Is it possible to create a community-edited custom search engine?

Question: I'd like to use Google Custom Search to create a custom search engine that anonymous users can edit (by adding or removing sites to the custom search engine). Is it possible to do this?
Answer: It seems like it is possible to do pragmatically, though i didn't try. Here you can find bit more about it.
Basically, this is what I get from that page. You can have an xml file on your website, that google will query and will show results from that file only for you custom search engine. Now all you would need is an interface to have that xml file manipulated easily, though nothing stops you from editing it manually. :)
Comment: How can you specify which sites to include (or disallow) from the search engine, using the XML file? I'm looking for more specific information.


Bitter Turnip fries

Question: I tried making turnip fries the other day and they were horribly bitter. If  am planning to fry them like french fries how long should I boil them in the salt, vinegar and lemon juice so that they don't get too mushy? I have never prepared turnips as a potato before.Thanks
Comment: I haven't tried it yet, I need to by some gin, I only have Crown Royal at home, I think that is brandy? Not sure, it's my husbands thing. :-) I had a bout with declining health for one day... not enough electrolytes I assume because as soon as I got some in me I was A-OK. Needless to say, I slept all day and all night Tuesday.
Comment: Welcome to [cooking.se]!  **;-)** It's quite clear what the problem is, but *for the future* could you please describe more clearly what you're doing exactly: I can deduce you're trying to parboil the turnips, but I wouldn't: I'd just cut them up in smaller (McDonald's size) fries and soak them overnight in as little water as possible as per the answer...  **0:-)**
Comment: Sure, I just saw this solution of parboiling them from someone else. I will certainly try and be clearer next time. So nothing in the water or follow Fabby's suggestion with as little water as possible? I thinly sliced them when I tried to prepare them Friday just slice and fry and that did not work out well at all.
Comment: So? How did the Gin&Turnip turn out? (or keeping it for next time?) **;-)**
Comment: Angela, did you ever get a chance to try??? (Just got another upvote on this today and still wondering...)  **;-)**
Answer: First of all: you made me laugh because I misread the title as "Bitter Trump Fries"...  :D
Secondly: if they're too bitter, there are a few things you can do by soaking them overnight in the fridge with water with one of the following:

a dash of honey (take warm tap water and let it cool down after you've added the honey)
a dash of lemon (or better: lime) juice
a dash of gin

How much is "a dash"?
Well, for 500g / a pound of turnip: a coffee spoon or maximum 2 depending how bitter they taste raw.
Comment: I was going to try the gin, actually. :-) Thanks I will give it some time.
Comment: Thank you Fabby I will try this. I am really missing french fries since I have been low-no carb. I really wanted to curb this desire.
Comment: @AngelaJohnsonAppy I'm just a midget here: please wait a while because maybe some of the giants here on the site will come up with an even better idea! And if you're trying no-carb: *skip the honey.* For low-carb: use half a dash!  **;-)**
Comment: Well... I put that one last, but ...  **;-)**

Bitter Turnip fries


How to align (rotate) mesh by 2 vertices?

Question: I have a complex mesh. I need rotate mesh along some axis (x,y,z never mind) to line-up 2 points of this mesh. I don't need align points (S,Z,0), i need align mesh. Of course i can move pivot to vertex 1 and visually rotate until vertex 2 will be on my desired axe. But i want to keep original pivot and precisely rotate mesh.
See the picture.
Comment: Just to make sure I understand the question and to use Blender's terminology: You want to rotate an object in object mode, not in edit mode. You want to rotate the object, but not around its object center (what you call "pivot") but around one of its vertices. Correct? Did you try to use the 3D cursor as a rotation center?
Why do you want that, what is your real goal? The question sounds like an [XY problem](http://xyproblem.info).
Comment: I try to orient head 3D scan, received from photogrammetry software with random rotation to standart FrontLeftTop position for further editing. Scan of course not symmetrical. Scan contains 600k verticles, and i CAN find verticles, which must be i.e. on Y-axis. (tip of nose and back of the head). So i want to rotate scan. I cannot change pivot point because further editing in photogrammetry software demands unchanged pivot.
Comment: Oh I see, that makes sense! Please edit your question and add that information, because this is really important to know.
Answer: TeeTrinker is right: have you tried using the 3D cursor as the "Transform Pivot Point"? Snapping to other geometry does not work in this mode, so if you need absolute precision, I would recommend an add-on like Mesh Align Plus. It has many alignment options, but the one you are looking for in it is "Quick Align Lines". Keep in mind there are far more advanced options that may save you time later on.
Using Mesh Align Plus add-on, here's what I did to achieve the rotation you described:

Create a new plane mesh object with a side aligned to the final upright green line orientation you showed in your image.
Select this new plane, entered Edit Mode, select the edge
representing the green line, Mesh Align Plus>Quick Align Lines>Grab
Destination. Exit Edit Mode.
Select your plane you want to rotate.
Enter Edit mode. Select vertex 1 and vertex 2 like you show in your picture. Exit Edit Mode. Mesh
Align Plus>Quick Align Lines>Apply to: "Object".
Answer: One simple solution is to create an empty and parent the object to it. Then rotate the empty any way you like. You can easily get the original rotation back by resetting the rotation of the empty.
You can go a tiny bit more complicated by using a Copy Rotation Constraint.

Create an empty.
Create a Copy Rotation Constraint on the object to the empty.
Rotate the empty.
Now you can easily switch the constraint on and off, which might be useful for exporting the model to your 3d scanning software for further processing.
Comment: I think this would work well if aligning view to selected edge / face with Shift+NumPad1, 3, or 7 and adding an empty with F9 options Align: View. Then make the Empty the parent of the object you want to rotate. Then, select the Empty and Alt+R to clear rotation of it so your object is aligned to World XYZ, OR snap align the Empty to another object etc.
Answer: To do this perfectly precisely (which is rarely necessary, eyeballing the two verts to align in and ortho view is almost always good enough):
In edit mode, select the two vertices.  If one does not already exist, create an edge between them ('f' for me.)  Create a custom orientation (ctrl alt space for me.)  Delete any edge you've created.  If you're worried about your original geometry, you can duplicate these verts to a new object and work there instead.
You now have a custom orientation where the Y axis corresponds to the line between those two vertices.  You can rotate and constrain to Y ('r', 'y', move mouse, 'enter' confirm) to rotate in this axis.


Rigid Body Problem, Active objects stay rigid, its not working

Question: Gravity seem off in the world. I made a big cube and a lot of little balls(50) at the top inside. I want them to fall to the floor, but things are off in my blender rigid body World. The balls are the active ones, and the cube the passive one. both have collider added with default settings.
When I tried to do a bake with the balls together in a collection and the cube  a constraints, things do not go the way I thought they would. A large portion of the balls stay rigid, and a few fly off in all directions but not to the floor. Any Ideas as to what setting i may have forgotten or what i did wrong?
Answer: The little balls are inside the big cube? That's not going to work with default settings. You either need to model the floor, walls and ceiling as separate objects, or set the cube's rigid body shape to mesh. While you're at it, set the balls' shape to sphere and choose good values for mass and bounciness.


Is inner monologue a bad way to show character traits?

Question: Is directly showing a characters inner thoughts and conversations with themselves too telly or cheesy?
Comment: As much as I personally despise this method as a reader, I do see it used frequently in published work. It's way more prevalent in genre fiction than not, but it's been creeping into everything. It is, however, the narrator literally telling me the character's thoughts, so use sparingly, and know what your audience expects regarding its use.
Answer: Not necessarily, but the propensity to indulge in internal monologue is itself a character trait. Fundamentally, the way we assess the character of someone in fiction is the same a how we assess their character in life: by their actions. Sometimes it makes sense to shortcut the process of establishing character by telling us directly some aspect of the character's character, but even that is best done by telling us how the typically act (as opposed to dramatizing a whole scene).
So, if you show a character's internal monologue, readers will interpret that first and foremost as a piece of behavior and will judge first and foremost that indulging in internal monologue is a character trait of the person.
Will the content of that internal monologue also reveal aspects of their character? Sure. But you have to treat that in context of the broader effect of showing all that internal monologue. If you use it to reveal a character who is not contemplative by nature, the dissonance will be obvious and will undermine what you are trying to achieve.
Answer: Inner monologue is used quite frequently, and it can reveal character traits that may not be revealed any other way: True feelings.
Such as, if Jack is telling the truth about never cheating on Jill, if the photograph of him doing so had to be faked.
The same with secret desires, dislikes, hatreds, plotting, faking friendship or even faking love or sexual attraction for nefarious purpose. Jack may have faked his love for Jill to get laid. Or alternatively, Jill may have faked her enthusiasm for Jack's clumsy and laughably stupid seduction of her, to become trusted enough by him to rob him blind.
You should not abuse inner thoughts, readers trust they are the real thing. Just like in real life, actions and dialogue can be misleading lies. Inner dialogue should be the true thoughts; I think it would be a violation of the "reader contract" to find out they were lied to by some previous passage portrayed as an inner thought or feeling.
Comment: Point of Origin movie is a great example of how to do this wrong
Answer: Nope. Best selling authors do it all the time. Its encouraged as long as it adds to the story instead of being a distraction; which is the general rule to putting in anything.
Answer: It's not inherently bad
It is a trap where too many things as resolved through inner monologue when it might make the story more dynamic. I suffer from that big time where the character thinks and thinks and thinks about stuff but does not do anything about it. My personal take is that it is not bad, but whenever you can have the character DO something that would prove the dialogue, it helps.
Keep it short whenever possible. Show, don't tell. And thinking about stuff has a bad tendency to have you tell, rather than show.
Answer: Inner monologue can be used to GREAT effect. As others have said before me, it isn't inherently bad or cheesy. Depending on the medium however, should determine how often it is used. If Your Project Is A:
Visual Novel: Inner monologue is practically essential, however if you can see the character than you should have their monologues supported by character animation.
Book: Inner monologue should be used specifically with the protagonists opinions about other characters and the situation at hand. However remember the rule of "show don't tell," especially in bigger, pivitol moments your characters actions should indicate your character's feelings, as actions speak louder than words.
Film: I would use this very rarely. Voice overs are used sparingly in film for a reason. As you can both see and hear the emotions of a character, "actions speak louder than words" and in film this is a must. I would only use it if you deem absolutely necessary, for perhaps the tone you want.
Something Else: Try to think of the most notable example of inner monologue in that medium you can think of. Figure out how effective you think it was, and why it was effective, and use that as your baseline. If you can't think of any, then there is likely a better way of doing it.


