Different ways of going about worldbuilding besides making up words and drawing maps?

Question: I'm really not interested in creating a language for my world, especially having to make up names for the peoples and places. Or drawing maps. Mainly because I'm neither a good linguist nor a good drawer, and worried it will turn out badly like some other series I've read, or be too similar unconsciously to my favorites.
Are there ways around this when writing an epic fantasy?
Comment: Welcome to the site. Questions about the worldbuilding process are on-topic (and imo really helpful!) here, but this question seems to straddle the line between the worldbuilding process and the writing process. In particular, the line `when writing an epic fantasy` implies you need help describing the world to an audience in addition to making it. A helpful answer could either be on-topic "here's an introduction to easy mapmaking + conlangs" or off-topic "here's how to omit place names in your writing". I'm tempted to vote to close as answers will likely tend toward the latter.
Comment: My advice is to use an online generator to get your names, or to wait until you're done writing and look back to reflect. As for the map - no one has to see it. It can be helpful to draw a map just for sake of logical consistency in your plot, but you don't need to show your sketch to readers.
Comment: @Zxyrra Remember that some of us use world building for games, where you absolutely must show the map to players. Not everyone is a writer...
Comment: I meant this as a purely wordbuilding question.
Comment: @Muuski I think you'll find a lot of tabletop RPGs do not require maps.
Comment: Why are you trying to world-build?  Me, I start with a story and then build the world that will fit it best and in particular the elements that will affect the story.
Comment: An interview that might be helpful. https://faq.brandonsanderson.com/knowledge-base/how-much-worldbuilding-do-you-do/
Answer: You don't need to make up languages. Most works just ignore the problem. This is commonly referred to as Translation Convention.
You can do the same for people and place names. Sure, your character's real name is ᡂꛡࡁߚ, but we'll just call him "Bob". (If you like, you can mention that you're doing this.) Another approach, which is fairly common¹, is to use "Native American" naming conventions², i.e. use names like Stormbringer, Clearwater, Dances at Dawn, Sits with a Stiff Back... Obviously these are also subject to Translation Convention, but they also provide a gentle reminder that they Aren't In Kansas, and can double as a Meaningful Name. Alternatively, of course, there are random name generators out there, or you can make your own.
(¹ I'm using this in the book I'm currently writing. Wings of Fire also uses it; characters have names like Clay, Tsunami, Moon, Winter...)
(² Almost surely not unique to those cultures; that's just the example I know offhand.)
As for maps, depending on what you're writing, maybe you don't need a map. If you do, well, there is no reason you need to show the audience. If you need a map (even if it's just for your own use), but don't feel capable of producing one yourself, there are various tools available; just search for "worldbuilding tools", "map generator", and such. One I've been playing with recently is Azgaar's Fantasy Map Generator.
Comment: OTOH, if you name your dark elves John, Mary and Judas, you might have trouble persuading others that the setting is a high fantasy and not a parody. But of course, you might get away with that :).
Comment: @mmj Not quite sure what you're saying, but as part of his "translations from the Red Book" framework, Tolkien mentions that Frodo Baggins is itself a translation from the actual name used in the Red Book.
Comment: @mmj [Further reading on that](https://literature.stackexchange.com/a/6597/17). The example I always remember (quote is from LotR Appendix F): "*Meriadoc was chosen to fit the fact that this character's shortened name, Kali, meant in the Westron 'jolly, gay', though it was actually an abbreviation of the now unmeaning Buckland name Kalimac.*"
Comment: Those *"Native American naming conventions"* are actually the most usual method of making names. Ancient Greek and Persian and Hebrew and Germanic and Slavic etc. names were made this way; it's just that nowadays few people know enough Greek to realize that names like Cleopatra or Archimedes or Aristoteles are of this kind. (They mean, respectively, Glory of [Her] Father, Greatest Planner, and Noble Goal.) (Germanic names like Wilhelm, Adelaide, Ingrid etc. are opaque today because of sound changes.) (And Persian and Hebrew names were always opaque for people who were not Persians or Hebrews.)
Comment: Tolkien did this with the whole of the book being transcribed in English I believe, I never thought of doing this for inworld names because Tolkien only used it for narration purposes.
Comment: Ah, did not know that aspect of it...
Answer: Maps, languages and other world-building isnt a requirement, and can in fact be a point of annoyance for the readers. Having some aes mokdai (local dragon lord) who uses his G'radhid Talons (a type of magical spear) in the Habdabib ceremony (important to celebrate the Jastran season halfway through winter) in the city of Urdal (a smaller regional city in the small country of Galhallen with a rich culture stuffed with more names) is going to get tiresome very quickly.
What is more important is the information itself and how it fits in the story. Lord Of The Rings has a massively deep lore explained in the Silmarillion (probably bad spelling there) but its not required for the story of a bunch of saps that have to get the magical mcguffin across the lands while things fall apart around them. The maps and languages a nice and all, but are actually mostly irrelevant to the story. The most important thing to know is that you have the high passes of cant-remember-mountain, and that you have 2 alternatives: through Moria or all around the mountains through Rohan. And just that sentence is all you need, the map is an extra, a bonus but not required. I never needed to know what Sauron really was. Its explained in the Silmarillion, but as an almost force-of-nature evil he does fine.
Focus on making the story awesome, the lore can wait. And nothing makes the lore more awesome than an invested reader.
Answer: Team up with a buddy.
Hollow Knight is one of my favorite works of literature in the form of a videogame. Team Cherry made it by having the original creators focus on mechanics and design only. The two of them added the names, backstory and context later. It ended up being a beautiful mythology.
When Valve developed Half-Life 2 and Portal 2, they their teams developing mechanics while Chet Faliszek (a.k.a. Mr. Awesome) did the text and setting.
Even Monty Python had a similar process. John Cleese and Graham Chapman would write together, with Cleese doing the frameworl of the sketches and Graham adding the layers of absurdity. Thus the dead parrot sketch was born!
Stan Lee was famous for worldbuilding, but he never did it alone. He would provide backstories and relationships but a lot of the worldbuilding proper came from Steve Ditko (who created all the mysticism around Dr. Strange - the Eye of Agamotto for example was Ditko's idea), Jack Kirby and even Moebius.

