What is the difference between Windows 8 Pro and Windows 8 Pro Pack?

Question: The Microsoft Store has two version of Windows 8: Windows 8 Pro, and Windows 8 Pro Pack:

What is the difference between these versions of Windows 8?
Answer: Windows 8 Pro allows you to upgrade from an older version of Windows (XP, Vista, 7) to Windows 8 Pro.
Windows 8 Pro Pack allows you to upgrade from a lesser version of Windows 8 to Windows 8 Pro.
The Windows 8 Pro Pack is just license to move a Windows 8 installation to Windows 8 Pro with Media Center. It does not contain any physical media.

The Windows 8 Pro Pack enables you to move up to Windows 8 Pro. Your
  PC or tablet must be running Windows 8 to use Windows 8 Pro Pack. The Pro
  Pack makes your PC or tablet ready for business by adding
  professional-grade features by adding:

Encrypt your data with BitLocker: BitLocker drive encryption helps protect corporate data on mobile PCs that include a TPM chip.
  BitLocker now encrypts hard drives more quickly, helping to keep your
  data safe without interrupting your productivity. BitLocker now
  supports encrypted drives, too.
Stay safer with SmartScreen: SmartScreen services help protect you from malicious sites and software on the Internet. It checks the
  reputation of any new app or website, helping to keep you safe no
  matter what browser you're using. That helps prevent malware and other
  viruses from infiltrating your PC, or your corporate network.
Connect to company networks with DirectAccess: Just because you're not in the office doesn't mean you're not working. DirectAccess allows
  remote users to more securely and seamlessly access resources inside
  of a corporate network without having to launch a separate virtual
  private network (VPN) connection.
Windows Media Center: Windows Media Center lets you turn your PC into a home entertainment system that can play and record
  high-definition TV (if you have additional tuner hardware), DVDs, and
  CDs. It's also a software DVR that can play photo slideshows and
  Internet TV content.
Answer: In addition to what Matthew said, Windows 8 Pro does not come with the Windows 8 Media Center Pack, while Windows 8 Pro Pack does.


Both Dark Barracks Under Upgrade

Question: The current barrack system has a single queue for all troops be it elixir troops or dark elixir troops. I know how the training time is calculated and all the other stuff. I would like to know what would happen if I decide to upgrade both dark barracks at the same time. Will I be able to train dark troops as there is a single queue for all troops or I won't be able to train any dark troops?
Answer: You would not be able to train dark troops while your dark barracks are upgrading.  You can train normal troops from the normal barracks.
From the coc wiki:  barracks will not function while under upgrade.
http://clashofclans.wikia.com/wiki/Barracks
Comment: I feel it is out-dated as http://vignette2.wikia.nocookie.net/clashofclans/images/9/95/Maintenance.png/revision/latest/scale-to-width-down/650?cb=20140201051224

Both Dark Barracks Under Upgrade


Kill thread started from APScheduler after given time

Question: Here is my problem: a user needs to log in via remotedesktop to a Windows server during given periods of the day.  I have a working bit of code however I believe threads are never closed correctly since after a given time the program is Stopped.
I would like to close this thread started by AP Scheduler, can someone tell me how I would do this properly? I have tried joining the thread and exiting as well as ._Exit() but neither work (or really should work) I am lost.
import sys
import os
import subprocess
import signal
import time
from apscheduler.scheduler import Scheduler
from pykeyboard import PyKeyboard
from threading import Thread

def rdp_start():
    os.system('rdesktop -d domain -u username -p password -g 1600x1050 -a 16 18.104.22.168')

def rdp_check():
    p = subprocess.Popen(['ps', '-A'], stdout=subprocess.PIPE)
    out, err = p.communicate()
    for line in out.splitlines():
        if 'rdesktop' in str(line):
            print("Rdesktop is running!")
    else:
        print("Starting rdesktop!")
        rdp_job = Thread(target = rdp_start, args = ())
        rdp_job.start()
        time.sleep(5)
        k = PyKeyboard()
        k.tap_key(k.enter_key)
        #time.sleep(600)
        #Where I would like to kill rdp_job, and remove rdp_kill scheduling

def rdp_kill():
    p = subprocess.Popen(['ps', '-A'], stdout=subprocess.PIPE)
    out, err = p.communicate()
    for line in out.splitlines():
        if 'rdesktop' in str(line):
            pid = int(line.split(None, 1)[0])
            os.kill(pid, signal.SIGKILL)
    print("Killed RDP")

def idle():
    # Stop from sleepin
    k = PyKeyboard()
    k.tap_key(k.scroll_lock_key)
    k.tap_key(k.scroll_lock_key)

sched = Scheduler()
sched.daemonic = False
sched.start()

# Fix screen issues with PyUserInput
os.system('xhost + > /etc/null')

sched.add_cron_job(rdp_check, hour=15)
sched.add_cron_job(rdp_kill, hour=15, minute=8)
sched.add_cron_job(rdp_check, hour=23)
sched.add_cron_job(rdp_kill, hour=23, minute=8)
sched.add_cron_job(rdp_check, hour=7)
sched.add_cron_job(rdp_kill, hour=7, minute=8)
sched.add_cron_job(idle, second='*/60')

I know that killing threads is generally bad practice, however I really need this program to run for any given amount of time, can anyone point me in the right direction?
Answer: If you're on Linux, consider the following changes:
1) instead of using Thread, just run the rdesktop command in the background:
os.system('rdesktop ... &')

2) the killall command finds running programs and optionally sends them a signal.
To see if a rdesktop command is running, send it signal #0.  It'll return status 0 if it found something, or status > 0 if no such process exists:
$ killall -0 sleep
$ echo $?
0
$ killall -0 beer
beer: no process found

3) to kill rdesktop:
os.system('killall rdesktop')

Note the above assumes that you have at most one rdesktop process running, and that you started it therefore you can probe it with killall -0.


lstate error: no such file or directory while building Docker from a custom image with Docker build command

Question: I have create a custom image for lamp stack with following files
apps.conf
Dockerfile
entrypoint.sh
start.sh
supervisord.conf

Dockerfile was create with ENV, RUN, ADD and CMD command.
Each application installed successfully, but stuck it at ADD command and check the given path which is correct.
ADD /home/ktpl/nayan/MyLamp/supervisord.conf /etc/supervisor/supervisord.conf

ADD /home/ktpl/nayan/MyLamp/apps.conf /etc/supervisor/conf.d/apps.conf

ADD /home/ktpl/nayan/MyLamp/entrypoint.sh /entrypoint.sh

ADD /home/ktpl/nayan/MyLamp/start.sh /start.sh

Process is stuck at Add command.:
lstat home/ktpl/nayan/lamp/supervisord.conf: no such file or directory

Answer: ADD can be used to copy local files to image while building.
Couple of things:

You are building an image using current directory
In your case, /home/ktpl/nayan/lamp is the valid directory
Not sure if you have a directory /home/ktpl/nayan/MyLamp exists and files present in there.

As per the documentation of docker

The  path must be inside the context of the build; you cannot ADD ../something /something, because the first step of a docker build is to send the context directory (and subdirectories) to the docker daemon.

If your files are in the same directory as you build image, then you may use below statements in Dockerfile
ADD ./supervisord.conf /etc/supervisor/supervisord.conf

ADD ./apps.conf /etc/supervisor/conf.d/apps.conf

ADD ./entrypoint.sh /entrypoint.sh

ADD ./start.sh /start.sh

Of course, like it was mentioned in the other answer, COPY can also be used.
Sample Dockerfile contents:
FROM busybox
ADD ./test.txt /test.txt
CMD ls /

You can building image and running it shows file being added in the below image.

If all the files and directories present and still you see this problem, then check .dockerignore has entry for the same.
Comment: Thanks for point out my error and details. got the idea about my docker file error point and thanks for sharing such important areas where i need to focus while making docker file.
Comment: @NayanVanza, glad to know that this is helpful.
Answer: Docker builds always work relative to the context - i.e. the directory you pass in the docker build command. You cannot use absolute paths in ADD, you should be specifying the source file relative to the build context.
For local files you should use COPY instead of ADD too, so your Dockerfile becomes:
COPY ./supervisord.conf /etc/supervisor/supervisord.conf
#etc.

And then you build it from your MyLamp directory with docker build -t my-tag .


Comparable editor for gedit with less dependencies?

Question: I want to leave Gnome and install awesome on debian squeeze or wheezy, but I really can't work without gedit. Is there any text editor like gedit capable of editing columns, highlighting nearly any language, and building texfiles straight from the editor? The wealth of features is important to me because I want to use it as a central "IDE". I've tried Eclipse, but didn't care for it.
Comment: No, it's not wrong at all. The aim is to be productive with your applications to get your work done. There's nothing wrong with using kde applications under gnome or gtk applications under awesome. Don't restrict youself to minimal applications just for the sake of it. Sure, there are some quirks, like with nautilus drawing the desktop, but there are simple solutions and most programs behave just fine. My advice: keep using gedit if you're productive with it. If you're not try vim or emacs.
Comment: You could of course go with the classics like vim or emacs. But, if you like gedit so much, is there a reason you want to get rid of it? Simply keep using gedit with awesome and be productive.
Comment: Well I cant tell you exactly. It feels wrong to use Gnome-Apps in a different dektop environment :D and I presume there will be some conflicts, like nautilus drawing to desktop.
Comment: When it comes to dependencies. Do you prefer the alternative to gedit to have any particular dependencies except for them being less, e.g. is it better if it depends on GTK than QT?
Comment: Also, could you please include in your question what would make an editor fit for awesome?
Comment: @N.N. well I would say less dependencies to a specific desktop. If its ever again the case that I  have to switch the dektop environment (omg gnome), I dont want to learn new apps. The editor should not really fit for awesome. It should fit for me  and be independant of DEs. I will give vim a try.
Comment: Both ViM and Emacs have the advantage of being really wide-spread so learning to use at least one of those is a good idea of its own.
Answer: I agree with Marco that sticking with gedit makes sense. After all you say that you cannot work without gedit.
However if you are prepared to spend some time learning a new editor and are curious of how an editor can help you even more than most editors I recommend Vim or Emacs as it is possible to be very productive in them, they are very capable and configurable, has helpful communities and they can be used with few dependencies (they may even be pre-installed on many *nix systems). I used to do my work in gedit but two years ago I started to learn Emacs and I now do most of my work in it and I am very happy with it. The problem with Vim and Emacs is that it takes some time to learn them as they are quite unlike many other editors. Initially it may be a good idea to use an editor you know well in parallel to Vim or Emacs so that you can focus on your work when you need to. If you want encouragement and tips for learning Emacs see the section "Learning" in this answer to a question about learning Emacs.
To answer you question (instead of saying to stay with gedit or recommending a wholly different editor) an alternative to gedit that has fewer dependencies and the features you ask is Geany. It is presented as

a text editor using the GTK2 toolkit with basic features of
  an integrated development environment. It was developed to provide a
  small and fast IDE, which has only a few dependencies from other
  packages.