Using Chrome, why is PDF downloaded from one site but displayed with Chrome pdf viewer from another site?

Question: My company moved our shared files from one instance of Microsoft Sharepoint to another instance. Strangely, when I try to open a PDF in the new instance, Chrome downloads the PDF, while in the old instance of Sharepoint, Chrome displays the PDF in its built-in viewer. How can I make Chrome use its PDF viewer for documents in the new Sharepoint? I searched around and most questions on this site and others is about preventing the Chrome viewer. I want to ensure that it is always used.
Answer: Is the new instance a newer version? Websites have some ability to direct how files they send should be handled, e.g. they can indicate that a file should be downloaded rather than viewed. I suspect that this has changed from version to version. It might be configurable, perhaps if you asked your sharepoint administrators they could look in to it.
Answer: Response headers for the resource you requested can have a great impact on how a browser treats the output.  The new version of sharepoint may simply be telling the browser to react differently.  Is the behavior similar on other browsers?
Comment: Well, it's hard to say with other browsers since I'm not aware of IE9 or Firefox 4 having a built-in viewer like Chrome.


MITM based on ARP spoofing

Question: I fail to understand how a MITM attack sniffs packets and modifies them.In the case of ARP spoofing although the attacker has spoofed the MAC address of a host, how does he modify it?
if he listen to the message between the sender and destination  and after the message delivered to destination he sent gratuitous ARP reply ? when he know the message  delivered to destination ?
Answer: Generally, to perform MITM attack between A & B, you must apply 3 steps:

Trick A to think you're B
Trick B to think you're A
Enable packets forwarding

To answer you question, there are 3 types of ARP packets, the normal send and reply packets, and gratuitous packets.
Using gratuitous packets, the attacker can modify or 'poison' the targets cache, so he can trick both A & B, and stay in their ARP table as a legit part of the connection.
Note that this kind of attacks can be stopped using some kind of switches which is able to sniff the network for gratuitous arp packets and re-send the correct data through the network.

MITM based on ARP spoofing


Banging/Snapping Sound When Turning ('04 TrailBlazer)

Question: I'm thinking that this is the sway bar or sway bar links.  Does this sound right?  This happens often and it doesn't matter which way I turn.
Answer: Based on my experience, I'd suspect the strut bearing plates if it has struts in the front (I'm not familiar with that particular model)...  Those plates usually last about 5-10 years, then start falling apart.  Makes snapping/banging/sometimes even grinding noises when turning.  Eventually the steering will start to bind up and popping noises will start.
Answer: First thing i'd get checked is your wheel balances on all 4 tires. It's usually the most common cause of vibrations at higher speeds from my experience.


How do you save an Animated GIF file using Photoshop?

Question: I am making a .gif file in Photoshop CS5. While saving this animation, I used the steps = File > Save for web & devices > Preset= GIF 128 Dithered > GIF > Save.  After saving the .gif file it does not show the animation.
So what is wrong with the procedure?
Comment: Did you set the animation options on the right side of the Save for Web window?
Comment: Are you saying about animation looping option.?
Comment: yes I have choose forever option for looping.
Comment: Have you tried opening your animation in a browser to test?
Answer:
The file must have a Timeline or Frame sequence. (Window > Timeline)
You need to set the animation options in the Save for Web dialog:

In addition, it is possible to have a quick animation and not see it initially due to speed and duration if the Save For Web options are set to "once". You may need to reload a page/image to see the animation.
Also, some browsers have an option to disable gif animation. If you've done all the above, verify it's not a browser setting preventing the animation from being visible.
Comment: Note: in newer Photoshop CC, you still need to use the old Save for Web command to export GIFs with animation. It's under _File > Export > Save for Web (Legacy)..._
Comment: @peterflynn is there a way to export to gif with animation using the new export settings? (it's not important, I'm just curious)
Answer: Try duplicating those presets in a 'Custom' preset. Try changing the path that the file is saved to also to see if that works.


Grub rescue error when booting

Question: I was using Ubuntu 13.04 alongside Windows 8, but I deleted the Ubuntu from the C drive where it was installed and deleted and formatted the partition as well. I extended the C drive with its previous partition. Now, when I restart my PC the screen shows grub rescue error: no partition. How can I completely delete Ubuntu and restore it to Windows 8 again?
Answer: You can do this several ways:
1 - Simply reinstall Windows 8, it will format and occupy entire disc;
2 - You have to use an Ubuntu Rescue CD do boot and remove Grub
3 - Using Windows DVD do a recovery system

Grub rescue error when booting


Linking Arduino and Matlab

Question: My project is based on controlling a moving fan using different hand gestures. I am using image processing toolbox from matlab to detect and identify various hand movements.I want to link my matlab codes to arduino for hardware implementation. How to link these two?
Comment: this may help: [arduino support from matlab](https://www.mathworks.com/hardware-support/arduino-matlab.html). Firmata may also be what you need to link matlab to arduino.
Comment: Seems like Serial is often used but then you need a protocol. You can use everything from textual or binary blocks to more advanced parsing. To give you more advice you would need to describe what you want to communicate and how often (for the bandwidth and response time calculation).
Answer: This block of code can give you some idea...
<code>% create an arduino object

a = arduino('com3', 'uno');

% start the loop to blink led for 10 seconds

for i = 1:10

    writeDigitalPin(a, 'D11', 1);

    pause(0.5);

    writeDigitalPin(a, 'D11', 0);

    pause(0.5);

end

% end communication with arduino

clear a
</code>
For more details on this code and working of it you can visit....
Here

Linking Arduino and Matlab


Auto-Unlock on a manually Continuity-enabled Mac?

Question: I have a brand new Apple Watch Series 1, an iPhone 6 running iOS 10.0.1 public beta, and an early 2011 MacBook Pro with an upgraded AirPort card and Continuity Activation Tool running the latest Sierra public beta. Handoff and AirDrop and other Continuity features have been working fine lately between my phone and my laptop, but how do I get Auto Unlock to work? I tried following these steps for enabling Auto Unlock in general, but System Preferences isn't showing me an "Allow your Apple Watch to unlock your Mac" checkbox. How can I make that box appear? Thanks!
Answer: What hardware is required for Auto Unlock?
According to Apple's macOS Sierra beta 2 release notes, Auto Lock requires a 2013 or later Mac. That means that even 2012 Macs with Bluetooth 4.0 don't officially support Auto Unlock.
What software is required for Auto Unlock?
To use Auto Unlock, you'll need to be running macOS Sierra Developer Preview Seed 2. You'll also need to have the watchOS 3 beta installed on your Apple Watch. Apple indicates that the latest version of watchOS 3 (beta 2) needs to be installed, but I was able to get Auto Unlock working with watchOS 3 beta 1.
You'll also need to have Two-Factor Authentication established for the iCloud account associated with your Mac and Apple Watch.
How do I set up Two-Factor Authentication?
Two-Factor Authentication can be set up via the Apple ID website. Beware that a small number of users are complaining of being locked out of their accounts when enabling 2FA on the developer beta.
Keep in mind that Two-Factor Authentication differs from Two-Step Authentication. You must be using Two-Factor Authentication for Auto Unlock to work. If you need assistance, a full guide for enabling Two-Factor Authentication.
Once 2FA is enabled, Apple encourages users to do the following:

On your Mac, open System Preferences →  iCloud, and click the Account
Details button. Click the Security tab, and make sure Two-Factor
Authentication is on. On your iPhone, open Settings →  iCloud and tap
on your name to reveal account details. Tap on the Password and
Security item, and make sure sure Two-Factor Authentication is on.
On your iPhone, open Watch →  General →  Apple ID, and verify your
Apple ID is showing.
How do I enable Auto Unlock?

Enabling Auto Unlock is handled on your Mac via System Preferences → Security & Privacy.
I'm not seeing the Auto Unlock setting in System Preferences
After performing a clean install, it can take minutes for the Allow your Apple Watch to unlock your Mac checkbox to display in System Preferences → Security and Privacy → General on your Mac. This delay occurs while your devices are iCloud pairing. If you performed an upgrade instead of a clean install, you should not experience any delays.
If you're still having problems getting Auto Unlock to work, try rebooting all three devices (Mac, Apple Watch, paired iPhone). Also, double-check to make sure you have Two-Factor Authentication enabled, not Two-Step Authentication.


MailEnable - Management tool?

Question: At the moment we use Plesk to manage mail accounts (Via a MailEnable Mail Server) however, we are thinking of scraping plesk.
Are there any managment panels out there for controling email server settings?
Answer: We use Postfixadmin to manage our accounts "Postfix Admin is a web based interface used to manage mailboxes, virtual domains and aliases. It also features support for vacation/out-of-the-office messages."
Can also be integrated into squirrelmail webmail.
Answer: Plesk only makes much sense if you're providing a hosted service. What else you might use depends on the scale of your operation. IMHO GoSA (an LDAP frontend and schema) is a very good solution even for smallish environments. vimbadmin is a convenient tool for postfix. There are lots more available.
Comment: We are not server-admins. What you have just said, if I'm honest was just Jargon :)
Answer: ViMbAdmin was created as a modern replacement for PostfixAdmin. Check it out at http://code.google.com/p/vimbadmin/.
Answer: Why don't you just rely on MailEnable's own management tool? It allows web based interface for management but the limitation is to assign mailbox as Admin for management. You can assign one mailbox from every domain as Admin so user can create more mailboxes.
Answer: The professional version of Mailenable has a web administration function but costs $350. I have used Mailenable Pro and it is good.
If you are considering scrapping Plesk the presumably you will be managing other server functions by remote desktop. The management interface to Mailenable you can access this way for all versions and is easy to use. The downside being only people you trusted with remote desktop access to the server would b able to administer mail accounts.
Other than full server control panels I am not aware of any other software that can act as a front end to Plesk.
If you are thinking of changing mailserver then on windows hmail is worth looking at it has many more feature than mailenable standard and is free has webmail but no standalone web administration. there is a GUI to use by remote desktop though.

MailEnable - Management tool?


