How do you actually, physically, lose weight?

Question: When you exercise and/or are on a diet, how does the weight you lose physically leave your body? Is it through defecation, or do you actually burn it somehow?
Comment: You breathe in O2 and breathe out CO2. Ever wondered where that C came from?  waste is of course also a way to lose a lot of weight, especially since most of your body weight is water. I found this on google for you if you want to learn more about breathing https://snowbrains.com/brain-post-why-do-we-breathe/ . It's quite literally burning, a fire also converts several things into CO2. Ever wondered why the ashes is lighter than the log you've just burned?
Comment: @Raditz_35 - My comment was entirely selfish - I liked your comment better than what is currently out there.
Comment: @Raditz_35 - I think you need to put that out there as an answer, since it does directly adress the question.
Comment: @PoloHoleSet That sounds like too much work. I really want to spend as little time as possible on researching what humans excrete in what quantity and through which hole. Since the fact that we breathe is what I would call common knowledge, I leave it as a comment for the Op to realize they already knew that and specify the question further
Comment: @PoleHoleSet please feel free to copy paste it as an answer if you think it is good enough for that . I don't mind
Answer: This is the end result of a fairly complex system of interactions in the body.
Your fat cell population is usually defined by adolescence/puberty, and remains relatively stable throughout your life. The size will vary.
When your body needs more energy from fat storage, it releases fat from the cells in the form of triglycerides. The body converts these (somewhat inefficiently) into usable energy forms (glucose). The end products from this conversion cycle are mostly carbon dioxide, water and the aforementioned energy.
Most of the CO2 is exhaled, and the same for the water, along with sweat, urine, saliva, etc. So essentially, you are spending some of the fat to drive the conversion process, the conversion process produces energy which is used by the body, and the majority of the rest is exhaled, which is how "fat" leaves the body. A little is excreted or used for cooling (sweat), and the rest is either reabsorbed or serves another purpose in the body.
Comment: not only fat is used to get energy, but also muscle and muscle glycogen. That is why estimation for average person, is that if you lose 1 lb of weight, you just lost 1/3lb of muscle mass
Comment: "Most of the CO2 is exhaled" - Correct! I've seen/read some scientific tests that showcased that about 84-86% of all "burned" calories are actually exhaled, leaving only around 15% of the calories to come out as sweat etc.
Answer: Energy Storage

Excess glucose is transformed into a carbohydrate, glycogen, and
  packed into temporary stores in muscle tissue and in your liver. As
  your glycogen stores get filled, your body transforms the additional
  excess glucose into triglycerides and stores it in fat cells that are
  distributed throughout your body under your skin and in a fatty sheath
  of tissue that hangs off your stomach called the omentum.

Energy Use (basically the reversed process of storing energy)

When cells need energy, they generally use glucose in your blood. As
  your glucose levels get low, your body taps your temporary glycogen
  stores and also extracts triglycerides from your fat cells.

Source: https://www.livestrong.com/article/420965-does-coconut-oil-make-you-fat-or-lose-weight/ (first thing I found on Google, next time please use Google before asking such a simple question)
Comment: This doesn't really address where the mass/weight goes or how it is "lost."
Comment: Are those cells converted from mass to energy via E=MC^2? Is energy extracted from them via a bio-chemical process and the cells are completely destroyed, and then other mass gets filtered out and excreted via the kidneys? Liver?  Through the intestines?  Sweat glands? Mixed with the exhaled air through the lungs?  Saying "fat cells are used" still does not explain, even remotely, where the actual mass that is lost comes from, nor how it is "lost" from the body.
Comment: @PoloHoleSet The fat cells are used by your body to produce energy in order to fulfill movements when e.g. running, lifting, cycling etc.
Comment: It's not my question, but that is what OP is asking. If you're not going to answer the question that is being asked, why bother?


Run command from Jenkins to Linux Server

Question: I have a HAProxy server setup in Azure Linux Machine. How can I run a HAProxy start/stop command from Jenkins to multiple Linux server?
Answer: If you have ssh access from the Jenkins machine to the HAProxy machine, you could run an Ansible task:
ansible -i ha-inventory.ini ha-servers -m service -a name=haproxy state=restarted
Of course you could also have Jenkins do a simple ssh :
for server in ${server_list} ; do ssh server 'sudo service haproxy restart' ; done
For both of these, you would need

ssh keys set up between Jenkins and the HAProxy servers
sudo rights for restarting the service (at least) for the connecting user (probably jenkins)


Photo Special Effects Software

Question: I would like to know about a software for creating special effects on photos just like on http://avatar.pho.to/ . it is not necessary that it should have all effects. you may even recommend more than one .It can be both free and non-free
Answer: You can create animated gifs using GIMP. It's not easy to replicate those effects, though. It will take lots of experience and practice.

Photo Special Effects Software


Difference between chemical potential and gibbs free energy

Question: I know that the chemical potential is the molar Gibbs free energy and that it is an intensive variable and that the gibbs free energy is extensive. However, they have identical units: $\mathrm{J~mol^{-1}}$. I don't understand why $G$ is extensive if it has $\mathrm{mol^{-1}}$ in its units.
Comment: It's a matter of notation - technically, $G$ has units of $\mathrm{J}$. But we commonly speak of $\Delta G_r$ of a chemical reaction which has units of $\mathrm{J~mol^{-1}}$. The reason is because $\Delta G_r$ is by definition a difference of molar Gibbs energies: $\Delta G_r = \sum_J \nu_J G_{m,J}$ (or chemical potentials if you prefer). The stoichiometric coefficients $\nu$ are dimensionless and $G_m$ has units $\mathrm{J~mol^{-1}}$. I find it a bit irritating that this notation (same with $\Delta S$ and $\Delta H$) is used in thermochemistry, but that's just how it is.
Answer:
I know that the chemical potential is the molar Gibbs free energy and that it is an intensive variable and that the gibbs free energy is extensive.

The chemical potential is related to the Gibbs energy in one of its definitions:
$$\mu_i = \left(\frac{dG}{dn_i}\right)_{T,P,N_{j\neq i}}$$
So it is the change in Gibbs energy when one component changes amount while the other components are of constant amount. The dimensions are energy per amount of substance (with units of e.g. J/mol).
The term "Gibbs energy" is used for a lot of things, and the dimensions could be energy, or energy per amount of substance. The Gibbs energy of reaction $\Delta_r G$, arguably the most important Gibbs energy for a chemist, is defined as:
$$\Delta_r G = \left(\frac{dG}{d\xi}\right)_{T,P}$$
where $\xi$ is the extent of reaction with dimensions amount of substance (i.e. amounts of all reactants and products change as $\xi$ changes, according to the stoichiometry specified in the reaction equation). As a consequence, the dimensions of chemical potential and Gibbs free energy of reaction are the same.
For other uses, the term "Gibbs energy" might refer to the Gibbs energy of a given system, and would have dimensions of energy. $G$, like the enthalpy $H$, does not have a defined reference point that is zero, so there is never a specific value associated with $G$. You can, however, use $\Delta G$ to describe the change in Gibbs energy from a defined state to another defined state. This $\Delta G$ would have dimensions of energy, and would be extensive (if you duplicate the system and look at the total, it would have a $\Delta G$ that is twice as large).
It would be easier if the symbols would indicate which quantities are per amount of substance (intensive) and which are not (extensive). Some textbooks use bold typeface for all molar quantities, but introductory textbooks are usually not rigid in terms of dimensions at all.

I don't understand why G is extensive if it has $\pu{mol−1}$ in its units.

The Gibbs energy of reaction is not extensive. However, if you multiply all coefficients by a constant factor, you also have to multiply the Gibbs energy of reaction by the same factor. For example,
$$\ce{H2 + 1/2 O2 -> H2O}\ \ \ \ \Delta_r G^\circ = \pu{−237.13 kJ mol−1}$$
$$\ce{2H2 + O2 -> 2H2O}\ \ \ \ \Delta_r G^\circ = \pu{−474.26 kJ mol−1}$$
The first is equal to the Gibbs energy of formation of water, and the second avoids fractional coefficients. The two are different because the extent of reaction is linked differently to changes in the amount of the reactants and products.


What is the first reference to 'video calls' in sci-fi?

Question: I was thinking earlier today about video-calls, which reminded me of the video calls in Back To The Future 2.  Then I remembered that a similar technology existed in Gerry Anderson's (RIP) Thunderbirds.  It got me wondering about what was the first reference to this idea of a 'video-call' i.e. where you can 'call' someone like a phone call, but actually see them as well as talk to them?
Comment: I seriously doubt voice calls are "on the way out".
Comment: Dick Tracy has a video call watch in the comics.
Comment: Voice-only-communications are only about as much "on the way out" as text-only communications.
Comment: I consider video calling to be very pointless and gimmicky, so I very much doubt audio-only calls are on the way out. But the 100 year old telephony system is certainly on its way out with the advent of the Internet.
Comment: Video calling has advantages. I use it to listen to kids read. They are happy to hold up the book to show me pictures or words they do not know.
Answer: The earliest literary reference I can find in an overtly science fictional context is from the 1889 story "In the year 2889" by Jules Verne where we learn that in the future, people will converse by telephote:

Would not our contemporaries prize the telephone and the telephote
  more highly if they had not forgotten the telegraph?
  ...
  The first thing that Mr. Smith does is to connect his phonotelephote,
  the wires of which communicate with his Paris mansion. The telephote!
  Here is another of the great triumphs of science in our time. The
  transmission of speech is an old story; the transmission of images by
  means of sensitive mirrors connected by wires is a thing but of
  yesterday.