So if you don't like mapping and naming, have someone do it for you (and with you). You may end up having a lot more fun that way :)
Comment: Most writers don't draw their own maps. If you're good enough, someone will.
Answer: Write some investigative scenes...
Imagine your protagonist back when they are middle school age and write a scene in which they are making a presentation to their class.  In their own voice, have them tell the class about a particular historic event and how it influenced all that came later.
Imagine your protagonist's love interest at a coming of age ceremony, reciting the family history to their assembled love ones.
Write a few epitaphs for famous historical figures, listing their life accomplishments and the family they left behind.
Write the summary page of a college level thesis on language evolution in your world.
For each question about the details of your fledgling world, write a scene or written artifact to provide an answer.  In using your writing process to slow down the usually rapid-fire question/answer cycle, you will give your imagination time to find the best answer to each challenge.
Then print out all of these informative scenes and put them in a box for future reference.  They are not intended to be part of your finished book, just some tools to help you illuminate and discover your world.
Answer: I suggest researching Earth's actual history in the classical and medieval periods. Take notes of features from various cultures and empires you would like to incorporate into your world. Don't be afraid to go as far as the muse takes you, both in terms of document sources and inspirations. Things like the rank structures of armies and noble families, demographic data regarding "mundane" factors like nutrition and average education levels, and the etymologies of common names in various times and places of history.
One site I recommend for fantasy worldbuilding inspiration is The Ancient History Encyclopedia at ancient.eu.
Comment: I just took a quick look at that website, very nice source, but your saying I should take certain obscure names without worrying about the etymology?
Comment: Not necessarily. I'm talking in the more abstract sense. Take a look around at the etymologies of names that they came up with and i think you will get a clearer picture for the ways that people in your own fictional world will develop their etymolog(ies).
Answer: One thing to do is draw a different type of map.
If your story is set the way too popular fantasy society based on feudal Europe, why not show makes of Feudalism?  You could have one map that shows the kingdoms in a region, and then another map showing the dukedoms that each kingdom is divided into, and a third map showing the countships that each duchy in each kingdom is divided into.  There might be 10 kingdoms, 100 duchies, and 1,000 counties.
I've seen many maps where the USA is shown as a solid block along with neighboring countries.  I have also seen maps which show the USA divided into states.  And I have also seen maps showing all three thousand plus counties in the USA.
In a feudal society, each county would have been divided into many lordships or manors, just as counties in the USA contain municipalities.  And I have never seen a map dividing the entire USA into many thousands of municipalities.  But it is is quite common to make maps showing all the municipalities in a county or a region containing a few counties. And it would be equally difficult to show all the lordships or manors in a map of Feudal Europe.  But a map showing all the lordships in the feudal county the main character lived in would be feasible.
What about a political map showing the political subdivisions in a non feudal country?
For example, the early Roman Empire was mostly composed of hundreds or thousands of city states consisting of a capital city and farmland around it.  In each city state aristocrats competed to be elected to to the city council and as magistrates.  Above the city states were the governors of the dozens of provinces, and above the governors the emperor.  City states were divided into districts called pagi.
In the later Roman Empire the levels of administration were increased.  A district or pagus was part of a city state which was part of a province ruled by a governor which was part of a diocese ruled by a vicar which was part of a prefecture ruled by a praetorian prefect which was part of the empire ruled by one or more emperors.
So even a non feudal country could use maps showing various levels of political subdivisions if they are important for the story.
And one thing to do in a feudal or more centralized state is to draw a chart of organization instead of a map, showing who has authority over who.  And if the country has a bureaucracy many people will have non territorial zones of authority over their subordinates in the bureau.
Or maybe the entire story takes place in large caravan with hundreds of people and camels crossing a desert, or an elephant caravan with hundreds of people and elephants crossing a lush but uninhabited jungle, and you might need to make an organization chart of the expedition, and maybe another chart show likes or dislikes who.  Or the entire story might happen on a ship at sea or a starship with hundreds or thousands of people aboard and you will need an organizational chart to keep track of people's roles.
Or maybe the story is set in an isolated mansion where a large family has gathered for an event and a murder happens.  In a fantasy or science fiction story the family might be non human or have life extending technology, so there could be many more generations of cousins and their ancestors alive at one time than is normal at the present. So you may need to make a family tree to keep track of everyone and make notes on how they feel about each other.
So whether your society is a galactic Empire with billions of densely inhabited planets or a tiny isolated group of travelers, you need to figure out how that society works before you start creating events that stress it close to or beyond the breaking point.
Answer: Yes. Thinking and doing draft and plot what plot writing sessions basically you are feeling out the world it's functions, its layout when you just write it plop your characters into what you think is the world then see if it still is that. I don't do maps, I do clothing design, I don't design buildings I search pintrest and Deviant art for inspirtations or approximations to what is in my mind as I don't draw buildings externally. Instead I make house plan layouts so see their homes. Now keep in mind picture surfing isn't to copy that exact thing its a refferance so you can imagine it better. But yes you don't need map skills or langistic skills just do what you can to make it visable and real to you have all 5 senses walk into your world feel the weather or taste their spices things like that can help.
But really it's just a lot of thought then putting it down you can learn so much about your own world how it runs, who runs it, and what towns are where if you just write it don't try to adhere rigidly to what you think you want this world to look like it will evolve slowly and show you. Like I have a small town located to where my mages live the mages had open fields all around and flat terrain but this grew as I wrote now the world over many months told me the mages live in a city, they have a city of helpers next to them, they have fields and deep forests and a huge river near them. The human town moved 5 times and is now huge it's a city dependant on the mages I did not have all this when I started it grew and evoloved now I can see the both areas to the point I've now made my own rough city maps so I can see what my characters are seeing in these places.
You do however want to make up town names, you don't have to go all fancy but you don't want to have a Batman as that is a real town in the world. Using Wiki to see city and town names of the regions you are inspired by can help you draft up your own names also there are mixing sites that will scramble and make a lot of new words see:
https://www.nameacronym.net/name-combiner.aspx
https://www.babynamesdirect.com/blender/
https://www.mithrilandmages.com/utilities/CityNames.php
Now why did I just give you a baby name scrambler? Because you can put in anything towns, plants, wood names, whatever and it will mix it up.
Mithril is a rando town generator use it to find ones you find agreeable then use either baby names or nameacronym to mix it up the acronym allows for a 6 names to be mixed at the same time generating a billion options.
Answer: Language is easy, don't write a language unless you really want to, very few readers will ever engage with it and it really does not help you write the story. The only thing you might have to consider is terms for your fantasy elements, do you have giants beasts, well those will need a name, have magic based on glowing rocks well the rocks will need a name but there is no reason to reinvent the wheel, for the most part use your normal native language.
As for naming people and places, that is on you, characters and locations need a name, its basically impossible to follow a story with no identifiers. You could take the goblinslayer route and use characters jobs/outstanding features in place of names, Farm Girls, Dwarf Shaman, Novice Fighter are the actual names of characters in the story. Consider however your characters need names even if they are unconventional ones. This is important for you to fully form a character concept in you head you will need to call the character something.  If you can't bother to do that then chances are your characters are not fleshed out enough to be interesting.
For map making first you don't need a map, some of the best authors did not created maps until after they had many books and even then often they used maps created by fans. Or make the map after you have written the story following your characters journey. A map just for the sake of a map is not really a good feature. Tolkien had a map but his story was about a physical journey, where a map is a very useful tool for tracking a journey. If your story takes place entirely in a single town or area, you don't need a map. If travel is not an important part of your story you also don't need a map. The Conan stories did not get a map until several books in, you just had vague descriptions Cimeria was in the north Stygia in the south and that was about it, travel itself was just kinda skipped over most of the time, the story just jumping from location to location so a map was not necessary.
You should also consider the scale of your story. If the your story takes place in one city you don't need a map of the continent, but it might be a good idea to have a rough sketch of the layout of the city even if just on a napkin marking the major parts of the city. Just becasue you make a map does not mean you have to publish a map. You can also expand a map as you write more books, the map pulls out and you get more and more of the world as the story itself explores more of the world. If your story deals with political intrigue between warring states then you will need a map for your readers to follow along. If your story is about an epic journey then a rough sketch of the journey may be helpful. Consider if a map would actually hep your readers follow the story.
Answer: If you don't forsee those things being important to your story, don't waste your resources on them. Just don't for all of those things.
Just don't make a language. The characters always speak a language strikingly close to English in stories written in English. Reading a book with a bunch of weird terms is confusing and sucks. If you wanna get fancy sprinkle some Italian or Spanish in there or something.
Just don't make up place names. Use real names or names other people use in books (those are also real names or based on real names). Name places after people. Do you know how many fantasy locations are named Albion?
Just don't draw maps. I liked the idea of having my setting on a large plateau, so I used Iran. My story takes place in (not) Iran. The culture is mostly like Kowloon Walled City, a completely different, real place I found interesting.
Overall, having to keep track of a bunch of names detracts from the story experience, and originality is no where near as important as execution. Just look at classical art. The subject matter is quite often literally the exact same thing; you'll see two or three paintings of Chronos eating his child, eight to ten virgin Marys, and a bunch of fruit. What matters is technique: those brush strokes, the pallette, the use of light. It also helps if you can make your audience feel something. In worldbuilding this is done through setting, not coming up with funny names.
Comment: "The characters always speak a language strikingly close to English in stories written in English." Rather, the author always translates for the convenience of the audience: this is known as [Translation Convention](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TranslationConvention). [Sometimes](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_Trek_VI:_The_Undiscovered_Country) this is lampshaded by having dialog start out in another language and suddenly switch to English. Sometimes you'll even see aliens "speaking English" struggling to understand a human who is *actually* speaking English!
Comment: (Citation for the last point: the [Chanur series](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Chanur_novels)... although I'd have to go check if Tully is definitely speaking *English*. In any case, it's made clear that the aliens *aren't* speaking English.) Something else you'll see (again, I want to say Chanur did this) is two factions that can't understand each other with the POV alternating between the two, but always in English. (Also, while *we're* using English, this all holds for whatever language a work is authored in. In Russia, for example, extraterrestrials all speak Russian.)
Comment: Yes, I get that. The effect is still the same, though. Your characters could have never heard of England and be living in R'ulutho'nopteph, but you aren't going to expect your readers to know the fictional R'ulutho'noptephese language to read your book, so it's unnecessary for the author to come up with their word for "coffee," or "fairy-smiting sword." Unless it's something completely unique, there's no real necessity.
Comment: Also, all puns and wordplay are going to be based on the reader's language. If there's a misunderstanding over language, it's going to be a misunderstanding that works in the reader's language.
Comment: Right... I'm in the middle of writing a book in an alternate world in which presumably there is no such thing as "English". I have, on several occasions, been aware of having jokes, puns or just pleasant alliterations (e.g. names of stores/businesses) that work due to English. If anyone questions how this works, you wave your hands a lot and cite [Belessario's Maxim](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/BellisariosMaxim).


Ambiguous tag: mdb

Question: I notice that the tag mdb has become a problem as it refers to both JBoss Message Driven Bean (as far as I can tell) and MS-Access. I am tempted to remove all mdb tags and replace them with, say, JBoss-MDB and MS-Access. I should be glad of an opinion on this as there are 57 in this tag at the moment.
Comment: Either way, it's not going to be easy. Manually retagging is always unpleasant.
Comment: @Remou I've raised the further issue of retagging MS-Access to MS-Jet-ACE here: http://meta.stackexchange.com/questions/33216/ms-access-or-mdb-or-access-database-engine-or-ms-jet-ace
Answer: DO IT BABY!!  correctly-tagged-things-are-good.
Answer: Go for it. Just take your time and make sure that the question is really related to the tag you think its related to. A while back my insomnia cranked up to 11 so I did some similar work to pass the time. You'd be surprised how many posts won't have anything to do with either technology - or both. Also be prepared to be surprised at just how vague a question can be.
If you're taking your time and checking the questions you also won't run into that many CAPTCHAs. Always a plus. :)

Ambiguous tag: mdb


How to enter flow experience for SW development?

Question: What are your strategies to improve the flow experience when doing work?
Answer: It's a bit like creativity. You can't force it, you can only prepare conditions favorable for it to appear. Some of the most important requirements:

Distraction-free environment (you'll need hours of uninterrupted concentration).
Clear goal.
Genuine, intrinsic interest in that goal.
Clear mind; not too much "should do this, should do that" issues nagging in the  background.

