Is Bakhmut an important city in the Ukraine war, and if so, why?

Question: Russia and Ukraine have been fighting over it for over 4 months. Is there a reason why the city seems to be considered important for the war? I heard analysts say that the city only has a symbolic importance and they've been attacking it because of the sunk-cost fallacy. Is this true, or is there any strategic value in obtaining the city?
Comment: There is no one way to answer that.  It might mean one thing to the Russian army or politicians.  It might mean another to Ukrainians.  Militarily it seems to have relatively little immediate significance *besides being the current flashpoint of hostilities*.  Like people who are famous for being famous, once many troops fight for a hithertho not very significant area, it can assume real significance because that's where military effort is expanded.  If that sounds like circular reasoning:  it is, making this question hard to answer.
Comment: Additionally both sides have incentives to spin different narratives: if Ukraine does get pushed out, it doesn't want to make it seem as if that was a big loss. But if Russia takes over they want to make it seem as if it was a huge win. So the significance - or not - is very much ground for propaganda.  One thing for sure:  months of Russian efforts and Bakhmut's still in Ukrainian hands.
Comment: @Trilarion Yes, it was that important. ["Stalingrad was strategically important to both sides as a major industrial and transport hub on the Volga River,"](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Stalingrad) giving both control of the Volga and access to the Caucasus oil fields at a time when Germany was running short on fuel.
Comment: For Russia, capturing Bakhmut would be one step closer to capturing whole of Donetsk oblast. Maybe the Russian army has no more important strategic goal at the moment and the Ukrainian army does not want to concede more territory to Russia than necessary. Why did Russians and Germans fight over Stalingrad in WW2 so much? Was it that an important city?
Comment: @cjs not really, no.  [Case Blue](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Case_Blue) didnt really care all that much for Stalingrad early on.  Germany's goals were the oil fields.  Later on, with the name and everything both sides cared.  A lot.  But Stalingrad was secondary to the oil fields and was initially meant as a *covering* drive to shield the flanks.  Germany should have never pushed its panzers into an urban battle in a non-encirclable city that the Soviets could drip-drip supplies and men into via the river.  It should have never stuck to capturing it.
Answer: It seems to be agreed by all that the city's location and the city itself
has no real strategic military importance. But even if it has just symbolic
importance, that does not mean that a decision to continue attacking or
defending it is merely an example of the sunk cost fallacy.
The Russian Side
In this case, from the Russian side, the importance seems to be related to
prestige, both of the Russian army in general and of certain individual
units within it:

[T]he battle for Bakhmut is widely seen as an opportunity for Moscow to
regain lost prestige after months of military setbacks....
The battle for Bakhmut is also a key test for the Wagner head, Yevgeny
Prigozhin, who is believed to have recruited thousands of Russian
convicts to help with the storming of the city. Prigozhin has previously
fiercely criticised the Russian defence ministry for its performance in
Ukraine and has lauded Wagner as the country's most capable fighting
force. The city's capture by Russia would increase Prigozhin's political
standing as he seeks a more prominent position in the country's
decision-making process. [g1220]

Prigozhin has claimed that he's also befitting from a war of attrition here
(for more on this see below), though that may be merely cover to try to
provide a plausible military excuse for the above attempt to regain
prestige:

Yevgeny Prigozhin, the founder of Russia's Wagner group, has said his
troops have primarily centred their efforts on demolishing the Ukrainian
army there.
"Our task is not Bakhmut itself, but the destruction of the Ukrainian
army and the reduction of its combat potential, which has an extremely
positive effect on other areas, which is why this operation was dubbed
the 'Bakhmut meat grinder'." [o1210]

The Ukrainian Side
For Ukraine also, there is a component of morale and public opinion
involved:

If Bakhmut were to fall, military observers have said Ukraine could pull
back to the west without suffering heavy strategic defeats. But a retreat
from the city might suggest Kyiv's military efforts were running out of
steam after months of continuous gains....
"Militarily, Bakhmut has no strategic importance," Col Gen Oleksandr
Syrskyi, the commander of Ukraine's ground forces, said earlier this
month. "But it has psychological significance." [g1220]

However, this battle can also be seen as a military opportunity for
Ukraine. The battle is currently seen by both the Russians (as mentioned
above) and the Ukranians as a war of attrition:

[T]he embattled city of Bakhmut, which has largely been ravaged after
nearly five months of fighting [has] been referred to by both sides as
the "Bakhmut meat-grinder". [g1220]

Normally in a war of attrition the side incurring higher costs would be
wise to back away and chose another avenue of attack.¹ But Russia's
apparent need to take Bakhmut for non-military reasons means that, if
Ukraine incurs relatively lower costs defending it, the battle is an
opportunity to wear down the Russian army at lower cost than Ukraine would
have to spend otherwise. It does appear that Ukraine's costs are indeed
lower than the Russians':

"They are still using old Soviet tactics," explains Mikola, the fire
coordinator [for a unit of the Ukrainian 24th mechanised brigade], who
supplies the target grids to the gun crews from the drone operators and
forward fire controllers with the infantry. "We have more modern
technology than the Russians so we can be more accurate and sparing with
our ammunition."
"We only shoot when we have coordinates," explains Vasily Pavlokavic,
aged 42, a short and stocky officer who commands the crew of the
howitzer....
"They just send one group after another against our positions," Sasha, a
member of Ukraine's 24th mechanised brigade fighting in the area, told
the Observer.
"If the attack doesn't succeed they'll just try again in exactly the same
way. The only strategy I can see at this point is that they want to take
the city so they can claim some kind of victory after a year that has
seen so many losses.
"We've noticed in the past two weeks an increase in shelling and infantry
attacks as if they are in a rush to take Bakhmut. That also means that
they are suffering ever greater losses. They are just throwing in meat."
[o1210]

And it also appears that the Russians may indeed be suffering severe
attritional costs:

[Andrii, a crew member of the Ukrainian 24th mechanised brigade,] recalls
when his brigade was last in this area, during the summer, when any
Ukrainian fire was met multiple times over from Russian guns. "They would
fire at everything. Now they have become more sparing," he adds,
suggesting shortages of Russian ammunition....
A recent assessment for the Institute for the Study of War [stated], "The
costs associated with six months of brutal, grinding, and attrition-based
combat around Bakhmut far outweigh any operational advantage that the
Russians can obtain from taking Bakhmut." [o1210]

Reports of Russian attrition on a more general level are widespread; see,
for example, "'The army has nothing': new Russian conscripts bemoan lack
of supplies" (The Guardian, 2022-10-20).
Summary
On the Russian side, the importance of taking Bakhmut appears to be related
to prestige, particularly of the Wagner unit and to some degree of the
Russian side overall.
On the Ukrainian side, public perception is also a factor, but it may also
be an opportunity for the Ukrainians to wear down the Russian army at lower
cost than they could do elsewhere.
References

[g1128] "Fighting in east Ukraine descends into trench warfare as
Russia seeks breakthrough" (The Guardian, 2022-11-28)

[g1209] "'Only 100 metres apart': Ukrainians and Russians face off in
Donetsk" (The Guardian, 2022-12-09)

[o1210] "In the 'Bakhmut meat grinder', deadlocked enemy forces slog it
out" (The Observer, 2022-12-10)

[g1220] "Putin admits to 'complicated' situation in Russian-occupied
Ukraine" (The Guardian, 2022-12-20)

¹ The side incurring higher costs in a war of attrition might choose
to continue the attack if they have have vastly larger resources available
that cannot be more profitably used elsewhere. However, Russia in this case
does not; they've already had to conscript hundreds of thousands more
troops, many of whom are being sent to the front with minimal training.
Comment: @CPomerantz If Russia is losing troops relative to Ukraine they are indirectly _losing_ time here; the losses from throwing ill-trained troops into a meat-grinder by [trying to seize Bakhmut](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/dec/20/putin-admits-to-complicated-situation-in-russian-occupied-ukraine) rather than holding more of them back until they have better training and equipment slows the rate at which they (re-)build their forces. To gain time they should try to hold more cheaply defensible positions, rather than mounting expensive attacks.
Comment: You missed one important thing Russia may be hoping to gain: time. Ukraine has had the advantage for the past few months. ISW has written about the three things Russia is hoping will help them turn the tide: More equipment and supplies from Iran and China; better trained conscripts; and worsening morale (in both Ukraine and the west) as energy shortages, missile strikes, and winter cause problems. But for any of that to matter, Russia needs to defend now, and that includes forcing Ukraine to commit soldiers defending Bakhmut instead of attacking somewhere else.
Comment: @cjs: It may well be the case that Russia is not actually throwing ill-trained troops into the meat-grinder. It depends on which side's presentation of the situation you accept. Also, the focus on convicts in the Russian mobilization may itself be misleading; the mobilization generally targeted reservists. OTOH, the Wagner group specifically has been described as having recruited convicts (by pro-NATO sources at least) - and it's Wagner who are "working on" Bakhmut and the surroundings.
Comment: Fighting with convicts conscripted here might be a win-win situation for Russia: pay less to have them in prison if they die, or gain the city if they suceed.
Comment: @PaŭloEbermann Not really, since using them here means that they aren't using them elsewhere. I can't think of anything the Russian (or any other) army is using at Bakhmut that is useless elsewhere, so there's nothing here that they're getting "for free."
Comment: Your sources are quite one-sided... pro-Russian sources claim that the attrition is just the other way around: NATO/Ukraine is losing large numbers of soldiers in Bakhmut, and keeps "feeding" more people in the meat-grinder; and thus, for Ukraine to retreat from Bakhmut would be an enormous failure in hindsight - tens of thousands sarcificed for a stall rather than a break of the enemy momentum. And while the fog of war is thick -  if Russia were to lay off of Bakhmut, they wouldn't be ceding territory or jeopardizing their position. So it's more likely the attrition math works in its favor.
Comment: @einpoklum 1. I have quoted sources from both sides. Feel free to suggest other sources if you have them. 2. It is highly unlikely that Wagner's recent convict recruits are well-trained, though they are probably in use alongside well-trained troops. 3. You are confusing Putin's mobilisation and Wagner's recruiting of convicts; these are separate and unrelated recruitment programmes. The former is not related to my answer except in as much it happens to be the area that most makes it clear that the Russian army is generally having severe supply problems.
Answer: To play devil's advocate since 2/3 answers so far basically say "makes no sense, just for politics", let's take a look at a more military set of possible motivations for Bakhmut.  Do I truly believe the Russian high command has only rational reasons and is pursuing an optimal strategy in Bakhmut?  Not really.  But assuming your enemy is only stupid is rarely sound planning.

