Take me off the endless email threads

Question: I recently asked to be taken off an email thread that was producing about 20 back-and-forths a day and had nothing to do with me.  My boss caught wind of this and scolded me.  He said he wanted me up-to-date on my co-workers' progress.  How do I convince him that these email threads are clogging up my inbox and preventing me from getting real work done?
Comment: Comments are not for extended discussion; this conversation has been [moved to chat](https://chat.stackexchange.com/rooms/128871/discussion-on-question-by-i-love-cats-take-me-off-the-endless-email-threads).
Answer: So set up a folder for each project like that one and a mail rule to direct the emails there.
Then once a day, or every other day, a quick gander will keep you up to date.
Leaving the inbox for more directly relevant stuff.
Comment: I would add "disable notifications for emails that are sent to less-relevant folders", if the OP's email client is set to produce notifications for incoming emails. Personally my productivity went way up on the day when I disabled all notifications from my email client.
Comment: Yes, surely "notifications" are the true interrupter, not the email itself.
Comment: Unless these emails are being sent to a DL, an inbox rule isn't going to work consistently.
Comment: This is a good idea, but definitely not a solution. Clearly OP's boss feels this is directly relevant. **If** notifications are the issue, this will help significantly. If the problem is the amount that you have to read, then this is mostly useless. (Although it can help efficiency if you read them at your own time, in batches)
Comment: @Mars my reply was not concerned with the amount of material to **read**, that would be a different question.
Comment: @SolarMike Exactly. This response assumes that the mail only requires a quick gander, which is quite an assumption to make. I'm not saying that there aren't many times when a quick gander isn't all that's needed, but I am saying that there are many situations where a quick gander is not enough, and there is not enough info in this post to assume that it is. And looking at the question again, this isn't an answer to the question at all. (In other words, it could use a qualifier, and it needs a tie-in to the actual question)
Comment: This is the virtual equivalent of what, when paper was around, we called "Rundablage" ("round filing basket") in German ;-).
Comment: It's not actually useless though. If OP normally gets 2 important emails a day, but the new deluge gives them an additional 50 not-as-important emails to sort through, then each day OP now has a useful to questionable-utility ratio of 2/52, or ~4%. That's a pretty bad signal to noise ratio, and will make it really hard to find and keep up with those truly important emails.
Comment: Just going to suggest this myself.
Answer:
How do I convince him that these email threads are clogging up my inbox and preventing me from getting real work done?

You can't convince him because this is a bogus argument. There are a myriad of ways of handling this from configuring various email client settings to not reading emails just because you received one.
Clogging up your inbox is a bit overly dramatic, and doesn't prevent you doing meaningful work.
Comment: I don't entirely agree.  Yes, what you say is generally true.  But, I've been in a work situation where I received daily over 200+ lengthy emails from one of my superiors and I was expected to read them all and respond.  In fact, this superior would bury requests to me deep in some of these emails to make sure I was indeed reading them.  I chose not to continue working in such an environment.  But demands about email can be onerous and make it near impossible to complete your other responsibilities.
Comment: @A.Ellett that isn't even close to the OP's situation, I'm not answering your question about being required to read 200 emails and respond per day. I'm answering the OP's question.
Answer:
How do I convince him that these email threads are clogging up my inbox and preventing me from getting real work done?

One of the first training received at the company I work at includes efficient management of e-mails. I was dismissive at first, I've learned to really appreciate it.
There are multiple things required to efficiently manage your e-mails:

Time Management:

Disable e-mail notifications -- whether sound, pop-up, or anything else. E-mails are for asynchronous communications, they can wait a few hours.
Handle e-mails in batch, on your schedule. Whatever the schedule is doesn't matter, it can reserved time, or flexible "in between" time. The important point is to only handle e-mails when you have time, when this doesn't interrupt your work.

Empty inbox:

Automated e-mails which generally do not require attention (I get many) should be automatically dispatched to the appropriate folder. Consider them as "archives".
Your inbox should be reserved for mails "to be handled". Depending on the volume of e-mails there are multiple strategies:

Small volume: any e-mail "to be handled".
Medium volume: any e-mail "to be dispatched", where dispatching is skimming and deciding whether it needs further handling. If not, then move it to the appropriate folder, and if it does... also move it to the appropriate folder -- different from the precedent.
Large volume: same technique, but nested. One folder per project/sub-project with its own "inbox", "to be handled", and other sub-folders.

E-mails which you need to reply to, but for which building the reply will take time (for whatever reason) go to a "to be handled" folder. If necessary, you may schedule time (as estimated) to reply to them later.

To / CC / BCC:

BCC is perhaps the clearest: it's for people that are in copy, secretly. Either your boss, to keep them in the loop without seeming to escalate the issue, or when sending announcements to avoid people replying to everyone.
To vs CC is a bit subtle. In general, there seems to be an agreement that:

To: people from which an action (reply, actual action, ...) is expected.
CC: people just kept in the loop, or people acting as "back-up" for a "To" person.

That's the gist of it!
I'll throw in a few tips on top, though they are vastly less important:

Use "Conversation mode" so that the entire conversation takes a single line in your inbox no matter the number of replies.
If you need to regularly chase people, you'll want a folder "to follow-up on" where you keep the e-mails for which you are waiting replies to.

Now, let's apply it to your situation:

Those e-mails should not clog your inbox. Even if you manually have to sort them out, it's just a quick "Move To" action and they're gone.
Those e-mails should not prevent you from doing your work:

You don't have notifications, so they do not interrupt.
When you do handle them, they're quickly moved out of the way.

And that is the worst case, because ideally you'll be applying a rule: all e-mails related to a project should either have a project tag in the subject or be directed to a specific mailing list, which can be used to apply rule. And if that is not the case, you should be promoting the idea. It eases everyone's life.
Just be careful -- do not automatically move+mark as read an e-mail you are in "To" of, in case there's an actual action you need to take in there, such as answering a question.
Comment: That's excellent advice. That said, your first point (disable notifications) only works if you never get e-mails from people (boss, clients, contacts in other teams) who expect an immediate response. If you do, and can't convince them to use some other system (e.g. phone calls or chat @pings) for urgent issues, you may in fact need to enable notifications for at least *some* e-mails. But if you can't disable all notifications, do at least disable them for the "endless threads" (e.g. using "rules and alerts" in Outlook).
Comment: @IlmariKaronen: Indeed. Clients are probably the trickiest. I'd attempt to explain "mail etiquette" to any coworker or even boss -- especially if there's an internal "chat" application -- but clients essentially have e-mails or phone, and even "urgent" e-mails are at least somewhat asynchronous, so less distracting than phone calls.
Comment: Great answer. The problem here is poor use of TO vs CC vs "let's hash this out in chat and announce the results afterwards"
Answer:
My boss caught wind of this and scolded me. He said he wanted me up-to-date on my co-workers' progress. How do I convince him that these email threads are clogging up my inbox and preventing me from getting real work done?

You do as you are told.
Your boss already knows you don't want to be involved in this email but has decided you need to be.
No one said you had to agree with or like your orders.
Twenty emails a day should not be "clogging up your inbox".  You need to organize your mail folders and move stuff to appropriate folders either manually or using automated filters.
If these emails are very lengthy and this is the source of the problem you need to explain to your boss that this is the case and suggest the team involved produce e.g. a summary document each week rather than requiring everyone to follow the entire discussion.  This may, however, be something your boss wants you to see in detail for e.g. training purposes.
Answer: Even if you could somehow convince him, do you really want to be the one making an issue out of something that isn't an issue for anyone else? Being seen as difficult to deal with at work is almost never a good thing, especially by your boss. Maybe he'll understand your position so well, he'll start leaving you off other threads as well, even some that might be of great interest to you.
Ignore them, filter them, turn off notifications, google "how to deal with distracting email chains." Just don't do the one thing your boss asked you not to do.
Answer: You might want to consider switching away from email.  Collaborative chat environments, such as Slack, Microsoft Teams, and many others have replaced endless emails and reply chains for many companies.  I work in a 24/7/365 IT environment and if we still used email, I would start every morning with 100s of emails.  With these collaborative environments, Everyone can be subscribed to the channels that matter to them and read and reply to everything in one place. While I still have email, I maybe get one or two per week.  The biggest challenge is convincing your company to try this new method.
Comment: They are also way more organised then an email thread. Most tools allow comments, clickable reference and tagging people for who the message is extra important. This wel solve your problem and then some :)
Comment: While this _may_ work for some (we have a mixture of Teams PM and groups and email), it won't work for all. It especially won't work if the company hasn't implemented some sort of collaborative chat environment. We only implemented Teams 2 years ago - prior to that it simply was NOT an option.
Comment: @FreeMan " It especially won't work if the company hasn't implemented some sort of collaborative chat environment"  umm....  what?  this comment makes no sense.
Comment: Several answers & comments have suggested using chat/IM/Groups, etc. If the OPs company doesn't use those systems, then these suggestions are useless to the OP. Not every company is caught up to date technically enough to have these systems in place. i.e. email may be the only option to the OP and his coworkers.
Answer: I think Dave Crenshaw would say that you can still read the e-mail threads but still be focused. Solution: Set a certain time of the day to check e-mail instead of checking e-mail/your phone every time you get a notification.

