Can I GM a Pathfinder game using the D&D 3.5e DMG or is the GameMastery Guide a must?

Question: I know there are a lot of differences between these two games, and I don't mean to ask for a comprehensive list. What I would like to know is if there are any important differences between the D&D 3.5e Dungeon Master's Guide and the PF GameMastery Guide. I have the impression that these books contain mostly general DM/GM advice and are somewhat light on game-specific rules. Can I GM a PF campaign with just the DMG? Or do I absolutely need the GMG?
Answer: You only need the Pathfinder Core Rulebook to run a game. The GMG is not the equivalent of the old DMGs; the core rulebook is basically PHB+DMG. The GMG has help, additional rules, advice, NPCs, etc. You do not need the 3.5e DMG either.
You can see a lot of the content (specifically the rules content) of both the CRB and the GMG on the PRD site to compare and contrast - that omits a lot of the "advice" sections however. The CRB has about 10 pages on running campaigns and 30 on environment (not really worldbuilding in the entire-setting sense). The GMG has a lot more on structuring campaigns and building settings, but that's a weird definition of "information you must have to run a game" because that's more general "read it once for any game, you're good" kind of content.
Comment: Does the PF Core Rulebook contain campaign/world building stuff? Or is that in the GMG? That's the kind of stuff I'd really like to have. Maybe I should have phrased my question around that - is *that* part of the GMG/DMG basically the same?
Comment: If you need to refine your question, please do, and be real specific (yes it contains "campaign/world building stuff," depending on how much you're looking for, if you're more specific it's easier to say yes or no). Your question says "must have" not "nice to have."
Answer: Pathfinder does not follow the three-book PHB/DMG/MM tradition that D&D does. Although PF's Bestiary series serves the same purpose as D&D's Monster Manuals, PF's Core Rulebook is more like a combination of D&D's PHB and DMG, as opposed to being analogous to the PHB alone. You can certainly use the fluff from 3.5e's DMG if you wish. You can even use some of the rules, as long as you give precedence to PF's rules when the two disagree.
PF's GameMastery Guide is more analogous to what 3.5e called DMG2, which wasn't necessary to run 3.5e campaigns (and wasn't released until several years after the release of 3.5e). As with that book, it can help with some of the various behind-the-scenes DM work, but isn't really necessary.


Calculating SNR after lowpass filtering

Question: I am currently working with a sinusoidal signal buried in noise.
I filter the signal with a low-pass filter of which I know the transfer function.
How can I calculate the SNR after the filtering process assuming white Gaussian noise?
How would I calculate the SNR assuming pink noise?
Comment: Convolve your signal with the filter and convolve your noise with the filter separately. Now you can just divide the two to get the SNR.
Answer: This looks like an exam/homework style question. If it is, it may be helpful if you could provide a bit of background about what are you expected to know, because there are several ways we could solve this.
The most general way would be to get the power-spectral density of the noise. Then we would integrate it over our bandwidth and get the initial power of the noise.
Next we have the noise filtering itself. You convolve the noise with the filter in time domain or you multiply the filter's transfer function with the noise PSD in frequency domain. Then you could integrate the surface under the PSD in frequency domain and get noise power.  In the end you get something like in the illustration:

Black rectangle is the PSD of "unfiltered" noise and the red rectangle is the PSD of filtered noise, assuming a filter with square transfer function and AWGN.
In the case of pink noise, the main difference is that the PSD of the noise will look a bit different. Instead of square, you'll get something that looks like a triangle. The procedure is same. You multiply the PSD of the noise with the transfer function of the filter and get a shape. Surface of that shape is your noise power.
Answer: What you need is an understanding of Equivalent noise bandwidth. See this.
What this basically says is that if you low-pass filter wide-band white noise with a simple 1st order low pass filter, you are effectively doing the same as a theoretical brick wall filter at 1.57 times the cut-off.
If you have a steeper filter the equivalent bandwidth becomes closer i.e. for a 2nd order filter the equivalent noise bandwidth is 1.22 times the filter's cut-off frequency.
So if you have white noise at x watts per Hz and you have a 1kHz 1st order low pass filter, the total noise at the output is limited to x watts x 1570 Hz

Calculating SNR after lowpass filtering


Error installing websockets package for Haskell in Cygwin

Question: I'm trying to install a package to the Haskell Platform in Cygwin.  It requires the websockets package, for which the most recent version is 0.9.0.1.
My command looks like:
cabal install websockets

And I get the following error message during the build (it downloads fine):
Resolving dependencies...
Configuring websockets-0.9.0.1...
Building websockets-0.9.0.1...
Failed to install websockets-0.9.0.1
Last 10 lines of the build log ( C:\Users\username\AppData\Roaming\cabal\logs\websockets-0.9.0.1.log ):
Building websockets-0.9.0.1...
Preprocessing library websockets-0.9.0.1...
[ 1 of 11] Compiling Network.WebSockets.Hybi13.Mask ( src\Network\WebSockets\Hybi13\Mask.hs, dist\build\Network\WebSockets\Hybi13\Mask.o )
[ 2 of 11] Compiling Network.WebSockets.Http ( src\Network\WebSockets\Http.hs, dist\build\Network\WebSockets\Http.o )
[ 3 of 11] Compiling Network.WebSockets.Types ( src\Network\WebSockets\Types.hs, dist\build\Network\WebSockets\Types.o )
[ 4 of 11] Compiling Network.WebSockets.Stream ( src\Network\WebSockets\Stream.hs, dist\build\Network\WebSockets\Stream.o )

src\Network\WebSockets\Stream.hs:24:57:
    Module `Network.Socket.ByteString.Lazy' does not export `sendAll'
cabal.exe: Error: some packages failed to install:
websockets-0.9.0.1 failed during the building phase. The exception was:
ExitFailure 1

I have a default install of Cygwin x64 and Haskell Platform x64 on Windows 7 Pro x64.  Is there a workaround to this?  Or am I missing some configuration?
I have the same cabal update issue mentioned at http://www.haskell.org/pipermail/beginners/2010-June/004357.html, where my updated cabal version is not being used (I keep getting notified about a newer version), but the install command keeps saying the new version installed fine.  I'm not sure if that has something to do with this...
Answer: I did not find an actual answer for why the most current version of websockets won't build, but what fixed my issue is installing an older version of websockets.
cabal install websockets-0.8.6.2


Mac pro 2,1 boots up but won't restart?

Question: I am very confused with this problem. So I just recently purchased a 8 core 3.0ghz Mac Pro 2,1 and I upgraded the memory with 16gbs of hynix ram, and everything worked great the computer was reading all 16gbs of memory and I thought all was well but when I tried to restart the computer it just shuts off and the screen goes black and there are no start up chimes or anything. So I have to hold the power button and shut it off all the way and then reboot it and everything works fine again until I try to restart it again? Any help would be appreciated. I am running OSX Lion! P.S there are no led lights that are illuminated on the memory boards!
Answer: Try reseting the NVRAM. To do this, just hold Option-Command-P-R after the chime sound.
If this doesn't solve the issue, boot using the verbose mode (just hold Command-V after the chime sound) and let's see why the restart process does not restart...
Here you have all the boot commands: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1533

Mac pro 2,1 boots up but won't restart?


Killing 'Fallen Lunatics' as a melee class

Question: Fallen Lunatics always seem to slay me when they explode. So is there any safe way to kill them as a melee class?
Answer: Every melee class has some way of killing them. Barbarian can use Throw and the Monk can use Wave of light or Seven Sided Strike. There are many more. If you just need them out of the way however you can stand still a single second and then move away. They usually take a couple of seconds to explode. Thats the way I do it, or let my companion eat the damage.
Comment: Do you know some viable build which includes weapon throw? I would have a hard time incorporating it in my current build. And you can't respec, cause you will lose nephalem valour. I'm not in act 3 yet, but I can imagine I will have difficulties with them there, since they were quite dangerous already on hell difficulty, where I could get away with specing a ranged ability.
Comment: There are some quite interesting builds out there.

http://us.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/barbarian#fdQYXk!fWh!ZZaYbZ

or

http://us.battle.net/d3/en/forum/topic/5149541682

As I havent been there on a barbarian I wouldnt know how effective they are.

On a side note though I would rather use Leap just before they explode. Requires some focus and timing.
Answer: A few ideas would be:

Use skills with damage over time components, and run
Use skills/runes that give you some range
Use skills that give you temporary shields or invulnerability
Have your follower kill them
Run away!

As a Monk, I like to have some skill active that gives me some range, even if it's just Deadly Reach. Another option is Seven-Sided Strike, which effectively gives you a second of invincibility, but on a cooldown. Normally I play in groups so it's not a problem, but you have to be much more careful when solo!
Comment: Fists of Thunder/Thunderclap followed by Lashing Tail Kick/Sweeping Armada is very effective against these.  If the don't die they'll be knocked back quite far, and you can thunderclap right to them again to finish them off.
Answer: Im not sure if this counts as a kill on your part, but with monks, you could cyclone strike them all on you, then followup with a serenity so that when they blow, you dont take any damage. Remember your cooldowns though!
Comment: As a monk this certainly is an easy way to kill them. Not sure if it gives any XP.
Comment: Exactly... BUT!!! If you DO cyclone strike them in, and it SHOULD count. I'll test later tonight as I am at work at the moment.


Quadcopter Design

Question: What would be the most optimal shape for a quadcopter design? I have tried the cross beam design, but the center joint, though epoxied, is extremely prone to shearing off on impact.
Comment: [You could always make it out of a cat...](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PNVeUjB3Bzk)
Comment: I'm not sure this is answerable in its current state. Optimal shape with regards to what? Structural stability? That sounds more like an engineering and materials problem.
Comment: Yes, optimal shape with regard to stability is what i meant.
Answer: There's really no "optimal design" for a quadracopter - there are many good designs, each of which is a compromise between several factors like endurance, performance, flight handling characteristics, and durability.
Your question seems to imply that you want something that's geared toward durability (and probably beginner-friendly flight handling characteristics) since you seem to be worried about things "shearing off on impact", and I'm going to break this to you as gently as I can: No aircraft is designed to crash.
Some designs are better at crashing than others -- in manned aircraft that means they're designed to let the occupants walk away, and in unmanned aircraft it means they're designed for you to put the pieces back together as quickly as possible.