TLDR:
It MAY be the least bad spot to make some effort in, given the force structure Russia currently has available.
Attrition
Do remember Russia 140M pop vs 40M Ukraine when gauging how beneficial a higher kill ratio is to Ukraine.
As a comment says:  killing your enemy is not the point in warfare.  Very true, doesn't mean armies haven't repeatedly tried to use just this approach.  And Russian commanders may be even more predisposed to do so.
Nearness.
It's close to a concentration of Russian troops and it may threaten more important Ukrainian cities:

taking Bakhmut would enable Putin's forces to launch artillery strikes on key places, such as the cities of Kramatorsk and Slovyansk in the Donetsk region.
"They will be in range of the Russian artillery, and those places are important," said Roozenbeek.
"All other cities and towns in Donetsk region are too far from the Russian lines and the capture of Bakhmut will signify at least some progress for Russians in Donetsk region," he said.

It's what worked before.
When they captured Sievierodonetsk it was through a grinding positional battle.  Granted, it hasn't translated into all that much.  But Ukraine suffered significant losses at the time and it is the one operational level victory Russia has had.  I remember reading, not sure where, that there was some criticism of Zelensky for hanging on too long to that city - heavy losses.  True, the artillery situation has changed, but still...
An area can become strategic once it sees enough fighting.
Like people who are famous for being famous, once many troops fight for a hithertho not very significant area, it can assume real significance because that's where military effort is expended.
One example would be the Kursk/Zitadelle battle in 1943.  Was it necessary/useful at the start?  No, not once German prospects for an easy encirclement faded out, but once both sides committed enough troops to it, it assumed an artificial, but no less real, strategic significance.
Maybe Bakhmut is also the least-bad use of the forces Russia has at its disposal now:
Per ISW, Kofman on War on the Rocks, Russia has suffered massive losses in its regular units and especially its officer corps.  They're using a hodgepodge of understrength units.  Kofman says that enough conscripts can hold a defensive line, but will struggle to perform offensive missions and especially combined arms.  Russia has never been great at combined arms integration and all these losses and problems surely can't be helping.  Russia is presumably training those conscripts it did not send to plug in the front line right now and hopes to do something useful with them later, once trained.  So don't expect sweeping equivalents of Ukraine's Kharkiv dash from Russia right now.  They probably can't.
But one area undertrained, under-integrated, under-armed, under-led infantry can be semi-useful is the kind of mindless repeat assaults Russia seems to be indulging in Bakhmut.
i.e. it may not make sense to "do a Bakhmut" given the immediate availability of better trained, better equipped troops to perform savvier offensive missions.
Pending reconstitution of those forces through training and rearmament during the winter however, Bakhmut may be a valid enough operation to allow Russia to retain some level of initiative with essentially disposable troops.
If not Bakhmut, where else, right now?
I for one found the surprise full withdrawal from Kherson very well executed.  Assuming the same staff is involved in pursuing Bakhmut there may actually be some sound strategic reason to persist there, besides the politicking.  Not that I give Russia much credit on its strategy to date, but cautious is better than over-confident.

p.s. All that said Bakhmut still doesn't look all that clever.
Grinding static positional battles are not a sign of strategic cleverness, the overall value of Bakhmut seems low and Russia seems to lack reserve forces to exploit any hypothetical breakthrough it would achieve there.  And then it would just find the next line of Ukrainian defenses.  Still, the media consensus that it is pointless seems a bit facile to me.
p.p.s. Don't take all of this as me claiming there is no political posturing going on, as alluded to in the other answers.
Comment: The purpose of war isn't to kill everyone on the other side, it's to force the other side to do what you want, generally by breaking their morale.  Even if Russia can mobilize four times as many people as Ukraine, losing four soldiers for every Ukrainian loss is going to be devastating to morale.
Comment: @Mark Oh, **I agree**:  *Grinding static positional battles are not a sign of strategic cleverness*.  But it may they don't have much choice at this point in time, short of going fully on the defensive everywhere which has its own military and morale risks.  Besides, casualty reports are probably minimized and advances talked way up - one wonders when Russians are gonna realize it's been 4 months of "successes" + still no Bakhmut.  My point is caution about somewhat glib/triumphalist chatter that it is pointless by any metric other than politics.  It might very well be.  Or not.
Comment: "Kofman says that enough conscripts can hold a defensive line, but will struggle to perform offensive missions" means that, from a _purely military_ point of view, "the least-bad use of the forces Russia has at its disposal now" is _not_ to put them on attack instead of defense. That would then be something done for (probably domestic) political reasons, even if not "just for politics."
Comment: As for "140M pop vs 40M," that's an irrelevant figure (irrelevant enough that I think it possibly should be removed from the answer): the real question is how many troops each side can practically mobilise. Ukraine appears able to mobilise most of its military-age males. In just seven days after the September call-up, Russia may have [lost more potential troops than they originally sent to invade Ukraine](https://news.yahoo.com/more-russian-men-now-fled-101919295.html).
Comment: And this is not even taking into account equipment and troop quality and morale differences. In Vietnam we saw 1.4 million _very_ well-equipped troops lose to 860,000 with mediocre equipment and much less mechanisation and air support. Clearly at this time things are looking _very_ bad for Russia, though certainly the morale situation could change. (An event where Ukraine is perceived to be seriously threatening some core part of Russia might do that.)
Answer: At the moment, unclear and covered by the fog of war
There are sources saying Bakhmut has strategic value, e.g. (all sources are from a random Google search as I was writing this answer, but I have read a lot of such articles with similar statements over the past few months):

For the uninitiated, Bakhmut is located on a strategic supply line between Donetsk and Luhansk, the two separatist-held regions in Ukraine's Donbass region, which Russia claimed to have annexed a few months ago.
Experts agree that the capture of Bakhmut could potentially change the course of the conflict and give Russia a platform to launch a broader campaign across many parts of Ukraine.

On the other hand you get statements like this:

The offensive has been Russia's priority since early August but the capture of the town "would have limited operational value," although it could be a staging post to threatening the larger urban areas of Kramatorsk and Sloviansk, officials added.
...
The ISW [Institute for the Study of War] had previously assessed that Russia was undertaking a "high-cost effort" to take the city which was only "of limited operational significance."

So yeah: there are some conflicted opinions on how valuable Bakhmut is strategically. Everyone agrees it's worth at least something, but people disagree over how much. For the people who think it's not worth much, they have lots of theories as to why Russia is trying so hard to conquer it, but they're all educated guesses; at the moment, nobody except the Russian high command actually know what is the value they see in Bakhmut. We might find out if/when Rusia actually takes the city, or when the historians from 10+ years in the future dig through the historical records.
Comment: Pretty much.  And keep in mind that Western coverage as a whole has a vested interest in making the Russian MoD seem as inept as possible.  Not that they have not, in fact, been spectacularly inept, at least up until the Kherson surprise full withdrawal.  Russia's internal narrative claims that controlling Bakhmut hinders Ukraine supply lines to the more important cities to the northwest.
Comment: https://www.newsweek.com/why-russia-obsessed-capturing-ukraine-bakhmut-donbas-zelensky-1755174 : *He explained that taking Bakhmut would enable Putin's forces to launch artillery strikes on key places, such as the cities of Kramatorsk and Slovyansk in the Donetsk region*  and *Bakhmut is the only town very close to the frontlines, and therefore potentially within the reach of Russian troops.*  Assuming Russia is stupid is a complacency Ukraine can ill afford, even if it has mostly been true to date in the "special military operation"
Answer: Military/Economics analyst Perun's metaanalysis floated 3 possible reasons for Russia's intense interest in Bakhmut:

Offensive potential - it could open up the rest of the Donbass (or, at least it would have, if Izium was still under Russian control)

To (try to) attrite Ukrainian forces

Domestic and international politics/marketing (the idea being that Russia lost significant territory around Kherson and Kharkiv recently, so by attacking Bakhmut it allows the Kremlin to distract from the less favourable talking points)

Source
Source here (starting around 33m 20s)
Comment: I like Perun, insightful guy, but dearly wish he'd shorten his videos.  Watched 1 but then bailed on watching more 60+ minute vids.
Comment: Point 2 and 3 are not so specific to Bakhmut. It could be any other place as well for diversion or attrition.
Answer: As one answer here says that Bakhmut's importance is that "Bakhmut is located on a strategic supply line between Donetsk and Luhansk". That is true but mostly irrelevant for present phase of the war because Russia controls the entire section of that road (M03 aka E40) which connects Donetsk and Luhansk. The other two cities of comparable size to Bakhmut that are near this highway, Kramatorsk and Sloviansk are also still in Ukrainian hands, despite being also being nominally annexed by Russia. Both saw rebellions in 2014, but were retaken by Ukraine. So, e.g.:

Mike Martin, a researcher at King's College London, says Russia is persisting in its efforts to capture Bakhmut because it corresponds to Putin's stated war aim of, in his words, "liberating the Donbas." Martin explains: "If you look at the way the roads and the rail networks are arranged, there are two bigger settlements to the west of Bakhmut, but still in the Donbas: Sloviansk and Kramatorsk. And in order to take those bigger cities, which he needs to do to complete his strategic goal, he needs to take Bakhmut first."