There's an even earlier reference in an 1879 cartoon in Punch by George du Maurier captioned "Edison's Telephonoscope (transmits light as well as sound)"

Ironically, this may be one instance where science-fact overtook science-fiction. Edison and Bell were both working on telephones that could also transmit pictures as early as 1875 (some three years before any fictional account), albeit with only limited success.
Louis Figuier wrote a letter to the New York Sun in 1877 extolling the virtues of an Electroscopic device, a whole year before it appeared anywhere in fiction. Since he was describing something that didn't yet exist (presumably based on concept patents issues to Bell), this is arguably the earliest reference of any sort in print. Since he thought it was a real invention it's probably not fair to characterise it as fiction.

As far as films/TV are concerned, the "videophone" seen in Fritz Lang's Metropolis (1927) has to be one of the earliest seen on screen:
Comment: I would buy an iTelephonoscope if only Apple were to make such a device.
Comment: @CrowTRobot - Telephonoscope was my favourite.
Comment: "phonotelephote" That's so wonderfully ridiculous.
Answer: Hugo Gernsback predicted the "telephot" (a video telephone device) in dramatic use in his novel Ralph 124C 41+ which he ran for 12 months from April 1911 in Modern Electrics.

Stepping to the Telephot on the side of the wall he pressed a group of
  buttons and in a few minutes the faceplate of the Telephot became
  luminous, revealing the face of a clean shaven man about thirty, a
  pleasant but serious face.
As soon as he recognized the face of Ralph in his own Telephot he
  smiled and said, "Hello Ralph."

You can see an artist's impression above (from Electric Experiments Magazine) and read the full story here.


Does a bike helmet without chin straps make any sense?

Question: Wouldn't any major impact make it fly off the head and not protect you.
Comment: Are you asking whether a helmet could me made that doesn't use straps, or whether a typical helmet with straps serves any purpose if the straps are not done up? There are a few motorbike helmets that are two piece designs with a pivot instead of straps, and those seem to work quite well. Something similar might be possible with a bike helmet, but ventilation, weight and cost make it unlikely I think.
Comment: Exactly. It is similar to all safety gear that are not apply properly.
Comment: A bike (or football or hockey or polo) helmet without a chin strap or some other equivalent means to secure it to the head is worthless (except perhaps to keep the sun off you head).
Comment: There are few if any helmets that go down far enough to encase the head like a motorbike helmet.  Some downhill/full face ones might work.
Answer: Yes.  And no.  It makes some sense in that a helmet should fit snug enough to stay on on its own.  The chin strap's job it to keep the helmet on your head after the initial impact.  Were one to have some condition (a skin condition, stitches on the face or neck, etc) where the chin strap was extremely detrimental, one would be somewhat safer riding with a helmet simply missing the chin strap, than with no helmet at all.
However, barring some obvious condition, or a radical helmet design that doesn't require a strap to stay on after impact, a helmet without a chin strap makes no sense.
Comment: All of my helmets will stay on, without the chin strap, while I "bang head" like a 80's metal freak.  They should fit and stay on as well as a ball cap.  If your helmet doesn't, then it doesn't fit properly and you should get a different helmet.
Comment: It would be quite easy for an unstrapped helmet to fly off in, say, a "head over" accident due to striking something or braking too hard with the front wheel.  In such a case the helmet would be dislodged before the head struck the ground.
Comment: Well, the over the neck adjustement, at the back of the head, can get tight, and seems like it could still make the helmet effective in many scenarios.


How secure connection between modem and microchip

Question: My board has a separate Quectel MC66 modem and STM32 microchip. The communication between modem and microchip is AT Commands.
If a hacker connected a wire between modem and microchip, he could have access to transferred data between these two parts.
How can secure these AT commands between the parts, so that hackers could not have accessibility to data transferred and send them to the Server?
Comment: Well, modern software assumes that the wire is anyway accessible to hackers. Hence, there should be encryption of data that gets sent on the modem. That way, the hacker can know what number you called, but after that, the data should be encrypted. In the past, when I used dial up modems to get on the net, there was some encryption as part of the ppp. And then, if you're browsing the web, etc, the web server may use its own encryption. But I doubt you're web browsing on an STM32 !
Comment: @kalyanswaroop -- I might be wrong, but I think the OP is talking about the connection on the PCB between the STM32 and the modem IC, not the data leaving the modem IC to the remote endpoint.
Comment: @behroozbc let us know whether you found what you were looking for. Share thoughts.
Comment: @kalyanswaroop at this moment I don't found any good way but I'm not going to forget it
Answer: I will try to answer your question without going off into the weeds.
This comes down to threat modeling.  The modem IC (from what you wrote) exposes an interface that doesn't allow an encrypted & authenticated connection between it and the host (MCU).
Even if you attempt to secure the device/enclosure (anti-tamper measures with sensors, as a start)  you have to assume an attacker will be able to "sniff" and log the traffic between the ICs.  And as you indicated, at worst, the attacker can "MiTM" or worse, by cutting traces and/or injecting/intercepting traffic.
I work in embedded security but I don't know the market for embedded modem chips.  They might all be the same.  But have you looked to see if there are modem ICs that support a secure connection (encrypted & authenticated, such as TLS) between host (STM32) and the modem IC?
(Bottom line: if your threat model includes an attacker who can access the signals between the modem & STM32, and the modem IC doesn't support a secure connection, you're going to have a bad day.)
Answer: Encrypting a physical data bus between an STM and a modem is hard, like, really hard. Unless (as @Dan mentioned) you're using a modem that supports secure connection of some sort (and we're talking about the physical wired connection in the PCB board, not the wireless connection with the server) then the only choice for that is probably having your own embedded system that would contain both the modem and the microcontroller. Unless you're a big company and gonna mass product these devices for a really big scale then it's gonna be really expensive.
But you probably won't have to do that. You can leave the AT commands unencrypted but send through them the data that is already encrypted on the STM32. This way a hacker can get to know the control AT commands sent to the modem but not the data itself. Of course this way them would also know when the data is being sent and the approximate volume of the data but the data itself would be encrypted. Through the AT commands the hacker would be able to determine the route used by the modem (the AT commands contain things like the IP, port and protocol of the connection with the server). But assuming the data transfer is wireless, that would already be available from just listening (wiresharking) to the wireless data stream between the modem and the router.
The only thing I would be concerned about is to make sure the STM32 doesn't pass any vulnerable information to the modem about the access point within the router like a password to a wifi network. Here you probably have a choice between these two:

not passing anything vulnerable between the STM32 and the modem (or maybe pass it only once/few times while configuring the device in place or other moments the device is physically safe)
passing it, accept that it can be intercepted and have the security measures configured within the access point (the router) so that a hacker cannot plug into the WLAN using the data transferred to the modem.


Are single-syllable accented words like "mí" and "tú" pronounced a certain way?

Question: "Tu" and "tú" are the same spelling, except for the accent. Are words like "tú" and "mí" pronounced differently from how they would be without the accent?
Answer: Yes and no.
They are pronounced the same in isolation.  However, the words tu and mi lack prosodic stress, that is, like a very limited number of words in Spanish (prepositions, articles, object pronouns), within a sentence they will not be stressed.  When you say en mi casa, for instance, you only stress the first a of casa: /en.mi'ka.sa/.  The rule in Spanish for unstressed words is that they will be pronounced as if they are part of the next word that has prosodic stress (this is why you have to write enclitic pronouns as one word, to show they are pronounced with the previous word instead).
On the other hand, tú and mí like most Spanish words do have prosodic stress and will always receive a stress: a mí me gusta is /a'mi me'gus.ta/.
The effect goes a bit beyond just stress though, as stress influences things like vowel elision or reduction (tu amor will probably be pronounced /twa'mor/ but tú amabas will have a clear haitus /'tu a'ma.bas/).
Comment: Great answer.  Suggest you strengthen it by including example of enclitic pronoun.  Not everyone will understand the technical term.  Also you could use localized bolding to show stress as an alternative notation, maybe.
Answer: I have a simple example from an English speaker's perspective.
"Tú" with the tilde, the letter is stressed. It sounds like:

This deal sounds too good.

"Tu" without the tilde sounds like:

I want to laugh.
Comment: I get what you're trying to say, but in many English dialects unstressed "to" is pronounced `/tə/` with a schwa.
Comment: @u you're right I didn't realize that
Comment: @ukemi - I think that's exactly what jasonwubz was explaining, in his own way, without the specific jargon (schwa) you referenced.  Many native speakers of English are unaware of the term *schwa*.  If you are saying that this answer is lacking, because it didn't use the term *schwa*, I disagree.  (But maybe I misunderstood what you were getting at.)
Comment: @aparente001 - The difference in the Spanish pronunciation is one of (phrasal) stress, but the vowel articulation itself remains unchanged, they're both [u]. In English, the unstressed /u/ vowel (in British, American etc dialects) additionally changes *quality*, to a schwa. Hence the analogy may be misleading.
Comment: @ukemi - Ah, I see what you mean now.  Still, I personally do like analogies to inspire intuitive understanding.
Answer: I would say they are pronounced the same and that the difference in writing is to distinguish one word from the other. There might be a difference in stress as the person above wrote, but I can't hear it for itself. "Tú, madre,..." (You, mother,...) would sound different than "Tu madre" (your mom) to me because there is a comma there that makes you stop, implies that you are talking to someone by name and therefore has a tone like in "hey, mother" and not because there is an accent. Same goes for "No te preocupes por mí, mamá" (don't worry about me, mom) and "No the preocupes por mi mamá"  (Don't worry about my mom).
If you are a beginner in Spanish though, I wouldn't stress about it ;)
Comment: Welcome to the site, Sabrina.  Interesting point of view.  Hmm.  What do you think about @guifa's specific examples supporting a slightly different point of view?
Comment: Thank you! Well, I think he must be very knowledgeable but I also think it is a very technical and advanced answer even for a natives speaker. It could be because native speakers don't think about about stresses while speaking. I do think though, that as a learner if you worry about the stress of them, it will show and it will make you sound robotic.  I would rather focus on the meaning of the words and the commas.

