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About BatchMaster ERP
Serving the process manufacturing industry for more than 25 years, BatchMaster employs over 200 dedicated professionals, half of which work exclusively in research and development. The BatchMaster software team's wide range of experience in the process manufacturing industry allows the company to stay on top of emerging trends, regulatory changes, and new methods of production. BatchMaster software is used in more than 1,500 locations globally, and the company's customers span formula and recipe-based industries.
The BatchMaster ERP software is designed specifically for small to mid-sized, formula-based manufacturing companies in the food, beverage, nutraceutical, personal care, chemical, and life science trades. Companies like these choose to use BatchMaster software to increase efficiency in operations, scale production, reduce costs, and comply with regulatory standards. This process manufacturing ERP software solution can integrated with many existing business systems, including Microsoft Dynamics GP, SAP Business One, Sage 100/300 ERP, and QuickBooks. BatchMaster also offers industry-tailored versions of Microsoft Dynamics GP and SAP Business One solutions with its ERP services.
This specialized process manufacturing ERP software includes sample, lab, formulation, production, cost, quality, and compliance modules that are designed to meet the highly specialized needs of formula-based and process manufacturing firms. As expected from any enterprise resource planning software, you also get optional modules for inventory tracking, planning, and scheduling. BatchMaster software is not only a viable planning solution, but a scalable one at that. Choose BatchMaster if you want software that can grow with your business.
(Last updated on 02/02/2022 by Jonathan Darcy)


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Market Report: Electronics Industry Expects Growth in Consumer and Manufacturing Services
After taking some knocks during the recession, the electronics industry is expanding and anticipating growth in its consumer and manufacturing services sectors.
March 2011
The consumer electronics industry will reach a new industry peak in 2011, with revenues exceeding $186 billion, according to the Consumer Electronics Association (CEA). On the electronics manufacturing services (EMS) side, New Venture Research predicts the industry will grow from $270 billion in 2009 to $479 billion in 2014.
The question is where will electronics companies locate or expand as they seek to amp up capacity and drive greater efficiencies across the supply chain? There are the usual suspects, of course. Silicon Valley dominates the electronics scene, but Boston is known for its audio cluster. New Jersey has a strong electronics base with the Toshiba anchor, and the Southwest is still a strong force to be reckoned with. But recent developments are shining an electronics industry spotlight on Northeast Ohio, and the focus on lean manufacturing and logistics savings has put cities like Bentonville, Arkansas, in the center of the fray.
Innovation Spurs Growth
In terms of consumer electronics, innovative new products - like tablets, ereaders, and smartphones - helped spur consumer interest and brought stronger than expected growth throughout 2010, according to the CEA. The category will continue to grow in 2011, CEA predicts, with nearly 59 million units being shipped to dealers and revenues of $32 billion projected.
CEA also predicts the wireless handset category will see continued growth in 2011. Smartphones continue to lead the way. Revenues are expected to increase nearly 20 percent to more than $21 billion, and 72 million units are projected to ship to dealers.
Digital displays are a weak spot in the electronics industry, but the rise of Internet-connected TVs is picking up the slack, with 2011 sales expected to rise 63 percent over 2010 to exceed $5 billion. In addition, 3D TVs will see steady growth in 2011, with increased content from video games, Blu-ray movies, and TV events (especially sports) driving this growth. It is projected that 3D TV unit sales will grow 67 percent in 2011 to 1.9 million units.
Northeast Ohio's FlexMatters Cluster
For all the focus on Silicon Valley, Northeast Ohio's flexible electronics cluster experienced significant growth in 2010, attracting $14 million in capital, according to NorTech, a nonprofit technology-based economic development organization serving 21 counties in Northeast Ohio. Dubbed FlexMatters, the cluster of businesses, suppliers, service providers, and institutions is focused on low-cost electronic device manufacturing printed on flexible plastic materials.
Northeast Ohio is home to companies and research institutions with technical expertise in polymers and advanced materials, flexible displays, printed sensors and circuits, flexible photovoltaics, and organic light-emitting diode (OLED) technology, all of which are developing a new class of flexible electronic devices. The region's companies produce electronic writing tablets, switchable eyewear, printed batteries, and medical implants.
Standouts in Northeast Ohio include Blue Spark Technologies, which develops flexible, printed "green" proprietary power source solutions for battery-powered printed electronic systems. Kent Displays develops and manufactures Reflex™ No Power LCDs for consumer and OEM markets. Other innovators included in the FlexMatters cluster are AlphaMirror, Akron Polymer Systems, GrafTech International, and Five Star Technologies.
"We are building a robust innovation cluster in Northeast Ohio that is going to put our region at the forefront of the global flexible electronics industry," says Rebecca Bagley, president and CEO of NorTech. "The capital attracted this past year proves that we have strengths and assets in this sector. It's NorTech's role to seek additional opportunities and funding to help accelerate the growth of the FlexMatters Cluster."
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subset: commoncrawl


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in a lovely root beer color
in a lovely root beer color
that is hot! nice choice on wheel color.
wow looks good!
hot fiya
i had a feeling what with a proper finish and stance these wheels would look sick
ig: @jonnie86
wow wow wow wow wow....flow so nice.
Prime Motoring
Detailing, Parts and Accessories
Me gusta. Love that color. Now you just need some proper pics to show off the true color of the wheels!
CCs look insane dumped with lots of tuck, wheels look good too
1997 BMW 328is Alpine White // Dove Grey
ZF Swapped | 3.23 LSD | FK Coilovers | 17x8.5 Borbet Type C | 75mm Wheel Studs | 12mm Vorshlag Spacers | 5000k HIDs | Euro Taillights | Suede Headliner/Pillars
hot damn


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Toronto's first disloyalty card launches next week, promising to send people on a liquid tour of seven independent coffee shops. The counterculture scheme, to promote quality coffee and community, is the brainchild of the newly formed Toronto Coffee Conspiracy.
Made up of Mercury Espresso Bar, Dark Horse Espresso Bar, Sam James Coffee Bar, Crema Coffee Co., Manic Coffee, Lit Espresso Bar and Blondie's Coffee Bar, the group embraces neighbourhoods from the Junction and Roncesvalles Village to Chinatown and Leslieville.
"We all have something great to offer and we all do it a little different," promises Matthew Taylor, co-owner of Mercury Espresso Bar in Leslieville.
Taylor has long mused about collective action. Then he heard that 2009 World Barista champion Gwilym Davies had launched a "disloyalty" card late last year, promising to make people a free drink at his Prufrock Coffee once they visited eight independent coffee shops in East London.
Inspired, Taylor emailed Davies — as a gesture of respect — to say he'd love to replicate the card in Toronto. He got the okay, and on March 5 called six of his closest coffee friends to Dora Keogh pub on the Danforth to pitch the idea for the conspiracy and the card.
Toronto's disloyalty card, set to launch April 20, works a little differently than London's version.
Once the business card-sized wallet cards are printed, you pick one up at your regular coffee shop (there will be about 500 per store) and that will be marked as your starting point. Then you visit the other six spots, buy any coffee that's on the menu (brewed or espresso based), and get the card punched. When you're done, you return to your starting point for a free coffee. Finished cards can be turned in for monthly draws. They'll also help people score invitations to attend or judge things the coffee shops do privately, like latte art competitions.
Geoff Polci, who owns Crema Coffee Co. in the Junction (plus a new kiosk within a Freshii at Yonge and Bloor Sts.), is pumped by the card's potential.
"We're hoping people treat it like a passport," he says. "We're in the Junction and it's still so undiscovered. This is great exposure for the independent coffee scene in Toronto. Collectively, as a group, we're a lot stronger and able to reach a lot more people."
The Toronto Coffee Conspiracy hasn't quite figured out how to promote their neighbourhoods, except to give customers advice on where to shop, eat or visit nearby.
Since news of the initiative broke, there has been unexpected backlash at the whiff of exclusivity.
"You don't want to exclude people," concedes Polci, "but you want to maintain some integrity."
The aim is to start small, see if the disloyalty card works, and then expand.
"We hope to get more places in the west end, and more in the east end," says Taylor. "Maybe an east card that you take to the west, and a west card that you take to the east."
The name Toronto Coffee Conspiracy has also sparked troubled rumblings. It's actually a harmless homage to a 1970s Stratford band called The Perth County Conspiracy.
"It's not a conspiracy by any means," stresses Taylor.
The seven shops, with a combined 10 locations, have different owners. And no, the disloyalty card isn't secretly backed by any of their suppliers. The shops use various espresso machines (like Synesso, Clover and La Marzocco) and a spectrum of roasters — including Intelligentsia, 49th Parallel, Dark City, Origins, Detour, Stumptown and Terroir.
"We just want to show people it's a tight-knit, and not negative or competitive, industry," says Taylor. "We want to get together and show people there is fun in our community."
The disloyal coffee route
These coffee shops are part of the Toronto Coffee Conspiracy, and will be offering a disloyalty card program starting April 20.
Blondie's Coffee Bar & Restaurant, www.blondiesbar.ca, 1378 Queen St. W.
Crema Coffee Co., www.cremacoffee.ca, 3079 Dundas St. W., 53 Bloor St. E. (inside Freshii)
Dark Horse Espresso Bar, www.darkhorseespresso.com, 682 Queen St. E., 215 Spadina Ave.
Lit Espresso Bar, www.litespressobar.com, 221 Roncesvalles Ave., 810 College St.
Manic Coffee, www.maniccoffee.com, 426 College St.
Mercury Espresso Bar, www.mercuryespresso.com, 915 Queen St. E.
Sam James Coffee Bar, http://samjamescoffeebar.com, 297 Harbord St.