For starters, schedule a time to process everything. Having a specific time to go through your stuff keeps everything from hanging in limbo.

https://davecrenshaw.com/4-simple-steps-managing-email/
https://davecrenshaw.com/email-inbox/
Answer: I know you didn't ask this, but what about using Jira or asana users can comment on their progress, problems, and any other issue? Using a tool like jira/asana has helped me reduce the number of random email conversations I get.
Comment: Chat is even worse. In emails, at least a small fraction of people at least try to form coherent thoughts at least some of the time. In my experience, chat is mostly stream-of-consciousness gibberish. Both email and chat require you to chronologically reconstruct everything everybody has ever done to figure out what the current state is. A ticket system or a Wiki would allow to edit the status to always reflect the current reality, requiring only a single glance at the top of the page.
Comment: @JörgWMittag also chat is asking for your attention right away (and that makes sense for some things) but switching something from mail to chat means you are supposed to follow it more closely not less. Most people can be convinced that email is a comparatively slow medium where you maybe read and check once a day or maybe every couple hours. For chat the assumption is that you at least get the message immediately.
Comment: Yes, I was going to make the same suggestion. Hopefully, he can convince his company to do this.
Comment: Yeah, do this in a chat. Email is the wrong forum for a lot of things nowadays.
Comment: @FrankHopkins Not really... if you are subscribed to a Project X channel but aren't actively participating in the project, you can turn off notifications and check it a few times a day. Most chat apps that I've used will notify you if someone sent a message @ you even in those channels. Also, there's plenty of people that expect that emails should be answered immediately. I'm not saying that's right or wrong, just that it's a fact.
Comment: @JeffC sure expectations can differ, but I've not come across someone that expects internal mails to be answered fast in a decade and for chat it's the other way around. Plus, sure you can mute channels but imho it's much harder to keep track of what's still relevant in most such tools. In a mail thread (with proper citing culture) it's often enough to read the last mail to figure out what's still relevant /open. Not saying you cannot manage slow reactions topics in a chat tool, but it seems counter-productive to move something from mail to chat to achieve this.
Comment: @JörgWMittag Chat can be but is not always worse. I find chat easier so long as it's organized into per-topic channels, since I can scan through fifty or sixty new messages in a channel (flipping back to previous messages when necessary) faster than I can scan through a couple of dozen email messages. I can also ignore a channel until I have time to deal with it while still paying attention to channels whose topics require more immediate attention. (Though it's not unusual for me to go an hour or more never looking at chat at all; if it's truly urgent someone will come to my desk or phone me.)
Answer: Using your experience to occasionally redirect your colleagues is "real work." Yes, sometimes it takes some of your time that is fruitless, but it's worth it if occasionally you can save other people a lot of time.
What I do is allocate a half hour every morning, and occasionally when I have downtime between other tasks, and put things into rough categories:

I can safely ignore it just from the title.
I need to scan the content to know if I need to weigh in.
I need to carefully read the content to know if I need to weigh in.
This requires my full attention and I need to allocate some time for it.

The vast majority of things fall into one of the first two categories. I get maybe one or two of the third category per day, and maybe two or three of the last category per month.
Also, people don't always know what is useful to include you on. I had some pretty important input on something this week that I was only incidentally notified about. It's better to be included unnecessarily, than to be accidentally left off when you had important input. If you start asking to be removed from threads, people are going to become more reluctant about including you in the first place. And often, just knowing that you saw something and didn't see a need to intervene is helpful to others.
So find a way to manage the clutter and your career will thank you for it.
Answer: Just direct them to spam.
Anything that can be solved with technology is not worthy of human interaction. Just set up a rule that emails from X or emails with specific phrases go to spam/archive/a custom folder for garbage.
Comment: @JoeStrazzere: That's why asking to be taken off the list was a mistake. If OP had kept their mouth shut, they would not have been given such a directive. Now they're left with the uncomfortable choice of either reading the emails or quietly ignoring them and hoping the boss doesn't notice or care.
Comment: Your boss states that they want you to stay in the loop on some project and your reaction to that is to move all emails regarding the project to spam? Sounds like a good way to get fired. "Specific phrases" is also a really bad way to filter emails... you most likely aren't going to get all of them and/or move the wrong ones into spam.
Comment: Sending the emails to spam or ignoring them is effectively ignoring the instructions explicitly given the OP by their boss.  This could get the OP fired depending on the details fo where they are and their contract.
Comment: Directing emails to a folder does not equate to ignoring them - it's just *organizing* them.  Solar Mike's answer may be OK if the OP's boss is OK with the idea of looking at them every day or two (which I am dubious about), but just plain ignoring them (your idea) is asking to be fired under these circumstances.  If workload is the issue them the OP needs to *directly* address that with their boss, but ignoring it isn't a viable option.  Bosses, let us remember, do not always care that you have too much to do.
Comment: Ive actually seen people fired for doing this.  I mean, basically you are telling your boss that his direct command is worthless, as is the work.
Comment: And you can read the last one at the end of the day or once or twice a week to catch up with what the discussion is about.  You do NOT have to read each one as they come in, especially when you know you have nothing to contribute to the chain.
Comment: @StephenG however, as the answer from Solar Mike suggests, directing them to a folder, switching off notifications and taking a look every day or two will work perfectly to both avoid being interrupted and keeping up to date.
Comment: I used to do this - turns out our corporate Gmail system sends things tagged as spam to an internal "security team" for review.  Whoops.
Comment: A former employer had a "Report Phishing Attempt" button on their email client.  They would send out test "phishes" every now and then.  Clicking on a test phish link would auto-brick your computer.  There was a record of who did and did not click "Report Phishing Attempt."  You wanted to be on the "reported" list.  From time to time, I would report annoying emails as "phishing attempts".  Once you pressed that button, the email was removed from your inbox and became someone else's problem.
Comment: In a security conscious organization, there is no real penalty for hyper-vigilance and there is almost always a reason to suspect something is a phishing attempt.  Security will hassle the email sender to clean it up.  Your mileage may vary.

Take me off the endless email threads


Exercise based book to learn Verilog/vhdl?

Question: I was planning on learn an HDL (preferably verilog as I have to take a course in it in subsequent semesters). My initial plan was to first learn the syntax and then implement all the digital systems I studied in my digital electronics course using HDL. But just out of curiosity, is there a book which would combine teaching computer architecture with HDL implementation? I think that would be much more fun.
Comment: Verilog vs. VHDL is a religous issue.
Comment: You should consider accepting some answers, it will be more conductive to getting better answers...
Comment: @Thomas, I accepted Mark's answer but I think Schedler's was also good. I selected mark because his book suggestions were more relevant to Verilog.
Answer: Peter Ashenden's "The Designer's Guide to VHDL" uses a DLX CPU design to illustrate many topics. However, if you're only interested in Verilog HDL then this might not be the book for you.
Comment: +1: I code mostly in verilog, and used this book to get up to speed with VHDL when we had to integrate a bit of VHDL IP into our designs. IMHO, the book is organized well and it has good exercises at the end of each chapter.
Comment: @Marty, how did you learn verilog?courses or books?
Comment: @Rick_2047: Did a Doulous course, then picked it up on the job. Come to think of it, Doulous do have decent training stuff on their website: http://doulos.com/knowhow/verilog_designers_guide/
Answer: My two recommendations, only read the later but I like the author so i'll plug the other one as well:
Computer Arithmetic and Verilog HDL Fundamentals
Digital Design and Verilog HDL Fundamentals
Digital Design and Verilog HDL Fundamentals is probably more what your looking for, the first is more focused on implementing mathematical operations.  It may depend on what your after though, if your EE classes walk you through the entire design of a microprocessor as mine did you may find both useful eventually.
Answer: There are tools available on android also to practice syntax errors. Just check out https://play.google.com/store/search?q=skand+vlsi
Answer: I decided I wanted to learn how to work with FPGAs, so I bought a Xilinx Spartan-3A Starter Kit.  Since I was new to this, and wasn't sure which flavor of HDL to learn, I got these two books:
FPGA Prototyping By Verilog Examples: Xilinx Spartan-3 Version
FPGA Prototyping by VHDL Examples: Xilinx Spartan-3 Version
both by the same author (Pong P. Chu).
Each book has dozens of examples that apply directly to various Spartan-3 based boards but can be applied to others.  More importantly, the exact same examples are used in both books (as one would expect), so one can compare the complexity and readability of each one, Verilog vs VHDL.
Answer: Coincidence or not, I just came across to this today: http://www.nandland.com
[moderator note: This answer had arrived here as a result of a merge.]


Emission vs reflection

Question: Is there any difference in the way we perceive two objects, one that reflects white light and another that emits white light?
Answer: As you've written the question, with exactly the same light reaching the eye, then they'll be perceived the same.
But perception is complicated.  It depends on the light reaching the eye from a point, but also lots of other things.
To see that:

Look at a projection screen with the projector off.  What color is it?  Usually white or light gray
Now have the projector project black text on a white background.  The letters are black, right?

But those letters in the second step are sending to your eye exactly the same light as the screen was in the first step:  The projector has made other parts of the screen brighter, and that makes your brain consider as black something that used to be considered as white.
This is why "emitting light" is often considered to look differently from "reflecting light".  The emitting case is usually brighter (because it's emitting and often reflecting some light) than the reflecting case, and that can make it look very different.
Comment: @Sean Try the experiment starting with a light room or a dark one.  When the projector goes on, the place where the letters are looks darker than it did just a second before.  (This is done-in-reality-experiment, not a thought experiment:  You might not understand it's true until you see it)
Comment: @FredStark yes, exactly. Which is why it's key to a proper answer to "any difference in the way _we_ _perceive_..."
Comment: Usually, using a projector involves turning off the ambient lighting in the room, in which case the letters in the second step will _not_ be sending the same light as the screen was in the first step, but, rather, will be much darker (in absolute as well as relative terms).
Comment: I _do_ understand that; just pointing out that the experimental scenario is considerably different from what usually goes on when someone actually uses a projector for something.
Comment: I'm very confused by this example. There's no reflection here, just scattering (I guess a form of emission) of different amounts of light.
Comment: Isn't this just a trick of the eyes because of the light around the area, rather than difference in the area itself? This is pretty common in visual puzzles
Comment: Not really, because they're asking about difference in perception of two objects, not two objects in radically different contexts
Comment: @FredStark The whiteboard with the projector shining on it is one object; the whiteboard in the next room where the projector is turned off is a different object.
Answer: Imagine a source of white light with a known intensity distribution as a function of wavelength. It falls on a sensor (your eye). How it is perceived (quantified) will depend on the response behavior of the sensor itself. The response behavior is a function of wavelength. So, the sensor will quantify the incoming light signal according to its own response curve.
Now imagine the white light source is reflected from a mirror. How it is reflected will depend on the reflectivity of the mirror. The reflectivity is a function of wavelength. A perfect mirror will have a reflectivity of unity across all wavelengths. The mirror will transmit an intensity distribution pattern that is different from the incoming white light source depending on the degree to which its transmission function is not perfect.
Now, imagine the reflected light is sent to the sensor. The sensor will process this reflected incoming light signal using its own response curve.
In short:

A white light source has its own transmission pattern.
A sensor has its own response curve.
A mirror has its own reflectivity curve.