And that seems to be the official Russian line as well. According to RFERL:

Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said on March 7 that capturing Bakhmut would be key to launching a further offensive in the Donetsk region.

Also to the West of Bakhmut, albeit not on that highway but on another, albeit 2nd tier one (T0504 aka H-32), lies Kostiantynivka (pre-war pop. around 67,000) which is also in the region nominally annexed by Russia, but is still controlled by Ukraine. Kostiantynivka was also briefly captured by the rebels in 2014. Both Kramatorsk and Kostiantynivka are close enough to be in artillery range from Bakhmut, at least according to CNN:

If the Russians can take the high ground to the west of the city, nearby industrial towns Kostiantynivka and Kramatorsk would be at the mercy of their artillery and even longer range mortars.

So, yeah from Bakhmut the Russian offensive could push along two highways. Here's the ISW map from the Ukrainian defense perspective (click below to zoom--or use the previous link which allows even more interaction):

OTOH you can see from this that the Russian have other avenues to push towards Kostiantynivka, and are already much closer than the CNN analysis suggests. That red/Russian salient you see there south of Bakhmut is Klishchiivka (pop. 400), which the Russians captured in January. However getting full control of the T0504 highway would make supplying an offensive towards Kostiantynivka considerably simpler. That road and the high ground/ridge, which you can see better in the topographic map below, also have the town of Chasiv Yar (pop. 12,000) at their intersection, of sorts. Ukrainians were still in control of Chasiv Yar as of beginning of March.

So if highways still had a major importance in this war for advances, opening up the M03 West of Bakhmut could (also) matter. Russian forces capturing areas West of Bakhmut without controlling Bakhmut proper would be a bit of logistical headache for them. Blitzing along highways while avoiding major cities was a hit and miss affair in the early phases of the war due to the territorial defense forces engaging in quasi-partisan warfare (there's a good documentary here on that regarding the events around Sumy.) So the Russian strategy now is to take over and secure everything methodically, which often results in attritional battles in urban landscapes. Bakhmut is hardly the only place where that happens, see also Maryinka, which however is a much smaller settlement than Bakhmut.
Conversely, in the opposite direction, M03 runs SSE and passes between the capitals of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions, though Debaltseve, which saw an ultimately unsuccessful Ukrainian offensive in 2014 because it was retaken by the separatists in 2015. So, a putative Ukrainian counter-offensive along this axis could indeed split the two Russian controlled regions/republics, as well as envelop Donetsk city from the north. (When Prigozhin spoke of Bhakhut's importance for Russia's defense, he probably had something like this in mind.) In a war of movement, that highway could have a lot more importance than it does in the present attritional phase. The entire region has been heavily fortified by both sides, in depth, though, so major roads are more important as supply routes than quick axes of advance right now.
Also, psychologically, after Russia lost ground last fall in both the north and the south of Ukraine,

A Russian victory in Bakhmut, with a pre-war population of about 70,000, would give it the first major prize in a costly winter offensive, after it called up hundreds of thousands of reservists last year.
Comment: There's a video [here](https://youtu.be/YckzzvtPNNI?t=163) which while of ho-hum quality in terms of commentary shows the 2nd Ukrainian line of prepared positions in that area with some satellite photos.
Answer: Bakhmut is along a major highway to Sloviansk and Izium. Highly industrialized eastern Ukraine has a lot of rail networks. Lyman, another Donetsk town, is about 20 miles NNW from Bakhmut. Its recapture by the Ukrainian military was highly significant because it's a rail hub. Russia is heavily dependent on rail for logistics, so this weakened their grip on that entire section of the country.
When Russia still controlled the area near Lyman it was more feasible for it to attempt a 'cauldron' (encirclement / pocket / kettle) in the region. In a way we are seeing the leftovers of that campaign.
Lyman was recaptured just as Russia claimed regional annexation. Russia's tried to claim an annexation of all of Donetsk despite losing control of much of the territory in a rout, so there is a political purpose to contesting Donetsk towns even when they seem marginal now. Regarding the merits of the terrain between Sloviansk and Bakhmut I cannot say.
(I am hardly an expert in this subject but have been keeping loose tabs. Consult the maps on liveuamap.com which helpfully highlight the critical rail network very well)
Comment: Yeah, not sure what got the Community Bot's skirts ruffled up.  These are fairly good reminders of the strategic context Bakhmut is located in.  The Izyum/Lyman angle is definitely part of it - this is the stunted half of the southern pincer.  re. the railroad... not so sure.  Grabbing Bakhmut by itself doesnt do all that much, they'd need to grab a lot more territory to control all of the North-South running tracks, letting alone capturing enough to have some buffer between UA and Russian trains ambling along like sitting ducks.  But overall, yes, there is some logic to be had military-wise.
Comment: Your answer could be improved with additional supporting information. Please [edit] to add further details, such as citations or documentation, so that others can confirm that your answer is correct. You can find more information on how to write good answers [in the help center](/help/how-to-answer).
Comment: I dug around quite a while to try to find a suitable link but it wasn't at the blog I thought - rather I had picked it up from scattered tweets.
Answer:
Bakhmut itself, a city with a prewar population of 70,000 inhabitants, has little strategic value. But the battle for the city is a marathon contest to see which army can break the other.

...Russia has thrown tens of thousands of newly mobilized troops into a huge ground assault to take the city. Ukraine has used every hard-learned tactic to hold ground and inflict maximum casualties on the invader,

Hence Bakhmut is significant for propaganda reasons, and this is true for the both sides. As propaganda is important part of every war, the Bakhmut is important as well. This is the real importance, not illusory.
Recently, however, Yevgeny Prigozhin strongly emphasized the importance of this town: if Wagner retreats from Bakhmut now, the whole front will collapse. Similarly, Volodymyr Zelenskiy also said that that retreating from Bakhmut would "open the road" for Russian forces.  It is not clear what changed and if it will really be so in either case.
Recently the Institute for Study of War  said they think there is a conflict between Russian Ministry of Defence and Wagner Group financier Yevgeny Prigozhin, and due that "currently prioritizing eliminating Wagner on the battlefields in Bakhmut" which it concludes is slowing its advance in the area (published here by The Guardian). If indeed so, really horrible things are evolving around this town.
Comment: What you describe is simply attrition as described in [this answer](https://politics.stackexchange.com/a/77292/8199) already.


Command to list all monospace fonts known to fontconfig

Question: I'd like to have a list of all the monospace fonts that fontconfig knows of,
which command do I have to use?
Answer: The command fc-list can list all available fonts according to their properties. In your case one needs to search for the spacing corresponding to mono, that would be 100, so fc-list :spacing=100. Simpler form fc-list :mono should probably work too.
Example:
$ fc-list :spacing=100

/usr/share/fonts/urw-fonts/n022003l.pfb: Nimbus Mono L:style=Regular
/usr/share/texmf-dist/fonts/opentype/public/semaphor/smftt10.otf: Semafor:style=Mono
/usr/share/fonts/TTF/luximbi.ttf: Luxi Mono:style=Bold Oblique
/usr/share/texmf-dist/fonts/type1/public/droid/DroidSansMono.pfb: Droid Sans Mono:style=Regular
/usr/share/texmf-dist/fonts/type1/public/bera/fvmbo8a.pfb: Bera Sans Mono:style=Bold Oblique
/usr/share/fonts/dejavu/DejaVuSansMono-BoldOblique.ttf: DejaVu Sans Mono:style=Bold Oblique
/usr/share/texmf-dist/fonts/type1/public/bera/fvmr8a.pfb: Bera Sans Mono:style=Regular
/usr/share/texmf-dist/fonts/opentype/public/semaphor/smfptt10.otf: Semafor:style=PersonPillar-Mono
/usr/share/texmf-dist/fonts/type1/urw/courier/ucrr8a.pfb: Nimbus Mono L:style=Regular

A good documentation of fontconfig library (including font properties and their values selected in the fc-list) is available in the file /usr/share/doc/fontconfig-2.12.1/fontconfig-user.html (change version number to yours).
Comment: To get a readable list of just the font names of monospaced fonts, try `fc-list :mono | awk -F: '{print $2}' | sort -u`
Comment: I knew `fc-list` but "_… the spacing corresponding to mono, that would be 100 …_" was waay above my fontconfigosciousness. Thanks
Comment: @gboffi You may take a look at `/usr/share/doc/fontconfig-2.12.1/fontconfig-user.html` (change version number to yours) - there is detailed description of different font properties and their values.
Comment: May I suggest that you add the reference in your comment to the body of your answer? Ciao
Comment: Depending on distribution, the documentation may simply be in `/usr/share/doc/fontconfig/fontconfig-user.html` without version number.
Comment: In fact `fc-list :spacing=mono` also works. The named aliases for values (like `mono` for 100) are documented in `man fonts.conf`.
Comment: Or, shorter, `fc-list :mono family |sort`


What does coming-out mean in this context?

Question: In a movie I watched there was a scene where there was a couch delivered to a house. The owner of the house is telling some workers where to place it. She says "We were thinking in here" while pointing to a room which they were entering and after they are inside she points to a wall and says "with the coming-out part along the wall". The couch is basically a corner settee but two-piece not one, with a little table in-between. What is the coming-out part of a couch?
Comment: Are you able to post a screenshot of the movie showing the couch in question, or an image of a similar couch? In general I would say the "coming-out part" is any part of an otherwise smooth or uninterrupted object that juts out, often at a right angle, from the main body of the object.
Comment: What @randomhead said, and to make explicit that in this context the "coming-out-part" would mean the shorter section of a corner couch.
Comment: I added the screenshot :) The coming-out part is further along that wall with drapes.
Answer: It means "the part that comes out". The descriptive clause ("that comes out") has been transformed into an adjective phrase ("coming-out"). Some similar constructions are:

The rubbed-out part said something interesting. (There is a part of the writing that was rubbed out.)
The combed-over part doesn't hide much. (There is a part of their hair that is combed over the top of their head.)
The tidied-up part looks as good as new. (There is a part of the area that has been tidied up.)