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Intel i7 5960X Review with ASUS X99 Deluxe
Published: 29th August 2014 | Source: Intel | Price: £759 |
The question on everyone's lips (their chapped lips) is, "Is the i7-5960X of sufficient improvement to justify the expense". Perhaps the latter bit is subjective, but when it comes to 'call your momma in the room and show her how awesome this is' results, yes, it's fair to say the i7-5960X is jaw-dropping. If our jaw was left slackened any more then we'd have to change our website to Yokel3D. Largely of course this is to be expected. It's the top of the line, Extreme Edition, Intel CPU. Those usually come with magnificent performance and eye-opening price tags, and the i7-5960X is the shining example of this ethos.
Perhaps the thing we enjoy the most is that this is a comprehensive change. The move from Sandy Bridge to Ivy Bridge to Haswell was all incremental changes. They brought a little something new, but were largely refinements. The LGA2011 when it appeared was replacing the X58, but despite the greatness of the CPUs the memory bandwidth was always pretty bad, and that had a large factor in the results obtained by nerdy types like ourselves, and the fact nearly nobody brought them. There just wasn't enough between a, for example, i7-4960X and a i7-4770K to justify the expense. That 'close enough' performance gap has been torn asunder by the i7-5960X.
For a start we have eight cores, and sixteen threads, to play with. Such is the rapid advance of software support for multiple cores we hardly came across a single title that didn't use the CPU to its fullest. The addition of DDR4 has moved what we expect good Memory bandwidth to be so far across the horizon you'll need to get in a plane to see it. The old X79 was doing well to get 20GB/s. The LGA1150 rocked at around 30GB/s. The X99 and i7-5960X with DDR4 combination regularly hit 60GB/s. Astounding.
It isn't just a case of some exciting CPUz number though. The results bore out the insane capabilities of the i7-5960X in every test. OC3D records were broken so often we decided against pointing them out because the gap between the Haswell E and its predecessor is so large that it would be akin to saying the sky is blue. The overclocking is easy, with the chip responding beautifully to even the slightest increase in available bandwidth. The soldered cap rather than the TIM of old helps dramatically too. With our Corsair H105 we saw a max of 40°C under load at stock. Yes the temperatures rose quickly with our overclock, up to nearly 80°C, but we're trying to maximise performance at a stable setting.
Now we're not stupid, we know that the i7-5960X is a pricey little number. But considering that you're getting so much more than the Extreme Editions of old but for the same near $1k price tag, the value for money is increasing dramatically. If you just want a system to game on, or write emails to your Auntie, then this is perhaps overkill. However, if you were planning to do that you're entirely missing the point. This is for the enthusiast who demands the very best and by that scale it's a bargain. For the rest of us it's a glimpse into the future. A future where DDR4, plentiful PCI Express lanes, SATA ports, USB3.0 ports and pure CPU horsepower are moving to new levels. A game changer.
We also need to thank ASUS for supplying us with the X99 Deluxe to form the backbone to this review. If you're one of those people who long for a high end motherboard that isn't dominated by black and red, or perhaps you want a motherboard rich with features but freed from the "it's for gamers" trappings, then we can highly recommend it. It performed beautifully throughout our testing, overclocked like a champion and looks the business with those white accents. There has been loads of thought put into the design, the box has so many accessories it's hard to know where to begin, and it comes complete with the ASUS OC socket, something that many manufacturers would save for one model alone and then price-gouge you on it. It's been a joy to use, and also wins our OC3D Gold Award.
Thanks to Intel and ASUS. - Discuss the Intel i7 5960X Review in the OC3D Forums
Most Recent Comments
I really want it :/Quote
Performance on the other hand, particularly a workstation, there's no beating it. Although it's a pity the turbo frequencies are as low as they are though. The two 8-core Xeon E5-2687V2's that are in my workstation at work turbo up to 4GHz. No way Intel is going to sacrifice their huge margin Xeon business though. Quote
I'd buy one second hand if i could at the right priceQuote
Wow Tomb Raider really benefits from the extra cores, Wish they would of done like they did with the last gen though, 4930K had the same cores as the extreme version.
Not out of my price range but it would be wasted on me due to only gaming with 1 GPU and not needing a gazillion gigs of ram Quote


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Two hundred and ten students graduated from the University of Maine at Presque Isle during the 2013-2014 academic year. On Saturday, May 17, at 10:30 a.m. during the 2014 Commencement Exercises, the University's 105th Commencement, President Linda Schott conferred degrees upon 137 students who participated in the ceremony held in Wieden Gymnasium.
Graduating summa cum laude were Whitney Flint, Ashland; Rachel Jordan and Christine Solman, Caribou; Sarah Taylor, Industry; Melanie Drew, New Limerick; Dawn Casella, Jared Dickinson and Kimberly Hall, Presque Isle; Leslie Monk, Princeton; Desireé Genthner, Rockland; and Justin Howe, Washburn.
From elsewhere in the United States were Heather Herbert, Cumming, GA; Ben Hamilton, Morning Sun, IA; and Kathleen Christoffel, Clifton Park, NY.
From New Brunswick, Canada, were Melissa Pleasance, Centerville/Woodstock; Amanda Doiron and Benjamin Savoie, Saint John; and Ryan Barrett, Waterville.
Also graduating summa cum laude was Lauren MacDonald, no hometown provided.
Graduating magna cum laude were Henry Pelletier, Biddeford; Kayla Pickering-Ames, Blue Hill; Lucas Bartlett, Bradley; Kevin Huston, Caribou; Lynnelle Lavway, Castle Hill; Jordan Hemingway and Janelle Horten, Hodgdon; Laura Cone, Valerie Jay and Nancy McMannus, Houlton; Ryan Schieber, Limestone; Katherine Madore and Angel Strout, Lisbon Falls; Elyssa Deschaine and Chelsea Pelletier, Madawaska; Kelly Smith, Mapleton; Michelle Bucci, Milo; Barbara Redman and Amy Schnoor, Monticello; Hallie Bartlett, Morgan Meyer, Tyler Michalowski and Donna Robichaud, Presque Isle; and Jean-Pierre Dumond, Van Buren.
From elsewhere in the United States were Michael Balmer, New Smyrna Beach, FL; Amanda Chambers, North Attleboro, MA; Toni Wise, Las Vegas, NV; and Elizabeth Lewis, Peace Dale, RI.
From New Brunswick, Canada, were Patricia McIsaac, Florenceville; Jennifer Burgess, Fredericton; Anthony Corbin, Plaster Rock; Julie Devine, Quispamsis; and Marea Innes, Woodstock.
From Nova Scotia, were David Roy, Halifax; and Richard Landry, Shubenacadie.
From elsewhere in Canada was Alexander Csiernik, Hamilton, Ontario.
From even further afield was Yujia Song, Ma Anshan, China.
Also graduating magna cum laude was Melinda Hitchcock, no hometown provided.
Graduating cum laude were Hollis Seamans, Amity; Sarah Pickering-Ames, Blue Hill; Elizabeth Barbosa and Joey Bard, Caribou; Jaron Gray, Danforth; Brooke Hanington, East Millinocket; Michael Henderson and Dennis Rogeski, Fort Fairfield; Valerie Cormier, Grand Isle; Brittany Luetjen, Hampden; Cody Pond, Haynesville; Melody Gonya, Houlton; Kate Heal, Kittery; Audrey Pictou, Limestone; Lana Desmond and Jasmine Rockwell, Oakfield; Michelle Russell, Patten; Karrie Brawn, Leslie Horne, Desireé McGrath, Laurence Shorette and Joel Whitaker, Presque Isle; Josiah Brazier, Searsport; Nicole Boggs, Talmadge; and Jenna Bouchard, Van Buren.
Also from the United States was Nicholas Johnson, Spokane, WA.
From New Brunswick, Canada were Nicole Marshall and Kayla Steeves, Fredericton; Jessica Yorke, Gordonsville; and Michael Sorensen, Grand Falls.
From Nova Scotia was Daniel Lewis, Gardiner Mines.
Also graduating cum laude were Zipeng Liu and Vanninnia Small, no hometown provided.
Others receiving degrees were Danielle Clark and Jeremy Tarr, Ashland; Jason Hafner, Auburn; Jordan Perry, Baileyville; Adam Baillargeon, Bangor; Ericka Benayad, Bath; Zachary Wentzel, Benton; Kameron Thyng, Berwick; Kari Bradstreet, Bridgewater; Bradley Burlock, Kimberly Englund, Elizabeth Flagg, Melinda Godin, Nicole Hamilton, Justin McLauchlan, Robert Marrett, Melissa Nadeau, Benjamin Pinette, Daniel St. Peter and Theodore Walker, Caribou; Rowena Forbes, Castle Hill; Daniel Cote, Caswell; Kirby Hardy, Dyer Brook; Aaron Hutchins, East Millinocket; Abby Gray, Easton; Randi Kaplan, Embden; Mirandah Akeley, Joshua Churchill, Kathi Jandreau, Lydia Thebarge, Matthew Tompkins and Kelsie Wilson, Fort Fairfield; Cameron Morrell, Harpswell; Megan Bither, Hodgdon; Jorge Alvardo, Taylor Bailey, Timothy Chase, Eric Cone, Dina Currier, Samuel Hiscoe, Nicholas Howe, Stephanie McGuffin, Martha McPartland, Jeannette Phillips and Ryan Van Buskirk, Houlton; Candace Collins, Houlton/Howland; Janet Vose, Island Falls; Crystal Allen, Jackman; Alison Casey, Lewiston; Demerese Montgomery, Limestone; Jeffrey Jamieson, Limestone/Caribou; Dylan Worster, Lincoln; Haley Quint, Linneus; Frederick Bartlett, Littleton; Bryan Molloy, Lovell; Katie Sell, Machias; Ashley Desjardins and Sara Gendreau, Madawaska; Roland Guimond, Andrea Hill, Annie Johnson, Hayley Ritchie and Kathleen York (Carter), Mapleton; Deavin Gustafson, New Sweden; Brittany Brewer and Malachi Stover, Oakfield; Christopher Cosenze, Old Town; Rebecca Doty, Penobscot; Blaine Hunt, Phippsburg; Andrea Allen, Caitlin Ballard, Joshua Boyles, Courtney Cray, Lee Delong, Kyle Gilson, Jenna Kitchen, Kayla Legassie, Bethany Lord, Brittany Lovely, Courtney Lovely, Logan McNulty, Shane Rucevice, Krista Stevens and Wendy Walsh, Presque Isle; Rebecca Callahan, Searsport; Jennifer Ouellette and Ashley Ruest, Van Buren; Morgan Berube, Washburn; Corey Hebert, West Baldwin; MandaLynn Ring, West Paris; Stephanie Landry, Winterport; and Jacob Nason, Winthrop.
Also from the United States, were Amy Kahn (MacDonald), Hollister, CA; Heather LaFontaine, Northampton, MA; Thomas Jeh, Sharon Advocate, MA; Bret Glidewell, Lewistown, MT; Cheney Quist, Epping, NH; Pauochau Brown-Paul, Charlestown, RI; and Linde Goodness, Peace Dale, RI.
From New Brunswick, Canada, were Dani Green, Centreville; Mitchell Feero, Douglas; Stephanie Jellett, Grand Falls; Bryan Jennings, Lower Sackville; John Haddad, Plaster Rock; Katelyn Frost, St. Stephen; and Angelique Paul and Raeann Michaud, Tobique First Nation.
From Nova Scotia, were Allison MacDonald Phillips, Antigonish; Joshua MacKinnon, Lismore; and Mark Cavanaugh, Londonderry.
From elsewhere in Canada was Jordan Duffy, Fort Augustus, PEI.
From even further afield were Yuning Lu, Nanning, Auangxi, China and Michael Warner, Norwich, UK.
Also graduating were Gregory Beasley, Yuxin Guo, Breena Hood, Claude Louis, Steven McDougal, Rosemary Moody, and Terry Perley, no hometown listed.