The cross-beam design isn't really built for durability. It's the sport model - light, fast, maneuverable, and often just a little bit unsafe.
You can improve its crashworthiness by designing it to break apart on impact (i.e. rather than trying to beef up the center hub build it so the beams can detach and be easily reattached). This will hopefully reduce the work you have to do after a crash.
As an alternate design though, consider something like the one pictured below:

These full-frame quadracopters are the kind you'll often find at mall kiosks (made out of styrofoam). They're great for beginners because the frame design braces itself and can take substantially more abuse than simple cross-beam designs.
The design also inherently protects the propeller blades from whacking into things when you lose control (and innocent bystanders from whacking into the propeller blades) which is a nice bonus.
This particular example has the motors mounted on a modified cross-beam structure under the copter, but designs where the mounting comes from above & an undercarriage is provided for landing are also out there in the wild. Another option is a frame thick enough that your propeller/motor attachments can come out of the middle of the frame, protecting them further.
Answer: From what I understand, you want stability and good crash-worthiness.
For stability, what you want is to drop the CG of the middle section below the plane of the propellers. The lower the CG of the middle part, the more stable your craft will be. Additionally, you would want to lower the control sensitivity of the pitch, roll, and yaw axes.
voretaq7 did a great job covering crash worthiness in my opinion, in addition to protecting the propellers from impact, properly designed shrouds can actually improve the performance of your aircraft as well.
The trick to any crash is to dissipate as much energy as possible. One way, as vortaq mentioned is by designing the copter to break apart. Another way is to absorb the fall with purpose-built mechanisms that absorb  energy. These mechanisms are generally refered to as suspensions in cars and motorcycles. A suspension consists of a spring mechanism, and a dampening mechanism. The simple description is that you need a spring to absorb the impact, and a dampener to keep it from bouncing back up. Here are some examples:
Flat carbon fiber rods - good spring force, poor dampening, light weight.
Shocks (like from RC cars) - limited spring travel, heavy, good dampening.
Foam - properties depend on the type of foam, but generally has good dampening.

Quadcopter Design


Is it possible for rooted phone to move internal SD to external SD?

Question: I want to make my internal space solely for app installation and then the rest of the data (e.g. big game files, etc) I want to go to my external SD instead. How do I do this with a fully rooted phone with Xposed framework and recovery and running Lollipop 5.1.1?
Comment: You could link the sdcard/Android/obb folder with sdcard2/Android/obb and just save the obb files ( big game files ) separately ! ... I think it's called symlink or something
Comment: How would I go about doing that?
Comment: Start with our [app2sd tag-wiki](https://android.stackexchange.com/tags/app2sd/info) for the general info (especially read the "extended methods" section), and then continue to our [link2sd tag-wiki](https://android.stackexchange.com/tags/link2sd/info). That should get you started :)
Answer: I'm answering my own question here now. What I ended up going with is the Xposed module called XinternalSD. What it does is trick the apps of your choosing to think the external SD card is the internal SD. You can choose which app to redirect so things you want to be faster (like a launcher) can be kept pointing to the internal. This module can also work on system apps so that's really nice. For example, if you set Chrome or Firefox to be redirected, when you download things, it's gonna go directly to external SD.


$(m,n)=1$, what could $(3n-4m, 5n+m)$ be?

Question: This is what I have so far:
let's say $d$ is the common divisor of $3n-4m$ and $5n+m$, then $d$ divides $5(3n-4m)-3(5n+m)=-23m$ and $3n-4m+4(5n+m)=23n$. $d$ can't be a divisor of both $m$ and $n$, so 23 must divide $d$. But is this the greatest common divisor of $3n-4m$ and $5n+m$?
Comment: In my understanding your conclusion does not look correct, because $d$ can divide both $m$ and $n$, and in that case it is equal to $1$. Otherwise, it divides $23$, hence it is either $1$ or $23$.
Comment: What does $(m/n)$ mean???
Comment: I meant the greatest common divisor.
Comment: Um don't you mean $d$ must divide $23$.  Not $23$ must divide $d$?
Answer: If $m=3$ and $n=4$, the greatest common divisor of $3n-4m=0$ and $5n+m=23$ is $23$.
If $m=1$ and $n=1$, the greatest common divisor of $3n-4m=-1$ and $5n+m=6$ is $1$.
Your argument is good, but the conclusion is wrong: you prove that $d$ can be a divisor of $23$. Thus it is either $1$ or $23$.
Comment: Thanks, this clears things up.
Answer: By Bezout we have $An+Bm=1$, multiply this by $23$ and create some terms
\begin{eqnarray*}
20An+4Am-4Am+3An+20Bm-15Bn+15Bn+3Bm=23.
\end{eqnarray*}
Now factorise
\begin{eqnarray*}
(4A+3B)(m+5n) +(A-5B)(3n-4m) =23.
\end{eqnarray*}
So if $(4A+3B,A-5B)=1$ then $(m+5n,3n-4m)=23$ and
and if $(4A+3B,A-5B)=23$ then $(m+5n,3n-4m)=1$.
Answer: You have the right idea - eliminate $n$ and $m,\,$ but your conclusion is misworded (reversed). It should state that $23$ must be divisible by $d$ (not $23$ must divide $d$) since $$\,d\mid 23m,23n\iff d\mid (23m,23n)\! =\! 23(m,n)\! =\! 23\ \ {\rm by}\ \ (m,n)=1$$
Remark $ $ We can use linear algebra language, i.e. use Cramer's rule to solve for $\,m,n\,$ below
$\qquad\qquad\qquad$ $ \begin{eqnarray}
3\ n\, - 4\,m &\ =\ & i\\[.3em]
\ 5\,n +\, 1\,m &=& j \end{eqnarray}\quad\Rightarrow\quad
$ $
\begin{align}
\  23\,n\ &= \ \ \ \ \ \ \,  i\ +\, 4\,j \\[.3em]
23\,m\, &=\,  -5\,i\ +\ 3\,j \end{align} $
Thus by  RHS: $\,d\mid i,j\,\Rightarrow\, d\mid 23m,23n\,\Rightarrow\, d\mid 23\ $ as above. More generally this method yields
Theorem $\ $ If $\rm\,[x,y]\overset{A}\mapsto [X,Y]\,$ is linear then $\: \rm(x,y)\mid (X,Y)\mid \color{#90f}\Delta\, (x,y),\ \ \ \color{#90f}{\Delta := {\rm det}\, A}$
e.g. $ $ in OP we have $\,\color{#90f}{\Delta =\bf 23}\,$ so the above yields  $\ (3n\!-\!4m,5n\!+\!m)\mid\color{#90f}{\bf 23}(n,m) = 23$
using the map $\ [n,m]\mapsto [3n\!-\!4m,\,5n\!+\!m]\ $ i.e.
$$ [n,\,m]\,\mapsto\, [n,\,m]\,\underbrace{\begin{bmatrix}3 & 5\\ -4 &1\end{bmatrix}}_{\large \det A\, =\, \color{#90f}{\bf 23}} =\, [3n\!-\!4m,\,5n\!+\!m]$$
Comment: Thanks for explaining where I went wrong, and then providing more interesting information!


Why is conduit for 120V building power metallic?

Question: I saw wire conduit being installed in a building, and it was metallic.  Wouldn't you want to use an insulating material instead?  What if the live wire sheath started to fail?  It would short to the metal conduit.  Isn't that something worth avoiding?
Answer: The conduit will be connected to earth.  If the insulation breaks down, the live cable will short to earth, drawing a large current that will trip a breaker.
If the conduit was an insulator the fault would go unnoticed.
The cable in the conduit may well be a steel reinforced cable that will have the conductors surrounded earthed steel.  If the live insulation did break down it would would then short to the steel and again trip a breaker, so in this case the insulated conduit would be unnecessary too.
Answer: It can be metal or plastic as offered in your local hardware store.
I believe all exposed wiring in commercial settings are required to be in conduit according to code.  There is no specification of type of conduit I believe so there is no requirement for it to be metal at all.
I believe contractors would prefer metal due to it's ease of use because it can be bent to fit around corners, etc where as plastic requires fittings for every bend.  Also I think plastic is used for more weather resistant applications vs metal.
Metal conduit is always grounded to prevent it from being live and will usually trip a breaker if an exposed live wire were to touch it.  (One reason why wiring is always sized for the breaker or higher loads)
Answer: Building entrance cables may reduce radiated noise from say arc welders and also improve shunting stray lightning arcs to earth ground by this means of earth ground shielding or sheath in the conduit.
Outside and underground Distribution wires may be coaxial shielded  XLPE cables with an outer layer of insulation to impede lightning current induced.
Fault protection gear will protect the customer entrance 1st and/or the switchgear and transformers to determine the optimal OCP time constants.
So it is often, something worth having, rather than avoiding.
Buried entrance is better for lightning avoidance but worse for winter thaw moisture creepage breakdown and often causes power failures in my residential region (maybe once a year) every spring on a warm day after frost is leaving the sub-ground.  Power is often restored quickly but these are the tradeoffs for buried in moist clay that freezes in Canada vs above ground entrance.  Yet we have one of the best power utilities in the world. So these types of interruptions are added to the maintenance tasks of replacing 30y old XLPE underground cables.


For a given group $G$ , what are the sets on which a non-trivial group action of $G$ can be defined ?

Question: Say we are given a group $G$ , we want to find those sets on which we can define an action of $G$ ; now in this sense any set $X$ works as we can always define the trivial action $o:G \times X \to X$ by $gox:=x$ ; but what if we want to allow only non-trivial actions ? that is for a given group $G$ can we always define a non-trivial group action on any set $X$ ? If not then can we classify those sets , depending on $G$ , on which a non-trivial group action of $G$ can be defined ?
Answer: Every group action of $G$ is uniquely a disjoint union of transitive group actions. These are all of the form $G/H$ where $H$ is a subgroup of $G$, and two conjugate subgroups give isomorphic group actions. So the problem reduces to classifying the conjugacy classes of subgroups of $G$, which is hard in general, but that's the general answer. The resulting action is nontrivial as long as at least one $H$ appears which is not all of $G$.
Answer: All that matters is the cardinality of $X$. If $G$ acts nontrivially on $X$ and $X \subset Y$, then $G$ can act nontrivially on $Y$ by setting $g \cdot y = y$ if $y \in Y \setminus X$ (and otherwise it's the action on $X$ already defined). In the end the question becomes:

What's the smallest cardinal on which $G$ can act nontrivially?