The combined system of source + mirror + sensor is only the same as the system source + sensor when the mirror has a perfect reflectivity curve (unity over all wavelengths).
Answer: Short answer: No. Light is light.
According to prevailing theories, there is no distinction between photons of the same wavelength/frequency/energy, even if they have come from different sources or indirectly. If you accept that we perceive via our eyes, and that our eyes convert light into a biochemical signal, and that any epistemological perception events happen after than conversion, then, no, we do not perceive reflectors and emitters differently.
In practice, yes, something reflecting light will look different from something emitting it. You could probably engineer a reflecting object to look arbitrarily similar to an emitting object (provided the right lighting), but it would be hard.
Answer: Imagine a spherical white light bulb next to a white diffusely scattering sphere of the same size. I think you should be able to spot the difference. So, yes.

Emission vs reflection


How is negligence dealt with?

Question: Negligence is unintentional, so at least for the first offence due to negligence, there should be no punishment or kammic results (imo). What of recurring negligence?
Answer:
Content with that ...(see sutta)..., he does not exert himself further in solitude by day or seclusion by night. For him, living thus heedlessly, there is no joy. There being no joy, there is no rapture. There being no rapture, there is no serenity. There being no serenity, he dwells in pain. When pained, the mind does not become centered. When the mind is uncentered, phenomena do not become manifest. When phenomena are not manifest, he is reckoned simply as one who dwells heedlessly
Answer: See the whole chapter on Heedfulness (Dhp 21-32) on the danger of heedlessness and the benefit of heedfulness.

How is negligence dealt with?


How did Iblis seduce Adam to eat from the forbidden tree?

Question: So Iblis is a jinn because he disobeyed Allah and because he was created from fire. When Allah commanded Al-Malaika to prostrate to Adam, Iblis disobeyed and thus became from the disbelievers. Thus, he cannot remain in the Jannah. So how can Iblis seduce Adam(as), who is in the Jannah, into eating from the forbidden tree? What I mean is that Iblis seduce us, humans and jinn, into committing sins because we are on the same world. Iblis is not in Jannah and is on earth with us, which is not like in the case of Adam(as).
Comment: My word, that's a lot of questions.  Please be aware that this site works best with a single, answerable question.  Would it be possible to [edit] so there is only one question please?
Comment: I edited the question. I hope it is according to the site's rules.
Answer: You seem to be asking how Satan could tempt Adam, while Adam was in Jannah and Satan had been expelled from it (7:13 , 7:18 , 15:34). This has been discussed in various Tafsirs:

He re-entered Jannah, as expulsion does not preclude temporary or unwelcome entry. Some traditions say that he entered in the mouth or form of a serpent in order to get past the guard.
He did so without physically entering Jannah. For example he spoken from outside its gate.

Refer to: تفسير القرطبي , تفسير البيضاوي
Comment: Thanks for the tafsir


How can I direct people from a mobile app to specifically a desktop site?

Question: My issue is that I want to be able to send people from our app to a feature that is only available on the desktop version of our website. It's not available on the mobile responsive site, so tapping a "send me an email (with the link)" isn't ideal as they would likely open it on their mobile device.
Comment: Aside from making the missing content mobile friendly and putting it in the app, I think the best you can do is messaging "Hey, there's this other cool thing you can look at later when you're at home".
Comment: So the idea is a kind of bookmark that you want to guide/nudge them into opening with a desktop computer?
Comment: Yes - I guess so.
Comment: Are you asking how to let users know a feature doesn't exist on the mobile app?
Comment: If there is a need for telling people a specific feature is only available on desktop, there is a user need for the feature to be on mobile. Something you might want to consider.
Comment: Case in point: one of my co-workers a year ago owned only a smartphone, not a desktop PC. Is there a reason this feature can be made available on a 10" netbook but not a 10" tablet, such as extensive text entry? The nature of this reason may help us understand how to phrase such a reminder.
Answer: "Access our desktop site for this information" with "desktop site" being a specific link to desktop, assuming you can force the desktop site to load.
That way you give up the link, but let users know it's on desktop - they can decide if they want to open it or not.
Answer: Perhaps if you could add some kind of reminder/push notification system into your app? Something along the lines of: "To get the most of our service, use x feature on the desktop." Then have a button "Remind me" with a date and time selector to pick when this reminder should be pushed to him/her?


Which sans-serif pairs are good using typeface Foco for headlines?

Question: I am kind of struggling with pairing right sans-serif typeface for body text. I need to use Foco for headlines for certain reasons. So far I didn't like anything I tried and I feel stuck. I would be glad for some advice.
Comment: Hi. Welcome to GDSE.  What fonts have you tried, and what was wrong with them, also which of the Foco fonts are you trying to pair against?  Questions on pairing of fonts are quite opinion based, since there is no correct answer. You may be able to salvage this question if you perhaps edit your question to show the work you have done so far, and say what you think is wrong with it or why it doesn't meet your requirements.  Also please don't just link to other web pages in your question - we like questions where we can see images, without the need to click on external links. Thanks.
Comment: Hello. Sorry for formating and other mistakes, I am new here. I tried to pair with Open Sans and Raleway, which didnt work. Now I use Rubik which seems to work better.
Answer: It is not easy to find an equivalent pair when we already have an assigned font. But there are some tricks that can be useful.
Styles
Choose font families with a large number of styles. Families usually bring four basic styles: normal, italic, bold, italic bold; useful for small
designs or designs with few text. For larger projects such as a book or a corporate identity, it is advisable to foresee a greater number of possibilities in advance and avoid changing the font or altering the design of the chosen one for different highlights.
Stroke Modulation
As a starting point, the font Foco does not have stroke modulation, so we would reject all Humanist Sans Serifs that do have it (as long as the design does not require it).

Font Structure
There is a base structure in each font. The Foco's o character is elliptical, which indicates that in its normal design, the font is slightly condensed. This serves as a reference to avoid overly expanded or rounded fonts (as long as the design does not require it).

Character Structure
The lowercase a or the support stroke of the capital R usually have a particular structure in each font. The ideal situation is to find a font that formally balances with these characteristics. As an example, if possible, avoid these combinations:

On a smaller scale, but similar importance are: Q, K, k, t, y.
Design
The font Foco has as a main characteristic in its design the rounded stroke to one side. This gives it enough personality. Try not to eclipse it with a font of greater visual weight in the design or typographies with a deep historical base.

But this is also positive information, a sans serif with rounded strokes at the ends could fit.
Search
With this information, 75% of the sans serif are discarded. Helping to find a good pair:

Searching just Sans Serif
Discarding Humanist Sans Serif
Avoiding expanded font designs in its base version
Typing "aRgGMQKtky" to compare
Avoiding fonts with too much personality in the design
Admitting those with rounded strokes as a good option

Using Typekit, on the first searching result page this one appears, maybe there is a better one, but I would give a chance.

Or:
Apertura
Comment: Hello. Thank you very much for such detailed answer. It is extremely useful for me. I tried to pair font Rubik (google fonts) and it seems to work, at least in that particular webdesign. Can I ask you your opinion about Foco (headlines) + Rubik (body copy) combination? Thanks


Do Thunderbolt to Display Port cables exist?

Question: Is there any  such cable? I'm trying to connect a monitor with display port connector to a MBA with Thunderbolt port. I know I can use a Display port to Mini-display port cable but I'm wondering if there is any Thunderbolt to Display Port cable so that I can get a better resolution.
Answer: There can be no such thing.
Thunderbolt is an active technology, Display Port is passive.
Adding the required circuitry to one end of such a cable would be pointless - it needs both ends to work.
Edit: Now I read your question again…
You have a Thunderbolt machine & a Display Port monitor…
That's Thunderbolt to Display Port not Display Port to Thunderbolt.
In which case DP to DP would be sufficient; the Thunderbolt circuitry would simply be inactive if you used Thunderbolt to Thunderbolt.
Display Port & mini-DP are the same thing, but different sizes.
Comment: If the monitor is DP, that's the best connection you can get. TB will 'step down' to DP. Knowing what mac it is would help
Comment: So basically a such cable would make no difference, right? The reason why I'm asking is that I've got an LG monitor connected to the mac with a DisplayPort to mini display port cable  and it says that I can't reach the native resolution(2560x1080) so I'm wondering what kind of cable I should use.
Comment: thanks @Tetsujin! The device is a late 2014 Macbook Air.
Comment: Then it should be able to manage 2560x1600 - I think the issue might be the ultra wide screen not being correctly recognised. Maybe try SwitchRezX or similar, see if you can persuade it. or hold Alt as you switch to Scaled resolution' in the prefs
Answer: Tetsujin's answer is not correct. A display port WILL support resolutions up to 4K with the correct cable. Every high end graphics card have display ports as output. The cable must be certified to support 4K resolution otherwise you will not get 2K resolution support on your LG monitor.
Try this setup: Cable Matters DisplayPort to Mini DisplayPort Male to Female Adapter - 6 Inches with a Thunderbolt cable - length of your choice. The adapter plugs into the LG's display port and the female thunderbolt port is connected to the MBA with a male to male thunderbolt cable. Done.
Here is a link to Amazon store to purchase the adapter (Cost is only $9):  http://www.amazon.com/Cable-Matters-DisplayPort-Female-Adapter/dp/B014DV2RGG?ie=UTF8&psc=1&redirect=true&ref_=oh_aui_detailpage_o00_s00


Where can I find a LEGO collection of minifigure photos?