So, before starting to actually work to problem, be sure to define the goal clearly, complete or at least write down other to do -items so that they don't disturb your mind, and go somewhere where you can concentrate. If you're interested in what you're doing, you now have a good chance of getting into flow.
Comment: +1: "Distraction-free environment (you'll need hours of uninterrupted concentration)." I think this is a very important factor. I work in a distraction-rich environment and I could only achieve flow once, when I explicitly asked my colleagues not to be distracted for a couple of weeks. Then because of a too rigid interpretation of our development methodology (develop in small increment, commit often, discuss a lot of useless details with colleagues) I was forced to interrupt my development cycle and my flow state was gone very quickly.
Comment: thanks for your summary. just a small question.  "genuine interest in the goal", do you have examples for this, that you find personally rewarding?  esp for topics that might not be interesting per se, such as testing and/or debugging?
Comment: Unfortunately I think that topics that are not "interesting per se" are, by definition, not "genuinely interesting" either. I don't know if there's some magic trick to get a flow experience on those. At least it's not easy. But luckily I find most programming-related things interesting per se.
Comment: i see. thanks. related to this, I am just reminded on the theory that I have heard lately, that interests are related to fear and hope that certain goals can arouse. fear and hope result from "genuine / intrinsic roots". it would be something necessary in order to "flow" too, but your points on no-distraction and clear goal set are helpful for me addtionally. thanks.
Comment: I find I need a picture of Edgar Codd and a picture of a flying sheep.  Not being facetious.  But that's just me.
Comment: See also point 1 in this article: http://www.paulgraham.com/head.html
Answer: I need a clear understanding of what I'm trying to accomplish.  It's hard to achieve flow when I'm testing something because I'm searching around, trying to find stuff and figure out what to do next.
I need sensory isolation. By this I mean no distractions in any of my senses.  If people are wandering through my field of view, or people are making noise around me, forget it (touch, taste and smell usually aren't too much of an issue in an office).  A good set of noise-isolating earbuds and either some white noise (waves crashing on the beach, or a campfire burning and popping) or some music works for me.  Any music needs to be devoid of lyrics; otherwise, my mind will be parsing the words, unconsciously, which will disrupt the flow.  Ditto for people in my vicinity carrying on conversations; I try to "tune them out," but my mind will, unconsciously, lock on to the speakers and the conversation and distract.
Finally, I need an editor which doesn't force me to "pause."  I can code for hours using vim; I use the control-n and control-p to auto-complete stuff, but that's really quick and I can usually get to where I can predict how many of those I will need to get the variable name or method name I'm seeking.  Using Eclipse is largely devoid of flow because it is always pausing the input while it reformats stuff, checks to see if my syntax is valid, etc.  The auto-completion for object-oriented stuff is too slow and unpredictable to achieve a state of flow.
In case you haven't guessed, flow involves a rhythm.  Anything which disrupts that rhythm, disrupts the flow.
Turn off the email notifiers.  Turn off the social networking notifiers.  Turn off the alarms.  Make sure you have a nice, long, uninterrupted block of time in which you can work.
Finally, copious amounts of caffeine seems to help.
Some of the most productive coding I've ever done involved writing HTML, CSS, Javascript and Perl, using vim, with Eric Johnson, Blues Saraceno and Joe Satriani blaring in my earbuds, amped up on Mountain Dew.
Some of my least productive time involves sitting in a cubicle farm, trying to write Java, using Eclipse, when I forgot my smartphone and earbuds at home and the guy across the cubicle wall feels the need to use his speakerphone on a conference call.
Comment: +1 for turning off email and social networking distractions, and starting out with clear objectives.
Answer: This is an interesting concept for me. One reason I got into software development a couple of years ago is that I found it could be a 'peak experience' where one pleasantly loses track of time. But I experienced less and less of this as time went on, I suppose because the amount of stuff I seemed to NEED to know looked limitless. But I want to recapture the peak experience. It's important for my quality of life.
I found a helpful chart in Czikszentmihalyi's book 'Finding Flow". I probably can't post it here (though it's easily found on Google) but the essence of it is that to increase your chance of enjoyable 'flow' experiences, your current challenge should be somewhat balanced with your current skill level. Of course you want to always be learning new things in I.T., but too high a challenge could send you into an anxious or worried mood. Too low a challenge could send you into boredom or even apathy.
I had experienced a ton of boredom and apathy in my previous I.T. career (not s/w development). It was a kind of bottoming-out experience that forced me to explore how I could make work better. Having once gotten a charge out of a big Perl project, I decided to explore Java.
Speaking of having a clear goal, I got plenty of that from the programming  classes I then took at a local university. The goals were mostly set for me. Of course the external discipline helped me focus: I needed to read and understand a particular chapter in a book by a certain date and time. Or I had to produce a working s/w project by that time. Maybe something about having someone else to please was at work. It's harder to set one's own goals, so I wouldn't mind working in an office again on a development team soon, for the extra external discipline that should bring. I suppose we can't all be entirely self-directed.
Back to answering your question. In working on my own, I got best results by taking my laptop (since stolen, ugh) to a coffee shop, listening to my own carefully-selected music (this one is good, if you're interested: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soundsystem_01) on headphones while I worked. It helped drown out local conversations. Lack of unwelcome distraction was/is VERY important to me. Plus I think being in a public place was good for me as I couldn't just decide to take a nap or watch TV. Plus it helped motivate me if the problem I was trying to solve with code was in a domain that already interested me.
Also I just realized that it's cool to write mobile phone software because you can always whip out your phone and show people (or yourself) what you've been working on. I do kind of get a charge out of that, which is motivating.


Investing at the beginning versus throughout versus the end of the year

Question: I donate the max to my HSA, which I then invest in commission-free ETFs, with the plan of using this money for health care costs in retirement. My employer contributes a certain amount but that is not predicated on my contribution, so I don't have to worry about matching like I do for a 401(k). In the enrollment election I am allowed to enter a monthly contribution amount. However, since the general long-term trend is for my ETFs (ITOT, IXUS, AGG) to increase in value, would it be worth the trouble to call to try to do the whole contribution in one or two paychecks? I could afford this and wouldn't have to sacrifice my 401(k) contribution and matching, health insurance premium, etc., but is it worth the trouble? I don't believe I can time the market but it does seem quite high right now--would that be reason to stick with contributing throughout the year in case of a pullback? Are there any studies looking at the effects of investing at the beginning of the year versus throughout the year versus at the end of the year?
Comment: Are you saying that you are treating the HSA as a long term investment? Not planning to use it up most years?
Comment: Got it. The question boils down to Jan 2 lump sum VS DCA. We need to find it, but DCA has been thoroughly addressed here. On average, January will be lower by the average market return. But not in every year. In down years, or choppy years, DCA is better. I'd have to ask, "do you feel lucky? Well do you, punk?" (A Movie reference. I know you are not a punk.)
Comment: @JoeTaxpayer Correct. I plan to use it for health care costs in retirement, and anything left over will be treated as an extension of my 401(k) and IRA.
Answer: The Mad Fientist has an article on this. He gives these following benefits:

Stocks go up more than they go down when you're in for the long haul (which you claim you are). So front-loading gets a bigger piece of the up-trend.
Postpone Taxes. HSAs are tax deductible, allowing your to put more money in investments at the beginning of the year. You'll still pay the same taxes, but they will be delayed towards the end of the year.
Front loading allows more tax-free growth. (His words, not mine.)
If you lose your job, you've got your contributions maxed out, and possibly your employers match too!

He also gives the caveat that your employer may not match things in their entirety. Like you mentioned, this mostly applies to 401(k)s and not to HSAs where the employer tends to contribute a fixed amount (in my experience).
Anecdotally, my wife and I front-load our IRAs; but not our HSA and 401(k) because we don't have that option. In the comment section of the linked article, several big-name early retirees confess to front-loading before it was cool.


Difference between autonomic and paratonic movements in plants

Question: I can't understand the difference be because both involvery the main cause that is an external stimuli, so how do they differ(
Answer: its about the gene that is involved in autonomic movements. while, there is no gene involved in plants for paratonic movements.furthermore, autonomic movements are presents in plants by birth, and paratonic movements are induced in plants by an external stimuli only and not present in plants by birth.
Comment: There is no need to post a second answer to supplement a previous answer you gave. Instead, you can use the [edit button of your previous answer](https://biology.stackexchange.com/posts/74602/edit).
Answer: In other words for autonomic movements the plants use an internal cause( simply indicating to gene) and external stimuli both. while, paratonic movemens use external cause only( light, temperature,gravity etc.Hope you understand


Why were some of the works of Rabbi Steinsaltz banned?