Exactly what part of the couch this is must depend on context. It likely means one side of the corner piece—the speaker considers one side (the longer one?) to be the "main" one, and in their mind, the other side "comes out" from there. They want that other side to lie along the wall.
It could equally mean other things for different furniture. A sofa bed has a part that "comes out" in the sense of folding out when needed. I personally might use "comes out" to describe the part of a corner piece that does not follow the wall (it "comes out" towards the middle of the room), but that's clearly not the case here!
Answer: Thé 'coming out part' would more than likely be the part that unfolds into a bed.


unable to download apps from Google play store using mobile data

Question: I am using letv and i am trying to download Google applications from play store when i click on install it displays "waiting for wifi"
I am using mobile data but it's not downloading through mobile data .
How can i download through mobile data
Answer: Can you access the internet through your browser? If you don't have internet access at all, your mobile networks settings are probably incorrect.
Try changing the Network mode and then under Network operators tap Select automatically.
You can also try contacting your service provider.


Google Apps version for Moto E2

Question: What version of open gapps should I get if flashing android 7.1 Lineage Is on my Moto E2 Surnia XT1524
Answer: A quick search tells me that Moto E2 runs on Snapdragon 410, which is a typical mid-end 64-bit SoC. However, I investigated its stock ROM and found it's a 32-bit one.
So you should download OpenGApps ARM 7.1 pico in order to get the bare minimum Google Play functionality. You may want to pick another package if you want to have more of Google, but remember to choose ARM from the first column and 7.1 from the second.
According to Andy Yan, if you attempt to flash a wrong OpenGApps package, it will refuse to install and tell you the right one you should pick.
Comment: E2 runs on a SD410. To OP: the package should error out and tell you which arch you should download even if you happen to download the wrong one.
Comment: @AndyYan I mistook E (2nd gen) for E2, or maybe I missed *Surnia*.

Google Apps version for Moto E2


Feynman's $i \epsilon$ prescription in loop expansion

Question: I have some questions about the $i\epsilon$ factor in Feynman diagrams. First, what is the physical meaning of $i\epsilon$ in loop amplitudes. Second, how does it ensures unitarity?
And third, Dyson series assume that incoming and outgoing particles are free, this can be implemented by assuming that the interaction Hamiltonian switches off adiabatically, $e^{-\eta\,t}H_{I}(t)$. Is this $\eta$ related with the $i\epsilon$?
Comment: Related: http://physics.stackexchange.com/q/110046/
Comment: As for the last part of your question, even though I haven't checked it carefully enough myself, I think that indeed the adiabatic switch off of the interactions gives rise to the $i\epsilon$ prescription. You can indeed check it out in section 9.2 of the first volume of QFT book by Weinberg (around eq. 9.2.14)
Comment: This will likely help: http://physics.stackexchange.com/q/138217/
Comment: In general, whenever you find yourself enumerating multiple questions as "first", "second" etc, that's a pretty clear sign that you should post those questions separately. The first question you're asking is already explained [here](http://physics.stackexchange.com/questions/138217/complex-integration-by-shifting-the-contour). The second question should definitely be posted separately as it is a well defined and self contained question. The third question is also clearly separate and should be posted separately.
Answer: $\rm{i}\varepsilon$ is not a factor, but an addendum. It allows to integrate straight along the axis. It removes poles from axes in a "physical way" - by obtaining the right propagator. The right propagator does not need any adiabatic tricks.
Incoming and outgoing particles are not always free. In particular, the meaningful electron line has many soft photon lines emitted. It means the electron is coupled to the electromagnetic field even in the asymptotic regions. Only perturbatively (which is rather inexact) the lines may be "free".
Answer: At first, the $i \epsilon$ prescription: In Feynman diagrams we have a lot of Green's functions connected by some rules, the Feynman rules. Actually, the $i \epsilon$ prescription is more related to the Green's function. The prescription is responsible for a choice in the boundary conditions (asymptotic behaviour). We may put this $i \epsilon$ inside the expression $(\omega + i \epsilon)^2$ or $(\omega - i \epsilon)^2$. The first is related to retarded Green's function, the second is related to advanced Green's function.  This choices of boundary condition are related to some adapted Feynman's rules. Calculating things in this prescriptions is not manifest relativistically and not so compact. The Feynman Green's function is the best for doing calculations and very natural.
Now, let's be more general. This prescriptions are aroused when we have operators like this:
$$
(H-E)G(t)=\delta(t)
$$
We want to find an expression for $G(t)$. Applying Fourier transform, we can find that
$$
G(t) = \frac{1}{(2 \pi)} \int d\omega \, \frac{e^{-ip(t)}}{\omega - E\pm i\varepsilon}
$$
If you see this function in complex plane, we can se that we have a cut in real axis made by eigenvalues of $H$. The prescription $\epsilon$ determine how far we pass about the singularity $\omega=E$. The choice of signal tell in what side.
This precription is simply procedure to getting inverse of operators with real eigenvalues, satisfying some asymptotic behavior.
We can interpret this $\epsilon$ as a inverse of timelife of the signal describe by the repective Green's funciton. This is because we can identify a relativistic Breit–Wigner distribution
The untary is hold because we get $\epsilon \rightarrow 0$, so the signal persist at infinite time.
The adiabatic turn on and turn off interaction is another mathematical departure: adiabatic theorem and Gell-mann and Low theorem, but physically is very close to the $i\epsilon$. Is a inverse of a caracteristic time that is send to infinity.


iPod "Classic" 60 GB and Bose SoundDock

Question: I have an old "classic" 60GB iPod that I have been using with a Bose SoundDock for years. All of the sudden, one day, there is no sound coming from the dock speakers.  I can listen to the Ipod with headphones and when I place the Ipod on the dock it charges, but no sound.  I have tried replacing the board on the dock, but that didn't help.  Any ideas what might be wrong?
Comment: Do you, by any chance, have any other iPods (or iPhones) you can test with that dock? Or any other docks you can use with that iPod? If you could test this, this would determine whether it is the dock or the iPod that is the problem. I would also recommend contacting Bose support. Perhaps they might have some suggestions for things to try also.
Comment: I do not have any other ipods or docks.
Answer: Unfortunately, without having access to another dock, or iPod, your options are somewhat limited, as there could be a number of things that failed. Because without another dock, or iPod, either the dock, or the iPod could be at fault. With that in mind, your best options are probably to take the iPod to an Apple store (schedule and appointment) and see if they can offer assistance in testing to see if your iPod had a hardware failure.
If the Apple store can't find anything wrong with it, then it may be time to send your Bose SoundDock into Bose to see about repair.

iPod "Classic" 60 GB and Bose SoundDock


How calculate average output probabilities in MLP or SVM in MATLAB

Question: I have a system that find best model (best inputs and parameters of MLP/SVM) model in a financial problem for every inserted database and create a specific model for a specific data sample. I'm using 5-fold cross validation that repeats for 5 times (for increasing reliability of my system) for cost function of my optimization algorithm so In the end I will find best 25 models that now will use for out-sample data.
When I insert out sample data to these 25 models in some cases I have slightly different outputs ( I have a classification MLP model that can generate probability). This is one of the outputs :
<code>0.380032703, 0.356491904, 0.369914169, 0.377588996, 0.425321986 ,0.382467546, 0.341404809, 0.538460421, 0.353585952, 0.332340499, 0.36827261, 0.369171894, 0.329522399, 0.398054125, 0.360501952, 0.406897298, 0.480889919, 0.403619213, 0.406236551, 0.422529236, 0.393108809, 0.309808029, 0.357776713, 0.337373411, 0.397259506
</code>
As you know these outputs have difference parts of data as training sets and testing sets for creating model. Other things like inputs and parameters are the same.I should have only one probability for any out sample. My fist approach was using average. I want your suggestions to create one robust probability from these probabilities. When I check other out sample outputs, In a lot of cases difference is low but in some cases difference between probabilities is high.
What is your idea about this problem?
Thanks.
Answer: You should weight the outputs according to how much you believe that the model which generated the output is correct. If you have no reason to prefer any of the models, then they all have the same weight (namely 1/(number of models)), and the combined output is just the mean of the individual outputs.


Why, thank you........not correct

Question: Let's forget how it is used or what it might imply , because why , is why? (?)
Regardless am I not correct." Why, thank you" makes little sense to use unless you are asking why someone is thanking you. let's keep it real , I don't think there is another language that uses such , so  commonly.It is not correct....it makes no sense.  Am i the only one here that feels this way?
Answer: The word Why has multiple meanings. Specifically Why is being used as an interjection in this case. While you are probably interpreting it as an adverb.
What is the purpose of using the word "why" in "why, thank you"?

Why, thank you........not correct


Another crockpot error

Question: I accidentally set my crockpot, with raw chicken and broth, on warm for a little less than one hour. I read answers to a similar question, but since this is chicken and only for 1 hour, I thought I'd ask if it's likely okay or not.
Answer: If we go with the 2 hour rule, then you have about an hour to get it back up to a safe temperature.
So either turn the crockpot on high 'til you get it back over 140°F, or remove some of the broth and use another method to heat it and then re-combine the two.
Comment: Personally, I like going with a method mentioned on Good Eats -- get your liquid boiling, then add the chicken (so we kill off stuff that's on the outside, then reduce the heat so you maintain the desired finished temperature.  This allows you to come back in 2 to 6 hours, and the chicken's at the desired doneness.

Another crockpot error


What is the best way of transferring money from American to Canadian bank?