Question: I am looking for a collection of LEGO minifig photos - something like this, but with each minifig pictured separately in a full-length portrait. I have not been able to find such a collection on the LEGO website or elsewhere.
Answer: Here are three options that have what you are looking for:
1) Brickset has the highest quality and best organized photographs of minifigs, but they are far from complete. For example, as of this writing, the gallery does not have any of the City theme figures. The collection is growing all the time. For example, here is their collection of Batman figures:

Pros: Free to browse. Very good quality. Well-organized.
Cons: Far from complete.
2) BrickLink has a fairly thorough catalog of almost every part and minifig ever made, and they have individual photos of most of the minifigures, for example:

Pros: It's free to browse. It has almost everyone.
Cons: It's inefficient, the photos aren't all high quality, and it may not have every figure. Organization and naming are not always obvious when looking for a specific figure.
3) The Unofficial Minifigure Catalog. This is a series of catalogs that attempt to document every minifigure ever produced. It's available as a printed book through Amazon (~70 USD), as a PDF e-book through Lulu (25 USD), and as a smartphone app. Here's a sample page, taken from Amazon's "Look Inside" feature:

Pros: High quality photos, thorough, well-organized.
Cons: Costs money. Harder to search and find specific photos. Takes effort to convert to individual digital photos if that is what you need.
Answer: Brickset has a gallery of high quality photographs of minifigures from both licensed and non-licensed sets.
Comment: I second the Brickset answer - Huw began photographing minifigures only a couple of years ago. Be aware that the Brickset photos are all copyrighted since it is for use on their own site, but they are amongst the best available. http://www.brickset.com/miscellaneous/articles/minifigPhotography/


Is there a difference between a Rabbi and a Temple Priest?

Question: I was reading about Perushim and Tzedukim on Wikipedia and the articles seems to suggest that there is a difference between them.
Is there a difference between a rabbi and a (Temple) priest?
Answer: In the Torah, priests are called kohanim (singular: kohen), and are defined as the direct male descendants of Aharon HaKohen. There are many laws concerning kohanim specifically
that do not apply to other Jews, such as not marrying a divorcee or not becoming ritually impure. The Kohanim conducted all the services that were required to be done in the Temple.
A Rabbi, historically speaking, is someone who was ordained as such, based on his demonstrating an expertise in Jewish law. There is definitely no requirement for a rabbi to be a kohen, nor for a kohen to be a rabbi. Nowadays, the title "Rabbi" is more ambiguous. It can refer to anyone who is in a position of teaching Torah to others.
Comment: In fact, if someone who is a kohen applies for a rabbi job today (as spiritual leader for a congregation), the fact that he's a kohen can be a downside, as he can't officiate at funerals.
Comment: http://judaism.stackexchange.com/q/45032/759
Answer: A kohen serving in the Temple was expected to have [at least some of] the expertise in practical laws that is expected of a rabbi in modern times. In that sense, the two occupations overlap, although there are significant differences, covered in other answers.
The quotation below (with my English approximation) is one of the Torah's commands to kohanim to not only grasp the details of the law intellectually, but to teach those laws to the nation.
Vayikra 10:8-11:

וַיְדַבֵּר ה' אֶל אַהֲרֹן לֵאמֹר
יַיִן וְשֵׁכָר אַל תֵּשְׁתְּ אַתָּה וּבָנֶיךָ אִתָּךְ בְּבֹאֲכֶם אֶל אֹהֶל מוֹעֵד וְלֹא תָמֻתוּ חֻקַּת עוֹלָם לְדֹרֹתֵיכֶם
וּלֲהַבְדִּיל בֵּין הַקֹּדֶשׁ וּבֵין הַחֹל וּבֵין הַטָּמֵא וּבֵין הַטָּהוֹר
וּלְהוֹרֹת אֶת בְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל אֵת כָּל הַחֻקִּים אֲשֶׁר דִּבֶּר ה' אֲלֵיהֶם בְּיַד מֹשֶׁה
God spoke to Aharon saying, "do not drink wine or [some other kind of] wine - you or your sons with you - when you enter the temple. And [thus] do not come to die. [This is] an eternal statute for your progeny. And [so] to differentiate between the sanctified and the mundane, and between the pure and the impure, and to teach Israel all of the statutes which God has spoken to them by way of Moshe."
Answer: cohen is simple the person that works at the temple. while restritions apply, to qualify to this job you basically need that your father worked there too. it's a kind of proteccionism.
a rabbi is basically someone that studied the necessary to qualify, the qualification is based on merit.
you could have a rabbi that is also a cohen and you could have a cohen one thing doesn't affect the other, it's like your father puts you to work on the family business, no matter if you have a diploma on administration. you could have the diploma or not.
while someone even with a doctorate wouldn't get the job, because your father only puts you, your brothers and cousins to work there.
Comment: A _kohen_ is not "the person that works at the temple" (as of this writing).
Comment: @msh210, that is unfortunate, but I think the point being made is a simplification of the purpose of the role, not the daily function today.


Implementation of tokens/assets/colored coins on top of bitcoin lighning nodes / channels?

Question: I'm trying to research how tokens or colored coins would work on top of bitcoin lightning channels / nodes. Has any project tried to build token issuance on top of  the Bitcoin lightning network? How would that work exactly?
Answer: Just wanted to add that Colu has been working on this problem since at least 2016, so i would dive deeper into their repositories, if you haven't already:
https://github.com/Colored-Coins
the most recent information I can find on these efforts is:
https://bitcoinexchangeguide.com/coloredcoins/
Answer: I can only answer the first part of your question as I am not aware of the implementation details other than that they use some form of "pay to contract script".
BHB-networks with Alekos Filini are working on the RGB protocol (which are colored coins) for Bitcoin. There is an rgb-spec which also has a section about Lightning but it is not very extensive. The first page says there are c Lightning and lnd forkes but I believe that is work in progress.
Answer: Coloured coins work by adding metadata to the a transaction output with an OP_RETURN output script. The metadata describes a transaction of the coloured coin, but is ignored by the Bitcoin script interpreter.
This allows any state-transition protocol to be implemented on top of Bitcoin, with a state-change fee being paid in Bitcoin for confirmation, but validation rules which are enforced by a separate coloured coin server, parsing the Bitcoin strong chain for valid metadata.
Transferring such a coloured coin across a single payment channel requires both channel peers being able to sign Bitcoin channel states with coloured coin transactions represented in OP_RETURN outputs. A channel state update can be in both Bitcoin, since the states are captured as Bitcoin transactions, and in the metadata, representing a balance change of the coloured asset.
Routing a coloured coin across multiple hops just requires the first and last routing segment balances to denominated in "colour coins", so that the colour coin can be delivered in the channel balance at your destination. An intermediary who is routing from a mSat denominated channel to one which is denominated in your coloured coin along this path would be necessarily be agreeing to an exchange of the two coins.


How Vedas treat mathematics?

Question: Is there a formal study to find how Vedas treated mathematics? I am interested to know; have we understood all the mathematics in Vedas by now? Does Vedas covers has all the present topics of mathematics? Is there anything in Vedas (mathematically) that we do not understand? Is there anyone who is still trying to bridge the gap?
Comment: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shulba_Sutras
Answer: Although there was a great understanding of mathematics during the vedic period, they are not mentioned per se in the vedas. The Mundaka Upanishad (part of the Atharva Veda) says in I.i.4-6 (Swami Gambhirananda translator):

To him he said, "' There are two kinds of knowledge to be acquired--the higher and the lower', that is what, as tradition runs, the knowers of the import of the Vedas say."
Of these, the lowers comprises the Rg-Veda, Yajur-Veda, Sama-Veda, Atharva-Veda, the science of pronunciation etc., the code of rituals, grammar, etymology, metre, and astrology. Then there is the higher (knowledge) by which is realized that Immutable.
(By the higher knowledge) the wise realize everywhere that which cannot be perceived and grasped; which is without source, features, eyes, and ears, which has neither hands nor feet; which is external, multi-formed, all-pervasive, extremely subtle, and undiminishing; and which is the source of all.

So mathematics is not mentioned as one of the lower knowledges or the higher knowledge. For more information on early Indian mathematics see - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_mathematics
Comment: Very hard to accept as the limit of understanding. It may be the limit at that time.

How Vedas treat mathematics?


What is the overall capacity of two cascaded BSC channel?

Question: Is it true:$C = C_1 * C_2$ where $C_1$ and $C_2$ are the two cascaded BSC which makes $C$.
Comment: Perhaps the only cases when your conjectured result $C = C_1C_2$ is true is when both channels are noiseless ($C_1 = C_2 = 1 \implies C = 1$) or at least one channel has zero capacity in which case $C = 0 = C_1C_2$.
Comment: Adding "channel" to BSC is a bit redundant. Could you expand the acronym at least once, and provided more context on their transition probabilities?
Answer: No, this is not correct. Consider the chain of two BSCs with error probabilities $p_1$, $p_2$ as a single BSC with unknown error probability $p$.
Now, we know that in overall no error occurs, when:

neither BSC1 nor BSC2 create an error: $(1-p_1)(1-p_2)$
both channels make an error: $p_1p_2$.

Hence the overall probability of an error is
$$ p= 1-[(1-p_1)(1-p_2)+p_1p_2]=p_1+p_2-2p_1p_2 $$
which is also known as the binary convolution. Now, the capacity of the chain-BSC is given by
$$C=1-H(p)$$
where $H(p)$ is the binary entropy function.
Comment: $p_1+ p_2 - 2p_1p_2$ is the probability that exactly one of the two channels make an error.
Comment: It should be $C=1-H(p)$.


