Looking for Robert Silverberg story about the dead being returned to life

Question: What is the name of an old Robert Silverberg story where there are colonies of people who have died, who don't interact well with the living. A curious journalist tries to get answers by infiltrating, is of course detected, and is killed so he can finally stop pestering them and fit in. I think there was an epigram from T.S. Eliot.
Answer: That is Robert Silverberg's novella "Born with the Dead", first published in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, April 1974, available at the Internet Archive. Here's a description from The Quasi-Official Robert Silverberg Web Site:

This story was written for a special Silverberg issue of F&SF and won the Nebula Award for best novella, 1975.
In the 1990s, doctors have discovered how to rekindle dead people, re-animating the bodies and minds. But the deads are different, aloof, unconcerned with the matters of warms — those still alive — and mostly keep to the Cold Towns. Jorge Klein finds that he cannot let go of his dead wife Sybille, and seeks her out obsessively, following her around the globe. This is just not done, but Jorge can't stop himself.
One interesting scene involves an African preserve set aside for vacationing deads, where they must leave the native animals alone and hunt instead genetically recreated extinct species — aurochs, ground sloth, quagga, passenger pigeon, dodo. Many aspects of the situation are explored, including the attitudes people of different cultures have towards death. Definitely one of the high points of Silverberg's career and the culmination of his intense and intimate writing of the 1970s.

The story is prefaced with this quotation from T. S. Eliot's poem "Little Gidding" (full text of poem available here):

And what the dead had no speech for, when living,
They can tell you, being dead: the communication
Of the dead is tongued with fire beyond the language of the living.

Damien Broderick wrote a sequel called "Quicken".
Comment: +1 | Personally, I think it was some of his finest work.
Comment: Sounds very interesting! Damn, now I have to read it :)


Can you critical hit while sprinting in Minecraft Java 1.9+?

Question: I have researched this and found many varying answers, can somebody please clarify. Is it possible to critical hit, after jumping, while in the air, while sprinting? Because some guides say to release the w key and then press it again. I'm not sure, thanks.
Comment: By 1.9+ Do you mean up until 1.18.2?
Answer: No, you cannot critical hit while moving faster than walking in Java Edition.
Minecraft Wiki [emphasis added]

The requirements for a melee critical hit are:

A player must be falling.
A player must not be on the ground.
A player must not be on a ladder or any type of vine.
A player must not be in water.
A player must not be affected by blindness.
A player must not be affected by Slow Falling.
A player must not be riding an entity.
A player must not be faster than walking (like flying or sprinting. [Java Edition only] )
A base attack must not be reduced to 84.8% damage or lower due to cooldown. [Java Edition only]
Comment: Okay, I looked into this, and it's inconsistent as hell. [In both](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IojuRULXtJc) (0:10 for fullspeed forwards crit) of [these videos](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8DZBho2-3Ns) I was able to crit the horse while sprinting - something that **should be impossible**. It's possible that instead there's a speed cap, somewhere, that alters a hit from a critical hit to a "strong" hit, but that wouldn't explain 0:10 in the first video, where I was not in range to get pushed back by the horse yet was sprinting and got a crit anyway.
Comment: Yep: [here's one I got at full speed](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=67JsSAt9120). I don't know what's going on, but the wiki isn't entirely correct in its statement.
Answer: Both answers are technically right. When sprinting (regardless of whether you jump or not), you instead perform a "strong attack" that deals a ton of additional knockback and almost as much damage as a critical hit (but not quite). Using a netherite sword, a critical hit brings a villager (with a base health of 20, or the same as a player) down to 8 points of health (so -12), whereas a sprint attack brings it to 12 points of health (-8). A sweeping attack also appeared to bring it to 12 health (-8), and a quick hit (as in rapidly clicking) seems to range anywhere from 1 to 8 damage based on how long you recharge (up to the max of 8 resulting in a sweeping attack).
Comment: "almost as much damage as a critical hit" - it's actually the same as a fully charged hit.
Comment: Yea, but doing a fully charged hit instead performs the sweeping blow attack
Answer: Sprinting makes no difference to whether a critical hit lands or not. The only conditions are that you must be falling, not just in the air.
EDIT: This answer is wrong. My understanding of the game is outdated, heavily, but I've kept it up as one of the other answers refers to it.


Is there a principle of Weak Induction for well-founded sets?

Question: I often see the statement that weak and strong induction are equivalent. However, while I understand that this is true for the natural numbers, is this true for any well-founded set of objects?  As I understand it, a well-founded relation can be a partial order without being a linear order, so we could be dealing with a well-founded set but not a well-ordered set.  But then what would the 'successor' of any object be that the principle of weak induction refers to?  Can we even meaningfully define a principle of weak induction for well-founded, but not well-ordered, sets? So does the equivalence between weak and strong induction only hold for well-ordered sets?
Answer: Actually, weak and strong induction aren't even equivalent for arbitrary well-orderings! Consider the well-ordering $\omega+1$ (so, the natural numbers together with one "infinite" element), and the formula $p(x)=$"$x$ is finite." Then:

$p(0)$ holds;
for every $x\in\omega+1$, if $p(x)$ holds, then $p(x+1)$ holds; but
$p(x)$ does not hold for every $x\in\omega+1$. (Specifically, it fails for the "top" element.)

So the problem isn't the non-totality of the ordering, but rather the existence of limit elements which have no predecessor.
Comment: Ok, so I guess I was right to suspect that weak and strong induction are only equivalent for certain kind of sets, thanks! But was I also right to suspect that in well-founded sets there might be no such thing as a 'successor', and hence no such thing as weak induction at all?
Comment: Well, that's not quite right. Say $a$ is a successor of $b$ (and $b$ is a predecessor of $a$) if $a>b$ and there is no $c$ with $a>c>b$. Successors are not unique, but we can formulate two versions of weak induction for a well-founded partial order $P$, with a least element $0$ and no limit elements. **First version**: If [$X\subseteq P$, $0\in X$, and for all $x\in P$, if *every* predecessor of $x$ is in $X$, then $x\in X$], then $X=P$. **Second version**: If [$X\subseteq P$, $0\in X$, and for all $x\in P$, if *some* predecessor of $x$ is in $X$, then $x\in X$], then $X=P$. (cont'd)
Comment: As it turns out, these two versions are *equivalent*! (This is a good exercise.) And they hold of precisely those well-founded partial orders with least element, which *have no limit elements* - that is, for which every nonzero element has at least one predecessor. (Equivalently, these are the well-founded partial orders with least element which do not embed $\omega+1$.) So I think this is in fact the right notion of "weak induction." And this version is indeed equivalent to strong induction, for such partial orders.
Comment: Thanks!  But can't you have multiple 'smallest' elements in a partial order? And if so, could you include all those elements in the base case? In fact, would you be able to allow for those limit elements to exist as well, but just also include those in the base case?  And if we were to do so, wouldn't that prevent the weak induction to go through in your example (since the base case fails for the 'infinite' element)? So with that modification, might weak and strong induction be equivalent after all?
Answer: OK, I did some more research myself on this, and feel I can now answer my own question.
First, we can follow Noah's suggestion and define immediate successor and predecessor as indicated. We can then consider Noah's two versions of weak induction as indicated as well, except that instead of insisting of a single least element $0$, we can allow for multiple minimal elements having no predecessors. Notice that in doing so, any kind of ' top limit element' as described by Noah would indeed have no immediate predecessor ... but would for that very reason be seen as a minimal element.
Thus, we can define weak induction as saying that as long as all those minimal elements have property $P$, and as long as all other elements $x$ have property $P$ if either all (version 1), or some (version 2) of its predecessors have property $P$, then all elements of X have property P.
It is easy to show that these two versions of weak induction hold true as long as X is well-founded. Indeed, in contrast to Noah's claim, these two versions of induction would actually hold for the set as initially described by Noah.
Are they equivalent? Well, they are 'equivalent' in so far as that for any well-founded set, whatever can be proven using one version can be proven with the other version as well.
If X is not well-founded, however, the two versions are no longer equivalent. Consider a set X consisting of elements $a_{1}, a_{2}, a_{3}, ...$ together with $b_{1},b_{2},b_{3},...$, and suppose relation R holds between any $b_{i}$ and $a_{i}$, as well as between any $a_{i+1}$ and $a_{i}$, and nowhere else (in other words, each $a_{i}$ has exactly 2 predecessors: $b_{i}$ and $a_{i+1}$, while any $b_{i}$ has no predecessors at all). R is not well-founded because of the infinite 'descent' of the $a$'s. And it is because of that infinite descent, that the first version of weak induction as defined no longer works, but since each $a_{i}$ has minimal element $b_{i}$ as a predecessor, the second version still works.
This also demonstrates that the second version of induction does not imply well-foundedness: apparently it can also work for non-well-founded relations. So that means that it is not equivalent to strong induction either, which works for all and only well-founded relations.
And the first version is also not equivalent to strong induction in the general case: with $X$ the singleton $a$, and with $R$ a relation that holds between $a$ and $a$, $R$ is clearly not well-founded, but the first version of weak induction holds true, simply because $a$ has no predecessor, and would thus be considered a minimal element after all.
So both versions of weak induction as defined can work for non-well-founded relations. Of course, this does not mean that they always work: keep all the $a$'s from the first example, and throw out all of the $b$'s. Then there are no more any minimal elements, and any version of induction no longer works.
In sum: Yes, we can define a meaningful notion of weak induction that isn't restricted to just well-ordered relations. In fact, we can define two, and interestingly, both versions can hold for non-well founded sets, meaning that they are no longer equivalent to strong induction. And without the restriction of well-foundedness, the two weak versions are not equivalent themselves either.


React Native AndroidManifest.xml debug vs main?