Code-driven way to enable PHP parsing on a template

Question: Still a bit new with EE2, but I'm looking to be able to construct a way we can push changes up in environments, without having to sync up database-level stuff.  Right now I have several templates that are being changed to include PHP in them.  Part of what I want to get right is making sure PHP is enabled in our production environment when we go to push.  Is there a way in code to set this flag on a given template?  Or is the only solution in the database?
Answer: The setting on whether a template has PHP parsing turned on lives in the exp_templates, under the allow_php column (either y or n) and the php_parse_location column (either i or o). This question really pertains to practices related to versioning, as I assume you would use a VCS tool for pushing code from development to production.
Programatically, you can always modify the database using the Database class, but that isn't what you're looking for. If you are using git, I would recommend using git hooks.
I would use a hook to

Dump the exp_templates table pre-commit
Add that dump file to your commit
Repo gets pushed from dev to production here
Use a server-side hook to run an update to that table with the dump

It seems like a convoluted way to go about it, but that should essentially push your exp_templates table along with your code, but not interrupt your channel data or other tables. This can also have the unfortunate effect of overwriting production changes to templates that were done during development time. Perhaps if you could expand on your teams planned development to production path (agile sprints or something?), and how stable the production deployments are going to be, we can help more.
Edit Whether a template gets pulled from file or template, there is still a read from the exp_templates table in the EE engine to determine PHP parsing. If you want to just have a post-push trigger, you could write a PHP script that looks at both development and production tables, does a comparison of those columns, and then updates the production rows to match the development ones, using a git hook.


Bonding of my Broken Dining table glass

Question: My dining table glass is broken at a particular area, that has become powder at that one point...is there any way to bond those powdered glass...I jst want to get rid of the powder coming from the table...i want to bond that powdered glass
(https://i.stack.imgur.com/mgErN.jpg)
Answer: You can try with windshield repair kit (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QjuWqBzO7qY), but it seems that the glass is too damaged to be fixed easily.
Windshield repair kit should fill the center hole and fix the powdered glass part.
Comment: Good, thanks for the video...But in my case, the crack area is round 80mm in dia...Is there any tool kit available in the market ?
Answer: I've had reasonable success for damage of that kind using superglue (cyanoacrylate). If you can find one that is thinner/more fluid it will flow into the cracks better. For cracked glass you don't need to separate it, just apply the superglue along the top of the crack and it will creep into it via capillary action. Model (airplane etc) shops are a good source of cyanoacrylate in various consistencies/fluidities
The glue is reasonably optically clear too, so diminishes the appearance of the crack, but it isn't dedicatedly optically clear. Such glue also exists, referred to as LOCA and normally used to glue things like mobile phone screen glass to the actual phone LCD so widely available from large online shopping destinations as well as local phone repair stores. Sets using uv light so  don't leave it out in the sun before you want to use it!
Comment: You said you wanted a solution that stops the powdered glass from going everywhere, not something that will bond the table back to full strength. Cyanoacrylate will definitely stop the powdered glass migrating
Comment: This seems to be we can use only for mobile dispalys where as my glass thickness is around 12mm & at a dia of 80mm, anymore suggestions?

Bonding of my Broken Dining table glass


How long should I steam squid and cuttlefish?

Question: I have read that the squid and cuttlefish are more tender if they are cooked in less than 3 minutes in a pan. But what about steam cooking, how much time does it need?
Answer: I have always found that squid needs to be only cooked for 1 minute (2-3 minutes if battered and deep fried). Any more or any less results in very rubbery texture.
It can also be slow cooked for an hour or more in a soup so that it becomes tender.
Comment: 1 minute or an hour? Big difference there...
Comment: Absolutely, squid really only needs a minute to be fully cooked (i.e. 1 minute of quick cooking in a pan or frying) going over that in the 2 - 59 minute range results in squid that is barely edible and very rubbery. If you cook it for an hour in a braise or soup the hour of cooking will break down the collagen in the squid resulting in a once again tender squid with a completely different taste and texture then if you had quickly cooked it.
Comment: Ah, I see what you mean now, I'll edit your answer a bit to make it more clear.
Answer: Squid etc are tender if cooked very quickly or for a long time. In between = rubber, inedibility


Ethernet connection of pi is not detected by laptop

Question: I have a Raspberry Pi 3 Model B, and I'm trying to use my laptop screen as display for the Pi. I had followed various tutorials for this none of it is working. I found that laptop couldn't detect the Pi when connected to the Ethernet port and even not blinking on either side port when connected. When I connected them using a router, even the router couldn't detect the Pi. What can be solution for this?
Comment: Is the Pi powered?  Has it booted?  What IP address has been assigned to the Pi?
Comment: How to assign ip address to pi? I m new to the Pi. I have just wrote IMG file on SD card(8GB) using win32 and inserted SD card into pi. Thank you !
Comment: I'm not aware of a laptop with a **HDMI-IN** port. You have to use a HDMI monitor or tv-set to connect to the pi or [operate the pi headless](https://www.raspberrypi.org/forums/viewtopic.php?t=74176).
Comment: @akshayhadawale By default the Pi will expect a DHCP server at the other end of the Ethernet link (to dynamically supply an IP address).  If your laptop doesn't perform that role (which it won't by default) you will need to give the Pi a static IP address.
Comment: If you are not seeing link lights on either end, you don't have an ethernet connection at the most basic level. Do you have a power LED on the RPi? Have you tried connecting a display to the RPi to verify it is booting?
Answer: Modern ethernet devices usually support Auto-Mdi-X.
If for whatever reason this doesn't work or isn't supported you'll need a crossover cable directly connecting the two.
Or use a device like a hub/switch/router to connect them with normal straight through patch cables.
For the router not detecting the pi - check with a different cable, the one you used might be broken.
Comment: I have used three different cables, but result was same.  Can you refer a good and trusted tutorial for this?
Answer: Order matters here! The same thing happened to me. The solution turned out to be to first connect to the router, then insert the card, and then power on the raspberry. If you insert the card or connect via ethernet cable after it has been powered on then it may not work.


Arduino Leonardo clone voltage question

Question: I'm planning my first Arduino project which involves a MPU-6050 accelerometer(3.3V) and a RGB led(5V). I've found this Arduino Clone but i'm not sure if it has 3.3V and 5V outputs that I can use. The pins do exist on the original Leonardo board but i'm not sure if the clone contains them as well.
Answer: That has a 5V pin (Vcc) but no 3.3V. Also the 5V pin can't provide more than a few hundred mA.
Better specifications are here: https://www.sparkfun.com/products/12640
Comment: I see, thanks a lot. If I find a 5V accelerometer would I be able to connect it + the led to the same 5V pin?
Comment: Yep. Note that a 5v accelerometer will probably be a 3.3v one with built in 3.3v regulator, so you need to take the same precautions as a 3.3v one.
Comment: What kind of procautions do you mean? Could you maybe give me term to google to send me down the right path?
Comment: Logic level shifting. Interfacing a 5v Arduino to a 3.3v device. If the accelerometer is I2C include that in your search too.

Arduino Leonardo clone voltage question


Old story about a man with tattoos that told stories

Question: I'm trying to remember the name of this book that's really a collection of short stories but is told with a narrator character who's telling the stories he sees as they take place on a man covered in tattoos. There's a pretty big number of stories in the book even though it isn't overly long. The stories range from soft to hard sci-fi but more so on the hard side in general. There were many common themes but the main one seemed to be around technology and how it's not always a good thing. Each story corresponds to one section of his body. The tattooed guy was older and think he used to be in the circus. I think it's really old too.
Comment: Can you remember any details about the specific stories that could help track this down?
Answer: This sounds like Ray Bradbury's "The Illustrated Man".  As described by the Wikipedia entry:

The Illustrated Man is a 1951 collection of eighteen science fiction short stories by American writer Ray Bradbury. A recurring theme throughout the eighteen stories is the conflict of the cold mechanics of technology and the psychology of people. It was nominated for the International Fantasy Award in 1952.1
The unrelated stories are tied together by the frame device of "The Illustrated Man", a vagrant former member of a carnival freak show with an extensively tattooed body whom the unnamed narrator meets. The man's tattoos, allegedly created by a time-traveling woman, are individually animated and each tells a different tale. All but one of the stories had been published previously elsewhere, although Bradbury revised some of the texts for the book's publication.

That description covers not only the frame device, but the fact that the tattooed man was a former carnival member, and the theme of technology being dominant in the stories.
Comment: I've read a short story in which a man receives a series of prophetic tattoos, to be uncovered one by one on a schedule. They are increasingly disturbing and he wants them removed, but they're too deep.  The last one shows his own death.  Is that (part of) *The Illustrated Man* or something else?
Comment: @AntonSherwood I think you may be better off asking this as a separate question, rather than as a comment that not many people will read.
Comment: yup that's it. My dad gave me a copy when I was in middle school when I first fell in love with sci-fi and wanted to reread it. I saw an episode of Futurama the other day that I thought might be apart of it and it's been bugging me that I couldn't remember the name
Comment: There were several paperback editions, with some pretty interesting [cover art](https://www.google.com/search?tbm=isch&q=the+illustrated+man); the red covered one where the man is sitting on a wooden structure is probably the most well known. There was even a movie starring Rod Steiger as the tattooed man.