Question: I am a Canadian that will be working in US for some time. I will still have Canadian bills to pay, so I would need to regularly transfer US dollars from some US bank to my Canadian bank account in $CAD. What is the least expensive and easy way of doing this?
Answer: We've been in this situation for about 10 years now.  We don't have to send money back to Canada very often, but when we do, we typically just write a US$ check/cheque and send it to a relative back home to cash for us.  We've found that the Canadian banks are much more familiar with US currency than vice versa, and typically have better exchange rates than many of the other options.  That said, we haven't done an exhaustive search for the best deal.
If you haven't left Canada yet, you might consider opening up a US funds account at the same bank as your Canadian funds account if the bank will allow you to transfer money between the accounts.  I haven't priced out that option, so I don't know what the exchange rate would look like there.
Also, you didn't ask about this, but if you have any RRSP accounts in Canada, make sure they're with a broker that is licensed to accept trades from US-based customers.  Otherwise, you won't be able to move your money around to different investments within the RRSP.
Once you're resident in the US, you will no longer be able to open any new accounts in Canada, but you will be able to maintain the ones you already have.
Answer: The easiest and least expensive way of doing this, similar to the answer from Randy Coulman, is to write a check and deposit it into the Canadian Institution. Since this transfer is between accounts you own the easiest thing to do is to do a deposit by mail.
Contact your current institution on where you would need to mail your deposit to. You can then write yourself a check on the US bank and mail it to the Canadian bank; be sure to write "For Deposit Only" along with your account number (and Branch Number for Canada) on the back. This is the slowest, but cheapest method.
An alternative option is to use Wire Transfers, but they can be very costly (you'll usually incur a fee when sending and when receiving). I only recommend them when you need the money in the account fast (they are usually settled within an hour).
Answer:
I posted this on another question, but Royal bank has a no-fee-per-transfer service, You set up an account with their american counterpart and can then transfer back and forth as much as you want. There is a small fee if you keep very little money in the account.
http://www.rbcroyalbank.com/usbanking/cross-border-transfer.html
RBC's rates are consistently better than another option: xe.com. Even with the monthly fee RBC's rates are sufficiently better than xe.com that the RBC is cheaper overall (depending on how much you transfer).


Steps after SQL Injection detected

Question: I've come across SQL injection vulnerabilities on my companies ecommerce page. It was fairly poorly put together. I believe I have prevented future attempts however we are getting calls about fraudulent credit card charges on our site and others. This leads me to believe that someone was able to get a list of our credit card numbers. What doesn't make sense is that we don't store that information and we use Authorize.net for the transaction. If someone was able to get the CC#s, what should I do next? Inform ALL of our customers that someone broken into our system and stole their information? I have a feeling that will be bad for business.
Comment: Are you sure someone wasnt just using stolen credit cards at your store?  Thats pretty common.  If you dont store the credit card number... how do you think someone got them?  Are you sure you arent storing them someplace... in session information, for example?
Comment: @GrandmasterB if I had to guess they read grabbed the database logs and executed attacks that way, at least that is what I would do if other routes failed.
Answer: It could shut your business down.
If you do not store the card details, then identify how there could be a leak - quickly.
[I believe they are allowed to fine you upto $100,000 per incident if you fail to notify within 24 hours of discovery.]
If you find a leak, then do not notify customers, notify the credit card companies, they require you to do this and failure to do so can land you in very hot water in deed.  Expect to be required to be audited at a minimum, you could be heavily fined as a company.

US VISA instructions on this issue
Mastercard contact: firstname.lastname@example.com
American Express information
Answer: If you are certain that the card numbers have been leaked, no matter who is at fault, it would be in your best interest to inform everyone affected (The appropriate law officials and credit card companies too). Giving them advance warning now will look better than them getting ripped off by some thief and then finding out how their card number got stolen.
Answer: Document everything you've discovered about this breach. Back up the necessary files. Inform your management and get the FBI involved -- if you believe there has been a theft of cc#s.
Good luck!
KM
Answer: Well first and foremost if they captured the CC#'s you are in more trouble than you could ever imagine as that is against the law, at least in the US (apologies if you are not in the US).  Authorize.net isn't really on the hook here as it was the poor coding of your web application, that being said what does the contract with Authorize.net state?  Ideally there is no liability on your side and they take full responsibility.  Worst case is you have to bite the bullet and risk law suits.
Comment: We have an onsite lawyer. I just started here a week ago to do some basic website upgrades and then I started to notice all kinds of crazy things happening. Spam bots and SQL injection vulnerabilities. Now this... I don't know who wrote the original code. I believe it is an e-commerce CMS.
Comment: Regardless of the individual country law, the credit card handling will go through VISA/Mastercard most likely and they will fine/sue the pants off the company for losses.  If they are really unable to get money via the law in a given jurisdiction (not common), then they would simply ban the company from accepting any more credit card transactions - which is not much better than being shut down in this age.

Steps after SQL Injection detected


Recovering mail in Outlook

Question: After importing an old backup, can I still recover more recent emails?
Answer: Yes, you can open again the file (ie: Outlook. pst ) It should take the new ones.
Not import, but open in an special way: Go to File menu, Open, Outlook Data File. You should have just copied the pst file from the folder, not "exported" from your other Outlook.

Recovering mail in Outlook


Looking for small distro (to be installed automatically, with g++ and javac)

Question: I'm looking for Linux distribution only with command line and I need in it only g++, javac, python. I found Damn Small Linux but it doesn't have g++ and javac. It should have it out of the box because Linux will be installed by a script in virtual machine (qemu KVM). An easy way to prepare my Linux would be as much appreciated as Linux itself. The distribution should be as small as possible.
Answer: I would use whatever distro you are most familiar with administering (preferably what is on the host system to make tooling easy). You don't need a completely separate distro to do this, all you need is a package set and install script to install your current / preferred distro to a target file system (in a loopback file to create a drive image). This will get you exactly the set of tools you need and no more with little fuss and a lower learning curve than automating the install of some other distro.
If you state the distro of choice and ask a specific question I'm sure somebody here can be helpful with the details.
Comment: I was going to suggest this. Keeping with a familiar distro is easier as you're already familiar with the environment. Strip it down to your liking, replacing window managers (in your case, removing them) and installing exactly what you want.
Answer: Have a look at ArchivistaVM, it is only about 100 MByte (with Xorg + Firefox), or 72 MByte without GUI:
http://www.archivista.ch/en/pages/support/download.php
Zip-File without GUI (same password) https://www.archivista.ch/avtest5.zip
It works completely in RAM, startup time is about 15 or 20 seconds, there is a cluster mode (drdb), but at this time, the documentation is not yet fully available in English.
Answer: Fedora with the AOS kickstart. g++ and javac/gcj can be installed via yum after, or you can modify the kickstart file to include them in the install.
Answer: Distros like Archlinux, Gentoo or Slackware would get you where you want, but you'll probably need to get your hands dirty a bit.


Are junk bonds advisable to be inside a bond portfolio that has the objective of generating stable income for a retiree?

Question: Suppose a person has retired. He would like to construct a bond portfolio that generates stable income for his remaining days. Is it advisable to include junk bonds in the bond portfolio for that extra yield? Are there rules of thumb in the construction of such a bond portfolio in personal finance?
Comment: There is a reason they are called junk bonds. That isn't investing, it's speculating.
Comment: Risk-free government bonds are appropriate if they provide the necessary rate of return. If they don't, you have to take on additional risk.
Comment: There is a huge space between government bonds and junk bonds. Pick something at the appropriate level of risk/return tradeoff. It may not be possible to hit the balance point you want with nothing but bonds.
Comment: No, he means there are other bonds with lower return than junk, but with lower risk (and higher return and higher risk than government bonds). For example. A+ rated corporate bonds.
Comment: So, should the bond income portfolio strictly contain only risk-free government bonds?
Comment: @Pete Becker, in today's context, few government bonds provide sufficient yield. Thanks very much to financial repression by the central bankers in U.S, Europe and Japan.
Comment: @keshlam, do you mean using dividends from stocks?
Answer: I let someone else pick and chose which junk bonds to buy and which to sell. So instead of holding individual bonds in my portfolio I hold an ETF that is managed by a man with a PHD and which buys junk bonds.
I get a yearly 15.5% ROI, paid monthly.
Buy and hold and you can get a good return for the rest of your life. It is only speculation when you sell.
Answer: Junk Bonds (aka High Yield bonds) are typically those bonds from issues with credit ratings below BBB-. Not all such companies are big risks. They are just less financially sound than other, higher rated, companies.
If you are not comfortable doing the analysis yourself, you should consider investing in a mutual fund, ETF, or unit trust that invests in high yield bonds. You get access to "better quality" issues because a huge amount of the debt markets goes to the institutional channels, not to the retail markets.
High yield (junk) bonds can make up a part of your portfolio, and are a good source of regular income. As always, you should diversify and not have everything you own in one asset class. There are no real rules of thumb for asset allocation -- it all depends on your risk tolerance, goals, time horizon, and needs. If you don't trust yourself to make wise decisions, consult with a professional whom you trust.
Comment: Investopedia tells me that 'junk' starts at bonds graded BB.
Comment: @JackSwayzeSr thanks for the comment. I updated my answer to avoid the distraction of a possible debate :)
Answer: Corporate bonds have gotten very complicated in the last 20 years to the point where individual investors are at significant disadvantages when lending money. Subordinated debentures, covenants, long maturities with short call features, opaque credit analysis, etc. Interest rates are so low now that investors (individual & professionals) are forced further out the risk & maturity spectrum for yield. It's a very crowded and busy street.....stay out of the traffic. Really you are better off owning a low cost bond fund that emulates the Barclays Corp/Gov index, or similar. That said, junk bonds may be useful to you if you can tolerate losing money when companies default....you've got to look in the mirror. Choose a fund that is diverse, Treasuries, agencies, corps both high and low.....and don't go for the highest yield.