And then $G$ can act nontrivially on all sets of bigger cardinality.
It's not always possible to define a nontrivial action of $G$ on a given set $X$ (even when $|X| > 1$). For example $\mathbb{Z}/3\mathbb{Z}$ cannot act nontrivially on a set with two elements (there are no nontrivial morphisms $\mathbb{Z}/3\mathbb{Z} \to \mathfrak{S}_2 = \mathbb{Z}/2\mathbb{Z}$).
In general I don't think the answer is known. If $\varphi : G \to \mathfrak{S}$ is a nontrivial morphism, then $G / \operatorname{ker}(\varphi) \cong \operatorname{im}(\varphi) < \mathfrak{S}$, so a quotient of $G$ is isomorphic to a subgroup of $\mathfrak{S}$. So if for example $G$ is simple of order $k$, then $G$ cannot act nontrivially on any set $X$ of cardinality $n$ with $n! < k$. With the existence of infinite simple groups the answer appears to be even more out of reach. In general the answer is "the smallest cardinality such that a quotient of $G$ embeds in the symmetric group", but that's not really tractable.
Some bounds: $G$ always acts nontrivially on itself, so $|G|! = |\operatorname{Bij}(G)|$ is an upper bound. Sometimes you cannot do better, eg. when $G$ is simple.


What is different between root and sudo?

Question: A root user can have all the privileges. But a normal user can gain access like a root with su or sudo command and their own password.
So what's the difference?
Answer: The su (and sudo) command traditionally require root's password. However, you can setup sudo so that ordinary users can achieve root privileges with their own password by modifying /etc/sudoers (as root, preferably with visudo).
Modern Linux distributions preconfigure the first user to be able to sudo with her own password. This prevents accidental system malconfiguration by the user, and enables them to gain full control without the need of a separate root password.
Comment: You should use « visudo » instead of editing manually /etc/sudoers - the syntax will be checked before saving which could save you some trouble.
Comment: @Nicolas Updated to include that. But I wanted to point out that the file is written automatically by modern distributions.
Answer: A normal user can only gain root access with sudo if they are in the sudoers file (meaning they are trusted enough to gain admin permissions on demand).  In a production environment, almost nobody should be a sudoer.
Comment: Depending on your definition of root access, this isnt exactly correct. Adding a user to the sudo group allows using `sudo -i` and `sudo -s` to get a shell as a root user, without changing /etc/sudoers with visudo. This can allow adding nologin to the root user in /etc/passwd, to disable brute force attacks on root user through ssh, while still providing good utility for the (home?) user similar to the redhat wheel group.
Answer: The su command it to temporary change an identity to any user on a system and execute many programs with his/her/its permissions. It doesn't have to be the root. If the user executing su isn't the root, he have to enter the password of the user he want get identity.
The sudo command is to execute one command with permissions of any user. It doesn't have to be the root too. The command is very configurable and provide some kind of precise access control. The entering own password is optional and configurable. Some distribution let the first user of the system to execute with sudo everything.
Answer: To add to the above answers,
su user1 with the user's password shall switch your credential to user1 till you type exit
just su shall assume root by default.
sudo as mentioned in other answers, can be granted to trusted users and a ristricted set of commands. moreover, sudo can be configured to log commands executed. This is a good way to track misuse of privilege.
Answer: Not all normal users can use sudo, they have to be in the sudoers file and you can control which commands or types of commands the user can execute. Also, only certain users can use su to switch to the root user. Normally you would only have sudo permissions for a limited set of commands and full su permissions for a limited period of time.
Comment: pretty sure all users can use su, they will just need the password of the user they are switching to.
Comment: Traditionally, BSD's require one to be in the wheel group to allow using su to become root. This can be configured on Linux as well, but is not standard.
Answer: Only users with super-user privileges can sudo or su, normal users cannot.  This is configured in /etc/sudoers, which should always be edited with visudo.
The benefits of this system are:

Its easy for a privileged user to run commands as root only when needed,
makes it harder to guess the root username (e.g., if a simple ssh bot tried logging into a system root would be the first login name to guess).
Multiple users on a shared system can have root permissions, without needing to share passwords.


Choose blackberry 10 platform to use call logs, messages, data usage all this functionality through application

Question: Please help me to choose correct blackberry 10 platform to create application which will access call logs,sms,data usage records from the mobile. Blackberry 10 webworks and Android runtime doesn't support all API's required for this application. Now I am planning to switch to native development. In native application should I go for core development or cascades development?
Comment: What does your research tell you?
Answer: The difference between using Cascades or not is simple: in both cases, you develop a native application. Cascades simply offers you a richer API. Everything you can do with Cascades, you can also do it without, Cascades is just simplifying a ton of things. For example, without using Cascades, you'll have to create your own, complete GUI system. With Cascades, you have already one, which is integrated and homogeneous with the system.
Usually, when developing a native application, not using Cascades is reserved to a particular type of applications: games, which creates their own GUI. For a "standard" (read: not a game) application, you really should use Cascades.


Install DKMS on self-made Linux system

Question: I am trying to install DKMS on a Linux system that I made from the Linux from Scratch and Beyond Linux from Scratch books. I've found the package source from here but absolutely no info as to how to install them. There's no configure file in the tar ball and the Makefile seems to expect either Debian or RPM, which I don't have. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks
Comment: ok... I think I figured out hot to install this from source, but the Makefile seems to have some errors or maybe needs some tweaking. I'll try to fix it and post a patch on GitHub or somewhere. Please let me know if there is a better place to upload patches.
Answer: Ok...so there's only one change to be made. This can be done in two ways:

Rename the directory in which the tarball is extracted as dkms instead of dkms-2.2.x.x. The Makefile expects that the tarball is unpacked in a directory called dkms.
Change the Makefile using the below sed:
sed "s@\.\./\$\(RELEASE_NAME\) @\.\.\/\$\(RELEASE_STRING\) @" -i Makefile

Go with option 1 though. Much easier and safer.
After that DKMS can be installed using:
make tarball
sudo make install
sudo make install-doc

Install DKMS on self-made Linux system


Is there an NPC who can repair to 100% in Fallout 3?

Question: Is there an NPC someplace in Fallout 3, or the expansions, who can repair the unique items (Chinese stealth armor, etc) to 100%?
Answer: According to the Fallout 3 Wiki -- Somah (An NPC from the Mothership Zeta DLC) has a repair skill of 100.
You may also look into Haley (An NPC from the Point Lookout DLC) who has a glitch that will eventually bring his repair skill up to 100.
If you are just looking to repair your unique items up to 100%, look into Alien Epoxy, a semi-repeatably obtainable consumable that instantly restores between 15% and 30% condition to an item. (Also from the Mothership Zeta DLC)
Comment: The Alien Epoxy link has changed, the new one is: http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Alien_epoxy
Answer: Just letting you know, Chinese Stealth Armor can be repaired with Recon Armor. However, you will need to use the aforementioned techniques to repair the Gauss Rifle. In addition, I am pretty sure that the Winter Armor does not degrade (which is honestly a little odd).
Comment: I believe the Winter Armor does degrade.  However, there's a bug (shocking, I know!) that winds up with you getting the simulation version of the armor instead of the one the developers intended, so the armor has a ridiculous amount of durability.  The regular degradation rate barely makes a dent in it as a result.


Question on dictionary software with some specific features allowed?

Question: I'm looking for a dictionary software with some specific features, which I haven't found anywhere so far and would like to ask on this site if anyone knows of a program with those features. Will such a question be accepted? I don't want to elaborate on the features I'm looking for just to have the question closed immediately.
Comment: I'm also looking for a dictionary with a specific feature - specifically, a dictionary that makes it possible to search for words with a specific conjugation.
Comment: It would appear that there is general support for this type of question judging by the vote counts - 6 in favor and 0 against.  (But it's hard to be sure without seeing the question, of course.)
Answer: I have my own glossary of computer terminology (> 22K terms). You can search for English terms to obtain translations, descriptions and links to other related terms either by similarity or by opposition. There are images included in some ones. It's just English to Spanish and free for everybody.
Comment: Hi there JL, could you mosey over to Resources for Learning?  I'm not sure the ping I sent you there will actually reach you.  Thanks.


SMS to 2 iPhones

Question: Why do SMS messages addressed to me also go to my wife. I also get messages addressed to her. We both use iPhones and have an Apple Mac which also connects to iCloud.
Comment: Just to make sure I'm getting your question right: we're talking about SMS/MMS (Green bubble background) or about iMessages (Blue bubble background) ?
Answer: If you are both using the same Apple ID then it is most likely 'Text Message Forwarding', a feature of Continuity in iCloud.
To disable this, go to Settings > Messages > Send & Receive and turn un-tick any other numbers that aren't yours.
Also, go to Settings > Messages > Text Message Forwarding and ensure it is turned off for any devices you don't want your messages showing up on.
Alternatively, look into setting up Family Sharing so that you and your wife can both have separate Apple IDs.

SMS to 2 iPhones


6L90 Transmission swap

Question: I'm swapping out a worn out 6L90 transmission that has over 220k on it in a 2011 GMC 2500 HD with one that has 89k on it from an identical truck. Will it have to be reflashed or reprogrammed to work?
Answer: As long as it came out of another like vehicle, the Transmission Control Unit (TCU) should not need reflashed. What I mean by like is, another GMC or Chevrolet 2500 HD truck of the same year. As long as we are on par there, there shouldn't be any issues with the swap.

6L90 Transmission swap


Does cyanogenmod work on my device?

Question: I use a rooted "AOC tb07mc" does cyanogenmod work on my tablet?
And if it does, how to mod it?
Comment: "AOC tb07mc" does not come up at all through a Google search (other than this post). Firelord is right- you should check directly through CM or check [xda forums](http://www.xda-developers.com/).
Comment: Thank you for answering my question, I searched for my tablet and I didn't find it, it's OK I don't want to mod anymore . Thanks again.
Answer: This is a device independent answer.
For new comers: Whenever you want to find a CyanogenMod (CM) build for your device, find out whether your device is supported officially by CM or not. You can do that easily. Click here and search for your device's name.
Officially supported devices usually have a separate page for information including flashing instructions, device specifications, name of  maintainer(s) among other things. Click here to know more.
In the event your device's name doesn't show up (i.e. not officially supported), then head to Unofficial Ports page. The entries in the list are -- ideally supposed to be -- added by the respective developer(s) or maintainer(s) of that unofficial build.
If you still don't see your device's name anywhere, then either, the developer didn't add the entry to that last list or nobody has yet ported CM to your device.
For the case when you do not see your device's name anywhere in both official and unofficial devices list, then search the ROM on the web, specifically XDA forum but not limited to that. You'll have to try multiple queries for better results from search engine and possibly, even the Advanced Search if Google is your choice of search engine.
As for flashing the CM ROM -- provided that you do have a build in your hand -- you would probably be able to see the instructions from wherever you got to know about ROM's download link. If not, use web search or our site's search. If nothing shows up, ask us.