When checking out its dependencies in Ubuntu it indded has fewer dependencies than gedit. Also it seems to have the other features you mentioned: it can edit columns, it can syntax highlighting many languages and it has an interface for building. Geany also has other features in common with gedit. For example, it has a snippet manager and a plugin system.


What are the design principles that result in thin, long-span, narrow chord main rotor blades?

Question: Regardless of the overall design configuration of a helicopter, it appears that helicopters have main rotor blades that all fall into the class of ultrahigh aspect-ratio wing design: that is, you never see a modern helo swinging blades around that look like the wings of a piper cub, for example. What are the design principles that result in thin, long-span, narrow chord main rotor blades rotating relatively quickly for every helicopter I can remember seeing?
Comment: Check out the Boeing X50 Dragonfly.
Answer: Unlike with fixed-wing aircraft, there are very few structural limitations on the planform of helicopter blades.

Pic above was used in this answer and shows the centrifugal force acting on the blades. The blade is hinged to the rotor hub, and from the angle relative to the rotor hub we can see that the lift force on the blade in vertical direction is much lower than $F_C$. That allows the helicopter to use blades with very high aspect ratio, which is aerodynamically the most efficient for a given lift area.
A rotor like in the pic has zero bending moment at the root: it has a hinge. Fixed hub blades do experience a root bending moment but this is also comfortable evened out by the centrifugal forces.
In general, the design principles for a helicopter rotor are:

For a given design gross weight & range, establish a practical rotor disk loading. This results in the rotor disk area => blade length.
Rotor rotational speed is as high as possible, without entering critical Mach on the forward sweeping blade in cruise.
Number of blades is the minimum we can get away with, Rotors with the lowest solidity have the highest efficiency, increasing the number of blades does have some advantages like lower rotor induced vibration and a less distinctive noise signature.

Regarding the last point: the Wop Wop of the UH-1 was a well known distinctive feature. The Huey had two blades with a larger chord than usual: due to the teetering hub design, number of blades was limited to 2, and in order to accommodate the required disk loading the rotor blades have a wider chord than on similarly sized fully articulated rotors.
Comment: A shame that you didn't get an upvote when the answer was accepted. +1.
Comment: What is the relationship between teetering limits and blade length that limits blade length?
Comment: @JohnK Was distracted, have amended, thx.
Comment: I would remove the statement "Unlike with fixed-wing aircraft, there are very few structural limitations on the planform of helicopter blades." Both have structural requirements, but most of those can be addressed thanks to the wide availability of a variety of materials. The limitations on fixed wing and helicopter blade planforms are governed more by design requirements, rather than structural integrity. There are many examples of high AR aircraft available that show that structural limitations can be overcome for fixed wing high AR aircraft.
Comment: @MishaP The statement is exactly the reason why. Wing /blade load and structural integrity iare the primary design criteria.
Comment: @Koyovis I agree, which is why I think "Unlike with fixed wing aircraft" is out of place. Not that it makes your answer worse.
Answer:
comment under question: "check out the ... X 50 Dragonfly"

Well, both crashed.  Reason: rotor created too much turbulence around the fuselage, creating an uncontrollable pitch up tendency.
In addition to @Koyovis answer, a very high aspect ratio (allowed by the "centrifugal force" on the blades as they turn) reduces turbulence, thereby reduces interference with the following blade (and anything else that happens to be around).
The reduction of turbulence per unit rotor lift produced is by the same principle of reducing drag in high aspect wings:  smaller, weaker trailing edge and tip vortices. This is also why high aspect propellers, as few as possible, are most efficient.


Oracle non-CDB to CDB - Do I need to recreate dataguard?

Question: To convert from non-CDB to cdb it's necessary to install a new instance as CDB and so, to use dbms_pdb.describe in the non-CDB database to generate a xml of the non-CDB to add as a PDB in new CDB instance. The new CDB instance in dataguard side is installed with a normal controlfile (as primary database). This mean I always need to recreate dataguard? has someone made a conversion of non-CDB to CDB in a dataguard environment?
Answer: Have a look at Doc 2273304.1. Essentially, you will need to set up a dataguard environment with your target CDBs and plug the non-CDB in to your new primary allowing the new secondary to redo the plugin.
There are special points at which you must pause redo apply on your old DG and make sure it is synced to appropriate positions so that it can be safely plugged in.
Make sure you test your process on non-prod at least a few times – user217655


Unreal engine how do I change the visual studio version without having loaded up a project?

Question: I get an error which I mentioned in a previous post. I did a little more research on this error and found out that I need to use an up-to-date visual studio. I think that I might need to change the visual studio version from the config. I have both visual studio 2017 and 2013 on my computer.
Answer: to anyone else who has been searching for the answer of how to switch vis studio version without opening project, you must change the selected version in both the DefaultEditor and DefaultEditorSettings files located in the config folder.
will look like this
[/Script/SourceCodeAccess.SourceCodeAccessSettings]
PreferredAccessor=VisualStudio[your desired version number]
in my case I had to switch from a 2019 to 2017 so it looks like this
[/Script/SourceCodeAccess.SourceCodeAccessSettings]
PreferredAccessor=VisualStudio2017
Answer: 4.15 uses only VS2015+. Easiest solution is to uninstall 2013. Otherwise, just open the game solution in 2017 and compile it. It's unclear what you mean by "without having loaded the project".


Local Langlands correspondence and Galois equivariance

Question: The local Langlands correspondence $\text{rec}$ for $\text{GL}_{n}$ itself is not Galois equivariant (i.e. invariant under automorphisms of its field of definition) but rather its twist by contragradient and an unramified character is. In Carayol's article "Non-abelian Lubin-Tate theory" in Ann Arbor proceedings, this twist, which I will call $r_{\ell}$, is just referred as "Hecke correspondence," which makes me feel like there is something more about it. Is there a deeper reason to believe why not the local Langlands correspondence but its slight twist is the one that is Galois equivariant? More generally, is there an a priori reason why $r_{\ell}$ is the one that appears in geometric constructions?
Comment: You may want to add link to the article and at least one top level tag.
Answer: The reason $r_\ell$ appears in geometric constructions involving Shimura varieties is because Hecke operators act on the cohomology of a Shimura variety with coefficients in $\mathbb{Q}$; that's the source of the good behavior of $r_\ell$ with respect to automorphisms of the coefficient field.


How do I underline in Tomboy?

Question: In the Tomboy note-taking application, there are options for Bold, Italic, Strikeout, Highlight, and Fixed Width, but not for Underline. Is there any way to do this at the moment?
Answer: It's listed as an official add-in.  I could not find an option to add it on my Ubuntu install but it would be under Edit -> Preferences -> Add-Ins in Tomboy.
Answer: This add-in is included in Tomboy 1.0.  It is disabled by default to avoid confusion with links, but you can enable it as djhowell has said.

How do I underline in Tomboy?


Is gravity active in the very early universe before matter exists?

Question: Since gravity separates very early, and takes it's present form by 1 Plank time, does it act on the energy in the very early universe (e.g., during the Grand Unification Epoch) as it does on electromagnetic energy later on? Is there analogy of wave particle duality with the force(s) in the very early universe, even though matter does not exist until the Electroweak symmetry breaking?
Answer: You are making some (not unreasonable) assumptions about the early universe that are not supported by any evidence. For example, we're not sure that gravity was once unified with other forces and separated from them around one Planck time, although that seems plausible or likely to many physicists.
But yes, in General Relativity gravity acts on any kind of energy. (And also on momentum.) You don't need to have mass, either to produce gravity or for gravity to act on. In the very early universe, mass was probably non-existent, although again we don't have good evidence that this was the case. And if, for some reason, it was not non-existent, it would have been irrelevant because mass-energy would have been insignificant compared to other forms of energy.
Comment: My question should have been stated, "Since gravity is a separate force very early and takes its current form by 1 Plank time..." I did not intend to state that gravity was unified with the other forces.


Does research support the notion of mimicry building trust?

Question: Mimicry is the behaviour in which one person subconsciously imitates the gesture, speech pattern, or attitude of another person.
Some people believe that mimicry has strong social effects. For example, according to NLP, mimicry can be used strategically to build rapport (here, the technique is called "mirroring").
Has there been any scientific research on the effects of mirroring?
If so, does research support the notion that mirroring builds trust?
Comment: See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Bargh#Perception.E2.80.93behavior_link
Comment: What is "mirroring"? A great way to phrase a question is to assume that not everyone can read your mind.
Answer: A good primer on the psychological effects of mimicry is the review by Chartrand and Lakin (2013), who define mimicry as "the automatic imitation of gestures, postures, mannerisms, and other motor movements" (also see this earlier question).
They cite several findings suggesting that mimicry indeed contributes to positive relationships between people. For example, people being mimicked become more prosocial to the mimicker, as expressed in increased liking, empathy, helping behavior, and felt closeness. Chartrand and Lakin describe mimicry as a kind of "social glue" bringing people together.
More specifically with regard to your question, several studies are in line with the idea that mimicry increases trust.
For example, as per Chartrand and Lakin (2013):

Van Swol (2003) had a confederate, while trying to change the participant's opinion on a topic, imitate his or her behaviors (or
  not). Later, participants reported that they perceived the mimicking confederate as more knowledgeable and persuasive, even though
  they did not ultimately change their opinion on the topics. In a twist on this, Bailenson & Yee (2005) found that participants liked a computer avatar that mimicked their head movements more than one that didn't, and
  were more persuaded by its arguments.