Are single-syllable accented words like “mí” and “tú” pronounced a certain way?


blocking direct access to files via url input while still allowing a script on server to access files

Question: I am trying to accomplish the following and have been unsuccessful. I would appreciate any insight. Scenario: http://www.mydomain.com/filename.html  is a webpage.  On this webpage I am running a viewer script that calls up documents (.png,swf, pdf) and show these to my visitors when they visit the .html page.Right now you can still access the pdg, swf, and pdf files by going to http://www.domainname.com/viewerfiles/nameoffile.png (or swf or pdf). How can I block the direct access
(http://www.domainname.com/viewerfiles/nameoffile.png) but still allow the viewer resting on the html page to access the files located in the viewrfiles folder. I have tried .htaccess method but you can still access the files directly. My goal is to allow visitors to view and print the files from the webpage but I do not want scrappers
and bots indexing/taking the .pdf, png, swf etc and hosting them on other sites. Thanks!
Comment: Hi @Tracy, welcome to [security.se]! I suggest taking a moment to review the [FAQ], it will help you get used to the format of this site.
Comment: what web server are you using, and how exactly are you linking in the new files? .htaccess will work to deny access to all IPs to a file or directoy if the server is configured for it.
Comment: Would something like one-time identification via Captcha help prevent bots?
Comment: you might get some inspiration from this question:
http://stackoverflow.com/questions/6030750/control-access-to-files-based-on-db-values-with-php-apache
Comment: @logicalscope CAPTCHA isn't any form of identification, what do you mean by one-time identification?
Comment: @AviD: Human identification vs. bot.
Answer: It is not possible to do what you want to do, for fundamental reasons.  The user controls the client.  From the server side, the server has no way to distinguish a legitimate browser that happens to be making a request for an image on the page (a case where you want to serve the image) from a malicious user who is trying to directly access the image (a case where you don't want to serve the image).  These two situations are indistinguishable from the server's point of view, so the server has to behave the same way in both cases: either serve the image in both cases, or don't serve it.
You might want to revisit what you are actually trying to accomplish, and see if there is some other way to achieve it.  What are you trying to prevent?  What threat are you trying to protect against?
If you are trying to prevent scraping, one thing you could consider doing is making the images available only to logged-in users.  You will have to decide whether that is appropriate for your site, or if it is not a good match (maybe you want the web pages and images viewable by everyone).  Another option is to set up your robots.txt file to kindly request that bots not download the images.  You will be forced to rely upon the good will of the bots.  Well-behaved bots and scrapers will usually obey the instructions in robots.txt.  A malicious user can always ignore the robots.txt file and scrape your site anyway, but unfortunately, there is no way to prevent that: a malicious user will always be able to download any content that you've decided to make available to unauthenticated users.  So robots.txt is in some ways arguably about the best you can reasonably do, in most situations.
See also How do I prevent people from stealing photos from my website? and how can I prevent people from using my images from my website.
Comment: +1, but one other thing (not really worth an answer) that might help in *some* scenarios, again depending on what @Tracy really wants to do, is generate long random names for each file. Obviously, if these are all linked from an index page, or if the OP is trying to DRM the files, this would not help - but, it would help prevent illicit users from grabbing all the existing files.
Comment: It is possible to do what the guy is asking. Look at my solution below.
Answer: You can only decide whether a user has access to download a file from your site or not, you cannot control what a determined user does with the file. You could attempt to inspect properties of the request to recognize behavior typical of a browser embedding the file as a resource into your main page, but these properties are easily spoofable, and you are prone to breaking the normal usage of your site.
Comment: Thanksewan89, logicalscope, and JGWeissman, it sounds like this won't be possible since I have to allow my server to access the images for the viewer, hence a visitor could find the pdf, png etc files as well. I will look at hosting the files on another site and blocking all except the one domain to allow the viewer to access the files. I am not technical nor have I ever posted a question online and am TOTALLY THRILLED at the prompt and courteous responses. Thanks again
Comment: @Tracy, I'm afraid that putting it on another domain and blocking all but one domain isn't going to accomplish what you want, either.  The request comes from the user's browser, not from the site that is hosting the web page, so the server that hosts the image has no secure way to tell what triggered the request for the image.
Answer: Try Googling how to use image Hotlink protection to prevent direct access to them.
If your hosting account has cPanel, their instructions are at: http://docs.cpanel.net/twiki/bin/view/AllDocumentation/CpanelDocs/HotLinkProtection
Comment: Welcome to IT Security! We generally discourage answers that only provide a link without any real substance. Perhaps you could expand your answer with more information?
Answer: You might want to check mod_rewrite in Apache configuration:
RewriteEngine on
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http://(www\.)?localhost [NC]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http://(www\.)?localhost.*$ [NC]
RewriteRule \.(gif|jpg)$ - [F]

This would show 404 page if the file is accessed directly through browser link, but will show it if it's accessed through website code.
Comment: This can be easily circumvented by falsified Referer headers.
Answer: you told in your post that you are using .htaccess
I already answered this question few days ago on stackoverflow
In that post it was about images, but you can easily modify it for everything
Comment: Also, blocking users who don't send a `Referer` header is a bit unfriendly.  Some corporate firewalls, and many privacy tools, block the `Referer` header to protect the privacy of the user.  Blocking those users is not a very friendly thing to do if you care about privacy, and will annoy some users (admittedly not many).
Comment: Salvador Dali - @D.W. [has a more elaborate answer on REFERER blocking here](http://security.stackexchange.com/q/7944/396)
Comment: This only stops access via a browser.  It doesn't stop a user from downloading the file via `curl` (specifying extra headers on the command line if necessary).  It doesn't prevent scrapers and bots from downloading the file, so it doesn't answer this question.  The question you link to on StackOverflow is a different question: the SO question asks about using up your bandwidth, whereas this question is about preventing people to access the file.
Comment: I was giving a partial solution, which is better than no solution at all. Because as you told in your post, if the person wants to take the file, he will take it. On the Referer part I totally agree with you. I was not thinking about it when I was responding. Thanks for pointing this out


sub soil data finding

Question: I am going to search  and finding some subsoil data, (vanGenuchten Parameters, specific storage, Hydraulic conductivity, porosity, Manning coefficient and humidity of root zone) I have no idea about it and want to know if there any sites about this data that one can downloaded them? is there any other way or guide? maybe someone have same problem like me and know about tips that are helping.
Thanks a lot
Answer: The United States Geological survey might have some data on soil
As should the US Dept of Agriculture.
More to it, Universities with Agriculture departments

sub soil data finding


Cryptomatte from Blender to Fusion Studio 16

Question: I am new to Blender and I am trying to export individual multi layer exr files into Fusion Studio 16 for the purpose of utilizing cryptomatte editing. I enabled the cryptomatte in the render pass properties for object, material, and asset. I then setup up a compositor node as seen in the image attached. I am using the Reactor plugin's cryptomatte. I know others have been able to do this. I just do not know what it is that they did that I am not doing. If anyone could help me out with this I would greatly appreciate it. I also attached a screen shot of my Fusion Studio node build. It is what you would imagine. There is no cryptomatte file embedded anywhere in the openexr. On top of all of that, I cannot find anything on Cryptomatte for animation in Blender. I only see people using through the compositor which renders single images. I prefer single images, but it would be nice to be able to compile them and cryptomatte in Fusion through the compiled finish.
Comment: You should store all render passes in a multi-layer OpenEXR (possibly with Cryptomatte passes in a separate file). This is the same for still images and animations. Yes this will produce a lot of file and require quite a bit of disk space, but jpeg is not suitable for compositing.
Comment: So I think that I got it working with the file output node in the blender compositor. I am still not quite sure how to manage animation through individual files that are created by Blender and when the image file is a jpg file rather than a png file. I am sure that there is supposed to be more options that I cannot find that allow for a transparent background pass. If anyone has any tips on how to composite the animation in cryptomatte in a compiled form I would really be grateful. https://us.v-cdn.net/5021068/uploads/editor/8f/0yg9z7903ape.png
Comment: here is other image link....  https://us.v-cdn.net/5021068/uploads/editor/0w/uzv9ms81mkz1.png
Answer: Blender

enable Properties editor > Layers Properties > Passes > Cryptomatte Object
export animation as image sequence in Multilayed OpenEXR format (Float Full)

Fusion

go to File > Import > Footage and select your image sequence in your directory (so it is imported as one node)
search Cryptomatte (from screen i see you have it instaled, so i'm not going trhough installtation process)
now you have to specify what object to use as mask, for that select cryptomatte node and place source cursor on desired object in image (Torus in my case) and click Add in properties editor, or you can type name of your blender's object directly into field (see image).

I had some issue with edge, but was solved with additional node (macro/group?) here (you will have to Login first). I was also asking for the same kind of node tree fix on BA Thread, but without help for now.
Answer: I actually do not think that cryptomatte editing for animation is possible with a Blender and Fusion workflow, maybe Nuke. But, it was better designed for Maya that it was Blender where I believe that animation editing in a cryptomatte environment is possible.


Are the planets Mercury, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune losing mass?