Does cyanogenmod work on my device?


Where do the electrons that are released in the Sun go?

Question: Where do the electrons released from the clutches of nuclei in the Sun's plasma go? Do they go to the product nuclei of the nuclear fusion reaction in the Sun (i.e. He)? Or do they remain on the surface of the Sun?
Comment: This isn't an answer, and should probably be converted to a comment. Regardless, if there are free protons in the solar plasma, the corollary is that there are also free electrons. Sum them up along with all other charged species and you'll find the Sun is electrically neutral to a very high precision. Note that in the diagram, six free electrons are implicit in the left side. Two electrons are annihilated by positrons, leaving four free electrons on the right side, which is exactly enough to neutralise the positive charges.
Comment: This almost begs the question - If the deuterium and tridium nuclear reactions each produce a positron, each of those presumably 'react' with an electron, annihilating each other, but the protons of the three hydrogen atoms starting the reaction are still around. Unless there is a source of electrons, wouldn't the positive charge in the sun accumulate from these deuterium, tritium and helium ions that are accumulating? If electrons bind with those helium nuclei to form stable atoms, where did those electrons come from?
Answer: Some of the electrons will react with positrons formed during the fusion processes; they annihilate each other and give off high-energy radiation (also called gamma rays):

Source
But this process  happens at the core, and there is no way that those electrons get out to the surface. So my best guess is that the electrons which don't get annihilated just stay there in the core plasma. I do not think that they combine with the $\ce{^{4}_2 He^{2+}}$ particles formed by this chain, because the temperature is still too high. So you start out with 6 protons and 6 electrons (for electrical neutrality reasons), two electrons get annihilated in the process and you end up with a doubly positively charged helium particle and two protons and four electrons. So the electrical neutrality is not violated.
There is not only the core of the sun but also the outer layers and the corona, from where we observe the solar wind, which is a stream of particles, mainly electrons and protons. So there you have some electrons that escape the sun. But these are not the electrons from the core, they come from the surface of the sun.
Comment: Do you even look at the pages I link to? This isotope decays under proton emission (doubly so). [Here](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioactive_decay#Decay_modes_in_table_form) is a comprehensive list of decay modes. And if you like my answer it would be nice to accept it :)
Comment: By which process the beryllium nucleus splits up into He and 2 protons.
Comment: It's the process called [radioactive decay](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioactive_decay): [$\ce{^6 Be}$](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isotopes_of_beryllium#Table) has a half-life of 5.0 zeptoseconds, so it decays very very quickly into two protons and the helium particle.
Comment: I know that. Which type of radioactive decay is that? Can you name that decay? all I know is alpha, beta +, beta- and gamma decays.


How to run Plasma (KDE) session in Xubuntu 16.04.5 running xfce by default?

Question: When I logout on Xubuntu (xfce) I get a screen to login again, on top bar of this screen is placed an icon and when click it the drop down menu offers 3 options to login: Plasma, xfce and Xubuntu. By default the login is set to Xubuntu, but now I tried Plasma then I get KDE desktop screen and it stuck, displaying a error message that some packages/libraries are missing. I was able to open task manager and ended some processes to return to Xubuntu session. How to fix this issue? do I need to install some pcks to fix that? Another question : what the difference btw xfce and Xubuntu session? thnaks, vladi.
Comment: Why are you getting Plasma session? By default Xubuntu should offer just 2 (Xfce, Xubuntu) session. Have you tried checking the **Launch KDE services on startup** option in **Settings>>Session and Startup>>Advanced** and restarting your PC? Xfce session offers pure non-customized/vanilla Xfce desktop environment without all the customization Xubuntu devs made.
Comment: @HattinGokbori87 I want to test and try Plasma(KDE) it looks very interesting. I have set a new user in Xubuntu then login and chose Plasma session and it WORKS ! Why is it not working for my account (administrator) ? Did I miss some thing ? Some configuration missing ? thanks, Vladi
Answer: If you want to run KDE session you need install complete KDE desktop by using sudo apt-get install kde-plasma-desktop.
I can assume you already have some KDE software in your installation which caused KDE session to appear in session chooser, but its not complete, valid installation so its obviously works with errors.
As fr "what the difference btw xfce and Xubuntu session" - there is not much of difference, just some preferences is different. Its just one is added by installing XFCE and another by installing "xubuntu-desktop" package, this is sometimes caused by installation of system from netboot install cd.


Is there a way to upgrade api versions of all apex classes without manually updating each of them?

Question: I have an org with hundreds of apex classes, all of which have api versions ranging between 30-37. Is there an easy way to bring them all to the latest api version at once without resorting to manual updates?
Comment: Do you have a reason to want to do that? One of the points of the versioning is so that older code can rely on the behavior that existed when it was written and new code can opt-in to newer features by using the latest API version. Changing all the classes to the latest version would require some testing to be done to check that nothing has broken.
Answer: WARNING

First of all, I would like to say, do this only if you are certain you have sufficient unit tests to catch anything that might break. Also, make certain you back up your code. I cannot stress this strongly enough.

You can do this pretty easily with any IDE, Salesforce DX, workbench, etc. The general process is either two or three steps.
First, download the files you want to update the API version for. Next, use a tool to "Find and Replace in Files". All major IDEs have this feature. Replace <apiVersion>.+</apiVersion> (a regular expression match) to the desired version. Third, if your IDE doesn't automatically deploy the changes, deploy the changes back to the server.

Force.com IDE (Search > File)

Edit: 2020 Edition
You can use VS Code to do the same thing. Click on Edit > Replace in files, and use the Regular Expression option (far right button next to Search), and you can do this with VS Code. You need to perform a SFDX deploy afterwards.

You can also do this with sed/awk and other *NIX (Unix, Linux) shell tools, too. Check the online documentation for your preferred tool.
Answer: Firstly, do heed sfdxfox's warning. It is very important to backup your metadata before embarking on such a large scale update of the api versions.
Make sure you run all the test cases before and after to look for things breaking. They might break in strange and unexpected ways.
If you can, try this out in a scratch org first so it is easy to experiment and roll back if required.

René Winkelmeyer has created a SFDX plugin that can automate this process for you. It will either target the highest version in the target org or you can specify a target version.
sfdx muenzpraeger:source:api:set -a 41.0

Reading content of package directories
         45 files have been set to API version 41.0.
Comment: any specific examples of times you saw "things breaking in strange and unexpected ways"?
Comment: @krigi I've definitely seen changes to how things are compiled as the API versions increase. It comes stricter in some scenarios and classes start getting compile errors.  There was a point where `@IsTest(SeeAllData=false)` was a valid keyword but didn't actually do anything at the lower API version. Once it went past that API version it started working as expected.
Comment: thanks @Daniel. yes, I can think of the SeeAllData as well, API 28 to 29 or thereabouts. Lately, though, I don't have specific "break" examples to draw from when moving UP the API ladder. Is there a comprehensive list of known issues when upgrading API versions, maintained by SF or anyone else, for that matter?
Comment: @krigi I haven't seen such a list. These things, such as breaking changes, tend to appear in the release notes and then get forgotten about. There were several when the new Apex compiler was released. I haven't seen a single source. It could be something worth putting together and then adding to over time.
Answer: Assuming that you have your project downloaded in sfdx format and
assuming that you run MacOS, you might use simple bash script to achieve this instead of third-party plugins.

Do heed sfdxfox's warning. Backup all of your code and run apex tests before and after this process.

Create a file updateVersion.sh with the following code
find force-app -type f -name "*-meta.xml" \
    -exec sed -i '' -e 's|<apiVersion>[0-9]*[0-9.]*[0-9]*</apiVersion>|<apiVersion>51.0</apiVersion>|' {} \;

Run this file ./updateVersion.sh

Commit and push your changes to repository and deploy it to your org to rerun all tests

profit


Whats causing Drupal to freeze when creating/editing a mini-panel?

Question: I'm quite new to drupal.
Drupal has been freezing for me when I try and create or sometimes edit a minipanel. Once I select the panel layout and start adding content it just remains in the lightbox 'grayed' state and wont let me click or do anything. It's almost like it's trying to load but I've left it for an hour and it's completely frozen.
I've tried on Firefox and IE10 and get same issue. Also upgraded my drupal from 7.23 to 7.24 today so a completely new core is running but still hangs like this.
I haven't fully explored everything yet in drupal so I don't know if other sections will do this. So far it's just the minipanels section.
Does anyone have any suggestions? Thanks.
Answer: I figured it out. It was because I was running jQuery 1.8. I went into configuration->development->jQuery update and switched to 1.7 = problem solved.


needing new front suspension

Question: I have an old Schwinn sidewinder 2.6 mountain bike. I'm starting to get into better trails and I want to upgrade my front suspension. It has the standard 1-1/8 steering, but its a threaded shaft. Does this mean I can't upgrade to the new "smooth" style forks that are readily available?  I guess in short can I put any suspension in my bike if i change the front forks and handlebars?  I don't know much about bikes suspension and what can be messed with and what can't.
Thank you
Kyle
Answer: Given that the Schwinn sidewinder is a Walmart bike, you're best off getting a new bike. We call these BSO's or bike shaped objects.
By the time you get a basic suspension fork, you'll be spending more than the bike after installation, whereas you could easily buy a good used entry level front suspension mountain bike (say, a Specialized Hard Rock or Trek 3700 or whatever) for slightly more, which will be way more durable and better quality components.
Answer: First of all, make sure you really have a 1 1/8" fork. Most threaded forks are 1". Remove the top nut on the headset, and measure the outside of the steering tube with vernier calipers - that's the dimension you're interested in.
If it is 1 1/8", then yes, absolutely, you can install a threadless fork. You'll  need a new headset and new stem. You can re-use the old handlebars, just make sure that the stem clamp is the right size for your bars, and not for the newfangled 31.8 mm bars.

needing new front suspension


Rail traffic is backed up trying to leave my city. Is there anything I can do?