Question: I've been working on a React Native app and just noticed there are two different AndroidManifest.xml files: android/app/src/main/AndroidManifest.xml and android/app/src/debug/AndroidManifest.xml.
What's the difference between these two? And more generally, what's the difference between the debug and main folders in general? Is one used when you're running your app on an emulator and the other used when the app's been pushed to the store, etc?
Answer: AndroidManifest in the main directory will be used when you generate a release APK, AndroidManifest in the debug folder will add and/or replace things in the main AndroidManifest when running in dev mode. Running on emulator has nothing to do with dev/release modes. Other than that, you can put more things into the debug folder (like an app icon) that will replace things in your main folder when running in dev mode.
Comment: thanks for your insight. What's dev/release mode and how is dev mode different from running on the emulator? Is dev mode a flag you set somewhere so that you can use things like the app/src/debug folder?
Comment: You can run with dev/release on a device or emulator, the device has nothing to do with the mode you choose. There are many resources on debug/release modes, please google https://stackoverflow.com/questions/29027643/android-studio-run-debug-release-version-of-app


Battery warning ''Service battery"

Question: Battery warning "Service battery". This warning have appeared in my MacBook Pro (2008) with Snow Leopard. Is there a way to find out what a reason of this warning, without apply to service centre?
Answer: This means your battery is at the end of its life. This happens to all batteries, sooner or later, depending on your type of usage and most importantly on the amount of cycles (i.e. full recharges).
Your battery will probably not last longer than one hour at this stage. You can of course try to train it by letting it drain the battery until the MacBook sleeps and then recharge it up to 100%, leave it recharged for at least a few hours, and then repeat this process a few times. By doing this, you sort of "reset" the battery and can get a few minutes more out of it. It helped me get at least 20 minutes more.
If OS X tells you to service battery, it means that you will need to buy a new battery if you want full capacity back. There is no warranty that would cover worn out batteries. I had had the same problem, but unless your battery has less than 200 cycles, this is absolutely normal and you should buy a new battery. Again, Apple will not replace your battery unless it's almost unused.
Comment: Moreover, probably the 200 cycles you mentioned is a magic number as I just recently noticed to have "Service Battery" warning, and I'm currently at 204 cycles and ≈ 75,89% of designed capacity.
Answer: It's most likely because your battery is nearing the end of its useful life.  Your battery has a maximum charge capacity that decreases with age and use.  You can see the current capacity in Utilities --> System Profiler --> Hardware --> Power --> Full charge capacity (mAh):.
However, this doesn't tell you what your original Full charge capacity was.  For this, you either need to look up the specs of your laptop, or use a utility like CoconutBattery.
Comment: Another way to find the design capacity is `ioreg -l | grep -i capacity`.
Comment: @lri: nice one, love cli alternatives :)

Battery warning ''Service battery"


how make own gitian-sigs end detached sigs?

Question: How make own gitian-sigs end detached-sigs. I cannot find any useful info. Where i try see it's always start with "you  already have .assert and .sig . but how they create ?
Answer: Instructions for setting up a Gitian building environment are available at https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin/blob/master/doc/gitian-building.md. Instructions for performing the gitian builds for releases are available here: https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin/blob/master/doc/release-process.md
Comment: I dint no see command to create own .assets ,this method say's how to create new sig from exist. But i want create only own.
Comment: The .asset files are created by the gbuild commands. There is no command which explicitly has .asset in it.
Comment: but what command add to build file for create asset's end then make sig with gpg :/ For sig assests with gpg need fist it create but gitian builder not create it if assets not exist
Comment: You need to first build the binaries. You do that with the commands that begin with `./bin/gbuild`. That command will also create the `.assert` files in your gitian.sigs directory. Then you sign those files with GPG. It will create those files; this is the exact process used for making the releases and their gitian sigs.


Minecraft skin stops working in 1.9

Question: My Minecraft skin works fine in 1.8.9 (I use it to play on Hypixel), but when I play on 1.9, my skin turns into Alex or Steve. This has been happening since the snapshots. I have tried re-uploading the skin on minecraft.net, but it still doesn't work. Does anyone know how to fix this?
Comment: Are you properly loading the game on startup? (as in, not clicking "Play Offline") Are you going through a proxy server? Have you retested your skin in 1.8.9 after updating it? Are you only using Single Player? (sometimes you need to go to a multiplayer server first) Do you have multiple MC instances open? Please add this information to your question so we can help you further.
Answer: If you're showing up as Alex, that means you've been randomly assigned the Alex model that's new in 1.9. Steve skins don't fit the Alex model, and it appears that accounts with the new Alex model have had their skins reset (maybe to avoid visual artifacts?).
To get your old skin and Steve model back, login to your profile on minecraft.net and change your model from Alex to Steve, then re-choose your skin with Choose File, and click Upload to re-upload your skin:

(As the profile page says, there may be a delay in seeing your skin update due to server caching.)
Answer: Well, I just did some testing and it worked for me. Usually early updates Mojang has this problem; it's most commonly a glitch in the system, and if that's the case then there's nothing you can do.
My best advice would to be to try to run the profile on the fully released 1.9 version, and not the 1.9 snapshots. If it works for the 1.9 full version, then it means Mojang just hadn't fixed it in the early development builds.
If it's not, there's not really a whole lot you can do. You can potentially check if the server or you are running in an offline mode, or if skin servers are down. Other than that, you are out of luck.
Like I said, try to play the game on the full version of 1.9. Update your skin of course, and see if it works.

Minecraft skin stops working in 1.9


Can you actually date Sans in Undertale?

Question: So I found this video

 supposedly you go on a date with Sans but this is different than the Papyrus date and besides that, I never saw this in the game maybe, I have not gotten to this part. But I did go to Grillbys with Sans and I thought they were just hanging out as friends. So is the Sans date real or a hoax?
Comment: This part is in the game but I've never heard anyone call it a date before.
Comment: This scene is less of a date and more like a friendly chat. I did not feel like it was a date when I encountered this scene.
Comment: I've occasionally seen fans refer to all of the "spending time with [character]" scenes as "dates." The usual assumption is that the protagonist is too young for any of the other characters (except perhaps for Papyrus) to take it all that seriously anyway.
Answer: So it looks like you can get dinner with Sans if you go to Grillby's and talk to him before heading to the core. In most of the videos I've found in the descriptions it says "this is my favorite scene in the game" or something along those lines proving that it's in the game. Weather it's a date or not it up to you to decide really because they did go out to dinner but no one said anything about a date.
Answer: It isn't a date, as many have wondered. It's a progression in the story and shows character advancement for Sans & Toriel, showing a little more backstory. Sans doesn't like you, and personally, I believe even if you go through a pacifist route, Sans still won't like you. Because he knows your gonna leave. Even if it's your first time playing, he knows since hes gone through timelines before. Because eventually, curiosity will strike you and bam, genocide. However, this is a real scene in Undertale, which I believe is part of the main route but I've only played genocide and pacifist so I am unsure! Have fun. :)


How long for a planet to settle down from rapid "copy and paste" terraforming

Question: In my world a powerful entity decided to take a brute force approach to terraforming by picking a planet with a similar orbit and gravity to Earth and literally copy and paste vast swarths of the Earth onto the surface. This results in it dumping various copies of plants, animals, as well as water and air semi-randomly onto a completely separate world.
I am wondering what a realistic time frame for this new biosphere to settle down after this sudden change. I imagine there would be an initial die-off period as various plants and animals failed to adjust, but I am curious on how long for things to normalized.
Comment: Does the water go in a cavity, or just sit on the surface if the contours of the planet don't match? Pouring e.g. the Mediterranean onto a mountain plateau is going to cover an awful lot of land in salt water.
Comment: If the powerful entity could literally copy and paste Earth onto the other planet, why would it take any time to settle down?
Answer: A few centuries for semi-stability, millenia or never for complete stability
A total guess by someone who knows very little about ecology or biology. Make of it what you will, take what's useful, if anything.
There will be chaos straight away, as entire ecosystems collapse. In many ways, the brutality of the shock will make for a more rapid new equilibrium as huge numbers of species go extinct, resulting im simpler ecosystems with fewer niches.
I reason that a century or two ought to be enough for hardy, invasive weed species to cover areas that are going to be fertile, provide cover for regenerating forest, and allow big trees to take over most places that they are going to.
This is what we see in areas that man disrupts and then abandons: rapid changes for a few decades, followed by long, slow ones.
After that, you won't have giant swings in CO2 levels or other really dramatic global changes, changes will be localised and some areas will be fairly stable.
Actual 'stability', similar to what man has known since civilisation began, will take millenia though, as forests and river systems continue to change over centuries.
True stability is never reached due to inevitable perturbation and normal interspecies competition and adaptation.
Answer: Your new biosphere instantly collapses
By simply copy-pasting the items, relevant flows are not established and with the lack of the flows or an initiator, they don't start to run. The gulf stream stays off, and Europe dies off. Then other biomes collapse in a frame of months, as self-regulation tries to kick in.
In the end, the planet kickstarted extreme evolutionary pressure with the mass extinction. What little survives slowly will adapt to the remains and  the resulting flora and fauna might look entirely different if given a few million years.
Answer: Q: "This results in it dumping various copies of plants, animals, as well as water and air semi-randomly onto a completely separate world."
This answer assumes your powerful entity can transfer things in a blink, without being limited by energy, mass or distance. And it has all the time of the world.
Yes, it can be done
..but you'll have to start from scratch.. there is this empty planet, it has nice temperature and proper day and night cycle, but there's nothing there yet. No oxygen, no water, no nitrates, no carbon..
Copy/Paste the moon first
Advisable for compatibility with Earth's species requirements !
Copy/Paste the top layer of Earth in one go (rocky underground + atmosphere)
Now you want to copy/paste Earth. To maintain biodiversity, that is have a healthy transfer for all species involved, you'll need to prepare your new planet to maintain life. It is empty now. Your omnipotent entity may choose to copy/paste the crust first, with oceans and land on top of it. Just put ca 25km of rocky underground and 80km of atmosphere above it as a shell around your new planet. It will contain some 50% of the biosphere already, which is in the soil.
Some patience..
At this point, you'll require a few thousand years of waiting time, to allow tectonic plates to stabilize, let atmospheric cycles and ocean currents settle down. Weather will need to stabilize, rivers will form. I guess your omnipotent entity is immortal as well, so a relatively small wait at this point  won't be an issue ?
Copy/Paste sea life and land life in the proper order
Suppose your volcano's have dimmed, your atmosphere works, oceans flow, winds have started and clouds are ready to rain, soil is in place.. you can put your plants and animals, they will survive.
Mind the proper order, you can't put everything at once, the food pyramid has to be built bottom-up.. first you'll need plant life, to maintain oxygen level.

algae, grass
fish and insects
plants and trees
birds
other animals

Steps 1 and 2 will need some time. Steps 3, 4 and 5 can be done a few weeks before the tourists arrive.