Question: My understanding is that Venus, Earth, Mars, and Jupiter are all losing mass due to their gravity, temperature, and the solar wind.  But what about Mercury, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune?  Mercury has a magnetic field and so typically would repeal the worst of the solar wind and no atmosphere to lose, only an exosphere.  Though the Poynting-Robertson effect should be pulling in more dust to Mercury.  I do not know the calculations to determine if Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune are losing mass though.
Comment: What? That's a step hypotheses to make that anything loses mass due to its own gravity. Any proof of that?
Comment: Gravity might strength of some effects, but it never is the cause of any mass loss like you claim in your question. Of all planets listed, Mercury certainly is not an example for a particularily strong magnetic field either (though for an interesting one). I think you should elaborate your question a bit more on the base assumptions you base it on. Maybe read https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atmospheric_escape
Comment: You should say what you mean or you will never mean what you say ;) Accuracy in expression is important - especially in physics. Escape velocity does play a role when considering mass changes of planets. But it is by far not the only variable in that equation
Comment: @planetmaker My statement was that the amount of gravity is a factor that affects mass loss, the less gravity the more you lose and vice versa.
Comment: @planetmaker When I refer to gravity it is more accurate to say I am referring to escape velocity.  Which is dependent on the mass and distance from the center of the mass of the object.  Gravity is what we tend to refer to when in regards to what is force is measured at the surface and is why I used it.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Escape_velocity
Answer: I'm not sure how the balance between mass loss and gain works out...
Yes, atmospheric escape is probably happening to some extent on all the planets, with rates that depend on escape velocity, magnetic field, atmospheric/exospheric composition, temperature, and other effects we are still learning about.
But the planets are also gaining mass by capturing dust, meteorites, and the occasional larger object that can cause cratering on solid bodies, or atmospheric debris clouds in giant planets like Jupiter.
Comment: +1, maybe what's missing to this answer: Many effects in physics exist, but whether they matter significantly is another question. Numbers on escape rates for the lightest species for the lightest planets, closest to the sun (i.e. the terrestrials) from https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2018A%26A...614L...3G/abstract show that you'd loose about 10% of the Martian atmosphere in ions under current solar conditions during 1 Gyr. That's not very much, and as for the gain mechanisms, their magnitude is unknown. Loss for the (giants) will be correspondingly weaker.
Answer: Anything that's working, spending energy is losing mass,  Einstein Mass-energy equivalence of SR along with radiant energy(electromagnetic and gravitational radiation) would be effecting all the planets, but at a different rate for each one.  https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radiant_energy
  And.   https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_in_special_relativity
  These should help I think


自习 vs 自学: what's the difference?

Question: What's the difference among:

自习     (zì xí)
自学     (zì xué)

They should be something like "to study by oneself", "to study on one's own", but still, I don't get the difference.
Comment: Simply, 学 is learn, while 习 involves practice / review
Answer: 自习 is more frequently related to the "self-study sessions" of high-school and colleges.
自学 generally implies teaching oneself about sth., i.e. no connotation to schools.
Answer: 自习:study by oneself in scheduled time or free time; review one's lessons; Preview.
自学: study independently or teach himself totally. emphasis study on one's own.
Answer: 学 more represent learning something new while 习 is more like review or revise, though you might learn something during review.
Confucious said: 学而时习之(学习 而且 时常 复习 它), means you learn something new, but still need to review / revise sometimes.
The part you concentrate for 自 has no difference no matter "by oneself" or "on one's own".
Answer: 自习 emphasizes more on one's  reviewing the knowledge points he has learned.
自学 emphasizes on one's teaching himself something where no teachers are available. In general,  you don't  have to  go to school.
Also, 自习 or 自习课 could be a noun, referring to a session in school where the teacher is absent, or when present, the teacher doesn't teach any new material, and the students sit on their seat, do their homework, review the material, read words from textbooks and etc. I don't know if such a session exists in foreign countries. I remember I started taking this session from grade 6 in the primary school, and there are two sessions, in the morning and in the evening.
Answer: 自习:practice by yourself.
When you said 自习, you more like describing the action, rather than the content. Also you still have teacher to teach you, but you just practice by yourself when no teacher around.(but you still have a teacher)
Or you can think in this way: When you study in school, there are several study section. teacher teach you, practice when teacher around, practice when teacher not around. 自习 is the section to practice by yourself alone when teacher not around.
自习 describe an action.
自学:teach yourself without teacher.
if you watch online video course or tutorial, it still count 自学. kind of that you should manage your study progress by yourself, and there is no teacher who can give you any feedback. When you 自学 something, there is no 自习 section because you study by yourself all the time and no need to divide into "practice by yourself" section.
自学 describe a progress and an ability.
Answer:
自习 is more like self review, self study.  It is more likely that you learn it from a teacher, and reviewing it by yourself.
自学 is self learn. It implies you probably don't have a teacher, but learn it from books, online materials, or by DVD or online videos.
Answer: 自学 means to learn something from zero by oneself.
自习 means to review or study for a course by oneself. We have 自习时间 in high school and colleges.
Answer: 自习: Study on your own
自学: Learn something by yourself
Answer: 自 means by oneself.
学 usually means to learn something new.
习 usually means to review something which has been learned.

自习 vs 自学: what's the difference?


Rotate a cube around Y axis m*360 degrees in 200 frames?

Question: I have a cube that I would like to rotate m*360 degrees around the Y axis in 200 frames where m is an integer. So I go to frame 1 with the default cube, press I for insert keyframe and press rotation. Then I go to frame 200 and rotate the cube around the Y axis m*360 degrees. I know two ways to do this:

press R, Y and manually rotate it m*360 times with the mouse, click leftbutton and press I for insert keyframe and press rotation
press R, Y and type 'm*360', enter, press I for insert keyframe and press rotation.

However, only the former option works; the latter option will result in a rotation of 0 and result in no rotation. For small m the former manual option is okay, but for larg m the latter option would be more handy.
Answer: You can type m*360 directly in Transform>Rotation window. This would be the easiest and most transparent way to do that.


Send Transaction XDR To Other Account Using Stellar

Question: Situation: I am trying to implement the Stellar 2-party multisignature escrow account with time lock & recovery Smart Contract example using the Java SDK. In transaction 3 (unlock transaction), the source needs to create and sign the transaction and then pass the signed transaction to the destination, so they can sign it.
Question: Is there a way I can pass the transaction XDR from the source to the destination account, so they can sign and return the transaction to the source using Stellar's Java SDK?
What I Have Tried:

I experimented with the Transaction Memo, but that limits the number of bytes to 28, so I am unable to send the hash or XDR using this format
I have tried to use the transaction hash, but it looks like you cannot use the Stellar transactions endpoint until that transaction has been submitted.

I have researched this issue, but I was unable to find an example containing how to send just the transaction XDR between accounts.
I appreciate any help that you can provide. Thank you!
Answer: I'm not sure if SEP-0007 is what you want, but you can check the Multisig section.


Scratch on MacBook Pro LCD screen (not the glass)

Question: I was replacing a rather broken piece of glass on my macbook pro 13" and got impatient toward the end, managing to slip and scratch the LCD screen itself.  Before I cover it up with the new piece of glass, I'd like to try to at least reduce the visibility of that scratch, if not repair it.  Is there anything that will work on the LCD screen itself (all the tips I've come across are for the glass)?
Answer: You have no good options for repair.
Any mechanical stress you add could sabotage the panel later making it more likely to crack. Any coating you try has worse side effects as it ages.
I would make a judgement call based on the location of the scratch, the depth of the scratch and your temperament. If you can live with it, just continue with the repair.
If you know it will drive you nuts or is on a part of the screen you look at often, bite the bullet and buy a new LCD panel. Sell the scratched one to someone that isn't as picky (you probably know several people that use a phone with broken glass for months and maybe someone that even uses one with chunks of the digitizer missing). You could probably charge someone your costs for the panel to repair their Mac and come out of it even.
Comment: Interesting.  Well, that's less than encouraging.  :/  I was actually doing the replacement on the glass so I could sell it... the scratch is definitely going to cost some resale value unfortunately... but I doubt it's worth replacing the LCD.  Wish I had just slowed down and not been so impatient.
Comment: Sorry to give you tough news, but do consider that when the panel is lit, the light coming out will mask most light scratches. When the panel is dark, you really have to have an eagle eye to spot a scratch on an LCD panel that lies behind Apple's glossy front glass.
Answer: Now i don't think you can fix that, but here's what you can do : Go to a computer repair shop and tell them what happened. They will maybe order you a LCD Screen or there's one option. Buy a new LCD Screen at BestBuy, they will give you a new one to you around $110.99


Far side of the moon question

Question: Do all / most / any other moons orbiting a planet synchronize their rotation so as to become tidally locked with it, or is the earth a special case?
Comment: @SarahBourt Some examples of exceptions from Wikipedia which actually strengthen your argument: "Notable exceptions are the irregular outer satellites of the gas giants, which orbit much farther away than the large well-known moons." "Pluto's other moons are not tidally locked; Styx, Nix, Kerberos, and Hydra all rotate chaotically due to the influence of Charon."
Comment: @called2voyage  Having researched it a bit more now, there's a lot to tidal locking and how it affects satellites!  Objects want to face each other, but if the planet is faster than the satellite, the satellite will increase orbit height until they either it's orbit is outside the planet SOI, or the planet is tidally locked with it.  On the other side, if a planet rotates slower than the orbit, tidal deceleration will make its orbit smaller until it eventually falls into the planet!  Neat!
Comment: I believe tidal locking between moons / planets is an eventuality in almost every case.  Many of the Jovian moons are tidally locked.  Charon and Pluto are tidally locked.  The Moon / Earth system is not special.
Answer: Moons are not always tidally locked.
They are formed with a certain spin angular momentum that will be dragged by asymmetries on the hosting planetary body. Those asymmetries then backreact onto the moon and drag it's spin to become synchronized with the orbit angular momentum.
How rapidly this process happens is roughly a function of the tidal forces
$$F_{Tid} = G \frac{m_{Moon} \cdot m_{Planet}}{r^3} d$$
exerted by those asymmetries. Here $d$ is the moon size, $r$ the distance between planet and moon and the other quantities are masses and the gravitational constant.
The time $t_{lock}$ this locking takes can be estimated by comparing the excess angular momentum $L_{ex} = r^2m_{Moon}(\omega_{actual} - \omega_{orbit})$ with those acting forces:
$$t_{lock} \approx L_{ex} / \left(r F_{Tid} \right) \approx \frac{r^5}{ d \cdot m_{Planet}}$$
The latter equation makes it fairly obvious that this is not a process that happens at a certain magical orbit or at a certain time. It is an asymptotic process, and the only coincidal thing is that we observe any given moon at a time where it may not have lost enough spin angular momentum yet.
This should hopefully also clarify some confusion from the comments:

Yes, the tidal locking time is also dependent on the mass of the host-planet, but much more sensitive to the planet-moon-distance. Note that this derivation is independent of the moon's mass, and only dependent on it's size. The literature knows much more sophisticated variants of this, that also incorporate a (realistic) weak dependency on the moon's mass.
For Hot Jupiter exoplanets it is thought they'd be in tidal lock when the asteroseismologic age of the system is bigger than the derived tidal lock time.