Matching Project CRS to Layer CRS in QGIS

Question: I'm working with QGIS (2.18.13) and I have a vector layer made up of many polygons (CRS: WGS84/29N) but need to change project CRS to match this in order to extract correct area data. Project CRS = WGS 84/Pseudo Mercator EPSG:3857. The base map I am using is Bing Maps Aerial (accessed through Open Layers plugin). How do I do this without distorting the polygons and keeping them in place on the map?
Comment: Welcome to gis.SE! Please take the [tour](https://gis.stackexchange.com/tour) and find out how to write good questions. Specifically tell us what you have tried so far and what didn't work.
Comment: Please, [edit your question](https://gis.stackexchange.com/posts/308904/edit) by adding the following information: What version of QGIS are you using? Wich is the current CRS of your project? Are you using a base map served on the web in your project? If yes, are you using a plugin to access that base map? If yes, wich plugin and what base map are you using?
Answer: What really deforms and goes out of place, to establish in the project a CRS different from EPSG:3857, are the images provided by the plugin. You can use them only as a background reference, as long as your project is in EPSG:3857.
To be able to work with your layers normally, in a valid projection for your work area, you will have to turn off the Bing Aerial layer, change the CRS of the project to match that of your layer, and do not worry about the loss of spacial relationship with respect to the images of the plugin. Your polygons will be much less deformed and much more in line with their real surface if you project them on a coordinate system suitable for your work area.
If you still want to have a satellite image in the background, it would be better if you download it from the web and upload it to the project as a raster file, so that it can be reprojected to another CRS without being deformed, as the tiles served directly from the plugin.
I use Terra Incognita software for that. Select the map source, the region of interest, and the zoom level you want to download (if you abuse the zoom, the files become really heavy). Save as OziExplorer map, add the generated .map file as a raster layer in QGIS and assign the CRS EPSG:54004 (World_Mercator) to that layer.
I'm sure there are other ways. I do that because it works for me, and I never set out to investigate much more about better ways of doing it.
The raster layer will be projected without problems to the CRS that you decide for your polygons and your project. Do not forget that it is only a background reference. The service of those images is prepared just for that.


On what basis do Catholics continue doctrinal development after the Bible canon was closed?

Question: On what basis do Catholics continue doctrinal development after the Bible canon was closed?
Comment: Are you asking for a Biblical basis for further doctrinal development based on extra-Biblical revelation, or a theological or philosophical basis?
Comment: @curiousdannii   You are the one with seminary training.   That being said it's not my style to force answers by making the questions too narrow.
Answer: The Catholic Church teaches dogmatically that general revelation ended with the Apostles (cf. condemned proposition no. 21 in Pope St. Pius X's Lamentabili Sane). This general revelation forms the Deposit of the Faith, which is taught and explained by the Church.
We see through history that Church fathers, saints, and theologians have explained the Deposit of the Faith in new ways. Per Catechism of the Catholic Church ¶ 66,

Yet even if Revelation is already complete, it has not been made completely explicit; it remains for Christian faith gradually to grasp its full significance over the course of the centuries.

Obviously, new explanations must be judged prudently by the Church, lest contradiction or novelty be introduced. St. John Henry Newman, in An Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine, shows a set of principles by which genuine development may be judged. Summarily, these are:

Preservation of Type
Continuity of Principles
Power of Assimilation
Logical Sequence
Anticipation of Its Future
Conservative Action upon Its Past
Chronic Vigor
Comment: Very good quality for a first post. Welcome to SE-C. Please see below (bottom left) for the Tour and the Help as to the purpose and the functioning of the site. (+1 up-voted)


Derivation of the energy function of a hopfield network

Question: Can someone please point me towards a rigorous derivation of the energy function of a discrete Hopfield network. What I want, is the derivation must start out with the structure of the network and prove that the critical points of the dynamical system can be obtained by minimization of some function (possibly by constructing the Lyapunov function of the dynamical system). I cannot seem to find such a rigorous proof. Thankyou!
Answer: I believe what you want to show is that the energy function is monotonically decreasing from time $t$ to time $t+1$ given the state update rules. Since there is only a finite number of states, this means the state must converge to a equilibrium under the given dynamics.
To this end let $\mathbf{s}(t) \in \{0,1\}^n$ be the state of the network at time $t$. We update the network state by picking a unit $s_i(t)$ and updating the state according to
$$
s_i(t+1) = \left\{\begin{array}{r l} 1:& \sum_{j} w_{ij} s_j(t) > 0\\ 0:& \text{otherwise}\end{array}\right.
$$
and define the energy function as
$$
E(\mathbf{s}(t)) = -\frac{1}{2}\sum_i\sum_jw_{ij}s_i(t)s_j(t),
$$
where $w_{ij}$ is the weight between unit $i$ and $j$, $w_{ij} = w_{ji}$ and $w_{ii} = 0$ for al $i$.
WLOG assume we will update the $i^{th}$ unit. First, because of the restrictions on the weights, we may rewrite $E(\mathbf{s}(t))$ as the difference of 2 terms
$$
E(\mathbf{s}(t)) = -\frac{1}{2}\sum_{j\neq i}\sum_{k\neq i}w_{jk}s_j(t)s_k(t) - s_i(t)\sum_jw_{ij}s_j.
$$
Let $c_t = -\frac{1}{2}\sum_{j\neq i}\sum_{k\neq i}w_{jk}s_j(t)s_k(t)$ be the part of the energy function that does not depend on $s_i(t)$. Now if $s_i(t+1) = s_i(t)$ then clearly we have $E(\mathbf{s}(t+1)) = E(\mathbf{s}(t))$, so we only need to consider the 2 other cases.
Case 1: If $s_i(t+1) = 1$ and $s_i(t) = 0$ then it must be that $\sum_{j} w_{ij} s_j(t) = \Delta_t > 0$. So
$$
E(\mathbf{s}(t+1)) = c_{t+1} - \Delta_t = c_t - \Delta_t < c_t = E(\mathbf{s}(t)).
$$
Case 2: If $s_i(t+1) = 0$ and $s_i(t) = 1$ then it must be that $\sum_{j} w_{ij} s_j(t) = \Delta_t \le 0$. So
$$
E(\mathbf{s}(t+1)) = c_{t+1} = c_t \le c_t - \Delta_t = E(\mathbf{s}(t)).
$$
Having considered each case we can conclude that $E(\mathbf{s}(t+1)) \le E(\mathbf{s}(t))$ and is therefore monotonically decreasing.
Comment: Thanks for the answer. I will examine the proof. My initial attempt was to derive the energy function for the discrete net from the continuous case by considering the additive model of a neuron. But I couldnt figure out how to discretize the eqns and impose some condition on the energy function to convert it into a discrete one. In that process, when the eqn is discretized, the form of the energy function doesnt remain the same and my attempts failed. Any help in this direction will be appreciated!
Comment: This proof is very understandably written! +1  It is intended for the asynchronous update rule, I assume, because it assumes $\forall j \neq i . s_j (t) = s_j(t+1)$. How does this proof generalize to a synchronous update model where every node is updated simultaneously?
Answer: One way to go about it is to consider the energy function for a (fully visible) Boltzmann machine  which approaches a hop field net as T->0. You can derive the sigmoidal activation function from the energy via the boltzmann distribution and Bayes rule P(output=1| net input) for each unit.


Do I need the Ground and 5 V pin connect to Led?

Question: I am building an ambilight. So I bought a 3 pin LED Strip which I power with the USB hub from my TV. Next step is to connect it to the Arduino Nano. Is it OK when I only use the dataport from the Aduino and the power only from the television?
Answer: I think it is not a good idea to power the LED strip via USB.
Normally USB delivers a maximum of mA  (see below). Assuming you have 30 LEDs (minimum for a normal LED strip), and each LED gives 40 mA (maximum), this is already more than what most USB ports can deliver. This can ruin your USB port.
For the Arduino Nano you can use the 5 V, and you should connect all GNDs together.
But you will need a decent adapter anyway for the LED strip, so than you can power your Arduino Nano from the adapter you use for the LED strip.
Update
According to Wikipedia USB power

Low-power devices (such as a typical USB keyboard) may draw at most 1
  unit load (1 unit load is 100 mA for USB devices up to USB 2.0, while
  USB 3.0 defines a unit load as 150 mA), and all devices must act as
  Low-power devices when starting out as unconfigured.
High-power devices (such as a typical 2.5-inch USB Hard Drive) draw at least 1 unit load and at most 5 unit loads (500 mA) for
  devices up to USB 2.0 or 6 unit loads (900 mA) for SuperSpeed devices.
Comment: I am totaly new to this but the lightstrip got a 5v connection it is a WS2812B strip with 300 leds. I use a 3.0 usb port but an old cable witch i got long before 3.0 was out does this made any differnce?
Comment: To be honest, I don't have much experience with current from USB, but 300 LEDs * 40 mA = 12 A, 12 A * 5 V = 60 W. Of course you can software wise make sure not all LEDs are on at maximum current at the same time, but this is not so safe (in case of a programming error).
Comment: Your TV certainly cannot power a strip this long. You will blow your USB port with this (at least). Keep in mind, that even most high power USB charger will only give you a few amps. You have to buy a 5V power source, that can actually handle this current. Also you should provide the power to both sides of the strip (Start and end of the strip) to avoid it getting too hot.
Answer: Yes, you can take +5v from the TV's USB and supply data from the Arduino, as long as you connect both the TV's USB-Ground and the Arduino-Ground together.
Answer:

simulate this circuit – Schematic created using CircuitLab
Can you follow this? Connect all GNDs. TV 5V can power the Arduino, connect to the 5V/VCC pin and not the Vin pin.  5V power supply only powers the LED strip.  No reason it couldn't power the Arduino as well tho, in which case there would be no need to connect to connect anything to the TV.
PC USB ports typically can only supply 500mA, only enough for 8 RGB LEDs at full white. I doubt your TV can do much more.


Who is the strongest esper in One Punch Man?

Question: In One Punch Man there are several espers. One of them claims to be stronger than Tatsumaki. Is this true? Who is the strongest esper in One Punch Man?
Comment: Tatsumaki is the strongest esper shown so far. I can't seem to recall that an esper is claiming to be stronger than Tatsumaki. Who is it you're referring to? Is it Geryuganshoop?
Comment: Yes, I just watched the fight between Geryuganshoop  and Saitama, Geryuganshoop  claims he is in the anime. But I think I wrote it because of Psykos and I didnt want to mention her saying so for spoilers
Comment: I just saw that, I dont remember why I wrote that, I think Psykos claims so in the webcomic. Probably Geryuganshoop claimed the same in the anime, I dont recall
Comment: Lel there's always spoiler indications.
Comment: We need to know their power levels to make comparisons, and I haven't seen any scouters show up yet, so it's all conjecture.
Answer: Update: Gyoro Gyoro(Monster who created Orochi, the king of monsters) and described by Tatsumaki as a "Bag of Flesh" was actually as said, a doll controlled by an esper. While that esper goes by the name Psykos, nothing is revealed about her yet in the manga (Much less the anime).
Spoiler from the Webcomics:

In the Webcomics of One Punch Man (The most original version which is far ahead of the manga) created by the group One, shows the fight between Psykos and Tatsumaki. It is then revealed that Psykos was once a student/part of Fubuki's group and was nearly overpowered by Tatsumaki until the Cadets of the Monster Association attacked Tatsumaki. While defending herself against the Cadets, she didn't realize that Psykos was about to attack her until it was too late. After Tatsumaki was defeated by the surprise attack from Psykos, Fubuki comes in and attacks Psykos, which she comes out of victorious.

