbulent.
Gilbert stuck a hand under his mattress and drew out his old copy of Pride and Prejudice. Opening it at the bumpy place, he lifted from the book a dry, yellowing, white rose, which he had once rescued after it had fallen from Anne's coiffure; her dance card, from the Christmas dance; and a pink tissue rose, the most important one, which Gilbert had taken from Anne's hair…at her consent…at Miss Lavendar's wedding.
As he settled back into bed, Gilbert's face and pride still stung from the blow Anne had dealt him earlier.
"You mean, hateful Boy—how DARE you!"
"Oh, why don't you get off your high horse?!"
"These flowers are indeed lovely, but I am afraid I cannot accept them. Good day, Mr Blythe."
"Well, it's kind of risky, don't you think, Anne?"
"Gilbert Blythe would stand on his head for me if I asked him to."
"Well then, the fact is, I've rescued you."
"Why don't you figure it out, if you're so clever?"
"It was never about you, Josie Pye—if that's what you're implying!"
"Aren't you afraid? I'm liable to break another slate over your head…"
"I was thinking about how despite the years that have come and gone since you came here you are as much of a little girl—dreaming and playing and imagining—as you were before."
The snatches of dialogue, born of Gilbert's more poignant memories to do with Anne, danced about his head like frenzied leaves in an autumn wind. So did questions, arranged in a list like a test:
How do you feel about Anne Shirley?
What will you do if she does not return your love?
What do you need to do right now?
And suddenly Gilbert remembered sitting in Miss Lavendar's garden, beside the yellow roses, as Anne and Charlotta the Fourth went berrying:
"I mean I have seen Anne's temper—occasional flashes of it—and I know that she is just like I was in that respect. Don't give up on Anne. No matter if she gets very mad at you, no matter if she refuses your proposal the first time…"
Gilbert rolled over onto his side and smiled a little. In a very few minutes his eyelids dropped and his breathing came slow and even. And across the Avonlea main road the white curtains of the east gable window with the green roof quivered in the breeze.
FanFiction presents
My stupid mouth
Has got me in trouble.
I said too much again
To a date over dinner yesterday
an L.M. Montgomery fanfiction
And I could see
She was offended.
She said "W
ell anyway..."
Just dying for a subject change.
Oh, it's another social casualty
Score one more for me
How could I forget?
Mama said "think before speaking".
No filter in my head.
Oh, what's a boy to do?
I guess he better find one
Story by Morte Rouge
We bit our lips. She looked out the window
Rolling tiny balls of napkin paper
I played a quick game of chess with the
Salt and pepper shaker.
Illustrations by White-Lily-Blossom
And I could see clearly
An indelible line was drawn
Between what was good, what just
Slipped out and what went wrong.
and based upon Lucy Maud Montgomery's novels
Oh, the way she feels about me has changed.
Thanks for playing, try again.
How could I forget?
Mama said "think before speaking".
No filter in my head.
Oh, what's a boy to do?
I guess he better find one…
Anne of Green Gables (1908)
Anne of Avonlea (1909)
I'm never speaking up again. It only hurts me.
I'd rather be a mystery than she desert me.
Oh I'm never speaking up again.
Starting now…
in conjunction with
One more thing.
Why is it my fault?
So maybe I try too hard
But it's all because of this desire
Kevin Sullivan's movie adaptations
I just wanna be liked, I just wanna be funny.
Looks like the joke's on me
So call me captain backfire
"Anne of Green Gables" (1985)
"Anne of Green Gables: the Sequel" (1987)
I'm never speaking
up again. It only hurts me.
I'd rather be a mystery than she desert me.
Oh I'm never speaking up again
I'm never speaking up again!
I'm never speaking up again…
Starting now…
Credit Song: "My Stupid Mouth" by John Mayer
Thank you, everyone, for reading my story, and for reviewing, but let's not go into that. I know you lurkers!
Blythe Spirit was published on a whim back in February, but has grown into a real project for me.
The illustrations, plus a sneak peek at Unromantic Ideal, can be found at blytheauthoress . livejournal . com
See you on 31 August! | [] |
Stephen Colbert just isn't in love with the idea of Mitt Romney becoming President of the United States, which his victories in Iowa and New Hampshire obviously foreshadow. But, that doesn't mean Colbert can't get used to the idea. When Stephen and Andy hash it all out over cosmos, Stephen learns that, sooner or later, everyone has to settle.
[Colbert Nation] | [] |
Bimillenial Facepalm – 11.2.1
Cubs "losing" a bunch of players to free agency/waivers
Team MVP Shawn Camp was the only officially official free agent on the roster, but a few other players have opted for free agency after being kicked off the Cubs 40-man roster. Apparently they don't realize that "cut from the Cubs roster" is not going to be a net positive for them in future negotiations.
So far, the team has "lost" the following players to free agency/other organizations
As Aisley pointed out, given Mather's -1.5 fWAR last year he's probably going to have to pay some team $15m to play for them next year (laughing)
Brenly Replacement Search Continues
Dan Plesac has joined Eric Karros as a candidate for the position. Please, no Plesac. I'm really hoping to hear that Doug Glanville is actually being considered, rather than just being wishcast by various fans.
Thoyer Conference call with season ticket holders
Brett has a paraphrased transcript over at Bleacher Nation. Nothing too earth-shattering there. They admit that they inherited some really shitty pitching depth and mentioned that they're not planning to bullpen Arodys Vizcaino, which is great news. They also said they're not interested in doing any deals like the Cubs did with Carlos Pena that defers a huge chunk of money. But there's no real reason for them to do that right now anyway because they have so little payroll.
Javier Baez Update
Baez broke the tip of his left thumb, but it was a non-displaced fracture so it sounds like it's relatively not a big deal. It will end his AFL season, however. Logan Watkins was given his spot for the rest of the league's short season.
Cubs float a balloon about bringing back Ryan Dempster
In that same article, Carrie Muskat mentioned that Hoyer has been in contact with Dempster's agent. Hoyer was quick to down-play this, and said it was more of a "I bumped into him" kind of situation. Though it's hard to accidentally bump into someone when you pick up your phone and call them. Maybe he and Demp's agent were just discussing candlesticks as wedding gifts for a mutual friend of theirs.
Vague trade rumor of the moment
Bruce Levine mentioned last week that the salary-dumping Marlins have approached the Cubs about trading Josh Johnson. If (almost) all he costs is money, it's something I think that Thoyer would be interested in. He turns 29 in January, but has surprisingly little mileage on his arm. Of course, that's due to an injury or two…
The Cubs should strike while the iron is hot here, because if the Marlins secure the funds for a new ballpark they might keep Johnson and go on another spending spree.
(That's probably a top ten all-time Onion article)
Additional vague trade rumor of the moment
The Cubs are interested in Dan Haren, and according to Heyman they have been involved in "talks". The Angels have to decide today if they're going to pick up his option. I would be shocked if a deal gets done here though. The Angels don't have a ton of leverage.
Minor league coaching hires
The Cubs have hired Anthony Iapoce as the new minor league hitting coordinator. He was previously an instructor in the Blue Jays system, and a career minor leaguer with the Brewers and Marlins before that. The Cubs also grabbed Vandy pitching coach Derek Johnson as the new minor league pitching coordinator. Vandy went to the College World Series in 2011, and eight of their pitchers were drafted (two in the first round), and he also worked with David Price before he was drafted.
Is there a Cubs game today?
Off-topic comments thread I recently enjoyed
There was much discussion of board and role-playing games in the comments yesterday, as well as arguments for and against plastic cutting boards. Needless to say, it's been our busiest day in weeks here at OV. The 2013 Cubs, everyone!
About berselius
We're gonna make it. | [] |
Nightfall Summary
Isaac Asimov
Everything you need to understand or teach Nightfall by Isaac Asimov.
• Nightfall Summary & Study Guide
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Nightfall Summary
In 1941, John W. Campbell, Jr., editor of the premier science fiction magazine at that time, asked one of the fledgling writers he mentored an intriguing question: What would happen if people saw the stars only once every thousand years? He postulated that people would go mad and asked twenty one-year old Isaac Asimov to write a story about it. The result was "Nightfall," now one of the most famous science fiction stories of all...
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News & Features Discussion » Guild Wars 2: Colin Johanson Livestream Interview with Pokket TODAY!
3 Pages 1 2 3 » Search
41 posts found
Associate Editor - News Manager
Joined: 6/28/10
Posts: 14225
OP 10/29/12 3:20:19 PM#1
Today, Thursday, November 1st, our own Pokket will be hosting a live stream chat with ArenaNet's Colin Johanson. The event will run on the Live Stream Channel and about future content updates to ask Colin. Join us later today for this epic event!
Associate Editor:
Follow me on Twitter: @MMORPGMom
Novice Member
Joined: 10/14/06
Posts: 1768
10/29/12 3:37:43 PM#2
Are they planning to add a whole new zone with a normal content patches? Or do they plan to only add content to existing zones?
Novice Member
Joined: 2/20/12
Posts: 7969
10/29/12 3:40:39 PM#3
I'm curious at what plans for sPVP are.. what new modes are coming and what other rewards are in the works as it seems many do need some sort of "carrot" other than cosmetic gear
Also what are the future plans for expanding WvW and why server transfers are still open as it's killing WvW balance(see Nov 1st it will go to once a week) why did they wait so long?
Oh and is there any plans to expand the current skill system to offer more skills or variations of skills for the weapon slots and utility skills
Game desperately NEEDS a build manager ot save multiple builds.. one of th best aspects of the trait tree is flexability in builds.. but the game punishes you to want ot have several builds for several differn't situations. There has been numerous times I wanted to run a dungeon but didn't want to drop all my traits and go re-do my build just to do so.. same for sPVP.
PVE progression seems to be the big concern to many on this site as they need more goals to work towards perhaps some sort of extra trait bar to progress through or extra set of skills or something along thones lines.. GW1 had tons of skills you aquired as you went through the campaigns and even after you finished them.
Is any player made content in the works? I know Guild halls were talked about.. but solid player made content has much more longevity than just adding another dungeon or some new events
What are plans for expanding guild features as now many complaints are guilds are basically just glorified chat rooms right now
Any plans for Legenadary armor? also perhaps adding some special skill assocated with a legendary armor set or even adding something like that to the legendary weapons.. right now it seems the grind forever for looks isn't sitting well with a good number of people in PVE.. What if legendary weapons gave you entire new skill set for that weapon? that would give people something to really strive for and keep true to the no stat grind at cap
Any news on a dungeon finder or better LFG options? getting tired of LA being turned into a LFG spam
Another big complaint I see is the not so dynamic feel of the dynamic events.. not enough variations in scenarios when events pass or fail and not enough variety in the events themselves.. people are wanting more lasting effects or at least more variations in what happens
Apprentice Member
Joined: 4/12/12
Posts: 47
10/29/12 4:41:20 PM#4
A grouping tool would be nice for those who won't sit and spam chat trying to find a group. Is anything in the works? How long until we see something?
The current LFG list buried deep in a menu somewhere isn't enough.
User Deleted
10/29/12 4:50:07 PM#5
Updates on min games, housing, and alternative advancement would be good to hear
Apprentice Member
Joined: 11/13/10
Posts: 22
10/29/12 6:07:20 PM#6
A few things i'd like to ask..
1.) About future dynamic events or updates to existing dynamic events.
Are there going to be more events like the Dragon fights, or the Megadestroyer fight? And also how are you going to improve on them since as many players have pointed out even though these fights look great, they are not quite what the players expected since most of them (not all) are not very epic since the bosses are stationary and the players can pretty much just stand there and auto-attack (Shatterer, Tequatl).
2.) Regarding rewards
Recently there was a post from a Dev (can't remember who it was) that said you are working on improving the rewards that players get from Dungeon bosses, Veteran/Champion mobs in the open world and Chest Events. Could you share some more info about these changes?
3.) Dungeons for bigger groups
Another thing I would like to ask is if you are planning, or at least considering adding bigger Dungeons to the game. And by bigger I mean for more than 5 people. I'm not talking about the traditional raids ofcourse with gear progression and stuff. I'm talking about Dungeons for 8-10 people that are harder, more difficult (not more 1-shot skills though :P) and have unique skins for players to purchase with tokens. Because all of my friends are curious about this, and every time we run a dungeon we're all thinking "god it would be great to do a 10-man version of this!"
Claire Gearhead - Level 80 Norn Engineer - Far Shiverpeaks (EU)
Apprentice Member
Joined: 5/20/11
Posts: 677
10/30/12 6:00:55 PM#7
1. How big will the new Island be in the November update and what type of setting will it be? fire and lava or maybe Tengu?
2. Will the balance of classes in PvE and PvP be adressed? I can name a few examples. Thief is weak in PvE. Ranger is weak(low damage) in PvP unless beastmaster build. Necromancer lacks in damage and some support, but they are very tough(Tanky) to kill in PvP.
Managing Editor
Joined: 7/28/06
Posts: 1806
10/30/12 7:31:25 PM#8
Get your questions in still! We'll take them until tomorrow, due to the server outages.
Apprentice Member
Joined: 9/21/10
Posts: 594
10/30/12 8:40:44 PM#9
How does a pocket talk? It's just a piece of cloth...
Will they ever add skritt as a playable race? (not really halloween event centric, but a question none the less.)
Playing: Smite
Played: Nexus:Kingdom of the Winds, Everquest, DAoC, Everquest 2, WoW, Matrix Online, Vangaurd, SWG, DDO, EVE, Fallen Earth, LoTRo, CoX, Champions Online, WAR, Darkfall, Mortal Online, Guild Wars, Rift, Tera, Aion, AoC, Gods and Heroes, DCUO, FF14, TSW, SWTOR, GW2, Wildstar, ESO, ArcheAge
Waiting On: Nothing really, though Black Desert looks pretty amazing so far.