Question: I've got a long line of trains trying to leave my city on one of the pre-made connections to the foggy lands. It's become a traffic problem within the city and I'm looking for a way to clear it up.
Answer: I've found the best way to prevent this happening is to:

Keep cargo and passenger train lines separate
Don't connect your passenger train lines to the external world connections

The first really just enables the second (because you do want your cargo lines connected to the world, so they'll have to be separate). The second prevents trains coming in from outside brining in tourists - of which you seem to get way too many that go on to clog everything up.
If you want to still get visitors coming in by train from the outside world, then connect the world train line to a station next to a transport hub of some kind, let the tourists transfer onto you local line, metro, buses, etc.
In terms of rail network construction, avoid compact rail track t-junctions; three trains can deadlock in this situation (which unsurprisingly causes all manner of problems). Ideally the links should be at least a train length apart.
Comment: But external train connections bring in tourists.  I think the better approach is to keep your commuter train network mostly separate, while also having interconnects to the outside world.
Comment: I do kinda say that when I talk about brining a link for the external line into a station next to a transport hub somewhere.
Comment: That sounds like a good solution to me. Perhaps I can devote one whole incoming train line to tourism. There are three on my map


Jackson Deserialization of List with Default Typing

Question: Good Day,
Hi All,
I'm trying to configure the Jackson Object Mapper to de-serialize any json String to my domain specific objects.
I've configured the Object Mapper as below
ObjectMapper mapper = new ObjectMapper();
mapper.configure(Feature.FAIL_ON_UNKNOWN_PROPERTIES, false);
mapper.enableDefaultTypingAsProperty(DefaultTyping.NON_FINAL, "remoteClass");

In my domain, any json string should contain a remoteClass property which denotes the actual JAVA POJO (canonical name) that it corresponds to. The above configuration helps resolve abstract types
However with the above, now java.util.Lists are not getting properly deserialized, since they are abstract types.
I get the following error
Unexpected token (START_OBJECT), expected VALUE_STRING: need JSON String that contains type id (for subtype of java.util.List)
Object Mapper in this case is not resorting to the default collectionFallBacks
I tried other configuration to overcome the issue such as
SimpleModule module = new SimpleModule("test", Version.unknownVersion());
module.addAbstractTypeMapping(List.class, ArrayList.class);
mapper.registerModule(module);

However these lead to other problems.
Can someone please help me with the same. I've spent days on this now. This seems like a limitation in Jackson. Correct me if I'm wrong
Answer: I faced this problem recently. Try this, in your POJO, instead of defining property as
List<SimpleModule>

define it as
List<Object>.


How to come up with a formula for amortization yearly payment but is compounded monthly?

Question: For this problem I had a hard time answering it because I do not know how to make the payment thrice as it was also being compounded monthly:
Construct a loan amortization table for a 50,000 dollars loan at a 6% rate of interest, compounded monthly, to be repaid in 3 years with year-end payments.
All I had to do was to use the given:
$$P = 50000, i = 0.06, m = 12, n = 3$$
Using this formula to get the yearly payment:
$$A = P(i/m)/(1-(1+(i/m)^{-mn})$$
So it becomes like this:
$$A = 50000(0.06/12)/(1-(1+0.06/12)^{-12*3})$$
which equals = 1,521.10 yearly payments for 3 years. That is not true becaus if we multiply it by 3 it give us 4,563.30. Supposedly it should be greater than the principal coz the principal amount is compounded at an interest. The problem is in the formula I am using, I guess. I hope someone can spot the mistake I made.
Note: can't add a tag for this question.
Answer: The correct yearly payment formula should be,
$$A=\frac{50000}{ \frac{1}{ \left(1+\frac{0.06}{12}\right)^{12} } +
\frac{1}{\left(1+\frac{0.06}{12}\right)^{24}}+
\frac{1}{\left(1+\frac{0.06}{12}\right)^{36}} }$$
which gives $A=$18764$.


When to offer co-authorship vs asking for feedback

Question: I am quite new to this game and I am not sure how to ask people to be co-authors on a paper I have mostly written myself but that I think would get better  with someone else's input. When is a good strategy to offer a coauthorship and when should I simply ask for a feedback on the paper? This is somewhat of a review paper and I feel that it would be important to have some experts from the field. But regardless how should I decide when to offer a coauthorship?
Answer: I'd ask for help. If said help turns out relevant, add a footnote thanking for it. If the help is in some way crucial (found and fixed a fatal flaw, suggested a (better) way to compute the results, suggested a relevant extension, ...) ask the helper if they want to be coauthors or just be thanked as above.
Answer: Co-authorship depends on many factors, few of them are:

The authors who had worked with you together to achieve the results.
Since this is your review paper, then co-authors may be them who had
shared the knowledges to briefly summarize your findings to write
the paper.
To get the proper feedback of any research work mostly
depends on the methods, results and discussions. So you need to find
few researchers' paper which has a good overlap with your findings.
Then you can ask the most focused/ experienced/ renowned researcher
out of them to get some feedback.
To increase the standard of the paper, you can ask well known
scientists/ researchers who can reorganize your paper.


How deep do watermelon, cantaloupe, summer squash & cucumber plant roots grow? How big of a pot do I need for above ground gardening?

Question: How deep do watermelon, cantaloupe, summer squash & cucumber plant roots grow?  How big of a pot do I need for above ground gardening on these plants?
Comment: I don't know exactly, but I'm guessing that you'll be limited by the pot at any "reasonable" size as these plants all get quite large in the garden, normally. Which is not to say you won't get anything (and I suppose if you essentially end up doing free-form hydroponics by fertilizing the heck out of them you might get a fair amount? If that doesn't kill them, of course...)
Answer: 5 to 20 gallons (I would recommend 10 to 20) should be good, depending on several factors (don't put more than one plant in a 5-gallon container). 30 gallons is probably overkill. I wouldn't do less than 5. The smaller the container, the more often you'll need to water (and the greater the chances are that your plants will be damaged when they dry out). The smaller the container, the more you'll need to fertilize (but you should still fertilize with larger containers).
Smaller containers result in smaller plants. The bigger the plant is supposed to be, the bigger the container should be (unless you're trying to dwarf it by keeping it in a smaller container, and don't mind watering and fertilizing it a lot). However, plants dwarfed by being in a smaller container will not only have smaller leaves, but will have fewer leaves, and probably produce less; they may have less dry matter in their stems, too. See this PDF for a source on the information in this paragraph.
You should ensure that you use a good quality soil, and that you fertilize properly (and regularly).
Here are a couple links that give recommendations on container sizes:

https://savvygardening.com/growing-watermelon-in-containers/#:~:text=Choose%20a%20pot%20that%20holds,Remember%2C%20that's%20a%20minimum. (This recommends 7 to 10 gallons for Bush Sugar Baby watermelons, and bigger for other kinds.)
https://harvesttotable.com/pot-and-container-sizes-for-growing-vegetable-crops/

Bush-type plants are often recommended for containers, but if you don't mind long vines, and perhaps a somewhat to much larger container, then you should be fine with non-bush types.
There are smaller and bush-type cantaloupes/watermelons, but there's not a wide variety of them, unfortunately (most melons grow large vines). There are Bush Sugar Baby, Bush Jubilee, Minnesota Midget, and some others.
There are other bush-type squash than zucchini. Trivoli Spaghetti F1 is an example of a winter squash (I don't remember the other bush-type summer squashes offhand).
As far as how deep the roots grow goes, see RubberDuck's answer here. However, note that watermelon roots can technically get deeper than that. I haven't noticed them being terribly deep in my own garden, though. I think there was this guy who had a bunch of old horse manure who got his watermelon to grow 5 feet deep (but I'm not sure if I'm remembering that right).


Should the plural form of "daphnia" be used if there is more than one?

Question: For my science fair, I am confused on if I should write, "daphnia", "daphnias", or "Daphnia" regarding to the species, especially multiple of them.
Is there a certain time to use the word in upper case, italics, etc.?
Answer: Write "Daphnia" as part of a scientific name
Daphnia is not the name of a species, but of a genus. Genus names conventionally have the form of singular Latin nouns, and lack explicitly pluralized forms: some other examples of genus names are Homo, Canis, Felis. In scientific contexts, genus names are written capitalized and italicized (see e.g. this APA style guide blog post).
Although genus names are singular in form, you may see them used with plural verbs or plural pronouns: this is an example of the phenomenon of "notional agreement", which also occurs with other kinds of nouns in English. There are no firm rules about when to use notional agreement.
A common name "daphnia" may also exist, but...
"Common names" for animals are not standardized. Sometimes a group of animals has a common name with the same form as the genus name: e.g. animals in the genus Gorilla are called gorillas. I have most often seen common names written in lowercase (unless they contain a proper noun or proper adjective, as in "Canada goose") and without italicization.  So I would not recommend writing "daphnia" or "Daphnia", but you might be able to write "daphnia" or "daphnias" if you consider this to be a common name for these animals.
There are dictionaries that list "daphnia" as a common noun. The American Heritage Dictionary calls it a plural noun, whereas Collins defines it as "any water flea of the genus Daphnia", using the singular word "flea".
As a common name, "daphnia" might be used as a singular count noun, a noncount noun (singular in form but not in meaning), or as an irregular plural count noun. Perhaps compare "algae" and "plankton". The pluralized count noun form "daphnias" seems to be rare, but not completely nonexistent. I would recommend against using the Latinate plural form "daphniae", but I was able to find one example, in the English summary of an article that was apparently written in German: "Toxicological investigations in an artificial ecosystem. A progress report on copper toxicity towards algae and daphniae".
For a science fair, a scientific name is better than a common name
In the context of a science fair, it seems appropriate to use the scientific name rather than a common name, so I would recommend writing "Daphnia". If you know which species you are dealing with, it would be good to include the second part of the binomial as well; e.g. "Daphnia pulex" (which can be abbreviated as "D. pulex" after the first mention if you need to save space).
Answer: In English there are some species which have similar singular and plural forms (species, fish, salmon, etc.).
According to Oxford Living Dictionaries
(https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/)
there is only one form of the word in the Singular and Plural -
DAPHNIA :

'A large part of their diet consists of many winged insects, a large assortment of aquatic insects, and some zooplankton such as daphnia.'
'When they reach a length of 12 mm, chub begin to feed more on small invertebrates, particularly chironomid larvae and tiny crustaceans, such as daphnia.'
'In addition to fish, other aquatic creatures such as clams and daphnia are used as indicators of chemical changes.'
'They are not fighting for breath as some people believe, but are instead feeding on the dense clouds of daphnia that gather just below the surface.'
'Small fish begin by feeding upon zooplankton, mainly cladocera, such as daphnia, before moving onto bloodworm and larger invertebrates as they grow.'
'Fish are feeding on small light olive buzzers and daphnia.'
'The fish are still feeding heavily on the prolific green daphnia.'