Humanoid Gestation Rates?

Question: What are the fastest and slowest gestation rates possible in a humanoid species and/or a human sub-species? What does the gestation rate say about the species and vice versa?
Comment: We only have one subspecies to get data on. General trends from other species might be better in biology.se
Comment: Marsupials are a compromise on the gestation as the offspring is outside the body sooner after conception.  There is not reason why humanoids couldn't have marsupial characteristics.
Comment: define humanoid, are we limited to huamn size? human like intelligence?  for a human sized with human intelligence humanoid, well elephants gestate for 22 months and humans gestate for 9, so between those.
Comment: There are some theories that humans evolved to have longer gestation time due to time needed for development of the brain but the limit then became the vaginal opening for human babies to fit through. It eventually evolved into how we are today with humans taking many years to develop their brains as children compared to other animals.
Answer: The human average gestation period is 270 days.
A list of mammalian gestation rates can be found here.
Some of our closest relatives, gorillas and chimpanzees have similar if slightly shorten gestation periods; gorillas - 257 days, chimpanzees - 240 days.
Judging by the list the gestation period is roughly correlated with size of the animal, larger animals have longer gestation periods.  So a smaller sized humanoid would have on average a shorter gestation period.
There are of course other options:
The marsupial route: emerge from the womb into a pouch, this allows much less development before "birth".  The largest kangaroos have gestation periods of only 33 days, but the neonate will stay in the pouch for another 235 days before emerging.  So total time is still 268 days, comparable with other similar sized mammals.
Comment: With modern medicine 25 weeks gestation has similar odds to adulthood as a full term 1000 years ago. Pretty similar to the marsupial plan in that there is supper helpless stage, but humans have one anyway and aren't expected to be independent for the first decade or so anyway.
Answer: Gestation period lengths mostly relate to size and how developed newborns need to be to survive. This is somewhat related to the species level in the food chain. Quick gestation with small relative body size is typically only found in lower level food chain animals. The mouse is the first to come to mind. They are clearly a "feeder" species. Very long gestation periods seem to belong only to the largest of species, which consequently have few predators. The elephant comes to mind, needing longer than two years to produce their 200 lbs newborns. Whales also need significantly longer than other species.
Humans average about 9 months, as you know, however, that is only one in a long list of traits that contribute to their domination in the food chain. At least, not in the recent evolutionary past. Comparing to other top predators, humans are relatively long. Comparing to relative sizes, human gestation is relatively long there as well. Some reasons scientists give is slow relative metabolism and a far more complex brain. Compared to chimps, the closest evolutionary relative to humans, chimp gestation is about the same time, however, chimp newborns are far more developed than humans.
If this is to be explained by evolutionary pressures, rather than the chance of genetic drift, then it's easily believable that a humanoid species has a gestation as little as half as humans. Conversely, it's just as easily believable that a humanoid gestation is twice as long, but newborns are far more developed.
Another factor is how much effort parents put into their offspring's survival. Humans put a great deal of effort in, resulting in a post-natal developmental period of nearly two decades. Other species are far, far shorter than that, but generally the longer they spend on their offspring, the more post-natal development there is rather than in utero.
So you also need to determine how developmentally advanced these humanoids are. If they are highly developed at adulthood, it is likely they have a long gestation and a very long "childhood". However, if they are primitive, they will need less.
Comment: A human pregnancy could not last any longer, i.e. lead to larger and more developed newborns, without giving up either erect posture (at least for women) or our abnormally large brains, unless C-sections occurred naturally.

Humanoid Gestation Rates?


Brokered Kerberos web service security over the Internet

Question: Is it possible to use Brokered Kerberos Authentication for web services over the Internet?  I'm looking at web services security for an environment which already has Active Directory.  Due to the existing architecture the web services will be quite chatty and I have no control over this architecture.  It may take up to 6 web service calls to perform one business process .
There is concern over authenticating multiple times and the overhead this will incur.  From my initial reading of brokered kerberos authentication, once the user credentials are provided then a Kerberos security token will be returned and authentication is not required for each web service call.
I'm envisaging a system where the user credentials are passed to Active Directory via a web service call and the Kerberos token is returned.  This token is then used for all subsequent web service calls.
Is this possible or am I heading off on a tangent?  If I am heading off on a tangent is there a preferred approach for this?  I've finished reading the Microsoft Web Service Security: Scenarios, Patterns and Implementation Guidance for WSE 3.0 and still a little unclear.
Answer: Consider leveraging the SAML protocol as a way to exchange assertions via WS-Security.


Is tsocks necessary?

Question: Yo, Tails noob here. So if Tails is supposed to route everything through Tor by default, can I just type "nmap [options] [target]" and it will be torified or do I actually need to specify tsocks or something like proxychains before the command itself? Thanks in advance for any help!
Comment: The general consensus is that portscanning is harmful to the Tor network... http://tor.stackexchange.com/a/10531/1730
Answer: Tails doesn't route everything through Tor.
Tails uses a set of applications that are pre-configured to use Tor and stops applications from sending non-Tor traffic.
As such tsocks would be necessary and is mostly incompatible with nmap.
Please see this answer.
P.S.: quit skiddin'
P.P.S: Port scanning over Tor is both harmful to the Tor network and mostly ineffective. See this comment
Comment: Firstly, thank you for answering. I see now that tsocks or just setting the --proxy flag would indeed be the way to go for nmap use on Tails. However, I must disagree with you on a few points. Port scanning is probably pretty low on Tor's worry list when compared to, gee, I don't know, maybe heavy torrenting and botnet traffic and DDoSing and basically everything else. Also, it is not always very noisy. See here: http://security.stackexchange.com/questions/19576/what-scanning-tools-are-unlikely-to-set-off-network-ids
Comment: And if nmap is "ineffective" and qualifies as "skiddin" then surely a grandmaster haxx0r like yourself must know a better way? If not, then I urge you to check your facts before hating on a very well known, professionally used tool.
Comment: Ok, well I'm just here to learn so if you wouldn't mind telling me about this "better than nmap" port scanning technique, I would honestly love to hear it. You seem very knowledgeable.
Comment: Try the kali linux forums for tips on being a skid.

Is tsocks necessary?


How to secure components to a wire-wrap board

Question: I used to use a breadboard, and it would hold the components put into it. A wire wrap board is different. The components are don't seem to be secured to the board. How are they supposed to be secured to the board?
Comment: There are these little carrier plugs that fit in 14 pin or 16 pin sockets, that will accommodate 7 or 8 small components, like 1/8W resistors or disc ceramic caps or 1n400x, etc. For example with the 16 pin kind, you'd have a resistor (or cap, etc) between pins 1 and 16, another between pins 2 and 15, etc. I believe this is what Leon Heller's referring to.
Answer: I'm not sure if this is what you're asking, but you are supposed to use sockets specific to wire-wrapping.  The pins in these sockets are square and have very sharp edges.  The mere act of wrapping the wire will hold the socket in place.  Then you press your components into the socket.
Comment: That's how I did everything in school, but I totally understand that that seems like overkill.  They even sell plastic holders with pins that stick into IC wirewrap sockets, and then you solder your resistors and diodes to it.  I looked at Jameco's website but couldn't think of the right search keyword.  I had bought them there, but back in the day I was ordering from the catalog.  :)
Comment: So for each component that I want to put on the board, I have to use a socket for it?
Comment: try 'header plug'
Comment: @JustJeff thanks!  That's exactly what I was referring to.
Answer: You can also buy dedicated pins that allow you to solder on one side (usually bifurcated) and wire wrap on the other. The pins have a shoulder that you can jam into the PCB through hole to secure it.
Basically, if you want to attach a component to a wire wrap board that component has to be connected to a wire wrap pin. Whether that's a dedicated terminal, a single piece of a strip socket, a repurposed DIP socket, or a component carrier plugged into a DIP socket - that's your choice.
As an aside, unless you're dealing with exotic components or have a stash of wire wrap stuff, wire wrap components seem pretty expensive. Digikey wants $3 to $7 for a 16 pin DIP socket. You might be better served by doing point-to-point wiring on a Veroboard.
Edit to add:
OK, given the specific example of a voltage regulator, how would you add that? Let's assume this is a TO-220 or similar package. There are three leads that need to be connected, so you need to connect them to three wire wrap pins. Exactly how you do this depends on what kind of wire wrap pins you have:

Terminal pins (bifurcated or not): I'd solder the pins to the component, then plug the whole thing into the perfboard, then wire-wrap to the pins.
DIP socket: plug the three leads into 3 adjacent socket pins (bending if necessary), then wire-wrap to those pins.
SIP or discrete sockets: same as DIP sockets.

If this were a TO-92 with an off-pitch triangular lead layout, you might have to "normalize" the leads to fit the 100 mil pitch of the perfboard. Just use good pliers to make it fit (or cheat and get the 3 leads started into 3 holes, and use the perfboard to leadform it - this is what I'd do).
Other tips:
Don't forget that you can cut skeletonized wire wrap sockets apart to make discrete socket pins/SIP socket strips.
You might have to glue the wire wrap sockets in place, especially when using single-pin connections.
Comment: What if I'm just putting in something like a voltage regulator?
Comment: @awakeFromNib - use the single pins he mentions. They're just a wire-wrap post, but at one end there's a wider bit that press-fits into the hole, and then the very end is a little fork that you cram the component lead into. A touch of solder will bond the component into the pin. Biggest advantage - you can set the pins anywhere, and accommodate any sort of discrete you want.
Answer: I used to solder them to carriers plugged into wire-wrap sockets.


A question on Artinian and Noetherian rings.