Novice Member
Joined: 8/06/08
Posts: 2360
10/30/12 8:51:25 PM#10
What's going on with that and when are we going to get details on it?
Novice Member
Joined: 8/03/11
Posts: 807
Definition for innovation is below. Your welcome.
10/30/12 11:13:19 PM#11
What are there plans for future minigames? I would love to see a "Nazi Zombies" style of group minigame (or Dungeon :P), Fort Aspenwood type also.
Future PvP maps. What new types of PvP do they plan to institute?
Future World events. Will there ever be Dynamic events that affect the ENTIRE world? Similair to those at the end of the Beta Weekends and this Halloween?
Hints on future Holiday events?
Novice Member
Joined: 7/03/04
Posts: 3618
10/31/12 12:03:24 AM#12
Would they ever think of adding appearance tabs, even if it is something you must pay to unlock. Because the coins aren't doing it for me.
And how about adding in an image designer.
And where is housing?
Advanced Member
Joined: 9/05/10
Posts: 1276
10/31/12 1:21:38 AM#13
When will player housing be released, and what plans are there for it in the future and what does it entail in general?
When will the Crystal Desert be released?
Is there a schedule or idea on when the next expansions will be released?
Will there be a type of barbershop introduced into the game to change hair color and style?
What have you learned from this release that could be applied into future expansions?
Will the stories that abruptly ended in the personal story lines come to a conclusion in future patches or expansions?
How oft should we expect major content update patches?
Will there be additional armor sets added to the Market that have the original Guild Wars theme to it? I'd enjoy a knock-off of the dervish primeval armor myself.
What is the future of PvP and Guilds?
Novice Member
Joined: 4/28/10
Posts: 48
10/31/12 6:02:55 AM#14
When will the game finally get performance optimized, including rendering issues? ie: invisible enemies in WvW
Will you close servers/merge servers to fix population and WvW imbalances due to extensive server transfering.
When will basic MMORPG features like dungeon LFG feature and player dueling get included?
Hard Core Member
Joined: 9/04/09
Posts: 1028
10/31/12 6:45:03 AM#15
When will we see a massive cull of all the bots?
Why you ask players to report bots when they are still farming the same areas weeks after being reported?
Why are players forced to grind so many mats and items and then proceed to put DR into the system?
When will you introduce payments for server transfers?
Why do the events in Orr keep bugging out and when will this be sorted?
Why did so many players spend so much on keys for Halloween and lead to believe they get halloween items and actually recieved nothing worthwhile? leads me to also ask why so much RNG and the low chances of getting anything? ( partly assuming to know the answer, but would like an official one)
Got a ton of questions but I doubt they get asked or answered so I don't really know why I posted. Pocket and MMORPG will be so far up their anal cavity to ask such questions.
Novice Member
Joined: 7/20/06
Posts: 2923
10/31/12 8:38:34 AM#16
When can we expect official Windows 8 support?
Advanced Member
Joined: 4/25/12
Posts: 456
10/31/12 10:55:12 AM#17
WIll you start fixing class problem's before nerfing or changing how a weapon work's?
Will you change how legendary precursor's are obtained? or the RNG % chance to get them from the mystic forge?
Joined: 7/26/03
Posts: 11792
10/31/12 1:11:19 PM#18
Spotlight Poster
Joined: 11/12/03
Posts: 1374
11/01/12 12:55:05 PM#19
Very important question:
There was some controversy with the Halloween event, particularly with the low drop rates of items in black lion chests and difficult of the clock tower. What have you learned from the Halloween event and are there any changes you might make to the overall philosphy of how holiday events should be going forward?
Novice Member
Joined: 8/14/05
Posts: 2
11/01/12 2:19:18 PM#20
What is Arenanet's opinion of the current legendary precursor scarcity and trading post pricing? Are there currently any plans to adjust the rate that precursors are coming into the economy or additional methods of obtaining them?
3 Pages 1 2 3 » Search | [] |
AV Receiver Battlemodo: $600 or Bust
You want a serious home theater. One that will rattle the windows, and ensure movie night is always at your house. But you don't want to spend more than $600 on the thing that ties it together. Cuz you're smart.
You've got the big screen flat panel, you've thrown that cheap HTIB system in the garbage, and you've picked out an awesome speaker system. You just need one more component to tie it all together: a surround receiver with enough muscle for Aliens vs. Transformers, and enough ports to handle your Blu-ray player, Xbox and/or PS3, and all of the other black boxes in your living room.
Spending $500 to $600 will get you a receiver that will use a microphone to listen to itself, configuring and equalizing up to seven speakers and a subwoofer. It will switch between at least four HDMI sources and a lot more analog devices, and send everything off to the TV upconverted to HD resolution through a single HDMI cable. The feature sets of competing models are so similar that it can be tough to tell them apart, so I called in the four best in this price range—from Denon, Onkyo, Pioneer and Yamaha—to help you make your decision. As it turns out, the decision was easy.
A side note, before we continue: None of the tested receivers—and no receiver currently shipping—features the HDMI 1.4 required to pass 3D video signal to a 3D TV. If 3D is a must-have feature for you, you'll have to stay tuned, as all of the major electronics makers announce and eventually ship their 2010 models. But a new crop of models may actually mean better deals on the receivers reviewed here, and don't forget, even if you're a big enough spender to get a first-gen 3D TV, you can always route video directly from 3D Blu-ray player to 3D TV, using the receiver for audio alone.
I tested each model in my 7.1 channel theater—a $5300 Mirage OM Design system which has the resolving power to highlight minute differences in sound between amplifiers. This also gave me the chance to test each model's two-channel music and multi-channel film soundtrack performance against my reference Pioneer Elite 49TXi—Pioneer's $4500 flagship from 2005—a yardstick to hold up in order to see how far mid-priced receivers have come since then.
In addition to sonic prowess, I also judged each model in the areas of design and build quality, ease of use, and video conversion/scaling ability. Here are the full results of my tests:
AV Receiver Battlemodo: $600 or Bust
The Onkyo, with superior sound quality and a multitude of HDMI inputs, put up a very tough fight against the Pioneer. But ultimately the Pioneer's class-leading user interface, superb auto calibration system and built-in USB and iPod/iPhone support gave it the win.
AV Receiver Battlemodo: $600 or Bust
Pioneer VSX-1019AH-K: First Place
AV Receiver Battlemodo: $600 or Bust
At first I wasn't sold. The Pioneer's music performance without EQ engaged was disappointingly dull and flat. Switching on EQ really kicked the amp into life, though, bringing detail and staging into proper focus. I found that the default curve was overemphasizing the upper midrange and treble, but fortunately the 9-band EQ is user configurable, and with a few adjustments I was able to dial in a nicely balanced sound that was fairly close to my reference, save for a persistent artificial coloration in the mids and highs. The Pioneer includes a technology called "Advanced Sound Retriever" which claims to restore compressed music files to near CD quality. (It may not surprise you that the others also feature similar abilities.) To test this, I loaded an iPod Touch with tracks encoded at moderate bitrates. ASR definitely did its job, as every track I tried sounded significantly more lifelike and enjoyable with ASR engaged. I connected the iPod to my more expensive reference system with a mini-jack cable and felt it still had the edge, but ASR made the difference between $4500 receiver and $500 receiver considerably smaller.
Movie audio performance with EQ was very good, with realistic portrayals of the cannons in Master and Commander and the drum sequence in House of Flying Daggers. Analog video scaling from my DVE test disc was decent, though the Pioneer struggled a bit in the jaggies test.
AV Receiver Battlemodo: $600 or Bust
The VSX-1019AH-K is $100 less than the model that it replaced, and it appears that Pioneer was able to hit the $499 price point by chopping out 10 lbs. of power supply and much of the multi-channel analog connectivity. From bench tests that I've seen, being the shortest and lightest of the group has not affected the Pioneer's ability to compete in terms of horsepower. While it can no longer serve as a surround preamp—the Yamaha is the only one of this group that can—the Pioneer's user interface is simply in a different class than the competition at this level. Combine that with the forward thinking built-in USB and iPhone connectivity, and you've got a winner.
Onkyo TX-SR607: Second Place
AV Receiver Battlemodo: $600 or Bust
The Onkyo loses in the looks department with its blocky styling and ancient pale green display, but give it some music to play and things turn around rather quickly. Without EQ engaged, the Onkyo produced the best, most transparent sound of the group, with realistic soundstaging and natural timbre that was surprisingly close to my reference. Switching on EQ mostly made everything sound artificially forward and aggressive, so I left it off for the majority of my music listening. Onkyo's "Music Optimizer" with the iPod just about equaled my reference, which shows just how effective this technology is.
The Onkyo also did very well with movie sound, though without EQ the bottom end was not quite as strong and impactful as the Pioneer in the cannon and drum sequences. Only five bands are available in the EQ, but this was enough to improve the bass response for action sequences without throwing off the rest of the range. I tested several movies in both the Onkyo-exclusive Dolby Pro-Logic IIz "height speakers" mode and with my speakers in their regular back surround configuration. (The Onkyo is not a 9.1 receiver, so your choice is either one or the other.) I preferred the standard configuration, as I mostly couldn't tell whether the height speakers were even on. A few weather effects perhaps sounded slightly more realistic, but I certainly wouldn't go to the trouble of permanently mounting and wiring extra speakers high on the front wall for a bit of rain or wind.
AV Receiver Battlemodo: $600 or Bust
The Onkyo firmly embraces digital audio and video with a total of six HDMI inputs, and completely ignores multi-channel analog connectivity. Analog video scaling was by far the weakest of the group, with poor results in DVE's resolution, jaggies, and 2:3 pull-down tests. The front panel HDMI input is great, but the Onkyo really needs a USB port and a full GUI to put it over the top.
Denon AVR-1910: Third Place
AV Receiver Battlemodo: $600 or Bust
The Denon's performance with music was solid, besting the Pioneer but not quite matching the Onkyo. Without EQ its sound was a bit leaner than the Onkyo's and slightly dry, with mids lacking a bit in body and warmth. As with the Onkyo, the default EQ curve just pumped everything up without any finesse. The Denon offers nine bands of EQ to play with, and by applying much more mild adjustments than the default curve, I was able to achieve a sound close to the Onkyo's un-EQed performance. As with the Pioneer and Onkyo, Denon's "Compressed Audio Restorer" significantly improved its performance with the iPod, though not enough to best the Onkyo or my reference.
Movie performance let the Denon down a bit. The cannons in Master and Commander had a distinct lack of impact compared with the Pioneer, even with EQ engaged, and the Flying Daggers drum sequence sounded a bit flat, particularly when I turned off the subwoofer and let the main channels run full range. Things picked up for the Denon with analog video scaling, where it aced all of my DVE tests.
AV Receiver Battlemodo: $600 or Bust
The Denon was the most stylish of the group, but the plastic front panel and controls did not have the precision and quality feel of the others. The front panel display was also the smallest and hardest to read from across the room. The Denon's biggest problem though is that it just doesn't seem to have changed much compared to its predecessor, the AVR-1909. One more HDMI input and one less component video input seem to be the extent of the major changes. The user interface is functional, but still looks 15 years old. With the Pioneer now offering a full GUI at the $500 level, Denon needs to do the same.
Yamaha RX-V765: Fourth Place
AV Receiver Battlemodo: $600 or Bust
Music from the Yamaha sounded much like Denon without EQ. It titled quite a bit towards the lean and dry side, with forward and slightly grainy highs that became tiring at higher volume levels. Two EQ curves are available, and the "natural" curve was able to tame some of the excessive brightness. I also tried adjusting the 7-band EQ, but I was never able to get the Yamaha to sound as good as the Onkyo or Denon.
Yamaha's "Compressed Music Enhancer" brought similar improvements from the iPod as the other receivers, but couldn't overcome the Yamaha's inherent weaknesses with music. It did perform one trick that the others can't: I was able to stream Last FM from my Nokia via the Bluetooth dock.
The Yamaha fared better with movies. It delivered a realistic amount of punch to the cannon and drum sequences, though I still preferred the Onkyo's more neutral tonal balance. Analog video scaling performance was average, with poor results in the jaggies and 2:3 pull-down tests.
AV Receiver Battlemodo: $600 or Bust
The Yamaha shares nearly all of its chassis components with the $900 RX-V1065, and due to that its build quality is a considerable notch above the rest of the group. It looks and feels like a $900 receiver, which is why it's such a shame that the terrible UI completely lets it down. Setting up the Yamaha was aggravating; partly due to the un-assignable inputs, the badly designed remote and the cryptic way that Yamaha labels most functions, but mostly due to the UI. The four "Scene modes" are an attempt to replicate the Activities function of a Harmony remote, but they don't really work in practice. Unless all of your components are made by Yamaha and support the Scene control ability, pressing a Scene button can do little more than switch the receiver to an input and select a sound mode, which the others can do just as easily with their own source buttons. In the end you're going to end up using a universal remote anyway, making the Scene abilities completely unnecessary. The optional Bluetooth streaming support is great for many people who use their cellphone as an audio source, but the Yamaha is just too much of an incomplete product to recommend.
And Now For Something Completely Different…
AV Receiver Battlemodo: $600 or Bust
The Onkyo produces surprisingly decent stereo sound for a mid-priced receiver, but what if stereo is all you are interested in? What if you don't need HDMI switching, or Dolby Pro-Logic IIz, or Audyssey equalization, or any of the other stuff crammed in to a modern receiver? Can you do better for $500? Indeed you can, with something called an integrated amplifier.