They also cite studies that measured trust specifically:

Trusting behaviors tend to increase after a person has been mimicked. For example, mimicked participants seem more willing than those who were not mimicked to divulge personal information to strangers, even when that
  information could be embarrassing (Gueguen et al. 2012). According to Maddux et al. (2008), mimicry also smoothes the progress of negotiations. They instructed negotiators to either mimic or not mimic partners' behavior and later assessed mimicry's impact on negotiation outcomes. Mimickers experienced higher individual and dyadic gains and were more willing to come to an agreement with others regarding a difficult decision, and the
  relationship was mediated by interpersonal trust (see also Swaab et al. 2011)

Does mimicry always work?
NLP holds that Mirroring is a powerful technique. Note, however, that the cited findings only document modest mean differences, showing that mimicry can have an effect. Nevertheless, the size and importance of this effect may still be questioned.
Furthermore, under some circumstances mimicry may not work or even backfire.
Lakin and Chartrand (2013):

It turns out that one does need to mimic the "right" people to enjoy the positive consequences of mimicry. Recent research has found that mimicking may backfire (in terms of public opinion about one's social competence) if
  someone mimics an unfriendly person. After watching someone mimicking unfriendly behaviors, people thought the mimicker was less socially competent than someone who mimicked a friendly partner or someone who mimicked no one (Kavanagh et al. 2011).

In addition mimicry may work less well if people mimic outgroup members, if one has to mimic nonaffiliative expressions (e.g., anger), or when people have a proself mindset or have high levels of social anxiety (Chartrand & Lakin, 2013).
Finally, in some situations, complementary (doing the opposite) rather than imitative behavior may increase liking. For example, Tiedens and Fragale (2003) asked confederates to mimic or complement bodily postures of dominance or submission (using an expanded or constricted posture). Participants whose behavior was complemented (the confederate showed a submissive posture when the participant was behaving in a dominant way, or vice versa) liked the confederate more. Thus, in power or status relationships mimicry may have different effects.
References
Chartrand, T. L., & Lakin, J. L. (2013). The antecedents and consequences of human behavioral mimicry. Annual Review of Psychology, 64, 285–308. doi:10.1146/annurev-psych-113011-143754


Can the last n bitcoin blocks (including transactions) be reliable enough to be used as a seed for a PRNG or an input to a crypto hash-function?

Question: Suggested by u/HolgerBier on reddit
Is it unpredictable enough or too difficult to manipulate (as in more than a few hundred million USD) to have a sequence of blocks?
Answer: Bitcoin, like most other blockchains, has a well-ordered collection of blocks.  However, because the longest valid chain is the correct one, it may happen that, at a particular time, it's not clear which chain is valid (say, if there are two competing proposals for block N).  This will almost certainly be resolved in the future in favour of one chain or the other, as one is built on and the other is not.  Provided you specify some defined format of the chain to hash, you can use this value as a hash input, but you may want to wait for a few blocks to be sure that you don't have competing chains.
Now, whether you should use this for a PRNG or other secret input is different.  If you want a secret input, this is not helpful, because if your project is interesting enough, it's possible for a mining group to get together and only attempt to mine blocks that would produce a certain outcome.  For example, if you had a coin flip that determined who would win a large amount of money, it might be interesting to mine only the block that would let a certain person win.  This becomes more complicated if there are many possible outcomes, since it increases the complexity of the attack, but in general, you cannot assume the output of a blockchain is random and free of influence.  This is true even if multiple parties agree on a future block hash (say, N + 5).  That would still provide the same incentive to attack the PRNG.
If you're looking to have a group of people agree on a secret seed ahead of time, each person can generate a random 256-bit secret $ S $, and then commit to it using a commitment scheme (such as the output of $ HMAC-SHA256(K, S) $ with a per-user random 256-bit $ K $).  Everyone shares their commitment ahead of time, and then reveals their $ K $ and $ S $, and the $ S $ values can be used in a fixed order for a hash or seed.  If you need to not reveal the value of the PRNG ahead of time (say, for playing a card game), you can send the $ S $ values to one person (the dealer), and then reveal the commitments at the end.


How to sort structure arrays in MATLAB?

Question: I'm working with an image retrieval system using color histogram intersection in MATLAB. This method gives me the following data: a real number which represents the histogram intersection distance, and the image file name. Because they are different data types, I store them in structure array with two fields, and then I save this structure in a .mat file. Now I need to sort this structure according to the histogram intersection distance in descending order in order to retrieve the image with the highest histogram intersection distance. I've tried many methods to sort this data but without result. Please can you help me solve this problem?
Answer: It's also possible to sort the entire structure.
To build off of gnovice's example...
<code>% Create a structure array
s = struct('value',{1 7 4},'file',{'img1.jpg' 'img2.jpg' 'img3.jpg'});

% Sort the structure according to values in descending order
% We are only interested in the second output from the sort command

[blah, order] = sort([s(:).value],'descend');

% Save the sorted output

sortedStruct = s(order);
</code>
Comment: Note: to sort by the filename (or any string), you would do `[~, order] = sort({s.file});`, then `sortedStruct = s(order);`. You can't use `'descend'` in that case, until this is implemented in some future version of Matlab.
Answer: Here's one example of how you could do this, using the function MAX instead of having to sort:
<code>%# First, create a sample structure array:

s = struct('value',{1 7 4},'file',{'img1.jpg' 'img2.jpg' 'img3.jpg'});

%# Next concatenate the "value" fields and find the index of the maximum value:

[maxValue,index] = max([s.value]);

%# Finally, get the file corresponding to the maximum value:

maxFile = s(index).file;
</code>
EDIT : If you would like to get the N highest values, and not just the maximum, you can use SORT instead of MAX (as Shaka suggested). For example (using the above structure):
<code>>> N = 2;  %# Get two highest values
>> [values,index] = sort([s.value],'descend');  %# Sort all values, largest first
>> topNFiles = {s(index(1:N)).file}  %# Get N files with the largest values

topNFiles =

    'img2.jpg'    'img3.jpg'
</code>
Comment: you can also use **cat(1,s.value)** to concatenate the values
Comment: Thank you so much for reply , I will try to use this function . Please can I get your email address in order to sent you my matlab cod

thanks
Comment: @zenab: My email address is on my profile. Feel free to drop me a line if you have anything you want to discuss directly.
Comment: Hi Mr. gnovice

         I would like to extend my sincere thanks and appreciation to you for you helping ... I applied your solution (because I have a very large Structure) it work efficiently

     Zenab

How to sort structure arrays in MATLAB?


Selecting tables in PDF

Question: On Adobe Acrobat on Windows there is a "select table" tool that allows me to select tables to cut and paste into Word.  I would like to cut and paste tables from PDFs into OpennOffice on Ubuntu now, but there is not similar tool.  Is there a way to make evince do this, or another program that does have this tool?  I also looked at pdfedit and xpdf, but no success.
Answer: While this is not exactly what you ask for it may help to get the table data from the PDF that you can then format and use in other documents.
You can use the free Adobe Acrobat reader's  text selection tool and the spreadsheet gnumeric, both of these applications can be installed from the repositories. For Adobe Acrobat Reader, just enable the partner repository in synaptic or software center.
Open your PDF with Acrobat Reader and copy the text in the table area with the text selection tool, this tool is available under Tools>select & Zoom menu, you can hold down  the Ctrl and Alt keys on your keyboard when this tool is selected and you will have the ability to select blocks of text, it gives you good control over what is selected.
Start gnumeric, select a cell and click the paste button on the tool bar.
you will be presented with the Text Import Configuration dialog, quite often you will not have to change much in this dialog, usually you want the original Data type set to Separated. Click the forward button and check your Separator, usually Space.
look below and see if the structure looks OK then you can select finish. gnumeric will neatly place the copied text into the spreadsheet recreating the table there for you,
The table can now be copied from gnumeric and pasted into your Openoffice.org writer document, or you can paste from gnumeric to calc first and then format, then it is a simple matter of copying and pasting the formatted calc table in writer.
If the tables are complex and have wrapped text in the headings then you can copy the headings first, individully or the whole row, paste them and fix them up in gnumeric then copy the data section and paste under the headings.
This may seem a bit long but it is much better than retyping the data or pasting text directly into a word processor that often times will need tedious editing to look good.
If you do not mind a bit-mapped table you can use the Snapshot tool in Adobe Acrobat Reader to Marquee select the table area and paste it into your word processor, on many occasions when you do not care about editing the table this will work.
Comment: It would be nice if the person who voted  down the answer provided here leave a comment to state why they voted that way, note that we can not always provide exactly what the user ask for, what must be examined is if the answer has any use at all in providing a solution to the problem posed by the user.
Answer: I would argue the industry standard for PDF tables extraction is Tabula
https://github.com/tabulapdf/tabula
Answer: You can also install Acroread in your system and have all the functions of the software on it.
http://get.adobe.com/uk/reader/
In synaptic insert the next software sources:
deb http://archive.canonical.com/ubuntu maverick partner
deb-src http://archive.canonical.com/ubuntu maverick partner

This can be done by opening "System/Administration/Synaptic Package Manager" (enter your password when required).
In synaptic go to Settings/Repositories and click the "Other software" tab and you will get a window like this:

Click the "Add" button and enter the software sources that I previously provided you, one line at once.

When finished, perform a refresh by clicking the "Reload" button or by dropping the next command in a terminal (NOTE: this command can only be done with Synaptic Package Manager closed)
sudo apt-get update

Then, again in synaptic, perform a search for "acroread" and mark it for install. Apply the changes and enjoy.
NOTE: If you opted to use the terminal to install, just add the repositories to the software sources, close synaptic and run the next in a terminal:
sudo apt-get install acroread

Comment: you don't need to do this any more, going into the software center will show you packages available in the partner repository. Click the Enable and away you go.
Comment: In which moment is my answer worth for a downvote? just because people think there is such a "easier way". Thank you anyway.
Answer: Okular has a "Copy table" tool

Selecting tables in PDF


which file generated after compilation in C#?

Question: i want to know that after compiling the file in C# which type of file is generated?
Answer: Probably a .dll or a .exe is the answer you are looking for
Answer: It would have to depend on the type of project.  If it is a console application it will be an exe file.  If there are multiple projects and one console app then the other projects will be compiled as DLL files.  Obviously this doesn't include web projects.