Question: Apparently some of the works of Rabbi Steinsaltz were banned. What are the specific examples that prompted the ban? Is there a list of all of his works that have been banned, as I am interested in knowing if this ban is limited to his previous works or if it applies to his new shas project with Koren publishing as well?
Comment: Dozens of extremely reputable and inmportant rabbis over the years supported the work of Rabbi Steinsaltz. Here are just two examples: haskamot from Rabbi Moshe Feinstein and the Lubavitcher Rebbe for Rabbi Steinsaltz's Hebrew edition of the Talmud, upon which the new English edition is based:
http://www.korenpub.com/EN/tal-haskamot.htm
Comment: The reason for the ban is discussed in detail here: http://www.yoel-ab.com/katava.asp?id=115
Comment: R. Aharon Feldman published a long critique of the Steinsaltz Talmud in his book The Eye of the Storm. While he declined to discuss any potential theological/hashkafic issues, and did not issue a ban, he concluded that it does not do a good job as an aide for Talmud study.
Comment: ok, I'm pleading ignorance here. I have read through the letter by myself and with a Hebrew teacher. It seems to be a rationalization, not an explanation. A claim that adding in peirushim is problematic is, by itself, easily dismissed. This is a slippery slope argument because one could make the same claim about including rashi. The later claim to apikorsus with no details or examples is a "take my word for it" kind of claim. this does not, to my limited understanding, give any explanation as to what exactly is wrong with the text. so any insight would be appreciated.
Comment: @Dan thank you! that's exactly what I was asking, clearly without putting it quite so well. I didn't see any real explanation so I was trying to understand what the reason was.
Comment: Related: http://judaism.stackexchange.com/q/15728
Comment: @Alex: Here is a link to the article online. https://www.jstor.org/stable/23260930?seq=1
Answer: I have an old copy of The Jewish Observer that discusses the ban. It seems a couple comments in his translation of the Talmud implied that certain sages ruled consistently in a particular fashion (e.g. stringently) because their personality inclined in that direction. Some were worried that readers would infer that the sages were allowing their personal biases to influence their rulings, and doubt their authority. However, this does not appear to have been the intent of those comments, but merely to point out the consistent pattern among the sages' rulings. To my knowledge, none of his other works were banned.
Comment: boric, welcome to Mi Yodeya, and thanks for the informative answer, which would be even more so if you'd edit into it bibliographic info (e.g. what month and year the _JO_ issue is from). I hope you stick around and enjoy the site.
Comment: @Baruch did you ever manage to procure that JO article?
Comment: i think shmuel is right -- I recall as a child, learning about the personalities of hillel and shammai and how they affected certain behaviors and rulings in terms of the chumra and kula positions. if this is what triggered a response to Shteinzaltz then it should be applied much more liberally to many other people.
Comment: @baruch: if you still have access to the Jewish Observer, can you tell us the date it was published (and issue number, if applicable), thanks.
Comment: @Menachem: I will try to dig it up and add that information.
Answer: My Rabbi once told me that HaRav Shach ZSWQ"L didn't like the idea of changing the Surat HaDaf of the Gemara.
Comment: If you read the link provided by the questioner you'll see there was more to it.
Answer: The link provided in the question has all the answers! (and i'm dissapointed no one is pointing out the obvious so now i have to comment)
Here I simply quote in English (making use of google translate feature), from the said site above, some of the more controversial examples of comments from Steinsaltz.
"..."Moshe sees and knows his own limitations ... In his approach to the people he must always avail himself of people who have A closer relationship to the   problems of the Jewish people. In a certain sense it seems that Moses can never fully understand the so-called 'simple man'. The great limitation of Moses is that there is a gap between himself and the people. Although he cares for their needs, he can not take seriously their problems and wishes ... In the end he can not relate to the great people that he leads as adults"
"אכן על ראשיתה ותחילת התפתחותה של התורה שבעל פה יש בידינו רק מעט ידיעות..." (עמ' 14).
"Indeed, at the beginning and start of the development of the Oral Law, we have only a little knowledge ..." (p. 14).
this summary over the generations, decisions on one side have been gradually changed to another, and therefore a considerable part of the Halachot has not yet reached an absolute consolidation ..." . Everything is developing. Everything can be changed. "Natural process" of "gradual" development
Bar Yochai is a "gloomy and mystical figure." "In later generations it was attributed to him the composition of the book of the Kabbalah, the Zohar, in which he is the main protagonist"
"... the custom of Israel in recent generations of inviting a rabbi to perform the wedding ceremony is from the late Middle Ages and partly by imitation of the Christian example... "
"The very existence of a written marriage contract between husband and wife is Very early. And it is already mentioned in the laws of Hammurabi, long before the giving of the Torah , but the shape and contents of this contract vary according to the times, according to the nature of the culture in which they are made. The sages were very careful to make such a contract ... "(p. 97).
You can see the site for the sources, but they are in Hebrew. It seems to me that people defending Steinsaltz must either improve upon my translations, or explain the true intent behind the words to coincide with accepted orthodox opinion, or are unfamiliar with the actual opinions of Steinsaltz.
Comment: Why are these quotes not reflecting accepted orthodox opinion? Just because they aren't your opinion doesn't make them non Orthodox
Comment: @DoubleAA Those doing the banning don't think that these opinions are orthodox.
Comment: @DonielF It would definitely help if he would cite sources that the Poskim quoted by the OP don't hold of these lines, but knowing their attitude, it's not outlandish that people like R' Vosner, Shach, or Eliyashiv would find these quotes beyond the pale.
Comment: Is there a list of all of his works that have been banned, as I am interested in knowing if this ban is limited to his previous works or if it applies to his new shas project with Koren publishing as well?
Comment: @mevaqesh that was part of the OP
Comment: Not seeing anything that answers the q.
Comment: @riki riki exactly a part of the OP that wasn't addressed!
Comment: The OP's main point of interest seemed to be the reason for the ban as related to the extent of the ban; whether it includes different works such as h his Talmud commentary. This doesn't address that.
Answer: Probably because he also authored books prior to his becoming religious. Long ago I recall reading a book of his on Sampson, which hardly could have been something he wrote as a religious scholar. The book depicted Sampson as a tough hombre rather than the great tzaddik Sampson really was!
Comment: How do you know he really was a great tzaddik?
Comment: A tzadik can be a *tough hombre* You need to provide details as to what you mean. Was that book *banned*?
Comment: +1 If you read through the linked article in the question you will see that the two reasons you presented here were part of what was objected to. Basically to write critically and in a secular way was a major issue taken up. That was compounded by the fact that anyone in history who criticism was accepted was only by great and holy rabbis. Not just someone with a secular opinion.
Comment: Did he write it before becoming religious, or is it because he wrote controversial books after becoming religious. If you can verify either way, it _would_ look like an answer.
Comment: Double aa - I have no knowledge of my own. What I write is from my learning Torah from Chabad rebbeim literature but don't recall to pinpoint the source. I do remeber reading somewhere that שמשון was the Tzaddik or Nassi Hador. One thing the Baal Hatanya speaks of is a tzaddik's presence being felt even more strongly once he passes on; Perhaps in such context I recall the fact that even after שמשון passed on, his influence held strong for 20 more years against the Philistines.
Comment: @sabbahillel I remember when the ban happened. It was pure politics. What is being written here is actually correct. The ban was imposed over the biographical book that he wrote. Rav Shach had used it as an excuse because Rav Steinzaltz openly supported the Lubavitcher Rebbe. As a consequence many foolish young men actually tossed their copies of Shas into shaimos. I still have a copy of the book of biographies. The ban was more than stupid.
Comment: @YaacovDeane What is the name of that biographical book by Rabbi Steinsaltz?
Answer: The Internet was also banned, so if one is paying heed to bans, it makes little sense being on the Internet inquiring about it.
But, as for what prompted the ban, perhaps two factors were in play:
1) As Rav Mordechai Gifter said about Adas Korach:

And this is experienced in every generation, that of those who are diligent and precise in mitzvos, the fire of controversy moves them against their own will and against the will of their Creator.

2) As one commenter in the a Hirhurim thread writes:

IIRC, R Leiman thought that the ban was inspired by the fact that R Steinsalz's English edition was being published by Random House, which had beaten ArtScroll to the secular and English speaking audiences.

Any other details are secondary.
Comment: -1. This doesn't seem to answer the question, which sought a list of R'AS's works that prompted the ban and a list of works included in it. (Plus, item 1 seems unnecessarily snide.)
Comment: true, though it answers the edited-out original "Why was this done?". a list of works presupposes that these works were what really prompted the ban. Snideness is sometimes the appropriate response to those who seek to ban, or drudge-up old bans and controversies.
Comment: I'm not familiar with the halacha regarding snideness as an appropriate response to a discussion of banned works. I would assume it is meritorious to try to understand why something was banned so that I can make an educated decision about it. I understand why the internet was banned and chose to ignore that ban, I may very well chose to do the same with Rav Steinsaltz's works, but I can't do so without understanding the nature of the ban in the first place.
Comment: Who said halacha? This is the appropriate response, IMHO, because dignifying it with a 'real' response lends credence to the question, and the ban. (Snideness also does not mean that something isn't true.) But surely someone else can translate and summarize your link for you, if that is what you are asking. BTW, is that what you were asking for?
Comment: I would question the assertion that the first sentence in this answer is unnecessary. The whole answer is an attempt to challenge the assertion that this ban, and others, are meritorious. Just like the rest of the answer, that first sentence serves to point out possible hypocrisy of those who pursue or endorse bans.


Transitioning mountain bike into city commuter bike

Question: In effort to transition my mountain bike to a city commuter- can I replace the mountain tires with thinner city tires without changing the bike wheels?
Answer: Short answer: Yes, you can.
The rims on most mountain bikes will support a tire as thin as 26 x 1 inch. 26 x 1.25 is virtually guaranteed on any mountain bike at all. (As long as it is a 26" wheel bike.")
Comment: Panaracer T-Serv Protex tires come in 26x1.25" sizes and offer extra puncture protection.  I've had a great experience with Panaracer's puncture resistant tires.
Comment: Yep, you can generally fit a 26x1.25 tire on standard mountain bike rims, and that is a good size for a commuter.  Look for a tire with minimal to moderate tread (no lugs), and ideally Kevlar belted for puncture resistance.
Answer: In my opinion it's a fallacy to believe that a city bike should have thin tires and in fact if you look at bikes that are specifically marketed as city bikes (and don't aim at the hipster single speed crowd) they often come with quite wide tires.
Wide tires offer much more dampening and the difference in rolling resistance is much smaller than once believed. Since city roads and bike lanes often aren't very smooth this means a considerable plus in comfort at virtually no cost.
For me slightly modified MTBs make perfect city/allround bikes and as far as tires go I personally love Continental Town & Country.
Comment: I agree, for commuting a good tire size would be 40-45mm.  With tires of that width, you don't have to care what kind of cracks/curbs/bumps you roll over, and it's much less jarring on the hands and wrists.  On my hardtail mountain bike, when I'm not riding singletrack trails, I use Continental Touring Plus 47mm tires.  They are a bit heavy, but they don't slow me down much, even on 100+ mile rides.  Never had to worry about punctures or pinch flats, either.
Comment: That said, it is worthwhile to have a set of slick tires for commuting.