Also, see some examples from Reverso.context.net:

The daphnia are exposed for 48 hours to the test substance added to the water in varying concentrations.
This classification is based on the fact that the substance is very toxic to fish, daphnia or algae and the substance is not readily degradable or bioaccumulative.
The object is to determine the effective concentration of the substance in water which renders 50% of the daphnia unable to swim.
Comment: Where does Oxford Living Dictionaries say that "daphnia" is used as a plural noun? In most of the examples, I think it is ambiguous whether it is plural or a mass/noncount noun. It's unambiguously plural in the example "The daphnia are exposed...", but that's from Reverso, not from Oxford Dictionaries.


Keep total transaction in invoice application

Question: I want to make an application called as Invoice Application with MySQL database. Now I have designed this database. Now I want to know is this database good for Invoice Application. I will use MySQL with Yii framework(php). I am really confused in calculation table. In calculation table I want to store every individual invoice's total tax amount, sub total and total. So is this daabase good for all that purpose or should I keep total in InvoiceItems table?
Answer: The first question is: why do you want to store these values?
Typically this is done for performance, so you only have to recalculate them when edits are made.  If that's the case, I would also suggest caching the line item values in ia_invoice_items, so you can SUM those to compute the values in ia_calculations.
Usually, I see the ia_calculations values in the ia_invoices table.  Having them in their own, smaller table would make updates a little faster, but...
Managing them with triggers (rather than app code) will also protect you from changes made via any app (including the mysql command line tool, etc.)
And some comments that you didn't ask for:

Don't use INT as your id in your large tables, e.g. ia_users.  Use UNSIGNED INT instead.
Don't use INT to store dates, e.g. ia_users.createtime.  Use DATE or DATETIME instead.
Don't use INT to store booleans, e.g. ia_users.superuser.  Use TINYINT instead.
Don't use INT as the primary key in your small tables.  SMALLINT may be a better choice.
I wouldn't leave the length and precision of your DECIMAL columns to chance.  Define them explictly as DECIMAL(5,2) (or whatever length you need).
ia_invoices.updated_by only allows you to track the most recent update.  I would suggest an audit system, where you can track multiple edits, each with their own user_id, datetime, and notes.
Why don't you have product_id in ia_invoice_items?
Don't use VARCHAR(45) for postal code.  Nobody in the world has a 45-character postal code.  Since all customer records should have a postal code, I like to use CHAR here.
Comment: The calculations should be stored in an invoicing application because they represent what are, essentially, representations to the customer as to how much was owed.  In theory they could be checked from elsewhere, but in practice this makes everything more robust and provides for clearer, more transparent audit trails.  Otherwise, agreed on all the points, +1.
Answer: Here are some additional thoughts, from somebody who has designed an invoicing subsystem:

What is apply_tax1 and apply_tax2?
Why is late_fee a decimal?  Why is it stored on the invoice?  How will you keep track of updating the late_fee?  Allowance and charge instructions, including late fees, typically belong to an Order.
You do not have the concept of an Order.  Order-to-Invoice is a very universal business workflow cycle.
You have payment_method, but you do not have Payment Terms.  How will you allow the Buyer to pay on a schedule? e.g., net10, net30, etc.  Breaking this out will also then allow you to design a data warehouse where you can robustly report on buyer payment delinquency.
How do you plan to support rounding?  There are two general ways to do rounding - VAT (Line Item) rounding, or Subtotal Rounding.  You don't store the Invoice Total on the invoice header, nor do you store the line item total on the line item, nor do you store the rounding method.
Some invoicing schemas store quantity, unit, and pricePerUnit.  This is more common for hospital billing systems, where you have a drug that is administered at 15/cc's but you administer 40/cc's, and so quantity = 3.
Once you get into thinking about Orders, beware: Orders have their own life cycle.  They may only be valid for a certain period, and may only be invoiced under certain conditions (e.g., Amazon.com invoices upon handing the package off from its warehouse to the UPS delivery truck).  Orders can be rejected, changed, or canceled.


How do hosts filter broadcast signals in wireless network?

Question: In bus/hub network, hosts check the destination address of every broadcasted packet they receive and accept it if they are the destination, otherwise they ignore it. Do we use the same principle in wireless network?
Comment: Did any answer help you? If so, you should accept the answer so that the question doesn't keep popping up forever, looking for an answer. Alternatively, you can post and accept your own answer.
Answer: In all shared media, every host receives every frame.  The host determines which are addressed for it and ignores everything else.
In switched Ethernet, the switch only sends packets to the host that match its address(es), but the host still acts as if it's a shared media, i.e., it only responds to frames addressed to it.
Comment: Wireless is a shared media.  Every radio (in range) hears every transmission.
Comment: Thanks for answering. But what im asking is if that same principle used in shared wired network also applies to wireless network. So are you confirming it when you say "In all shared media.."?


How can an executable be this small in file size?

Question: I've been generating payloads on Metasploit and I've been experimenting with the different templates and one of the templates you can have your payload as is exe-small. The type of payload I've been generating is a windows/meterpreter/reverse_tcp and just using the normal exe template it has a file size around 72 KB however exe-small outputs a payload the size of 2.4kb. Why is this? And how could I apply this to my programming?
Answer: The smallest possible PE file is just 97 bytes - and it does nothing (just return).
The smallest runnable executable today is 133 bytes, because Windows requires kernel32 being loaded. Executing a PE file with no imports is not possible.
At that size it can already download payload from the Internet by specifying an UNC path in the import table.
To achieve such a small executable, you have to

implement in assembler, mainly to get rid of the C runtime
decrease the file alignment which is 1024 by default
remove the DOS stub that prints the message "This program cannot be run in DOS mode"
Merge some of the PE parts into the MZ header
Remove the data directory

The full description is available in a larger research blog post called TinyPE.
Comment: It does not run on 64-bit because it's a 16-bit executable.
Comment: @Overmind: a COM file is not a PE file, so there's no discrepancy. Does that file still run on nowadays Windows (7 or later)? COM files have no header, no metadata etc. Also note: this question was migrated from Security.SE in the context of Metasploit, where I assumed that someone wants to download malicious payload, which you probably can't in a 20 bytes COM file.
Comment: I disagree. Read my initial reply. I have a 20-byte valid .com file I've been using on MS-DOS times.
Comment: Btw, what does the 97 byte file do ?
Comment: @Overmind: it does nothing, just return. Updated the answer
Answer: For EXE's this small, the most space typically is used for the icon. Typically the icon has various sizes and color schemes contained, which you could get rid of, if you do not care having an "old, rusty" icon, or no icon at all.
There is also some 4k of space used, when you sign the EXE.
As an example for a small EXE, see never10 by grc. There is a details page which highlights the above points:
https://www.grc.com/never10/details.htm
in the last paragraph:

A final note: I'm a bit annoyed that "Never10" is as large as it is at
  85 kbyte. The digital signature increases the application's size by
  4k, but the high-resolution and high-color icons Microsoft now
  requires takes up 56k! So without all that annoying overhead, the app
  would be a respectable 25k.  And, yes, of course I wrote it in
  assembly language.

Disclaimer: I am not affiliated with grc in any way.
Answer: The is little need for an executable to be big, except when it contains what I call code spam, code not actually critical to the functionality of the program/exe. This is valid for other files too. Look at a manually written HTML page compared to one written in FrontPage. That's spamcode.
I remember my good old DOS files that were all KB in size and were performing practically any needed task in the OS. One of my .exes (actually .com) was only 20 bytes in size.
Just think of it this way: just as in some situations a large majority of the files contained in a Windows OS can be removed and still the OS can function perfectly, it's the same with the .exe files: large parts of the code is either useless, or has different than relevant-to-objective purpose or are intentionally added (see below).
The peak of this aberration is the code added nowdays in the .exe files of some games that use advanced copy protection, which can make the files as large as dozens of MB. The actually code needed to run the game is practically under 10% of the full code.
A file size of 72 KB as in your example can be pretty sufficient to do practically anything to a windows OS.
To apply this to your programming, as in make very small .exes, keep things simple. Don't add unnecessary code just for the looks of it or by thinking you will use that part of the program/code at a point.


Remove "Launch blog program to post"

Question: How do I remove "Launch blog program to post" from the SharePoint 2010 blog page??? Any suggestions will be GREATLY appreciated.
Thanks!!!
Comment: I've added the 2010 tag to your post to make it easier discoverable in the future for others. Hope you don't mind.
Answer: Alternatively, replace the webpart with a content editor and just include the links you want
Comment: Cool and easy idea! Unfortunately undesirable in my case because it would make the links visible to everybody, including people who might not have permissions to create a new post and also anonymous users (which in my case was the reason why I developed the CSS based solution).
Answer: Since you didn't specify your SharePoint version I'm assuming 2010.
Adding the following CSS code will hide the link:
<code><style type="text/css">
.ms-blogAdminLinks li+li+li+li
{
    display: none;
}
</style>
</code>
You can either add the above code directly to your masterpage, e.g. by using SharePoint Designer.
Or you can add a Content Editor or Simple Form WebPart to the page and paste the code into the source view of the WebPart. I prefer the Simple Form WebPart, BTW.
UPDATE: Assuming you are using the default masterpage, the above CSS code will also work with SharePoint 2007 but only for Webbrowsers other than Internet Explorer (no matter which version).
If you need to get it working with SharePoint 2007 and IE you need to resort to a JavaScript based solution.
Comment: Thanks Sig Weber!!! I'll try your SharePoint 2010 suggestion.
Comment: I used the html form web part and the code above to hide the "Launch program to post" link and it works! Then I checked the box to hide the web part and put the web part under the Tools web part. Works Great! I'm using SP 2010 enterprise. Thank you for your help!

Remove "Launch blog program to post"


If Stormbreaker is a 'King's Weapon' why didn't Odin have it?

Question: I am wondering why Odin didn't have Stormbreaker since it is a 'King's Weapon', or was the magical staff/spear that he carried around in the Thor movies more powerful than Stormbreaker?
Comment: Because he had a few of his own. Besides, Stormbreaker wasn't made yet.
Comment: There's no definitive comparison between Stormbreaker and Gungnir afaik, just that Stormbreaker is "meant to be the greatest", but designs don't always pan out in reality. But since it's the dwarves' job to invent and design, yeah it's pretty likely that they would come up with improved designs all the time, wouldn't you think?
Comment: This isn't me being sarcastic - just an attempt at humour. Imagine if the Dwarves sent word that they had a new iPhone every few decades. You might decide to skip one or two upgrades, or consider whether you need a new one when your old one is working perfectly fine. Besides, it's not like they have a prototype anyway, and maybe they're not going to spend Uru on prototyping every design they can think of without some funding or backing, cause they'll come up with a better one soon, maybe.
Comment: @Mooz, so Odin and Thor were unaware that Stormbreaker could be created and be more powerful than their current weapons?
Comment: @DariM, I agree that they would come up with improved designs, I am mostly curious as to why it hadn't already been built.
Answer: I can think of a few reasons really for why he didn't want it.
It was symbolic
Gungnir was symbolic of the campaign that Odin led to Conquer the Nine Realms because it was his weapon during it. He's then used it to maintain the peace and to lead afterwards. This was a symbol of power for Asgard so it makes sense he'd then keep using it even just for his largely ceremonial role nowadays as Thor is doing a lot of the fighting.