Controlling database record correctness

Question: What do you is the best possible strategy from a technical point of view of being sure that the data stored in the database is genuine and hasn't been changed, for example, by DBA ? Especially in cases when storing financial transaction data.
Answer: You can set up membership rule access to database/tables/DML operations and so on.
Comment: Wouldn't it still mean that there's at least one account (with privileges) that's able to edit data "silently"?
Comment: No, you create as much roles as you want and assign different access level for the each. And full access give only for yourself, for example. Or by request of somebody if you will allow it.
Comment: I get your idea, but a 3rd party looking at the DB records should be sure of data being genuine. It won't help me if I grant those privileges only to myself, because I could be a financial beneficiary of certain data. My question is - how do you make a 3rd party trust you? My idea was using some kind of hash chains maybe for sequential records or something similar. Or maybe there's more elegant way.
Comment: Do you mean inadvertent  changes? If so, then only way I see - add data integrity constraint on the database level, as you said. Hash is nice in this case. That is my opinion.

Controlling database record correctness


How can I help an unfriendly dog with a serious wound?

Question: I feel like seeing coils of intestine through the cut wound or it may be the muscle I'm not sure. A staff here said its infested with maggots. The dog is kinda irritated one , doesn't allow any one to go near  . we are unable to restrain him. So i can't find out whether its infested with maggots. I see no signs of pus or blood. Since it is in breast area he has the access to lick it. But for precaution can i spray med. turpentine oil ? Will it cause harm if maggots aren't there? Would oral ivernectin heal that ? Or any other antibiotic course should be given?
Comment: You don't say where you are or what resources you have. Can you feed the dog some meat with a tranquilizer in it? Do you have a slip lead you could thread through a pvc pipe to make a catch pole? Honestly, if you are seeing intestines and the wound is old enough for maggots, you are probably not going to be able to save the dog, so if you can put it down humanely that is probably kindest.
Comment: As a start give the dog some food and fresh water
Answer: Please find a way to get this dog seen by a veterinarian. Even if you can't restrain the dog, perhaps you can get a veterinarian to visit your location and determine if the dog has maggots or intestines poking through the wound (both conditions are serious).
I do not recommend the use of turpentine oil on such a potentially serious wound, turpentine oil can harm the body's ability to heal.
Comment: I think Zaralynda has it. I'd also suggest calling animal control. The vet probably isn't going to come out and try to catch a dog. Even if they do, they'll charge you. Animal control handles things like this for a living. They'll come catch the dog for free and make sure it gets treated. They'll also handle finding out if it has an owner and if it does, why it was left in this condition without medical treatment. They'll take appropriate legal action if necessary, against the owners. Also, if it doesn't have an owner, they can try to get it adopted. It'll get good treatment either way.


Are documents in SP2010 saved directly to MS SQL Database

Question: When I Upload a document e.g. Word or Excel documents to a document list. Are the files saved directly binary to an SQL database? If yes, could someone give me a url by MS, where I can find further informations?
Answer: Yes, documents are stored as blobs in the site collection content database (SQL Server). You can read about document management in the Microsoft blog, and on database management on technet.


Handle user session with access token + OAuth provider

Question: I am building a web application with a basic client-server architecure. The frontend runs with react (nextjs) and the backend is on rails. However, the questions will be more about the flow of the authentication/authorization + session handling on the frontend.
I am using an Oauth provider to handle the authentication but don't need any authorization from their part as I don't need the resources of the oauth provider (ex. drive, calendar etc.)
For the authorization, as I want to access resources of my API, it's the API itself that handles authorization on any request made by the client (frontend) to the rails API.
Right now for the initial authentication this is the flow I'm using, Taken from https://blog.prototypr.io/how-to-build-google-login-into-a-react-app-and-node-express-api-821d049ee670  :
Implementation details important for the following questions :
I am using JWTs as access token (those generated by my API) and I simply sign them using a secret key that's only available on my API so the access token is unreadable from the front end point of view.
On the frontend, it is a react app and I used the following package to handle the OAuth flow google-react-login
Information received, what to use from Google (OAuth provider)
1- I receive(amongst other things) an IdToken and an access token from Google. Also I'm apparently supposed to receive a refresh token (which I didn't see). For my use case, all I need is the idToken from Google is that right?
Revoking of a refresh token (logout), flow for a re-login?
2- From my understanding access tokens need to be short lived for security reasons. So I need to return a refresh token to my client app to be able to generate new access tokens frequently. However, once a refresh token hits its expriy time, do I need to log out the user and prompt him to re-login through Google and basically redo steps 1 through 5 (Please refer to Figure 1)?
How to maintain the session through the access token
3- From the frontend perspective, can I assume that simply having a refresh token means the user is logged in? Once the server revoke the access token and the refresh token that means the user is logged out and I need to ouput a view of the web application for an unauthenticated user? That means after every page reload I need to check for the presence of an access and refresh token?
Thank you
Comment: Contrary to belief, a cookie is a simple ID that can be brute-forced and allow hackers into any users account. So keep that in mind hijacking can occur, this is no more or less secure but adds a double authentication which is what secures you.
Comment: Yes that is why I use a short lived access token to authorize users to make requests to my API. Also this token is encoded using an algorithm that make it hard to brute force on top of the fact that the token only has a short amount of Time to live. By double auth you are talking about the Authentication with google?
Answer: I think you could improve your security and lower complexity by one thing - replace issuing of your own JWT tokes by a custom OAuth2 server. This OAuth2 server could use Google as an authentication provider. This way, your would not know about Google and it would just use your own OAuth2 server.
Then you can decide how to use it - whether the frontend will be the OAuth2 client or the backend.
If you choose the frontend, you will use the auth code flow with PKCE (as a public client). The fronend will use an access_token to authorize its requests to the backend. This way, the frontend will handle a session using hidden iframes. See the OpenID Connect Session Management RFC.
If you choose the backend, you will use the auth code flow (with a client secret). This way, your backend can maintain the session using a cookie (with secure, HTTP-only, SameSite options).
You can read the OAuth 2.0 for Browser-Based Apps RFC for the current best practices.


How should questions that you plan to answer on your own be phrased?

Question: I did not realize until recently that Stackoverflow encourages posting questions that you plan to answer on your own in order to share your knowledge. What is the best way to phrase such questions? It seems strange to post a question asking if there is any solution to an issue if you already know the answer. Is there any phrasing for questions that you post that you know you are going to answer that is recommended?
Comment: Make it look like any other question really. If you don't make it look like any other question (that has a question, and could in theory also be answered by anyone else) you run the risk of it getting closed because it doesn't conform to the Q&A format.
Comment: I'm somewhat disappointed this wasn't self-answered.
Comment: @Gnat this is not a duplicate of that question. I am asking for general guidelines, not for advice because a question that I posted was voted down.
Comment: Title of the duplicate question is slightly off but that doesn't matter. General guidelines are right there, [in the top answer](http://meta.stackoverflow.com/a/251878/839601) - "Questions asked on this site are expected to be of high quality. The fact that you answered it yourself is entirely irrelevant..." etc. Second top answer over there is also worth reading - again, for general guidance
Answer: You phrase your question like a question, and your answer like an answer. All like you normally would if you weren't the author of both bits of information.
So don't ask your question with the answer already in mind. Ask the question the way you would have, before you thought of the answer to it. Include all the things we require from anyone else asking a question. Show us your code, demonstrate your problem, give us anything we need to reproduce the issue. Only once you've done that, you can think of the answer.
A great answer is no excuse for a crappy question, no matter if you're the OP of the question or not. And we won't hesitate to close or downvote your question if it's not up to scratch.


How to solve this trigonometric equation $\sin (x)-\cos (x)=0$?

Question: $\sin (x)-\cos (x)=0$.
Should I square them both or what should I do?
Comment: several ways to proceed: transform into $\tan(x) = 1$ or $\sin^2(x) = \cos^2(x) = 1/2$
Comment: $sin(x) = cos(x)$, square them, then use identity $1=cos^2(x)+sin^2(x)$
Comment: See the second answer of this question: https://math.stackexchange.com/questions/878279/finding-the-zeros-of-trionometric-polynomails/1084082
Comment: Can you write what you get after squaring and how far you can get from there? That would be one of the possibilities how to [add context](https://math.meta.stackexchange.com/questions/9959/how-to-ask-a-good-question/9960#9960). (You may have notice that your question received [several close votes](https://math.stackexchange.com/posts/2240727/timeline).)
Answer: Recall that $\sin(x) = \cos(\frac \pi 2 - x)$. Therefore your equation is:
$$\cos(x) = \cos(\frac \pi 2 - x)$$
And from here we get: $x = \frac \pi 2 - x + 2\pi k \Rightarrow 2x = \frac \pi 2 + 2 \pi k \Rightarrow x = \frac \pi 4 + \pi k$ (Of course $k \in \mathbb{Z})$
Comment: How are you sure you don't miss solutions. $\cos (\frac{\pi}{3})=\cos (-\frac{\pi}{3})$ but $\frac{\pi}{3} \neq -\frac{\pi}{3}+2\pi k$. So what I'm trying to say is that in general $\cos u=\cos v$ does not mean $u=v+2\pi k$.
Comment: You are right. In general, $\cos u = \cos v \Rightarrow u = v + 2 \pi k$ or $u = -v + 2 \pi k$, but in our case the other equality with the minus sign gives a false statement ($0 = - \frac \pi 2 + 2 \pi k$)
Answer: Plot the circle $t \mapsto (\cos t, \sin t)$ and see where it intersects the line $y-x = 0$.
Answer: Squaring could potentially introduce extraneous solutions, so I recommend avoiding that if possible.
$\sin x - \cos x = 0$ means $\sin x = \cos x$.  Now we can note that $\cos x \ne 0$ if $\sin x = \cos x$, because cosine and sine are never zero at the same time (i.e., for the same values of $x$).  So it's safe to divide both sides by $\cos x$, and we get
$$\tan x = 1.$$
Solving this boils down to knowing the unit circle.  Knowing the periodic property of tangent also helps.
Answer: If $\sin{x} - \cos{x} = 0$, then $\sin{x} = \cos{x}$. Sine and cosine are both $\pm \frac{\sqrt{2}}{2}$ for some multiple of $\pi/4$ for the angle, and can only intersect there. They are both positive in the first quadrant, and both negative in the third quadrant, so the general solution is $x = \pi/4 + {\pi}n, \  \forall n \in \mathbb{Z}$.
Or, you can divide by $\cos{x}$ on each side, to get $\tan{x} = 1$. Tangent is positive in the first and third quadrants.
If you love squaring things, we have $\sin^2{x} = \cos^2{x}$ and $\sin^2{x} + \cos^2{x} = 1$, so you can now substitute your least favorite function of the two to get: $1 - \cos^2{x} = \cos^2{x} \implies \cos^2{x} = \frac{1}{2} \implies \cos{x} = \pm \frac{\sqrt{2}}{2}$. Not all these solutions work, but if sine was your favorite function, then you would have gotten $\sin{x} = \pm \frac{\sqrt{2}}{2}$ instead. Now we have $\sin{x} = \cos{x} = \pm \frac{\sqrt{2}}{2}$.
As you can see, there are many ways to solve this! There are even four other answers above this one! So when in doubt, really just try something, because when you try something, you are one step closer to solving it, even if you have no idea what you are doing.
Answer: $$\sin { x } =\cos { x } \Rightarrow \tan { x } =1\Rightarrow x=\frac { \pi  }{ 4 } +n\pi .n\in Z\quad $$