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(1) Introduction
The Astrophysics Source Code Library (ASCL) was founded in 1999 to improve the transparency and reproducibility of research by making the software used in astrophysics research discoverable for examination [15]. We also encourage reuse of software and advocate for accurate software citation; citing codes increases transparency and gives software authors a way to demonstrate the value of their work, thus providing incentive to make their programs available. Software methods are vital to research [11, 10, 17]; the importance of computational methods in astronomy is underscored by the existence of journals devoted specifically to these methods [7].
For the ASCL, sustainability is not nearly so ambitious as that defined in The Blind Men and the Elephant: Towards an Empirical Evaluation Framework for Software Sustainability from the 2013 Workshop on Sustainable Software for Science: Practice and Experiences (WSSSPE): "a measure of a systems extensibility, interoperability, maintainability, portability, reusability, scalability, and usability" [21]. Our sustainability model is much smaller: Is the source code available to be read, and can it be found easily? Preservation and discovery are the most important attributes – if the code is not preserved and cannot be found, no other attributes of sustainability matter!
Several libraries or registries of astrophysics codes have been created over the past two decades. Each endeavor offered opportunities for researchers to share their software techniques and improve the reproducibility of research, but none reached the tipping point of widespread adoption by the community. What lessons can be learned from examining these efforts?
(2) Looking Back and Around
Though there were online sites for individual codes and a few other smaller collections, perhaps the first robust online resource for astronomy software was the Astronomical Software Directory Service (ASDS), conceived in 1993 by Robert J. Hanisch, Harry E. Payne, and Jeffrey J.E. Hayes [9]. Funded by the NASA Astrophysics Data Program [16], ASDS was not a repository or library; rather, it maintained information about codes, but the codes and related files such as documentation were stored on other sites, typically personal or institutional websites. This resource eventually provided information on 56 programs. In 1998, ASDS changed its name to the Astronomical Software and Documentation Service as it expanded to include telescope and other instrument manuals; the service ended about 2000. The ASDS had expected that "software providers would be their own metadata managers. But they didn't do it." Over time,"the directory service started to be out of date" [8], making it increasingly less useful.
In 1999, Robert Nemiroff at Michigan Technological University and John F. Wallin, then of George Mason University and now at Middle Tennessee State University, founded the online Astrophysics Source Code Library (ASCL) to house programs of use to the community [15] and serve as a download site for them. This was a volunteer, spare-time endeavor; between 1999 and 2002, approximately 40 codes were deposited. Nemiroff said that "Getting people to post their codes in ASCL was like pulling teeth. Nobody submitted anything. We had to go out there and get them ourselves." [14] In 2003, a new volunteer editor-in-chief was sought for ASCL; none was forthcoming, and with developments elsewhere to provide a code repository, the ASCL remained available but work on it ceased.
In 2003, Michael Remijan and Robert Brunner from the National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA) at the University of Illinois announced Astroforge, which used the SourceForge model for open source software but focused on the needs of astronomers [18]. Development of the resource was a three-year project [6]. The site, which was at http://www.astroforge.net, no longer exists; it was discontinued due to lack of funding [5].
We know of four other code directories, though certainly there are many project groups and individuals who pull together such information for their own work, team, or subspecialty. One such subspecialty repository is Astromatic1 for astronomical pipeline software; another is the codes wiki for computational fluid dynamics2.
Carlo Baffa, Elisabetta Giani, and Alessio Checcucci of the Istituto Nazionale di Astrofisica (INAF) created SkySoft3 in 2003 as "Yet Another Astronomical Software Directory, but with a different overall approach as a community-supported directory, to which everyone can contribute, both developers and end-users." [1] The site has entries for 309 codes, many added in 2003 and 2004; since 2007, 18 software packages have been added. Software used in research as well as development tools and management codes are included, and the site provides space for news items, which are frequently updated, and links to astronomy institutions, resources, and other software sites.
The Astro-Code Wiki4, created by AstroSim – European Network for Computational Astrophysics5, contains approximately 55 codes and has had sporadic updates. AstroSim was a five-year project "to bring together European computational astrophysicists" running from October, 2006 until September, 2011 [12]; its focus was on comparison of codes for suitability for specific tasks. Once the funding ran out, the project ended; the Astro-Code Wiki is still available, though the most recent code addition was made in 2013.
Another repository called Astro-Sim was established in April, 2007 by Steffen Brinkmann of the High Performance Computing Center Stuttgart (HLRS) of the University of Stuttgart [4]. This site, which housed about thirty codes, also provided forums for discussion and links to other tools and libraries. The site6 had been updated as recently as August, 2010, but now appears to have been deleted.
Keith Shortridge discussed the need for communication and sharing among astronomical software users and authors at the Astronomical Data Analysis Software and Systems (ADASS) conference in 2008; included in his talk was information about a TWiki site called AstroShare, created in October 2008, which was intended to permit information and codes sharing [20]. The site housed about 30 packages and had areas for discussion of topics such as releasing software, social media, and middleware. A flurry of activity occurred shortly after Shortridge's presentation and subsequent publication of his talk but did not continue. In mid-2014, the site had 126 registered users and showed a last update of November 2012; since then, however, the URL for the site7 stopped working and as of this writing (August 2015), the domain is used by the Chilean Virtual Observatory.
(3) Learning From the Past
What we learned from these endeavors was instrumental in our work to restart and grow the ASCL. Each of the efforts to aid communication and share knowledge of codes useful for astrophysics has offered valuable information to the community, yet a number of common factors inhibited the growth and use of these software directories.
The experience of ASDS demonstrates that metadata curation is an ongoing requirement for a resource to be useful and used, and that code authors do not want to take on that task [8]. The original ASCL was not successful according to Nemiroff because "most people just didn't know about it and had few ways to find it." He came to realize that consistent exposure is needed for a resource to become known and used [13]. SkySoft is also affected by a lack of marketing, replicating the ASCL's experience in its earliest days: an initial announcement, a splash or two that generated activity, and then a gradual fading of interest.
Curation and marketing are not the most difficult hurdles; the greatest inhibitors relate to human nature, including the unwillingness of scientists to share their codes openly, the effect of the lack of an adequate reward system for software authorship, and the competitive environment in astronomy.
A depressingly small number of programmers are willing to share their work openly even on their own websites. Most emails that we have sent to software authors to request either a download site for or an archive file of a code we have found in a research paper go unanswered; authors who do reply usually say their codes are not available. The common reasons code authors are reluctant to share their work are covered more fully elsewhere [2, 19, 22].
Nemiroff's assumption that software authors would be eager to deposit their code proved false [14]. Indeed, experience shows that even authors with open code are reluctant to provide copies of their software to a repository site; many prefer to keep their work close to them, especially if they continue to refine and develop these codes. Most efforts have relied on software authors to submit codes, yet most authors are unwilling to submit information and maintain metadata stored in a software directory, especially as the payback for doing so may be uncertain.
Astroforge ceased to exist when its initial funding ended [5]. The AstroSim project was funded for five years and is now closed; though its Astro-Code Wiki is still available, it is not updated often and is not actively advertised. ASDS, too, ended when its support did. Success of a software directory requires a change in community attitudes and behavior to one of routine code sharing. Absent outside pressures, change in how a discipline works often takes time, longer than a funding cycle of three or even five years. Without uptake by the community, a new software directory is unlikely to receive additional funding, and as the funding goes away, so too may the resource.
In 2010, the ASCL was restarted with the decision to move the existing code entries to a phpBB site (Starship Asterisk) that houses forums for discussing the Astronomy Picture of the Day (APOD)8, educational resources for astronomy, and other topics of interest to APOD viewers, and a new volunteer editor was found. The ASCL initially had been a code repository; as software may undergo additional sporadic or continuous updating, it was decided that linking to a download site and dropping the requirement of software deposit would be sufficient for discovery. Requirements for metadata that may prove ephemeral and that are typically found on the download website (or inherent in the software) were also dropped to increase the accuracy of each entry, as was code categorization; with Starship Asterisk offering full-text iterative searching, it was felt that feature offered more opportunity for discovery than static categorization.
Each code record was posted to a separate discussion thread in a new forum dedicated to the ASCL; threads on this forum were ordered alphabetically by the name of the software. Authors and other interested parties were welcome to post to these threads, to provide updates, ask questions, or share other information they wanted to post. In the four years the ASCL was housed on Starship Asterisk, few people took advantage of this ability, though some did subscribe to particular threads, or the forum itself, to be notified of any changes to those threads or the forum.
It was at this time the examination of other efforts described in section 2 took place. Examining the other projects and talking with those who had run them was instructive, and provided guidance in developing change management strategies to increase the likelihood the ASCL would become a useful and used resource for the community. With the goals of improving the discoverability of research software, increasing the transparency, integrity, and falsifiability of research, and perhaps even helping to improve the efficiency of the field by encouraging code reuse, we developed a plan to guide the future of the ASCL.
(5) Creating a Sharing Community
Space does not allow a complete list of strategies that can be employed to inspire a community to new behaviors, but to start to move the astronomy community to one that routinely shares codes, we can:
- ensure there is a way to share software (build an infrastructure) that
- provides incentives for making codes available, and
- enlist/involve others with appropriate credibility in the community to endorse the effort,
- market the effort effectively,
- engage the community to learn what barriers and incentives exist and
- mitigate these barriers and nurture the incentives,
- examine and reach out to other communities, and then finally,
- be patient.
Let's look at a few ways we implemented these steps when restarting the ASCL.
Build an infrastructure
In 2010, the existing codes were moved from the original ASCL HTML pages to the phpBB discussion forum that houses, among other things, the discussion threads for Astronomy Picture of the Day (APOD), making the resource more visible and easier to use.
Enlist/involve others to endorse the effort
In 2011, an advisory committee was formed that includes several people prominent in the astronomical software community, computer science professors, well-known code authors, and the founders of the ASCL; among these are people who had been involved in other similar efforts. Advisors not only lend credibility and provide domain expertise, but also serve as change champions within the community. The Advisory Committee currently has ten members and has plans to eventually grow to twelve to provide better international representation.
Provide incentives for making codes available
The ASCL started assigning unique identifiers to codes in 2011, providing a way to cite software even when it does not have a descriptive paper associated with it. The SAO/NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS), the primary indexing service for astronomy, started indexing ASCL entries in January 2012, which makes codes in the ASCL more discoverable and also provides a way to track citations to ASCL entries.
Market the effort effectively
Members of the Advisory Committee developed a marketing plan that includes presenting the ASCL at conferences, writing guest pieces for blogs such as AstroBetter and Astronomy Computing Today, and using social media. Further, the APOD website, which most astronomers view at least occasionally, provides consistent and effective exposure for the ASCL by providing a link to it on the bottom of the APOD page every four to eight weeks. The ASCL editors also write to every author whose software is registered when an editor-initiated record is added.
Engage the community
The ASCL sponsors Special Sessions at American Astronomical Society (AAS) meetings and Birds of a Feather sessions at ADASS conferences that split the allotted time between presentations and open discussion with attendees. These sessions have been invaluable to learn what barriers to code sharing exist and what incentives may be useful to encourage sharing. These sessions also let the ASCL learn what the community expectations are, which helps us to meet or manage these expectations. Journal editors and publishers are also part of the community, and the ASCL has engaged them in informal discussions and also through a Software Publishing Special Interest Group9, and continues to do so.
Mitigate barriers and nurture incentives
Because authors are often reluctant to deposit their software, we dropped the requirement that it be housed on the resource itself. Instead, code records have a link to the software rather than store and serve the actual source codes, as several other astronomy software directories have done. (The ASCL can and does house software, but the majority of codes it has registered reside elsewhere.) Rather than rely on scientists, who are generally very busy, to provide information on their software, we seek codes and add information about them to the ASCL. In addition to aiding citations and citation tracking for software, the ASCL advocates for greater recognition for its authors.
Examine and reach out to other communities
As there were lessons in other astronomy efforts to build a code registry or repository, so too are there lessons from other disciplines and people who have done or are trying to do the same. Many of the challenges the ASCL faces are not unique, and with funding agencies, governments, and organizations pushing for more openness in research, opportunities to meet and discuss both small and broader issues with representatives from other disciplines periodically arise. Members of the ASCL advisory committee have participated not only in WSSSPE, but also in workshops at the Library of Congress and National Academies of Science, and have had informal discussions with representatives of fields as diverse as economics, computational chemistry, and materials science. The ASCL follows developments elsewhere, such as those discussed in Force1110, and is a signatory to the Center for Open Science's11 Transparency and Openness Promotion (TOP) Guidelines12.
Be patient
It takes time to change a community. Our timeline is ten years; ten years after the restart of the ASCL, we should have a good idea whether the resource will reach a tipping point and become embedded into the way the community works. We are heartened by the signs of progress we are already seeing; the number of visits to the ASCL has risen every year, code authors are requesting that the ASCL entries for their software be used for citation, citations to these entries have grown substantially, and code submission by authors has increased.
(6) And So We Grow
We continue to expand and improve the ASCL. As the ASCL grew from 2010 from about 40 code entries to nearly 900 in mid-2014, we desired greater flexibility for managing it. A new infrastructure based on a MySQL database was proposed, developed, and went into production in July 2014. We worked with Alberto Accomazzi and Carolyn Stern Grant from ADS to normalize software author names and improve procedures for the flow of data from the ASCL to ADS. Several features were added, including automatic bibcode generation for ADS ingestion, an improved submission process, one-click author searching, and more flexible browsing.
PHP and mySQL were chosen for their ease of use and portability. Both are powerful and ubiquitous tools for web applications. Codeigniter by EllisLab is an open source PHP framework and was chosen because it enables rapid development and increased security for the simple but fully customized user and administrative experience required for the ASCL. The framework is also fully documented13, increasing the sustainability of the ASCL itself.
Previously, the ASCL WordPress blog and the code records were disconnected and part of two seemingly different websites. WordPress is now fully integrated into the website both as a blog and for its use as a simple content management system. The discussion forum the ASCL had been using was moved and incorporated into the new website and topic management for codes is fully automated. With the code records, blog, and forum housed under a single continuous format, user experience is now vastly less confusing and more respectable.
The new database infrastructure offers opportunities for collaboration; we hope the capabilities and flexibility of the new infrastructure can be leveraged to further increase software discovery and citation, elevate the status of those who create the programs that enable so much research, and help to make research more transparent and reproducible.
(7) Impacts and Use
Before the new infrastructure was implemented, the number of codes submitted by author directly to the ASCL (rather than through email) was very low, with two submitted in 2011, eight in 2012, nine in 2013, and four in the first few months of 2014, for a total of 23. Since implementation of the new site, over 100 codes have been submitted directly by authors. The sharp increase in author submissions is likely primarily due to the easier submissions process on the new site, though growing awareness within the community surely contributes as well.
Both former and new infrastructures track how many times a record is viewed, and we see from this tracking that code records on ASCL 2.0 have been viewed over a million times (1,022,102) since mid-2010; records on the new site have been viewed over 390,000 times in less than 14 months. According to Google Analytics, overall use of the site in 2014 increased by 12% over 2013.
ASCL IDs are used in some papers served electronically to provide a hotlink from the article directly to the code record, making it very easy to find the software used in the research discussed. An example from an article in Astronomy & Computing [3] is shown below in Figure 1.
Software is cited in various ways; though the most common is citing a paper in which the software is explained or used, some authors are citing codes explicitly and independent of a code paper using ASCL entries. We started tracking the number of codes cited by their ASCL entries in January, 2014 and found that 7.5% of the ASCL records indexed by ADS had been cited. Figure 2 shows the growth in the number of citations; as of the beginning of August 2015, 16.8% of ASCL entries have been cited. The number of software records grew 34% during this time, while the number of entries with citations grew by 70%.
Code hosting sites such as GitHub and BitBucket and archival services such as Figshare and Zenodo make code available to researchers and, in the case of archival services, mint DOIs for deposited codes, are valuable resources to the community and aid in transparency of research and software sustainability. The commit IDs and DOIs available from them are sometimes used to cite software, thereby assigning credit to those who develop these tools, but at this time, ADS, the main indexing service for astrophysics, cannot track these citations; ADS can track citations only to resources it has ingested, such as ASCL entries.
(8) Looking Forward
Since 2010, the ASCL has taken an active approach to registering codes; its editors search the literature to discover software that enables research and create entries for those packages that are publicly available, after which the editors inform authors of their code's entry. This has enabled the ASCL to grow much faster than it would have if relying on author submissions for the past five years, but is time-consuming. The increasing popularity of code hosting sites such as BitBucket, SourceForge, and GitHub has made discovery of new codes somewhat easier; still, approximately 85% of codes reside elsewhere, typically on institutional or personal websites. With ASCL entries being cited and some authors and journals recognizing the benefits of a curated code registry, and with the easier submissions process, the increase in software entry by authors has shifted some of the work of ASCL editors to vetting author entries rather than discovery work. Among the improvements we'd like for the ASCL are automated methods for code discoverability in literature, code repositories, and archives, better linking between articles that are about or use software and the software entries, and a way to represent mutable author lists for codes under active development.
In April 2015, ASCL, ADS, GitHub, Zenodo, and other entities participated in a Sloan-sponsored meeting at GitHub in San Francisco to develop a collaboration on a cohesive research software citation-enabling platform14, with the expectation that this work will improve code discoverability and transparency as well as software citation, and as of this writing, a proposal to fund this work is under development.
(9) Conclusion
The ASCL's requirement for research software sustainability is very basic: the software must be discoverable and available for examination. Ensuring even this basic requirement can be daunting, as there are barriers to and a lack of incentives for code sharing. Looking at several attempts to create astronomy software directories with an eye toward change management suggests specific steps can be taken to provide an environment that encourages software sharing and discovery. Some of these steps are outlined, and how the ASCL has implemented them is shared with the hope that other disciplines facing some of the same challenges may find this information useful. Finally, we have provided information on recent changes and upgrades to the ASCL, how the ASCL is used, a few of the additional improvements we would like to make, and collaborative efforts underway.
Competing Interests
The authors declare that they have no competing interests.