Closing a close votes review loophole

Question: A certain user has commented that they make use of a loophole: the user skips all of the questions in the close vote review queue, but opens the questions in a separate tab/window and votes to vote to close them there. This definitely seems to me to be an abuse and defeats the purpose of having a review limit. Is there any way we can prevent this?
Comment: There's a limit on close votes, too, isn't there?
Comment: For the reason Gerry mentioned this is not really a hole. If somebody thinks they are being smug, let them. When I had more time to spend in the review queues I would often do the same thing. That way you will see more of the context of the post being reviewed. I found that reaching a verdict is easier that way. Also, it is easier to decide whether to edit or not to edit. But thank you for raising the point!
Comment: How would you propose this loophole be closed?
Comment: @AsafKaragila Then why not allow 50 reviews? I'm not actually sure if Leave Open does anything, but if it does it should have the same weight as Close.
Comment: There is another reason to "skip" and load the page in another link. The review dialog limits what you can do (e.g., you can't always vote and/or comment from the review page). So you have to load the post in another tab to those things. But if you use the review queue links, it will move onto the next post, making it a pain to go find a link to the post you just reviewed. It's easier to just load the post in another tab, do what you want there, and then move to the next review task with "skip".
Comment: Quid points out that the close vote limit outside the queue is higher than other sites. 25 instead of 50 would lessen the problem.
Comment: Matt, the closure votes limit was 25. But this site is *big* and not enough people are actively vote to close things. Having it as 50 is just fine.
Comment: @CarlMummert It's not necessarily opening the question in another tab that I have a problem with. It's having a steady stream of easy-to-find questions that other users have cast close votes for allowing one to use the larger number of close votes than reviews to give one's opinion greater weight.
Comment: "It's having a steady stream of easy-to-find questions that other users have cast close votes" As I explained at least a 10k+ user has this *without the review queue.* too. "Leave open" (3 of them, IIRC) kicks the post out of review.
Comment: @quid This is tagged discussion as well as feature request because I'm not sure what a good solution is. One possibility would be a way to vote to kick it out of the queue and that page, but that sounds like something that's hard to implement.
Answer: I do this too, sometimes. When I am feeling particularly dutiful. Why? Because this site is flooded with poor-quality questions every day and we need more people casting close votes, not less.
As Gerry Myerson points out, there's a limit of 50 close votes on questions per day, by any user (compared to the limit of 20 close vote reviews per day). So the abuse can only go so far. Moreover:

It is quite hard to get through 50 close votes in a day; most users probably go nowhere near this on most days;
The 20-review limit is mostly necessary for people who are poor reviewers, while those who open up questions in another tab are likely more conscientious and serious about their votes;
It doesn't seem reasonable to try to prevent users to close questions that they have open in their browser, no matter how they found them: through the close vote queue, through some browser extension or data.SE query, etc.

Therefore, I disagree that users exploiting this loophole is anything we should be concerned about.
Comment: Comment on the second bullet. This is somewhat of a problem. We have a number of roboreviewers: either they have an agenda (e.g. nearly automatically voting to close or voting to keep open everything) or appar ently think that 500 mouseclicks are worth a gold badge. The problematic reviewers all have something in common - they spend very little time per review task. The lowest average I've seen has been about 3 seconds. Thankfully moderators have access to all review data. I have written a few warnings, review bans even, in the extreme cases.
Comment: That the gap between reviews and votes is so large is somewhat rare; most SE sites have 20/25 not 20/50 (IIRC). Another point to add: for 10k+ http://math.stackexchange.com/tools?tab=Close provides unlimited access to questions with VTC, making this "exploit" even less of an issue as the basic information is provided anyway in almost as convenient a form.
Comment: @MattSamuel in the *reopen* queue votes to reopen can be "abused" in this way, yet not leave closed reviews. In that sense the situation is symmetric.
Comment: Perhaps a solution then would be a way to allow "conscientious" users to Leave Open in a separate tab/window. Then they would gain nothing in terms of completed review tasks, and the purpose would be to express their opinion that the question should stay open.
Comment: @matt 1. Feature requests can take a lot of time to implement and should not be made lightly. In this case the problem doesn't seem to merit a new feature. 2. I believe skip does not count towards review tasks.
Comment: @6005 No, skip does not count. That's my point. If Leave Open does something, it should be able to be "abused" in the same way, not gaining review tasks but still contributing.
Comment: @6005 I don't make this lightly either. I think Close votes are being abused by a contingent of users who think questions should be closed and deleted for bad reasons. This would be a way to prevent them from overdoing it a bit.
Comment: @quid Not quite symmetric. Questions that have been deleted that some users would want to undelete/reopen are difficult to find, while browsing through to find questions one dislikes to vote to close is easy.
Comment: @MattSamuel Mainly, I only meant to comment on your remark: "If Leave Open does something, it should be able to be "abused" in the same way, not gaining review tasks but still contributing." The "Leave Open" corresponds to "Leave closed" while "votes to close" correspond to "votes to reopen" and they are treated in the same way. By contrast "Leave X" and "Vote Y" are quiet different and it will be hard to treat them in the same way. For one thing the "votes" have an intrinsic rate limit too the "leave" not. A closed qis typically only del after 2+ days, in the interim it'd trivial to find.
Comment: @quid I understand your point. Regarding the last sentence, questions that are months or years old are closed and deleted, so a two day window to reopen something is hardly equivalent.

Closing a close votes review loophole


Mapping between camera pose and image features in visual servoing

Question: I have a robotic arm and a camera in eye-in-hand configuration. I know that there is a relationship between the body velocity $V$ of the camera and the velocities $\dot s$ in the image feature space that is $\dot s=L(z,s) V$ where $L$ is the interaction matrix. I was wondering if one can find a mapping (a so called diffeomorphism) that connects the image features' vector $s$ with the camera pose $X$. All I was able to find is that it is possible to do that in a structured environment which I don't fully understand what it is.
Answer: Image features are connected to the camera pose through two steps: (1) the relationship between the feature pixel coordinates and its homogeneous coordinates in the camera reference frame, and (2) the relationship between the camera reference frame and the world frame. Take a look at this figure, where the world frame is denoted with subscript 0 and the camera frame is denoted with subscript C. A feature is shown as a blue dot, with position $p$ in the world frame.

The camera has a particular field of view (shown with a pyramid in the image), which relates the pixels coordinates to the relative position of the feature in the camera reference frame, $\tilde{p}$, through the camera projection matrix:
$\begin{bmatrix} I \\ J \\ 1 \end{bmatrix} = \begin{bmatrix} k_x & 0 & C_x \\ 0 & k_y & C_y \\ 0 & 0 & 1 \end{bmatrix} \begin{bmatrix} X \\ Y \\ 1 \end{bmatrix}$
Where $I$ and $J$ are the pixel coordinates of the feature in the image, and the camera is defined with parameters $k_x$, $k_y$, $C_x$ and $C_y$ (based on the field of view and output image size). The homogeneous coordinates, $X$ and $Y$ are defined based on the relative position of the feature in the camera frame:
$\tilde{p} = \begin{bmatrix} \tilde{x} \\ \tilde{y} \\ \tilde{z} \end{bmatrix}$
$X = \frac{\tilde{x}}{\tilde{z}}$
$Y = \frac{\tilde{y}}{\tilde{z}}$
That relative position of the feature is then related to the actual position of the feature (in the world frame) as well as the camera pose, according to:
$p = R_C \tilde{p} + p_C$
Where $R_C$ is the rotation matrix defining the camera orientation and $p_C$ is the position of the camera.
One thing I have not discussed is lens distortion, which must be accounted for before using this approach but can be treated separately. Note that the OpenCV Camera Calibration and 3D Reconstruction page provides a more detailed explanation.
Comment: Nice introduction into pinhole camera model but I don't think this fully answers the question. It is impossible to estimate the velocity of features observed by a monocular camera without knowing their depth. It would be possible to do that by using structure from motion algorithms but it radically increases the complexity of the task. Using a kinect would be preferred.
Comment: The question asks "if one can find a mapping... that connects the image features' vector s with the camera pose X". There is mention of velocities $\dot{s}$ but that is not the question. Also, this model necessarily requires 3D coordinates of features to begin with ($p$ is assumed to be known) -- I'm not saying you get depth from a monocular camera, these features are assumed to be known because it is a _structured environment_! Sorry if my answer is confusing, I will update it later.
Comment: Structured environment means an environment with observable edges and corners as far as I know. Doesn't need to be an environment where the structure is known. I see that the question was only about the mapping from pixels to camera frame but I don't think that it would be enough to the OP considering his final goal.
Comment: Not quite, a structured environment is one where features are recognizable based on some a priori knowledge. Yes, you can treat edges/corners as known structures in the environment, but in general it refers to the fact that these structures are filling a necessary gap. In the case of a monocular camera you would be depending on fiduciary markers or known objects with scale to provide that structure. Also, you often want to predict the pixel coordinates for a measurement model so this is the relevant component of that larger question -- what comes next may be already answered elsewhere.
Answer: Look up Camera Space Manipulation, which uses the pinhole camera model to map image space and physical space coordinates.  It is not too difficult to do.
A structured environment is one in which objects which occupy the environment are known, and can be modelled.   It is much easier to program mobility, and to identify objects, in a structured environment.   For example, if you know that a particular circular object has a given diameter, you can use that object's elliptical shape in camera space to determine viewing angle, and dimensions to determine distance between the circle and the camera.  But if you don't know the model of that object, you can't be sure if it is a circle viewed from an angle, or an ellipse viewed head-on.   Therefore unstructured environments are much more difficult for relating camera space coordinates and physical coordinates.


Does Bing maps silverlight API work on Windows phone 7?