Weighing a flying bird

Question: Let thing of a bird standing still in a box on top of a weighing machine that shows a mass $m_0$. Now, imagine that the bird is flying, still in the same box and the same weighing machine shows a mass $m_1$. As the bird when flying, is applying a force towards the weighing machine, could we deduce that $m_0 = m_1$? I'm asking this question because saying that these masses are equal makes me as uncomfortable as saying that they are not equal and can't figure the right answer. So does $m_0 = m_1$ and why?
Comment: Possible duplicate: http://physics.stackexchange.com/q/12756/2451
Answer: The weight will be the same on average over time.
The bird is supported by the air which in turn is supported by the box. To every action there is an equal and opposite reaction so the force supporting the bird must be transferred to the bottom of the box if no air can escape. However as the bird and air move around the overall centre of mass can move up and down so the force will only equal the total weight on average over time.
Answer: The bird can hover because it is forcing air down with its wings at a force equal to its own weight. This force is continuously existing at the bottom of the box as the air decelerates on it. It's as if the bird was directly connected to the bottom--just sitting there minding it's birdly business.
If the bird is moving up or down in the box however...that's a different story. Any such movement indicates an acceleration, which will change the weight reading on the scale (it measures weight not mass).
Comment: So as the bird is flying without moving up or down, the masses will be equal but if the bird changes its altitude, they will be different. Is it so?
Comment: @moray95, yes it is so

Weighing a flying bird


How much does body fat affect body temperature?

Question: I'm currently about 30 lbs overweight. I'm also generally much warmer than many others around me, and am constantly seeking ways to cool off. I'm already working on slimming down, but I'm wondering - if I lose 30 lbs and reach my target weight, will I be significantly cooler as well? How much difference does fat make in regulating one's body temperature?
Comment: Good discussion. I am 65, lean thin and skinny; and also a vegetarian. I donot have BP problem but due to over caution I reduced fat content (cow ghee or oil) to almost zero. I am vulnerable to cold such as AC. I feel cold in the foot sole, knee and back. Even 23 - 24 deg C or cool breeze causes the said cold effect over my body and I need to properly cover my body. From the above discussion now I feel that I should increase the fat conent in my food intake. Any suggestion ?
Comment: [Mod: converted to comment from answer] Hello @s.p.chari. and welcome to Stack Exchange! This is not a discussion forum - please keep answers as answers to the question, and ask your own questions as separate questions on the site!
Answer: From personal experience, I can say that you will lose some insulation when you lose fat, but that may not change much for you.  I lost around 85 pounds of fat, and I can say that I get really cold in the winter.  My hands are almost always ice cubes, but my thyroid tested out OK.  I have to button up my jackets now, but now I can so it's OK.
I've always run a bit cooler than most people, seeking ways to stay warm.  My basic physiology is a bit different than yours.  You'll probably still be looking for ways to cool off, but you won't have to work as hard to do it.
Insulation traps body heat in, and slows the effect of the outside environment.  What you will see is that with less fat (insulation):

If you are already cold, it will take less time to warm up when you go outside.
If you are already hot, it will take less time to cool off when you go where there's air conditioning.
Comment: I _could_ have my jacket open and be OK.  That worked because I _had_ to have my jacket open.  I would be chilly but not cold.  Now I have to have the jacket closed.
Comment: Good answer, thanks. One question though - you said "I lost around 85 pounds of fat, and I can say that I get really cold in the winter". How did you feel before you lost the fat?
Answer: Surface Area vs Volume
Not only does fat provide insulation...it also affects a body's surface area-to-volume ratio.
Volume represents how many cells are in a body (and cell size, like in fat). Larger and more numerous fat cells means more volume.
It also means more surface area. But because surface area grows at a square rate and volume grows at a cube, your volume-area ratio will get tipped as you gain fat or muscle.
Because we cool our body via an evaporative process on our skin (surface area), if volume goes up 70% and surface area goes up 30%, we'll have increased the thermal load without a commensurate ability to cool.
Sweat Glands vs Volume
Also, your sweat glands don't increase as you skin stretches to accommodate a larger body. A larger body doesn't have more sweat glands for a larger heat load.
Thus it's more difficult to cool a fat body than a skinny body.
Answer: I have kept tabs on various body particulars, including daily records of weight,(160) fat (currently 9.5%, moisture (64.5%), heart rate (42) at different times, and blood pressure (range from 112/58 to a high of 229/127) from March 26, 2006 to the present day. I am a distant runner and Decathlon competitor, which includes weights, speed work and of course forms and plyometrics.  Recently, due to an injury, my exercise regime went from a high of 35 miles down to nothing. Then, I had the misfortune of falling off the roof. Stuck the landing, but bleed quite a bit. Anyway, things are improving. There is a phenomena called Wilson's syndrome in which the body temp is less than 98.6. When air temp gets below 45 degrees, the body temp goes down. With a 9.5% number, I have had usually a number in the range of 95-96F, but a recent cold spell, and not working out, had me down to 90.2. Death from hyporthermia supposedly occurs at 89F. But, I was fine.  There were no symptoms of shaking or cold body parts or whatever.  I'm running today.
    I have recently speculated that there is a defined ratio of air temp, and body fat, that allows it to slide down to 90, without problems.
Comment: How does this answer the question?


How to get a rank in Counter-Strike:GO?

Question: We (as a team) like to play CounterStrike just a few times a year. Last time we tried this in November 2015, we couldn't start any team game. Obviously there is a prerequitite of XP you need to have fulfilled to get a rank which then allows you to play ranked wars.
 What I'm looking for is a definition of these Prerequisites and how to reach them in case it is not self-evident.
As a side note: Before you had to play a number of wars before you were ranked. Afterwards you had a better matchmaking. These ranks we usually lost between just two of our sessions but were quickly refreshed again.
Answer: There was an update in CS:GO, which introduced levels in the game, now what these levels are for is pretty much to restrict people from playing MM (MatchMaking) right from the get-go ( pretty much buying the game and playing MM) this way, it would reduce the ammount of "noobs" you would catch in MM, now, to play MM you need to have level 2.
How do you get level 2?
You play, Casual, Arms Race, DeathMatch, even some community servers provide XP, all you have to do is get level 2, this way they can at least "force" the player to know something about the game before playing MM.
When you first start playing you need 10 MM games before a rank is given to you, while you do not have this rank, unless you are in a full lobby (5 people, including you) you will not be able to play with ranks higher than MG1 (Master Guardian 1) the rank insignia is a single AK47.
Remember that if you play with your LEM (Legendary Eagle Master) and DMG (Distinguished Master Guardian) friends, you will have a hard time playing properly (unless you secretly are a csgo pro) since they will be high above your skill cap, which might cause your rank to inflate and make you lose a lot of upcoming games when you play solo, so i suggest, play alone your first 10 games, then play with your friends, after you get a rank.
To answer your question:

You need level 2 to play MM (Level that you get playing Casual and Other games modes).
You need 10 MM wins before you get a rank.
Don't play with your High Rank friends, you will just drop down when you start playing alone and get de-motivated to continue playing (I know this from personal experience).
Comment: Thanks. I think the level 3 might be the issue. Public playing seems to deliver very few XP and you need a lot to reach lvl. 3. Deathmatch seems to be most effective (according to short research).
Comment: About the XP i am not sure, but yes it takes a while to get level 3, they made it so newcomers actually get some pratice in. No problem, whenever you have a doubt about CS:GO or LoL i will try to reply to the best of my skills, glad i could be of assistance.

How to get a rank in Counter-Strike:GO?


Im wondering, Can your buildings mess with the world seed in minecraft

Question: I want to recreate my world with all of my buildings but I'm unsure if the seed has my buildings built-in? will the seed of the world save my buildings?
Answer: The seed of the world does not change if you change the world. If you recreate the world using the original seed and the same world generation parameters, the world will be pristine and exactly the same as when you started, with no changes you've made to the world persisting. If you wish to preserve your changes, you'll need to use a tool like WorldEdit or Structure Blocks to transfer your buildings over to the pristine world.
Comment: You could also just make a copy of the world file.
Answer: The seed does not store anything, and it doesn't change when the world changes. It is literally just a starting value for the random number generator used for world generation. So if you use the same seed for two worlds, the worlds will generate the same.