In conclusion, we could say that... (Spoilers)

Fubuki is the strongest because she won against Psykos who defeated the "strongest" esper Tatsumaki, but seeing as Psykos was weakened and Fubuki had focused her training on defense against overwhelming psychic strength, they all were strong in their own ways. Tatsumaki had the overwhelming resistance and raw power to crush enemies, while Psykos and Fubuki used subtle techniques like doll manipulation (Gyoro Gyoro), and scattering the psychic waves respectively. However, as User Gary Andrews 30 pointed out, Tatsumaki was shown to be more powerful in several more instances and Fubuki's simple scattering technique didn't count as power.

Psykos's character page:

 https://onepunchman.fandom.com/wiki/Psykos
Comment: Sorry, this is incorrect. Psykos was simply mad at Fubuki and fell right into her trap. She's at the very least, a top tier A class hero and nowhere close to Tatsumaki. She needed Tatasumaki's help to defeat Demon Fan and Super S who are both demon level threats.
Comment: That's true, but we can't tell that for sure, because she did defeat Psykos. That's why I claimed above that they are all strong in their own different ways. Of course Fubuki couldn't compare to Tatsumaki in raw power, but she does use a subtle way to win.
Comment: Tatsumaki is much stronger than Psykos and Fubuki as well.
Comment: https://anime.stackexchange.com/a/52688/31104
Answer: OP specifies in the comment that they are referring to claims made by Gyoro-Gyoro.  Eventually Gyoro-Gyoro encounters Tatsumaki and they battle. The following will be spoilers for anime-only people, but at this point the encounter has happened in the manga, and is essentially the same as in the webcomic.

Turns out it's all arrogant bluster by someone who didn't grasp the true depths of Tatsumaki's power.

 Though as mentioned in Sphinx's answer, in the webcomic Psykos, the real identity of Gyoro-Gyoro, tactically outmaneuvers Tatsumaki in a group battle by landing a sneak attack to disable her while she's about to crush several other Dragon rank monsters.  This isn't a victory by esper ability, but one can certainly give her credit for knowing how to find and exploit an opening in Tatsumaki's defenses.  Sphinx's answer is otherwise misleading as regards Fubuki, as in the same chapter her special technique is described it is pointed out that Tatsumaki mastered it as a child and has since adapted it into a weapon. That's the usual story of things: every new height Fubuki reaches is something Tatsumaki has achieved since childhood. Fubuki needed it to deal with Psykos's superior power.  There's no indication that Tatsumaki ever needed anything more than her usual barrier to completely negate that power, though she's certainly aware of how to use that technique to do so.
Answer: Tatsumaki, and by a wide margin.
geryuganshoop + Melzargard + Groribas (Boros's three lieutenants) together have been stated to have very little chance against Orochi, even with prep time.
Gyoro gyoro is weaker than Orochi, but was just a meat puppet controlled by Psykos, Psykos plus a psychic enhancing drug was seemingly able to fight with Orochi at least mentally and has shown more impressive abilities than geryuganshoop and is probably stronger.
Orochi + Psykos + psychic enhancing drug + a boost by god + energy sucked up from the planet was absolutely outclassed by Tatsumaki.
The question isn't whether Geryuganshoop could fight Tatsumaki, it's whether or not Boros could.


Asking out an intern at close of internship

Question: There is an intern at my company who has been there for two months. During this time I've helped her briefly on a few projects and we have talked socially at work a little but mostly worked completely in different departments. She is of the same age as me and will not be staying in the company at the end of the internship. Would it be inappropriate for me to ask her if she would like to get a drink outside of work?
Comment: Why are you concerened with this being inappropriate? In what regard? Company policy, society, the fact that she is leaving and you are not, not knowing her well enough, past experiences, something else?
Comment: What is your position at the company? Are you an intern too?
Answer: There shouldn't be any ethical conflict in asking her out, especially if she's about to leave the company.  Ask her out first in a general rather than specific way (for example, "I would love to take you on a date sometime" as opposed to "do you want to have dinner on Thursday?") so that she clearly knows your intentions. That way, if she says no, you'll know it's because she's not interested, rather than because she isn't available on that day, and then there is no miscommunication/confusion about that.
Even if the intern is leaving the company soon, there might be a different power dynamic based on the different roles you had in the organization.  So in addition to asking her out, it's very important to give her plenty of room to say no.  For example: "I've really enjoyed working with you.  This might sound forward, but I would love to see you again.  Do you want to go out with me sometime? If not, I'd also be happy to hang out as friends."  (Assuming that, for example, you are interested in pursuing a platonic friendship with her.)
Good luck!
Comment: The suggested wording sounds a bit odd, and might give someone pause, even if they were interested in going out.  Why not just say something like "I'd really like to get to know you better, would you like to go out for dinner sometime?".  Given that there's no power dynamic and no other ongoing relationship, if the intern isn't interested, she can "just say no".
Answer: The unethical part may be a thing when there is power or dependency in play (a boss asking out their reports for instance).
In larger companies this is something which is normed a way or another (a female friend of mine married a guy in her organization (he was her n-2) - once they started to date they were split into two organizations so that there is not formal hierarchical relationship and everything was good).
Some companies even encourage making a family with someone else in the company, or having several members of a family apply.
You are in a case where there is no hierarchical relationship between you (which is already easier) and on top of that she is leaving. So no - there is no problem here.
Now that I think of it I know a case where an ex-manager asked their intern out when that intern was leaving (to make sure all relationship has ended). Another happy marriage (at least it was a few years ago when I saw them for the last time).
UPDATE: Another case I recall is my professor at the university who married his student (he was a post-doc at that time and was teaching a group of students she was a member of). I got her as the TA for a course I was getting a few years later after they married.
Answer: So long as you respect her answer and ask politely there should be no issue with it.  I would be honest and tell her it is not work related but you are interested on getting to know her on a personal level, or romantic, etc... your own words.
Answer: It's risky asking her at work, particularly if she isn't interested—consider damage control. If you do ask her at work, make sure you don't have an audience.
Even then I advise against it, because when women are at work, they are hostage to the situation. FWIW this includes working women at their place of work, where you may just be a customer.
Get her a going-away card
I would do something different if I were in your shoes. I would get her a basic "Good Luck!" card. They sell them everywhere they sell greeting cards.. Inside the card, put something simple like:

"HER_NAME, you sure do stand out from the crowd!
   Good luck on your next
  adventure
   — user20910
PS. https://note.ly/2MizSRV

*Disclosure: I've never used note.ly, but I assume it allows people to share notes with others using short URLs similar to bit.ly, so to demonstrate this I formatted a fake note.ly URL and linked it to a bit.ly that's linked to note.ly's homepage. Hopefully you get the idea.
Make sure the note.ly note does something flirty like, suggesting you'd like to take her out, and 'Check one: yes, no, maybe.' The point is, make it fun. And don't forget to include your phone number in the note so she can actually respond!
Timing the card delivery is probably the hard part. Personally, on her last day, I'd take a half day off, deliver the card just before lunch, then bow out. This is mostly in the theme of "avoid an audience". Make sure it's a face-to-face hand-off, but don't dive deep; I'd say "HER_NAME, I've got to take off early today but I got you a going away card and didn't want to miss you. See you if I see you!" Then leave. Don't stall. Don't hesitate. Don't wait for additional conversation. Just go. As of now, your pieces are in play.
This solves some problems and does some fun things.

It doesn't put her on the spot at work, which saves everyone a whole
mess if she isn't interested.
It's a little drama which will drive her crazy till she follows the link, "What?? What is this link?? What is he doing!?!?"
It's ultra memorable. And it might single-handedly reset whatever context/frame she has of you, which at bare minimum you need to catapult out of "coworker-zone" ASAP.
And best of all, it puts the ball in her court. If you hear from her at all after this, game on.

If she doesn't have a boyfriend and if she's at least 51% into you, I'm pretty sure this approach will at least get you a text. From there it's up to you. Hopefully I'm not too late. :) Good luck!
Comment: Side note: FWIW I'm assuming from OP's mention that they are about the same age that there is not a risky power-dynamic, etc. If there is that increases the risk. You always have to tread carefully until you know whether your attention falls on the side of wanted or not wanted!


In the sentence "It is she", which is the subject?

Question: If she is the subject, what is then the function of it? If it is the subject, then shouldn't the sentence be It is her since she is a subject pronoun? Thanks!
Comment: It **should** be _It is her_, or more likely _It's her_. The sentence cited is a monstrosity that marks one as a non-English speaker, because it's what schoolmasters used to try to teach their students to say 200 years ago, in the (incorrect) belief that the upper-classes spoke that way. It violates two rules of conversational English: (1) Contract personal subject pronouns and auxiliary forms of _be_ following them; thus _It's_. (2) Any personal pronoun appearing after the verb appears in the objective form; thus _her_. Throw away the textbook you found that in.
Comment: @Edwin: I think John is specifically referring to *normal conversational English*. I'm sure most competent native speakers are perfectly familiar with the "wrong" usage, and many of us will produce it ourselves from time to time (in literary contexts, facetiously, or as a misguided "formal" hypercorrection, for example). Who among us has never responded with *"This is he/she"* when answering the office phone to someone who says *"Can I speak to [your name]?"*.
Comment: @FumbleFingers Me! I haven't! (though my father has done!)
Comment: John Lawler can speak so authoritatively because he's run the course (in fact, quite a few of them). And because all the people who actually used the English he says is obsolete died many years ago. Well, perhaps 99.9999% of them.
Comment: @JohnLawler: Actually, sometime between Shakespeare and today, English grammar changed. *'Tis she* became ungrammatical and *It's her* became grammatical. *King Lear*: *'Tis she is subcontracted to this lord*. *Othello*: *I know his gait, 'tis he.—Villain, thou diest!* No *'Tis him*'s, and all the sentences with *'Tis her* are like *'Tis her command*.
Comment: So I'm not completely convinced that the schoolmasters 200 years ago were wrong. They're certainly wrong today.
Answer: This is an interesting question. In the Original Poster's sentence she is indeed the nominative case pronoun. It is also true that we associate this case marking with the subjects of finite verbs - such as the verb is in the original example.
However, occasionally we find nominative case pronouns in non-subject positions. Here she is in fact not the subject but the complement of the verb BE. In normal usage we would expect to see accusative case her here:

It is her.