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Father's Day
A Novel
Other Editions of This Title:
Digital Audiobook (4/25/2016)
Paperback (4/25/2017)
Hardcover, Large Print (11/16/2016)
May 2016 Indie Next List
— Don Luckham (E), The Toadstool Bookshop, Keene, NH
View the List
When devastating news shatters the life of six-year-old Harvey, she finds herself in the care of a veteran social worker, Wanda, and alone in the world save for one relative she has never met—a disabled felon, haunted by a violent past he can't escape.
Moving between past and present, Father's Day weaves together the story of Harvey's childhood on Long Island and her life as a young woman in Paris. Written in raw, spare prose that personifies the characters, this novel is the journey of two people searching for a future in the ruin of their past.
Father's Day is a meditation on the quiet, sublime power of compassion, and the beauty of simple, everyday things--a breakthrough work from one of our most gifted chroniclers of the human heart.
Praise For Father's Day: A Novel…
"In this novel, Van Booy is at his most poignant, showing how redemption can arise from heartbreaking circumstances." — Boston Globe
"There's so much to enjoy along the way, from Mr. Van Booy's muted lyricism to the profusion of quiet domestic moments rendered in the strangely captivating way of Andre Dubus." — Baylis Greene, East Hampton Star
In Father's Day, Van Booy again deftly demonstrates that he is a master at the craft of storytelling. — Portland Press Herald
"Moving, redemptive new novel...The third-person narrative gives both characters their own, distinctive voices that nonetheless change over time. Van Booy creates refreshing, humorous, yet poignant childhood milestones that the two reach with emotional honesty." — Publishers Weekly (starred review)
"Van Booy's great triumph comes in using a family secret to underscore the message that family is as much a choice as a blood tie. Although any reader will find something to love here, someone who has benefited from a perfectly imperfect family will wear the widest smile. This little book with a big heart is suitable not just for Father's Day, but for any day." — Shelf Awareness
"[Van Booy's] facility with word choice and sentence structure can leave a reader swooning...[a] movingly understated drama punctuated with moments of quiet reflection." — Barbara VanDenburgh, Arizona Republic
"The moving account of a unique relationship between a parent and child, thrust together under the worst of circumstances. With fine, nuanced prose and much tenderness, Booy guides this unlikely father-daughter pair into a beautiful maturity, showing us with great heart what it really means to be a family." — Elizabeth Crane, author of The History of Great Things
Harper, 9780062408945, 304pp.
Publication Date: April 26, 2016
About the Author
Simon Van Booy is the author of two novels and two collections of short stories, including The Secret Lives of People in Love and Love Begins in Winter, which won the Frank O'Connor International Short Story Award. He is the editor of three philosophy books and has written for The New York Times, The Guardian, NPR, and the BBC. His work has been translated into fourteen languages. He lives in Brooklyn with his wife and daughter.