Concluding
1.) Any moon would be tidally locked if we could wait long enough.
2.) There are much more effects / torques to consider for a detailed understanding than I did here.
Answer: Many, many moons throughout our solar system are tidally locked. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tidal_locking This wikipedia page lists 34 moons throughout our solar system that are known to be tidally locked, and another 26 that are suspected.
It is very common for moons within a certain distance of their planets to be tidally locked. If they are too far away, they won't be tidally locked. Astronomers have even deduced that some exoplanets are tidally locked, but I have no idea how they know that. This leads to some interesting questions:

What is the distance at which moons are likely to be tidally locked?
At what distance are moons less likely to be tidally locked?
How can we know an exoplanet is tidally locked to its star?
Comment: I think it's more about the mass of the two orbiting objects than distance, and also the time elapsed since the capture or the formation of the moon. At every distance, the oldest a moon is, the highest the probabilty of it being tidally locked. Also, the bigger the difference in mass is, the higher the probability. Distance matters at some point but I don't think it is the most important criteria.

Far side of the moon question


During acid reflux and vomiting, is the burning sensation from pepsin or acid?

Question: When one's stomach contents enter one's esophagus, a burning sensation usually ensues. Is this from the enzyme pepsin breaking apart your cells or just from the acid?
Answer: It is the acid that causes the burn
Medicines like proton pump inhibitors (e.g. Prilosec), or H2 receptor antagonists (like Zantac) that reduce acid secretion reduce the burning sensation.  Medicines that neutralize the acid like calcium carbonate (e.g. Tums) also reduce the burn.  These medicines do nothing to the secretion of enzymes.
ADDENDUM. @anongoodnurse wants references.  Maybe in exchange she will remove that pesky down vote.
Cimetidine won the team that developed it the Nobel prize - the first rationally (as opposed to empirically) designed drug.  It was designed to very specifically reduce stomach acid.
https://www.acs.org/content/acs/en/education/whatischemistry/landmarks/cimetidinetagamet.html

Smith Kline & French's multidisciplinary research team first looked at
  the physiological cause of acid secretion. They confirmed that a
  molecule found in the body called histamine triggers the release of
  acid when it binds to a specific receptor (now called the H2-receptor)
  in the stomach lining. Their aim was to find a molecule that
  successfully competed with histamine in combining with the receptor,
  but then blocked, rather than stimulated, acid release. Such a
  molecule was called a histamine H2-receptor antagonist and represented
  a new class of drugs.

This and the successor class of drugs (proton pump inhibitors) are very specifically designed to decrease acid secretion and do little else.
The fact that billions of dollars worth of these drugs are sold means that persons suffering from reflux pain / stomach ulcer perceive that their pain is reduced by a decrease in acid secretion, and so are willing to pay.

Tagamet® was greeted with great enthusiasm by doctors and patients
  alike. Ten years after its introduction, it had achieved sales of one
  billion dollars and had become the world's number one prescription
  drug.
Comment: You need a source for this answer, and truthfully, the pathophysiology of reflux pain is incompletely understood.
Comment: I didn't DV! Thought about it but didn't; commented instead. That's the problem with commenting when there's a down vote. :( People make assumptions. (I did DV the other posted answer, however.) But good job adding sources!
Comment: @sorry anongoodnurse.  Actions of any kind are sparse on these bio stack questions and I jumped to conclusion.  BTW: I appreciate the double entendre in your moniker.
Comment: @anongoodnurse - adequate references?
Comment: Actually, I also just decided to upvote because of the improvement of the answer. (I still maintain that the pathophysiology of reflux pain is incompletely understood.) But still, did not DV. Therefore my UV only counters one DV.
Answer: Pepsin is a protein breaking enzyme which is most active in acidic pH. Stomach is protected from its effect by mucus, but oesophagus and larynx don't have much mucus so pepsin reflux will cause injury. So burning sensation is from both acid and pepsin.
{In contrast, if pepsin refluxes into the oesophagus and above it is damaging as there is no protective mucus layer and also the squamous tissue (the cells that line the oesophagus) is more sensitive. Research has shown that the surface cells of the larynx and airways are even more sensitive than the oesophagus to injury by reflux and pepsin specifically.} ( an excerpt from  https://www.peptest.co.uk/reflux-the-role-of-pepsin-explained/ )
Comment: Yes, I do, but commenters don't need to prove they are correct. I actually read that paper you linked to in the comment before you commented; did you? It discusses the role of pepsin in **damage** of various kinds but not in symptomatology.
Comment: Again, yes, I do. Your comment is only your opinion; your link doesn't support it. Did you know that a lot of GERD is painless? Sometimes the only symptom is a cough. I suspect pepsin *may* have something to do with that. Other non-pain symptoms also occur. Yet the acid (and pepsin) is there. Hmm.
Comment: Your source is a for-profit advert for a diagnostic test that measures pepsin. For profit sites are not a reliable source of information. It's true that pepsin most likely damages the larynx, but it's role in the pathophysiology of "heartburn" (typical reflux pain) has not been proven.
Comment: Read this https://www.hindawi.com/journals/ijoto/2012/646901/ Don't say that this is also for profit. Do you have any proof for your claim?
Comment: Its damaging along with acid so the burning sensation is cumulative. DO you have any proof for your claim?


Tightening a loose bottom bracket

Question: I bought a new bike a couple of months ago. Recently I noticed that the bottom bracket is getting loose. It is regularly unscrewing itself, and while I can screw it back in partially manually, I cannot generate enough torque to get in back in there all the way in. What tool should I use to do this? I have found some 8-notch bottom bracket tools, but they would require removing the cranks, and I'm not sure that they're the correct thing anyway.
Comment: Is this part made out of plastic? You could try a tool like eg. https://www.merlincycles.com/pedros-bottom-bracket-wrench-shimano-114205.html.
Answer: It looks like what you have is a cartridge bottom bracket with a left hand cup with both Octalink style 8 notches (even though the axle is clearly square taper) and the more common 20 splines
Park tool BBT-18 (Octalink), BBT-22/32 (splines) with work, as will the dual purpose Lezyne tool you linked to.
Yes, you will have to remove the crank to properly tighten the cup. You probably want to do the drive side as well. To get the cranks off you need a crank puller (such as Park CWP-7). To tighten the bottom bracket and re-install the cranks you need a fairly hefty torque wrench as it's critical the cups and crank bolts are tightened to the correct torque.
For infrequent jobs where special tools are needed it's often easier to have a good local bike repair shop do the work.
Comment: Since the bike is only a couple of months old I'd take it back to the shop. But then this picture also shows poor assembly IMHO, the left cup should have a lock-nut.
Answer: If the cup is metal (or even plastic, though greater care must be used to prevent damage), you could try using a pair of plumber's pliers --aka Channel locks--which are tongue and groove, slip joint pliers.  You can move the jaws apart to accommodate a wide range of diameters and apply a great deal of torque as well as grip on what you're attempting to turn.  These types of pliers are a fairly common household tool. Care must be used to prevent marring the cup with tool marks from the pliers' jaws.  An old leather belt or piece of rubber from an old tire or tube, even layers of cloth rag between the jaws and BB will prevent most marks.  Selecting the appropriate jaw width that allows the handles to be close together so your hand grip is nearly closed and near max gripping power is key.  You don't want the pliers to slip on the BB which will increase the chances of marring the BB's surface.  This may seem overly complex or tricky, but it's not.  If the channel locks' handle is 10-12 inches long (as even a small pliers of this type can open their jaws wide enough to accommodate the 1 1/4" (32 mm)  or so outside diameter of a BB cup), more than enough torque can be applied. The main, cartridge bearing right side takes around 50 N-m of torque, the left cup is to be "snugged" tight after the right is torqued.  The torque required at the left is much less.  The system will be bound--the cranks won't move--if the left cup is tightened too much.  This is my reasoning for using this unconventional technique with a commonly found household tool.

Tightening a loose bottom bracket


Position of door stop vs lock striker plate

Question: When positioning the door stop after installing a lock set striker plate on an interior door (e.g. bathroom, bedroom etc) should I give the door more wiggle room (the striker plate allows the latch to go back and forth about 1/4") or make it more snug? I like the snug idea but would also like to provide some room for possible warping in the future.
Answer: If you have a little wiggle room this is good. You can take out wiggle by bending out (into the hole) the tab that goes into the hole. Most that I have seen have a little slot for inserting a flat blade screwdriver to bend the tab out to take up wiggle.
But be careful not to bend it into the hole too far. If you overshoot, the bolt will hang up, and bending it back away from the bolt may require some ingenuity and trial and error.