Why is 口説く read as くどく?

Question: There's okurigana at the end but for the kanji 口 used onyomi reading "ku" instead of "kuchi"
Answer: 大辞泉 dictionary lists this as possibly being ateji.
The verb くどく probably shares its origin with the mimetic word くどくど (repetitively, at great length, etc.). Both would have existed prior to being written.
The idea is that the kanji 口 and 説 were then chosen as a way to represent the existing word, ignoring how one would read them if the idea was to make a word from 口 and 説 from scratch.
This is not unusual, and represents a source of many exceptional readings.
The dictionary isn't absolute in its assessment though, leaving open the possibility of some other origin of the orthography.
Comment: Well 口説く may be 当て字, but く for 口 is just a on-reading [呉音](https://dictionary.goo.ne.jp/word/kanji/%E5%8F%A3/#jn-71497). Others listed: 口調(kucho)、口伝(kuden)、異口同音(iku-do-on)
Comment: @sundowner Yes, the questioner indicated they were aware of the onyomi く, so I didn't mention it.
Comment: @Leebo Sorry, I'm new and I don't know what ateji is. So just to clarify, the idea is that the word already existed with its own reading of くどく and they put 2 kanji together and since the reading already exists they didn't replace it with くちどく?
Comment: @Kanpie yes, although calling くどく a "reading" before it had any associated kanji is a little strange. It was just a word. If you search here for ateji, there are many related questions.
Comment: @Leebo If you have an opportunity, can u give me a link to the page with ateji and its patterns explained please?

Why is 口説く read as くどく?


How can I darken a bedroom yet let air in as much as possible?

Question: Of course one could use a vent but this is not feasible for me. Is there a low-tech solution, like some kind of a specific curtain?
I could also cover my window with an opaque board, letting some space but this lowers dramatically the quality of the air (mainly CO2 wise).
Comment: I guess something like standard tiling window blinds let in too much light?  Dark colored blinds would let in less light than the typical white blinds.
Comment: Do you have the legal right to modify the building?
Answer: 3 layers of pegboard (pierced hardboard), internal surfaces painted black, with the middle layer offset, and spacers between the layers. This should provide little or no straight path for light, but allow ventilation.
Comment: Paint the peg board black to avoid light reflection. Also, a small computer fan or two  mounted on the inner board to draw air through the smaller holes that may not "breath naturally" all that well.
Answer: Consider a combination of options:

Awning over the window.  This keeps sunlight from striking the window at least at mid day.  The wider the awning is, the more time it shades the window.
Exterior bamboo rollup blind.  This will block about 90% of the light.  If you mount it so that it stands a few inches out from the wall, it won't impede the air much at all.
Miniblinds.  The cellular ones block too much air flow.  Get the blinds is as dark a colour as you can.  (Dark blue?)  In use angle the blinds so that light must reflect upward to get in.  This still allows good airflow, but no direct light at all.
Double drapes.  You can get nested curtain rods, with the inner set being about 2" from the wall, and the outer set about 4".  Traditionally they are used with sheers on the inner layer to let in light and air, but still give privacy, and a heavier drape used at night in winter and made for reducing drafts.  (Good windows are a recent invention)   But there is no reason you couldn't use some breathable fabric that was dark.
Screen.  A folding screen that stands a foot from the window with the back side painted flat black, or if you can afford it, vanta black.

Light reduction is multiplicative.  But the human eye is sensitive to a huge variation in light.  Normal office lighting is about 1/10,000 that of sunlight.
Have you considered a sleeping mask?
Comment: Vanta Black isn't commercially available yet. (And probably never will; that stuff is annoying to work with.)
Comment: Vanta black is new for me. Thanks for this! And a mask (although uncomfortable) is a perfect solution.
Answer: A black painted louvre, if you still get too much light, add another behind it with the slats slanted the other way.
Answer: Of course you could just roll down the shutters letting just the air gaps open, just like . Won't be vanta-black but it's really effective.
Comment: Not enough air flow. I didn't measure how CO2 levels drop but can feel it.


Rails 3 returning a HTTP 406 Not Acceptable?

Question: I have the following controller code:
  def create
    @admin = Admin.new(params[:admin])
    respond_to do |format|
      if @admin.save
        redirect_to(@admin, :notice => 'Admin was successfully created.')
      else
        render :action => "new"
      end
    end
  end

  def update
    @admin = Admin.find(params[:id])
    respond_to do |format|
      if @admin.update_attributes(params[:admin])
        redirect_to(admin_admins_path, :notice => 'Admin was successfully updated.')
      else
        render :action => "edit"
      end
    end
  end

and the following routes:
           admin_admins GET    /admin/admins(.:format)            {:action=>"index", :controller=>"admin/admins"}
           admin_admins POST   /admin/admins(.:format)            {:action=>"create", :controller=>"admin/admins"}
        new_admin_admin GET    /admin/admins/new(.:format)        {:action=>"new", :controller=>"admin/admins"}
       edit_admin_admin GET    /admin/admins/:id/edit(.:format)   {:action=>"edit", :controller=>"admin/admins"}
            admin_admin GET    /admin/admins/:id(.:format)        {:action=>"show", :controller=>"admin/admins"}
            admin_admin PUT    /admin/admins/:id(.:format)        {:action=>"update", :controller=>"admin/admins"}
            admin_admin DELETE /admin/admins/:id(.:format)        {:action=>"destroy", :controller=>"admin/admins"}

Now, aside from the slightly whacky naming - the redirects always result in a 406 Not acceptable.  What could be wrong?
Answer: Remove respond_to do |format| blocks. Because you are not specifying to what format are you responding, e.g. format.html { #your code here } .
Check documentation of respond_to how to use it properly.
Answer: I had a similar error, my controller was only responding to JSON. I needed it to respond to HTML also for the tests to work (which only makes sense):
class AdsController < ApplicationController
  respond_to :json, :html

I received the error when trying to do: assert_redirected_to ad_url(ad)
Comment: This will only fix the problem if you use in conjunction with `respond_with @obj`. Otherwise, specifying `respond_to` in the controller is noop.
Comment: @maletor, not correct. 406 errors are generated regardless of whether `respond_with` is used or not.
Answer: I started having this issue after a deploy in production, even tough everything was working fine in development.
After some 15 minutes of wasted time, I finally found out that I had forgotten to commit some of the view files (like index.html.erb).
Using tail -f log/production.log on the server revealed: FATAL -- : ActionController::UnknownFormat (SomeController#index is missing a template for this request format and variant.
In development the error didn't happen because, obviously, the view file was present.


Personal training and fitness websites

Question: What are the best personal training websites? I am looking for site that will provide me with all of the information I would get from working with a personal trainer, such as exercise programs, nutrition recommendations, etc.
Comment: Personal trainer for: running, walking, weight-lifting? Maybe a personal skiing trainer? Your particular goals are very important in answering this question... _Hint: Add your goals to your question!_
Comment: I strongly recommend you add some specifications for the answers, because in it's current shape it will only attract one-liner answers! So what kind of exercise are you looking for, what's the goal you want to achieve, should it have an app as well, what is so great about the webapp, do they actually use it or just found it through Google?
Answer: A good jumpstart would be to register at this site and download the workout logs here. This is all about THT Volume Cycle and HIT training — for maximizing strength and muscle growth. The workout logs have embedded links that show how to execute each exercise for each body part. It also tells you how many sets you should do, how many minutes you should rest, and how many weeks you should keep exercising before cycling from THT to HIT training.  You'll also be receiving additional "must-know" information/updates while training through email.
A few sample infos that I got are:

What To Do In Between Sets To Maximize Growth
Massive Muscle Gains: Want 12lbs Of Muscle This Year?

A whole lot more will be sent to you from time to time.
Comment: This doesn't explain us what it does, why its any good and frankly not even the name of the site!
Answer: There are many variations and skill levels of personal trainers.  Some are vanilla gym guides, showing the proper use of equipment and how to set up a standard workout routine.  Others are available for specific sports and/or goals and/or recovery.  I would recommend listing what it is you're trying to achieve, how much time you have available and how much money you're willing to spend, and then search local gyms or recommendations from friends and then search the web for local ones.
I've found that the best way to find one is through observing them train others (at your gym) and then picking the one who provides the type of interaction and results you want.  Personal training has a lot to do with good personality match and then skill level... it's not just direction but motivation that they provide.

Personal training and fitness websites


Mint leaves turning brown

Question: I started growing plants since covid - so a novice :) I noticed that the leaves from the mint plant were turning rusty brown. Initially thought that it was just regular life cycle, but now I'm noticing them on the other leaves as well. Please help!
Comment: Are you growing the mint indoors or outside?
Comment: @Bamboo - indoors under grow lights
Answer: As you are growing this indoors, that makes it more likely the plant has a spider mite infestation, which is what it looks like rather than Mint Rust (which is the fungal disease). Spider mites on plants indoors are fairly common because the air is much drier and hotter than outside, and if you are using grow lights, that would make it an even more hospitable environment for them. All the time it's growing inside, mist it frequently to try to keep the humidity up, after you have taken steps to clear the infestation.
Because this is an edible plant, you are restricted in terms of pesticide treatments - spraying hard with water will clear many of them, but will need to be repeated frequently. Otherwise use a plant based insecticide, such as one based on pyrethrum or rosemary oil - most insecticides which are intended for use on edible plants should be fine. Make sure you spray the whole plant, including stems and backs of leaves. Further info here https://dengarden.com/gardening/Mint-Pests
Check all your other houseplants - spider mites are rarely only on one plant indoors, unless it's in a room on its own.
Comment: thank you! Yes I did find spider mites under the leaves :`(
Answer: The more you pick the leaves, the fresher your leaves will be on the mint. Yellow leaves is either a sign of lack of sunlight, water or other nutrients. Or may be they have just aged. Better pick them regularly and enjoy fresh. Or dry them to use later or make some spicy mint powder (indian way) that can be used as a condiment or sprinkled & eaten on toast.
Comment: thanks! so it's not a fungal infection?