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2018 GRAMMYs Poll: Who Will Win Best Gospel Album?
A good gospel album cuts straight to the soul, uplifting the spirits and reaching for a higher power to take us to new levels of understanding. This year's class of 60th GRAMMY Awards nominees have all risen to the occasion, and then some.
Delaware native Travis Greene is up for his 2017 live album, Crossover: Live From Music City; season three winner of the BET gospel singing competition "Sunday Best" Le'Andria earned a nod for Bigger Than Me. Meanwhile, previous Commissioned group member Marvin Sapp is nominated for Close and St. Louis singer Anita Wilson is up for her motivating LP, Sunday Song. And gospel mainstay CeCe Winans earned a nod for her soaring Let Them Fall In Love.
With this praiseful group of nominees, who do you think GRAMMY voters will choose as the winner for Best Gospel Album? Cast your vote now!
The 60th GRAMMY Awards will take place at Madison Square Garden in New York on Jan. 28, 2018, airing live on CBS from 7:30–11 p.m. ET/4:30–8 p.m. PT.


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This week I'm back in Michigan for a wedding and other assorted family obligations. It's not home in the sense that I grew up (or went to elementary or high school) there, but it's really where I came of age as a person and a Pagan. I participated in and led my first group rituals in Michigan, and while I was there I participated in Druid groups and was eventually initiated into British Traditional Witchcraft. I lived in Michigan for about fifteen years, fifteen great years where I got to figure myself and my gods out.
My early Pagan experiences in Michigan were very much in the realm of "Bootstrap Paganism." The first open Pagan group I found there was at Michigan State University, and within a year of joining I was leading rituals and helping to run it. In 2013 it's easy to take open ritual for granted, if you live near a large urban area and you poke around a little bit you can usually find at least one or two open circles a year. Back in 1995 in Lansing Michigan those opportunities didn't really exist, so we created our own. The first public ritual I ever attended I also led. In retrospect, that's pretty messed up, I should have been studying with someone, instead of leading others through ritual.
Those experiences did teach me a lot. I learned pretty early (and often) what makes up a good or bad ritual; every eight weeks or so it was sink or swim and I don't like doing impressions of rocks. Since our college student group was the only game in town we eventually attracted some actual adults to join us, which was much needed. None of those folks became teachers in the traditional sense, but we all benefitted from having a few folks around who "had done it all before." Our eventual elders often acted more like peers than teachers, but I still learned a lot through them. I was introduced to worlds outside of Eclectic Wicca which helped me to become a more well rounded Pagan. Since we were in a student group and not a coven/circle there were workshops and lectures with material and ideas in them not generally found on the printed page. It's certainly possible to figure a lot of this stuff out simply through books, but getting to bounce ideas and questions off of people was a game changer to me.
It's easy to see where you are from as significant, but I swear there was something special about the Pagans in Lansing (and those that ended up revolving around its orbit). Out of the core group of people I did ritual with up there a whole lot of them have gone on to do great and important things in the Pagan Community. One of them is a future Arch-Druid of ADF, and two of them started a very influential list in the BTW Community. Another one is now teaching religion at a Big 12 School and edits book reviews for a Pagan Academic Journal. We've all sort of gone our separate ways these days, but there was a moment when we were all in my living room singing "Mekong" at the same time after ritual. The Lansing Pagan Village may have been small but it had some strong personalities and ideas.
Lansing Michigan is about an hour from Grand Rapids (MI) and two hours from Detroit, but it might as well have been twelve hours. It took a few years for me to begin visiting other parts of the state, but those trips ended up being well worth it. These days the Detroit-area hosts one of the more successful Pagan Gatherings in the country, and if you can swing a trip up to ConVocation you'll find it's worth the trip. Last year there were over 800 folks there making it one of the biggest gatherings in the country. It also features a lot of great teachers from Michigan and the Midwest (and a few others from further afield). It's been fun watching that festival grow up and turn into its very own unique thing. I don't know of any other Pagan Gatherings with karaoke, but it's always fun.
I remember my first ConVocation and I swear there must have been 1000 people there (there weren't, but it felt like it!). Getting to meet Pagans from all over the state and the Midwest was a big moment for me, and it's one of the reasons I ended up blogging and going to other Pagan Festivals. There's something magickal about the first time you are in a room with over 100 Pagans.
The Magical Education Council(or MEC) is the group that puts on not just ConVocation, but a whole slew of other events in the Detroit-area. Sadly I never got to their Pagan Picnic but I'm still glad it's there. Since I left the state (maybe they were all just waiting for me to leave) all kinds of Pagan events have taken hold. The ever growing Michigan Pagan Fest is now in its fourth year (with Margot Adler this time around!), bringing a little outdoor festival magick to an otherwise urban area.
Apart from those early trips to Detroit my other first excursions into the greater world of Paganism took place in Grand Rapids. GR lacks an organized group like MEC, but they hold one hell of a Pagan Pride Day. Those were some near perfect fall days . . . a cool breeze, a cup of hot chocolate, Christians protesting in the parking lot and me lecturing about the Horned God. Those were fun, and again, felt so much bigger to me in my younger days than they probably were.
I don't think Michigan is going to turn into the Pagan Capital of the Midwest anytime soon, but there are a lot of great people there who are truly helping to build a thriving Pagan Community. The lessons I learned on that peninsula I still apply on a daily basis, and it's where I met my wife . . . I certainly ended up there for a reason. I love being where I'm at, but I miss those folks sometimes, I just don't miss their winters.