Question: Has anyone seen any good resources on using Bing Maps Silverlight APIs on WP7?
Answer: Here are a few links.
http://channel9.msdn.com/Learn/Courses/WP7TrainingKit/WP7Silverlight/UsingBingMapsLab/Overview
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ff955762.aspx
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee681883.aspx
Answer: Another option is to use the recently released ArcGIS API for Windows Phone - currently in beta.  In addition to Bing Maps support, the API has very robust capabilities for adding ArcGIS, OGC, OpenStreetMap, and client-side features (i.e. graphics) to the map.
Answer: Yes bing maps 7 silverlight for phone supports win 7 mobile. There is also support for Android and iOS.
Full details of mobile support here:
http://www.georelated.com/2012/02/cloud-web-map-api-services-reviewed_19.html
Other options include google maps:
Google Maps supports many mobile platforms and their html/js control is also also supported on many mobile devices.
http://www.georelated.com/2012/02/cloud-web-map-api-services-reviewed.html


Should I do my deadlifts on leg day or on back day?

Question: The way my workout is split is as follows: I do legs on Sundays which includes squats followed by deadlifts and then leg presses. On Mondays I do bi's and back. I do lat pulldowns, seated cable rows, and then I move on to doing curls. On which one of these days should i do the deadlifts?
Comment: I find it a best practice to have two full days between squats and deads. My personal split is Tuesday - Squats and Friday - Deads. I take Sat and Sun off completely. Mon, Wed, Thurs is upper body.
Comment: Do you work out on other days, or are you only working out those two consecutive days?
Comment: I work on more days here is an example of my split. Sunday ill do legs monday bis and back then tuesday chest tris and shoulder. Wed ill rest thursday repeat sunday friday repeat monday. then the following sunday ill start this same cycle with the workout i did on tuesday the previous week.
Comment: So you basically have a day dedicated just for deads?
Comment: Friday I do "posterior chain" - Back (lower and middle) and hamstrings. Basically it's deadlifts followed by hamstring curls and then lats and traps. If you are going heavy having a day pretty much deticated to deads is needed.
Answer: If I were to do a split, I'd do the deadlifts on my "back" day, not the "legs" day.
Here's why: both squats and deadlifts are compound movements that are best done heavy. They both do a good job stimulating whole-body growth. In contrast, curls, lat pull-downs and cable rows are exercises that target less overall muscle, which is fine as supplementary movements but not as your main one. They also are generally done with lower weight and more reps.
Separating the squats and deadlifts ensures that you target the most muscle systems while allowing proper recovery for each one.
But regardless, it's generally best for beginners and intermediate lifters to follow a proper training plan such as Starting Strength or 5x5 rather than coming up their own random splits. It also sounds like you're only lifting on Sunday and Monday--if this is correct, you might get more mileage from spreading out your lifting days or simply lifting three times a week, spaced out, instead of two days back-to-back.
Comment: How is pull downs or cable row an isolation exercise? Is a Romanian deadlift also an isolation exercise? A lat isolation exercise would be a pull over for example. The lat pull down is a multi-joint movement and has mechanics parallel to the pull up. But maybe you count pull ups as an isolation exercise?
Comment: If i do put my deadlifts on my back day, is it advisable to have these 2 days back to back? Also is it a good a idea to include stiff legged deadlifts on my leg day in replacement of the deadlifts?
Comment: Deadlifts and squats back to back is less than ideal, but it can work. The stiff leg DLs would be OK on leg day, but *definitely* don't put those two next to each other. I'm not sure you need to do both anyway.
Comment: @mike Good point. I don't consider pull-ups isolation exercises, though I do see a significant difference between them and lat pull-downs that I can't quite articulate. Could you edit my post to incorporate your point?
Comment: Okay I edited it in :). The pull up and lat pull down aren't the same. For one, the pull down you are pulling the bar to you while your lower body is stabilized in place and the pull-up you are pulling your whole body up. The other thing is that the pull down is a machine and you can do a lot of stuff on it which you can't with pull ups (Like leaning back and using your back to help lift).
Answer: Your program varies from a lot of standard programs in that you are including both squats and leg presses. In the most popular strength training programs, squats are done every workout, and deadlifts are done every second workout, alternating with power cleans or rows. No leg presses.
So, there's nothing wrong with doing squats and deadlifts in the same workout, but perhaps not with the leg presses. You could also put some upper body work in between your squats and deadlifts to give your legs some recovery time.
Workout A could be squats, overhead press, deadlift. These work the posterior chain, spinal erectors, shoulders, upper pecs, and triceps.
Workout B could be your bis and upper back day. You could also do squats on this day if you had a rest day between Workout A and Workout B.


Including co-authored work in my thesis

Question: One of the contribution chapters in my PhD thesis (computer science) is a work (paper) that I was actively involved in but the experiments (simulation etc.) was carried out by another co-author. After talking to my supervisor I decided to include this work as one of my contribution chapters but without the results (plots, etc.). Know I want to write a paragraph at the end of the chapter to justify why I did not include any results, clarify my contribution and also refer to the paper where they can find the results in and my name as a co-author.
1- Does this look like a good approach?
2- This is what I am planning to write:
The experimental results have been omitted from this chapter to maintain the originality of this dissertation as the experiments have been carried out by other co-authors. These results can be found in [paper x].
Answer: You seem to be concerned that inclusion of experimental results will mean your dissertation isn't original. Yet, you could include such results whilst alleviating your concerns. For instance, you could present experimental results and explain that those results were carried out by your co-author. You could also include a fresh analysis of those results or (with attribution) regurgitate existing analysis. This approach ensures your dissertation is self-contained and surely provides the reader with a better understanding.
Comment: @Thestruggler I don't understand why you'd prefer not to include because _the co-author does not work in our institutions anymore and I have no access to them_. The co-author not working at your institution doesn't seem pertinent. Not having access might be problematic, but you surely have access to LaTeX source. If not,  surely you can get it. Perhaps what's published will do. Regarding the term _originality_ perhaps your concern is: your dissertation not being entirely your own work. Regarding _justify[ing] why the results are not [included]_, I don't think that looks like a good approach
Comment: Many universities have rules about the originality of dissertations. While these are often ignored, I don't see any reason not to use these rules to justify what the author wants to do anyhow. The research is available in a paper, and so it can be left out of the thesis without fears that the reader might think there the author is hiding something.
Comment: @user2768: no thesis is ever truly self-contained ... they all build on previous work. Ideally, every scientific article should tell a story (although for theses, there are often several stories, one for each chapter). The real question is: do these experimental results add or detract from the story that the thesis is telling. I can imagine each of these alternatives being possible.
Comment: Thanks @user2768, I prefer not to include the results as the co-author does not work in our institutions anymore and I have no access to them. I do agree that the term originality does not represent what I meant here. I'm just looking for a better way to clarify my contribution to the work and also justify why the results are not here.
Comment: @PeterShor I hadn't considered _that the reader might think the author is hiding something_. I'm concerned with self-containment and understanding, both of which I think will benefit from including experimental results (with clear attribution). (University guidelines should of course be followed, if they exist.)

Including co-authored work in my thesis


How many PC's can operate on a wireless router?

Question: How many computers can a family run on one wireless router and not have problems? If the family has 5 computers running at any given time all at once, what is the consideration in purchasing a wireless router?
Comment: Define "problems"...
Comment: Maybe "Buy one, that can run 5 concurrent clients" ?
Comment: What wireless standards does your router accept or are you just asking generally?
Answer: As far as absolute max, see here for some examples. The lowest models support 32 clients, which seems reasonable. This is probably just the maximum number that the router can talk to due to hardware and software limits. So 5 computers will not be an issue.
If you are concerned about performance, that is a different matter. If people are just browsing the Internet, there should be no problems. You will probably be limited by Internet speed before you have router issues.
If you are copying a bunch of files between computers often, then it gets complicated. In that case, a general idea would be "more antennas." Having more antennas can help the router talk to more devices at the same time.


What can players do while waiting for a troll to regenerate?

Question: Can players do anything while waiting for a troll to regenerate its hp on its next turn? For example: Player A drops troll's hp to 0. Player B and Player C go before troll goes. Do I just skip their turn and say that the troll starts to stand back up or do I ask them what they do and let them know that combat isn't over, effectively spoiling that the troll will come back?
Comment: Is the question really "what can they do", or is it "how do I handle this situation without spoiling the fact that the troll is going to regenerate in 12 seconds?"
Answer: Players would remain in the turn order after a Troll is taken down to 0 hit points, it would be unfair to just skip their turns as they may take that time to heal themselves, use consumables, or generally buff up before whatever is coming next. If they haven't encountered Trolls before, they may just suspect you have some more creatures to come.
When utilising a Troll in combat, keep in mind the following things:

Trolls can only be killed by Fire or Acid, in the Regeneration trait it states "If the troll takes acid or fire damage, this trait doesn't function at the start of the troll's next turn.", and "The troll dies only if it starts its turn with 0 hit points and doesn't regenerate.", which combined means that the only way for the troll to start it's turn with 0 hit points and no Regeneration buff is to get it to 0 hit points with acid or fire, or thirdly, deal acid or fire damage while they're at 0 hit points but before their next turn.
Jeremy Crawford in the Dragon+ episode that aired 29th January 2019 that the instant death rule does not effect Trolls, Regeneration trumps that rule, so even reducing it to 0 hit points, with leftover damage equal to its max hit points, the Troll will still gain Regeneration buffs. However, while Regeneration trumps Instant Death, Disintegrate's chance of instant death trumps Regeneration, so you can still instant kill a Troll with that spell, as discussed in this post.