Integrated amplifiers are a stereo preamp and amplifier combined into one component, and they offer maximum sound quality for the dollar as they basically only have one function. The NAD C-326BEE and Cambridge Azur 550A integrated amps both cost around $500, and both will outperform any of these receivers in stereo. Since there's no need to worry about having the latest sound mode or HDMI version number, you can stretch your dollar even further by looking on the secondhand market. A range of $500 to $700 can buy a Musical Fidelity, Primare or Arcam on audio trading sites like Audiogon that will be able to challenge $2500 AV receivers in stereo mode. Add a second hand pair of bookshelf speakers from PSB or Monitor Audio—or maybe even a pair of Magnepan 1.6s if you're feeling adventurous—and you've got truly high-end sound for around $1500.
David Kay is a veteran home-theater enthusiast, tech writer and all-around audio fanatic. He is currently Senior Editor of the audio news and feature blog Audio Junkies, and is on a never-ending quest to build the ultimate sound system, wallet be damned. | [] |
Take the 2-minute tour ×
I try to draw a very large dataset on google map (2500+ rectangles). The rendering of the rectangles take more than 5 secs. The whole page just stuck for the 5 secs, so I am thinking about adding a loading indicator or progress bar during the rendering.
To do this, I need to trap events of rending (start,finish rendering).
I checked the google maps Api documentation, did not find anything useful. Just what to know whether there is some work around or something I miss in the api doc that can help me to trap rendering events.
share|improve this question
What do you mean by trap events? – Halcyon Apr 16 '13 at 13:46
I did not realise I invented the term:( What I mean is to get the event when it is fired. something like addListener('click', function(e){ //do things}) – GingerJim Apr 16 '13 at 14:29
2 Answers 2
up vote 0 down vote accepted
As of Google Maps v3.14 the answer is no. There's no such event to listen for in the API. If you dug through the code long enough you might be able to find a hack, but given that you're in control of the rectangles you're drawing and you have a count of them, why not iterate the progress bar as you add them? Individually they will render very quickly so whether you iterate the progress before or after each is added to the map should make no difference to the user, despite the fact that it feels like the wrong order to the developer.
share|improve this answer
This gives an overview of all the events in GMapsV3 http://gmaps-samples-v3.googlecode.com/svn/trunk/map_events/map_events.html
Check if the events you need are there.
share|improve this answer
This example is cool. but I need a event indicating the finish of drawing of overlays. seems it is not there. – GingerJim Apr 16 '13 at 14:50
But you're adding the markers yourself .. you know when you're done. Markers have their own set of events developers.google.com/maps/documentation/javascript/… but there is no render (probably because that is the first thing it does). – Halcyon Apr 16 '13 at 14:53
Good point, I should check whether the rendering is sync or async – GingerJim Apr 16 '13 at 15:11
It is async. I'm running into the same problem. – joelmdev Nov 1 '13 at 14:29
Your Answer
| [] |
Letters to the Editor (Oct. 5, 2013)
by Courier staff
08:44 PM, Saturday, October 05 2013 | 2673 views | 0 0 comments | 6 6 recommendations | email to a friend | print
Government shutdown
As a 77-year-old citizen, I would like to take this opportunity to ask a question or two. First of all, Obama says repeatedly that the GOP cannot hold the Federal Government hostage as it should be; however, how does Obama hold the government hostage with his socialistic ideals and mandate “Obanna Care,” just one example.
Next question, would be why our senators and representatives cannot address the problem of our Nation with the good of our Nation at the forefront of what is good for our Nation rather than for the good of very few. It seems to me, if Congress would go to work in the morning, work diligently for 10 to 12 hours a day, as most citizens of our great nation do, the problems of waste and foolish spending might be solved in a few short years and we could overcome this with a government of the people, by the people and for the people as it was intended by our Forefathers and I might add, it might work very well!
If this government shutdown will affect the economy the way the media says, then our government is in too big a business and needs to leave this to free enterprise.
Paul Henderson
How many know what rabies is?
Having recieved a dog bite (or attack) on 9-15-13, I had to become more aware of rabies. I asked everyone I talked to if they knew what it was, what to watch for, how the dogs die that are bitten by a rabid animal. No one knew. Those people were deputies and employees of a pharmacy and friends.
Rabies is passed by the bite of a rabid animal to a dog or cat to a human, with no incubation period on the dog and four to eight days on a person if the bite is above the waist. The dog or cat must be quarantened for 10 days to see if it dies; if so, the person must take some painfu shots that cost $20,000.
What kills animals bitten by a rabid animal; a virus through the saliva attacks the nervous system causing paralysis and spams of hte throut so the animal cannot eat or drink. The animal is so thirsty that the sigh of food or water makes it foam at the mouth and it dies soon after. Hydrophobia the the name of it.
Pets need to be vaccinated yearly and kept confined in pens on the owners property so rabid aimals can’t get to them and so the pets don’t bother neighbors.
The owners of a biting dog is responsible for putting up the animal to watch it. The owner of the dog that bit me would not agree to that for a few days until a deputy insited on it.
So I have had a rough week wondering what would happen. If the dog is rabid and dies; the shots must start rimmediately to prevent death. This is a terminal disease.
Janice King
What matters
most America
Every person is a master or architect of their own life. That’s why we have public education in America. The taxpayers provide an opportunity for each individual child to become a productive citizen. Everyone has a philosophy which drives their life. Statements by various leaders which philosophically declare positions on matters which matter. Some examples are:
n Harry Truman — The buck stops here. That is a significant position when a person states they are responsible. How do current administrative officials of government rank today? (Eric Holder — gun running; President Obama — Benghazi; Hillary Clinton — Benghazi; Lois Lerner — IRS; Susan Ride — Benghazi, etc.)
n President Obama — He said to Joe the Plumber, we need to share the wealth. Sharing the wealth by government is a socialistic idea where someone else should provide for my wants or needs.
n President John F. Kennedy — Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country. How do 47 million workers provide 47 million non-workers food stamps, as recipients, plus 9 million SSI disability recipients checks paid by the government. This takes more than 1/2 of their checks in some form of taxes for these entitlements.
n Margaret Thatcher — Socialism is fine until you run out of other people’s money.
n Abraham Lincoln — reportedly said, you cannot provide for others what they should provide for themselves.
Currently America has a tax and spend government which controls by regulating industry to business operations. (coal-powered plants, nuclear energy, fossil fuels, banking, housing, automobile industry, etc.) by contrast, favorable pronouncements for Solyndra or clean energy, the focus of a socialist philosophy is to promote class or wealth differences as a basis to share the wealth. The American dream promotes as a basis to pursue your goals or dreams as Don Tyson, Sam Walton, or Wayne Smith Trucking have done. They had visions or dreams which they have achieved. Don Tyson stated in my presence, about 50 years ago, that chicken would become the number one meat in America. I personally thought he was an idiot for that statement, but evidently he knew how to accomplish his dream. When as many takers are enjoying the free entitlements (food stamps at workers or earners expense, unemployment at workers expense, rental assistance at workers expense, SSI disability checks at workers expense, and the list of potential free rides at workers expense will cover a full page and a half of listings of free rides that takers or loafers enjoy. This permits a taker to rise up by 10 a.m., have a cigarette, and watch tv to plan their day. They seem to have time for a beer as they watch their big-screen tv and check their message on their cell phone, and in some instances, check their computer as they plan their day. It sure is nice to have someone else provide for my needs, as I lost sight somewhere for my responsibilities as a person. It is my perception that liberal focused Democrats want a society where social justice philosophies will guide government entitlements. That means half of America has some claim of injustice where the others owe me and will pay me. The philosophy or ideology of the individual guides their behavior. Therefore, when you are a victim (social justice agenda) someone owes you! In that setting, socialism has arrived.
In closing, what did Martin Luther King Jr. say...People should be judged by the content of their character.
What kind of personality does somone have who feels that someone else should provide for them, or that I am not responsible for my needs. Only a dependent child has that status, while a few others are legitimate dependents of society. In my lifetime, the status of children has changed from being a part of family, in a productive role, to a less functional role of responsiblilities.
John Montgomery
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Hi, I am quite new at the field of semantic web and i need some help in order to conduct my research. I came up with the idea of a tangible interface which would take as an input the physiological sense of the user and recognize the emotion of it and the system can recommended simultaneously a playlist of songs and a collection of pictures. My basic idea is when for example a user is sad, the system can recommended a playlist of happy songs and a collection of pictures that provides positive feelings to the user. As for the methodology of the system, I thought about align 3 ontologies together (emotion, music, pictures). Is it right the way that I am thinking or there is another way like tag acquisition? If it is possible, what sources shall i look into? And about the recommendation method, should i look for the semantic-based recommendation?
Also, in the recommendation machines why knowledge base(construction of ontologies) is an important component?
Thank a lot for your valuable help, Debbie
asked 19 Dec '12, 17:11
debbieSemantic's gravatar image
accept rate: 0%
Hi in my opinion what you are actually thinking on it's a machine-learning system, so ontologies here are not needed and could be somewhat countert intuitive to use. For example stereomood: http://www.stereomood.com/ uses an approache based on machine learning, if i'm not wrong. The task it's interesting and there are many research on that since some years, the basic approach could be:
1. analyze features in the signal / lower abstraction point of view
2. analyze features from simbolic point of view in the music domain (here one could think about music ontology and MusicXML serialization, and some musical analysis regarding "functional" harmonies etc)
3. analyze the relations between different metadata schema. In that context i think you could use the three taxonomy you think (i think you intended them as taxonomies, but maybe i'm wrong)
4. design a tagging component in your system, so user should provide their own feature to your learning and/or inference phase.
Starting from here there are a lot of options to be considered to the actual implementation: i think you basically need a machine learning engine (suche as weka, for example), in order to collect emerging evidence from the data and the metadata, that you could use in some kind of cluster drive approach (with information retrieval) or to map them into a commonsense ontology (which i think it's really hard to construct on topic so fuzzy and personal by means of definition)
I hope this help
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answered 24 Dec '12, 14:46
seralf's gravatar image
accept rate: 14%
Seralf, thanks so much for your valuable information.
(25 Dec '12, 11:29) debbieSemantic debbieSemantic's gravatar image
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Rediff News All News » Movies » Review: Parijatha is perfect Valentine's Day outing!
Review: Parijatha is perfect Valentine's Day outing!
February 10, 2012 13:08 IST
According to Shrikant Srinivasa Parijatha is a film for those who are in love.
Billed as a film for young couples in love, Kannada film Parijatha is releasing ahead of Valentine's Day to cash in on the rumoured romantic link between its stars Diganth and Aindrita.
Evidently, the two share a good on-screen chemistry so casting them together in the Kannada version of the Tamil romantic comedy Boss Engira Bhaskaran (with Arya and Nayantara) makes sense.
Bhaskar (Diganth) is a good-for-nothing fellow who has to sit endlessly for supplementary exams in order to complete his degree. He has his own recipe for enjoying life--marry a working woman who will feed him all his life.
He lives with his mother, elder brother and sister, and is called Boss by everyone at home. He spends most of his time in his friend Sundar's hair-cutting salon and blows away much of Sundar's money on booze.
He meets Chandrika on a bus and falls in love with her and she takes a secret liking to him. He wants to marry her, but when he approaches her family with his proposal, they make fun of his jobless existence. This angers him and forces him to start a tutorial for Class X students after taking a loan from a local money lender.
Bhaskar makes a good profit from his tutorials, but Chandrika's father, who is a bank manager, still disapproves of the match.
Full marks to Diganth for living his role. The role is tailor-made for him. Although Aindrita Ray cannot probably match Nayanthara's charm, she complements him with a good performance.
Sharan as the barber-friend is hilarious as always. Mukhyamantri Chandru makes a comeback after a long gap. Raghu Mukherjee makes a friendly appearance in the movie as the prospective bridegroom.
Mano Murthy's music is melodious but doesn't linger in one's memory. The title song and the hot number Mohisu.. are good.
Srinivas's cinematography is pleasing; a major portion of the film was shot in Mysore. Director Prabhu Srinivas has remained faithful to the Tamil original.
This is a film for those who are in love. Go for it and enjoy.
Rediff Rating:
Srikanth Srinivasa in Bangalore | [] |
Mustaches may raise burn risk with home oxygen therapy
By Krystnell Storr
NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - A new case report from U.S doctors suggests that men who use home oxygen therapy should consider a clean-shaven look to reduce their risk of serious facial burns.
“If you’ve ever tried to start a campfire, you always start with some dry little twigs and once that starts - and that’s kind of the mustache - then that oxygen tubing lights on fire, it’s like a blow torch shooting up their nose,” said Dr. Andrew Greenlund of the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota. “So, if we can prevent it, it would be good.”
People with lung conditions that impair their ability to get enough oxygen from normal air may use home oxygen therapy, which delivers a steady stream of oxygen-rich air from a portable metal tank through tubing that fits into the nostrils.
After noticing that three of his patients, all with mustaches, had suffered facial burns while using their home oxygen therapy, Greenlund and his team decided to investigate.
“We looked through all the literature out there in the last 20 years and no one had noted that more people with facial hair and home oxygen were having burns than people without facial hair,” he told Reuters Health.
Narrowing their search to their own institution, the doctors identified nine patients who had suffered home oxygen therapy-related burns and eight of those men had mustaches.
Greenlund said that NASA has demonstrated how flammable human hair is under normal conditions and how it ignites much more readily in the presence of higher oxygen concentrations. But no one had looked at the issue in the context of home oxygen therapy.
To test their theory that facial hair places oxygen therapy users at a higher risk for burns, the researchers set up mannequins with and without human hair mustaches, outfitted them with the nasal tubing and exposed them to a spark.