Question: All rings are commutative and unital.
Suppose that $A$ is a ring in which the zero ideal can be written as a product of maximal ideals of $A$.
I try to prove that $A$ is Noetherian if and only if it is Artinian:
Proof. We begin by recalling the following fact:
Fact 1. Let $M$ be an $R$-module and $N$ is a submodule of $M$. Then $M$ is Noetherian/Artinian if and only if both $M/N$ and $N$ are Noetherian/Artinian.
Suppose $(0)=\mathfrak{m}_1\ldots\mathfrak{m}_k$ where the $\mathfrak{m}_i$ are maximal. Then consider the chain
$$(0)=\mathfrak{m}_1\ldots\mathfrak{m}_k\subseteq\ldots\subseteq\mathfrak{m}_1\mathfrak{m}_2\subseteq\mathfrak{m}_1\subseteq A.$$
For each $1<i\leq k$, let $M_i = \mathfrak{m}_1\ldots\mathfrak{m}_{i-1}/\mathfrak{m}_1\ldots\mathfrak{m}_i$ as an $A$-module. Note that $\mathfrak{m}_i\subseteq\text{Ann}(M_i)$ and so, for each $1<i\leq k$, we can regard $M_i$ as an $A/\mathfrak{m}_i$-vector space with scalar multiplication defined by
$$(a+\mathfrak{m}_i)(x+\mathfrak{m}_1\ldots\mathfrak{m}_i)=ax+\mathfrak{m}_1\ldots\mathfrak{m}_i.$$
It follows that $M_i$ is Artinian as an $A/\mathfrak{m}_i$-module if and only it is Noetherian as such. However, the $A/\mathfrak{m}_i$-submodules of $M_i$ are exactly the same as the $A$-submodules of $M_i$ and so $M_i$ is Artinian as an $A$-module if and only if it is Noetherian as an $A$-module. But each $M_i$ is Artinian/Noetherian (as an $A$-module) if and only if $A$ is a Artinian/Noetherian ring (by repeated application of Fact 1). Hence $A$ is an Artinian ring if and only if it is a Noetherian ring. //
I would be very grateful if someone could tell me whether this proof is correct or not.
Many thanks.
Comment: The same proof can be found in Atiyah-MacDonald, corollary 6.11.
Answer: Yes, your proof is correct; it's essentially the canonical proof.


Groupification and perfection of a commutative monoid

Question: The following definitions and proposition are taken from the paper The geometry of Frobenioids I by S. Mochizuki.
Let $\mathbb{N}_{\ge 1}$ be the set of positive integers.
$\mathbb{N}_{\ge 1}$ is a directed set by the order relation $a|b$.
Let $M$, $N$ be commutative monoids(the binary operations are written additively).
A map $f\colon M \rightarrow N$ is called a morphism if $f(x + y) = f(x) + f(y)$ for any $x, y$ and $f(0) = 0$.
For every $n \in \mathbb{N}_{\ge 1}$, the multiplication map $x \rightarrow nx$ on $M$ is a morphism.
$M$ is said to be torsion-free if $nx = 0$ implies $x = 0$ for every $n \in \mathbb{N}_{\ge 1}$.
Let $M^{gp}$ be the groupification of $M$, i.e. the grothendieck group of $M$.
Let $\psi\colon M \rightarrow M^{gp}$ be the canonical map.
If $\psi$ is injective, $M$ is said to be integral.
$M$ is said to be saturated if $na \in \psi(M)$ for some $n \in \mathbb{N}_{\ge 1}$ and $a \in M^{gp}$, then $a \in \psi(M)$.
$M$ is said to be perfect if the multiplication map $x \rightarrow nx$ is bijective for every $n \in \mathbb{N}_{\ge 1}$.
The perfection $M^{pf}$ of $M$ is defined as follows.
Let $M_a = M$ for every $a \in \mathbb{N}_{\ge 1}$.
if $a|b$, we define a morphism $f_{ba}\colon M_a \rightarrow M_b$ by $f_{ba}(x) = (b/a)x$.
Then $(M_a)_{a\in \mathbb{N}_{\ge 1}}$ and $(f_{ba})$ consitute a direct(or inductive) system.
We define $M^{pf} = colim_{a\in \mathbb{N}_{\ge 1}} M_a$.
There exists the canonical morphism $\phi\colon M = M_1 \rightarrow M^{pf}$.
My question:
How do we prove the following proposition?
Proposition
(1) $\phi\colon M \rightarrow M^{pf}$ is injective if $M$ is torsion-free, integral, and saturated.
(2) $M$ is perfect if and only if $\phi$ is an isomorhism.
Motivation
Recently(August, 2012), S. Mochizuki submitted a series of papers(Inter-universal Teichmuller Theory I,II,III,IV) which develops his new theory. As an application of his theory, he wrote a proof of ABC conjecture.
I think the validity of the proof has not yet been confirmed by other mathematicians.
However, considering his track record, I think it's worthwhile to read the papers.
He referred to The geometry of Frobenioids I for the notation and terminolgy concerning monoids and categories.
Comment: @user18921 I'm afraid I don't understand what you mean. Could you rephrase it?
Answer: (1) If $M \to M^{pf}$ is not injective,  there exist $x \neq y$ and $n\in \mathbb{N}_{\geq 1}$ such that $f_{n1}(x) = f_{n1}(y)$. (The fact that elements are equal in the colimit iff they are equal in some term requires some thought. It is not a general property; it follows here from the structure of the diagram defining the colimit.) So let us assume that $x,y\in M$ satisfy $nx = ny$.
Let $Z = [x] - [y]$ in $M^{gp}$. We have $nZ = [nx] - [ny] = 0$, which lies in the image $\psi(M)$, so saturation implies that $Z \in \psi(M)$. Say $Z=\psi(z)$ for $z\in M$. Since $Z$ satisfies $Z + [y] = [x]$, integrality implies that $z + y = x$. The element $z$ satisfies $\psi(nz)=nZ=0\in M^{gp}$, so integrality implies $nz = 0\in M$. Since $M$ is torsion-free this implies $z = 0$, so $z+y=x$ becomes $y = x$. This shows that $M\to M^{pf}$ is injective.
(2) Since $M^{pf}$ is perfect (an inverse to $x\mapsto nx$ is the map induced by sending $x\in M_a$ to $x\in M_{na}$), an isomorphism $M\to M^{pf}$ implies that $M$ is perfect. Conversely, if $M$ is perfect, we can change coordinates on $M_a$ by $x \mapsto \frac{1}{n}x$ (the inverse of $x\mapsto nx$, which is automatically a morphism). Now the direct system is constant and so $M\to M_1\to M^{pf}$ is an isomorphism.
Comment: I think (1) is correct.
However I don't understand (2) fully.
Could you elaborate on it?
Comment: If $M$ is perfect, then each map $f_{ba}\colon M_a\to M_b$ is an isomorphism of monoids. Therefore the colimit is boring: it is isomorphic to $M_1$. (To see this, check that for any $a\in \mathbb{N}_{\geq 1}$ and any $x\in M_a$, there exists some $y\in M_1$ so that $f_{a1}(y)=x$. This is worth working out.)
Answer: Aha. What does this '$\mathrm{colim}$' means? $M^{pf} = \displaystyle(\coprod_{a\in\mathbb N} M_a)/\sim$, where $m_a$ and $m_b$ are identified ($m_a\sim m_b$), if $a|b$ and $m_b = (b/a)\cdot m_a$.
Somehow, $M_a$ wants to represent the 'formal' $a$-fractions of $M$, regarding that any $m$ in $M_1$ is represented as $a\cdot m$ in $M_a$, so $m$ in $M_a$ wants to represent $\frac 1a\cdot m$.
Now pick $m,u$ such that $\phi(m)=\phi(u)$, denote $m_1$ and $u_1$ the (copy of) $m$ and $u$ in $M_1$, so it means $m_1=u_1$.
Identity in $M^{pf}$ means that
$$\exists m_1\sim w_{a_1} \sim w_{a_2} \sim \dots \sim w_{a_k} \sim u_1 $$
i.e., $w_{a_1}=a_1\cdot m_1$,  next one is either $w_{a_2}=(a_2/a_1)\cdot w_{a_1} = a_2\cdot m_1$, or $w_{a_1} = (a_1/a_2)w_{a_2}$
...
Comment: I got stucked, too.. sorry,
Turn back on that later.


Is it legal to reproduce a print of a book that was printed before being published?

Question: So a guy wrote a book in 2021 and made loose leaf prints of it and I have one of the loose leaf prints. The book at that time didn't have any copyright attached to it and people were freely photocopying the book and the author was fine with that. However in 2023 he got the book published and now it is copyrighted. Obviously photocopying the published version from 2023 is illegal, but is it legal to continue making photocopies of the original 2021 version? Although I don't have the 2023 version it is probably almost exactly the same as the original with minor changes such as fixing grammar errors.
Comment: In what country? Under US law, copyright is _automatically_ assigned to the author of any creative work, so the statement that *"The book at that time didn't have any copyright attached to it"* is incorrect as a matter of US law.  Unless the author explicitly provided a license allowing said photocopying, it's still a copyright violation.
Comment: What do you mean by "and the author was fine with [photocopying the 2021 version]." Did he specifically give permission for everyone to make copies, or only for some people to do so? Under what conditions did he allow you to make copies? E.g. did he say "sure, go ahead and makes copies of it for your own personal use." Most likely, the permission he gave to make copies of the 2021 version doesn't apply to the new 2023 version, though, since the publishing house probably has some/all rights in that version.
Comment: On the other hand, if "the author was fine with [people making photocopies]" simply means "well, he knows that we photocopied it, but he never told us to stop doing that, and he never tried to DMCA us or sue us, etc." then that wouldn't count as permission; as copyright holder it's your prerogative whether or not to use your rights in a legal sense.
Comment: He didn't give explicit permission that we could, but he knew about it and didn't say to not do it. So what Brandin said.
Answer: The author holds all the exclusive rights of copyright in the 2021 work, subject to licencing, assignment, or fair use or fair dealing.
The dominant copyright paradigm in the world is the regime established by the Berne Convention and agreed to by 181 of 195 countries in the world.
One of the terms of the Berne Convention is that "enjoyment and the exercise of these rights shall not be subject to any formality" (art. 5(2)). This is known as the principle of "automatic protection."
This principle is reflected in domestic legislation implementing the commitments of the Berne Convention. For example, see Canada's Copyright Act, s. 5. It specifies that copyright subsists "in every original literary, dramatic, musical and artistic work... if ... in the case of any work, whether published or unpublished, including a cinematographic work, the author was, at the date of the making of the work, a citizen or subject of, or a person ordinarily resident in, a treaty country."
Thus, it is it probably false that "[t]he book at that time didn't have any copyright attached to it." The author holds all the exclusive rights of copyright in the 2021 work, subject to licencing, assignment, or fair use or fair dealing.
Comment: "[the 2021 version] didn't have any copyright attached to it", probably OP simply means that the 2021 version didn't contain a copyright notice anywhere in the printed text. But I believe such a notice is not required by the Berne Convention.
Comment: @Brandin in fact, the Berne convention requires that law gives the protection **without** a notice.


