Is the Chinese name 海追远 weird sounding?

Question: My Chinese teacher gave me the name 海追远 last year. I picked out the surname 海 because it sounds like my last name, he just gave me the first name 海追远. Now that  I've started a college Chinese class, my teacher told me 海 is an uncommon surname and that it doesn't fit with 追远。 I'm looking for honest opinions on how common 海 is as a surname and whether it works with 追远.
Comment: 海 is a valid family name, though rather uncommon. I have more problem with 追. Theoretically, you can pick whatever character you like to be your name, but 追 to me sounds a bit unusual. Maybe your teacher was thinking "慎終追遠" when s/he picked that name for you? 慎終追遠 can be loosely translated as "remembering your ancestors".
Comment: I saw the last name 海 in a novel, a character in it is named 海大富. Another character from another novel is named 海紅珠. I've never heard of a real-life person have the last name 海. Not any person I heard of, nor any person from the news. Oh, 海瑞 is a real historical character who was a famous government official
Comment: The famous Hemingway is transliterated as 海明威, maybe you can change your name to 海明远? BTW Heidi  is  transliterated as 海迪
Comment: 海 is definitely a valid surname as other comments mentioned. As for the first name, to be honest, you can pick whatever you like. We usually name our children with our wishes. Taking 追遠 as an example, it sounds like you wish the kid to memorize their ancestors (which is important in Chinese culture though). You may be able to provide your expectations for your Chinese name. We can give you suggestions accordingly.
Answer: For your first question, there are about 48000 people whose surname is 海 in China, accounting for about 0.004% of Chinese total population. (This data comes from https://wenda.so.com/q/1591524650610065.) It is really a rare surname that I have not seen anyone surnamed 海 around me.
For your second question, I do not know why your teacher told you it doesn't fit with 追远. I think it is ok. And if you still mind it, 海明远 mentioned in comments looks more proper.
Furthermore, having a rare surname is a cool thing in my eyes. When I was young, I always dream to have a rare or compound surname, like 慕容 欧阳 姬. But different from you, I can not choose my surname by myself. I think your teacher may just be worried about your possible misunderstanding of Chinese Name System. It should not be related to name itself.
Answer: Is 海追远 "weird" sounding?
Not weird, but certainly "unusual" For males, the traditional names tend to connote qualities like "intelligence", "strength", "bravery", "patriotism","wealth", etc., qualities all parents wish for their children to have.
追远, "to chase far", as a name may elicit a teasing response like 追什么远? (what are you chasing thus far?)
So, it is not "weird", in the negative sense of the word, but I wouldn't name my child that, unless I live on a remote, isolated island and it is my fervent hope that with  海追远 my child would one day escape away from the isolated loneliness and "chase / seek his fame and fortune in far off lands over the seas"
Or, (speculatively), your teacher thought that you have a long, long way to go in your Chinese language studies and it thus amounted to an "ocean of a chase of a distant objective"

Is the Chinese name 海追远 weird sounding?


Who is/was the founder of

Question: if someone asks me "Who is the founder of apple?" Should I reply in present tense or past tense?Like, "The founder of the apple is/was Steve jobs": 'Was' or 'is', which one should I use? As I know the person is not alive, I think I should use past tense. But the questioner asks the question in present tense, then what form should I use? I've also seen in exams that questions often comes in present tense in this kind of context despite knowing that The person about whom information is being sought is not alive? Can someone tell me the reason? If I ask someone 'who was the founder of Apple', will I be wrong?
Answer: If the person is no longer alive, then it's common to use the past tense, even if the question is phrased in the present tense.

The founder of Apple was Steve Jobs, who passed away in 2011.

Otherwise, it's really up to you.  If the person is no longer associated with the company, then again, it's common to use the past tense even if they're still alive.

Steve Wozniak was Apple's other founder, and actually built the first Apple computer, but he has not been directly involved with the company for many years.

However, this only matters if you use the "to be" verb.  You can avoid all that with different wording:

Both Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak founded Apple computer in the late 1970s.

On an exam it's possible they don't want to give an clues to the answer by using the past tense, even if they know the person is no longer alive.  If the person is likely to be dead, then the question will normally be phrased in the past tense.  Example:

Who was the ruler of England at the time of the American Revolution?
Comment: If I ask someone(a student) 'who was the founder of apple', will it be wrong?
Comment: I think it is enough to say the "founding" was in the past, regardless of anything after that, so use past tense.
Comment: @user250189  Yes, it's fine.  Or you can just ask "Who founded Apple?" and avoid the issue.
Comment: @user3169  I would say, "Bill Gates **is** the founder of Microsoft,"  but as I say it's more personal preference than grammar.