The tubing on the mustached models ignited while those without mustaches did not, suggesting that concentrated oxygen together with kindling in the form of facial hair is a dangerously flammable combination.
According to the report published in Mayo Clinic Proceedings, 1.5 million people in the United States use home-oxygen therapy, and worldwide the numbers are growing as smoking rates increase, leading to lung disease.
“Since you can modify that risk by getting rid of the facial hair it seemed like a reasonable thing to look into to decrease the risk of the burns,” Greenlund said.
The American Thoracic Society advises persons using home oxygen therapy to keep the tubing as well as the oxygen tank at least six feet away from an open flame, and to never smoke while using the device.
The poly-vinyl tubing that patients use is extremely flammable, said Greenlund, so avoiding sparks is key. He noted that most of the patients who suffered burns were grinding metal at the time, which could have been a source of sparks.
“The best thing to do if your tubing catches on fire is to get it off quickly,” he added.
He thinks that another solution might be to change the material that the tubing is made of so that it doesn’t burn as easily.
If culture and religion allow, then shaving facial hair would be the number one preventive measure to take, Greenlund advises. But if a man decides to keep his facial hair, then using water-based hair products and avoiding those that are alcohol- or oil-based could also help reduce the risk.
He pointed out that while the degree of the burns varies, they can be very serious and a few of the individuals who suffered facial burns had to be put on a ventilator as their burns healed.
“One of my patients said it was like looking hell in the face, so it can be pretty traumatic and it’s life-threatening,” he said.
SOURCE: Mayo Clinic Proceedings, online June 22, 2014.
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Dumbledore's death in the style of Dan Brown
Renowned wizard Harry Potter looked in the mirror. The past few years had taken a heavy toll. His scar looked grey.
Is that stubble? If only Cho Chan could see me now!
"Harry! We need help!" Hermione held out a photograph. Harry took the picture and his entire body went rigid.
"Sorry," said Hermione. "My wand slipped." She reversed the petrifying spell. He relaxed again and looked at the photo.
"It was taken in Dumbledore's office."
As Harry stared at the scene, his initial revulsion and shock gave way to a sudden huge swelling of anger.
"Who would do this!?"
"You misunderstand," said Hermione. "He did it to himself. Either that or he had a heart attack while practising yoga."
Harry stood inside Dumbledore's office. It was a large circular room with a stunning parquet floor. Laid out in a dazzling, ephemeral, optical illusional, three-dimension geometric design, it made Harry feel as though he was floating.
"Sorry," said Hermione. She reversed the levitating spell and he came down.
"He's over there." Harry followed the line of her outstretched hand, relieved she was no longer pointing at him. Then he saw the body and felt a deep chill. Before him was the strangest sight he had ever seen. Dumbledore was dead. His body was contorted. His hand was pointing towards a parchment. Hermione picked it up. It was covered in scrawly, spidery handwriting. She tried giving it to Harry but couldn't let go.
"It must be cursed," she said. "It's really badly written but I can't put it down!"
It said, 'Just Diagon Black, Chukk'.
"Dumbledore was killed by a bad spell," said Harry. "That points to the badly spelt word. Try throwing it away..."
Hermione threw the parchment up. When it landed it read "Tough luck, Dan. JK is back."
Sarah Thomas | [] |
It's always refreshing to hear that a show truck has been built by its owner with one goal in mind - personal enjoyment. A no-strings-attached experience guarantees that a good time is had by all, and since this is a family magazine, we'll apply this little pearl of wisdom to Jose Valdez's '01 Ford F-150 Super Crew. Sorry to get your hopes up fellas but over the next few pages, we will be discussing a truck and not a random rendezvous, although the combination of the two would make for an intriguing story. However, for the sake of staying on topic and keeping our PG-13 rating, let's try giving the truck a second chance and take a closer inspection.
The Ford's cab was transformed into a veritable buffet for the senses, which was a feast that initially captured our interest. Aside from the leather covered Harley Davidson bucket seats, which were stitched by Arjonas Upholstery in Pasadena, Texas, there are enough inches of video monitors inside of the F-150 to illuminate a large living room. The dash has been given a dose of custom fiberglass, with a 10-inch screen sunk between the two center air vents and a Pioneer deck with a built-in 7-inch screen also provides a display just below eye level. Now, can you guess where Jose decided to stash a 42-inch Hitachi television? Nope, the entire dashboard does not completely flip around and no, there is nothing hidden behind the rear seats. Aim your eyes at the sky. A huge hunk of headliner has been thrown out to make room for the high definition ceiling. We're still trying to figure out where the optimum viewing position is. Any ideas ladies? Whoa, the R-rating alarm just went crazy - apologies.
To get the video feed to sound as good as it looks, KustomAuto in Houston, was called upon to wire a Punch 800 amplifier to the Boston Acoustics mids and highs, and another two Punch 800s to the two 12-inch Punch K1 subwoofers located in the rear center console. Three Optima batteries were required to keep every screen and speaker juiced, but that's not too surprising considering the amount of electronics that litter the cab. | [] |
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Erotica `*PART TWO
Erotica `* PART ONE
"Now, this is how it's gonna go. I need you all to get her in this building in ten minutes. There's an exit door to the back of the building on the right side and as soon as you open it, there's a stairwell. Go up the stairs and make it to Room 333 without anyone seeing you and I'll let you all go. Everyone got it?" "Yes." "Any questions?"
One girl raised her hand as she bit her lip. "What?" "What if someone is using the stairs?" "You kill them." I said shrugging my shoulders. "Anymore." Jody raised her hand as she smiled. "Yep?" "What if it takes us 11 minutes to do it?" "Look, I won't kill you over a minute but I will cut one of your legs off and make you my prostitute." All of them laughed. "Wow, a one legged prostitute." Kae said as she shook her head.
I grabbed my glock and put to her head. "Whoa! Aubrey! What the f*** you doin?" "b**** shut up and get out! Go get her out the trunk. If you cuss at me one more time I will blow your f***in brains out all on that freshly painted concrete, you hear me?" She shook her head. "Now get the f*** out!" I said pushing her out. She fell and slid on the raining street as I chuckled to myself. "This b**** funny."
She got up, ran to the trunk and lifted her out. I unlocked the doors and made all the other girls go help her finish the task. I sped off and made my way to the parking lot. "I hope these b****es do it right."
Lol don't judge me
I love Aubrey/Jimmy.
But I don't like drake emotional b**** ass lol
FYM lol
Eww Nani lol
Aubrey aint bulls***ting.
This nigga is uuuuh . . . . Kinda attractive in this light. | [] |
CHARLEROI, Pa.—Two former western Pennsylvania school cafeteria workers have acknowledged gambling away nearly $94,000 one of them stole from the school from August 2010 through October.
Attorneys for 50-year-old Stacy Lee Shipley and 49-year-old Sheila Ann Cook say both women are remorseful and working to repay the money stolen from Charleroi High School-Middle School.
The attorneys made those comments as the women waived a preliminary hearing on theft-related charges Monday.
Investigators say Shipley stole the money when students paid cash for lunches and agreed to share it with Cook when they played slot machines and agreed to split their winnings at The Meadows Racetrack & Casino.
Cook didn't steal the money, but knew where it came from while she was gambling with it.
Police say Cook told them she "just got caught up in the thrill of it all." | [] |
Take the 2-minute tour ×
New Ubuntu 12.04 User -
Having Workspaces is quite useful, but is there a way to easily identify which is which? In other words, if I have a terminal open in three of the workspaces it would be nice to have (for instance) the background colour of each workspace unique.
Is there any way to do that or something similar (e.g. different wallpaper?)
share|improve this question
1 Answer 1
You can install Workspaces Indicator to help to identifying which workspace you are in.
To do this, first add this to your PPA:
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:geod/ppa-geod
Then update and install:
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install indicator-workspaces
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Your Answer
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Height of Folly: Why Housing in Washington, D.C., Is So Awful
The nation's capital is a swamp of dumb rules and jumbled zoning laws. Let's fix them.
This engraving from the pages of a 1870s Harper's magazine shows Washington, D.C., with nearly the same height restrictions we have today; WIKIMEDIA COMMONS
If D.C. Mayor Vincent Gray and Rep. Darrell Issa get their way, Congress may finally relax the 102-year-old law that limits most building heights in Washington D.C. to no more than 130 feet. This would be a victory for good urban planning in the District, though a small one: Gray and Issa are saying that in most cases only about one additional story of development would be allowed.
But the real crisis of land use in Washington goes way beyond the height limit. It's that the District's planning and zoning apparatus is overall hostile to new development, usually allowing far less building that would be permitted by the Heights of Buildings Act of 1910. And while D.C.'s planning rules are restrictive, they are also arbitrary and unevenly enforced, making it a difficult market to enter.
Before I worked in public policy, I spent three years as a commercial real estate lending analyst for Wells Fargo. Nearly all of the project financings I worked on were in either New York City or Washington. And while both of these are expensive real estate markets with lots of rules about land use, there was a big difference between the two: New York, unlike Washington, has rule of law in land use.
Most development in New York City is done as-of-right. That means that, for any given piece of land, you can pick up a copy of the zoning declaration and figure out what you will be able to build: how many square feet of building area, how far it has to be set back from the street, how much parking, what kinds of uses, and so on. The incentive programs are also formulaic. For example, you get density bonuses in exchange for building public plazas.
There are exceptions to this rule. Most importantly, Manhattan has seen an unfortunate proliferation of "historic districts," where designs must be approved by a board of busybodies who will decide whether your plans for your property fit the neighborhood's character. Increasingly, these districts are being expanded to include vacant lots, and even a BP gas station on Houston Street, which recently needed historic district approval to change the doors on a storage shed.
But New York's historic districts, and the discretionary approvals they necessitate, are an exception to the usual development process. In D.C., a discretionary and arbitrary approval process is the norm for developments of any significant size.
It is normal for development projects in Washington, D.C. to obtain zoning variances or to go through a Planned Unit Development process, in which normal zoning rules are overridden. Officials in Washington tend to think of this as a strength of their planning process. The city shows "flexibility," approving extra development where the developer can demonstrate benefits to the community.
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Australia is on roll -- the kind of which crisis-wracked Europe, employment-challenged America and deflation-plagued Japan can only dream.
Steering around the worst of the post-Lehman Brothers crash was impressive enough. Returning Australia's national budget to surplus, as Prime Minister Julia Gillard says will happen within a few months, is nothing less than jaw-dropping in a world awash in credit downgrades and market turmoil.
Yet for all the great news, one factoid is costing some sleepless nights for Gillard and her economic team: the 44 percent surge in the Australian dollar since the end of 2008.
That's the biggest gain among more than 150 currencies tracked by Bloomberg. Fueling it is voracious demand from China, India and other developing-nation powerhouses for coal and iron ore. So is the perception that Australia's economic challenges are enviable ones in today's global environment, one that bestows a "safe haven" label on the nation of 22 million people.
The trouble is, the dollar's ascent is accelerating a hollowing out of sorts that's imperiling Australia's future. The mining industry is thriving, but other industries -- most of the nation, actually -- is struggling. This dynamic puts pressure on Australia to reinvent itself to avoid "Dutch disease," whereby the benefits of exporting natural resources lead to the neglect and atrophy of other sectors.
Gillard and her predecessor, Kevin Rudd, tried to impose resources taxes to share the benefits of the nation's mining boom more broadly. Mining companies have been remarkably successful in scuttling these efforts. Now, the risk is that Australia remains all too happy to be a mining site for China and fails to focus on a more diverse and innovative economic future.
Australia should be investing more in infrastructure, education and training. It also should review its tax system, one that encourages many of the nation's brightest and most productive people to seek jobs abroad.
Safe haven status has it benefits. Yet Australia may have too much of a good thing in its hands.
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What is meta? ×
I noticed SO, SF, SU, and here have a bit wider of a width for their fixed-width layout. Is it just me or did you just change this and why?
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I think I saw a pixel move on the logo! OMG OMG OMG! – GEOCHET Aug 12 '09 at 23:12
Really? Really? – TheTXI Aug 12 '09 at 23:12
How recent was this change? Nothing seems different for me over the last few hours – Ian Elliott Aug 12 '09 at 23:33
After 2pm Eastern. That's the last time I recall seeing a div.article-summary width of 650px. – Jonathan Sampson Aug 13 '09 at 1:28
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up vote 0 down vote accepted
Looks like 80px maybe. That's based on the .article-summary div's on the front page. Used to be 650px, If I remember correctly, and are now 730px. Now at 960px total for the container - a move toward the 960 grid system? :)
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From OpenWetWare
< Talk:Protocols
Revision as of 10:03, 18 October 2006 by Jamesh008 (Talk | contribs)
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• RS 14:48, 30 May 2006 (EDT)': Thought I would get the ball rolling on a protocols template. Feel free to revise further.
Discussion on Adopt-a-protocol from OpenWetWare:Ideas:
• Jasonk 15:49, 23 September 2006 (EDT): Long term, it might be cool to have people sign on as the "official" aggregator of information about a particular protocol/material/whatever. They wouldn't have any more edit right over anyone else or anything, but would be in charge of curating the entry. In the long term would be cool if this was something that was resume'-able. Similar to how someone might be listed as one of (many) authors in a large review book (e.g. Neidhardt et al E.coli and Salmonella volumes). Might serve as a mechanism to encourage people to do this job...