How to share profit based on duration and contribution

Question: Lets Say  Entity M manages construction project .  A Contributes  500,000 USD at the beginning of the project.  after 3 months B Contributes 1,000,000 USD to the project.
after an year from the  starting date project completes and  M makes a 1,000,000 USD profit and M  takes  200,000 USD as Managing Fee.  How to Share remaining 800,000 USD between  A & B ?
Comment: Welcome to Money.SE. Is this something you are facing now, or is this a hypothetical? It's likely to be closed as unanswerable unless you can answer some very specific details on what occurred during the 3 months.
Comment: When B makes their contribution you need to decide how much a portion of the project they are purchasing. The answer will depend on if they are just a money source or if they are also acting in management role and need to also be paid a salary.
Comment: **A** invested 1/3 of the total investment and **B** contributed 2/3.  So everything else being equal that seems like a fair profit split.  It's would also be unsettling if a "real scenario" involving millions would be a question on SE.
Comment: this is a real scenario  actually we are the managing partner
Comment: what does the partnership agreement say?
Comment: that is the problem. to create an agreement we need to have a fair way of distributing mechanism
Answer: From my understanding, only A and B are shareholders, and M is a managing entity that takes commission on the profit. Assuming that's true.
At the start of the project, A contributes $500,000. At this point, A is the sole shareholder, owning 100% of the project that's valued at $500,000.
The real question is, did the value of the project change when B contributed 3 month later. If the value didn't change, then A owns 33.33%, and B owns 66.66%. Assuming both A and B wants to pay themselves with the $800,000 profit, then A gets a third of that, and B gets the rest.
However, if at the time of B's contribution, both parties agreed that the pre-money of the project has changed to $1 million, then B owns half the project valued at 2 million post-money. Then the profit would be split half way.
Answer: There's no unique way to split the profit, it's about claims and arguments.
I propose the approach based on internal rate of return. Consider we have a project with cash flow -500 at the beginning, -1000 at 3 months and +2300 (1000 profit - 200 fee + 1500 of initial investments) at 1 year. The balance looks as follows (simple compounding):
<code>-500*(1+r) -1000(1+r*0.75) = 2300
</code>
The solution is r = 64% (not bad!). Now, the value of the 1-st investment is 500*(1+0.64)=820 and the value of the second is 1000*(1+0.64*0.75)=1480 (at t=1 year).
This gives the shares of 35.65% (820/2300) and 64.35% (1480/2300). Then split the profit according to the shares.


Deciding on number of tubes to construct a heat exchanger

Question: I'm a chemical engineering student and I'm learning about heat exchangers,I came across this question and had a doubt ,
Cold water is heated from 20 degree C to 85 degree C while hot process stream is cooled from 130 to 55. Overall heat transfer coefficient is $348 W/m^2 . DegreesC$ .
Surface area of each tube is 0.092$m^2$ , how many tubes would be required to construct this heat exchanger ?
Rate of heat transfer = 165800W
I calculated LMTD = 39.79
And I calculated the area , which is about 11.97$m^2$
Number of tubes = $11.97/0.092 = 130.4$ tubes.
In this case, I need 130.4 tubes . Do I round up to 131 or round down to 130? and why ?
Answer: In this situation I suggest you round up - as rounding down means that the number of tubes is not sufficient.


GIMP PATH Colours

Question: I am trying to use an SVG from GIMP to use in Blender, but I want the whole image not black and white which some tutorials have suggested then to import into Inkscape and recolour it there. How can I just import an image into GIMP then export it with full colours. I have tried to invert from path and only got box which showed GIMP, exported the box and Blender successfully imported the SVGs. Is it a settings thing or is the developer(s) of GIMP not thinking things on features people want?
Answer: Gimp is fundamentally designed to handle raster graphics, and not vector graphics.  Gimp has a limited support for vectors/paths only as far as they are useful to create bitmap shapes. You cannot export an image (File ➤ Export) to SVG in Gimp. The only way to create an SVG in Gimp is to export a path (that has no color information attached in Gimp).
If you want full SVG support you need an editor designed to create SVG and this editor is Inkscape, not Gimp.
Comment: actually an old svs export plugin for gimp still works in the latest version and if paths are created and then exported blender can read them
Answer: GIMP isn't an SVG editor. It's a raster image editor. It has extremely limited vector capabilities. It can't be used to edit an already existing SVG. It can import an SVG, but it will rasterize it, and it will no longer be vector. If you want to edit SVGs, use Inkscape, or some other vector image editor such as Adobe Illustrator, Affinity Designer, etc.
Also note that although you can export paths as SVG from GIMP from the Path dialog menu, there is no way to apply any stroke or fill attributes to that path in GIMP. All you can get out of GIMP is a path with a simple black 1px stroke. No colours are possible.
Of course there's nothing to stop you from opening the SVG in a text editor such as Notepad, or Notepad++, and adding your own stroke and fill attributes manually, or you could open it in Inkscape, and apply strokes and fills there.
Here's an example of SVG output from GIMP opened in a text editor (Notepad++). The highlighted line 9 is the one you would need to edit to change the fill or stroke attributes. To set a colour for the fill/stroke, you can use hex codes such as "#ff0a88".

GIMP PATH Colours


Gps mistaken my location and get me to trouble

Question: I really need ur help I hope u will do CZ I'm so in trouble with my husband becz of Gps mistakenly located my position I'm. A specialist. Pediatrician working in hospital and that day I.have oncall duty and I was working in the hospital all that time my husband can not belive I'm oncall he was tracking my position I think by my Gmail. Because he knew my email password later Gps photo showed to him that I was not at hospital and I was go out to 3 different place and he do not want to believe. Me he insulting me although all what Gps point is not true and I ask him to asks the nurses and security that night when I was oncall where I am but he do not want to believe he is trusting that Gps than me  I attached here the Gps he view showing where I have been although all the time I was working in the hospital ?is there anyway I can prove Gps being wrong or  Can I contact Google Maps and can they give an official printout of that certain day and every location I was? I really need to prove my honesty to him and hope there is a way.
Comment: Sorry to hear this. I sympathise. This relationship is being jeopardized by reliance on a technology that has a built-in margin of error. GPS is not exact. He has to come to realize this.
Comment: You can get your location history in Google maps, however, the GPS isn't the issue here at all is it? It is the complete lack of trust, and the utter invasion of your privacy from your husband. The GPS/WiFi/Cell location is NOT accurate and can be off by hundreds of meters radius, which is a HUGE area to cover. Really you should be talking to him and looking at your relationship. This isn't normal, it isn't right, and it's tally invasive. Lock your account and turn off 'location history' and sit down and talk to him. You said he is insulting you, this seems to be a much bigger issue tbh.
Comment: So what can I do now ? Does anybody out there can read the Google map Gps he saw! How I can prove he is wrong ?how I contact google map and  can they give an official printout of that certain day and every location I was on that day?? Please help
Comment: I'm thankful for all your help and sympathy technology Is sword with two sharp points offf offff
Answer: You can check this on google location history.... and I can attest it isn't entirely accurate

(more so when the points are several kilometers apart, and I probably walked at supersonic speeds)
As @flow has said though, its more of a socio/cultural issue as a technical one - I shouldn't be judging someone elses culture but this kind of unfounded suspicion and emotional abuse isn't right.
Comment: It's helpful thanks you so much I hope I can convince him
Answer: First, Google does track your Android device's location not solely on GPS. They use also WiFi Access Points and cell towers to do so. This makes not only the accuracy sometimes very inaccurate, but could also lead to false location reports.
I doubt that Google will be helpful here. This is more of a social problem then a technical one, consisting of the absolute believe in technology, which is wrong, and the distrust in persons, which is also wrong.


Differences between thermistors and thermocouples

Question: As I understand it, both thermistors and thermocouples are temperature sensors. So what are the advantages/disadvantages of using one over the other to measure the temperature?
What are the specific applications for either of the sensors?
Answer: Thermocouples:

wide range of temperature sensing (Type T = -200-350°C; Type J = 95-760°C; Type K = 95-1260°C; other types go to even higher temperatures)
can be very accurate
sensing parameter = voltage generated by junctions at different temperatures
thermocouple voltage is relatively low (4.3mV for Type T thermocouple with one end at 0 C, other at 100 C, so that's 43uV/C tempco)
mostly linear

Thermistors:

more narrow range of sensing (Quality Z thermistors spec'd at -55 to +150 C)
sensing parameter = resistance
usually very nonlinear
NTC thermistors have a roughly exponential decrease in resistance with increasing temperature
good for sensing small changes in temperature (unless you are careful in your signal conditioning, it's hard to use a thermistor accurately and with high resolution over more than a 50 C range).
sensing circuit doesn't need amplification & is very simple (voltage divider with reference resistor tied to reference voltage usually is sufficient) – see my blog for more information about signal conditioning.
accuracy is usually hard to get better than 1°C without calibration
Comment: And there is no need for calibration with a thermocouple? I can buy one from the shop and just trust the reading?
Comment: This answer is imprecise and biased towards thermocouples, Need to add three of their major drawbacks: Reduced Accuracy, Calibration Drift with time ([ref.](https://www.ametherm.com/blog/thermistors/temperature-sensors-thermistors-vs-thermocouples)), and they are mainly Non Linear ([ref.](https://www.omega.co.uk/temperature/z/thermocouple-rtd.html))
Comment: And how do prices compare for the two?
Comment: good q's... [thermocouples do have tolerances](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermocouple#Comparison_of_types) depending on what you buy, [which type, and which temperature range](http://digital.ni.com/public.nsf/allkb/776AB03E065228408625727B00034E20) you are using them. Type T is the most accurate near room temperature. The error comes from variation in the metallurgy of the wires (both during manufacturing, and over time as the wires may react with air or undergo metallurgical changes (annealing/quenching/work hardening etc.)
Comment: prices: Thermistors are less expensive, unless you're talking about short lengths of plain old unshielded sheathed 30AWG wire, which look like they are $0.20-0.50/ft. Thermocouple probes are typically in the $15-$150 range.
Answer: A thermistor is a temperature-sensitive resistor, whilst a thermocouple generates a voltage proportional to the temperature. Thermocouples can work at much higher temperatures than thermistors.
They are commonly used for temperature control in heating systems.
Answer: Different Principles
A thermistor is an electrical resistance, made of semiconducting material, that can be wired into a circuit. The semiconducting material is usually made of manganese oxides and nickel oxides. The thermistor works based on the principle that the electrical resistance of this material changes with temperature. A thermocouple, on the other hand, is made of two wires of different metals, such as copper and iron. The equal length wires are connected electrically together at one end and open at the other end. The principle is that if the open ends of the wires are at a fixed temperature and you change the temperature at the connected end, this generates a voltage between the two wires at the open end of the thermocouple.
Measuring Temperature
With a thermistor, you could use an instrument that measures electrical resistance and connect it across the thermistor. You will measure a resistance change with a change in temperature. If you then refer to a table that lists temperature change versus resistance, you can find out the temperature from this table. In the case of a thermocouple, you will use an electrical circuit to measure the difference in voltage between the two wires at the open end and use this to measure the temperature difference between the two ends of the wires.
Thermistor or Thermocouple?
In general, thermocouple readings are more precise than thermistor readings. However, they react more slowly to changes in temperature. Thermistors are also more expensive generally than thermocouples, due to the need for an external power source and the device's circuitry. The decision to use one or the other will depend on your specific needs.
Answer: The resistance of a thermistor varies with temperature. putting it in series with a resistor to form a voltage divider and you can measure temperature with a voltmeter. For even more accurate measurements it can be part of a Wheatstone bridge. They are often used as an over temperature sensor.
A thermocouple is a pair of dissimilar wires connected together. When heat is applied a small current is generated. The amount of current is roughly proportional to temperature. They work at higher temperatures than thermistors. A common use for a thermocouple is a detector on a gas pilot light. If the pilot light goes out, the thermocouple cools down and the gas supply is turned off.
Comment: A bimetallic strip is more common as a detector for a pilot light. It can turn off the supply without any other components.
Comment: @m.Alin: "Isn't the voltage proportional to the temperature" -- thermocouple voltage is proportional to temperature *difference*. (approximately -- there is some nonlinearity) But you're right, it's voltage, not current.
Comment: @Leon: I've never heard of using bimetalic strips. A thermocouple can be used completely passively for this purpose by running the generated current through a coil which holds the valve open against a small spring. Simple and inexpensive, without needing any external power.
Comment: Isn't the voltage proportional to the temperature?
Comment: "For even more accurate measurements it can be part of a Wheatstone bridge." Not really. That's true for strain gages where matched elements take advantage of Wheatstone bridge configuration. Thermistors don't have that ability.
Comment: you'd need a *thermopile* (several thermocouples in series) to generate enough voltage or power to hold a valve open. My propane heater used to run this way from the pilot light, & would still operate even if we had a power outage.


How Scopus CSAB plan to evaluate a submitted journal's citedness in Scopus?

Question: Our journal applied to Scopus for inclusion a few months ago and I, as an editor, would like to clarify some citations to our journal from articles already indexed in this database (as far as I know, the Scopus Content Selection and Advisory Board will be looking for the citedness of our articles in Scopus and the outcome will affect the result of the journal evaluation process).
Though there are some articles in Scopus that cite articles published in our journal, many of those citations are corrupted: Our journal's name is not given in full, sometimes author/article details are missing or misrepresented etc. I contacted Scopus Author Support but they informed me that they can only process my request once our journal is indexed in Scopus. Until than, they will not modify the incorrect citations.
Now I'm wondering how Scopus CSAB plan to evaluate our journal's citedness in Scopus if their database do not show these existing references properly? I was barely able to find them in Scopus and only succeeded because I knew exactly what I was looking for. If I've simply used advanced search and searched to our journal's name within the references (what I'm expecting the committee will do) I would have found no citations to our journal whatsoever.
Is there anything more I can do in this situation?
Comment: Have you been about to find anything out from Scopus?  I see that the advisory board was expected to meet in October.
Comment: no :(  Operators on the live chat directed me to addresses from where  I only received form emails.
Answer: For Scopus, like for any organization, if you can't find anything out online and aren't getting information back via email, then the next step is to call them on the phone and be persistent in finding the right person to talk to.
Beyond that, they are a private organization owner by Elsevier (a for-profit company), and there is no mandate that requires them to have either a transparent or a sane process, and there is likely little more advice that anyone outside of the organization can give you.


Bluetooth Trancievers for arduinos

Question: Would it be possible to use to of these on two separate arduino's, to send and receive information? I am having difficulties understanding the chinese-english descriptions and haven't seen any documentation on doing this. There would be no phone involved. There would only be two arduino's with a Bluetooth module on each of them sending and receiving data from each other.
Answer: The boards in your link look funny.  Typical boards like this include the "bluetooth circuit" which piggy-backs onto that board, and is soldered at all those little pads.
Have a look at say, the HC-05 board ~  https://www.google.com.au/search?q=hc05+bluetooth+module&tbm=isch
It's easy to see the part that's missing from the one in your link.
For these HC-05 boards, it's possible to pair two together.  They need to be configured as "Master" and "Slave" though.  Some bluetooth boards can do slave-mode only, so be careful before you purchase.
Comment: To add to this old thread, HC-05 is not the same as HC-06.  HC-06 is a "slave only" model, like @Kingsley mentioned.

Bluetooth Trancievers for arduinos


How do I rip vinyl plank flooring?

Question: I'm installing CoreTec One vinyl plank flooring and I've had trouble finding directions on how to rip it to width.  Most of the "vinyl plank" installation guides I've found are for thinner, more flexible product which can be scored and snapped.  I've seen suggestions that one can use a circular saw but I can imagine the vinyl might gum up my table saw.  If not, that seems dead simple.
Comment: I installed some very similar flooring recently. My circular saw cut it beautifully with a standard framing blade, and there was no melting or other gumming of the saw. I imagine that you could cut it fairly quickly with a jigsaw, too.
Comment: The resource tab on your product link includes some installation guidance.  They may call it vinyl, but it looks like some kind of vinyl composite that behaves closer to wood.  I doubt scoring and snapping will work.  They recommend cutting it with a carbide-tipped blade.  The wear surface probably contains aluminum oxide, which will quickly dull a plain blade.
Answer: In your position, I'd try a fine toothed blade in a table saw for cutting the vinyl planks. As long as the material keeps moving past the blade, I wouldn't expect a problematic amount of melting/gumming.
Answer: It cuts just like wood or MDF. I just installed a vinyl plank floor and I was able to do cross cuts by snapping and scoring, cut around door jams using a jigsaw and rip it to length on the table saw.   Some brands snap more easily than others, I have had to use a miter saw for a whole floor instead of the score and snap method. If a crosscut was too near the end of the plank I did have to use a miter saw.  It produces little vinyl chips kind a like sawdust but a little bigger and they can be vacuumed up easily.
Answer: I recently did some rip cuts on luxury vinyl plank and just used a table saw. A lot of people say to score and snap but every time I watch a how-to video, they will only score and snap the short way. I also don't trust my hands to create a good, straight line. This is just my opinion, but I think it's hard to score and snap 4 feet of any rigid material.
So I used a table saw. The table saw was not damaged after use, but the vinyl plank leaves a ton of dust behind that looks like rubber eraser dust, which I had to shop vac.

How do I rip vinyl plank flooring?


How to complete this circuit

Question: I got some decorative multi color led wire. It is broken at one place now. I need to connect the wire to complete the circuit. I am new to this and I am trying to learn. I tried twisting the wire so it would touch. But it didn't make the light to work. I tried twisting with aluminum foil also. It didn't work either. Please let me know how to connect these wires and whether these lights are of any specific types of led. What wire is this? Lead?
Comment: Hello, and welcome to Home Improvement. Unfortunately, electronics repair and soldering is off-topic here.
Comment: Ok. Thanks. I won't post these sort of questions here.
Answer: Small colored wires like this have an enamel coating that insulates the wire so that it does not short out to other wires or metal objects/surfaces. It is this coating that is making it so that you cannot just twist the wires together to complete the circuit.
The conventional way to rejoin wires of this ilk is to twist and solder. But first it will be necessary to very carefully scrape enamel coating off the surface of the wire using a sharp utility knife blade or safety razor blade.
Comment: Hi, Thanks for the information. It makes sense now
Comment: ED's answer is educational and very correct, and both of the answers (this one and his) joined give great information.
Comment: I've had good luck removing enamel insulation coating by placing an ordinary aspirin tablet outside, adding a bit of solder flux and heating it with the wire in place. It was then a simple matter to tin the wire for the project to continue.
Answer: LED's have a polarity if you connected them up backwards it would not work. LED's emit light in reverse bias mode and act as a diode in the forward bias mode. Hopefully when you hooked it up there was enough of a load on the string to limit the current or it may have blown the junction. Reverse bias the breakdown voltage is usually +1.2v in forward bias breakdown is ~.6v so if the current wasent limited the lower voltage breakdown allows more current flow and the magic smoke escapes. Twisting the leads should work if not plastic coated.
Comment: This answer is great for some bacground info. It's useful to note that with a DVOM (a basic digital volt ohm meter) they often have a diode test function. Some LED's are specifically built to be bipolor, he may have a bipolar led. However, current limits still need to be observed. (His device might use AC). Just using a meter, test the LED like Ed notes, and like Karas notes, clean the surface to allow soldering, then tape it off or heat shrink to protect the now exposed wires. Perhaps your kit has these instructions?

How to complete this circuit


Hosting a minecraft server with a vpn

Question: I've heard about the dangers of port forwarding to let people play on a minecraft server hosted on your computer. But I was wondering, could having a VPN on the computer with the server possibly avoid the danger or make it safer?
Comment: Not sure why the downvotes... I wouldn't upvote this question, but it's a valid concern that someone with just enough knowledge to host a server from home would have, and shows interest in keeping themselves secure.
Comment: Just throwing technology at the problem won't be a solution. What do you mean by "VPN"? What are you thinking a VPN will do for you? Who accesses the minecraft server?
Comment: I was just curious. I doubted it would work but i asked the question anyway.
Answer: To answer your question bluntly, "No, it would not make you more secure." However, your question shows that you are relatively new to networking and security, so I would like to expand my answer a bit, to give you some context for it.

What is a port?