Secuirity concerns from Windows 8 login screen

Question: I'm trying to create a secure setup on my new Windows 8 laptop to help
keep a serious thief away from my data. An SSD with 256-bit hardware
encryption provides a solid security foundation. But if a thief were to get
my laptop with the lid closed it will be in sleep mode. When coming out of
sleep, Windows 8 is at the login screen. There are many free and paid
software that run from a USB stick or CD/DVD that can retreive or reset a
Windows 8 password. I'd like to know, can a thief can run or load a program
from a USB stick or DVD/CD from the Windows 8 login screen to get my Windows
8 password, whereby they could then log on and grab my data. This could be
 done if Windows 8 allows access to the CMD prompt from the login screen.
Thank you
Comment: The type of attack you are worried about is not possible on Windows.  While a computer is locked there have always been protections against this.  Those free programs only work if you can boot outside of Windows which won't be possible since your system drive will be encrypted.  Of course it would be trivial to boot to a Windows installation disk and just reinstall Windows.
Comment: It's worth noting that, with @Ramhound 's last statement, even if they reinstall windows they will not be able to access your encrypted old data. It would just be a fresh install.
Comment: @Abraxas - Anyone that is stealing a device, isn't really interested in the data, a person interested in the data isn't worried about keeping the device.
Answer: While it is certainly possible to retrieve the unencrypted memory from a laptop that has been in sleep, it isn't trivial.
So unless you are worried about nation-state level attacks, you can be pretty certain your data is safe from an attack when you are not present.
That statement is, however, dependent on you having a strong pass-phrase and also that you are not relying on a laptop fingerprint scanner.
A much simpler attack is to beat your password out of you so you might be better investing in personal safety rather than just electronic safety!


Migrating from Ubuntu to elementary OS

Question: I have lots of important development files and set up in my Ubuntu installation. But now after trying elementary OS, I'd like to make it my primary OS. Since everything in Linux is a file, I was thinking of a way to have everything in my Ubuntu migrated here. Will copying the /home folder or /etc do it? Or will I have to manually install all the programs?
Answer: I would advise against trying to copy over configuration files from Ubuntu, like those found in /etc or ~/.config. There will most likely be incompatibilities that could cause issues over the long term.
I would also recommend re-installing your apps since elementary OS provides different versions than Ubuntu for some very important libraries and some apps.
Answer: I would use Aptik to backup applications and settings for compatible applications (Firefox, Thunderbird, etc). Saves a lot of time re-installing.
Back up your Documents, Videos, Pictures, Downloads, etc folders to an another drive so you can restore afterwards.
Comment: Also, using Firefox synch can save a lot of time when migrating as bookmarks, settings, add-ons all get synched on multiple computers/ distros. Whenever possible, use IMAP mail.  These two things are good timesavers for distro hoppers.

Migrating from Ubuntu to elementary OS


QGIS forces multi-geometry?

Question: I noticed that with at least QGIS 3.14 (maybe earlier too) all objects are exported to shapefile as multi-geometry ie. points are exported as multipoints, lines as multiLines, etc, even if objects are internally stored as single-part geometry (after running multipart to single part). I simply noticed that when some of my GDAL-based scripts stopped working with new data processed with this version of QGIS.
I consider it a bug. But I'm afraid it is a feature with some narrow-targeted explanations.
Comment: Shapefile doesn't support the concept of multi-geometry in lines or polygons (all lines and polygons are always potentially multi-part).  It does support point/multipoint, because the file format is different (XY vs bnd,count,array of XY). Please [Edit] your Question to contain a question.
Comment: Welcome to Geographic Information Systems! Welcome to GIS SE! We're a little different from other sites; this isn't a discussion forum but a Q&A site. Your questions should as much as possible describe not just what you want to do, but precisely what you have tried and where you are stuck trying that. Please check out our short [tour] for more about how the site works.
Comment: The question is correct and is answered below
Answer: @Jarekj1 yes, I also noticed it trying to change a plugin from QGIS2 to 3, in QGIS3.4. I could notice that in QGIS2 it accepted simple geometries, but in 3 all of them are "apparently" generated as multipart.
Just in case, I put a conditional in my code if feature.geometry().isMultipart(): to handle the case that a simple geometry arrives, but it has not happened yet.
If you are writing code I advise you to consider that conditional. At least, until we find such a specification in the API or a CORE developer manifests it
If you want to handle multiparts with python in QGIS, just make the queries and we will guide you.
Comment: Thanks, that explains. Unfortunaltey .isMulipart is not gdal/ogr api but qgis. For gdal there is a different workaround (check geometry type)

QGIS forces multi-geometry?


Browser recognising non-touch screen as a touchscreen

Question: I have recently replaced the primary screen in my triple-monitor arrangement with a touchscreen. Set-up worked like a dream on connecting without the need to change any settings.
However, I notice that since adding the touchscreen to the setup, my Chrome browser displays websites optimised for touch (mostly the differences are minor like items in drop-down menus are now much more spaced out) regardless of which monitor the browser is open on.
I rarely open my browser on the touchscreen. Is there a way to set it so that Chrome knows which monitor is open on, so that it knows when it is not running on the touchscreen? Failing that, is there a way to manually turn off the touch-optimisation of websites in the browser?
Answer: You can turn off touch events entirely by doing the following:

Go to chrome://flags
Find the "Touch Events API" setting
Select "Disabled" in the dropdown

Further Reading: http://ccm.net/faq/40811-google-chrome-how-to-disable-touch-input


Exclude extraneous values in a range

Question: I have a range of readings from a test (for example:0.796, 0.109, 0.11, 0.11, 0.109, 0.109, 0.109, 1.78). I want to remove the extraneous values of these so that I get a more realistic view on the more accurate test result range. If I take the average (1.78) or the median (1.09) it doesn't give me that picture. I am not able to figure out how I could mathematically have a way to achieve this, because I don't want these extraneous values to skew my results.
Comment: Can you define what you mean by "extraneous"? Do you think that some of the readings represent a population other than the primary one & that you are not interested in? Do you think that some measurements have error in some way? Nb, in general, the median is considered the most robust measure of central location possible, so if the median isn't good enough, I'm not sure what would be.
Comment: Note that while ordinary English usage seems to be shifting recently to regarding _skew_ and _bias_ as synonyms, that's not standard in statistics, which has two terms for two different ideas. Skewness is asymmetry of distributions and bias is getting the wrong answer on average. I think you mean bias here.
Comment: @Nick: Indeed I mean Bias.
Comment: @gung: You are right, I am worried that some measurements are erroneous, especially that show sudden huge variation from a previous reading.
Answer: I get the impression you're talking about excluding outliers.
Exactly what should count as one (and whether they should be removed at all) sort of depends on your own views (like what 'accurate test result range' means) and your purposes.
It sounds like you might actually just need a reasonably robust estimate of scale; there are many such.
For example,
i) the quartiles for your data (using the default definitions in R) are 0.1090 and 0.2815; the interquartile range for your data is then 0.1725. The middle 50% of the data lie in between 0.1090 and 0.2815.
ii) the median absolute deviation from the median (MAD) is 0.0005; 50% of the data lie between median-MAD and median+MAD.
Comment: Not to mention robust estimates of location. Trimmed means, for example, usually include more values than the median but fewer than the mean. (They equal the mean and median as limiting cases.) The 25% trimmed mean, or midmean, is easy to explain to users of boxplots as the mean of values inside the box, at least approximately.
Comment: +1 Yes, there's a lot to be said for trimmed means as simple yet robust location estimators; nice point about the midmean.

Exclude extraneous values in a range


Stop Visual Studio from appending numbers to the end of new controls

Question: I am wondering if there is any way to stop Visual Studio 2010 from appending a number to the end of the ID on new controls I create.  For example, when I add a new TextBox, I would prefer that it do this:
<asp:TextBox ID="TextBox" runat="server">
<asp:TextBox ID="TextBox" runat="server">
<asp:TextBox ID="TextBox" runat="server">

Instead of this:
<asp:TextBox ID="TextBox1" runat="server">
<asp:TextBox ID="TextBox2" runat="server">
<asp:TextBox ID="TextBox3" runat="server">

It would make it easier to rename them appropriately, so I don't have to arrow/mouse over and delete the number each time.  As I was writing this, the "Questions that may already have your answer" suggested this:
How do I prevent Visual Studio from renaming my controls?
which admittedly was the biggest part of my annoyance, but that appears to turn off putting in an ID="" field altogether, not just for pasted controls.  It would still be helpful to turn off the numbering for new, non-pasted controls and have it not rename pasted ones as well.  At the moment I'm working with ASP.NET, but it would be nice if it there was a way to do it for WinForms as well.
Before anyone suggests it, I do know that allowing it to append the numbers prevents name conflicts should I not rename them appropriately.  However, I would much rather have it fail to compile so I know to fix the issue now (if I forget to name something properly) rather than find random "TextBox1" items lying around in the code later on.
Answer: in visual studio goto:
Tools > Options > Text Editor > HTML > Miscellaneous
Uncheck 'Auto ID elements on paste in Source view'.
Comment: The link included in my original question already has that answer.  Unfortunately, it turns off including the ID tag altogether, not just the numbering.


What kinds of fish recommended for my 3 gallon tank?

Question: I have had several Beta over the past years and my kids want a different kind of fish. The Beta worked because they didn't need a filter or aeration.  Our tank  is 3 gallons,  some decorative plants,  and a temp regulator. What fish would be good for this set up?  Not interested in purchasing a bigger tank  or air system they always break on me. Thinking two or three fish max.
Answer: Unfortunately, there is no fish that can thrive in a small container of its own filth with limited oxygen for any length of time. I am sorry to say this, but even your beta fish needed filtration once it arrived at its new home. Unfortunately, I suspect that's why you've gone through several of them in the last few years. Betas live 4-6 years upwards of 10 years in a domestic environment. It's unfortunate that pet stores continue to sell fish and bowls as zero-care setups explicitly.
Beta fish and (to a lesser extent) your common goldfish are able to survive adverse conditions for a short period of time. That's why they are displayed that way. But understand that by keeping them in these conditions is only giving them minimal life support; barely. These no-air, no-sanitation habitats are essentially subjecting them to becoming short-lived, disposable pets struggling on borrowed time.
To be fair to your question, if you pick virtually any small, non-social aquarium fish rated for "beginners" — one that will never grow and one that doesn't mind living in near isolation — it is possible to maintain a severely under-stocked tank without a filter… but that's provided you follow a rigorous routine of frequent water changes and water conditioning that is outside the scope of this question.
But honestly, for want of a simple sponge filter and an air pump that should last you for years, I wouldn't even try.
Answer: I agree that this tank is not suitable for fish.
But perhaps you can consider getting shrimps? It are active animals which are also  fun to look at.
They're perfect for small, low maintenance tanks. Even though they will also need some filtration. Best is a sponge filter with an air pump, that way the little shrimp won't be sucked into the filter.
I've got a 30 litre tank (8 gal), with neocarina heterepoda shrimps (cherry shrimp). These are ideal starter shrimps, because they are easy to keep & breed.
They're group animals, so to start you should probably get around 20 of them. But after a couple months you should already have plenty more. I started 7 months ago with 25, and I think I'm now well over 70 (it's getting to difficult to count).
If possible, check if nobody in your area wants to sell a few, instead of buying them in a pet store.
In Belgium, pet stores usually charge up to €2/shrimp. I've been able to buy mine for €0.50/shrimp.