• Jamesh008 09:08, 15 October 2006 (GMT): Not sure if this is the correct way to contribute to a discussion but here goes. How do people think protocols will be amalgamated? I see some issues with individual personal, lab, group, institute or country protocols needing to be different due to local procurement, laws, equipment all sorts of things. Might it be a good idea to have a consensus protocol with an official aggregator? This would be the protocol that brought all info together. This would then allow individuals as above to keep info pertinent to them in their protocol. Each consensus protocol could list all individual protocols in the references and each individual could link to the consensus at the top of their page. If it is resume'-able then there may be pressures to decide who gets elected?
• Reshma 10:52, 13 October 2006 (EDT): Hey James, so what you're suggesting is totally along the lines of what other's have been thinking. As you said, we should probably have one consensus page like DNA ligation on a given technique which describes general background on the protocol and then links to a bunch of lab or individual specific protocols like Silver:Ligation and others. I think right now we still need more folks to work on and update these consensus pages but it would be great if in the future there were several people interested in each aggregation page. Any ideas on how to make this process easier so that people are more likely to build these consensus pages?
• JH 16:08, 17 October 2006 (GMT): Check out the way I am thinking about consensus protocols here.
• JH 17 Oct 06: I would like to discuss protocol template(s) and naming both specifically and generally but one problem I have is that there seem to be too many places to discuss things! Where should discussions be directed???
• Template
• I would like to see the procedure broken down with subsections used for different steps in teh procedure.
• I also like the idea of a central protocol,a consensus as I called it OpenWetWare:Ideas, and this seems to be an idea others agree with but there does not appear to be a consensus about how to implement this. If DNA Ligation is the current best practice it leaves a lot to be desired as it is not actually a protocol in it's own right but just links to other lab specific protocols.
• I am a little confused about naming pages. I created several protocols with the express intention of getting them out into the community. It looks like I may have jumped the gun a little and perhaps I should have made two protocols at the same time; a general one linking from the protocols page with my lab specific one referenced as a specific protocol. However these would, for now, be almost exactly the same.
• The reason I want to get this right is I have a lot of other protocols to add and where I am setting up I am trying to get a WIKI installed as our intranet. Lots of people are afraid of the fact that anybody can edit your pages, lots of convincing is needed. Being able to lock lab specific pages might well be the thing that brings lots more labs into OWW.
• JH 17 Oct 06:
• Consensus protocols: For now I will make a consensus protocol page/template on my user page and show you what i am thinking. I did not want to jump in and add tot he protocols template and it is locked anyway.
• Reshma 12:06, 17 October 2006 (EDT): Hey James. First off, all your protocol contributions are awesome and it sounds like you have a lot more planned, that's great. With regards to some of the issues you've raised...
1. The only reason the protocol template page is protected is cause we had a couple instances of people accidentally modifying the template page rather than copying it. (i.e. they overwrote or moved the page to their own protocol). So we just locked it to make it obvious to people that they should copy it. I'll unlock it now so that you can edit it. Or we can get you sysop status so that you can edit it despite the fact that it is protected.
2. Totally agree that discussions are fragmented and it is confusing about where to put them. So sorry about that. We're still trying to figure out the best way for people to conduct discussions. In general, the best place is on the relevant talk page (if there is one). That's why I am responding to you here. We created the OpenWetWare:Ideas page for those random ideas that you just don't know where to put. For discussions between just two people, they often occur on a user talk page (like yours and Sri's).
3. I think you are totally right that it would be great to have a consensus protocol on the main protocol page, as you have done at Jamesh008:consensus DNA ligation protocol. We just need more folks willing to put together and maintain these consensus protocols. (A lot of folks are more interested, understandably, in posting and editing their own lab specific protocols, rather than general OWW consensus protocols. As our community grows, I expect consensus protocols to emerge more and more.
4. I also agree that the procedure section of a protocol should/can be broken into steps. Really, the protocol template is just a guide that people can customize to their own needs. I think it is totally reasonable to update Protocols/Template to include subsections within the Procedure section.
5. In terms of protocol naming, in general the convention has been that generic terms like DNA ligation are consensus pages and then labs and individuals use prefixes like Knight:DNA ligation. Sometimes, if the person is the first to contribute a protocol of that kind, then they'll just name their page generically. If someone else comes along and wants to add a new version of that same protocol, then they can move the existing page to a lab/individual specific name, create a consensus page, and then link their new version off the consensus page. Given that it sounds like you will be adding a lot of protocols, you might want to go ahead and create a consensus page and a lab specific page linked from there at the same time. But that is pretty much up to you. Basically, the OpenWetWare:Etiquette is that people can edit generically named pages mercilessly but should use more caution with lab specific pages.
6. Totally agree that DNA ligation leaves a lot to be desired as the "ideal" protocol. Please feel free to improve it according to your Jamesh008:consensus DNA ligation protocol.
7. From everything you've said, it sounds like we might want to have two templates. Protocols/Template is a template for an individual protocol instance and perhaps Protocols/Consensus template could be a template for consensus protocols (it would essentially be copied from your Jamesh008:consensus protocol template).
8. Regarding your suggestion of locking lab specific pages ... it is definitely an issue that has come up a lot. Check out the debate at OpenWetWare:Software/Private Pages. I think it is safe to say that everyone still has mixed feelings about it. But given that we don't have the resources to implement permissions/access control, it ends up being kind of a moot point for the time being (until we get more resources).
• Austin Che 12:37, 17 October 2006 (EDT): With the imminent move to the new server, I've been doing some rearranging of things and I've set up a really trivial way for us to host subwikis that can have arbitrary permissions (e.g. pages that are completely private to the world, pages that only particular people can edit, etc.). I'll put my current ideas on to OpenWetWare:Software/Private Pages soon.
• JH 15.47 18 Oct 06: Responses to Reshma:
1. Protected protocol template - sensible to keep stuff like this protected so new users don't make a mistake. I will see if I can help out with the new user documentation to help prevent mistakes when adding protocols. I an not sure about unlocking it though and am not sure sysop status is needed for me; what does that mean?
2. Fragmented discussions - I have replied to several discussions today and referred to other discussion in my replies, it does seems difficult to keep track of discussion but now I am using the watch function more, it helps a lot.
3. Consensus protocol on the main protocol page - I will be willing to act as an editor for a couple of the protocols I have submitted where I have lots of experience and where a consensus is required. If people adopt only one or two protocols this should not be too onerous.
4. Procedure section of a protocol - these were my suggestions. I do not expect there to be a perfect consensus on the layout of different protocols. Sometimes they will need to be different. I started using OWW as I could not get a template from nature Methods due to copyright, I want to have everyone in my lab using the same layout so it is easy to find things and update things. OWW lets me do this and share at the same time.
5. Naming still confuses me.
6. DNA ligation leaves a lot to be desired as the "ideal" protocol - I do not want to appear as having savaged someones work; this is an example of things I think could be done better generally. I would not be a good DNA ligation editor.
7. -
8. Two templates - yes exactly and I would hope over time that the front protocols page would be almost exclusivley consensus protocols. After all how many years have we all been referring to Maniatis!
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Heat Wave Taking Its Toll on Your Health
Triple digits across the country and the effects on your heart, brain and blood pressure.
3:16 | 07/17/13
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Transcript for Heat Wave Taking Its Toll on Your Health
Did you know that for much of the country the definite physician of a heat wave is three days of untrumtd heat. This is the time when hospitals say they begin to see people in trouble, sudden effects on the human body, heart, blood pressure, also the brains of people of all ages. So what happens? Abc's meteorologist ginger zee is out tonight and she's going to show us what is happening all around the country. Reporter: Whether it's the 90s THAT FEEL LIKE 100 IN Chicago -- it feels like you're going to explode, it's so hot. Reporter: Or the whole feels like the inside of an oven. You can't just call any heat a heat wave. There is an actual definition for a heat wave here in the northeast. Three days at 90 or higher. We're on day four. Tell you what, these guys can tell you we've done it. Like a sauna probably. Reporter: He's been out there washing windows for the last five hours. Probably gone from the glass in your face. Reporter: The water evaporates before he can wipe the window clean. As the temperature on the glass approached 120, the whole team called it quits. It's hot like a trying pan. Reporter: The heat is taking its toll. On tuesday an intern at a conference in new york passed out. This man tested how hot it gets in a car. We approached 120 degrees in the car, completely miserable. Reporter: We asked dr. Jennifer ashton to measure what the heat does to the average person going about their day during a heat wave. This is stacey. She's in good health. Dr. Ashton took her blood, rate, heart rate and urine. I'm going to check that in the morning, check it in the afternoon, see how dehydrated you get. Reporter: Five hours later, after running every day errands like watering plants, doing laundry, she lost three pounds. Her heart rate went from a normal 72 to 127. Even her urine showed obvious signs of dehydration. Day after heat never allowing a person to cool down can be dangerous for a body. We expect to see people with heat exhaustion and heat stroke at the end of this heat wave than the beginning of it. Reporter: It's the ohios but the low lows. Washington d.C. Temperature didn't go low 80 degrees, a trend that won't break until sunday. Get this, allstate's in the lower 48 have hit 90 degrees for higher at least in someplace. That's a big wave of heat for much of the nation. It's going to break. I have some good news. That's the national temp I was telling you about. Look for places like chicago, the cooling will come not just for storms. Look at that, 80 degrees by the end of the week. Have to wait until the end of the weekend but that's going to come with severe storms. Diane? Thank you, ginger. The heat is compounded by the
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Amazing Anatomy Of The James Webb Space Telescope Mirrors
March 20, 2014
Image Caption: Technicians and scientists check out one of the Webb telescope's first two flight mirrors in the clean room at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. Credit: NASA/Chris Gunn
Rob Gutro, NASA
When you think of a mirror, there really isn’t that much needed to describe it, but when you look at a mirror that will fly aboard NASA’s next-generation James Webb Space Telescope, there’s a lot to the anatomy of a mirror.
NASA’s Webb telescope includes a primary, secondary and tertiary mirror. Although the relatively small secondary and tertiary mirrors are unique, it’s the expansive primary mirror that has the most complicated anatomy with a number of components operating together to make the telescope work.
The mirrors were built by Ball Aerospace & Technologies Corp., Boulder, Colo. Ball is the principal subcontractor to Northrop Grumman for the optical technology and lightweight mirror system. Ball Aerospace also developed the secondary mirror, tertiary mirror and fine-steering mirror.
The raw power of any telescope is determined by the size of its main optic — the bigger the first or “primary” optic, the better—and in the case of large telescopes, the optic is a mirror. Webb’s primary mirror measures 6.5 meters (21 feet, 4 inches) across, and although that’s respectable by ground-based telescope standards, it is absolutely huge for a space telescope. A mirror this large and in space is needed to capture the light from the most distant galaxies and stars in the universe, but it would too big to launch into space if it were one single piece, so that’s why Webb’s is composed of 18 smaller lightweight “segments” that can be folded up to fit into the nosecone of a rocket. Each of Webb’s 18 hexagonal-shaped primary mirror segments measures just over 1.3 meters (4.2 feet) across, and weighs approximately 40 kilograms (88 pounds). All of the 18 primary mirror segment assemblies that will fly aboard NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope have already arrived at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md.
Each of the 18 mirror segments is not “just a mirror” but is a complex assembly of technologies that allows all of them to work together as one. Each mirror has an “anatomy” of many parts, from the reflective gold-coated Beryllium substrate or layer, down to a Beryllium structure of “whiffles” and a “Delta frame,” plus precision actuators to position and shape the mirror, mounted on Backplane Interface Flexures.
“The complexity of the mirror assemblies comes from the fact that they are designed to be very lightweight, work at cryogenic temperatures below -400F, survive launch vibration and forces, be align-able on-orbit via actuators, and then stay aligned for up to two weeks as though they are a single large mirror,” said Lee Feinberg, NASA Optical Telescope Element Manager for the James Webb Space Telescope at the Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland.
Beryllium Mirror Substrate (Smooth mirror surface)
The Beryllium Mirror Substrate is the part of each mirror segment that acts as a mirror in the classic sense. Each substrate is nearly 2 inches thick with a highly-polished and exquisitely smooth “front” reflective side and a “back” side that is precision machined into a sort of egg crate-looking structure to make it lighter weight than it would be if solid. The reflective surface is polished to an “average” roughness of only 20 nanometers (i.e., 20 billionths of a meter) and coated with a microscopically thin layer of pure gold to maximize its ability to reflect infrared light. Beryllium is the material of choice because is it extremely stiff and lightweight, and it behaves very stably and predictably at Webb’s extremely cold operating temperatures.
Beryllium Whiffles
The opposite side of the smooth surface Beryllium Substrate is mounted on three triangular Beryllium Whiffles that look like the openings in an egg crate. Each of the whiffles are about 1 foot wide and 2 feet long. The whiffles spread the load or mass (because the mass has no weight in space) from underlying structures and mechanisms to minimize distortion in the mirror. Beryllium was chosen because it is strong and light, and will hold its shape at extremely cold temperatures.
Beryllium Delta Frame
The Beryllium Delta Frame or BDF is the main intermediate structure for each of the 18 primary mirror segments, and it is about 2.5 feet wide and shaped rather like a regular triangle or “delta.” The BDF connects the reflective mirror or substrate and whiffles to actuators.
Actuators are tiny mechanisms composed of precision motors and gears used to move and shape the reflective mirror surface of the substrate. Actuators align the 18 primary mirror segments in positions to focus on an object in space.
Each of the primary mirror segments has six actuators that enable it to move and rotate so that all 18 can be aligned to each other to act as one giant mirror. Also, each primary mirror segment has one special “force” actuator attached directly to the middle of the backside of the shiny mirror and via long, thin Beryllium struts to the edges of the mirror segments. Each force actuator enables all 18 segments to have the exact same “center of curvature” such that they will all focus at the same point
These mirror actuators are one of the Webb’s many new inventions. They enable the miniscule movements on the scale of nanometers that are necessary to achieve optical perfection. A nanometer is one billionth of a meter, or one millionth of a millimeter. To put this in perspective, consider that a typical sheet of paper is about 100,000 nanometers thick. Moreover, these actuators must operate reliably and repeatedly at the extreme “cryogenic” temperatures of only tens of degrees above absolute zero.