Click image to enlarge.
It appears to be tradition to use your "own" weapon
During Thor's ceremony Odin says the below which indicates somewhat that keeping the one weapon during your rule is somewhat of a tradition. Thor would never have gotten Stormbreaker if Mjolnir wasn't destroyed so that backs up the theory that they keep their one weapon usually.

Odin: And though the day has come for a new King to wield his own weapon -- that duty remains the same. Thor Odinson, my heir, my first-born. So long entrusted with this mighty hammer, Mjolnir. Forged in the heart of a dying star, from the sacred metal of Uru. Only one may lift it. Only one is worthy. Who wields this hammer commands the lightning and the storm. Its power has no equal -- as a weapon, to destroy, or as a tool, to build. It is a fit companion for a King.
Thor

He didn't need it
Gungnir is clearly a powerful weapon, we get a glimpse of Bor using it at the beginning of Thor: The Dark World where he defeats the Dark Elves. It's power is then seen several times afterwards with Loki using it a bit too. He managed to defend Asgard and the Nine Realms with it so he clearly didn't really need a new one.

Odin: Gungnir. Its aim is true, its power strong. With it I have defended Asgard and the lives of the innocent across the Nine Realms since the time of the Great Beginning.
Thor

Gungnir can even open the Bifrost as we see in Thor when Odin banishes Thor. He might have to use it more as a key than being able to summon the Bifrost like Stormbreaker can but Odin didn't really venture out anymore. He didn't have much need for summoning the Bifrost on the fly so the upgrade wasn't worth it. Presumably though Gungnir could summon the Bifrost like we saw Heimdall do with the broken Hofund at the start of Avengers: Infinity War it just takes a bit more.
Your familiarity with a weapon matters
It may be obvious to some but familiarity with a specific weapon matters a lot and even more so when switching between types of weapons. Gungnir is a staff/spear with a ranged attack whereas Stormbreaker is a big old axe. They require vastly different fighting techniques which Odin might not have been comfortable with so wouldn't have wanted it.
We see this somewhat in the duel Thor has with Hela whilst wielding Gungnir, he is easily bested. In part this is due to him not awakening his power and Hela being super strong but he was also unfamiliar with Gungnir being mainly a hammer user until then. He didn't use Gungnir effectively because he was unfamiliar with it.
Stormbreaker wasn't created yet
Lastly, and it's quite important, Stormbreaker wasn't created yet and the theory on the weapon wasn't even completed. Eitri states "In theory, it could even summon the Bifrost." meaning it was probably still in the prototype stage. If that wasn't completed and the weapon wasn't even built it makes sense why Odin wouldn't use it.

If Stormbreaker is a ‘King’s Weapon’ why didn’t Odin have it?


What is the best way to guess a number in a limited number of guesses?

Question: A random integer is picked from 0 to 100. You can make 5 guesses at what the number is, and after each guess, you are told if your guess was too high or too low. What strategy maximizes your probability of guessing the number?
Comment: Choose $31$ of the $101$ possibilities.  Make you first guess the median of these and your later guesses the medians of those which remain plausible after the clues from the earlier guesses.  So you have ${101 \choose 31}$ possible optimal strategies, almost $10^{26}$
Comment: Is the goal to *know* the number after $5$ guesses, or that one of the guesses is the unknown number? (for instance, if you have $2$ choices and only one guess, you try one, and you will know the solution even if you picked the wrong one).
Comment: Picking at halfway between the range...
Comment: Interesting question. I suspect it's bisecting until the last guess and then picking at random in the short interval remaining. See if that works for $1000$ numbers and $2$ guesses.
Comment: There are rather a lot of ways to give a success probability of $\frac{31}{101}$
Comment: I intended for one of the guesses to be the unknown number.
Answer: You can work your way back from the end of the game to optimize the strategy. At each stage, you know that the number is in some interval. On the last guess, you'll just guess any number in the interval, and your chance to win is one over the length of the interval. On the penultimate guess, you have some interval $[i,j[$ (closed at the beginning and open at the end to simplify the length calculations), and you can choose some integer $k\in[i,j[$ to maximize the remaining winning probability. You have probability $\frac1{j-i}$ to win right away by guessing right. You have probability $\frac{k-i}{j-i}$ to guess too high, and then you have probability $\frac1{k-i}$ to guess right on the last guess; and you have probability $\frac{j-k-1}{j-i}$ too guess too low, and then you have probability $\frac1{j-k-1}$ to guess right on the last guess; so the total winning probability as function of $k$ is
$$
\frac1{j-i}+\frac{k-i}{j-i}\cdot\frac1{k-i}+\frac{j-k-1}{j-i}\cdot\frac1{j-k-1}=\frac3{j-i}\;,
$$
which doesn't in fact depend on $k$. Each of the three possibilities contributes $\frac1{j-i}$ to the winning probability, independent of $k$.
But that means we don't have to do much more work for the previous stages – they work essentially like the penultimate one, except the cases of guessing too high or too low contribute larger winning probabilities, whereas the case of guessing right still just contributes the reciprocal of the interval length. So on the third guess, your winning probability is $3+1+3=7$ over the interval length, on the second guess it's $7+1+7=15$ over the interval length, and on the first guess it's $15+1+15$ over the interval length, that is, $\frac{31}{101}$ – irrespective of which numbers you choose to guess.
Well, not completely irrespective, that can't be, since you obviously only have a $\frac5{101}$ winning probability if you guess $0$, $1$, $2$, $3$, $4$. The argument is only valid as long as you always leave enough numbers on either side to have all three possibilities – if you don't, you lose the contribution from that possibility. That means that you have to leave at least $2^{5-n}-1$ numbers on either side on the $n$-th guess, so for instance your first guess must be between $15$ and $85$.


Question about AWS Cognito replication between regions

Question: I have a question about AWS Cognitos replication between regions (Example: Region A - primary site / Region B - standby site).
At this time it is known that user pools (Cognitos) can be replicated in another region. However the original passwords of users (we can say, in Region A) are not migrated to Region B.
If we want to failover to Region B (for example, because the Region A is not available for some reason), the users in Region B will need to create new passwords, since Congnito does not replicate passwords,
The question is:
Are there any known workarounds to address the situation described ?
or
The only valid alternative in that scenario is for the user community to create new passwords in Region B (after a Failover) ?
Answer: Short answer: there isn't any. Best choice right now seems to be Okta or Auth0 or any self-managed solution.


Syncing iTunes between Mac and Windows using DropBox?

Question: How do I sync iTunes library files (xml, itl) and music files/folders between these two different operating systems with different folder structures? I currently keep both the library files and the music files/folders in Dropbox, but every time I switch operating systems, I end up with half of my songs "missing" and the other 50% fine.
Comment: Can you mount your windows drive in mac and vice versa?
Comment: I don't see how this is possible since Mac is Unix based and file structures are based on forward slashes. While Windows have drive letters that start with C:\ etc.
Comment: Possible duplicate of [How to keep iTunes libraries in sync?](http://superuser.com/questions/151/how-to-keep-itunes-libraries-in-sync)
Answer: I'm guessing here.  If you can try this and let me know the results:

Log in to your Mac.
Use iTunes.
Play a short list (say ten or fifteen songs).
Give Dropbox a huge amount of time to update (think an hour or more).  Check to MAKE SURE that DropBox is done updating.
Log out of your Mac when this is done.
Log in to Windows, and DO NOT start iTunes yet.  Give Dropbox a huge amount of time to update.  Think an hour or more.  I'm GUESSING that the database is updating when iTunes makes a call to try to use it.
Try iTunes and post if there is any difference in the behavior.

If you're wondering, playing music causes changes in the database (update to play count among other things).  I suspect that the WHOLE database has to re-download to sync.  Let me know if this helps.
Answer: Assuming Dropbox is installed on both computers, you should be able to move your iTunes library into your Dropbox, and then open it in iTunes on each computer. To do this on Windows, hold Shift while opening iTunes. On Mac, hold Option. Then, click on Choose Library and browse for the XML file.


Charging without posting price?

Question: Can a fast food place like Wendy's, charge for refills at whatever price they want, without having any form of notice
or pricing on their screen menus?
Comment: Toronto, Canada
Comment: In the US, this will be a matter of state law, if there is any law regulating such charges. In other countries, this will vary by country, or possibly by province or even municipality. Where are you concerned with?
Comment: What country or state are you in?
Answer: Normally, a fast food place will make clear whether or not refills are free and at a minimum, provide a price from a printed tariff of prices on request. Customary practice would clarify the default assumption regarding whether refills are free or not. Written item pricing doesn't necessarily have to prominently include everything that can be purchased on a single large display at all times.
In the absence of an agreement, where it is clear that refills aren't free, the recovery of the vendors would be in quantum meruit (i.e. a common law claim for unjust enrichment) for the fair market value, but that would be very uncommon in this situation where a price is almost certainly set in advance somewhere and available with little difficulty.
Comment: If there is no price displayed for a *refill* wouldn't that just be another drink?
Comment: @Moo indeed, if nothing is posted the basic assumption in europe is *there are no refills* [safe for tap water in France and Italy]
Answer: Based on This document from the US NIST it seems that most US states would not require such a charge to be posted.
To give an example, The US State of Maryland laws (found through the link above) are at https://www.nist.gov/sites/default/files/documents/2017/05/09/MARYLAND.pdf
They provide that:

MARYLAND Commercial Law  §14–103.
  (a)   Except as provided in § 14-102 of this sub
  title, each person who sells or offers or displays for
  sale a consumer commodity at retail shall disclose:
    (1)   The total price of the consumer commodity; or
    (2)   Except as provided in subsection (c) of
  this section, the unit price of the consumer  commodity if:
       (i)   It is sold only by units; or
       (ii)   It is a prepackaged or retail-packaged consumer commodity within any of the                                                                                following categories:
         1.  Foods,   condiments,   cooking   oils,   shortenings,   and   similar
  consumer                                                                                commodities;
  ...
§ 11–309.
  (a)  If  any  commodity  or  service  is  sold,  offered,  exposed,  or  advertised  for  sale  by  weight,
  measure, or count, the price may not be misrepresented or represented in any manner calculated or tending
  to mislead or deceive an actual or prospective purchaser.
§11–309.
  (a)      If  any  commodity  or  service  is  sold,  offered,  exposed,  or  advertised  for  sale  by  weight,
  measure, or count, the price may not be misrepresented or represented in any manner calculated or tending
  to mislead or deceive an actual or prospective purchaser.
  ...
§14-101. Definitions
  ...
  b) Consumer commodity
   – "Consumer commodity" means any food, drug, cosmetic, or other article,
  product, or commodity of any kind or class which is:
(1) Customarily produced for sale at retail for consumption by individuals for purposes of
  personal care or in the performance of services ordinarily performed in or
  around the  household; and
(2) Usually consumed or expended in the course of that use or performance
  other than by wear or deterioration from use.
  ...
§ 14-102.  Exemptions from unit pricing.
a) Exemptions.
   – This subtitle does not apply to:
...
(6)
  Except as provided in subsection (b) of this section, a retail sales agency which:
i.
  During the preceding calendar year, sold a gross volume of consumer commodities
  of less than $750,000;
ii.
  Is not part of a company which consists of ten or more sales agencies in or out of the
  State;
iii.
  Derives less than 15 percent of its total revenues from consumer commodities
  subject to this subtitle; or
iv.
  Is owned and operated by not more than one individual and the members of his
  immediate family.
...
§ 14-104.  Manner of disclosure.
The seller shall disclose the total price or unit price, as the
  case may be, for each item in the following manner:
(1)
  If the item is visible conspicuously to the consumer, by attachment of a stamp, tag, or label:
i.
  Directly on the item or its package; or
ii.
  Directly adjacent to the item or on the shelf on which the item is displayed; or
(2)
  If the item is not visible conspicuously to the consumer or if the stamp, tag, or label
  would not be visible conspicuously to the consumer, by a sign or list which contains the price
  information and is visible conspicuously to the consumer.  (An. Code 1957, art. 83, ⎝  21E;  1975, ch. 49,  3.)

It is not fully clear to me if this applies to retail restaurants, it seems to be aimed more at shops where goods are displayed on shelves. But it does not specifically exclude restaurants, and it might well apply, they are surely retail sellers. Note that if a retailer provides prices for at least 90% of goods available for sale, the remaining items may be omitted without penalty under this law, which could be relevant.
My main point here is the level of detail of regulation specified, and the various reasons for exemption of particular cases. (I have quoted only what seem to me the most relevant sections.) All this will vary by state, or by country if this is not a US location. All this was reached via the NIST link.
Comment: I don't see how you're connecting NIST guidance on commodity pricing to a Wendy's.
Comment: bdb484: Because it gives links to various state laws on item pricing. Do yu have a better source?
Comment: They don't seem to be talking about "item pricing" in the sense that would be relevant here.
Comment: @bdb484: I have provided detailed quotes from the Maryland law, just for an example. i think they might well apply to the situation in the question if it was in that state.

Charging without posting price?


OneNote 2010 full notebook encryption?

Question: in OneNote 2010 one can encrypt single tabs / categories - but how to encrypt a complete notebook, so that not just all existing tabs but also new tabs become automatically encrypted?
Answer: You can use TrueCrypt to create a container. Then, under OneNote Options > Save & Backup, point the following path to a folder in your container.

Unfiled Notes Section
Backup Folder
Default Notebook Location
Cache file location

Additional Information
If you have already created notebooks before creating any container/encryption, check the following path for files that you may want to move/erase - C:\Users\username\AppData\Local\Microsoft\OneNote\14.0
Answer: A OneNote notebook is actually a folder in the file system,
which contains each tab as a .one file.
Maybe you can encrypt the notebook folder with some other methods.
Ex:
Windows 7 Encrypt Folder with Password
Answer: You can use TrueCrypt to encrypt your save files, however anyone will still be able to access your information in the cached location. OneNote will not allow you to encrypt the cached location.

OneNote 2010 full notebook encryption?


What's the difference between Application.ThreadException and AppDomain.CurrentDomain.UnhandledException?

Question: Alright, this is an easy one:

What's the difference between Application.ThreadException and AppDomain.CurrentDomain.UnhandledException?
Do I need to handle both?

Thanks!
Answer: Application.ThreadException is specific to Windows Forms.  Winforms runs event handlers in response to messages sent to it by Windows.  The Click event for example, I'm sure you know them.  If such an event handler throws an exception then there's a back-stop inside the Winforms message loop that catches that exception.
That backstop fires the Application.ThreadException event.  If you don't override it, the user will get a ThreadExceptionDialog.  Which allows him to ignore the exception and keep running your program.  Not a great idea btw.
You can disable this behavior by calling Application.SetUnhandledExceptionMode() in the Main() method in Program.cs.  Without that backstop in place, the usual thing happens when a thread dies from an unhandled exception: AppDomain.UnhandledException fires and the program terminates.
Fwiw: "ThreadException" was a very poor name choice.  It has nothing to do with threads.
Comment: I always read it as Application-thread exception, given that winforms is bound to a single thread.
Comment: And how to stop WinForms application from crashing on the occurrence of `Application.ThreadException`. I raised a question for this [[here](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/23153287/suppressing-application-threadexception-and-appdomain-currentdomain-unhandledexc)] with my small C# code.
Answer: From source:

In applications that use Windows Forms, unhandled exceptions in the
  main application thread cause the Application.ThreadException
  event to be raised. If this event is handled, the default behavior is
  that the unhandled exception does not terminate the application,
  although the application is left in an unknown state. In that case,
  the UnhandledException  event is not raised. This behavior can be
  changed by using the application configuration file, or by using the
  Application.SetUnhandledExceptionMode method to change the mode to
  UnhandledExceptionMode.ThrowException before the ThreadException
  event handler is hooked up. This applies only to the main application
  thread. The UnhandledException  event is raised for unhandled
  exceptions thrown in other threads.
Starting with Visual Studio 2005, the Visual Basic application
  framework provides another event for unhandled exceptions in the main
  application thread - WindowsFormsApplicationBase.UnhandledException.
  This event has an event arguments object with the same name as the
  event arguments object used by AppDomain.UnhandledException, but with
  different properties. In particular, this event arguments object has
  an ExitApplication property that allows the application to continue
  running, ignoring the unhandled exception (and leaving the application
  in an unknown state). In that case, the AppDomain.UnhandledException
  event is not raised.

Application.ThreadException can be caught and the application could continue (in general is not a great idea, but for the application like running periodically some actions this is a good solution).
To catch exceptions that occur in threads not created and owned by Windows Forms, use the AppDomain.UnhandledException. It allows the application to log information about the exception before the system default handler reports the exception to the user and terminates the application. The handling of this exception does not prevent application to be terminated. The maximum that could be done(program data can become corrupted when exceptions are not handled) is saving program data for later recovery. After that the application domain is unloaded and the application terminates.

Starting with the .NET 4, this event is not raised for exceptions
  that corrupt the state of the process, such as stack overflows or
  access violations, unless the event handler is security-critical and
  has the HandleProcessCorruptedStateExceptionsAttribute  attribute.

For more details, see MSDN.
Answer: OK - I had it in front of me, this bit of code from msdn is pretty self-explanatory:
public static void Main(string[] args)
{
    // Add the event handler for handling UI thread exceptions to the event.
    Application.ThreadException += new
        ThreadExceptionEventHandler(ErrorHandlerForm.Form1_UIThreadException);

    // Set the unhandled exception mode to force all Windows Forms
    // errors to go through our handler.
    Application.SetUnhandledExceptionMode(UnhandledExceptionMode.CatchException);

    // Add the event handler for handling non-UI thread exceptions to the event.
    AppDomain.CurrentDomain.UnhandledException +=
        new UnhandledExceptionEventHandler(CurrentDomain_UnhandledException);

    // Runs the application.
    Application.Run(new ErrorHandlerForm());
}

Comment: this is in contrast with the other answer of serhio when he says: UnhandledExceptionMode.ThrowException should be set before the ThreadException event handler is hooked up. Not sure if the order really matters...
Comment: @DavidePiras yes, and there's something more murky. SetUnhandledException seem to make no difference in my case.
Answer: Well the thing is, ThreadException occurs due to a problem with your thread, the Unhandled Exception is fired if you code throws an exception that is not handled.
Easist way to cause the second one is to create an app with no try...catch blocks and throw an exception.
Now if you need insurance you can handle them both, however if you capture and handle your exceptions correctly then you should not need the UnhandledException handler as it's kind of like a catch all.
Comment: thanks - what I was not too clear about was if handling UnhandledException I would catch also ThreadException - which seems not to be the case


Past tense or present tense for that clause in a present perfect tense sentence

Question: " I have never seen a smiling face that was not beautiful."
Why do we use "was" instead of " is" here?
Answer: We usually use Simple Past was to reflect the Present Perfect (a "past tense" usage) of preceding have [never] seen. But this isn't a matter of "valid grammar/syntax". It's a stylistic choice - which is to some extend also governed by the exact meaning in the exact context.
In OP's specific example, there would be a strong preference to "backshift" the second verb to agree with the first one, making the whole utterance more "balanced, internally consistent". For the same reason we usually backshift in contexts such as He said his name was Smith (rather than He said his name is Smith).
But there can also be a semantic aspect to the choice. The way I think this applies in OP's example is that a smiling face is a "temporary, ephemeral" thing - that could happen in the past, present, or future, but isn't normally thought of as a continuous state.
On the other hand, consider the same syntactic construction in, say,...

I have never met anyone who doesn't speak English.

It feels much more natural to me to use doesn't rather than didn't there - because to a first approximation, anyone I met who did speak English still does. Either tense choice is perfectly valid in most such contexts, but depending on the exact semantic content (and relative relevance of Past and / or Present to that content), one might be more appropriate than the other.
Answer: Every smiling face we saw was beautiful (when we saw it).
Comment: @DavidSiegel Actually, I think the answer does **implicitly** answer the question  by indicating that that "I have never seen a smiling face that was not beautiful" is talking about discrete instances that were completed in the past. The answer may be too curt, but it is responsive.
Comment: This does not answer the question of **why** we use the past form