This usage of the nominative case is unusual, but it is recognised and described in grammars such as The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language, (Huddleston & Pullum 2002 p.459). As they point out, many speakers would find this usage rather 'pedantic'. Doubtless some people in the comments here are going to say it is a form of hyper-correction (I don't entirely disagree). This usage is definitely extremely formal, and notice it is even less acceptable if we couple it with an informal contraction of the verb:

It's she!

However, returning to the Original Poster's question, what then is the subject in this sentence? She here is nominative only in terms the name given to the pronoun used. It is not in subject position and is the complement of the verb BE. The subject then, by a process of elimination, must surely be it?
However, we do not have to take this for granted, there are several tests we can do:
Firstly, subjects normally occupy the position before the verb. This is obviously the case here.
Secondly, subjects invert with the auxiliary verb to form questions:

Is it she?

Here we see it inverted with is. Again, this seems to show that it is the subject. Thirdly, we use the subject and auxiliary to form question tags:

It is she, is it not?

Again here it can be shown to be the subject.
Fourthly in terms of case, although in standard English we may occasionally find nominative pronouns in non-subject positions, we hardly find accusative ones in subject position, unless co-ordinated. If we substitute it with a masculine pronoun, for example we would get:

He is she.

This is marginally acceptable. However...

Him is she.

... definitely isn't! Again this shows the first pronoun to be the subject.
Lastly every sentence in English, ignoring imperatives for the present purposes, is comprised of a subject and a predicate - where the predicate must include the verb. If we want to reiterate the sentence, we would probably get the following:

It is she! It is!

In the second sentence here, is  is taking code. This means that it is standing in for the rest of the Verb Phrase. In this instance, is stands for: is she. This shows that she is in the Verb Phrase, and therefore in the predicate. Also, the fact that there are only two words in the new sentence shows that, because the predicate is is, it must be the subject.
What is the subject of It is she? It is it!
Comment: Also, the verb invariably agrees in number and person with "it" rather than with the other pronoun; this isn't visible here, but it is in analogous structures ("It is I/me"  and "It is they/them", never "It am I" or "It are they").
Comment: Good answer.  Near the end, has "is comprised of" become acceptable?  In my school days, that was taught as an error.  Choices were "is composed of" or "comprises".  I did spot a dictionary reference so perhaps rampant misuse led to normality?
Answer: In classical grammar, it is the subject and she the subject
predicate, which is in the same (nominative) case as the subject.
Your assumption that she is a ''subject pronoun'' is wrong.  It is a
nominative pronoun, and the nominative is not used only in the subject
position but also in subject predicates.
Answer: My old brain recollects this as being reflexive, i.e. self-referential. Announcing a beauty-contest winner, or in a game of tag you would say "She is it!" which is grammatically identical. So "It is she" is technically correct. But like a lot of correct usages (wave bye-bye to subjunctive, everybody!) it is simply chucked out the window, along with the carcass of Samuel Johnson and his prescriptivism. Anarchy rules OK!
Comment: "...(even though some users of formal English still prefer **It is I**). Though **It's me** is fully acceptable, **It's him, It's her, It's us, it's them** are not" (!!-end of entry). LOVE that flat rejection at the end--sort of reminds you of King Knud (aka Canute) ordering the tide to recede, doesn't it? =[
Comment: Wellll, sheer WEIGHT of pop-usage has settled the question for us: It is her. Period. Anyone who disagrees can only grumble & fuss impotently Still, since this site advises resorting2 authorities, I haul out my Senior High *Guide to Modern English* (Corbin, Perrin, Buxton, no date =circa mid60s; Gage; Toronto). It's dictionary-ish; under **It's me** we get: "Formal grammarians explain that the verb **be** should always be followed by the nominative case: **It is I**. But in actual practice **It's me** is so generally used by educated people that it is now accepted standard usage... (1/2)
Comment: It's not a matter of throwing out the rules; rather, it's about determining what the rules actually are. Many (though certainly not all) of the *prescriptivisms* (for want of a better word) were deliberate impressions of Latin rules, or at least parallels of Latin rules, on the English language, the aim being to make the study of Latin easier on the one hand and to force English to conform to some ideal of respectability on the other. English *has* rules—oodles of them, some quite complex—there was no need to import foreign ones.
Comment: Also: you can't use the inverted version (*She is it*) to prove anything at all, since *it* has no distinct nominative/subject and accusative/object forms. In current European Indo-European languages, one would normally use the accusative or dative for the second part of an identity statement. *C'est moi.* *Es ist mir.* Latin worked differently; English doesn't.
Answer: Think of the following situation: You have got three phone calls in the morning from your ex-wife and she wasn't very polite. Now the phone is ringing again. Your mother asks "Who's that? You say: It is she/her again!
Now the question after "she" is: Who is it? And so I take "she" for the subject. It is natural that the answer to such a question can't be "it".
Another matter is the question what do we call the word "it". And there you will find a lot of terms: an impersonal it as in It's raining or a grammatical marker that the subject is in inverted position after the verb or something of the kind, the term isn't really important. I had, when I was teaching languages, the same problem: what term to use for such words as here/there/it at the beginning of a sentence. I used the term "main subject"for the inverted subjected and the term "function word/marker for inverted subject-position or even secondary/ introductory subject. This way I had not to care about a list of various terms in various grammars and various languages. By the way, you can call it what you want, even subject if you want.


Movies uploaded to iTunes

Question: How do I get the movies that I have uploaded to iTunes from my Mac to show up on my iPad? I have several movies that I would like to see on my iPad. I figured the best way to upload to iTunes, but when I launch iTunes on my iPad I cannot see or find them.
Comment: Note that the iTunes app on your iPad is only the iTunes Music Store, nothing more. You have to transfer the movie to your iPad using the iTunes app on your Mac.
Comment: https://www.google.com/search?q=copy+a+movie+to+ipad
Comment: See also http://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/105377/import-movies-already-on-computer-into-itunes and http://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/49379/how-to-transfer-itunes-videos-to-ipad
Answer: I don't believe there is any such thing as "uploading" to iTunes on the Mac. Rather, you import/add your own video files to your library or purchase them from the iTunes store.
Any movie or tv show purchased from the iTunes store should automatically be in your Mac iTunes library and also be able play on your iPad after you sync it there.
You can import pretty much any movie file of your own to your Mac iTunes library. From there, you can use iTunes to sync it to your iPad; however, your iPad can only play a few specific movie formats (scroll down to TV and Video). If your movies aren't in that format, you won't be able to play them on the iPad whether you sync them or not.
Once your iPad is connected to your Mac, you have options in iTunes on the Mac to auto-sync certain playlists of videos or all videos to your iPad. You can also use it manually, and simply drag/drop the desired video files from your Mac iTunes library onto your iPad library when it is connected to iTunes.

Movies uploaded to iTunes


Why does ゆっくり take the honorific prefix ご?

Question: Is ゆっくり the only mimetic expression that accepts the honorific prefix ご?
And for that matter, why does it take the honorific prefix ご- which is usually meant for 漢語?
Comment: 明鏡には、`まれに、和語であっても、「ご」が付くものがある。「ごもっとも・ごゆっくり・ごゆるり」`って書いてありますね。 https://sakura-paris.org/dict/%E6%98%8E%E9%8F%A1%E5%9B%BD%E8%AA%9E%E8%BE%9E%E5%85%B8/content/745_738
Comment: Related: [Honorific prefix 「ご」 vs 「お」](https://japanese.stackexchange.com/q/2111/542), [Looking Up Whether 御 is お or ご](https://japanese.stackexchange.com/q/15881/542)
Answer: There are a number of exceptions regarding the usage of お/ご, and, ultimately, you have to learn them individually.
According to a survey by Tanaka (1972) based on the word usage of newspapers, お attaches to a kango roughly 20% of the time, but ご very rarely attaches to a wago (they identified only ごもっとも and ごゆっくり). Even a long academic article dedicated for this topic lists only ごもっとも, ごゆっくり and ごゆるり. ゆるり is mimetic, so ごゆっくり is not the only mimetic expression that accepts ご. Still, you can say the number of such words is very small.
Kango that take お tend to be common and daily words such as お風呂, お料理, お財布, お写真 and お掃除. A few words accept both お and ご, and in such cases ご sounds stiffer (e.g. お誕生 vs ご誕生, お返事 vs ご返事). FWIW, I feel ごゆっくり, ごもっとも and ごゆるり also have formal, polite or even a little pompous overtones.
Answer: For clarity, I edited my answer by adding the text inside [] in the 1st paragraph below:
In addition, if one prefers to use a one-words sentence like "Relax!", saying only "ゆっくり" sounds confusing [because saying only ゆっくり would mean "be careful, do it slowly!", instead of "relax!"]. Maybe ゆっくりどうぞ could work without a ご but, at least I wouldn't say so.
So, ご it is partly to ensure that the person to which ゆっくり is adressed to feels that he/she hears it in a positive way.
p.s. On the other hand using both ご and どうぞ in a sarcastic way, the meaning could also be "You are just sitting there on the sofa and you really should realize yourself that while I am washing the dishes, there are lots of things that you could do, like maybe taking out the rubbish!"


Will my food continue to cook on the warm setting?