After Webb unfurls in space and cools down to its operating temperature, engineers on the ground will send commands to move all the actuators and co-align all the mirrors in a process that will take about two months. Then, once the Webb is fully-operational and being used for scientific observations, mirror alignment will be fine-tuned about once every 10 to 14 days. Thanks to this new technology, Webb will be the first space observatory to use an actively-controlled, segmented primary mirror.
Backplane Interface Flexures
The Backplane Interface Flexures connect a primary mirror segment to the telescope structure called the backplane. The backplane holds all 18 of the primary mirror segments. Flexures allow for expansion and contraction that occurs with temperature changes—especially the big cool downs that happen in pre-flight testing on the ground and the one big cool down that will occur in space as the observatory goes from room temperature after it leaves its launch vehicle to around 50 Kelvin (minus 390 degrees Fahrenheit) and below for operations. The flexures themselves are precision-machined blades that function as finely-tuned springs.
However, there are flexures everywhere in each primary mirror segment and not just where they connect to the Backplane.
It All Works Together
The purpose of all this new and specialized technology is to work in concert to enable great scientific advancement. The Webb will be the premier astronomical observatory of the next decade. It will study every phase in the history of our universe, ranging from the first luminous glows after the Big Bang, to the formation of stellar systems capable of supporting life on planets like Earth, to the evolution of our own Solar System.
Source: Rob Gutro, NASA
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Customize table views
When the data displayed in the Console is tabular listing objects of a particular type, you can customize the table by filtering the data displayed and adding or subtracting columns and rows. You can also sort the data tables by clicking on the column headers.
To customize tabular data:
1. Navigate to an object table and click Customize this table, located at the top of the table.
2. To filter the data that appears in a table, under Filter:
1. Select a column for filtering the data displayed.
2. Specify filtering criteria (a text string) in the Criteria text box.
The filtering criteria is specified as a string in the WLDF Query Language. The query language supports Boolean operators: AND, OR, and NOT, and relational operators. For more information on query syntax, see WLDF Query Language.
3. To customize the columns and rows displayed, under View:
1. Add attributes to display by moving them from the list of Available items (on the left) to Chosen (on the right).
2. Remove attributes displayed by moving them from the list of Chosen items to Available items.
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On the defensive after appearing in a Snickers commercial yanked for homophobia due to its swishy speedwalker, 80's icon Mr. T appeared on The O'Reilly Factor and made it up to gays everywhere the only way he knows how: with glorious, glorious camp. The arm-wrestling brawler immediately produced a long-winded, written defense which he then read from on air; highlights include the passages, "I have been pitying fools for 28 years, Biiiiiill," "Speedwalking is an Olympic sport," and desperate pleas for someone, anyone, to talk to "SPEEDWALKA!" for his reaction. T particularly triggered our sympathy (not pity, we leave that to the experts) when he whined, "On The A-Team, I called the bad guys a disgrace because they was harassin' helpless people. No problems. No complaints." Too true, T. Compared to GLAAD, those bad guy lobbyists really need to get it together. [Amy Proctor Blog] | [] |
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Too Old to Succeed? No, but It Takes Practice
Author Malcolm Gladwell says that it takes 10,000 hours to become good at something.
Ten thousand hours: That’s how long it takes to become good at something.
Want to succeed at golf? Put in 10,000 hours of practice. Playing an instrument? Same thing. Business, writing, hockey, knitting, flying a plane? You guessed it.
Ten thousand hours is “the magic number for true expertise,” writes Malcolm Gladwell in his new book, Outliers: The Story of Success. The New Yorker staff writer and author of Blink (2005) and The Tipping Point (2000) didn’t just pull this number out of the air. The 10,000-hour theory was first advocated by psychologist K. Anders Ericsson and colleagues, who studied violinists at the elite Berlin Academy of Music in the early 1990s, and has been corroborated by researchers studying everything from chess players to master criminals to Mozart.
Ten thousand hours. That’s three hours of work per day (or 20 hours per week) for 10 years. For older adults looking to start a new career or to pick up a new skill, this might seem discouraging—but it shouldn’t, according to Gladwell.
“One of the reasons people don’t feel they can reinvent themselves is that they think being good at something requires some innate gift,” Gladwell told AARP Bulletin Today in an interview. “They think, ‘I couldn’t do that, I don’t have that kind of mind or that kind of ability.’ But the 10,000-hour rule says you can do that; you just have to put in the necessary time. The thing that limits us in our choices is not something we have no control over, our abilities. It is something we do have control over—our effort. It really points to the value of experience.”
You can see the results on the public stage. “Many of the kinds of disastrous decisions made on Wall Street that led to this current mess were made by people who did not have 10,000 hours in finance, in trading,” Gladwell says. What about the hits President-elect Obama has taken for choosing Cabinet members who served in previous administrations? “That’s nonsense,” Gladwell says. “He’s correctly gone after people who’ve got their 10,000 hours in in government service. Both youth and experience have their advantages and disadvantages, and I think we overvalue the advantages of youth and undervalue the virtues of experience.”
It isn’t that simple
Before landing at the New Yorker and becoming a best-selling book author, Gladwell, 45, got in his 10,000-plus hours of experience working as a science and business reporter at the Washington Post. He has since become well known for repackaging academic research and socio-philosophical theories into eminently readable, narrative-rich general-interest books; for making the kind of connections that seem so obvious once pointed out but that require someone like Gladwell to do the pointing.
Outliers is centered on one deceptively simple question: Why do some people (or groups of people) succeed whereas others do not?
His conclusion, in its most distilled form: It’s the culture, stupid.
Successful people “are invariably the beneficiaries of hidden advantages and extraordinary opportunities and cultural legacies that allow them to learn and work hard and make sense of the world in ways others cannot,” writes Gladwell in Outliers.
Thus, while intelligence counts, not all people with high IQs—even genius-level IQs—will be successful. Outliers highlights the research of Lewis Terman, whose study of 1,470 “gifted” children over the course of their lifetimes found that the environment in which they were raised was just as, if not more, important in predicting the path their lives would take than their basic intellect was.
Intelligence only mattered up to a certain point. When it came down to determining which geniuses would succeed and which wouldn’t, “in the end, only one thing mattered: family background”—the economic and cultural circumstances in which one was raised. What the unsuccessful geniuses lacked was “a community around them that prepared them properly for the world.”
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what's the most watchers you have ever had?
(31 Posts)
Bradsplit Mon 18-Nov-13 14:15:31
I currently have 24, I am quite pleased with this but I am ware from previous experience that this doesn't translate into a high sale price
what is the most watched thing you ever had?
ggirl Thu 21-Nov-13 21:27:54
I just sold a dressing table , had 18 watchers and no one bid until last 10mins.
I bought it from ebay for £45 , realised it's actually not nice at all .sold for £51. Was gonna take to the tip!
Bradsplit Thu 21-Nov-13 21:10:01
we are now up to 33
for a scarf
one fricken bid
ggirl Thu 21-Nov-13 20:39:37
brad-too hot and sweaty
hoobypickypicky Tue 19-Nov-13 22:13:17
49 for a pair of red velvet curtains. They cost me £5 and sold for £122.
Bradsplit Tue 19-Nov-13 22:09:43
Were you not a tempur fan ?
ggirl Tue 19-Nov-13 22:06:50
had 370 odd for a well used tempur mattress , slept on it for 8yrs and sold it for £360!
nickstmoritz Tue 19-Nov-13 22:02:02
lljkk I think you might be able to bump up your place if you fill in all of the description details listed for the item. Any that are not applicable I now put n/a rather than leave blank and the rest I now fill - so all measurements asked for, fabric details etc. I don't know for sure but it is a hunch based on noticing my items being on first page after starting to do this.
lljkk Tue 19-Nov-13 19:05:51
Cassini = the search engine that Ebay uses (custom written) to return results for buyer searches. It's how they decide "Best Match."
Things that Cassini favours:
Buy-it-nows, pictures in focus with white backgrounds, new listings, titles that match existing indexing, listings from sellers with no performance issues, listings from sellers with high conversion rates, low prices, ending soon. The exact algorithm isn't published.
Snowflakepie Tue 19-Nov-13 10:32:03
What's Cassini? Not heard that one. I won't start anything at 99p now as if that's all it goes for, my share is not worth the effort listing. I save it all for a free listing weekend (another one coming up shortly I believe) and put it on higher, then if it doesn't sell or I don't think it's worth relisting in a few weeks, charity bag. I can't be doing with the faux bidding, risky.
Bradsplit Tue 19-Nov-13 06:40:26
Argh. Can't face the fear I'll forget to get someone to up it. Note I've only done it once. Was terrified
LittleTulip Tue 19-Nov-13 06:35:09
Currently got 48 watchers on my North Face coat. The trick is to always start bidding at 99p to entice them in!
Bradsplit Tue 19-Nov-13 06:25:17
What's Cassini
One multi size listing that I've had running since June has 162 watchers on 3022 views.
It's for a longline bra and I guess the watchers are seeing if I restock the sold out sizes. Sadly I can't as the style is discontinued.
JockTamsonsBairns Mon 18-Nov-13 22:32:26
Just today, I had 108 watchers on a pair of lovely Little White Company pyjamas. They sold for £1.28. Ffs!
lljkk Mon 18-Nov-13 17:25:06
>30 on each of two bikes. One had one bid in the end, and the other one no bids (though we sold privately instead).
We live back end of nowhere so both were collection only; the winning bidder drove 300 miles roundtrip to collect.
Also maybe 30+ watchers on a bike trailer that THEN was rejected by buyer costing me £61. I later resold it off ebay, collection only, for £75.
I think days of mega watchers are over though for me because of new Cassini system. I'm lucky to sell anything for a price I can stomach.
WoollyNortherner Mon 18-Nov-13 17:20:11
I had 27 watchers the other week for a dress I bought from Dorothy Perkins in the sale last year for £17. It sold for £19.58 and I'd wore it a few times, too.
Probably not the highest number of watchers I've ever had, but I was really surprised it attracted so much interest. I only expected it to go for a couple of quid smile
Floralnomad Mon 18-Nov-13 17:04:37
We had over 120 watchers when we sold our Furreal butterscotch pony , and it went for nearly as much as we had paid for it new.
75 watchers on a stunning gold and cream formal suit for a baby boy (DS wore it for his christening). We sold it for more than we paid for it but not mega bucks.
CarmonEileen Mon 18-Nov-13 17:01:14
CarmonEileen Mon 18-Nov-13 17:00:42
oh sorry grin £6.49. I saw so many on there and thought I ma as well put mine on as it was no use to me. Did make me giggle going for that much shock
Bradsplit Mon 18-Nov-13 16:53:28
what did it go for
CarmonEileen Mon 18-Nov-13 16:27:55
and what?
Fontofnowt Mon 18-Nov-13 16:27:24
*not that I dislike kids of course.
I was annoyed that she didn't think a child would be more of a hinderance when moving the heavy pine bed.
Plus she messaged a few times after the sale to try and flirt with my exoh (Cheeky cow) but sadly for her it was me who did the ad and answered the questions posing as a bloke.
Watchers didn't equal a high price for me
When I moved into my current house the first time, we explored the loft only to find a box of old console games (snes/master system etc) I called the previous occupants who rather rudely told me to just bin anything we found be uses it's just junk they couldn't be bothered to take hmm
I stuck the lot on eBay, had 174 watchers and they went for £566! <sucks to be you rude lady>
Snowflakepie Mon 18-Nov-13 16:11:30
74, for a second hand Internet router, fully functioning though. Was £120 brand new on amazon, went for £94 plus shipping. I was stunned. DH was laughing himself silly over it as we got it for nothing when the cable company left it with us despite having one when there was a fault on the line.
Nothing else has come close, a few in the 20-somethings for some rare gaming figures of DHs. Double figures is generally a good sign!
Anyone had loads of watchers but then not sold the item?
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At Improvisation Festival/NY, extreme virtuosity of body and psyche knocks you out. On a bill at Danspace Project, Darrel Jones and Jeremy Wade in Shits Creek were preternaturally articulate action figures—cartoonish, rubbery, possibly trapped in the backpack of a delirious child. At the start of The Beloved Dance (Phrases and Chi Improvisations), Sara Shelton Mann channeled and updated Isadora for 2001, tossing limbs and hair to an atmospheric drone. You could see shackles shattering. Her partner Abby Crain unpacked a shoulder bag, and Mann played solitaire with a bunch of credit cards that made satisfying clicks on the floor. The taped text pretty much flew past my ears—save for the word cheesecake. Silent moments in Scratch (with a deft, sensitive ensemble of six including Kirstie Simson and John Jasperse) suggested that sometimes less data to process means more depth to savor.—Eva Yaa Asantewaa
Nine-year-old Vera joined me for the famed Rockettes at Radio City Music Hall, where the Christmas Spectacular runs through December 30. Our journey began with a 3-D sleigh ride through the Big Apple, with Santa and his reindeer. I found it exciting, but Vera said the 3-D made her dizzy, and she watched most of the short film with her Toys"R"Us glasses safely in her lap. The Rockettes sparkled, performing their eye-level kicks under the bright lights in short evergreen velvet dresses and shiny silver-heeled tap shoes. Despite the dancing ballerina bears, the "Nutcracker" number did not hold Vera's interest: "I got bored when they were dancing forever and ever and wouldn't stop!" But the show redeemed itself when the Rockettes became wooden soldiers; this classic was her favorite. "The Living Nativity" closed the show. Since Vera is Jewish, she suggested omitting that part. "It confused me," she said. —Emily Moellman
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Don't write off actively managed U.S.-stock mutual funds just yet.