WWII Naval short story

Question: I am trying to locate a short story about a new radar being tested by the US Navy during WWII.  The captain of the test vessel encounters a Japanese fleet heading to the west coast and using the new radar was able to defeat the convoy.  I remember at the end the president, unprepared for the invasion, asked for the captain to surrender and the captain's reply was something like, who should I surrender to.
Comment: Possible duplicate of [Short story...probably pre WW2. About a battleship ordered to surrender](https://scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/70618/short-story-probably-pre-ww2-about-a-battleship-ordered-to-surrender)
Comment: @ZeissIkon Neither this question nor the target have accepted answers. You can post the answer from there here, if you like. Until then, we don't vote to close as duplicates, as per [this meta](https://scifi.meta.stackexchange.com/q/7065/70236).
Comment: Welcome to the site Mark, thanks for your first post =) Would you happen to remember any other details: particularly external details such as how old you were when you read it, when it's likely to have been written, was it in a collection with other short stories, what language was it in - all that kind of stuff. Have a look at the list on [this page](https://scifi.stackexchange.com/tags/story-identification/info) and see if you can tick off any items
Answer: As noted in the answer to this question, this seems to be "Politics" by Murray Leinster.  The story points up how technology (the new radar, tied to gun training computers) can affect politics.  Originally published in Amazing in June, 1932 (available for free at the Internet Archive), it was (as far as I can find) last printed in 18 Greatest Science Fiction Stories, from Tempo, 1971.

WWII Naval short story


How do I find things I retweeted but I retweeted?

Question: I had a habit of retweeting things reading them and then unretweeting when I finished reading all the comments. Now I realize I had good content that I would like to revisit. How can I find all these things I retweeted over the years?
Answer: From what I've understood is that after reading a retweet you unretweet it, right? If that is the case, the retweet is no longer available in your tweets but rather to the person you had retweeted from.
Solution: If you want to retrieve those tweets from your profile(if you never unretweeted) or from the original tweet author, use the Twitter advance to filter and find the tweets based on the day it was tweeted, else use the Tweets & replies section to find the tweet if it isn't old.
Simple to use -> (https://twitter.com/search-advanced)
Best Solution to your issue moving forward: If you find a tweet that is much interesting and you'd love to read or view it later, use the Bookmark(its icon is next to the like button) click it and it will show you the bookmark option. That way you can easily go to the bookmark section and retrieve it easily.
Again, if you find something interesting and would love to share it with your followers as well as read it at a later time, use the bookmark and retweet icons.
Hope that helps!


I deleted a custom trigger. How can I get it back if it's not in the Recycle Bin?

Question: Unfortunately I deleted a trigger, and now I want it back. I've checked the Recycle Bin, but it's not there. Any ideas how I can get it back?
Answer: You can't implement it retroactively, but this incident highlights the importance of version control as an industry best practice. Had you been using it already, you could simply pull the most recent version from your repository and reimplement it that way.
In terms of what you can do now, contact support and they might help you. I wouldn't hold my breath, though. It may well be out of their hands.
Comment: @raja Next to `Setup` in the upper right corner there should be a link for `Help & Training`. Note that you might not have developer support, it is a paid feature.
Answer: Currently, it is not possible to recover a deleted triggers or classes.
However, you can retrieve the deleted class or trigger id from workbench using the following SOQL query:
<code>Select Id,Name from ApexTrigger where status='deleted' or name='classname'
</code>
After getting the Id, you may try to browse to the following URL: https://.salesforce.com/ to see if the code of the trigger/class is still accessible.
NOTE: If you get "Data not available", the deleted trigger/class is no longer accessible.
If you have fetched the metadata of your org then it might possible that you can retrieve the trigger code from Eclipse IDE. Just Don't refresh the metadata. Check if trigger is present then you can use the same code to re-create trigger.
Comment: OP said it's not in the Recycle Bin though.
Comment: Yes, It wont be possible to recover. It was good point to mention about version control.


scooter won't restart after shutting off

Question: I have a VIP Future Champion which I ride on a daily basis. I can jump it and it will start. But as soon as I shut it off it won't restart. I've tried to kick start it but there seems to be no compression. It has a new battery. Any suggestions would be a great help.
Comment: I would bet the power leads are not connected properly since you have a new battery.
Comment: Did you have to fill the battery with acid when you purchased it or did the shop do that for you?
Answer: Try to unplug your spark plug and then kick start it.
Watch the tip of the spark plug, if it doesn't make any spark try to replace this spark plug.
Comment: I tried to kick start it. I can't for some reason. Don't know if its because I'm only 100 obs or if its just super tight. I did take the terminals off the battery and gave them a good scouring with a Brillo pad and got some of the rust off. Which is strange since the battery is only a few months old. Have it on the charger to recondition now. It did fire back up. Thanks for the tips. Turns out I could use a new spark plug. Looks a little burnt


Ball delivered before umpire calls play - out or not?

Question: With the first ball of the match a batsman clean bowled. But he correctly protests the umpire didn't call "Play" before the bowler delivered the ball. What should the umpire's decision be?
Answer: If the batsman has clearly faced the delivery, I'd say out.
As a proper umpire, not calling Play is a big error, and a contravention of Law 16. I'd be ashamed of myself, but it wouldn't change the fact that the game had started, because both sides considered the ball to be in play (see Law 23, section 1, part b for a description of when the umpires can consider the ball to be dead).
And crucially, Law 23 section 5 states:

The ball ceases to be dead - that is, it comes into play - when the bowler starts his run up or, if he has no run up, his bowling action.

This is the overriding factor - the batsman can't rely on a  technicality to reprieve him or her if they've faced the ball. I can guarantee they'd pitch a fit if he or she spanked the ball to the boundary and the ump then declared it dead!
Comment: The crucial bit is your first sentence.  If the batsman clearly faced the delivery.  If the ball was delivered before the batsman had taken guard, then it is ungentlemanly conduct - not out.
Answer: Law 16 is clear. The match / day / session does not commence until the Umpire calls "Play".
Law 23 refers to the ball becoming "dead" with the calls of "over" or "time" but as play hasn't been called in this instance it is not yet "alive"
Law 23 also refers to the ball ceasing to be "dead" with a bowler starting his run up / delivery action if no run up. Again this is interpreted as a ball having already been in play.
Law 22 refers to an over commencing when a bowler starts his run up / delivery action if no run up, but as play hasn't been called this should not be viewed as a legal delivery.
The overriding issue here is the ball not being in play until the call of "play"
This should also be viewed as bad match management of behalf of the two umpires.
Comment: Actually, Law 16 is very clear that *the umpire shall call* Play, but it says nothing about whether this is the official determination of the start or resumption of play, or just a formal acknowledgement  of the fact that play has actually begun.
Comment: Hi, look at the following. Law 1 Commencement of a batsman's innings. At the start of a match or resumption after time has been called an innings starts when "play" is called, otherwise its when a batsman steps onto the field of play. Law 13 loss of first days play. Play will have taken place as soon as, after the call of "Play", the first over has started. Law 15 defines an interval as being from the call of "Time" until the call of "Play"  I believe this points to the ball not being in play before "Play" is called.


excel upload with only specific columns

Question: I'm trying to upload an Excel file to SharePoint, but i would like to only upload columns AL, B, and AU, and wondering if SharePoint has a way to do this, or if Excel has a way i can upload it to a sheet and have every other column get deleted and it shift the remaining columns together?
Answer: Please see the below. For the full article click link.
https://support.office.com/en-us/article/Export-an-Excel-table-to-a-SharePoint-list-d1c7a1e5-d9ee-4322-87ed-924323d0ac53
Works great. I have done this many times.
Export a table to a SharePoint list

In the worksheet, click anywhere in the table that you want to
export.
Tip: This displays the Table Tools, adding the Design tab.
On the Design tab, in the External Table Data group, click Export,
and then click Export Table to SharePoint List.
In the Address box, type the Web address of the SharePoint site that
you want to export the table data to.
Tip: If you have already exported table data to this SharePoint site, the address may appear in the drop-down list, so you can select the address instead.
If you want to be able to update the table data on the worksheet
with any changes on the SharePoint site, select the Create a
read-only connection to the new SharePoint list check box.
Note: When you create a read-only connection, two columns are added to the table so that the folders that contain the SharePoint list can be included. An Item Type column indicates whether a row represents a SharePoint list item or a folder. A Path column displays the folder path for a list item (for example, mylist/folder). When you filter the table data, you can filter within the specific folders that are listed in these columns. You can also sort the Path column to group all rows in the same folder together.
In the Name box, type the name that you want to use for the
SharePoint list.
Note: A list name is required. This name will be displayed at the top of the list page. This name is also used in the Web address for the list page and in navigational elements that help users find and open the SharePoint list.
In the Description box, you can type an appropriate description for
the SharePoint list.
Note: A description is optional. If you provide a description, it will be displayed at the top of the SharePoint list in most views, just below the name of the list.
Click Next.
Review the list of columns and data types, and then do one of the
following:

If the columns and data types that you are exporting are correct, click Finish.
If the columns and data types are not correct for the SharePoint list, click Cancel, and then verify that the column cells in Excel can be converted into a data type that can be supported in the SharePoint list.