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Disability Access for COPD
It is estimated that approximately 16 million Americans suffer from COPD, and there are likely even more that do not know they have it. The American Lung Association believes this number may be closer to 24 million. Worldwide, that number jumps to about 65 million.
These numbers are expected to continue to rise over the next 50 years.
If you are one of the many people with COPD, the thought of applying for disability may have crossed your mind. But is there even disability access for COPD? This can be difficult to define without an expert opinion, as the severity of COPD varies greatly from person-to-person.
When is COPD Considered a Disability?
Having a diagnosis of COPD is not enough to qualify for disability. Your COPD must be severe, and there must be medical documentation that states that your COPD is severe and provide ample medical evidence to support the claim.
According to COPD Foundation, "Financial hardship can sometimes prevent people from seeking treatment and building a medical history in the process. If this is true for you, the Social Security Administration (SSA) will still consider your application and even send you for evaluations with a contracted physician to get the records they need on your condition. If your COPD is severe and significantly disrupts or prevents employment entirely, then you can be approved for benefits."
According to the Social Security Administration, "The definition of disability under Social Security is different than other programs. Social Security pays only for total disability. No benefits are payable for partial disability or for short-term disability. We consider you disabled under Social Security rules if:
- You cannot do work that you did before;
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If you believe that your COPD is severe, you may decide to apply for benefits.
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You can apply for disability online by clicking here. You can also apply by phone or in-person at a local office.
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- Banking information
- Listing of medical conditions
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What Types of Disability Benefits are Useful to Those with COPD?
There are two types of disability benefits:
- Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI): SSDI is available to people who quality if they have worked enough hours in recent months.
- Social Security Income (SSI): SSI is available to children and adults with limited income and resources.
Both SSDI and SSI have the same medical requirements, though they go through a slightly different process of approval.
Applying for benefits starts with the same process as identified above. Once the application is submitted, it is first determined if the applicant has earned an average of $1,260 per month. If this happens, the SSA generally states the applicant cannot be considered disabled. If the applicant is not working, the application is sent to the Disability Determination Services (DDS) office to review.
Short of full disability, the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) requires that employers provide accommodations for chronic medical conditions. A medical condition that is "substantially limiting" if it "prevents an individual from performing a major life activity or when it significantly restricts the condition, manner, or duration under which an individual can perform a major life activity." The ADA states that employers must provide reasonable accommodations for employees with medical conditions that are substantially limiting.
Examples of such accommodations include the following:
- Providing a workspace close to the job
- Working from home
- Having a flexible schedule that allows for doctor's appointments and time to take medications
- Being allowed to use a scooter or motorized cart to get around a large work area
- Having a workspace that is free from dust, perfumes, chemicals, and smoke
Final Notes
Being diagnosed with COPD does not mean you automatically qualify for disability. You must have documentation from a medical professional stating that your COPD is severe, and then you can begin the application process. There is different information you need to provide, so be sure to do your research beforehand and gather all the necessary documents.


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In February of 2015, I was informed that this quilt will be pictured in the new 2016 Quilt Art Engagement Calendar. You can order one of these calendars from the American Quilter's Society website. They are not printed yet, but will be ready for shipping in March, 2015.
I have never been to Africa. I was t-h-i-s close to making it, but the trip fell through when one person in the group lost his job from a non-profit organization, the business was doing the planning of the trip. It's the eyes of the animals in Africa that I can't get enough of seeing. African animals and African people are continually in peril by poachers, lack of food for both, drought, poorly run government.
I want you to SEE the animals. Look into their eyes, find all the eyes.


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–Fatshion February starts today, woohoo! I will be participating, although I might not do it every single day.
-Check out Finnish indie plus size designer Minnaleena Jaakkola.
-Affatshionista has updated her list of plus size bloggers who wear a size 24 or larger.
-Marianne has a lot of feelings about Target's new plus size line.
–Danielle Brooks' dress at the SAG Awards is everything.
-Pink poofy dress porn: the Giambattista Valli Spring 2015 Couture Show.
Fat Acceptance
–Fat and Weight Science is a new Facebook group for discussion about weight-related science without a diet focus.
-The Abundant Bodies track at the Allied Media Conference has put out a call for proposals.
–Weight loss and size acceptance.
–This is an essay about a fat woman being loved and getting laid.
-Tess Munster/Holliday has been signed by a major modeling agency, woot! Jes analyses why so many people hate Tess Munster (and other happy fat people), and Amanda looks at the messages Tess is sending and asks how she, and the rest of us, can do better.
–No, really, treat the PROBLEM.
-Leah writes about fat-shamers.


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Why Ubisoft its Most Popular Video Game ?
Ubisoft is one of the world's most popular video game makers and has launched their own gaming client called UPlay. This client is a service focusing on digital distribution, multiplayer and communication and digital rights management for your games. It also features rewards by achievements.
Uplay Desktop Client and Its Functionality ?
The more you use this client, the more points you get which in turn can be traded for various rewards like unlocked in game rewards. Not all games are supported but most of the current and popular titles support this client.
Awesome Features of Ubisoft Uplay
- Play your games
Easily download, install and play all of your Ubisoft PC games in one location.
- Explore new worlds
Pick from an extensive list of Betas, Trials, and Free Weekends to experience our PC games first-hand.
- Browse dedicated content
Stay up to date with all the latest news from your Ubisoft games and enjoy original curated PC content.
- Connect with friends
See what your friends are up to and easily know when there's an opportunity to play together. Don't forget you can make new friends using our "recently met" feature.
- Chat with your friends
Looking to brag about your triple kill or need some advice on completing a mission? Your friends are just a click away.
- Manage your groups
Discuss with other like-minded gamers or start a community of your own using the dedicated space provided by our Groups feature.
- The one-stop store
For Ubisoft games: browse our huge catalogue (368 products and counting) & find that game you'll love. Visit the store now.
- Exclusive deals
All year long: get new promotions every Wednesday, every weekend, every day.
- Automatic Activation
When you buy PC digital games, DLCs and additional packs on Ubisoft Store, they appear in your Uplay library. Automatic. Simple.
- 20% off discount
You can use the Club discount for 20% off on your next purchase on the Ubisoft Store. Download Ubisoft Uplay for Desktop now!
- Take on more Challenges
Complete in-game objectives via Classic, Weekly or Community challenges. Earn exclusive prizes, in-game currency or Club Units.
- Enjoy more Rewards
More than 700 Rewards to choose from. Character outfits, weapons skins, consumables. For free or with Club Units.
- Meet Sam
Your personal gaming assistant in the Ubisoft Club Mobile app. Sam follows your in-game progression and provides you with personal stats and useful community videos based on your playstyle.
Hardware Requirements
This software also compatible with Windows XP / Vista / Windows 7 / Windows 8 / Windows 10 Operating System. Download Ubisoft Uplay for Windows PC from Softwar2Crack. 100% Safe and Secure ✔ Free Download (32-bit/64-bit) Latest Version 2020.
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Softwar 2 Crack (softwar2crack.com) Clause
First of all thank you very much for visiting the website. We are not responsible for Uplay Download will work or not on your system. You have to complete the instructions that are provided as above to properly work on your system. As per directions, you have to disable the antivirus and then the internet for proper installation. On Windows, you must disable the Windows defender. I hope it will work without any issue and you appreciate our efforts. Moreover, if you have any issue you may comment. If you have no issue then it's your responsibility to share on your social account for your friends and community.