In conclusion, Trolls in D&D5e are much like their internet counterpart, hard to kill and relentlessly annoying unless you're prepared for them.
Comment: There's nothing spookier than when you've killed all the enemies but combat's still going.  *What did we miss?!*
Comment: @Medix2 in my second bullet point I specifically mention Disintegrate as a method of killing a troll, hopefully to put forward the point that the specific text in spells trumps the feature that trumps the general rule. But I didn't know quite how to phrase that.
Comment: @jgn my main reasoning is because the question can be summarised as opinion based, as I expect "what can they do" is not literal otherwise we'd be listing almost every feature that can take place in a turn, or two with a staggered turn order. You make a good point in mentioning the other post about controlling and leaving initiative order, but it would feel irrelevant in my own answer.
I proceeded to explain how the Troll works because I wanted the OP to understand completely how they run combat with a creature like this, because they're an especially tricky one.
Comment: It's worth noting that Jeremy Crawford's ruling on the Instant Death rule was specifically relating to the Massive Damage rule that causes Instant Death. He's previously stated that spells such as Power Word: Kill, Divine Word, or Disintegrate, *will* ignore the troll's regeneration and render the troll dead.
Comment: You answer the question in one sentence with the justification that "it would be unfair otherwise". Would it be a good idea to talk a little about the rules instead of including other troll facts?
Comment: The point that could make your answer stronger is that the players have likely *witnessed* these regenerative properties while the troll was up and fighting, and thus might suspect that it's about to pop back up as a result of that experience
Comment: Internet trolls are even harder to kill, because neither fire, nor acid goes through internet connection.
Comment: @Schrodinger'sStat the "Instant Death" rule is itself a written rule, not the concept of instant death itself, I mention the fact spells like Disintegrate work in the second bullet point.
The Troll feature is more specific than the "Instant Death" rule, but the spells that cause an instant-kill are even more specific than the feature.
Comment: @illustro from OP mentioning they didn't want to spoil the regen, and the fact that metaknowledge of creature features and stats (including their current hit points) is ill advised, I'm lead to believe that the players had no knowledge of the Troll's "Regeneration" trait.
Comment: While the OP might not want to spoil the regen, the point should be made that the regen feature doesn't *only* function when the troll hits 0 hit points. Meta gaming is a separate table issue (ie if you can't trust your players not to meta game then you've got a bigger problem)
Comment: @illustro it depends on how visible the regeneration is, the OP may have not overtly mentioned any changes in the Troll as the game went on, per other rules, healing hit points won't regrow a limb or seal torn flesh, so there could very easily be no cue for the players to know there is regeneration in play.
This is now veering off topic so I'll end responses here.
Comment: @SamsyTheUnicorn Missed that! Good answer
Answer: I've been in this situation with players who did not know that a creature could regenerate. It wasn't a troll, but the situation was the same.
Because we normally drop out of initiative when the last enemy is down, that's what we did. And then, as the players started the normal post-combat banter, I interrupted: "Suddenly, you see the creature you dropped twitch — it's still alive! Roll initiative again!"
No one objected or thought this was punitive. I considered having the party be surprised — I think this would have been fair — but I decided that since the time to regenerate is so short, they were probably realistically still on alert.
I've also, as a player, been in situations where we expect the DM to drop initiative, and they say: wait, we're still in rounds. In these cases, our assumption was that there was a hidden enemy somewhere, and we spent our actions looking for what we missed — making Perception checks — or saying "I ready an attack against whatever enemy shows up".
Sure, we knew something was going on, which was a bit of a spoiler, but it didn't feel bad. In fact, it felt kind of cinematic.
With one of these DMs, I can also remember several situations where this happened, and then nothing occurred after a round or two. I still don't know if this was just to set expectations, or if a monster or NPC was doing things in those rounds and something we could have done might have made things go differently.
So, really, I think either of these approaches is just fine.
Comment: They usually heal or investigate. They are used to this practice so they don't expect any new monsters or a monster to regenerate. They act as they would out of combat but taking turns in initiative.
Comment: In my campaign I keep everyone in initiative order until the end of the next round of every combat.
Comment: @Eternallord66 What do your players typically do on that last round? Kick the downed enemies to be sure? Ready actions? Look for danger? Pass?
Comment: This is exactly what I do with my players, they are usually on guard so dropping surprise on them isn't on my mind, but sometimes a player is busy searching or trying to remove a tooth and then it can be amusing :)
Answer: I am assuming that the question is how to allow the players agency without tipping them to the fact that the troll will be back up in a round (thus ruining the surprise). In short, how do you maintain the illusion that combat has ended even though it has not? In this case, I think it is fairly simple.

Ask the players what they intend to do now - as if combat were over. In your head, you will still be keeping in mind that the turn order is still relevant, but externally you ask all players what they intend to do next now that combat is over.
Hear all of their actions, even though only the actions of players B and C matter. If either player B or C interact with the troll, adjudicate that interaction. If they are hip to trolls and attempt to kill it with fire or acid, then they may do so. If they search the troll, allow them a perception check to see if they notice the troll's wounds closing. If they do, allow them to respond within reason.
If neither of the two players (B and C) choose to interact with the troll, you can be generous and allow them a perception check anyway if their action reasonably brings them adjacent to the troll, otherwise, you narrate that the troll rises up as they begin to perform their chosen actions. "As you begin to make preparations to rest, the troll stirs, then rises and attacks anew!" You would then resume the combat at the trolls turn, keeping the same turn order since the combat had not actually ended.
Answer: From When do player characters leave turn-based action (i.e. initiative order) if they are in a hostile area?

You enter turn-based action when you need to track time* that closely. You leave it as soon as you don't need that close tracking.
Turn-based time tracking dominates combat, but it can also be used for chases (DMG 252), complex traps (DMG 121), even tense social scenes.

However this is not a hard and fast rule and as you note it would be unusual to stay in turn based after the monster is downed. This would clue the characters in a little.
You may want to end turn based play with an outro to the affect of "The troll crumples to a heap spouting blood" and then allow the party to begin to discuss their next actions--leaving the area, looking for loot, etc. Then after a short interval (~6 seconds), interrupt them; "You hear a moan and the troll twitches, then starts to stand up!"
At this point you could either roll initiative again to see who reacts to the reanimating troll, or you could continue with players B and C going next. The first choice is closest to the rules, but the second may be fairer.
Next time the troll is downed continue combat or pull the same trick.
Answer: They can take an action, and interact with an object to ...
... light a torch.

Other Activity on Your Turn
Your turn can include a variety of flourishes that require neither
  your action nor your move.  You can communicate however you are able,
  through brief utterances and gestures, as you take your turn. You can
  also interact with one object or feature of the environment for free,
  during either your move or your action.   (Basic Rules, p. 73, emphasis mine)
  {snip}
  {Excerpted from table on the same page}

Here are a few examples of the sorts of thing you can do in tandem
  with your movement and action:
    • draw or sheathe a sword
    • open or close a door
    • withdraw a potion from your backpack
    • pick up a dropped axe
    • take a bauble from a table
    • remove a ring from your finger

One player gets out a torch, the other gets out lighting material (flint and steel, tinder, a match, etc) (interactions) and they light it (action+action).

A torch burns for 1 hour, providing bright light in a 20-foot radius and dim light for an additional 20 feet. If you make a melee attack with a burning torch and hit, it deals 1 fire damage. (Basic Rules, p. 52)

On the next round, all three need to attack again as the troll will have likely regenerated to above 1 HP.
On player wields the torch and attacks the troll with it, the other two attack the troll as usual.  To finesse this a little bit, that player could Ready an action to attack "if the troll falls prone1" and get advantage on the attack ... but that might be overcomplicating things.  As long as at least one point of fire damage is done, this can be enough to finish off the troll providing at least 10 HP total is done to the monster.

1If the Troll goes to 0 HP as a result of attacks, it will be prone/unconscious until it gets it regen HP back, that's how the torch wielding attacker will have advantage.
Comment: @leeA OK, I see that perspective.  Not every table assumes zero in-world knowledge.  When I as 13, I'd never seen a blue whale but I knew they breathed out of the tops of their heads.  The idea that the characters know nothing about creatures in their world until being in combat with them is a table by table thing.  Seen it both ways.
Comment: @KorvinStarmast I agree, it's a table-to-table decision, and it's not one my tables subscribe to. However, that doesn't change that this question is specifically asking what to do in a situation where they do not know it will regenerate.
Comment: @leeA. It was unclear as written, so "specifically asking" is a reach  until I had this conversation with you and matt.  This answer will be helpful to any table that does not bind itself to that convention; (though Sam's is a better answer)
Comment: I _think_ the question assumes that the players are not aware that the troll will regenerate....
Comment: Agreed, the question specifically mentions not spoiling the fact that the troll is going to regenerate, meaning the characters don't know this fact.
Comment: @KorvinStarmast it explicitly states in the question "effectively spoiling that the troll will come back"
Answer: There are a lot of good answers here; I just want to address the case of "The players know the troll will regenerate, and still consider themselves to be in combat."

They can take various actions, effective or ineffective, to try to kill the troll.
They can ready an action for when the troll has regenerated or starts moving again.
Additionally, I would let them voluntarily and permanently move themselves later in the initiative queue, so they could figure out how they wanted to use their turn after the troll had acted.
Comment: Yeah, 3.5 had a ["delay" action](http://www.d20srd.org/srd/combat/specialInitiativeActions.htm), and it's a generally-reasonable 5E house rule. The thing to watch out for is stuff timed to "until the beginning (or end) of your next turn". Changing initiative order can do weird things with that, for good and for bad.


Is there a way to momentarily raise a neutered cat's testoterone level so he can experience mating?