Mint leaves turning brown


Can Oracle be installed on Windows without being an administrator?

Question: Can the oracle software be installed on windows without having administrator privileges?
Comment: I ask because this was a top rated question on the Oracle Database proposal.
Comment: Does that make it a top rated question for this site tho? I'm gonna go with yes for right now.
Answer: No, but there are workarounds
One workaround is to run a virtual machine that has Oracle and only Oracle installed. this has the significant benefit of insuring that the many kernel tweaks required of oracle are constrained within one instance.
Consider trying deployment within: VMWare Thinapp, VMWare Player (maybe), and I believe VirtualBox offers a user-land install, based on the documentation here.
Comment: It does in my experience on Windows 7
Answer: Given that Oracle installation requires registry edits, service installations - I would say no.


Given a radius and velocity calculate position of an aircraft banking to make a turn in three dimensional space

Question: Suppose an aircraft is moving at a certain fixed altitude above the ground. It follows a path defined by latitude and longitude. Now if we want to define the position of an aircraft at any point in the air, three variables are required for example X for latitude, Y for longitude and Z for the altitude. Suppose an aircraft flies and reach a certain fixed altitude Z, it then follows a route defined by X and Y. Now suppose that at any stage during the flight the aircraft decides to take a turn.The aircraft does a maneuvre in such a way that it turns either to the left or right and increases or decreases it's altitude in the same time. Assuming knowing the speed and the current three Dimensional position of the aircraft, how can the future position of the aircraft after a known time t can be predicted? Also assume that other aircraft related constant parameters are also known like radius of the turn, Bank angle etc
Comment: In keeping with the comment by @Vintage, it would be helpful if you could explain why you have asked the question - I.e. the circumstances that let you to it and what you want an answer to achieve. As it stands it quite difficult to interpret and therefore answer.
Comment: Two comments: 1.) Not really sure what the intent of the question is; 2.) You use x,y and z, which implies a Cartesian coordinate system; but latitude and longitude are parts of a spherical coordinate system.
Comment: A set of coordinates defines a position, not a course!
Comment: A bit of clarification to my question. Suppose an object is moving on a circular path in three dimensional space in cartesian coordinate system. If the initial position of the object is known, how can the position of the object can be located after time t in terms of X,Y,Z coordinates. Assuming we know the speed of the object and the radius of the circular path.
Comment: @Abdul: now that's a much easier question to answer. In fact, consider just editing the question and replacing what you had written with the text of your comment. But also please take a look at http://physics.stackexchange.com/questions/10777/position-in-circular-motion and see whether it tells you what you want to know.
Answer: I assume you are going to program this. First you need to write the vector differential equations of motion. The derivative of position is velocity, and the derivative of velocity is acceleration. Acceleration is force divided by mass. Force is the sum of a number of components, mainly gravity, lift, drag, and thrust.
Then you just integrate those with any ODE solver you like. The simplest is Euler. If you want more accuracy, you can use Runge-Kutta. You probably don't need a stiff solver such as Gear or Adams-Moulton.
So if the motion of the aircraft is along a straight line with wings level at constant speed, then the lift vector is equal and opposite to the gravity force vector.
The way you turn it is to bank the wings to an angle. For example, if you bank the wings 45 degrees to the left, that tilts the lift vector 45 degrees to the left, so it's vertical component is .707 of what it was, and .707 of it is directed to the left. The sideways force causes the path to be a circular arc. The reduced vertical force causes the aircraft to start descending.
To compensate for that tendency to descend, the pilot increases the magnitude of the lift vector by adding back pressure on the control yoke.
You'll notice that you feel a little heavier in the turn.
The increased lift results in increased drag, so the pilot increases engine power to maintain speed.
Then when the aircraft has travelled far enough around the circular arc to be headed in the desired direction, the pilot levels the wings, releases the back pressue, and reduces the engine power. If he doesn't, the aircraft will start to climb.
You'll notice this the next time you fly.
That's how turning works. Now I'll tell you how straight flight works.
The lift and drag you get from the wing depends on two things, speed and angle of attack.
If you reduce speed, but want to stay in level flight, you need more angle of attack to get the same lift. So the way a pilot slows down a plane is to reduce power and then gradually pull the nose up by applying back pressure on the yoke.
Since it would be tiring to continue to apply back pressure when flying slowly, the pilot has a "third hand", the trim wheel. Rolling that wheel backward applies back pressure on the yoke so the pilot doesn't have to hold it.
In fact, the primary speed control of the airplane is the trim wheel.
The power doesn't actually control speed, it controls whether the aircraft ascends or descends at the speed it is travelling.
One last point is balance. If you take a plane on the ground, and place a jack under each wing at the center of lift and hoist it up, its nose will fall toward the ground.
It's center of gravity is forward of the center of lift.
So when it's flying, as the main wing is pushing up, the tail is pushing down.
The moment between the two is what keeps the nose from dropping.
This is very important for safety, because it stabilizes the speed.
If the speed decreases, that moment decreases, and the nose drops, causing the aircraft to start to go "downhill".
Since it is going downhill, it picks up speed.
Conversely if it's speed increases, it starts to go uphill, causing its speed to decrease.
If the aircraft is loaded too far aft, its speed and its up/down directional stability is lost.
In fact, it is possible to get nosed up, and then go into a backslide all the way to the ground!
Answer: This problem cannot be solved, because the airplane has all sorts of flaps that control the lift, so even if you know X(t) and Y(t), so you know the horizontal speed of all the turns, you don't know the lift or the engine thrust used, so you can't find the height.
It is an ill posed problem, in either formulation.
Comment: It's reasonable to assume no change of flaps in the turn & negligible aileron drag. Then for a given bank angle, you still need to know 1) how much additional lift is pulled (which affects drag), and 2) how much additional thrust is applied. Then it's straightforward to determine the path.
Comment: @MikeDunlavey: I see, this does work, but I can't imagine it's a sensible approximation. But then the OP should say so, and explain what this problem is about.


Is there a public API for Stack Overflow?

Question: I was just trying to find out if there was a public API for the Stack Overflow site. I want to know so that I could maybe use it for whatever it would let me use it for (like web-service or non browser application that can access Stack Overflow). I have a few (specific) ideas but I don't want anybody to get the jump on me before I have a chance to implement one of them ;). I know that is a little silly since there are a limited number of things that such a thing could be used for. It's not about $$ or copyright* or anything like that; I just want to do it my way first if possible. Anyhow I tried googling this and you can imagine how many results you get for "StackOverflow public api".
Comment: there are browser add-ons so there must be an api...
Comment: Ok so where can I find documentation for it? Just because there is an API does not mean that it is "public". Of course an API exists, i was just wondering if it was accessible and open.
Answer: There is an API available.
You can read about the API, develop and submit your own Apps over on Stack Apps which is linked in the footer of each site.
Here is a link to the API Documentaion
Comment: Thanks thats exactly what I wanted to know. Too bad it's read-only though. It would be awesome to have the full blown StackOverflow in my pocket. However I suppose that might make getting the ads fairly complicated for both the users (of the API) and StackOverflow. So then it couldn't be a free api. Devs would need to pay for part of it in that case. Hows that for an idea?
Comment: Yeah the link is there. Guess I missed it. Sorry.
Comment: @ettey, a paid write access API could be a good idea.
Comment: Is there an R package for interfacing the API from within R?


(RDO Mod) How do you figure out how good a relationship with an NPC is/how to improve a relationship?

Question: In TES: Skyrim (Special Edition) with the Relationship Dialogue Overhaul mod, how do you figure out how well a relationship is with an NPC? I am trying to marry Lydia with the RDO mod but I do not know how well she is into my character. If I need to, how do I improve my relationship with her using the RDO mod?
Answer: Without console commands, the only way to see an NPCs disposition toward you is through their dialogue. Most NPCs begin with a score of 0, an acquaintance, and increase/decrease based on your dialogue choices. The console command to set an NPC to "like" you is getrelationshiprank player 4. You can then set them to be married to you by using the command addtofaction 19809 1. The command console is only available on PC.
Howver, with the RDO mod, NPCs will tend to use the friendlier dialogue options towards you if they are friendly with you. Read the dialogue options and keep picking what you think is best.
RDO also provides an alternative to dialogue options through its mod configuration menu. The menu is available if you are using SkyUI. From the MCM menu, you can alter an NPCs disposition or relationship with you, including making someone your spouse.
Comment: Is there any alternative to SkyUI's MCM menu because SKSE is not out yet and SkyUI is not in development for SSE?
Comment: I don't think so. SKSE will be a while before release and SkyUI will not be getting a SSE edition.
Comment: Lydia for me only has basic dialogue choices that wouldn't increase her relationship with me. Do I just bring her with me on quests to increase her relationship without console commands?
Comment: I forgot to ask, but are you wearing the amulet of Mara? That is required for marriage options in game. Also, Lydia used to be bugged and not able to be married without console commands. That was fixed in a patch but I do not know if it was reintroduced in other patches due to further bugs.
Comment: I have it, but I unequipped it. I'll equip it and talk to her occasionally.


Can i use the cd/dvd from an older mac mini as a cd/dvd for a newer one via a thunderbolt cable?