Conventional wisdom these days is that investors want nothing to do with U.S. stocks, especially when it comes to traditional, actively managed mutual funds. Instead, investors are often depicted as frantically—and perhaps irrationally—rushing to put their money into anything that's a bond fund or an exchange-traded fund.
But the reality is much more nuanced. In a world where uncertainty is high and interest rates are at rock bottom, investors remain willing to move money into traditional stock funds that offer dividends or otherwise tempting income streams.
"Investors are looking for yield anywhere they can find it," says Tom Roseen, a senior analyst at Thomson Reuters Corp.'s Lipper unit.
Overall, through Oct. 26, investors this year withdrew $62 billion from diversified U.S.-stock mutual funds and poured $263 billion into bond funds, according to Lipper. At the same time, diversified U.S.-stock ETFs have attracted nearly $15 billion. That has suggested to some that the dissatisfaction isn't just with years of wild swings in U.S. stocks, but a more fundamental unhappiness with the inability of highly paid fund managers to generate market-beating returns.
But look a little deeper at the numbers, and a different picture emerges.
Dividend-focused "equity income" funds, not counting ETFs in that Lipper category, have taken in $16 billion. That amounts to an 8.3% increase in assets. That's also roughly three times the amount of money going into ETFs in the same Lipper category.
Another area attracting interest is funds focused on real-estate stocks. It's another category that can juice the income thrown off a portfolio, thanks to big holdings of real-estate investment trusts. U.S. real-estate stock funds, excluding ETFs, have attracted nearly $5 billion so far this year, and global real-estate funds $1.9 billion. U.S. real-estate stock ETFs, meanwhile, have taken in just shy of $6 billion.
Even among broader U.S.-stock funds, the news isn't as bleak as the headline numbers might suggest. Traditional large-cap growth funds have taken in $1.7 billion so far in 2012.
That may be a blip compared with the $516 billion in assets those funds hold, but it shows that not all broad categories of stock funds are suffering.
In this case, Mr. Roseen thinks it's the appeal of technology stocks—most notably Apple Inc. —that populate growth funds that are keeping investors' interest.
Taken together, the shifts seen in investor preferences may reflect a rational reallocation of their money, not just a knee-jerk reaction to disappointment with actively managed U.S.-stock funds.
"People are saying, 'Let's put our money where it's going to work better,' " says Mr. Roseen.
Send questions and comments to Mr. Lauricella at | [] |
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Big Brother Winner Aaron Allard-Morgan: 'Four Housemates Attempted Suicide'
As this year's crop prepare to enter the house
Photo: WENN
As a porn star, cage fighter and bouncer allegedly prepare to enter the Big Brother house tomorrow, last year's winner has claimed that FOUR of his ex-housemates have attempted suicide.
Aaron Allard-Morgan, who was met with boos when he emerged victorious in Channel 5's first full season of the reality show, made the claims on The Wright Stuff this morning.
"I genuinely fear for them, they don't realise what they're letting themselves in for," he said of the new intake.
"[Producers] give you very little preparation for what's likely to happen. From my year, with the 15 of us, I know that four of them have tried to commit suicide after the show just because of the ramifications and impact that it has on your life."
Though he did not name the unhappy evictees, he added: "You're not prepared and you don't have the aftercare that perhaps you should be getting afterwards. The people that are going in tomorrow, they're not gonna hear this."
One positive, though, is that he is still in a relationship with Faye Palmer, with whom he had an explosive romance during the course of his stint in the Elstree compound.
"Big Brother is a game show, and everybody who goes in there plays a game, including myself. You come out and you're not sure if the person who you could have this relationship with was playing a game with yourself," he said.
"And I knew that I was very much in love with her and it turned out she was the same so it worked out brilliantly."
Big Brother returns tomorrow on Channel 5.
This year's house in pictures
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Why should I break my Google habit?
Microsoft is taking another run at Google but excuse me if I don't swoon over the company's latest search brainstorm.
Michael Arrington has an interesting post today on TechCrunch in which he predicts that Microsoft Live Search Cashback will have a material impact on Microsoft's share of the search market. It's worth a read but Microsoft will still have to scale a few mountains before this becomes a smash success.
I suppose Microsoft will get some initial lift from the news, but the PR glow will ebb. Seriously, how many of you really plan to use Microsoft search in hopes of making a buck? At some point, the offering will be judged on its comprehensiveness and that's a comparison Google welcomes. I experienced much the same sense of frustration using the service as did SearchEngineLand's Danny Sullivan. His conclusion: "this is far from ready as the big game changer that Microsoft is hoping it will be."
Some people surely will accept a more limited selection in return for a few dollars in their pockets. Still, you don't find many examples where companies made out by paying customers to use their products. It's been tried. For example, Buy.com once purposely lost money on what it sold through what the company termed a "zero product margin" strategy. The idea was to sell advertising to compensate for any lost revenue. Needless to say, that's not how the company operates any longer--and for good reason. (By the way, Henry Blodget did a back-of-the-envelope analysis and concluded that Microsoft "generates no revenue from cashback." I know Bill Gates is big on philanthropy, but Microsoft shareholders are pursuing a decidedly different agenda.)
If any of this created a tidal wave of interest, Microsoft obviously would try to devise ways to monetize the offer. But first users are going to need to master the unnaturally geeky approach Microsoft adopted in building the "Live" franchise. I'm not bashing the products. Truth be told, I think Microsoft's done a good job with the individual properties. I'm just puzzled by the pastiche of forgettable and confusing URLs it's collected around the Live brand.
Last month, Microsoft tweaked things slightly--again--so that users can now access their Live.com personalized page by signing in with a Windows Live ID. Fine, but it's still a marketing nightmare. When I'm in a hurry, it's just a lot easier remembering Google.com.
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In evolutionary game theory, it is typical to model organisms as having a base fitness that is modified slightly by the game interaction. The ratio of the game effect versus the base fitness determines the strength of selection, with weak selection meaning the game modifies overall fitness only slightly, and strong selection meaning that the game payoff is a big part of the overall fitness of the organism.
Most analytic models like to assume weak selection because it allows the authors to Taylor expand the selection function and linearize it by dropping terms that are higher order in the stength of selection. However, it is unclear that results derived for weak selection would necessarily hold under strong selection. Are there mathematical (or computational) models where weak and strong selection produce qualitatively different results? If not, is there an argument as to why weak and strong selection should produce the same results?
I've also seen this discussion come up outside of evolutionary game theory, in a more general biological setting. In particular, with respect to inclusive fitness. The take away message I got was that in the regime of weak selection relatedness means what you expect it to mean, but for strong selection the concept becomes very slippery and counter-intuitive. What does inclusive fitness theory tell us about going from weak to strong selection? Again, I prefer arguments supported by clean mathematical or computational models over ones based on intuition and words alone.
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I haven't had time to look closely at it, but you might find this paper interesting: Wu et al. 2010. Universality of weak selection. ArXiv. It seems like they try to bend the rules and study differences between models. – fileunderwater Jan 9 at 21:33
@fileunderwater thanks, I found that paper shortly after I asked the question and it is extremely relevant, I've been meaning to give a self-answer based on it but have been too busy with other things. – Artem Kaznatcheev Jan 9 at 22:52
1 Answer 1
It has been shown that predictions based on weak selection can be different from that on strong selection. In fact, for rare mutations, each strategy has stationary distribution at the mutation selection equilibrium. The rank of the component depicts the relative prevalence of the available strategies. Yet the rank of the components of this distribution can change with the selection intensity. Thus results obtained under weak selection can not generally carry over to strong selection.
For more details, please refer to Fig. 1 in [1] and Fig. 2 in the supplementary information of [2].
1 Julián García and Arne Traulsen, (2012), Journal of Theoretical Biology, Leaving the loners alone: Evolution of cooperation in the presence of antisocial punishment
2 Christoph Hauert, Arne Traulsen, Hannelore Brandt, Martin A. Nowak and Karl Sigmund, (2007), Science, Via freedom to coercion: the emergence of costly punishment
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Other-worldy dust mites and an insight in tiny human brains were among the week's intriguing discoveries:
1. Tiny Find: Stardust From Beyond our Solar System? Earth may be host to some far-from-home specks. Seven tiny grains of rock sent back to Earth by a NASA spacecraft are believed to be the first from outside our solar system.
2. Newborns' Brains Grow 1% a Day: The first study of its kind shows that newborns' brains grow fast—figure a staggering 1% a day immediately after birth, though it slows to about half that rate by the end of three months. The brains of preemies grow even faster.
3. 'Evil Eye' Box Uncovered in Ancient Cemetery: People in the ancient kingdom of Kush not only believed in the afterlife, they apparently feared the evil eye—in the afterlife. Archaeologists excavating a 2,000-year-old cemetery near the Nile River in Sudan say that among many artifacts, they found a box decorated with eyes likely thought to protect the deceased.
4. How to Change a Woman's Biological Clock: Ladies, you know your biological clock—the one that "ticks" away as you start feeling like it might be time to reproduce? Well, it turns out the sound of an actual ticking clock can speed up your reproductive timing, making you want to have babies earlier.
5. How Bee Venom Might Fight Cancer: Locked within the honeybee's painful sting is a toxin that could fight cancer. A University of Illinois scientist thinks he's figured out a way to safely use a synthetic version to unleash it on cancer cells while leaving healthy cells alone.
Fascinating new scientific discoveries:
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A family of Jewish patriots. In 175 B.C. Antiochus Epiphanes became king of Syria and made a determined effort to stamp out the Jewish religion. At first he met with considerable success, owing partly to a Hellenizing movement among the Jews themselves, and altars were erected to Zeus in many parts of the Holy Land. Resistance began at Modin, a town near Beth-horon, where an aged priest named Mattathias, of the family of Hasmon or Chasmon, slew the sacrificers, and also the king’s officer under whose direction the altar had been erected. Mattathias was the father of five sons, and with a large body of followers took refuge among the mountains. They were attacked on the Sabbath, and thousands were slain. It was afterwards resolved to disregard the Sabbatical rule and, if necessary, to fight in self-defense. After Mattathias’s death, his son Judas, surnamed Maccabaeus, or “the hammerer,” became the leader. Several great victories were gained. The ruined temple was restored, the desecrated altar was pulled down and reconstructed, and the new altar was dedicated amid great rejoicing. In 165 B.C. a large Syrian army under Lysias invaded Palestine, the war continuing during several years with varying success. After the death of Judas in 161 B.C. his brothers Jonathan and Simon became the leaders. Jonathan was also high priest but was treacherously murdered about 144 B.C. Simon was then sole leader of the patriotic party. Under him the country enjoyed greater prosperity than at any other period after the Exile. The Jews, in gratitude for what he had done, put up in the temple a memorial tablet to Simon and his family, and he was appointed “governor and high priest for ever until there should arise a faithful prophet.” In 135 B.C. he was treacherously murdered by his son-in-law. His son, John Hyrcanus, then became high priest. He built the fortress in Jerusalem that was afterwards known as the Castle Antonia and destroyed the Samaritan temple on Mount Gerizim. After his death the position of the family was less secure. The Herodian family were powerful rivals, and the marriage of Mariamne, a Maccabean princess, with Herod the Great in 38 B.C. marks the end of the Maccabean dynasty.
The first book of Maccabees (see Apocrypha) contains a history of events from 175 to 135 B.C. and was probably written about 100 B.C. It was written in Hebrew or Aramaic, but only a Greek translation has survived. It forms a historical document of the highest importance. The second book of Maccabees deals with the years 175–160 and therefore goes over part of the period described in the first book of Maccabees. It was written in Greek, probably by an Egyptian Jew. | [] |
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Overdraft Penalties
When we overspend our account with a check or debit card purchase and the bank covers it, we have to make good, right? Overdraft penalties, which average from $30 to $34 nationwide, theoretically act as a deterrent. That pays the bank's costs for papering over our errors.
In fact, there is little correlation between a banks' cost to administer bounced checks or overzealous swipes. Overdraft fees, like most bank fees, are set by what the competition is charging. Nor are overdraft penalties related to going interest rates: charging $34 for covering the average overdraft of $36 for a week (when banks usually hit overdrawn customers with a second, "extended overdrawn balance" fee) amounts to a 5,000 percent annual interest rate.
Photo: iStock | [] |
From: Peter Eyland ([email protected])
Date: Mon Oct 21 1996 - 22:04:30 EDT
Thanks Wes for your input. You write with substance and imagination.
A word often has a cluster of various meanings associated with it and
these change with textual and temporal context. My interest in the word
*image* is that our present technological context has put unintended
meaning into past context.
Consider the history of the icon/image complex. The great debate that
split the Latin and Greek speaking churches (with apologies to Animal
Farm and anyone who takes unintended offense) was *two legs good,
three legs bad*. Thus *icon* drifted from statue to fairly flat in Gk/Rus
tradition. Then the Xerox Co in the 1950s invented the WIMP approach
to computing (Windows/ICON/Mouse/Pull-down menus), pushing
*icon* into symbol.
In the renaissance, optical images were shown to be illusions. They
are not reality, mere reflections (and refractions) of reality. There are
stories that certain New Guinea tribes could not interpret photographs,
and cats see the TV as mere wavering colours. Cinema images are
flickering illusions. Computer imagery is pixels, glyphs and morphing
(scheming?) leading to virtual reality. Political image can be
manufactured by PR firms.