Troops not attacking Clan Castle troops

Question: Why are my troops not attacking Clan Castle troops? I got zero stars with both attacks in our last clan war  because my wizards attacked the closest building instead of their dragon, making my hogs and barb king sitting ducks. I dropped them right under the drags, a good distance away from anything else, but they still went after buildings instead. Glitch?? Or bad luck? Anyone else see this before?
Answer: If you place wizards while a nearby troop is being attacked by CC troops, they will engage the CC troops present. Otherwise, they attack the nearest building like any other troop.
Comment: There is exception to this, of course, that is if your troops do not have the range of the attacking troops. Wizards, for example, have a shorter range than archers, so **theoretically** archers separated with sufficient walls could hit wizards but not be hit themselves.  Another obvious example is if your troops can only attack ground targets and the attackers are from the air. Finally, troops like the giant will completely ignore clan troops unless all the defenses have been destroyed.
Comment: Well, not really. The troops will come towards the attacking CC troops to engage them, regardless of range. Ever notice why barbs can attack Archer Queens?
Answer: Troops that targets "anything" can target CC troops. All the you have to do is when you place your troops, make them see the CC troops before the buildings, if the buildings are the nearest target, they focus on the building.
That's why so common to get the troops out of the castle, and aggro them away from towers, so that troops are killed easily.

Troops not attacking Clan Castle troops


At what age should a child be able to count to 10?

Question: My daughter currently can. She is 21 months old. What is a typical age for this milestone?
Comment: It would be interesting to know if most people consider just counting to 10 as satisfactory or if they should understand the sequence fully. Like asking what comes after 7, for example.
Comment: I think the title is pretty sufficient and clear, and the details in the body not really necessary to answer the title question. (I think it may be improved with less personal details). As the babycenter article linked in swiehoff's answer shows, parents want to know the answer to question like this.
Comment: My 21 month old son counts to 14 he started counting steps as we walked down together and as you can tell wet have 1steps haha now he just randomly stops talking to me and his mum and counts from 1 all way up to 12 he currently is getting up to 20 but after 12 his numbers are getting a little mixed 188.8.131.52.17 ect it's amazing to see how much he picks up and takes in :D
Comment: My 6 month old can count to 2 on his fingers. Were working on 3!
Answer: There are different ideas of "counting"

Memorizing 10 words in a row. If they started to speak early and practice a lot, they can manage it when they are about two years old.
Being able to count the number of items/fingers etc. My daughter and her friends started doing this correctly when they were four years old.
Answer: 21 months is pretty spot on, or even a bit earlier than a lot of the kids I've seen.  You don't mention how consistent she is about it (gets them in the correct order every time, doesn't skip numbers), but if she is not only able to count to 10 but not mix them up or skip some, then I think that is great!
Here is a nice article detailing how a child moves from no clue, to memorizing the number sequence, to actually internalizing the concept of numbers.
http://www.babycenter.com/404_how-and-when-should-i-teach-my-child-her-numbers_6899.bc
Comment: It's funny you say 21 months - at that age my son (whom we are raising bilingual) couldn't do it except by switching between English and Mandarin.
Answer: There can't be such thing as a "typical age" for this milestone (I mean, more precise than "about 2 years old").  Keep in mind that toddler's vocabulary is quite limited :

mean [Language Development Survey] vocabulary scores at 24 months have been between 175 and 195 words, with standard deviations in the range of 70 to 80 (Klee et al., 1998; Rescorla & Alley, 2001). [source]

This means (roughly) that about 70 % of children know "between 100 and 280 words" at 24 months — and 15 % more than 280, 15 % less than 100.  See the large dispersion ?
Of course you can translate this dispersion into a time dispersion.  As a rough guess, most children should be able to speak 100 words somewhen between 20 months and 26 months.  But being able to count to 10 would mean that 10 % of the words he knows are numbers !
Given that, and the fact that some parents will put some effort on numbers while others won't mind at all, not to mention the interest of the child himself, there is no way some "typical age" can emerge.
Furthermore, as reminded by arved there is a strong difference between counting as a nursery rhyme and understanding the meaning of numbers.
Comment: FWIW, our first daughter was somehow able to number things at 24 months, but didn't master numbers (to 10) before 30 months, although I often numbered stairs with her.
Answer: My little guy started counting to six at 12 months and now at 16 months counts to 10 . He can recognize the numbers in any order and say it from memory on his own and start at any number. I guess it all depends on the child, every child is amazing and unique.


Who created the first Transformer?

Question:
Son: Dad, where do Transformers come from?
  Me: The planet of Cybertron.
  Son: Who made the Transformers?
  Me: Transformers make each other. Remember how Wheeljack and Ratchet made the Dinobots?
  Son: But who made the first Transformer?
  Me: ...
Comment: I like the way your son thinks. Encourage him to keep asking these sorts of questions.
Comment: The great god of children's dreams, "Hasbro"?
Comment: See also http://scifi.stackexchange.com/q/26478/4918 "Where do new Pokemon come from?"
Comment: Point him to LEGO...
Answer: According to Transformer's Wiki - Transformer Origin there are quite a few different origin theories that derive from different continuities, and not all continuities give a specific race species origin.
Some of these are:

Atechnogenesis - Spontaneous evolution from simpler machines on Cybertron. Origin, 1st comic, but appears to have been largely abandoned.
Quintesson made - Created by an alien race (Quintesson) as goods and weapons on Cybertron while used as a factory for a larger empire. Origin, 1st gen cartoon series, but appears to be reconciled and retconned with Primus theory.
Primus created - The Lord of Light (Primus) created them to battle the forces of the dark god Unicron. Origin, UK series but carried back to most future continuities 2007-2010. Apparently a retcon for earlier works was also devised to use this origin.
Cube Creationism - The AllSpark mystically created the transformers race. Origin, live action movies and Transformers Animated circa 2007
Hybrid of Cube Creationism with Primus as creator - Unifying theory whereby Primus remains the creator and the AllSpark is the tool he used to create them.

*Note: these points are taken from the above cited source, but paraphrased for brevity. Additional details available at said source.
Comment: "The Lord of Light"? Does the weird lady in Game of Thrones worship Optimus Prime!? (I hope so.)
Comment: Károly Zipernowsky, Ottó Bláthy and Miksa Déri, in 1884:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transformer#Discovery_of_induction
Comment: The answer number 4 seems to be retconned by the 4th movie as there are creators mentioned (which are very probably 2 or something similar according to the small infos the film offers about them)
Comment: @Josh - as far as Atechnogenesis from the comics, I specifically remember the text "....by a naturally occurring system of gears and pulleys"
Answer: In the G1 cartoon and movie, the Transformers are created by the Quintessons, another robot-like species. They created the Autobots as laborers and the Decepticons as their military.
The origin in the comics and subsequent series differs, but here is one of the more accepted/referenced ones: Primus is brother to Unicron. Both Primus and Unicron were originally more traditionally formed beings (arms, legs, head, etc), but after a battle on the astral plane, they were both left in the forms of planetoids. Over time, they were both able to alter their forms into large metal planets. As more time passed, Unicron was able to transform himself between his planet form and his giant robot form. To battle him, Primus created beings with Unicron's ability to transform themselves. These new beings would live on him. Primus would come to be known as Cybertron and the beings as the Transformers.
Comment: "In the G1 cartoon and movie, the Transformers are created by the Quintessons, another robot-like species." But daaaad, *who made the Quintessons?????*
Answer: From the Transformers wikia, the Marvel Comics timeline:

Either way, Primus could only win by tricking Unicron into trapping
  his spirit in a barren asteroid — Primus was trapped in a second.
  Unicron turned his into a new body, Primus turned his into the planet
  Cybertron and birthed the Transformers to battle Unicron in his place.
  The Transformers were led by Prima, the first bearer of the
  Primus-born Matrix of Leadership.

In the Generation One continuity, it was an ancient scientist named Primacron
Beast Wars appears to be a continuation of the G1 television series.
The Dreamwave timeline references the fight between Primus and Unicron from the Marvel Comics timeline, as does the Unicron Trilogy timeline.
In the movie timeline, it was the Allspark cube.
Answer: In the TV universe, the Transformers were created by the Quintessons.  They showed up in the TV episodes that came out after Transformers: The Movie.
Answer: The All-Spark created Primus and Unicron, the first transformers, since it was the source of all life. Primus, at the beginning of time, battled Unicron and won. All good forces come from Primus to this day, such as the Autobots. The bad forces come from Unicron, the Decepticons being an example. In my opinion, the creator Primus should not be overlooked. He is goodness personified. That is all!
Comment: Primus as the creator was already mentioned in the accepted answer by Josh.

Who created the first Transformer?


Are Nishkama karma and Purusharthas opposed to each other?

Question: Nishkama karma means desireless action, whereas, purushartha is all about desires and goals.
Aren't these two opposed to each other? Which one should we follow?
Comment: All Purushartas are not about desires and goals. Purushartas are Dharma, Artha, Kama and Moksha. One has to give up worldly desires and goals if one wants to attain moksha. Nishkama karma is for attaining moksha.
Comment: Nishkama Karma is included in Purushartha
Answer: It depends on what you want to attain.
There are 3 types of action - karma, vikarma, akarma
karma - doing an action ordained by shastras (dharma) with desire to attain its fruits - this is what you and I do 99% of time
vikarma - doing an action NOT ordained by shastras (adharma) with desire to attain its fruits - what 'bad' people do.. and they won't even get its results, or the results won't last long.
akarma (it means non-action, but real meaning is different) - doing an action ordained by shastras (dharma) WITHOUT desire to attain its fruits
Akarma and Nishkama karma are synonyms.
e.g. going to work and earning money, but only for the sake of taking care of parents, wife & children, poor & disabled charity etc.. and not having any personal interest in using the money to buy cars, houses, computers etc. even though they are used in part of daily duties.
how does akarma/nishkama karma help you ?

when you do anything with desire to attain fruits, you have to wait until the result bears fruit. so that waiting period is spent in worry.
if you do not obtain the desired result (it's because you didn't do the work properly, or it was done against shastras), then you get angry. again, this causes pain.
if you obtain the desired result, you enjoy it.. great. but it creates 'vasana' or impressions in mind, that drive you to work and obtain the result again and enjoy it again (like a fire that does not subside when you feed it ghee, but only increases in strength). Now, you are back to square 1, because when you try to do that work again, same 3 options above can happen.