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— JUGS Jugueta (@jugsjugsjugs) July 31, 2016
(SPOT.ph) It's time to update your playlists, OPM fans! Pop-rock band Itchyworms has just released a new single in collaboration with local rock icon Ely Buendia entitled "Pariwara."
In a recent post on their Facebook page, Itchyworms' first-ever musical collab with Buendia was a "product of their first musical interaction together since the early 2000s." The song was reportedly in Buendia's "chest of unfinished ideas" since his Eraserheads days, up until this year when Itchyworms vocalist Jugs Jugueta asked if he had any partial songs lying around.
After adding more lyrics and reworking musical arrangements, the song was completed in May, and a music video is already on the way. The song was released on Monday, August 1, across local radio stations nationwide.
If you missed out on the fun, the song is set for release on multiple platforms this August. For now, you can listen to a 17-second snippet (above).


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Quick test: Would you rather run 75 miles or make love 3 times per week for a year? Research study shows that both activities burn the same variety of calories. (7,500, to be exact.).
We often think that something that feels great can't possibly be good for us. Now it's time to reconsider.
Sex in a caring, intimate relationship has many health advantages. In women, for example, the sexual act triggers the release of oxytocin. Oxytocin promotes feelings of affection and triggers that nurturing impulse. In males, sex motivates the flow of testosterone, which reinforces bones and muscles and assists transportation DHEA, a hormonal agent that may be very important in the function of the body's body immune system.
Paul Pearsall, Ph.D., author of Superimmunity, likewise preserves that sex in a loving relationship helps the immune system by increasing the circulation of particular chemicals in the body.
Hugh O'Neill, editor of Guy's Health publication, just recently noted some health benefits of sex, too. Regular sex is regular exercise and has comparable benefits, consisting of improved cholesterol levels and increased circulation. Guy's Health likewise reported that men who make love a minimum of 3 times weekly might have a decreased threat of establishing prostate issues.
Sex, like exercise, launches endorphins. Endorphins add to the runner's high and reduces pain levels.
An active sex life might help us live longer, too. Dr. David Weeks, a scientific neuropsychologist at Scotland's Royal Edinburgh Hospital, performed a research study of 3,500 individuals varying in age from 18 to 102. Weeks concluded that sex in fact slows the aging procedure.
Sexual therapists remind us that regular sex is a kind of exercise. And feeling secure in a relationship leads to feeling better, which might cause higher health– and a younger look.
In fact, these studies indicate that intimacy plays a crucial function in the health advantages of sex. A promiscuous sexual relationship might really produce an opposite effect by presenting a sense of anxiety and worry.
In spite of all these health advantages and the sheer pleasure of the act, Americans may still require a boost. A minimum of one-third of American couples report "prevented sexual desire," according to The Masters and Johnson Institute.
Sex therapists say sex acts on the principal of "use it or lose it." For your mind, soul, and heart, the best guidance might be to "Simply do it!".
Quick test: Would you rather run 75 miles or make love 3 times per week for a year? Research study shows that both activities burn the same variety of calories. (7,500, to be exact.).


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You can get the recipe on this web page.
Ate at The Local in Belmont last weekend and loved it! Great atmosphere, a little loud but charming with the exposed brick walls and great art work. We ate every single bite on our plates. The best dish we had was a spice rubbed pork chop on mashed potatoes and shoestring sweet potatoes with chipotle adobo gravy! Yum. There's a menu section of everything served with frites too. Can't wait to go back and try some other dishes.
I was so excited to see our favorite beach vacation spot, Ocracoke (Outer Banks of NC) featured, in Gourmet magazine. There is a recipe for Frances O'Neal's Fig Cake so I'm thrilled to have something to do with the jar of perserved figs in syrup I bought there last summer. I'll let you know how it turns out.


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Life Coach
of Souls
Are you ready to move toward authentic,
courageous, and joyful living?
Which method of discovery is best for you?
Life Coach
Coaching is a guidepost to discovering and creating the rich, joyful and courageous life you desire. As you let go of identified self-limiting beliefs and behaviors, you experience a new sense of wellbeing, personal fulfillment and freedom. Joy provides coaching, mentoring, and spiritual guidance to those ready to live whole-heartedly!
Joy is available to speak to your group on a number of topics that are Life Enhancing, Inspirational, and Spiritual. She has a long list of topics ready to choose from over the 34 years of learning, or we can create a topic created for your audience.
Joy also provides Group Facilitation and Workshops
for groups.
For more information
and a list or more topics,
click here!
Of Souls
Joy was meant to be a teacher! Although the focus of instruction has shifted along the way, her higher purpose has always remained the same: to inspire, uplift, encourage, ignite, awaken, and enlighten all students to see the beauty within, to fully express themselves, and to discover their unique gifts. Joy's Express Yourself With Joy classes help everyone to learn to express themselves fully.
Inspiring Artist
No matter your stage of life, you will be encouraged,
inspired and guided to uncover the truth of your heart's desire.
Joy's Inspiring Art
is Now Available!
Upcoming Classes
& Events
Holy Shift Mastermind Group
6 week group hosted by Joy
Sundays starting March 15, 2020 ~ 4-5:30 pm
All spaces are full! Waiting list only
Networking Event:
Hosted by "Atlanta Women for Women"
Register on their FB page to attend.
Free admission
Monday, March 9, 2020 ~ 6-9 pm
Joy is among the 20 vendors. She will be selling her art prints and cards
Dreams: Doorway to the Soul Workshop
Saturday, May 2, 2020 ~ 2-4 pm
Hosted by Women of Vision
Sold out! Waiting list only
Contact me today
and let's get started on living the life you truly want!


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Neutral Posture, Easy 3
The board has an instruction label on the keyboard arm which is nice when figuring out how to adjust the mechanism. Fits most keyboards. This tray is ideal for users that do not use the numberpad on their keyboard that much.
Keyboard Tray Description
Adjustable in height, depth, tilt, and angle. The mechanism allows adjustment of the tray to a wide range of heights. To achieve lower heights, shims can be placed between the desk and the track.
Mouse Tray Description
The mouse area is located at either right or left of the keyboard on a round tray that swivels over the keyboard.
Accessories Description
The wrist rests can be removed with a screwdriver.
Unique Features
Instructions on the mechanical arm help with adjustment.
The keyboard tray is nice because it actually has instructions on how to adjust. The tilt mechanism can be cumbersome to adjust, and unless you are familiar with that type of arm acheiving the proper tilt is somewhat difficult. The knee clearance is sufficient, but there could be more with a better designed attachment plate. The platform is designed to fit all keyboards with a mouse. The removal of the keyboard platform wrist rest will allow for the split keyboards to fit but a screwdriver is neccessary to do this. The mouse surface is one of the worst. There is a lip present to keep the mouse on the platform, and adding the mouse pad creates the same lip. This lip is bad because it rubs on the under side of the forearm cutting off circulation and causing an annoying contact point. The mouse can be used on either side. Overall, a mediocre keyboard tray, but the instructions are nice.
*Price: $177
Warranty: Limited Lifetime
Installation Fee: $12.00
Discount: Free installation on 4 or more; otherwise, call for any discount.
Triangle Office Equipment*
Trey Jones
P.O. Box 2372 – 300B S. Elliott Rd.
Chapel Hill, NC 27515
919-929-4203 (phone); 919-929-7647 (fax)
Federal ID: 56-1019983
Price Modern Carolina
Mendy Woods
3000 Perimeter Park Drive
Morrisville, NC 27560
919-228-4013 (phone); 919-228-4023 (fax)
Federal ID: 52-0450440
Storr Office Environments
Paul Estes
10800 World Trade Blvd.
Morrisville, NC 27560
919-313-3780 (phone); 919-313-3701 (fax)
Federal ID: 56-1781661
*Vendor with the asterisk is the one from which the approximate price quote was taken; other vendor prices may vary. Call to confirm prices.
- Overall Score
- 76%
- Keyboard Fit
- Good
- Keyboard
- Poor
- Mouse Fit
- Average
- Mouse
- Fair
- Accessories
- Average
- Instructions
- Very Good
- Rater's Opinion
- Fair


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Here are a few suggestions for troubleshooting your FF server:
1) First, test that your format files are defined properly and that it fits your data files by running chkform on them. You can also check that your data is being interpreted as you desire by running newform. Both chkform and newform are FreeForm tools that come with the DODS FreeForm Server distributions. (They should be located in the bin/ directory of your distribution.)
So that newform can display your data, you will need an 'ASCII_output_data' section in your format description file. Like this:
ASCII_input_data "test" Time 1 10 double 4 Test 12 33 enote 20 ASCII_output_data "test" Time 1 10 double 4 Test 12 33 enote 16
2) If you are serving ASCII data, pay attention to the whitespace in your data files.
- FreeForm will gag if whitespace extends beyond the line length determined by the format description. For instance, if the format descriptor fits
- '34.523 1.45'
- '34.523 1.45 '
- There needs to be whitespace filler if the data in a line doesn't cover the entire format. For instance, if the format descriptor fits this data
- '34.456 234.456'
- '34.456 234.45'
- '34.456 234.45 '
- The enote type doesn't seem to work quite like that. For instance, if the format fits
- '34.456 2.34e-2'
- 34.456 2.3e-2


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Dec 19, 2018
Category: Rides
The classy 1961 Lincoln Continental was a genuine landmark car with its elegant suicide doors in an era that saw numerous styling variations. Celebrating eight decades since the first Lincoln bathed in the spotlight, the 2019 Lincoln Continental Coach Edition is paying homage to its '60s counterpart with the reintroduction of suicide doors.
The special edition vehicle starts off as a Black Label model and gets shipped to Cabot Coach Builders where it's given a six-inch stretch and modified doors for a presidential feel. The reverse-opening rear doors are larger this time around, but they're operated with the same button on the inside of the handle as the Continentals of yesteryear and have a soft close feature. Taking a look inside, the center seat has been replaced with a large console to control ventilation and select music. And, you have the option of equipping the luxury car with a 3.0-liter twin-turbo V6 capable of 400 hp and 400 lb-ft of torque. There will only be 80 Coach Door Continentals produced for the 2019 model — the chauffeur will not be included.
HiConsumption is reader-supported. When you buy through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Learn more


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The TriMark e-newsletter is packed with ideas on how to save energy, reduce labor costs and boost your bottom line. Plus, you get a sneak peek inside a customer "success story," along with product recommendations that may help you operate more efficiently.
Subscribe now and get it delivered to your inbox the last Tuesday of every month. No Spam.