Tip: For example, you may need to convert complex table data on the Excel worksheet to a simpler format, such as plain text or a number. Data types that are supported are text (single or multiple lines), currency, date and time, numbers, and hyperlinks.
Click OK to confirm that the table was successfully published.
Tip: You can click the link to see your list on the SharePoint site. You can also view your list later by clicking Open in Browser in the External Table Data group on the Design tab.

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excel upload with only specific columns


what does the term rep-invariant and rep ok means?

Question: I heard this a lot when talking about software engineering and abstract data types, what does this do? Can anyone give me a concrete example of this concept?
Comment: Visceral reaction is to say rep means representation (and this is used in theoretical computer science often, especially with kolmogorov complexity -- look up "universal computer" if you are interested) but you need to give more context.
Comment: Well what if someone asks what is the rep-invariant of a Deck class?
Comment: I think you need to be a bit more specific.  In this case, rep invariance refers to a set of assumptions about the representation of the deck class.  For example, maybe it must contain a set of cards ...
Comment: Yes that is one I had in mind actually.. I am just confused from this on how to represent the abstraction function for a Deck of cards
Answer: A representation invariant is a condition concerning the state of an object. The condition can always be assumed to be true for a given object, and operations are required not to violate it.
In a Deck class, a representation invariant might be that there are always 52 Cards in the deck. A shuffle() operation is thus guaranteed not to drop any cards on the floor. Which in turn means that someone calling shuffle(), or indeed any other operation, does not need to check the number of cards before and after: they are guaranteed that it will always be 52.


Covertly Recording Conversations At Work If Policy of No Expectation of Privacy?

Question: My work has a policy that when using company property, there is no expectation of privacy. Does this amount to blanket consent? This is in the state of California so unsure if this policy conflicts with state law.
Answer:
Does this amount to blanket consent?

Not exactly. Instead, the policy precludes the prohibition in section 632 of the California Penal Code. The exact terms of the policy might bring up (or entail) a subtlety, but I'm answering based on the information you provide.
The California statute prohibits the recording of confidential communication [without the consent of all parties thereto]. But item (c) of that statute excludes from the definition of confidential communication those involving "any other circumstance in which the parties to the communication may reasonably expect that the communication may be overheard or recorded". In the context you mention, that circumstance could be a properly disclosed policy of no expectation of privacy.
Answer: This cannot be right
Such a policy would mean that you had no expectation of privacy in the bathroom - this clearly has no legal foundation. As such, the policy is fundamentally flawed.
Comment: @DaleM I know my comment on your answer will prompt you to downvote my answer, but the OP clearly is asking about recording *conversations*, not about recording the act of using a restroom for the physiological purposes of restrooms.
Comment: We don't know enough about the policy to make this judgement, just a single sentence from the OP.


Problems on the algebraic theory of sparse matrices

Question: I have finished testing basic large densely parallel matrix multiplication on 4 gpu's ,and have done work on TSLU and TSQR on cpu's based on mpi. I am going to continue working on the theory of parallel computation of sparse matrices. As far as I know, there are compression formats for sparse matrices like CSR, and there are also methods based on graph partitioning. Are these two methods two separate approaches and which one is more advantageous?e.g., sparse matrix multiplication, sparse matrix factorisation, and solver.Could you give me some papers or links?
Answer: your question is too general. It is very to hard to give specific advice. I will suggest you two books that you can use as first references, but they may not help much in terms of GPU computing for sparse matrices.
First book is Yousef Saad's "Iterative Methods for Sparse Linear Systems", which you can download from his website for free. This book covers some fundamentals of sparse linear algebra, and gives a very detailed description of some iterative methods.
Second book is Timothy Davis' "Direct Methods for Sparse Linear Systems". This is harder to get your hands onto. If you are a student (undergrad or grad), your university library will have access to it; otherwise you may check your library or buy it. It is a good reference to have if you are going to stay in this field for a long time. This book is also a good primer, and Tim Davis is one of the handful people who has a performance sparse linear solver on GPUs (https://developer.nvidia.com/cholmod). You can search for "GPU acceleration of CHOLMOD" and you will find many articles.
If Tim Davis' book is too dense (which honestly has very big ideas summarized in so few pages sometimes), I can suggest "Computer Solution of Sparse Linear Systems" by George and Liu as a preliminary. Note that this book is quite old, but it was written at a time when people were trying to figure out how to sparse linear algebra efficiently, so it is quite verbose.
Comment: Thank you for your answer, because I have to design the program interface based on the theory of sparse algebra, so the question will be very exemplary and complete, I have completed the design of datastorage for distributed sparse matrix multiplication, I will refer to these bibliographies for the solver of sparse matrices.
Comment: At the moment I think sparse matrix distributed computation (add,mul) involves matrix slice and collective communication of sparse structures, but matrix factorization and iterative solvers I'm not familiar with yet.Supporting a heterogeneous collective communication backend this looks like it will require some amount of work.But this can design distributed and sparse matrix computations separately.Obtaining a generalized distributed sparse matrix computation pipeline
Comment: This means that the distributed is decoupled from the sparse matrix structure and only deals with sparse matrices uniformly sliced and aggregated communication strategies. The different sparse structures and the operations between them are defined externally
Comment: You can take a look at the MA86/87/97 papers, SuperLU papers and also Pardiso papers, they are quite complete on how they implement parallel sparse factorization. Parallel matvec operations (especially on GPUs) is an open research area as the current methods do not scale very well.
Comment: Thanks for your answer.OVO


Is there a name for comedically ignoring something major while pointing out something mundane?

Question: Example: a video shows someone being injured and often times the top comment is something like "Wow... it's so tragic that people still think it's ok to wear green pants" or something similarly minor and unrelated to the more serious, obviously intended focus of the situation. I see this done frequently by comedians and on TV (South Park does this a lot).
Comment: This is a good question... It is a really common comedic device - misdirected focus. (I hope someone has an answer - I'm pretty curious...)
Comment: Irony is often ignoring what you darn know for something else.
Answer: You are describing an instance of Bathos:
OED:

2. Rhetoric. Ludicrous descent from the elevated to the commonplace in writing or speech; anticlimax.
1875   A. Maclaren Serm. 2nd Ser. xii. 211   It is as absurd bathos
as to say, the essentials of a judge are integrity, learning, and an
ermine robe!
c. 1979: I'm Sorry I'll Read That Again (BBC Radio Comedy) MARY:
"John – once we had something that was pure, and wonderful, and good.
What's happened to it?"
JOHN: "You spent it all."
Answer: Facetious (Wiktionary)

Treating serious issues with (often deliberately) inappropriate humour; flippant.
Robbie's joke about Heather's appearance was just him being facetious.

Pleasantly humorous; jocular.

Of an idea or statement, humorously silly or counterproductive for the purpose of sarcastically advocating the opposite.

Flippant (Wiktionary)

Showing disrespect through a casual attitude, levity, and a lack of due seriousness; pert.

(archaic) glib; speaking with ease and rapidity
Answer: There are a few words which might be Partially Suitable here.

gallows humour
Comedy that makes light of death or other serious matters
humor that makes fun of a life-threatening, disastrous, or terrifying situation

faux pas
A socially awkward or tactless act
Embarrassing Error

gaffe / gaucherie / solecism
Synonyms for faux pas

non sequitur
A reply that has no relevance to what preceded it

We could combine these terms into something like this :

The top comment in the car accident video was a non-sequiturial (??) faux pas bordering on gallows humour.
The Prince , known for his gaffes , indulged in gallows humour , when he non-sequiturially (??) voiced his faux pas observations.
Answer: The general comedic device is called a misdirection although it is mainly associated with stand-up comedy.

A comedian will sometimes use misdirection to have the audience think they're going to say one thing but then get the proverbial rug pulled from under them during the punchline.  Wikipedia/Comedic_device

Bait-and-Switch is a more specific term provided by TVTropes. The name is originated from a now-illegal advertising practice and it differs from paraprosdokian:

A type of setup where a character leads the audience or other characters into thinking they are going to say or do something, but says or does something unexpected. This is usually a joke, and if the punch line of the joke causes the first part to take on a new meaning (e.g., "I just flew in from Chicago, and boy are my arms tired"), it is technically called a "paraprosdokian."

There are examples of bait-and-switch from Western animations like Family Guy, South Park and The Simpsons. Here is a good and absurd example from Family Guy provided by TVTropes:

In an earlier episode, there's a Cutaway Gag where Peter cuts a cake but ends up accidentally slicing a woman inside the cake (who was supposed to surprise the guests by jumping out of it). Peter yells, "Ah, crap!" but not because he killed the woman; it was because the cake was coconut flavor.


How can I recover my SD card?

Question: Is there a way to recover my SD card (for free)? I get a message that says it has been corrupted. Simply formatting it again hasn't worked.
Answer: Have you tried SD Card Formatter on a PC? It seems the best way to format a SD Card, however if formatting in Android doesn't works I think it's pretty much dead.
But as I said, try SD Card Formatter to see if that helps.
https://www.sdcard.org/downloads/formatter_4/

How can I recover my SD card?


Do H-bridge configurations have any advantages over single MOSFET dc motor speed controller designs?

Question: I'm designing a simple dc motor speed controller that only needs to be driven in one direction and I'm wondering if an H-bridge configuration would have any advantages over a single or dual MOSFET control scheme besides being bidirectional. The motor in my project only needs to be driven in one direction but should be capable of dissipating power when spun in the other direction by the user - for example an electronic skateboard only needs to be driven in one direction but should also be able to spin (and dissipate power) in the other direction.
Comment: Comments are not for extended discussion; this conversation has been [moved to chat](https://chat.stackexchange.com/rooms/95192/discussion-on-question-by-sean-dever-do-h-bridge-configurations-have-any-advanta).  Any conclusions reached should be edited back into the question and/or any answer(s).
Answer: The H Bridge is more expensive and complicated and easier to Blow up ,But it gives Regen Braking and Foward /Reverse .The H Bridge offers 4 Quadrent operation where the single switch offers single quadrent operation.Maybe a half bridge is suitable for your application.
Comment: Why do you say an H-bridge is easier to blow up - shoot-through?
Comment: Shoot through is an issue .Standard mosfets have slow diodes which can cause current spikes


How to avoid using the same identifier for Class Names and Property Names?