Whereas when you do nishkama karma, your only goal is to do the job, not wait for its results, so there is no waiting period, no worry about not getting the result, and no vasanas to further force you into more work.
so why would anybody do nishkama karma at all ?
Think of your life on earth as a debt to be repaid. Once you repay it (by nishkama karma), you're free (moksha). But during the process of repaying, if you take more loans or credit (by creating more desires and vasanas), you have to be born again to repay the debt. And it's a never ending cycle.
Purusharthas - dharma, artha, kama - if they are done as karma, it can bind you to samsara. The same purusharthas, if they are done as akarma/nishkama karma, as a duty to parents, rishis, devas, gurus, family - it frees you from samsara.


What is the difference between "Class of 2004" and "Batch of 2004"?

Question: What is the difference between "Class of 2004" and "Batch of 2004"? I have a feeling that one means the students who joined the university in 2004 and the other means those who graduated in 2004. Is that correct? And if so — then which is which?
Comment: `Batch` makes you sound like an item of bakery! Do avoid.
Comment: I work in an education-related field (granted, a pretty esoteric branch of it, but still) and I've never heard of "batch of 2004".
Comment: @TimLymington Don't think so, since I've never heard in an American context, either.  If I really had to using something other than ***class***, I'd be a lot more apt to use ***crop* of 2004** than  ***batch***, which sounds  too much like you're making jam, instead of talking about something that's living and growing. I guess you could sneak in ***vintage*** if you were creative.
Comment: I've never heard either used in a British context -should this be tagged *american-english*?
Answer: My source in the Registrar's office - and the documentation for our registration system - refers to a groups of students registering at the same time as "cohorts" -  In fact, the term is used a lot in the Faculty of Nursing where they group the students for not only classes but training sessions and in-hospital experience.
Comment: This is also the language I'm familiar with as in the "2004 Honors cohort" or the "Spring 2004 cohort" who would be expected, but not guaranteed, to graduate in the Class of 2007.
Answer: In the Philippines, where my wife went to school, batch is synonymous with graduating class, and is used in preference to class. They say "Batch of 2004" the way Americans say "Class of 2004."
Answer: I've never actually heard of "batch of" — the "year of" is aways a reference to the year the group graduates.
I work at the U of Manitoba, and I know there are times when the administration wants to deal with groups in other contexts.  Especially when dealing with class loads in early years the counts are on the number of students who entered, and may graduate in three, four or more years depending on their programs.  A three year major, a four year hons or various other students may all need to take the same first year courses, so considering the 'batch' count aot the numbers at graduation gives you a better handle on the number of seats you'll need in some course like first year English which is a lead in for multiple course paths — all with different lengths.
I shall have to talk to my pals in the registrar's office and see if there is any use of the phrase in this university.
Comment: Did you talk? what they said?
Answer: "Class of 2xxx" is associated with the graduation year:

a body of students or alumni whose year of graduation is the same

But "batch of 2xxx" is not so clear, and can be associated with pretty much anything.
A batch refers to a quantity (as of persons or things) considered as a group.
This page, for instance, mentions a "Batch 2010/2011 Admission List".
Actually, you can also find the entry and graduation years associated with "batch of". See this page: "batch of 2008 - 10".
Comment: Not sure it's noteworthy, but the first example is from Nigeria (land of the scammers... j/k, no offense intended to actual Nigerians present ;-)) while the second is from India.  Not trying to slight either country, but I'd usually not take English-language advice from them (as long as it's not about regional variants)
Comment: Thanks. Is there any unambiguous word that can be used for "students who *joined* the university in a particular year"?
Comment: @JP19: Aren't they always called "class of `year_expected_to_graduate`"?  I know that we were called "class of `X + 4`" when we were welcomed into our university on the first day (which was in year `X`).
Comment: @JP19: maybe "promotion"?
Comment: At Oxford they number people according to the year of matriculation. It might be due to some courses being 3 years, whereas others are 4 (or even 6 for medicine).
Comment: @Kosmonaut: Same here.  And the convention at TAMU is that your "class year" never changes even if you reschedule your graduation.  So I have a "class of 2002" co-worker who actually graduated in 2008.
Answer: batch (OALD):  a number of people or things that are dealt with as a group.
A quick search on google and bing shows that "batch" (to refer to a group of students) is most commonly used on the Indian subcontinent, and in parts of Africa. I speak from the way I have used and understood these words:

"Batch" refers to students graduating (or enrolled) in a particular year across all classes (faculties / fields / branches). The university may have a unique set of rules and policies for the 2004 batch, for example.
"Class" refers to the group of students who attend classes at a particular department, and may happen to be classmates in one or more courses.
Answer: Batch means the students joined the university in 2004 and class means the students graduated in 2004.
So you can use "welcome, batch 2004!" or "congratulations, class of 2004!"


google contacts not shown

Question: When I log onto GMail on my HTC Desire, I can't find a way to access my GMail contacts. I read that there was some link on the left of the screen. I see none. I am now at a loss
Comment: Make sure your GMail contacts are syncing to the phone. Menu -> Settings -> Accounts & sync -> [your account name] and see if a box next to "Sync Contacts" is checked.
Answer: The Gmail app does not have a contacts section -- you only see you contacts when typing in the To field or whatever.  You should have a Contacts app with your Gmail contacts, if you are syncing them.  To change your sync settings, look in Settings -> Accounts and sync.
If you're referring to the website, that's not an Android question.  But the mobile website doesn't have Contacts on the left, you have to view the Full site (there's a link at the bottom of the mobile view).

google contacts not shown


A word for somebody who supports things fleetingly and whilst they are popular

Question: I'm looking for a word for somebody who supports things fleetingly and whilst they are popular, for example a sports team on a winning streak, or something which is currently in fashion.
Comment: [Related](http://meta.english.stackexchange.com/questions/4732/word-for-disrespecting-eldest-half-sister-by-referring-to-her-husband-as-girly-g#comment16076_4732).
Answer: For a sports team, bandwagon fan is probably the most common term in the US. Bandwagoner would be the more general, non-sports case, and most everyone would know what you mean although it's not very a common term.
If we're focused on sports, fair-weather fan also works well. It does have a slightly different connotation than bandwagon fan, in my opinion. A bandwagon fan is more likely to follow any team that is currently popular. A fair-weather fan is more likely to follow only one team (in a particular sport), but is likely to only act like a fan when that team is doing well.
e.g.:
"Dan is a bandwagon fan. He used to be a Yankees fan, but now he says he's a Red Sox fan."
"I never saw Dan wear a Red Sox jersey even when he lived in Boston, but now that they've won a World Series he wears them all the time. He's such a fair-weather fan."
Comment: I do not want to seem like a spoilsport and this a great answer but your suggestions are all or mostly related to sports only. And bandwagoner is a less common term than faddist and mostly used regarding to sports. The question was asking for a general term though. Just writing a comment for future reference.
Answer: It would be called a faddist.

A fad is any form of behavior that develops among a large population and is collectively followed enthusiastically for a period of time, generally as a result of the behavior being perceived as popular by one's peers or being deemed "cool" by social media.
Though the term trend may be used interchangeably with fad, a fad is generally considered a quick and short behavior whereas a trend is considered to be a behavior that evolves into a relatively permanent change
Comment: Fad is a great word.
Answer: Times change, and old words go out of fashion, forgotten or replaced by new metaphors.  For example, in the eighties, we'd call someone a trendie if they were a fickle follower of fashion.  But forty years earlier, an airman might call someone a windsock; whilst his farmer grandfather would call the same person a weathercock.  In both cases, they meant that the subject of their scorn would change as often as the wind, and might even end up facing in the exact opposite direction to that of an hour earlier!
Akin to the fair-weather friends mentioned earlier, our swimming coach used to deride what he called warm-water warriors.  He suspected our dedication if we weren't prepared to break the ice - literally!
But what's the currently fashionable term for a fickle faddist?  I have no idea, and besides, I'm not even sure I'd understand whatever new metaphor it uses.  So even if I wanted to be fashionable, I probably couldn't hack it ... :-(
Which all leaves me with a few rather pedestrian options.  (In case you missed the metaphor, I'm driving my car, of course.  While texting?  No, I don't have a death wish!)  They include nouns:

faddist
fashion-follower
swing-voter (for a special situation)

and adjectives:

fickle
wishy-washy (very slangy, but often on our lips)
inconstant (as the poet had it)
changeable
uncommitted (a mild reproach)
disloyal (a far stronger reproach)

among others.  So far I've avoided mentioning some harsher terms, such as sycophant, and another vulgar word (sadly, the commonest in my hearing) that alliterates with its first syllable.
Not all these terms need be pejorative!  As a pop song once claimed: "He's just a dedicated follower of fashion".  But I suspect the writer of irony.
Answer: A fair-weather friend isn't too far off but the definitions all use it to explicitly mean a friend, not a supporter of a football club or any sort of team.
Dictionary.com Fair-Weather friend
If you do a search for glory hunter or glory supporter you'll find most of the results relate to sports supporters who support a team or person that is doing, or is likely to do, very well.
Answer: front-runner is a term often used for the person who support the currently trendy winning team.


How did I get the 928 hit point poison is Skyrim?