Question: I neutered my male before the female got her first heat and I am waiting until she is one and a half to spay her (bigger organs, less complications in surgery...).
I wonder if there is a way to raise his interest and if it would calm her down.
Answer: Over the decades, we have spayed 9 females when they were about six months old, with no complications.  There is no need to wait until the cat is 1.5 years old.  Cats who are spayed before first heat are less likely to get breast cancer, and of course, will not have kittens.
As for feeling guilty about neutering your male cat before he had "done the deed", wouldn't he be more likely to miss what he knew rather than what he had never known?  Is your cat happy?  If so, you have nothing to feel guilty about.
Answer: Firstly, I don't think there is a way to raise his testosterone in a safe way. Once he's neutered, he's neutered. Secondly, this would not be advised as there's no saying that she would pick him as a mate anyway. In fact, she probably wouldn't since he would have lowered testosterone levels and the female cat will only mate with a male that is "desirable" that she thinks would produce good offspring. Lower levels of testosterone would pretty much eliminate him as a contender.So it probably would not calm her down. Lastly, once your female has had her first heat, it is considered safe to get her spayed anyway. In fact, it is considered safe even before that but once she's had her first heat, you know for sure that it's safe to spay her. So if you get her spayed now, you won't have to worry about that anymore anyway. And you definitely should get her spayed now because some cats when they're in heat will do everything they can to get out of the house and find a mate and then you'll end up with a bunch of unplanned kittens!
Comment: Trust me, the cat doesn't feel like he's missing out. Neutered dogs/cats don't feel the desire to mate. It's not like they want to and they can't. They just don't feel the impulse in the first place
Comment: Must be because he's the only Tom around. Anyhow, it is definitely considered safe to spay your cat by her first heat and if you do that, you will prevent a whole lot of problems for yourself (including this one)
Comment: She rubs herself against him, raises her rear in order to call his attention, and walks away "howling". She desires him alright since we are on the third floor and all the windows and the balcony are chicken wired. As far as the possibilities the ought to be safe levels.
Comment: I just feel guilty for neutering him before he experienced doing the deed...
Answer: Whether or not there is a way to do so, it would serve no purpose whatsoever.
Sex for cats is 100% about reproduction, nothing more. The drive to mate is instinctive it has nothing to do with pleasure. A neutered male does not miss sex or yearn for it. After the removal of their testicles, drastically reducing the amount of testosterone in their system, they pretty lose any tendency to act like an un-neutered male.
Did you know that for the female cat, intercourse is quite painful? A male cat's penis is radically different than a human males and it has backward pointing spikes on it which cause pain for the female when, he withdraws.
It is fairly widely agreed that the pain is what triggers the ovulation in the female - cats do not ovulate and then wait to get pregnant. A female cat will only ovulate after mating.
Just for the record, female cats do not have menstrual cycles like human female. I believe that human females are the only species which has such cycles,
Don't worry that your neutered cat is missing out on something special - he isn't.
EDIT - I should have added that waiting for a female to be one and half years old is far too long before spaying her. While it is possible to neuter a male too soon, it is actually rather hard to spay a female to early, but it can be done. The size of the organs have no bearing on the surgery except that the smaller the ovaries and uterus, the small the incision need to remove them.
A year and a half is way longer than you should wait. Call a vet office and ask them the age they recommend. It should not cost anything to get such an answer.
If you want to see what the surgery entails, go what the video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7YKC7fQT1zE It isn't a bloody video or such and it is quite interesting to watch just what is done.
Comment: Thank you very much, she has just gone out of heat today and I should have her spayed soon. Surprisingly the male mounted her a few times but didn't bring himself to anything.


Question on new bike assembly

Question: If I order a Fat Bike online it will come in a box.
Is the assembly hard to do for someone fairly good with their hands?
Comment: Your other option is to get it delivered to a Local Bike Shop and have them do the assembly.  It will cost you several hours of their workshop time/rate.
Answer: This depends how much it was assembled before going into the box. I've had one bike that just needed the stem bolts to be loosened and the stem rotated, plus the pedals fitted (using tools provided). The one I bought recently needed a little more work but still only using tools you'd carry on the road plus a pedal spanner. That was a used bike, and had been dismantled just enough to go back in the box.
The seller should be able to tell you exactly what is required. It's well worth asking them.
Important things to be aware of:

Some bolts need to be done up to a specific torque.  On many bikes this can be quite roughly approximated but on carbon fibre and light alloy you shoudl really get a small adjustable torque wrench (sometimes sold as a torque screwdriver).  The parts should normally be marked when the torque matters.
The left pedal has a left-hand thread.  Double check that you've got the pedals the right way round, then grease the threads and do them up with your fingers for severalturns before finally tightening with a pedal spanner (a thin 15mm open-ended spanner)
Comment: Agreed.   A few things to keep in mind during assembly:  Apply some bearing grease or anti-seize compound to the pedal axle threads before installing the pedals. One pedal is reverse thread.  Observe torque limits on stem steerer clamp screws, handlebar clamp screws, and seatpost clam screws, especially if carbon parts are part of the build.  I would suggest 5 N-m if you do not have other information on the limits.
Comment: Very good info. Especially the pedal with reverse threads. I will have to see about scaring up a torque wrench. The bike is probably coming from China.
Comment: I need to edit in @TimD's points, and maybe a few other tips. There are good guides to building bikes online. A torque wrench is useful on most bikes, essential on carbon and very light alloy. Adjustable torque screwdrivers aren't expensive on ebay and cover the right range, unlike many wrenches
Answer: The level of expertise required will vary by the brand and the complexity of the bike. You will need a decent set of Allen wrenches and common hand tools such as wrenches and screwdrivers. I've assembled numerous bike for friends from a variety of sources. The easiest involved installing the front wheel, inserting the seat post, mounting the pedals and handlebars. Another required mounting the rotors to the wheels, the calipers to the frame, both wheels, bars and saddle. Then it also required some shifter and derailleur adjustment. I would suggest reading some of the Park Tool tutorials. Pay particular attention to derailleur and brake adjustments. While it is not rocket science it can be frustrating the first time you do it. If the bike comes out of the box really out adjustment and your attempt to correct it is unsuccessful then bring it to your Local Bike Shop and pay for the adjustments.
Answer: As suggested I spoke with Moose Bikes and you don't have to do much more than put on the pedals. This question has been answered.
Comment: Not really - you've got an answer about one specific brand of bike, not a generic answer across all fatbikes.   To save shipping costs by having a smaller box, often the wheels are shipped beside the frame, in the box, and the handlebars may be rotated or dismounted completely.  So it will vary by manufacturer/supplier

Question on new bike assembly


Traps in the Jobava Attack

Question: Are there any known early tactical traps in the so-called Jobava Attack (1.d4 d5 2.Nc3 Nf6 3.Bf4) for both sides? Leaving out the Barry Attack (early g6 by Black).
Answer: Here are some mistakes you should avoid while playing the so-called Jobava Attack.
3...c5 is one good answer, and as you can see 4.Nb5 is not working here.
The video below also shows many tactics in the middlegame, after other continuations like 3...c6 and 3...e6.
After 14...Rfc8?! 15.Nf5 the best response is taking the knight and accepting a shattered pawn structure. Otherwise white is much better (+1.3 in the least: https://lichess.org/analysis/standard/r1r3k1/3bqppp/p3pn2/np1p2B1/3P4/P1NB3P/1PPQ1PP1/3RR1K1_b_-_-_1_17)

<code>
      [StartPly "5"]

      [FEN ""]
      1. d4 d5 2. Nc3 Nf6 3. Bf4 c5 4. e3 (4. Nb5? Qa5+
5. Nc3 cxd4 6. Qxd4 Nc6 7. Qa4 Qxa4 8. Nxa4 Nb4 (8...e5)) cxd4
5. exd4 a6 6. Bd3 Nc6 7. Nge2 e6 8. Qd2 b5 9. O-O Be7 10. a3 Bd7 11. h3 O-O 12. Rfe1 Na5 13. Rad1 Qb6 14. Ng3 Rfc8?! (14... Rfe8!) 15. Nf5 Qd8? (15...exf5) 16.Nxe7+ Qxe7 17.Bg5

</code>

You can find a more detailed video explanation here:
https://youtu.be/5joSsNpJ9qw
Related games:
https://lichess.org/OfUGrtY6
http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1838817
http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1857787
Answer: I once had someone play 3...Nc6, which is dubious but not immediately disastrous. But after 4.Nb5, any response other than 4...e5 and White has a decisive advantage. This is almost the mirror image of the knight attack against the two knights Italian game.
Comment: Why "almost" ? This is exactly the mirror image of 4.Ng5 is the two knights defense.
Comment: The king and queen are not mirrored! :-) This is not just to be pedantic but because there are no mirror-image counterparts to the Fried Liver Attack or the Traxler Counterattack. For example after 5.dxe5, 5...Nxe5 is obviously not an option as White can simply play 6.Bxe5, while in the Two Knights Defense, 5...Nxd5 is not nearly as bad, even if risky.

Traps in the Jobava Attack


Does tor browser open a new circuit for each unique website?

Question: What is the limit of circuits. For example if I open 100 unique domains will TOR make 100 different circuits or does this have some upper limit?
Answer: In Tor Browser, every domain gets it's own circuit. The Design and Implementation of the Tor Browser document has some more details on it.
Frankly, you get an own circuit for every domain shown in the address bar. So, if you visit google.com a different circuit is used than when you visit example.com even when content, like an advertisement, is loaded from google.com.
I do not believe that there is a limit or at least not one you're likely to ever hit.
Comment: Is there any downside to using a circuit for each domain? Like performance wise or security wise? Because the default tor daemon only opens 5 circuits and the number of circuits does not exceed that number.
Comment: There can be a slight performance hit because you need to build more circuits but Tor builds spare circuits that can be used when you visit a different domain making it pretty efficient. Security should be better since it is harder to correlate the traffic to the user when traffic I split among many exits. Tor exceeds 5 circuits here, how did you measure/observe the 5 circuits?


How to change language to English in Oppo A59s?

Question: All the RAM result are in Chinese, and I can't read it. I have an OPPO A59s running Android version 5.1, and a ColorOS version 3.0. All output is really difficult to understand and operate. What to do?
Answer: Try going into the settings, and search for language.
Unfortunately, that version of Android and colorOS is very old and outdated. Try and see if you can update it to a newer version.
Some oppo apps may of not been translated into languages other than Chinese.