Question: Here are a few example of classes and properties sharing the same identifier:
public Coordinates Coordinates { get; set; }
public Country Country { get; set; }
public Article Article { get; set; }
public Color Color { get; set; }
public Address Address { get; set; }
public Category Category { get; set; }

This problem occurs more frequently when using POCO with the Entity Framework as the Entity Framework uses the Property Name for the Relationships.
So what to do? Use non-standard class names?
public ClsCoordinates Coordinates { get; set; }
public ClsCountry Country { get; set; }
public ClsArticle Article { get; set; }
public ClsColor Color { get; set; }
public ClsAddress Address { get; set; }
public ClsCategory Category { get; set; }

Yuk
Or use more descriptive Property Names?
public Coordinates GeographicCoordinates { get; set; }
public Country GeographicCountry { get; set; }
public Article WebArticle { get; set; }
public Color BackgroundColor { get; set; }
public Address HomeAddress { get; set; }
public Category ProductCategory { get; set; }

Less than ideal, but can live with it I suppose.
Or JUST LIVE WITH IT?
What are you best practices?
Answer: This is sometimes known as the "Color Color" problem - and my advice is just to live with it.
The C# language specification has been designed for this not to be an issue. From section 188.8.131.52 of the C# 3 spec:

In a member access of the form E.I, if
  E is a single identifier, and if the
  meaning of E as a simple-name (§7.5.2)
  is a constant, field, property, local
  variable, or parameter with the same
  type as the meaning of E as a
  type-name (§3.8), then both possible
  meanings of E are permitted. The two
  possible meanings of E.I are never
  ambiguous, since I must necessarily be
  a member of the type E in both cases.
  In other words, the rule simply
  permits access to the static members
  and nested types of E where a
  compile-time error would otherwise
  have occurred.

(Followed by an example.)
Obviously when you can provide a more descriptive property name, that's great - but quite often the best name really is the same as the property.
This occurs in the framework itself - for example, HttpWebRequest.CookieContainer is of type CookieContainer, and there are various types with an Evidence property of type Evidence.
Answer: I try to rather use more descriptive property names.
Changing the class name feels like it is defeating the purpose, as where most developers tend to under emphisise the use of good and descriptive Variable/Property names.
As in your example, for instance an Address acan be
public Address HomeAddress { get; set; }
public Address PostalAddress { get; set; }
public Address CompanyAddress { get; set; }

etc. You can see where im going with this.
Answer: I personally am not shy about having the class name and the property name match if the names are truly applicable. For example, on an Address class, having a property called Country which is typed as a class named Country makes sense and there really isn't any name for the property that isn't redundant. I try to avoid collisions using descriptive property names, but sometimes the name for the property and its type are the best names to use and using anything else diminishes clarity rather than improves it.
I would strongly recommend against a Hungarian-like prefix on classes. That is just plain fugly.
Answer: I think the name of a property should just decribe what it is. When it is an Apple, just name it an Apple.
Why would anyone, just for property readability, use hungarians at class names. It decreases class name readability.
When accessing the Property, you can use the This keyword for preventing yourself to accidently misreading the the property as a class:
class Food
{
    public Apple Apple
    {
        get;
        set;
    }

    public void DoIt()
    {
        this.Apple = new Apple();
    }
}

class Apple
{
}

See SA1101 of StyleCop "Verifies that calls to local members are prefixed with the 'this.' notation."


What is this bush with five-petaled pink flowers?

Question: My wife and I bought a house in the Palm Coast, Florida area. We have a plant growing by the house that the previous owner tried to kill, but could not. We think it is very pretty. We would like to know what it is, because no one at the nurseries can tell us. It grows very fast and is right next to our foundation. We would like to move it, because of it being by the foundation. I have included pictures of the plant and hope you can tell us what it is and if it's a bush or tree and the best location in the yard for it.
Answer: I am going to take no credit for this one. I first thought of some variation of Plumeria, but the trilobate leaf was fascinating, so I dug around Google a bit.
Someone on a garden forum nailed it on the head: Jatropha pandurifolia Andr.
Link here: http://forums2.gardenweb.com/discussions/1591259/3-lobed-leaf-on-tropical-plant
Surprised this was hard to kill, but looks like you'd rather move it, and I would hope you do, because the flowers look exquisite on close up. If you can dig down to the roots, and do it at the right time depending on your zone, you should be able to save the shrub.


Change or add email address to Google account

Question: My primary email address is going to be invalid soon. So I want to change my email address for my Google account. However, it seems that I can't change my email address and I can't even add a new email address. This is what it looks like:
Answer: NOTE: On a recent comment to another answer, the OP mentioned that their domain is gulli.com, a German domain. According to Wikipedia, on May 2018 the domain was sold.

The email addresses of Google Apps accounts, including those of Google Apps for ISP, can't be changed by the user, only by the organization administrators. They should have access to the administration panel for your organization by signing into http://admin.google.com.
It's worth to say that when the original revision of this answer was posted it was not possible to change the primary domain of an organization [1], so if the domain will be invalid soon, then the organization information (the information of all the organization accounts) should be migrated. For details about how to migrate Google Apps information go to Migrate data away from Google Apps - Google Apps Help.
Nowadays G Suite allows to change the main domain. For details see Change your primary domain
Notes:
[1]Change your primary domain - Google Apps Help
Related

Google Apps for ISP EOL
Gulli.com (Wikipedia in German)
Comment: What is the best way to get in touch with the organization administrator?
Comment: Go to https://www.google.com/accounts/ForgotPasswd, select I forgot my password, in the box that will showup write your email address and click next. The following screen could show you how to contact the corresponding organization administrators if the set that information. The alternative is to ask for help to the IT support department of your organization.
Comment: When I do that, it says `Please contact your domain IT administrator to reset your password or retrieve your username.`. There are no contact information given. With "your organization", do you mean the Google Support of the country I live in? Just to be clear.
Comment: If someone gave you your username and password to access the account for first time they could be "your domain IT administrator". If you did the initial registration then you are the "your domain IT administrator".
Comment: It's my private Google account. I don't think we're talking about the same thing. I don't have a Google Apps account, just a regular Google account (GMail, PlayStore, ...).
Answer: On my previous answer the OP posted a comment saying

It's my private Google account. I don't think we're talking about the same thing. I don't have a Google Apps account, just a regular Google account (GMail, PlayStore, ...)

I understand that they means that the primary email address has a gmail.com or googlemail.com domain. In this case the only way to change the primary email address is to remove Gmail from the account then adding it again is you still want to use Gmail, otherwise you could have your Google account with a third party email address.
Reference

Change the email address for your account (Official help article)
Can I change my Gmail email address? (Q&A on this site)
Comment: It was neither a gmail.com nor googlemail.com domain, it was a German domain called gulli.com.
Comment: I forgot your previous message `Please contact your domain IT administrator to reset your password or retrieve your username.` That means that you had a Google Apps account. At this time gulli.com redirects me to a page on `sdsjweb.com`. Is gulli.com still working for you?


Average of sequence random variables

Question: Let $X_1, X_2, X_3, \dots$ be a sequence of random variables that converges almost surely
$$(X_n) \rightarrow X$$
to a number $X \in \mathbb R$ (or more precisely the delta dirac distribution centered at some real number).
I am interested in the convergence of the average sequence $(Y_n)$ where $$Y_n = \frac 1 n \sum_{i=1}^n X_i$$
Can we make any statement about the convergence of $(Y_n)$? Intuitively, I would guess it also has to converge to $X$, but I am not sure about the mode and how to prove it.
Comment: This is actually tricky to answer correctly, since there are distinct notions of convergence for random variables.  See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Convergence_of_random_variables
Answer: For numerical sequences $(x_n)$, it is a standard exercise that $\lim x_n=L$ implies $\lim \frac{1}{n}\sum_{k=1}^n x_k=L$.
By assumption, there is a set $E$ of full measure such that for every $\omega\in E$, $X_n(\omega)\to X(\omega)$. By the above, this implies $Y_n(\omega)\to X(\omega)$.
Thus, $Y_n \to X$ almost surely. (And consequently, converges in probability and in distribution.)  This is pretty much it; since there is no reason for $X$ or $Y_n$ to be integrable, we cannot expect, say, convergence in $L^1$.

Average of sequence random variables


Unexpected inconsistency in modelling of load propagation in Icosahedron struts

Question: My intent is to build a program dedicated to analysis of geodesic structures.
My proof-of-concept spreadsheet is intended to help me clarify the interactions at each node, so that when I approach the coding of a C program, I will know the path for the workflow required for force balancing throughout the structure.
My simplified model is a basic icosahedron, truncated at the lower pentagon for a flat base.
I am using this simplified model to help visualize the maximum recognition of symmetry, and to apply those simplifications for the compute model.
The model is starting to get more realistic.  Hoop stresses in the upper pentagon are clearly shown to be greater than those for the bottom pentagon, as one would expect.  That bit of sanity check confirms I am on the right track.
In the region of CY55, I am trying to resolve the force balance equations for node 11 (point K), but something is not working out and I don't understand why.  I think I am doing it right, the magnitude of the force on struts are as expected based on the balance at node 10, but the projections along each axis are not nullifying in this case (DE62:DE63).
I would appreciate it if someone could point out what it is that I have misunderstood/misapplied.
Thank you in advance for your reviewing and providing feedback.