Question: I am not a power user of macs but i have an early mac mini with a dvd drive and a 2011 mini without a dvd drive, and wondered if i can connect the 2 to use the older mini as an external dvd drive and possibly storage for time machine?
Also i have put in an ssd into my 2011 mini and want to put on a fresh copy of the snowleopard o/s [which i have] onto the ssd using - if i can - the older mini's dvd to do so.
Any help would be appricated
Comment: Which version of macOS/OSX are you running on the Mac with the drive?
Comment: I'm running 10.6.8 on the mini with  cd drive and now have  10.13.6 in the new ssd on the 2011 mini
Answer: The 2011 Mac mini can run OS X 10.7 through OS X 10.13.6, therefore you should not be able to install Snow Leopard. You should want to install 10.13.6 in a APFS container since APFS was designed for SSDs.
Comment: I now have 10.13.6 on the 2011 mini. My first mini with the cd drive is a 1.66 intel core duo with 10.6.8 on it. Can I use the first one as a cd drive for  the 2011 mini?
Comment: Based on the title of your question, the answer is no, because a 2006 mac mini does not have thunderbolt.


What kind melanin do fair or light skinned black or mixed people have, eumelanin of pheomelanin?

Question: I am doing a study on melanin and conductivity but I cannot find the answer to this question anywhere. Do light complected black or biracial people have eumelanin or pheomelanin? or both?
Comment: Race is not a biological construct, which is why asking this question from a racial perspective is not productive. All major variants associated with pigmentation (including the production of eumelanin and pheomelanin) had evolved a very long time ago and were selected upon as humans migrated from Africa. People of African descent, being the most genetically diverse group of humans on the planet, vary greatly in pigmentation, because they represent that initial pool of variants https://science.sciencemag.org/content/358/6365/eaan8433
Answer: Pheomelanin is associated with paler skin, while eumelanin predomominates in people with darker skin — this is influenced by alleles of the MC1R gene Swope and Abdel-Malek, 2018, NIH article on MC1R.


How to pass vuejs element instance by reference

Question: Ok it looks like its a really simple question, but i can't figure it out. I have a vuejs project in which i have this component code:

     <v-chip @click="chip_active(// pass the reference //)"
     color="#E0E0E0" class="white--text"
     v-for="single_interest in interest" :key="single_interest">
     {{ single_interest }}
     </v-chip>

So in the click method i need to change the property color of one single instance of the chip element (the one clicked), not the hole v-for chips.
To do this i thought of passing the chip instance reference and change the property color directly from the method, the problem is that i don't know how to do this on vuejs.
Anyone who can help me with this?
Thanks!
Answer: So i would approach this like this, keeps the concerns more separate

on each of the chips, have a selected that is false by default
add an @click=setSelected(chip)
in your setSelected, set the value of the one selected to be true and the others to be false

If you don't want to set a value on the chips you could also keep a completely separate variable that is selectedChip that holds the value of the selected chip.  You setSelected would then change the value of selectedChip.  You would also need to pass selectedChip into your loop so that you can handle the display if the current chip is selected
Comment: Hey, do you know how to access the property list of an element using $event.target, i could not find this anywhere.
Comment: Hey, any chance that you could setup a fiddle with specifically what you are running into?  What specific thing is causing you to need to access the target?


How do you live-migrate Hyper-V to Azure?

Question: I have a new install of Windows Server 2012 with the Hyper-V role setup and a couple VMs running along fat, dumb, and happy. I want to play with Azure hosting for VMs for a couple of stand-alone boxes. Is there anything special that I need to wire up to be able to live-migrate to Azure? I have the 90-day Azure trial account right now. Any special plumbing required? I have not found a lot of documentation about this yet. Everything I found points to manually copying the VHDs via command line and the Azure 2012 SDK.
Comment: I thought that was Microsoft's Big new Thing (tm) with being able to live-migrate without shared storage as long as the Hyper-V host was Server 2012. In one of the Server 2012 Launch videos they showed migration to Azure but never touched on the plumbing to make it work.
Comment: Hmmm... I'm pretty sure that LiveMigration requires shared storage so unless your local Hyper-V server is sharing the same storage device with your Azure trial I don't see how this would be possible... but I'm curious to see what answers are illicited.
Comment: Gotcha. Maybe it is possible in Server 2012.
Comment: Shared nothing live migrations do work within Hyper-V environments in the same AD. Azure does run Hyper-V on the back end, but those nodes are not joined to your AD so you cannot live migrate to them.
Answer: There is no path to live migrate a VM to Windows Azure. Moving a VM to Azure requires shutting down the VM.


Changing constructor in a custom VS 2013 template

Question: I'm working on creating a VS2013 C# project template for our "standard operations" jobs.  These are discrete executables executed by a third-party scheduler.  They have common functions within that framework that I'm building into separate libraries (a common engine for the scheduler, a logging component, and a command-line parser).  Each project will have two class files by default: the program executor (program.cs) and the processor, which will contain the business logic.  Other classes can be created by the developer as needed.  I want the processor to be independent of the executor to make it more portable (maybe moving to a new scheduler that operates on libraries versus executables, converting the project to a form, etc.)
The executor creates the references to the engine and logger, so it can use the functionality of those object directly, and also passes them into the processor.
Engine engine = new Engine();
Logger log = new Logger(engine.ProcessPath, engine.AppName);

Processor proc = new Processor(engine, log);

The default constructor takes those references and assigns them to local members:
private Logger log;
private Engine engine;

public Processor(Engine inEngine, Logger inLog)
{
    log = inLog;
    engine = inEngine;
}

What I would like to do is template the naming of the processor class.  I know I can do that by using the default place holders for the class and editing the vstemplate, so
class $safeprojectname$Processor

Results in a class name of the project name with 'Processor' appended, but I can't find a way to rename the constructor to match.  The whole point of this is to again provided portability of the business layer, so the classes can be moved around with out losing the context of the business process.
So, here is the question: is there a way to change the constructor name in a template project?
Also, at the back of my mind is a tickle suggesting there is a better way to go about this whole thing, but I can't place my finger on it.  I'm open to alternatives.
Answer: You can use the same approach to rename the constructor, e.g.
public $safeprojectname$Processor(Engine inEngine, Logger inLog)
{
    log = inLog;
    engine = inEngine;
}


how do I produce a time lapse visual animation like this famous video?

Question:

I want to create something of that similar effect...I don't know what this style is called, I don't know what tool to use, please help me.
Answer: R (the letter R) is free software environment for statistical computing and graphics.  It can be extended by means of packages that the R-core team and team and community create.  For creating a video such as the above, you would want the data that describes the date of a nuclear event, the yield of the event, some metric of its decay function (perhaps the half-life of some particular isotope present in the fallout of the event), the geolocation of the event, and the country responsible for the event.  You could then feed this data into a package such as animation combined with rworldmap.
R is a great way to bring data to life, visually.  With the above, you can create animated GIFs, active HTML pages, or full-fledged video files that can be further integrated into digital production environments.


How can I trap all mouse events on a control?

Question: I need to capture all mouse events on a .NET's WebBrowser, process them and prevent the WebBrowser from getting them. Is there any way to achieve this? I wonder if there is any way I can handle mouse events if the control is disabled.
Comment: If you are using WPF, you could lay a transparent canvas over the top of the WebBrowser control and simply catch all events with the Canvas...Winforms is a different story, though.
Comment: Duplicate? http://stackoverflow.com/questions/3268619/catching-a-contained-controls-mouse-events-in-a-usercontrol
Comment: this reads a bit weird suely you would ignore them? Why go through the trouble if trapping events if you have no real desire of doing anything with them? Just ignore them???
Comment: I'll process them myself. I need to customize WebBrowser's default functionality.
Answer: You'll have to override WndProc() to intercept the mouse messages.  Like this:
using System;
using System.Windows.Forms;

class MyBrowser : WebBrowser {
    protected override void WndProc(ref Message m) {
        if (m.Msg >= 0x200 && m.Msg <= 0x20a) {
            // Handle mouse messages
            //...
        }
        else base.WndProc(ref m);
    }
}

Comment: a (non exhaustive) list of windows messages can be found here http://www.autohotkey.com/docs/misc/SendMessageList.htm
Answer: There IS a solution to this. You need to capture the mouse events that are associated with the Document object that is associated with the webBrowser control.
After the DocumentCompleted event occurs, and inside you DocumentCompleted event handler, do the following:
myWebBrowser.Document.MouseDown += new HtmlElementEventHandler(myMouseDown);

and have the related handler:
void myMouseDown(object sender, HtmlElementEventArgs e)

{
    your code to handle the mouse event... such as ...

            if (e.MouseButtonsPressed == MouseButtons.Right)
            {
            }
}


Automatically restart simple Linux daemon (polipo) when it dies

Question: I have a polipo proxy running on Ubuntu. It's set to start automatically on boot, but occasionally it just dies. What's the simplest way to have it automatically restarted whenever it exits unexpectedly?
Answer: You can use init and upstart for this. For latest Ubuntu you will need to use upstart.
man inittab
man upstart

Comment: Thanks. I tried adding an upstart script, but after spending an hour on this it just wouldn't start. Typical Linux - nothing ever "just works". *sigh*
Comment: Can you paste your script into your question? This community is better at technical stuff...
Comment: Sorry, I've given up and deleted the script in disgust.Have a +1, anyway!
Answer: See: Bug #505391 in polipo (Ubuntu): "upstart config for polipo"


"Should have been us" or "Should have been we"?

Question: I understand that "have been" is a form of the linking verb "to be", so it can only take a predicate nominative. But saying "It should've been us" sounds better.
Answer: According to the rules, it should be "It should have been we." because, as you noted correctly, "to be" is a linking verb.  This has been discussed in many forums everywhere on the internet.  Just google "it is I vs. it is me".
However, "It should have been we" sounds wrong to the vast majority of people, so using that form is a bad idea.  If you do it, that will only distract your readers, and you don't want that.
You can either ignore the rule and say "It should have been us" (nobody will mind, and frankly, that form is eventually going to become the new right, because that's how languages evolve); or you can use a completely different wording.  For example, turn "It should have been we/us who were awarded the prize." into "We should have been awarded the prize." or "We were the only ones worthy of the prize.", and your problem is solved.
My personal advice: if you can say the same thing with fewer words, do it!