Question: I sometimes brew potions because I want to level up alchemy but I rarely actually use them. I have some fortify alchemy gear I probably wasn't wearing and no skill points in alchemy. So I was searching through my inventory and found "POISON OF DAMAGE HEALTH" weight 0.5 value 636 "Causes 928 points of poison damage. Decrease the target's Magicka regeneration by 100% for 23 seconds." I'm wondering what's the recipe for this so I can make more? Thanks.
Answer: It's hard to be completely certain... however... one of the most likely explanations is that you previously had gotten the Jarrin Root as part of a Dark Brotherhood quest.  This unique (!!!) alchemical ingredient significantly improves the power of the damage health poison.
Unfortunately, if you have not completed that quest, you will have to deal with your target in a different manner.
If you're on PC and you're into mods, you can consider getting this mod to get more Jarrin Root:
Hanyah's Plantable Jarrin Root
Comment: Thank you! I don't know who to use this on as I've killed Alduin and I'm pretty sure Miraak is immune to poison, but I'm sure I'll think of something.
Comment: @CoolPerson1 Use it on [The Ebony Warrior](https://elderscrolls.fandom.com/wiki/The_Ebony_Warrior)


Can't install game through apk and obb file

Question: I can't install a game through apk and obb file in my Android 6.0 Marshmallow. I have Samsung Grand Prime Plus and I have recently tried rooting my device several times but it failed. I'm wondering if it might somehow be relevant to this problem.
I installed the apk file, put the obb file in the respective folder and the game looks like it's been installed, but gets stuck on the startup screen. I think it's not picking up the obb file since the startup screen is probably part of the apk file. I have tried this with both the internal and external memories. I'm sorry for the awkward terminology. I'm new to this stuff.
Answer:
Accept/Check the App Permission
Check if you Place the obb file to android/obb
Check if the App is Compatible with your Phone


What was the religion of Prophet Mohammad (s) before become messenger of Allah?

Question: What is religion of the Prophet Mohammad (PBUH) before become messenger of Allah? He is acting according of christian shriah or other Abrahamic religion?
Answer: Abrahamic religion was prevalent in Arabia as no other prophet came to Arabia after Prophet Abrahim (PBUH). Arab used to associate themselves with Prophet Abrahim (PBUH), so I think Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) was also following Prophet Abrahim'S (PBUH) religion.
There are indications in different hadith that Holy Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) followed true Abrahamic religion when performing Haj (before becoming a prophet) and did not followed the deviations that the tribe of Quresh (to which Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) belonged)
Comment: this is wrong...He believed in the unity of a Higher Power and rejected the idol worshipping, because in Arabia at that time, there was only idol worshipping, Immoralities and injustice. Prophet Muhammad was a Thinker and a wise man way before he received the revelation and that was Divine guidance. ...and If you read the history of Arabia at that time, you'd feel embarassed of your "upvoted" answer. Furthermore, you also seem to ignore that Islam is a preaching of the abrahamic religion (from the Quran, it is abraham who named "us" the muslims i.e Submitters) ...well -1
Comment: Please add reference.
Answer: I searched somewhat, but to be honest I assume the response of your question is relatively long, So I reckon it is not feasible to reply to this question completely. anyhow I found two sites below (reference) which have illustrated it as a detailed response. Look at them please. (Note: unfortunately these are two Farsi sites, hopefully you could read Farsi)
but if I want to mention it briefly, I can classify them in four main classes:

the messenger of Allah (pbuh) was not follower of any religion

He was the follower of Christianity

He was the follower of the religion of Ibrahim (s)

He was the follower of his religion from first (Islam)

To see the detailed issues (about each one), you can refer to the
reference.

Reference:
www.hawzah.net
www.pasokhgoo.ir


Can Hydra and Crunch be used in combination for HTTP-get-form?

Question: I'm trying to recover my router username and password without resetting the router for educational purposes.   I read that Hydra can be used for "brute-forcing" http-get-form authentication that most routers use. They classify bruteforcing as a dictionary/wordlist attack. Bruteforcing is generating every possible combination possible in order to guess the correct password/username. Yes, it can be time consuming and tedious. But given enough time they're always successful.  I know that my password and username aren't all that complex as I don't see much of a reason to make it complex because with all the security measures I put up, no body will bother with my internet. I was reading a thread on Kali and someone asked if Hydra could legitimately "bruteforce" and I'm not sure honestly, but someone suggested using Crunch to feed words (combinations) to Hydra (not creating a massive 500 tb file full of words) and delete the ones not used (or successful). The OP of that thread was unsuccessful and so were many others who attempted to use this method. I know virtually nothing about Hydra. I probably left the password to my router as admin or something similar and the username something like mtndew. Is it possible to combine the two to create a bruteforcing tool for a router user/pass?
Comment: I'm not understanding what your question really is. Hydra is used for this very purpose, which you state. Crunch can create wordlists that Hydra can use, which you state. What's your question?
Answer: Short answer to your question is yes, Hydra and Crunch can be used in combination.
Your statement that "bruteforcing is generating every possible combination in order to guess..." is correct but the term "bruteforcing" is often used in relation to guessing based on a wordlist, so we just have to deal with the impercise term.
On to your goal of recovering your router username and password:
Try several different approaches, one being what you suggest, especially since you think you used a very easy to guess password:  Run Hydra against the http form with a short list of simple passwords, then a longer one, then employ Crunch.  The reason I suggest it is because you are likely to hit your password with one of the wordlists already supplied in Kali.
The other approach is attacking the router by other means besides Hydra as password guessing through a http form is very slow. It will be much faster if you can extract the hash of your password that is stored somewhere in your router and then run a hash cracker against it.  Since you don't have your password, I assume you can't just ssh into your router and look at the passwd file.  So, you will have to resort to researching router vulnerabilities and hoping that a vulnerability has been reported for your brand and version.  I would say that it is worth doing this while Hydra is doing its work.  Wifi Routers are famous for having unpatched vulnerabilities.
For example, read this:
 http://sijmen.ruwhof.net/weblog/268-password-hash-disclosure-in-linksys-smart-wifi-routers
What brand of router are you attacking? Does it have the OEM firmware installed?
Comment: It's a TP-Link archer C7 router. It has the original firmware installed although I had installed some other ones a while back. I reset it because I couldn't get it to work.


Boiling water at low pressure with heat supply

Question: I understand that water boils at lower temperatures at lower pressures, but I want to know what happens when external heat is supplied to a body of water at low pressure. Suppose I have a hot object in an enclosed chamber. I then cover the hot object with water, then vacuum the air out so the pressure drops. I know that with out the help of any additional heat the water can boil at low temperature because i have dropped the pressure, but what happens when I introduce the hot object? Does the water boil even faster because of the exchange of heat between the water and the hot object? What is the boiling point of the water at low pressure and the help of additional heat VS. the boiling point at just vacuum pressure?
Answer: Added heat doesn't change the boiling point, it just makes the water reach it faster. Once it has reached boiling point, the rate of boiling also increases with an increased heat source. Without the hot object, heat is extracted from the remaining liquid body by the vapour that leaves it (enthalphy of vaporization) during boiling, in effect causing evaporative cooling to the rest of the water. This will cause the water to drop below the boiling point eventually unless air pressure is further lowered, or the water is allowed time to absorb heat and warm up (essentially using the environment as an added heat source for boiling). Having a hot object accelerates the process.


Can we use computer coding activity as a kasina object?

Question: Anything we do mindfully can cause a meditative experience. I am a software developer and sometimes when I am engrossed I don't feel the 'I', some kind of 'annatta' experience. Reaching somekind of Zen experience. I want to ask can we use this activity of programming computers as a kasina and achieve some jhana state? How do I go about it?  Also, is my understanding of what kasina is correct?
Answer: What you are describing is colloquially known as being in the zone. It's a type of refined concentration where spectacular human feats can be achieved. There's a lack of ownership regarding the current task and often the concept of a body disappears. This should make you curious.
It's completely possible for jhana to occur under these circumstances, off the cushion and in the throes of daily life. In my personal understanding, experiencing jhana off the cushion has much more of an impact. In fact, this kind of exploration should be actively encouraged.
For dhamma practice, the object of concentration must not be generating continuity of thought, as with your task of programming code. There is something behind that primary task. This is the whole point: to bring meditative enquiry into the sensuous domain such that we become receptive to evermore subtle forms of awareness: hence, from coarse to fine, until we reach the bare subtleties of our awareness which flickers like a mirage in the desert. Like approaching a mirage in the desert, it vanishes; conditionality ceases. See the Lesser Discourse on Emptiness.
Look furthermore into these events you describe and see if you can replicate them in other settings. It's also important that, through study or teacher interaction, one is able to find a stable environment from where these experiences can be contextualized. See the Discourse on the Arousing of Mindfulness.
Comment: Can you substantiate this answer with texts known to be true? Ie the base of sutta pitaka. Thanks.
Comment: @8527 - updated to reflect your requests.
Comment: I meant this part: "It's completely possible for jhana to occur under these circumstances". And by these circumstances 'being preoccupied with coding' is what is meant or attaining jhana whilst being preoccupied with work unrelated to the teacher's message in general.
Comment: @8527 - in those general circumstances yes, but if you read further *"the object of concentration must not be generating continuity of thought"...* It only takes seclusion from sensuality, and seclusion from unskillful qualities. Incidentally, you cannot know any sutta to be true until you have direct knowledge of where it points. In this respect, the Buddha's teaching should be viewed as neutral. Likewise for my answer.
Answer: No.  Its too active and mutable to be used to attain jhana.  You need an object that is stable, unchanging, and that can essentially be "sat" on.  Any activity that has discursive mental content, gross emotional feelings, or agitation is, pretty much by definition, antithetical to right concentration.  In fact, the simple act of lifting your fingers to type is disruptive to the point where even access concentration will remain out of reach.