PCIe 1x cheap video card for image recognition with existing model

Question: When searching for a cheap video card for image recognition all the articles seem to have the AI learning in mind. But that is now what I need.
So the use-case is:
I have a small laptop based server running homeassistant and surveillance recording software. I am running an image recognition software on the images from 2 cameras ones a minute on the CPU. This is working fine but I would like to increase the frequency and probably even number of cameras. All this while not increasing the power usage a lot and in tight budget. The PC has a single PCIe 1x that can be stuffed with a riser.
Is there something that could be just better than CPU or is it a waste of time?
Answer: TPU is what you need.
Coral USB accelerator could be used.

They were originally $79.99, but unfortunately availability suffers and its near impossible to find one that that price.
One amazon user said

I use it to offload video motion detection from my frigate
home-assistant instance. It moves the load to the TPU, meaning I can
run my 7 CCTV cameras at 15 fps. Which previously would not have been
possible without putting my CPU at 50% load.

Can be found on amazon and at other retailers, but at a wide range of prices.
Comment: Thank you for the answer. My investigation lead me to the same conclusion. Already waiting for the shipment.


Scene descriptons?

Question: If one is describing a gala ball, what level of detail of the room is considered appropriate? For example, if the ball is a lavish one, is it appropriate to include the table settings (conical red napkins, crystal wine, and water glasses, etc.) or is the designation "lavish ball" sufficient?
Answer: Focus on the viewpoint character's attention and opinions.
Describe whatever the viewpoint character pays attention to, especially if the character has an opinion about it.
Don't describe anything that the viewpoint character pays no attention to.
Comment: Great, helpful answer. Thanks so much Dale. I learned a lot from your ideas and will incorporate them in my screenplay.
Comment: Oh… I didn't notice that you were asking about screenplays. My answer is good for novels and short stories. Screenplay descriptions are entirely foreign to me, and I suspect that my answer does not apply.
Comment: I think your answer applies as much to screenplays as it does to other art forms.  In a screenplay, you do not want to burden readers with TMI. You must remember to describe only what actors can see and hear. Directors can, and are capable of filling in the blanks. Therefore, your answer is completely appropriate. Your honesty and integrity deserves a +1.
Answer: Dale Hartley Emery answered

"Don't describe anything that the viewpoint character pays no attention to"

With this principle Zola's books would be short stories and The Lord of The Ring, a novella. A good portion of the world fiction would be reduced to shreds.
My answer as to the level of detail would be that it depends on your skills. Some authors can write pages after pages of intricate details without boring the reader, other authors make you speed-read and jump any bit of description.
Also, it depends if the description is needed or not. Is the environment an important character, are you writing an atmospherical novel?
Just saying "lavish ball", would be enough only if it is the umpteen unimportant ball the character attends.
If the setting is important yes, I would like to know details about the napkins,  glasses…mesmerize us, show us the wonder of the child seeing it for the first time, regale us with minutia, show us that it is lavish…do lavish in the details.
Comment: Thanks, Reed. Actually, I am writing a screenplay. It is entitled Mozart, Wunderkind. By the time the scene I referred to is shown, Mozart has already performed at Versailles and Buckingham Palace. These scenes are described in great detail. Your points, however, are well taken.
Answer:
Focus on the viewpoint character's attention and opinions.

Agreed. But some stories are told by an omnipotent narrator, so more care must be taken to stop describing things before the reader gets bored and skips ahead.
In general, I'd suggest having people read your work and be brutal about critiquing it. I like adding a note where I lose interest in the narrative and feel like jumping to the next paragraph.

Scene descriptons?


Particle system not working with geometry nodes

Question: I was working on a scene, and I wanted to try the new geometry nodes with rocks. I already had a particle system on the same plane. The problem is, when I enabled the geometry nodes modifier, the particles (grass) didn't show up any more. I think the the reason why it doesn't work is because the particle system isn't part of the mesh. I could convert the particle system to mesh, but that will just kill my computer and the pebbles will probably also go on top of the grass. So I want to know if there's a way to add the particle system in the geometry node modifier, or maybe you have another way!
So my question in short: "how can I add the particle system to the object while also having a geometry node modifier active?"
Thanks in advance!
Ravi
Answer: The particle system is a modifier. Make sure it happens after the geometry nodes modifier. Then check the box under the 'source' expander of particle nodes tab that says "Use Modifier Stack"


DNS not automatically retrieved

Question: So, I switch the IPv4 method to manual and leave DNS on automatic. After tying in the static IP I want, the subnet mask, the default gateway and then turning WiFi off and on to reconnect. You would assume there would be no problems, but surprise surprise, it hasn't retrieved the DNS addresses from the router like it does in the "DCHP" method. Why doesn't it retrieve the DNS addresses in the "Manual" method when the DNS "Automatic" switch is flipped on?
Answer: This is surely a bug since the only way to automatically assign DNS servers is via DHCP.

When using static IP addressing (manual) you must enter the DNS server(s) manually.
When using dynamic IP addressing (DHCP) you will get the DNS server(s) assigned to you automatically. But you can override the automatic DNS assignment from DHCP by entering one or more static DNS servers to use.
Comment: I was actually talking about the reverse, since it still has the Automatic switch for the DNS on On when the method is Manual, but it acts as if the switch isn't there. It's in the same row as the label DNS.
Comment: Well that was my point, it must be a bug since you should not be able to have Automatic DNS when the method is Manual. The switch should be grayed out when you are using Manual IP address assignment.

DNS not automatically retrieved


Diameter of a convex body relative to its Legendre ellipsoid

Question: Given a convex body in $\mathbb{R}^n$ that is symmetric with respect to the origin, let us measure its diameter with respect to the Euclidean metric determined by its own Legendre ellipsoid. How large can this diameter be? Is there a known sharp upper bound?
Comment: You're essentially trying to bound an "affine diameter" from above by the volume of the body. This is more or less a reverse affine isoperimetric inequality. There are not many known sharp inequalities of this type.
Answer: There are different notions of legendre ellipsoid depending on whether you have a background   euclidean structure on the space (and in this case you also have an additional possibily because you may  divide say by a volume, or not), or if you   have no background euclidean structure     and you first construct the legendre ellipsoid  on the cotangent space and then take its dual in the tangent space (how it is done in [V. D. Milman, A. Pajor,  Lecture Notes in Math., 1376, Springer,1989] or in  http://xxx.lanl.gov/abs/1104.1647).
In the second case, there are some estimations in
http://xxx.lanl.gov/abs/1408.6401 both in the symmetric and nonsymmetriccase
In the first case, one can get better results using the classically known formulas how  compare the norm given by the convex body and by its John and Loevner ellipsoids (some references are also in http://xxx.lanl.gov/abs/1408.6401). I do not remember  by hart whether in the symmetric case  they have exact estimations.
Comment: Indeed, the more natural interpretation of the question is the second one, where the Legendre ellipsoid lies in the vector space dual to the one containing the body.
Comment: Aren't you confusing the Binet and the Legendre ellipsoids? The Binet Ellipsoid is in the dual space and the Legendre ellipsoid is its dual, in the same space as the convex body.
Comment: Ach. I can't keep the names straight.
Comment: Juan Carlos, what is your definition of the legendre ellipsoid?


Difference between zero knowledge succint non interactive of knowledge proof (zk snarks) and zero knowledge range proofs (zkrp)

Question: What are the differences between between zero knowledge succint non interactive of knowledge proof (zk snarks) and zero knowledge range proofs (zkrp) ?
Answer: A very good explanation from ING's paper on ZKRP:

ZK-SNARKS, are a ZKP-variant, that requires no interaction necessary between the prover and verifier. The most appealing example of ZK-SNARK is its ap- plication in Zcash [8]. Also, Ethereums Metropolis will introduce ZK-SNARKS. This shows that ZK-SNARKS can, indeed, be applied in practice.
ZK-SNARKS are generic; they can verify any function which is particularly relevant for Ethereum which provides the Turing-complete EVM, allowing devel- opers to build any type of logic. Generic ZKPs like ZK-SNARKS, however come at a price. They are notably less efficient than specific zero-knowledge proofs.
[...]
Zero-Knowledge Range Proofs (ZKRP) allow for proofing that a number lies within a certain range.

Proofing that a number lies within a certain range is a more specific ZKP solution, which can be implemented more efficiently (-> gas usage) than the generic ZK-SNARKS.


HP Smart Array - Swapping drives in RAID set to upgrade

Question: I have a HP DL360 G7, with Smart Array controller that has 2x RAID sets (RAID 10). Host OS is VMWare ESX. The 2nd RAID set has 4x 10k 600GB Midline drives that are to be upgrade to 15k 600GB Enterprise drives. In the old days I would have just pulled the old drive out, waiting a moment, then put the new one in, waited for the array to rebuild onto the new drive and repeated the steps. That was in the days of G1-G2 servers with much older controllers, plus I had Windows as the host with the Smart Array utility.
What I am hoping to avoid is shutting down the VMs, copying them, then having to restart the server to go into the RAID utility. I would like to confirm since the only difference in drives will be the RPM speed, these could be swapped sequentially.
Answer: Yes this should work fine, it'll take a while but yes.


Why are the LED lights in my ceiling fan suddenly dim?

Question: Installed ceiling fan with LED lights. Circuit has three way switches no dimmers. Lights worked fine for a 1-1/2 months, but then turned on one morning and lights are dim. Fan has a remote to turn on and off.
Comment: On the fans with remotes I have seen, the remote also controls the lights. And usually if you hold the on/off button for lights (or some similar action), it will dim the lights. So try holding the button on the remote if there is one and see if you can bring the lights back to how you want them.
Comment: Does the fan remote also control the lights? Are you sure they weren't always dim when off?
Comment: There is not enough information provided for the community to help you.
Answer: It sounds like the driver for the LED has started to fail, I have seen this a few times , I would check to see if it is under warranty and exchange it.


How does Ethereum's proof-of-stake consensus algorithm work?