The internet works based on IP addresses. A typical IPv4 address will look something like 184.108.40.206. This address represents one computer1 somewhere on the internet. In order to communicate with a specific application on that computer (e.g. a Minecraft server), that application listens to a specific port, such as 25565.
A packet sent to a computer has to contain it's address, but also the port which corresponds to the application that is supposed to handle the packet. This is done so that a computer can have many different applications running at the same time, with each listening to different port. That means your computer could be running a Minecraft server on port 25565, an Unreal Tournament 2004 server on port 7777 and a web server on port 80 and 443.

What is port forwarding?

If you are at home and have multiple devices at hand, you can search for your external IP address and you will see that all of them likely have the same address. How is this possible, if above I said each address corresponds to one computer?
The answer is NAT. I won't go into detail, but think of it like a hotel lobby. The hotel has one address, but many rooms internally. Mails sent from the hotel go to the lobby, which then send the mail out. The sender is the hotel, and the recipient sees that it comes from the hotel. The recipient will write a reply to the hotel, and the hotel lobby will give the mail to the person who initially sent the mail.
The disadvantage is that this only works if the person in the hotel writes first. If someone would like to send a mail to someone living in this hotel, the hotel wouldn't know what to do and just throws the letter away.
This is where port forwarding comes into play. It essentially means "If traffic comes to this port, I will forward it to this internal machine on that port". In terms of our mail analogy, it's akin to writing "To: Awesome Hotel, Room 1337". The lobby will know where to forward that to.
Concretely, if we set up the gateway computer (the hotel lobby in our analogy) to forward all traffic to port 25565 to your internal computer running the Minecraft server on port 25565, then people connecting to your external IP on that port will actually be forwarded to your internal computer on that port.

Is port forwarding unsafe?

It's a necessary evil. By forwarding one port to your internal computer, it means everybody on the internet can attempt to connect to that port. This is necessary, as otherwise nobody could play Minecraft on your server.
The problem is that if the server has any security vulnerabilities, be it in the base software, a mod you installed, etc, then this directly affects your computer. It's a risk in theory, but in practice, I would not worry too much about it.

Can a VPN help me?

I'm sure you've heard all the YouTubers talk about how a VPN can help you be safe from hackers and all that nonsense. It's just marketing talk, and very dishonest. VPN's do provide security, in specific scenarios, against specific attacks. Claiming they solve all problems and you're just 7,99€ per month away from perfect security is dishonest.
The only scenario in which a VPN would help you is if you ran a VPN gateway in your network and have the Minecraft server accessible only to those with access to your VPN. The problem is, that this is way more difficult to set up, and even more difficult to set up in a secure manner. Just forwarding a port to your Minecraft server is way less likely to get you into any troubles.
My own Minecraft server also runs on my local PC and just has a forwarded port, so it's certainly not an extremely insecure way to do it.

1: Yes, even if it's NAT'ed it's still one box that handles all the NAT.
Comment: I like the hotel mail analogy.  As long as you are explaining the basics, it might be worth a quick mention of why ports exist in the first place.  I'm sure there are many reasons, but here the most relevant is (probably) just so a computer can have more than one application listening for internet connections, since you only have one ip address
Comment: You could also explain that you may want to be in this hotel because you want to be able to communicate with people via mail, but don't want just anyone to send letters to you.
Comment: If the hotel has a hot tub then that's reason enough to want to be there!
Answer: The danger of port-forwarding is that it lets computers on the internet communicate with any program on your computer that is listening on that port. If you instead host your server through a VPN, you'll still need to allow traffic to the port somehow; the content of the traffic isn't fundamentally changed by it coming through a VPN to your computer. If you're only running a Minecraft server on that port, and you do actually want people to connect to it, then there's no danger to forwarding the port.
Most VPNs don't let you forward ports (which wouldn't be usable for hosting a Minecraft server), or they expose all ports (which would be like forwarding all ports to your computer), so a VPN might even be worse on this measure.

There are other dangers that hosting through a VPN could address though. If you wanted to obscure what city you lived in, or you were worried that someone might DDOS you and slow down your home's whole internet access, then hosting through a VPN would help with these.
Comment: The stuff they could do if you open a port is talk to any programs on your computer listening on that port. If you actually want people to talk to your minecraft server and you only open the port used by your minecraft server, then you're fine.
The advice against opening ports is like "Leaving your front door open is dangerous, because people can come inside.". If you want your friend to come inside, then you do actually want to open the door for them.
Comment: Everywhere I've seen on this website says that port forwarding is dangerous and people can use the hole in your firewall to do stuff
Comment: from what I've read people can use the open door as well as friends to gain access to your computers and stuff, is this not true?
Comment: If the program listening on the port (the minecraft server) is insecure, then letting people communicate with it could be dangerous. If you still want people to communicate with the minecraft server, you could either accept the risk, or you could try to lower the risk by running the minecraft server in its own user account, in a sandbox, in a VM, or on another machine entirely. A VPN doesn't do anything to address the risk that comes from letting other people talk to an insecure program on your computer.
Comment: The server will be on a separate device only for the server. But couldn't someone use the communication to somehow compromise the network?
Answer: Installing a VPN client does not help, but installing a VPN server and making your friends connect to it will mostly solve the problem. I will explain.
If you just install a client, it does not change anything. Anyone can connect to your computer, no matter if the VPN is connected or not. Your outgoing connections will go thru VPN, but incoming connections don't.
On the other hand, if you install a VPN server, and make Minecraft listen only to the interface the VPN created, nobody outside can connect, except those coming from the VPN itself. You create a port forward for the VPN server, send login/password for your friends, and you are safe.
Comment: Such as hamachi?
Comment: Yes, Hamachi is a good example.
Answer: VPN does not help. If you are running a server and want to allow outsiders to connect to the server, you need to give the outsiders an internet-routable IP address, protocol (usually tcp) and port number to connect to.
TCP sockets that outsiders connect to that public IP/protocol/port will be forwarded to your private IP/port.
Using VPN just makes the server less reliable, or allows you to delete the known public IP in the future.  But if you want to make the server available, you have to make the server available.
If the Minecraft server software you are running is vulnerable to (for example) a buffer overflow attack, a hacker that is connected to your server may be able to trick the software into "phoning home" (opening up an outbound tcp socket to a home base allowing remote control).
One mitigation is to block outbound sockets from your server, other than what is needed to run the server (DNS and software updates for example).
Another mitigation is to have no valuable information on the Minecraft server, and have no other systems accessible from the server. But even then, a successful hacker might get your Minecraft players' usernames and passwords.  Getting a second Internet connection and only putting the dedicated Minecraft server on it is one easy way to achieve this.
Regularly updating the Minecraft server software will also help.
Comment: when you say getting a second internet connection you mean like a subnet or something, separate from your home network?
Comment: You could implement an isolated net using a router or firewall with two inside subnets and ACLs which prevent cross communication, but that is a more advanced and error-prone configuration. I was suggesting you get two internet connections: perhaps one DSL from phone provider, one cable modem from cable provider.  Then you have two airgapped networks. That is expensive, but easier for a non-network-engineer to implement.

Hosting a minecraft server with a vpn


What is back-emf: counter-electromotive force?

Question: Could someone knowledgeable on the subject explain what exactly is this back emf?
How is it caused in a motor/generator, which components and which effects determines it?
Answer: Inductive components like motor winding resist sudden changes in current. That's because the magnetic field caused by the current needs time to build up or decrease. That means that when current is flowing and this is suddenly cut off, the winding will try to maintain that current, and becomes a power source generating a voltage to be able to do so. It gets its power from the built up magnetic field.
Since the winding is now a power source instead of a consumer the voltage is reversed for the same current flow direction. That also explains how the voltage on a coil can become higher than the power supply: instead of subtracting the voltage over it you add it to the power supply. That's why you need a flyback diode on for instance a relay coil: the diode will allow the back emf to flow back to the power supply without damaging the switching transistor.
Comment: i would say that's a great definition of 'inductive kick'
Comment: "the voltage is reversed for the same current flow direction"-Let's say that I connect a power source to the inductor and mark its ends with A and B and current flows from A to B.When I take the source out and connect the winding to a non-supplied circuit,current will keep flowing in the same direction,but the voltage across AB is now -Vs.Am I right?
Answer: Motors and generators are somewhat interchangeable things. If you spin a motor, it can generate voltage - even if you spin it by electrical means. Back emf is the voltage produced (generated) in a motor as it spins.
At a dead stop, a motor produces no voltage. If you apply a voltage, and the motor begins to spin, it will act as a generator that will produce a voltage that opposes the external voltage you apply to it. The 'back' part of 'back emf' reflects this opposition.
Answer: It is the reverse voltage generated when you power a motor. Motors & generators are almost the same in principle. The difference between applied voltage & back emf is what supplies power to the motor.
If you stop feeding power to a motor, it'll keep spinning and generate a reverse voltage. That is back emf, and directly proportional to motor speed.
Hence this is often used for motor speed control.
Answer: When a current flows through a conductor it generates a magnetic field around the conductor. with that being said in a solenoid the exact process take place, The magnetic fields around each turn on the coil link with the rest of the other fields on other turns to form complete loops around on the out side and the inner core of the coil. These line of flux will determine the polarity and strength of the solenoid. No matter how tight are the turns there will be flux lines that will always remain around each turn, these smaller flux lines will induce a current in the coil when there is an applied voltage(these currents that are induced are known as Eddy currents). But when these currents are induced they will be in a opposite direction with the applied current and since it is in a counter direction therefore it is known as the back EMF.
Answer: When a armature is moving in a permanent magnetic field  than induced current in the coil and this current also produced magnetic field. Permanent and newly produced magnetic field make interaction between them. Due to this coil move and torque produced in the coil and anti.torque wants to stop the motion of coil  this is the back emf in the dc generator.
Answer: A typical electromagnetic (EM) circuit, like most systems occupying our environment tend to resist change. For mechanical systems we have Newton's laws of motion describing their nature, and his First Law basically states that a system at rest or moving at constant velocity and not acted on by an outside force will remain at rest or at its constant velocity. I.e. it will resist change. Well an EM circuit is similar to this, somewhat, in that if you change the current in the EM circuit, this will cause a change in the magnetism the current generates. Back emf is the force generated that will oppose this change in current that you make, as you make it.
Answer: AC voltages change polarity every half cycle. In an inductor each half cycle generates a magnetic field According to the polarity of that cycle. At the moment that the voltage changes polarity the first half cycles magnetic field starts to collapse and the new half cycle starts to build the collapsing half cycle resists the building of the building half cycle and this is what I was taught is CEMF or some call it back emf


What is Shannon's source entropy

Question: Suppose that ${X_n; Y_n}$ is a random process with a discrete alphabet, that is, taking on values in a discrete set for $n$ data length. They correspond to the input and output of a communication process. Assuming Y to be the discretized output, what is meant by Shannon's source entropy for a given discretization bin $k$ : $H_{source} = lim_{k \rightarrow \infty} \frac{1}{k} H_k$ where
 $H_k$ stands for Shannons entropy. I found this in the paper. Now, problem_Set also mentions about source entropy but the formula is very different! Its the same as Shannon's entropy. So,what exactly is Source entropy? Is it the entropy of X or Y or is it the same as Shannon's entropy
Answer:
So,what exactly is Source entropy?