Today the meaning of icon/image carries with it symbol/unreality. Thus
Jesus as the *image of God*, in temporal context, unconsciously implies
that he is the symbol and reflection of God. It implies that he is a mere
likeness and not a reality of personality and characteristics.
| [] |
Breaking Free
Why stepping out is the only way to travel.
August 13, 2010
I tell you all this to explain why I am not (yet) crazy from all the traveling I do. I average 25 trips a year, and more and more I feel like a hamster in a Habitrail. I scurry into an entry tube, also known as an airport, and then proceed through other tubes, a.k.a. buses and taxies, and P.F. Chang's and smart new brewpubs in renovated downtowns, before arriving, in every instance, at the exact same rest cube furnished with the same paper-wrapped soaps, thence to sleep before reentering the tubes and speeding off to my next, predictable nodule. Like a hamster, I enjoy only the illusion of freedom, but unlike a hamster, I can put on running shorts and break through the tube walls.
It's not always easy, though. Outside of certain older downtowns—New York, Chicago, San Francisco—pedestrianism itself is kind of a throwback, the sort of thing done by people who also re-enact Civil War battles and play "base-ball" under 1850s rules. If God had wanted us to use our legs, say 21st-century planners, he wouldn't have given us four-lane highways and drive-thru windows. So on those mornings when I step out of the hotel entrance, and run up the inbound driveway, I feel like a felon: a hamster gone rogue.
A few times earlier this year, I used the Internet to plan my runs before heading to the airport, checking on favorite routes that others have logged, and even connecting with local runners willing to guide me personally. And that has its significant pleasures, because nobody knows the terrain like the people who've worn their grooves into it, but I also experience the loss of the possibility of getting lost. There's nothing quite like the chill of realizing I'm somewhere I haven't anticipated, with only a vague sense of how to get back, a slight but thrilling sense of unease now as rare as an urban corner without a Starbucks.
Better, I now think, to just go. That is, after all, the great advantage of our sport over all others—we don't need a ball or a team or a field or even, according to some, shoes. We just need to stand someplace, imagine ourselves in the center of a circle, pick one out of the 360 degrees available to us, and head thataway. What the Habitrail designers want, ultimately, is control: They want you to go down this street into that mall past that sign. And, stuck in cars or trains or even on downtown sidewalks, people have no choice but to obey. Once, at a Disney World hotel, I asked a hotel clerk where I could run, and she said to take one of their shuttles to a nearby resort with attractive running paths. I nodded and smiled and turned away to head outside and run on the access roads, dodging buses, breaking through tubes, a member of the Rebel Alliance.
If I didn't, I'd travel all over, and never get anywhere. | [] |
SMH Home
Home > Entertainment > Music > Article
It's war on a generation of cyber pirates
By Amanda Morgan
February 18 2003
The recording industry has launched its most aggressive offensive yet against illegal music swapping over the internet.
In the Federal Court in Sydney today, record companies will try to seize evidence of song swapping by students using the computer networks of the universities of Sydney, Melbourne and Tasmania.
Record labels in the United States and Europe have warned the world's top 1000 companies they must stop illegal music swapping on their networks or face legal action.
Australia's major record companies, Sony, EMI and Universal, are acting on suspicions that students, and possibly staff, are using the universities' computers to swap digital music files. The industry says the three universities have not divulged information, but that others have co-operated.
Michael Speck, the director of Music Industry Piracy Investigations, which tracks swapping on behalf of the Australian record industry, believes the illegal file trading is significant.
"And we're not talking about one track here, one track there," he said. "We're talking piracy, significant examples of piracy."
The University of Sydney says it knows of one student who established a website with a handful of songs for swapping on its system. It has "isolated the website, and will hand over the evidence at an appropriate time", a spokesman said.
There are hundreds of thousands of song files on personal computers worldwide. They are "swapped" for free using special software, robbing artists and their record companies of royalties.
But the president of the NSW Council for Civil Liberties, Cameron Murphy, said the industry was wrong to target students.
"The focus of these organisations should be on people who are running or pirating music for clear commercial benefit," he said. "I don't think there is any benefit to the community in prosecuting individuals who do this as a one-off. I mean, we'd have half the students in Australia in jail."
Mr Murphy also questioned whether the universities should be forced into the role of policing their students.
Mr Speck denied the industry was making an example of the universities. "Somebody gets caught being involved in a wrongdoing and they utter, 'We're not the only ones, why are we here?' Well, you got caught."
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Take the 2-minute tour ×
I am learning tasker and reading up tutorial on http://tasker.dinglisch.net/tour.html.
If you look at the picture,
you can see the two same tasks "Set Widget Icon".
Is that a typo, or something I do not understand?
enter image description here
Also, what is the benefit of toggle? Why is the property ternary, not just off and on? Can you please help with a practical example?
Thanks much.
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1 Answer
up vote 2 down vote accepted
Yes, that seems to be a typo: the conditions should be If %WIFI ~ on and If %WIFI !~ on (or If %WIFI ~ off).
The %WIFI variable can only be on or off, not toggle. But the Wifi action can be used to enable, disable or toggle Wifi, i.e. if Wifi is enabled, it will be disabled, and if Wifi is disabled, it will be enabled.
The example (minus the typo) talks about creating a "Toggle Wifi" widget: if Wifi is on and you click the icon, Wifi will be disabled and the icon will be changed to a "Wifi is off" icon. And if Wifi is off and you click the icon, Wifi will be enabled and the icon will be changed to a "Wifi is on" icon.
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Platinum Boarder
The wheels are muddy, got a ton of hay
Re: why is Bakes such a hateful.lying loser?
#85153 2 years, 4 months ago
I had no idea that you 2 were brothers. Ive been chattin with you for about a year now here on furthurs facebook , well thats what this place kind of is..lol. Neverstopp, i can tell by the numerous posts you have made , not even knowing you or your sheppard, or labrador retriever, thatyou arent the type to hurt your very own pet. Geez, it really sounds like you two have a very strange relationship. Even if there really was a dog being beaten all the time, as he claimed in his obvious untrue post, Id have to say, Id still feel more sorry for you than the dog......but theres no dog being beaten, so thats really good news.
Bakes....grow the fuck up and stop cryin wolf....a dog might beat you one day. Neverstopp, you dont want your dog biting a kid, so I fully understand the situation. German Shepps are unpredictable around kids that pull and tease, as any dog is. Especially with the smell of turkey, or tofurkey, thats funny to spell out....cooking in the kitchen. lol
beating a dog isnt a joke so I cant apologize for my rant.
And i wont. Its good to hear you arent a dog beater. And its really more interesting to hear yalls Days of our Lives family drama. sorry , but lol. Family members Dukin it out on furthur .net discussion board. actually, its not funny. Family problems suck and are such a waste of a great thing we should be grateful for. to be frank and serious.
but again on a kidding joke.....
turn off the soap Bakes and go give your brother a hug.
Expert Boarder
Re: why is Bakes such a hateful.lying loser?
#85345 2 years, 4 months ago
To CaptainTony:
A board of inquiry has been convened to determine if you can remain here at the Furthur forum. Accordingly you must answer the following questions:
1.What are your military credentials?
2.When and where did you receive your military commission?
3.In which military do you serve?
4.Have you served in combat?
5.Are you a decorated officer?
6.For what did you receive your decorations?
7.Did you ever serve together with Captain Trips aka Jerry Garcia?
8.Were you present when then Private Jerry Garcia failed to return a tank to its proper parking space because he took a nap instead which led to the infamous "Dude Where's My Tank" incident(soon to be a major motion picture staring Hurley from Lost)???
9. You have been known to drink White Russians. Are you Sir now or have you ever been a member of the Communist Party?
Feel free submit an essay portion to justify your continued presence here.
Last Edit: 2 years, 4 months ago by deadegad.
Walk in the Sunshine
Platinum Boarder
Re: why is Bakes such a hateful.lying loser?
#85375 2 years, 4 months ago
You're on the wrong board...wit & intelligence is not allowed here. Well done.
Note had to edit my "your" so as to portray intelligence.
Last Edit: 2 years, 4 months ago by Walk in the Sunshine.
Baby Jeebus
Fresh Boarder
Re: why is Bakes such a hateful.lying loser?
#85408 2 years, 4 months ago
Walk in the Sunshine wrote:
You can say that again.
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Former prime minister Margaret Thatcher has won another landslide almost 20 years after losing power. | [] |
Microsoft Surface: how the software giant got Apple envy
Microsoft's new Surface tablet launch reveals the extent to which the company is apeing its greatest rival
• The Guardian,
• Jump to comments ()
Steve Ballmer
Look familiar? Microsoft chief Steve Ballmer unveils the Surface tablet in true Apple style. Photograph: Damian Dovarganes/Associated Press
A last-minute invitation giving journalists and analysts just four days' warning; a US West Coast unveiling of "a major product" touted as "something you won't want to miss"; a presentation of an own-brand device by the company's chief executive, touting its design aesthetic and magnesium-sintered parts in exploded view. You could easily have mistaken Monday night's unveiling of Microsoft's Surface tablet range for an Apple event – though you would never mistake Microsoft's bombastic Steve Ballmer for a charismatic Apple executive.
Yes, Microsoft is getting into the iPad space; after sitting on the sidelines for years, it has now started running after the fastest-growing sector of the computing market with its Surface.
The fascinating thing about the announcement, though, was how dramatically it shows the Apple-ification of Microsoft. The company that brought the world Windows, and got rich on it, has for years had serious Apple envy. When Bill Gates was still working full-time at the company, he would fume during visits to London at Apple's Regent Street store, opened in late 2004. "We need to have those!" he would complain, to the despair of his minions, who would forbear from pointing out that Microsoft didn't really make things like Apple did; it made software. Apart from the Xbox, a Microsoft store at that time would have been a showcase of lots of boxes of software, and a few mice and keyboards. The laptops and desktops on which Windows ran were all made by other companies, such as Dell or HP.
And that was a good arrangement for Microsoft: software is wonderfully profitable, because once you've made one copy, the next billion or so cost nothing to copy. It made Microsoft the most valuable company in the world by the end of 1999.
Yet now Microsoft is not just snubbing those companies that made it rich by making PCs that ran Windows; it's positively apeing Apple, making something the same size as an iPad, putting its own name to it, deciding the price, and selling it through its own stores, both physical and online. (Gates will be happy.)
But is this just some bizarre financial bromance? Or something deeper? "Why would Microsoft hedge against what it has, the most brilliant business model of the 20th century?" muses Horace Dediu, a former Nokia executive who now runs the Asymco consultancy. "Because," he answers, "it doesn't work any more."
He says that's because of the rise of mobility – the fact that increasingly we use smartphones and tablets to work anywhere and any time, where just 10 years ago we would have had to sit in front of a desktop, or unfold a laptop. Now iPads are used to create art or hold flight manuals for pilots; meanwhile, nearly a million Google Android smartphones are being activated every day.
Mobility is big. Smartphones have been outselling PCs since autumn 2010; and though the tablet business is only two years old, a total of 108m are expected to ship this year (against about 400m PCs); the research company IDC upped its forecast ahead of Microsoft's announcement. IDC has consistently lowered its forecast for future PC sales while it keeps pushing it up for tablets.
"The rate of growth in these platforms is almost vertical," says Dediu. "Microsoft's for Windows is pretty much flat."
Google is following the same path: it has bought Motorola Mobility, the US smartphone and tablet maker, and later this month is expected to announce an own-brand 7in tablet. (Larry Page et al won't be pleased at Microsoft stealing their thunder; Ballmer, who hates Google, will be delighted; it might also explain the last-minute nature of the announcement.)
The Appleification of Microsoft is happening because the company has got no choice. The smartphone and tablet pose what Benedict Evans, an analyst at Enders Analysis, calls "an existential threat" to Microsoft: if it can't get a credible foothold there, then its growth just stops. So far it hasn't managed it in smartphones. Tablets suddenly look like a necessary product.
Of course, this adventure could go horribly wrong. Think of the Zune – a Ballmer-ordered product (he literally snapped his fingers in a top-level meeting and said: "We need one of those!") that came far too late in 2006 to compete with the iPod, which had already passed its glory days; Apple already had its eyes then on the iPhone, which has supplanted and far exceeded it for profitability. Zune never went anywhere (literally; it was never sold outside North America) and was quietly killed last year.
Then again, the Xbox 360 games console has done well, cementing the company's position in millions of living rooms around the world. Except when you look at the numbers: total sales are put at 67.2m since 2005. Next year is expected to see a new generation – the Xbox 720 – for which a leaked internal document forecasts 100m sales in 10 years. Dediu laughs: "A hundred million? That's equivalent to a hundred days' of Android activations. And that's their ambition for 10 years?"
Nobody's expecting that Microsoft is going to stop Dell or HP selling Windows computers – or that they're going to stop doing so immediately. But the signs of strain are there already. Last summer, HP said it would quit the PC business because the margins are razor-thin (it dumped its chief executive and recanted); Dell keeps trying to push into services, and makes nothing on consumer PC sales.
But in making the first big move into the Windows tablet market, Microsoft has shown that it realises the need for reinvention. The old Microsoft would have let a thousand PC makers build tablets – big, small, great, awful, pricey, cheap. The new one will control the apps that run on the Surface, via an online store, will decide the price and the models. It's a long time since 2004, when an ebullient Ballmer came to London and told an audience of journalists (then prodding him about the iPod): "With great respect to Apple, there's no way anything gets to critical mass with Apple, because Apple just doesn't have the volumes."
Even then, the iPod was outselling Microsoft's then mobile offering, Windows Mobile. If you can't beat them, join them – and ideally, steal their clothes too.
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