LibreOffice .ods File:
Proof-of-Concept Model - Load Propagation Structural Analysis
Answer: I found the error in my logic.  It was related to how I was defining the formula for cell CU59, where I did not notice/update the incorrect reference to CP57 (from copy+paste) when it should have been CP59.
With that fix, everything fell into place, and I was able to complete the basic proof-of-concept for a purely vertical loading.
Modified file is available here


Super Mario Advance 4: "You can only load this game once" message

Question: In Super Mario Advance 4, what does the message mean when you try to save a game and it says "you can only load this game once"?
Comment: I assume it lets you save the game so that you can put the game down. When you pick it back up and load the game, the save file is deleted, so you must save again before putting down the game again. It partially prevents savescumming (constantly reloading a save file to achieve a more favourable result)
Answer: The message is the difference between a regular save game, and a feature that's commonly known as quicksave.
Most games have specific points where you can save the game, right?  Either a time, like right after a boss, or a place with actual save points, or only on the world map, or something like that. Starting around GBA times, somebody realized it should be more convenient. Possibly in the rush to port all the old nostalgia games somebody realized what a pain is was to actually lose progress if you had to turn the thing off right away.
Quicksave started showing up as a way to "pause" through a shut down, even though the game restricted where you can save.  It was a save anywhere anytime option, but worked almost exactly like a game pause in every respect.  Quicksaving the game also exited the game so you couldn't keep playing, and reloading the game with quicksave put you right back where you were and wiped the quicksave.  It never actually acted like a save file at all.
I'd have to load up my copy of Advance 4 to be sure, but that sounds exactly like every other quicksave feature I've run into.


Can I re-download my ps3 digital games to ps4 games?

Question: I have a few games that I want to bring to PS4 when I get one.  It's Destiny, Advanced Warfare, and other digital games that are also on PS4.  So if its on ps4 and I have it on my ps3, can I download it again?
Answer: It depends on the developer and publisher of the game. If the game employs the cross-buy system, a PS4 license should automatically be added to your account when it is released, if you purchased the digital version of the game on the PS3.
This was the case with the recently released PS4 version of Journey, as well as with Flower, Spelunky HD, The Unfinished Swan and several other games.
You can confirm whether a released PS4 game supports cross-buy simply by visiting its store page in the PSN store. If you bought the game on PS3 and it supports cross-buy, instead of a Buy button with a price tag, there should be a Download button or Options button, which offers alternate download options in a drop-down menu.
Comment: Additionally there are a few games that originally did a $10 upgrade fee to go from the ps3 to ps4. A few that I can think of were Battlefield 4, CoD Ghosts and Assassins Creed. Not sure if they still do this or not since I have had my ps4 for a while now.
Comment: Indeed, many publishers offered such promotions for games released in the fall of 2013 and 2014, but IIRC all of them expired early the following year.


System Tray Icons

Question: My system tray icons appear to be little square boxes instead of icons in login screen. On my user desktop however, they show up as the correct icons. This appears to have started after playing with Ubuntu Tweak. Everything else is working fine. Any ideas to get those little icons looking like little icons in the login screen? Thanks
Answer: Open a terminal (Ctrl Alt T)
Now you need to reset the Ubuntu  tweak tool.
unity-tweak-tool --reset-unity

Then type:
$ unity-reset

If this does not work you can try to reinstall ubuntu-desktop
First login to tty(Ctl Alt F1)
After you login to the tty type
sudo apt-get install --reinstall ubuntu-desktop

(you can also run this on " safe mode" sudo apt-get aptitude install --reinstall ubuntu-desktop)
After this completes reboot
sudo reboot

Comment: I did try that but it didnt work.
Comment: i have updated my answer

System Tray Icons


Why does the kernel not get updated when using a persistant Live USB?

Question: I have created a live usb of Ubuntu 12.04 with a 4GB persistence file.  Firefox and other software get updated when running update manager.  However, the linux kernel will not update and I am unable to install synaptic package manager, ubuntu tweak, etc.  Is there a fix for this.  Thanks in advance.
Answer: i found this solution also on askubuntu and i apply it and worked for me and i share again here:
gksudo gedit /etc/kernel/postinst.d/zz-update-grub

**
Comment out line 15
**
BEFORE
*/postinst.d/*:|*/postinst.d/*:configure|*/postrm.d/*:|*/postrm.d/*:remove)
    exec update-grub
    ;;

AFTER
    */postinst.d/*:|*/postinst.d/*:configure|*/postrm.d/*:|*/postrm.d/*:remove)
#       exec update-grub
        ;;

Run the configuration script:
$ sudo dpkg --configure -a
(lots of debugging)
$

You should see a lot of debugging, and NOT the error line at the end.
To be sure, re-run the configuration. It should end immediately without any logs:
$ sudo dpkg --configure -a
$

Now, you can restore the zz-update-grub file, just in case you want to install an other kernel later and Grub start to work with overlayfs...
Answer: This is apparently a common question no one replied correctly to.
None of the existing ISO9660-based live operating systems provide a kernel update feature: the kernel and the initrd are the only components that a live operating system cannot update, because they lay outside of the data persistence partition (if any) and the system partition is, as said, ISO9660-formatted.
After some years of asking me why, I found the liveng whitepaper on Read the Docs.

The full aim of the liveng project is to give the Community a set of
  best practices in order to turn a common Debian Linux live into a
  live(ng) operating system which features:
native encrypted persistence;
kernel update (on a live ISO 9660 filesystem!);
UEFI, with UEFI Secure Boot compatibility, with a real efi partition.

Tails is another example of live system with kernel update facility, but its filesystem is FAT, not so-good for a live...


Proposing Marriage to (have) a Synonym

Question: marrage should be a synonym of marriage.
Answer: It's a misspelling that occurred exactly once, not a trend in incorrect tagging. Just retag that question: you have the editing privilege. The orphaned marrage tag will be automatically deleted at 3:00 UTC, which is less than 12 hours away.
By the way, the same typo appears in the title of that question.
Comment: It's a misspelling that occurred once *so far in the early development of this site* which, relatively speaking, doesn't have a lot on it yet, and it's easy to see how the same mistake might happen again in the future.  If the site handles that (and other common misspellings) seamlessly, it's a little better off.
Comment: @WBT it kind of just clutters the system. If it's just a one-off question, there really isn't much reason to make a synonym, as it would barely be effective. Ideally, synonyms should really be for different words (like shoes and slippers), not really for typos. Typo tags are easily removed with a simple edit too.
Answer: As per the Meta Stack Exchange post How can we get rid of misspelled and unused (or "zombie") tags? Sally is correct.
I'm a little wary of creating tag synonyms for every single typo that ever happens, even if it's understandable how it might. In this example, it's definitely more work for me to create the tag synonym (and, if Sally hadn't already edited the question, to either edit the question or merge marrage into marriage) than it would be for the typo to simply be fixed and then the tag automatically removed.
Also note that these single-use tags get removed after 6 months.
In this case, I'm going to let it go, but if we suddenly get a deluge of marrage questions - or other similar cases of widely/frequently-misspelled tags -  I'm happy to reconsider and do the merge and synonymisation.

Proposing Marriage to (have) a Synonym


ADFS 2.0 Best Practices

Question: I'm having a hard time finding some good articles on best practices for ADFS.  We are looking to implement SSO for less than 200 users.  We plan on setting up a federated server farm (2 servers) behind a hardware load balance.  Is a ADFS proxy necessary if we put the federated server farm behind the hardware load balancer?  I need the solution to be redundant however it would seem unnecessary for us to build out 4 servers (2 for ADFS, 2 for proxy).
Comment: Is this for Office 365 integration?
Answer: Microsoft outlines counts of servers necessary as it relates to using ADFS to integrate with Office 365, Azure, and Intune. For Windows Server 2012-based ADFS deployments they call out a minimum of two (2) ADFS servers and two (2) proxies.
Of course, having redundant servers on-site is meaningless if your Internet connection, network infrastructure, and power isn't also redundant. If you're concerned about losing your entire ADFS infrastructure when your servers get carried away by a tornado / flood / rioters then you might consider deploying a redundant ADFS environment, including a Domain Controller, in an off-site hosting facility.
Comment: One other option is to consider migrating that infrastructure to Azure VMs.
Comment: Yep-- in an off-site hosting facility (see my last paragraph). >smile<

ADFS 2.0 Best Practices


How can I make my Garlic Bread less soggy?

Question: I want to make simple garlic bread pieces without getting them too soggy in the middle due to butter. Most of the restaurants near my area get this wrong - the bread pieces are soggy and yellow due to the butter they use and crunchy and tough on the crust. I want to try and making garlic bread but I want to avoid getting them soggy.
Answer: Easy -- don't use butter.
Put the sliced bread in the oven 'til it's toasted, then remove, and take a garlic clove and rub it over the sliced & toasted side.
The texture of the toasted bread should act like sandpaper, and slowly grate off bits of the garlic clove.  As you get to the end of the clove, you might need to abandon it and get another whole clove to use.
Another alternative is to roast your garlic, and then use it as a spread on the toasted bread.
Answer: Restaurants are making garlic bread quickly and in bulk, that can effect their processes, and results.  They are usually content to smear the garlic butter quickly, and mostly over the center, because it quickly covers most of the bread.  It is forgiving enough, and spreads enough, that the garlic bread they make this way is still pretty good - but being a little more careful might be all you need to make it better for your tastes.
If you're worried about sogginess, use a thin layer of garlic butter to start with, and spread it evenly towards the edges of your bread.  If you really want to be careful, scrape the garlic butter back off the very center of your bread.  This way, you won't have an extra puddle of butter in the center, and your edges won't get hard and dry from having less.
Additionally, make sure your garlic bread is toasted fairly quickly and at a high enough temperature.  If it is toasted at a much lower temperature or sits for a longer time afterwards, it is more likely to melt and puddle and soak the butter into the bread before it finishes toasting.  All you really should need for your garlic bread is to warm the bread and toast the top a little.  This can be done quickly, and the bread toasted and eaten while still warm and fresh, so it doesn't have time to get soggy.
If you're really wanting a drier garlic bread, you might consider lightly toasting the bread before you put the garlic butter on - and toasting again (or not) afterwards at your preference.  This will draw some of the moisture out from the bread, and form a drier crust between the bread and butter, which should help keep it from getting too soggy.
Answer: Toast your bread in the oven under a broiler first to the desired color, then when you pull it out of the oven, baste the bread with a baster and melted garlic butter.
I love crunchy garlic bread and this is how I achieve it.