When the paper talks about "source entropy" all they mean is the entropy of the information source.  You can see that from the following passage in the paper- "Shannon showed that there must exist at least one encoding of the sequence generated by an information source which allows error-free transmission of the sequence when the channel capacity is larger than the source entropy."

Now, problem_Set also mentions about source entropy but the formula is very different!

Yes, and no.  The formulas appear different, but they are not really.  The first formula is
$H_{source} = lim_{k→∞}\frac{1}{k}H_k$
$H_{source}$ is the total entropy of the source, and $H_k$ is the entropy of each possible discrete value that the random variables in $H$ can be.  Thus, it is almost a trivial statement that the total entropy is the sum of the individual value entropies, while the number of discrete values can go to $\infty$.
The problem set equation is-
$H(s) = \sum_i p_ilog_2\frac{1}{p_i}$
This is really the same equation, it just replaces the generic "$H_k$" with the implied $log_2\frac{1}{p_i}$.  The $\frac{1}{k}$ in the first equation is equivalent to the $p_i$ in the second equation- i.e. they are assuming that all of the discrete values of H are equally likely.  This is not generally true, but is true when the entropy is maximized.
Comment: Thank you for the eye opener. I have few more queries based on ur reply.(A)So, if Y is a discretized version, discretized into n bins, of X then source entropy would mean entropy of X or Y? (B)Also, when calculating & implementing entropy, do we consider the joint probability or the probability of each occurence of variable?(C)In the formula k would imply the number of discretization levels/bins or the total number of sample(ie data length)?
Comment: If $X$ is the source signal and Y is the signal that a receiver gets after $X$ travels through a channel, then $H_k$ is the source entropy, simply because $X$ is the source.  When you ask about joint probabilities, are you talking about the joint probabilities of $X$ and $Y$.  If so, that is not correct.  When calculating entropy you just calculate it for $X$ or $Y$.  You consider the joint probabilities when calculating the mutual information.
Comment: Thank you once again. So to sum up, formulae for source entropy and shannon's entropy is the same however, osurce entropy denotes the entropy of the sender's signal which is communicating through the channel. Whereas, Shannon's entropy in particulary does not imply either source or receive, it can be the entropy of either. Am I correct?  How about part (C) in whichI ask about a confusion about the varaible k
Comment: Yes, that is correct.  K implies the number of discrete values that the random variables can take, not the sample number.

What is Shannon's source entropy


Botulisum and Food safety

Question: Should i worry? We just had a vinagret made with olive oil, crushed garlic, white wine vinager, dijon and chives. It was on the counter in air tight container for 6 hours and then stored in fridge for 3 days.
Answer: I would chunk it, better to waste it than risk illness. Fresh garlic and olive oil left at room temperature for a significant amount of time (not like the 10 minutes it might sit during prep for addition to soup, pasta, etc.) makes a prime breeding ground for botulism.
Potentially dangerous things like this shouldn't sit out longer than 2 hours at room temperature. Three days in the fridge would be fine if it were safe when it went in, but in this case it wasn't.
For further information:
Brief write up on harvesting and storing garlic from UC Davis
FDA sheet on the temperature danger zone and two hour rule
Flavored vinegars and oils, article from Colorado State Extension
Comment: TY annag. Unfortunately we ate the salad and I thought about it afterward. I guess I will have to wait for the outcome!
Comment: @Patricia - I think the risk is low. I don't know the pH of your salad dressing, but the vinegar would help diminish the risk of illness.

Botulisum and Food safety


May one memorize large swaths of Tanach?

Question: It feels like a waste to memorize Keats or Cavafy when I can memorize Torah; however, I learned in yeshiva that one may not memorize psukim. What are the sources for this?
Comment: In Iggeres haGra: ושילמדו [בניך] מקודם כל החומש, שיהיו רגילים כמעט בעל- פה. Your children should first learn all of the Chumash, and be so familiar with it that they know it almost by heart. (Please no quibbles about the almost.)
Answer: The Gemara in Gittin 60b says

דברים שבכתב אי אתה רשאי לאומרן על פה
Matters that were written you may not express them orally.

This is codified in Shulchan Aruch O.C. 49:1.
However, this rule only applies to reciting it orally (and even that is subject to much debate. See the commentators there. There's also a nice Wikipedia article as well as numerous other articles available online.) Memorizing it is not a problem and virtually all of the Gedolim throughout history had vast swaths of Tanach, if not the whole thing, committed to memory. See for example Megilla 18b:

שאני רבי מאיר דמיקיים ביה (משלי ד, כה) ועפעפיך יישירו נגדך...
ואפילו הכי מיושרין הן אצל ר' מאיר
Rabbi Meir is different, as in him is fulfilled the verse: "And let your eyelids look straight before you" (Proverbs 4:25)... they remain exact [meyusharin] in the memory of Rabbi Meir, since he knows them all by heart.


What are strategies for dealing with negative course evaluations?

Question: I recently saw my ratings on RateMyProfessor.com and it's very disheartening to see all the negative reviews from a course for which I worked so hard. Comments like "sh***y professor" are very difficult to accept. It's taking a toll on my mental health for sure. What are strategies for dealing with such comments?
Comment: Closely related: https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/101009/do-professors-care-about-their-rating-on-websites-such-as-ratemyprofessor-or-koo
Answer: I am not a professor. Perhaps it would be useful to you to understand this from a student's perspective. I am a PhD candidate and did my undergrad at the same school I'm in the PhD program for. This has given me some unique insight into the difference between what is put on a review, and the actual person (one of whom I work with closely) in reality.
RateMyProfessor encourages extremely harsh reviews. From a professor's perspective this is simply noise in the channel.
As a student RateMyProfessor became virtually worthless after I got through the middle of my undergraduate courses. Early undergraduate courses tended to be a grab-bag of instructors and professors. Some of them not even in the same field they are teaching. You will find that as course numbers increase and topic becomes specific (implying higher difficulty) the ratings skew heavily to the negative. The conclusion here, I think, is obvious. Student's want easy grades. But the explanation for that is not simply "students are lazy". As a student I didn't really get time to enjoy my classes. In order to graduate in 4 years I had to stay focused entirely on two goals: (1) minimize time spent studying (because I had several classes to worry about as well as a part time job) and (2) maximize my grade. I got out of my CS program with a 3.7 GPA which given that I took several hard classes really amounted to a mixture of actual work ethic, careful selection of professor, and time management.
You might say "well that's quite contrary to what I'd expect of a PhD-worthy undergraduate!" given that I am a PhD candidate. But truth be told, it wasn't until my last semester of undergrad when my course load was low that I really got to enjoy my classes for what they were. Until then, it was simply a game. Optimize the parameters of the equation whose solution is your graduation. The crushing weight of both expectation (get a good job) and retaking classes costing significantly more money made this equation my single greatest concern. Though you didn't say you were in the US I am speaking from a US standpoint. This is absolutely a consequence of extremely high prices for classes (where failure isn't a financial option), the unspoken requirement of a college degree for a good job, and the time crunch to get into industry to make some actual money.
Knowing this, take these things with a grain of salt. Know that especially if you are teaching undergraduate courses your students are adversarial. You could be a bad teacher, that is certainly a possibility, but more likely you have screwed up their solution to the equation required to graduate. Keep this in mind and seriously evaulate whether you are a measurably bad professor or you are teaching a hard subject and students who misinterpreted your presentation (as in you, personally) are upset you screwed up the game they are playing.
Answer: Ignore these ratings. Just like most people who go online to write reviews of restaurants and other places go to write (sometimes baseless) criticism and vent, students who go online to write review of their professor go to write (sometimes baseless) criticism and vent. This is heavily skewed against the professor. Add to that the fact that ratings can be made anonymously and that people tend to behave like complete idiots anonymously (including posting multiple bad reviews just to mess with the professor), and you've got a recipe for disaster.
If you want to know better what your students think of you, take some time to do an anonymous in-class survey with pointed questions that go beyond rants and points on arbitrary scales. There are already questions about this on this website, you can look them up.
Answer: If it's a few people and your evals are otherwise fine then just ignore it. Everyone who gets a D or an F because they showed up high all the time and never learned anything will write a bad eval. Also you can ignore all your zoom class evals from last semester cause covid.
If it's a consistent thing in all your evals it's probably you. Teaching is a skill and like any skill it can be lost. Student evals are pretty good at telling you what's wrong but usually it's bad lectures, disorganization, or unfair/unclear testing. The biggest thing I think is disorganization and fair grading - students will put up with a bad lecturer. They hate feeling like the class is being slapped together at the last minute. They really hate exams that feel capricious and grading that feels arbitrary.
Answer: I think the only way you could counter this is for you to produce a few introdutory video productions of what you are teaching and post them online or YouTube , that way students who have seen your bad reviews have an opportunity to make up their own minds