Question: Ethereum uses a proof-of-stake consensus algorithm to ensure the integrity and security of its blockchain. Can someone explain in detail how this algorithm works and how it helps to maintain the network's integrity? What are the challenges of implementing a proof-of-stake system and how does Ethereum address these challenges?
Answer: When you're talking about intergrity I suppose you're referring to the safety property? In blockchains, the safety property ensures that there cannot exist two concurrent finalized block.
Ethereum's consensus algorithm is quite convoluted, so rather than give you the entire explanation, I will give you some pointers on what to look for to understand it.
You'll need to know:

what is a fork choice rule.
what are BFT (Byzantine Faul Tolerant) consensus. How is it related to the finality gadget.
In the attestations made validators what are the FFG vote and GHOST vote used for, respectively.

Here are some links that can help you get started:

https://ethereum.org/en/developers/docs/consensus-mechanisms/pos/gasper/
https://101blockchains.com/byzantine-fault-tolerance/
https://eth2book.info/altair/part2/consensus

Once you've unpacked all this information, you can probably get a thorough understanding of the protocol with the help of a scientific paper called Ethereum Proof-of-Stake under Scrutiny.
Comment: this is true. I have adjusted the question. Thank you


Can I use WD-40 or WD-50 to clean Cube bike chain?

Question: Can I use WD-40 or WD-50 to clean a bike chain?
Comment: To add confusion- "WD40" is a specific water-displacement product, as well as a company name for a range of other specific lubricants.  Which one do you mean?
Comment: Also, your question says "clean a bike chain" and you intend on lubricating the chain later?  Or are you asking "can you use WD40 to clean AND lubricate a chain?"
Answer: It is a debatable topic but due to its properties, you can indeed use it to degrease/clean your chain. However, I would only use it for that, "classic" (*) WD-40 is not a good lubricant, simply because it is too "thin" compared to proper lubrication products. On the long run, you are also better off with a specific degreaser and get better results, i.e. dirt and oil getting removed.
After degreasing, you should remove any residues of WD-40 (to avoid interference with new lube), make sure that the chain is dry and reapply lubrication with a suitable product.
We don't give any product advice here but in my opinion, regular cleaning is more important than the product chosen. Not properly applying lube or riding too long intervals respectively on a dirty chain is doing more damage than finishing a ride on a cheap oil if all else fails.
I would suggest a good quality bike-specific oil with suitable attributes for your typical riding conditions (basically: dry or wet). Wet-condition-specific oils typically stick to the chain better but also pull more dirt, so you might want to choose a type of oil for dry conditions if you're mostly riding in good weather and get away with slightly longer cleaning intervals, simply because the chain gets less dirty.
Dry lubes or even waxing your chain are also possibilities but the former isn't suited for wet riding (and in my experience doesn't last too long, either), waxing can be quite a complicated process that requires taking your chain off, time and tools.

(*) I wrote classic WD-40 because there is the multi-function
product we all know, and my explanations focus on that. However, the
company in question also offers specific bike products such as
degreasers, wet/dry oils and sprays, the latter with cleaning and lubrication properties, as far as I know. These
can indeed be understood as an alternative to any oil or degreaser
being referred to in the answer.
Comment: There is WD-50 now? Since when? Must have been a 50th anniversary thing.
Comment: @kaz Seems not - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yyDRZAg1pYo and https://www.reddit.com/r/AskAShittyMechanic/comments/pi2kpc/how_much_better_is_wd50_what_should_i_use_it_for/   both show "WD50"  and then provides counter examples.


What's the difference between "suasive" and "persuasive"?

Question: What's the difference in usage between suasive and persuasive?  I just read the former used, here on this StackExchange, where the latter would have worked perfectly, IMO.  Is there a subtle distinction between the two words?  Can anyone give me an example where using suasive would be compellingly better than using persuasive? And finally, as I'd never seen the word suasive before today, does that mean suasive is archaic, or just used in a particular context?
Answer:
Suasive is an adjective that, in Linguistics (Grammar), "denotes a class of English verbs, for example, insist, whose meaning includes the notion of persuading and that take a subordinate clause whose verb may either be in the subjunctive or take a modal."
Persuasive is an adjective as well, that means being "good at persuading someone to do or believe something through reasoning or the use of temptation: an informative and persuasive speech." OR "She was very persuasive!"

The difference, then, is that while the former denotes a grammatical class for verbs, the second is adopted the way you already know, with people, situations, etc.
EDIT NOTE: In the OED it says that a speech can be "suasive" but considering the OALD and my dictionary didn't have it, I supposed it was an old use or it fell into disuse. So I checked the Ngram on google and it confirmed what Billare said and what I was thinking.
Comment: Although "suasive" and "suasion" are much less common, [Merriam-Webster](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/suasive) does have recent uses of "suasion". It's unclear whether it's being used simply for variety (to avoid repeating persuasion/influence/etc) or if it has a slightly different meaning - from their examples it might be intended to mean something subtler, and less complete or total ("per-" is often used to indicate completion).


Video of Earth spinning?

Question: If the Earth is spinning or rotating at a really fast speed, why haven't we seen any videos from space of it spinning when we get a lot of photos of it?
Comment: ""If the Earth is spinning or rotating at a really fast speed,.."" What is "fast speed" for You? One rotation in 24 hours? Rofl
Answer: First of all, let's calculate the rotational velocity of the Earth, at the equator. The diameter of the earth is 12,756 km. Therefor, the speed is ${12,756km*\pi}/{24 hrs}=1669 km/hr$.
Given that we know the rate of spin of the Earth, what else would be required to see this change?

The point of reference would need to be relative to the Sun, or possible the Earth-Sun system, but not LEO like most spacecraft are. Geosync. orbit would not work either, as the satellite is moving at the same speed as the Earth. A very high orbit might work, such as the Moon would be in.
In order to achieve 1, a significant distance from the Earth is required.
Given that a large distance is required, the Earth will not appear to be moving as quickly as it would otherwise.

Just to compare this, I pulled the speed of the moon orbiting the Earth from wikipedia. That speed is 1.022 km/s, or about 3,680 km/hr. That is a much higher speed than the Earth rotational speed. Given that the distance requirements are similar to see the rotational speed of the Earth, it seems that one would have to notice the moon orbiting if one could notice the rotation of the Earth, in real time. (Note, it's a bit easier to see the Earth rotating, due to the easy comparison, but...)
Comment: I put your figures into a calculator amd got
12,756×3.14
=40,053.84

40,053.84÷24
=1,668.91 did you make a mistake or is it me?
Comment: @Jitter: Not sure what I did, but I think you are right...
Comment: It happens to all of us;-) I'd like to hear the excuses from the 7 people who upgraded you before the edit.
Comment: On SO I have an answer to one of my questions that has 10 upvotes and doesn't even remotely work, and on SO you can actually test it fairly easily, so...
Answer: Well it is quite expensive to go into space and so taking a video camera for some holiday snaps is not exactly a high priority.
However weather sattelites do exactly this with images of cloud formations and movements.  Obviously these aren't typically very glamorous so rarely make into the public domain.
However they did recently take a camera on board the ISS
APOD sept 27 2011
rather pretty I think!
Answer: More importantly, in order to see the rotation properly, you'd need to stay at the same relative point in space. But in order to orbit the Earth, you typically need to go around it faster (until you get to geosynchronous orbit). The video's from the ISS make the Earth look like it's spinning because the ISS is orbiting so quickly. (It's mean orbital time is about 90 minutes.) I guess if the Apollo astronauts had taken a video recording of the Earth, from the moon for just over a day, you'd see about one full revolution of the Earth. But as said, that wasn't exactly a high priority: it's not like we're in any doubt that the Earth rotates once per day!
Comment: Right we're not in any doubt but we always get sooo many cool photos of space from NASA, and who wouldn't want to see a video of the Earth spinning? That's something no body's ever seen before. If they can take a photo camera up there, I don't think it would be that difficult to press a record button, don't you think? That's why I was thinking it's a bit odd we don't see a video like this.
Comment: The I'm not sure if [the video](http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap110927.html) in @Nic's answer is what you're actually looking for? You question asked about the Earth's rotation, which isn't what the video shows, but it does fit the description of taking a camera up and pressing record.
Answer: This video shows the Earth spinning at high speed, as seen out of the window of one of the space shuttles.
Comment: is this video true ?
Answer: You know I have been asking this same question, why aren't there videos of the earth's rotation from space? I've searched and only have found the opposite. Dish network had a station called "dish earth" that was up for about 3 years. Now if you select the 'dish earth' channel it will give you a different channel/station, NASA. What's really interesting is for a good 3 years this station showed a non-rotating earth in space and if you were to record it for a day, speed it up a bit, you will see the sun revolving around the earth and there's no playing around with it! Youtube have a few of these videos posted by people who had "dish earth". There's no mistake about it. In maybe 2 of those videos you will also see the moon passing by as well.
Even some of the videos from the ISS can support a non-rotating earth, look up sunrise or sunset in space on youtube.
Sometimes seeing is believing and all the math equations in the world can't alter reality. If there can be visual evidence of the earth's rotation, we would have had it long ago, there's no doubt in my mind.

Video of Earth spinning?


Google chrome and Chromium

Question: What are the major technical differences between Google Chrome and Chromium that makes Chromium running on my Ubuntu smoothly while Google Chrome is expanding and killing both my CPU and RAM ?
Comment: Chrome is no longer supported for 32 bit systems whereas chromium is supported on both 32 & 64 bit systems
Comment: You don't entirely need to use both at the same time. In the configurations you can add another user and use the two sessions at the same time. Same Chromium.
Answer: Chrome is the brand product by Google - the base browser AND specific modifications. It generally does a lot of things that are widely considered to be violating the privacy of its users or the fundamental principles of free & open software - hence is not the default choice for Ubuntu users.
Chromium is the software base of all the non-Google-related browser features which is shipped with fewer phone-home features and not many modifications beyond the base browser.
If you wish to find out why they are performing differently, you want to one-by-one disable all Google-specific features in Chrome. You may or may not be able to disable the delinquent, which may be among plugins, codecs, error reporting or search features.
https://chromium.googlesource.com/chromium/src/+/master/docs/chromium_browser_vs_google_chrome.md

Google chrome and Chromium