Question: I want to start a meal in my crock pot and the recipe only calls for about 4 hours of cooking. However, no one will be home for another 3 hours to turn it off, but it will shut down and go to the warm setting. Once it sets itself to warm, will it still be cooking? I don't want the chicken to be overcooked.
Comment: Note that you should also double-check that your crock pot's warm setting keeps the food above 140F - there's a good chance it is, but if it's not, it's not safe to hold food there indefinitely. (See for example http://cooking.stackexchange.com/q/59764/1672)
Comment: It is hard to overcook chicken in a crock.  I have gone a day on warm with chicken and other meats.
Answer: It's still going to be heated, so yes it's going to carry on cooking.
However, the temperature on the "warm" setting is going to be lower, so it will cook more slowly, and therefore you might be okay.
It's difficult to say for sure, because it depends on what exactly the temperatures involved are.
Answer: Yes, the "low" vs "high" settings on slow cookers are for different cooking times - really slow, or if you don't have that much time, the high setting.
If you look at the owner's manual, and the recipes in there, you can see that the dishes can be cooked on the low setting.
However, this assumes that you're talking about the low cook setting, and not an entirely different setting at altogether.  The brand of slow-cooker might be helpful in this regard.  Even in that case, if it's adding heat to keep it warm, it would still be cooking it to some degree.
Comment: Some models (I've never seen one in the UK but apparently they're common in the US) have a "warm" setting that's lower than "low".  A maximum hold time is often stated as this mode can't be relied on to provide enough heat to maintain a safe temperature indefinitely
Comment: @ChrisH - This is where reliable appliances work against us.  My slow-cooker dates back to the early 1990s.  "Off," "Low," and "High."  My mom sent me a newer model about two years ago, the box has yet to be opened.  Maybe I should not answer unless the question specifically references "vintage" kitchen gadgets.
Comment: @ChrisH - so the new high setting is really " 'slow' cooking for people too impatient for slow cooking"?  lol
Comment: Our new one has "Medium" (and in the order "high, low, medium" at that).  Medium cooks about as fast as high on the old one, high tends to overcook unless the pot is very full.  They're not really standardised, but the recipes tend to be forgiving enough that it doesn't matter


Is this an acceptable place to ask for feedback on a sculpt? If not what would be a better place?

Question: Feedback from people who know what they are doing would be helpful in getting better, but I do not know a great place to ask for that feedback.
Comment: Generally the point of meta is for discussing the site, if that's what your question is.
Answer: No BSE is not for Critiques. (See point six What questions should be definitely off-topic?) Any question like you described would get closed as off topic.
You could try in our chat room there is almost always somebody there, but I dont know how much help you will get.
A much better place for feedback is on blender artists. There is a entire thread for Focused Critiques.
Answer: Try CG Stack Extchange, I guess that would be the right place to do so, since I've seen a post there requesting feedback, and nobody seems to object: https://computergraphics.stackexchange.com/
Still make sure to ask the right question, as in asking, what do you think is missing? Or should I do it this way? Rather than How do you like it?
Comment: On Computer Graphics Stack Exchange a request for an artistic review would be off topic, but a review of code that produces or works with models could be on topic depending on the context. A review of a hand sculpted model would be off topic. As a rough guide, if you're *writing* software your question is likely to be on topic, while if you're *using* software it is likely off topic. Research and algorithm questions are also on topic though, so for specific details see the Computer Graphics [on topic page](http://computergraphics.stackexchange.com/help/on-topic).
Comment: @trichoplax http://computergraphics.stackexchange.com/questions/2556/what-physical-properties-are-lacking-to-keep-this-3d-scene-from-looking-like-a
Comment: I thought that might be the example you were thinking of - it's a good way of seeing that the scope isn't obvious. In that case it's asking about which physical effects need to be included, rather than asking for a review of just the model. Some answers do include criticism of the model though, since that's part of what breaks the realism.
Comment: I think that the type of review question that the author of this meta question has in mind would be off topic, but Computer Graphics may well be an appropriate site for some of the people who find this meta question in future. Exactly what is on topic can't be easily summed up in comments, but there's the on topic page and also [Computer Graphics chat](http://chat.stackexchange.com/rooms/26589/the-cornell-box) for anyone with further queries.
Comment: Exactly it's a feedback request of a specific aspect concerning an artistic opinion based matter


What is the purpose of the composition the patent office sends

Question: I try to make my first patent (a machine/construction) in my country. Here is how things are, I thought of an idea I constructed, it is fully operational so I make a request with the data to the patent office (including the description I made, the schematics, the claims). The patent office sends me a file with patents that have some claims the same/similar as mine, either part of them or all of them, but these patents exist on US, China and one international patent (the last one covers 3 out of 9 of my claims). None of them is a patent in my country. So my question what is the purpose of the composition that the patent office sends to me? What should I check/see?
Answer: You don't state your country, but the general rule is that prior art anywhere in the world is prior art everywhere in the world. Thus you can't just patent in your country an invention found in any other country. This is not limited to patents. Any invention that is publicly disclosed is prior art.
I always suggest working with a patent attorney when drafting patents. Writing claims that are effective is difficult and requires experience and legal knowledge. While you see patents with similar claims, they may not be truly the same invention. In nearly every one of my patents the patent office cited prior art. With my patent attorney, we explained why that prior art was different from my inventions and in nearly every case obtained a patent.
Also, I should point out that if there are no patents covering your product in your country, you can sell the product in your country without fear of infringing a patent even if you don't obtain a patent yourself.
Comment: @just_learning I am not a lawyer so I can't give legal advice. Of course you can amend claims to try get your patent granted. The difficulty is that the rest of the application needs to support the amended claims. Few lay people do a good job of this. You want to avoid having such narrow claims that the patent provides little protection.
Comment: @just_learning Although I appreciate your accepting my answer, it might be worth waiting a couple of days to allow other to answer.
Comment: Yes, I live in European country, so it is not a good idea to quit your right to configure or change the claims after the patent office sends you their composition with the covered claims from other patents, right?
Answer: Usually a patent office will make you aware of publications, patents and patent applications that tend to show that your claims are either not new (not novel or anticipated) and/or are obvious (lack an inventive step or element). Any document published anywhere in the world in any language at any time before you filed can be used to show that your idea is not new.
Along with it should be a search report or rejection that spells out how aspects of the publications map onto your claims and give you a time period to reply. To get the patent you need to either amend your claims to only included novel and non-obvious claims or argue why the publication do not show what the examiner thinks they show.
Comment: What do these terms mean in practice, that the patent office indicated in the research report they have sent me: "especially relevant if it is combined with another
document of the same category" and "technological background". Has my patent the claims covered or not?


What exactly are Prestige classes, and what purpose do they serve?

Question: What exactly are Prestige classes, and what purpose do they serve?  Are they, in any way, better than the default classes?  Do they have any disadvantages/advantages to them?
Answer: From the DMG, pg176:

Prestige classes offer a new form of multiclassing. Unlike the basic classes found in the Player's Handbook, characters must meet requirements before they can take their first level fo a prestige class. The rules for level advancement (see page 58 of the Player's Handbook) apply to this system, meaning the first step of advancement is always choosing a class. If a character does not meet the requirements for a prestige class before that first step, that character cannot take the first level of that prestige class.

Basically, when you gain a level, you can choose any basic class to gain a level in (unless you're ineligible for alignment reasons). You could instead choose a prestige class, if you meet the prestige class' requirements.
Prestige classes (henceforth PrCs, the typical abbreviation) allow specializations or options not available in base classes, or make it easier to combine different base classes.
Some examples from the DMG are the Arcane Archer, which allows a character to imbue their arrows with magic, the Arcane Trickster, which combines rogue skills & sneak attacks with arcane spellcasting, and the Blackguard, which allows an evil fighter-type to become an anti-paladin.
You can't discuss advantages/disadvantages of PrCs in general: the quality range is simply too wide. Some PrCs offer very nice benefits to players who meet a few simple prerequisites they might want to get anyway, while others require you to meet excessive requirements for fairly minimal benefits.
Almost every class can benefit from taking carefully selected PrCs rather than continuing in their base class (especially wizards), but it's generally best to ask people who are familiar with all the PrCs what choices are best for your base class to aim for (the Giants in the Playground forums are one good place to ask, but you can also try here). Be sure you mention which source books your DM allows you to use PrCs from, as across the couple dozen official 3.5 rulebooks there are well over 100 PrCs. You should also find out if there are any PrCs that your DM specifically forbids: a few are so good that many groups ban them, or strongly enforce any roleplaying restrictions attached to the PrC in order to discourage players from taking them.
It's generally not a question of whether you should take levels in prestige classes so much as which ones and when.
Note that the requirements for most PrCs can't be met until your character is at least level 5 or 6, if not higher, so if you know the game isn't going to reach at least level 6, it's generally not worth worrying about prestige classes.
Comment: the Revised System Reference Document (RSRD) is a good resource for [prestige classes](http://www.d20srd.org/srd/prestigeClasses/prestigeClasses.htm) such as [Arcane Trickster](http://www.d20srd.org/srd/prestigeClasses/arcaneTrickster.htm), since it is 1. official 2. free 3. legal
Answer: Some background: prestige classes were a new concept introduced to D&D 3e by game designer Jonathan Tweet, who said that he based them on the cult levels in Runequest (one, two, three).  There, each character progresses in two main ways: first by improving their skills through, and secondly by getting access to cult knowledge, where progress in the cult unlocks the most powerful magics in the game.  Progress in the cult went through stages: first initiation, and then a mastery that usually came in two flavours, either rune lords, who are the heroic actors of the cult, or rune priests, who are the guardians of the cults ways.  By joining a cult, though, the character shapes themselves: simply belonging to one cult or another affects how others view you, and some cults have drastic restrictions, e.g., the main healer cult forbids its initiates from killing, and rune levels generally come with big time commitments.
In D&D, prestige classes work in a somewhat similar way: they are a second realm of endeavour that opens up new possibilties for characters, many giving special abilities that can be gained in no other way, where advancement in prestige requires some basic professional skill, but can be pursued independently.  They give an excellent opportunity to provide colour to PCs.
The prestige classes in the Defenders of the Faith show off the mechanic in a manner close to that of RQ: the prestige classes involve religious commitments and ties to game world organisations.
So, to answer your questions, the purpose of prestige classes is to add interest (in both the game appeal and narrative value) to character development; they may be better in that they open up possibilities for the characters - talk of character builds often leverage prestige classes.  As for disadvantages, they are costly in terms of XP, and they may involve onerous commitments.
Answer: The upside is that you are supposed to get a more specialized ability set and have something to look forward to as your character develops.  On the downside, everyone and their mother tends to want to make a prestige class for that flavor of the week, so be very careful when selecting one about how it applies to the campaign you're in.
Answer: Prestige classes are meant to be homebrewed, the 3.5 DMG - and moreso the DMG 2 - is very clear about that.  They're a way to integrate narrative and mechanics.  Say for example you have a forest-dwelling race who are master archers.  You can (and probably should) make their favored class ranger, yes, but you can also make a prestige class for them that grants bow-related bonuses (e.g., arcane archer).  Say you have a guild of master thieves, so skilled in their thievery it's like magic, reality defers to their expertise, you could make a class that combines elements of wizard and rogue, using magic to enhance their skills (e.g., arcane trickster).  The prestige classes in the book are just examples, "the best prestige classes for your campaign are the ones you make yourself."
Comment: (Uh, that said, I didn't downvote, and I think that's a little harsh. I suspect you'll find a better reception if you answer the question more completely, and maybe break up your wall of text there a little. But that said, we *are* really serious about being a Q&A site: you are supposed to *answer the question* as your primary responsibility. We're not here to discuss, as on a lot of forums, but to answer questions. I suggest checking out the [Tour] for more details on how we're a bit different from other sites you might be used to. Also, when you get 20 rep, feel free to discuss in [Chat]!)
Comment: @SevenSidedDie Regardless of opinions on that (not denying its RAW status), the answer is still fairly incomplete. It doesn't explain what they are, especially in contrast to base classes, or address the question of whether they are 'better' or what advantages and disadvantages they may have.
Comment: Wizards gave lip-service to that idea, and then *completely* undercut it by publishing **massively** more prestige classes than they did anything else (probably with the exception of spells and magic items). Regardless of what the DMG(2) says, this just is not the reality of 3.5 as it was published. On top of that, this answer feels somewhat incomplete; even if we buy that the best prestige classes are those you make yourself, *you still haven't said what a prestige class **is**,* which is the question.
Comment: This is RAW in the DMGs, +1. (Whatever meta-messages people take from WotC's publishing schedule due to Hasbro's fiscal-report demands, those are not RAW.)
Answer: Yes, depending on the situation, a prestige class can be charming more powerful than a base class. A prestige class also adds a new flavor to the classes — for example, a Hospitaler is a cleric committed to an organization, while a Cavalier is a fighter specialized in mounted combat.
Prestige classes offer focused mix of flavor and advancement: if you want to make a good archer class, the Deep-Wood Sniper prestige class is the way to go; if you want to become any monster possible, the Shapeshifter is the way to go. Basically, taking a prestige class adds new roleplaying elements to your base class.
Prestige classes are very diverse in what they offer in terms of advantages and disadvantages. Some prestige classes excel in certain situations at the expense of other situations. Some prestige classes excel in a role like healing in exchange for less survivability (like the Radiant Servant of Pelor). And so on.
Comment: @BrianBallsun-Stanton It's fueled by the raw material. I do what I can.
Comment: Normally, I would downvote an answer for quality as low as this; as you are new, I will not do so, but I assure you that you are not likely to receive many *upvotes* either (and I see others are not as generous as I am). Capitalization makes your writing easier to read and makes it look more serious and professional. This is actually a fairly good answer that *looks* bad; take some pride in your work and put in the effort to polish it.
Comment: Editor Hat Engage!
Comment: @SevenSidedDie Editor Hat needs a powerup, I fear.