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PocketGPSWorld SatNav Accessories/Power and Cables Menu
A constant problem with PDAs is the short battery life and the seemingly infinite number of connectivity options.
This section evaluates the offerings of a number of companies in an effort to overcome these shortcomings. We have reviewed some interesting solutions from external battery boxes through to Bluetooth cable which turn your Garmin or Magellan into a Bluetooth GPS receiver.
GPS Shopping


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Drucker on Management
Drucker on Management: Permanent Cost Cutting
Drucker on Management: Permanent Cost Cutting
By Peter Drucker
The Wall Street Journal - Jan. 11, 1991
Scores of large organizations -- businesses of all kinds but also government agencies, hospitals and universities -- have sharply cut staffs these past few years. But few have realized the expected cost savings. In some cases costs have even gone up. In many more performance has suffered. And there are growing employee complaints about stress and work loads.
Cutting staffs to cut costs is putting the cart before the horse. The only way to bring costs down is to restructure the work. This will then result in reducing the number of people needed to do the job, and far more drastically than even the most radical staff cutbacks could possibly do. Indeed, a cost crunch should always be used as an opportunity to re-think and to re-design operations.
To start cost-cutting managements usually ask: "How can we make this operation more efficient"? It is the wrong question. The question should be: "Would the roof cave in if we stopped doing this work altogether?" And if the answer is "probably not," one eliminates the operation. This is unpopular, to be sure. Some one is bound to argue: "We needed this procedure only 18 months ago and may need it again 18 months hence." But eliminating an entire operation is by far the most effective way to cut costs, and the only one likely to produce by itself permanent cost savings. It is by no means accident that the only places where cost-cutting done during the past few years has produced real savings are where an entire operation was eliminated -- in the commercial bank, for instance, that closed down an unprofitable merchant-banking subsidiary.
And it is always amazing how many of the things we do will never be missed. One example -- a fairly typical one -- is the old manual order-entry system used until the task was computerized five years ago, but still maintained "just in case." Another is the system of duplicate patient files that many hospitals maintain, one for billing, one for patient-care, each run on a different computer with a different program. Altogether, up to one-third of all clerical and control operations are likely to be found unneeded, because they either never served a purpose or because they have outlived it. And nothing is less productive than to make more efficient what should not be done at all.
The next question in respect to the two-thirds of operations that will be found to serve a need is: "What contribution to the business should each make? What purpose does it serve?" Managements usually think the answer to be obvious. But more often than not, no one has an answer; or the answer is patently wrong; or, worst of all, there is more than one.
"Why do we check all our sales peoples' expense accounts?" "To keep them honest, of course." But that is hardly a business objective. The right answer is: "To keep sales expenses under control." And this is best done -- and at a fraction of the cost -- by determining expense standards based, for instance, on a sales person's need to travel and on the number of nights spent away from home. All that is needed to arrive at these standards is for a small number of experienced sales people to keep a record of their actual expenses twice a year for one week.
The previous system in the company -- the system that thought its purpose was morality -- kept 11 clerks busy the year round. The new system employs not even one full-time person. And it further enabled the company -- a large national wholesaler of builders' supplies -- to cut its sales force to 158 people from 167, despite a steady growth in sales volume. Sales people have more time to sell, when they no longer misuse selling time filling out lengthy "swindle sheets."
Just as common as the wrong answer to the question of what purpose a given operation serves, are two or more answers. But a well-designed and cost-effective operation serves one purpose only. To combine two or more in one operation means inefficiencies and sky-high costs.
"We have two objectives in supplying our 2800 national distributors," said the builders' supply people in answer to the question of what their big logistics operation contributed. "We make sure that none of our distributors is ever out of stock. And we make sure that we don't pile up excess inventory." What was needed were two separate operations.
One would make sure that the distributors are always stocked adequately with the fast-moving standard items that together account for about half of the firm's dollar sales. This is being done by stocking the distributors with 15% to 20% more of these items than they will sell during the next three weeks. There is no central inventory of these items any more, and no inventory control. The stock level for every distributor is determined by systematic spot checks, taken every other week, of the actual retail sale of a 3% sample of distributors -- that is of 84 distributors throughout the country. This requires only seven or eight sales trainees, and has been found, incidentally, to be a most effective training tool.
A second operation then handles the 20% of "speciality" products -- mostly big-ticket items -- that together account for the other half of the firm's dollar sales (and for a substantially larger part of its profits). These are stocked in one central warehouse located at the hub of an air freight company, and shipped free of charge by overnight air delivery anyplace in the country within six hours of receipt of the order.
The old system cost almost 1% of the company's sales (and that in a business where a 6% return on sales is considered outstanding!). The new systems together cost less than one-third as much. And where the old system kept 53 people busy the two new systems together employ 20. Yet the new systems give both, better service and better inventory control.
The question of how to organize the restructured organization for maximum performance and minimum cost comes only at the very end. More computers to handle more data faster is rarely the right answer. To be sure, the end product will be in many cases expressed by a computer program. But the task is to define what information is needed rather than how to manipulate it.
This may mean -- as it did in one of my earlier examples -- switching from inside to outside data, in order to find out the actual retail sales of one's customers to the ultimate consumers. It may mean -- especially in operations aimed at controlling a process -- shifting from counting to statistics and sampling. Not only is sampling much cheaper than counting, it is far more reliable. Statistical analysis alone can provide the crucial information on which effective control rests: the difference between fluctuations within the permissible range of normal, and the "exception," that is the genuine malfunction, which calls for immediate remedy.
Cutting costs is only the beginning. If all that is being done is to cut costs without putting in adequate cost prevention, a recurrence of excess costs a few short years hence, can be guaranteed. For costs never drift down. Cost prevention requires steady work on productivity improvement of every operation, year in and year out -- with a 3% annual improvement a minimum goal. It requires that every operation and every activity be put, every third year or so, to the question: "Do we really need to do this or should it be abandoned?" It requires that new operations and activities -- and especially new staff operations -- be entered only if an old operation is abandoned or at least pruned back.
Each operation and activity should also be questioned -- again every three yearsas to the purpose it serves and the contribution it makes to the business. And each, finally, should be subjected to the question: What is the simplest way to achieve this purpose?
By now most of us have learned the hard way that dieting off fat is a good deal more difficult than not putting it on in the first place. Excess costs are excess fat. Cutting costs rarely gets much support from the work force itself; it means, after all, laying off people. Without active workforce participation, however, none of the measures needed for effective cost control are easy to implement. Indeed one reason why so many of the cost-cutting efforts of past years have failed to cut costs is that they were imposed from above on a work force that saw in them a threat to their own jobs and incomes. Cost prevention, however, can count on active, and indeed, enthusiastic work-force support. Employees know where the fat is. They also know that low, controlled costs mean better and more secure jobs.
A great deal more cost-cutting is still needed, especially in big organizations (and by no means only in American ones -- the big Japanese companies, e.g. the big banks, are far more over-staffed still). But cost-cutting should always be used as the first step towards building permanent cost prevention into the organization.


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About Peninsula Landscape Supplies
Peninsula Landscape Supplies Ltd. is a retail supplier of bulk landscape materials. Our yard consists of a wide variety of soil mixes, mulches, and composts. In addition to organic products, we also stock a variety of aggregates and ornamental slate. Our Sidney location includes a retail store in which you will find grass seed, fertilizer, garden tools, and a large assortment of garden ornaments.
All bulk materials can be picked up in small amounts, such as pails or bags. The yard has a loader on site for those who would like to have their pickup truck filled. Large and small loads for delivery are available, and our professional drivers can deliver your products in a timely fashion.
Our staff members all have an interest in gardening and will advise you on the correct products to use to complete your landscaping tasks. Chris and Cam are the senior landscape technicians and both hold certificates in horticulture and design. They are always happy to answer any gardening questions that you may have.
We look forward to helping you with your next project.
Hours of Operation
Spring & Summer
(starting in March)
- Mon-Sat: 8:00am - 5:00pm
- Sun: CLOSED
Fall & Winter
- Mon-Fri: 8:00am - 4:30pm
- Sat: 8:00am - 4:30pm
- Sun: CLOSED