Can I cook a pre-made meatloaf from frozen?

Question: Can I cook a pre-made meatloaf from frozen?  And if so, what temp, covered or not covered, and how long - how do I know when it is done?
Comment: How big is the loaf, is it in a pan? Its weight would be helpful.
Answer: Yes, you can cook a meatloaf from frozen. At 350F (175C), it will take about 1.5 times the length of time it would take to cook a non-frozen meatloaf of the same size. You will get more of a crust cooking a meatloaf from frozen, so consider that while considering whether to cook the loaf in a pan or not, also whether to glaze it. The crust will be somewhat inhibited by covering for the first half of cooking, so consider that as well, that's a matter of personal preference. If you use a glaze, let the meat cook for a half an hour or so before you apply the glaze. If you glaze before you put it in the oven, you'll risk burning the glaze.
MOST IMPORTANTLY
Use a thermometer, either instant read or leave-in - using both is even better. The meatloaf will be done when the thermometer(s) reading the very center of the loaf reads at least 160F (71C). Let it rest for a few minutes before serving.


Why saying "jummah mubarakah" or "eid mubarak" is considered a bidah (innovation)?

Question: It came to a shock on me that saying have a blessed jummah (Friday) is an innovation in Islam because it has never been said by the sahabis nor by our beloved prophet (saw).
Comment: Because of the difference of opinions in the definition of "bidah", I'd like to clear out that according to the majority of the scholars, this wouldn't be a bidah even though there were no proofs about this hadith.
Answer: Saying "Eid Muarak" or any good greetings for Eid is not a bidaah since the sahabah used to do it:

Jubayr ibn Nufayr said: "At the time of the Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, when people met one another on the day of `Eid, they would say: Taqabbal Allahu minnaa wa minka (May allah accept yours and our good deeds)."

[Reported by Al-Albani with an authentic chain of transmission]
As for Jummah. There is no harm in doing so. Unless you consider this as a sunnah (keep doing it every Friday) or you think saying "Jummah mubarakh" will increase your good deeds. Then this is considered a bidahh.


Why doesn't my HDMI connector output sound to my TV?

Question: I have a Sony Vaio laptop which is running Ubuntu 10.10. I have switched the sound settings so that the output is to HDMI stereo, but I'm still getting no sound when playing YouTube.  I have a Samsung TV. Why isn't there any sound coming from the HDMI connector?
Comment: I vaguely recall that audio over HDMI is broken on Linux.  I didn't work for me the last time I tried it.
Answer: In order to get sound over hdmi in linux, you need to insure the driver your using has support for it.  In my case my desktop is running an AMD card that in order for me to get audio I had to switch to the driver from AMD instead of the opensource one.  Do you know what video card is in the laptop?  If it is INTEL, it should work, if it is AMD I suggest using their driver, same with NVIDIA.


Scheduling of planned orders while respecting certain stock levels

Question: I am searching for the academic name of the problem of computing a valid schedule for planned order. More precisely, The problem consists of: list of orders O, available vehicle per day K, and the quantity of stock replenishment per day. My goal is to compute a schedule of order o delivered at day j while making sure that stock is not below or above critical levels.
Comment: Many or even most of the models I have worked on have no name in the literature that exactly covers what they are doing. Shoehorning a model to fit some existing model can lead to less natural modeling. By default, I try to stay close to the problem at hand.
Comment: Often I just start modeling (e.g. as a MIP). That is a good exercise to get a better understanding of the problem. If there is literature, I often find that to be easier to read, after I have been playing with the model a bit.
Comment: Thank you for your advice! The problem isn't hard to model, I think, but I am very surprised that I can't find it in the literature. I would think that it is a common problem in the industry. Scheduling of orders of different products on a month horizon. Such that the stock, which has a consistent inflow from my production, stays always between safe levels. Cant make all deliveries on day one for example cause not enough stock, can't let it too long because my stock will become full and products would be destroyed
Answer: This sounds like the inventory routing problem.
Comment: Thank you for your reply! but it's a little different I think. I am not trying to optimize the routing. The vehicle part is to say that I can ship only a limited quantity per day. It's more like a nurse's scheduling problem, where each order has to be assigned to a particular day. However, the number of orders that can be delivered per day is constrained by the limited number of vehicles, and the available stock. Stocks are replenished every two days.
Comment: I don't control the stock, stock replenishing is input, I just need to make schedule for the orders so that the stock is not overcapacitated neither empty. The stock is the ouput of a production process that cannot be changed. I search something like shipping schedueling with respect to inventory level constraints, but didn't found the problem.
Answer: I think the "drayage scheduling problem " might open a window for you.


Is there a way to create a Personal Geodatabase in QGIS?

Question: Is there a way to create a Personal Geodatabase in QGIS?  I know QGIS can view Personal Geodatabases, but can one be created?  I have a project where the client is requiring a small spatial database (they are very low on the tech level, so I do not want to jump into PostGIS etc etc).  They also only use ArcGIS.  I would like to do the project in QGIS, hence my question.
Answer: According to the GDAL docs:

OGR optionally supports reading ESRI Personal GeoDatabase .mdb files
  via ODBC. Personal GeoDatabase is a Microsoft Access database with a
  set of tables defined by ESRI for holding geodatabase metadata, and
  with geometry for features held in a BLOB column in a custom format
  (essentially Shapefile geometry fragments). This drivers accesses the
  personal geodatabase via ODBC but does not depend on any ESRI
  middle-ware.

Writing a personal geodatabase on the other hand, is another story. Access mdb is a proprietary file format and open source projects like QGIS tend to stay away from them. I did see an old open source project called MDB Tools which aims to

MDB Tools is an open source suite of libraries and utilities to read
  (and soon write) MDB database files.

I'm not sure how far along their goal that project is though. So no,  I don't think you can create personal geodatabase files using QGIS as of now or any time soon.
As for your client's request, @Ragi has just finished writing an ArcGIS plugin that let's you use OGR sources, this includes Spatialite and PostGIS. That way you can use ArcGIS and PostGIS ( or Spatialite, whichever you prefer ). You might want to give it a try.
I hope that helps.
Answer: QGIS uses the OGR library for the majority of it's GIS format access.  The Personal GDB access falls under this grouping.
Based on the OGR Vector Format's page here:  OGR Vector Formats
The ESRI Personal GeoDatabase driver does not have Creation support.
Answer: I had the same question now - what alternative to 'geodatabase' is there in QGIS that could hold multiple layers with attribute tables in a single file. I did not find answer at first, but I found this question.
After some research I found that SpatiaLite database is nice replacement for it tutorial http://www.qgistutorials.com/en/docs/digitizing_basics.html
Also I found that SpatiaLite is transferable between ArcGis and QGIS see this blog:  http://blog.geomusings.com/2013/08/07/spatialite-and-arcgis-10-dot-2/
Comment: I have been using SpatiaLite DBs in QGIS with great success.


How to make a POST request using the Collectd curl plugin?

Question: How do I make a post request using the curl plugin? I see no option where I can specify the post data, or the type of request.
Is it even possible with the plugin, or is there an alternative plugin I can use?
Answer: While libcurl certainly supports the POST method (example), it appears that the specific functionality isn't exposed in the current version of the collectd plugin.
Your best shot is probably going to be to setup a server/service/page that can "proxy" the POST request for you through a GET request, and return the results.