Who is/was the founder of


How to backup WP blog posts to computer, not new site

Question: Can someone please help me? I have purchased a new domain which is now sharing with my previous one that is currently "parked" there. While I will be keeping some posts on the site, I am revamping most pages and thus want to download my posts to my computer so I don't lose the work. I tried exporting, but the xl file looked so convoluted and confusing. What I'd ideally like is just a text version of each post  (even if they are all together in one file) so that I can go back and copy/paste if I ever want to. I also just want to keep the writing since some of it is personal/sentimental without losing it all. Thank you in advance!
Comment: WP stores everything in the database, so if you can access your database and download a .sql file, that would allow you to have a backup of all of the text. You can open this type of file in various text editors and IDEs, such as Notepad++ or VSCode, and see the text in a fairly human-readable form.
Comment: You could also consider using the Internet Archive to manually archive each post. That way you'd be able to see the full pages exactly as they were, text, layout, and all. It's just a bit laborious as you have to paste in each URL individually.
Answer: If you can login to the admin of your parked domain, install this plugin https://wordpress.org/plugins/wp-ultimate-csv-importer/ and save the csv. You can see all of your content there.


triangle wave form to sine form through band pass filter

Question: Why and how does this active band pass filter change a triangle form to a sine form? I know that the band pass filter consists of a low pass and a high pass , so it cancels out some frequencies , but I don't understand graphically how this could happen.
Comment: Graphically? Are you trying to understand this looking at this fancy animation?
Comment: First, if you picked the cut-off correctly, you don't need the high-pass part of the band-pass filter to convert triangle to sine. Second, the output will only be approximately a sine, and you can make the approximation better by using a higher-order LPF.
Comment: @ThePhoton I am specifically asked to use this filter as is
Comment: @Maverick98, Okay, but you can get rid of the 10 uF cap on the input and understand why the simpler circuit converts triangle to sine. Then put it back in to satisfy whoever dictates that you must use it.
Comment: @ThePhoton ok I'll try it :)
Answer: Any repeating wave form - including a triangle wave - can be represented as a sum of sine waves.  Look up "Fourier analysis" for details.  These sine waves consist of a "fundamental", the lowest frequency, plus a series of "harmonics" at higher frequencies.
Applying a bandpass filter to the waveform just selects the frequency you want, and discards all the others.  Pick the right filter and, in theory at least, you'd get a perfect sine wave out.
Comment: can you recommend me a link which explains in depth the fourier analysis of those signals (square, triangle ) ?
Comment: I actually found those two links really helpful for anyone interested
http://mathworld.wolfram.com/FourierSeriesSquareWave.html
http://mathworld.wolfram.com/FourierSeriesTriangleWave.html
Comment: @Maverick98 There's a nice illustration of the fundamental and the first 2 harmonics on this page: http://leancrew.com/all-this/2015/01/the-michelson-fourier-analyzer/


What is this vial for in this package of grass jelly?

Question: Recently I bought a package of grass jelly. My understanding of the instructions is that I should mix the powder in the package with a liter of cold water and 100g of sugar and then heat on a stove until it thickens. However, there is also a little vial of liquid in the package labelled "dầu chuối" which google translate tells me is "banana oil" and I don't see anything about it in the instructions. Is this something optional to add at the end for flavoring? Should I add it at the beginning? Or should I just not be consuming it at all?
Answer: Ok, did a little more hunting and found this link which says:

Some packages contain a sugar packet and a small tube of banana essence. The banana essence can be a bit strong, but if you enjoy it, add during the last minute of cooking.
Answer: In most (or all) sweet soups or jelly-like cakes like this, we use banana oil when the soup is being served. Just drop 2 or 3 drops to give aroma to the sweet soup bowl.
Don't put it when you are cooking, the oil will evaporate.


Repairing down stuff?

Question: I got a rip in my down jacket. I assume the fabric is nylon. What is the best way to repair a rip in a down sleeping bag or jacket?
Answer: There's a product called "Tenacious Tape" which is used for fabric repair. You should be able to find it at your local outdoor store, or search for it online.
Answer: I would probably use sail repair tape, which you should be able to get from most chandlers. You can get a range of colours to try and match your sleeping bag.
As well as rolls of tape you can also get patches which are slightly easier to use and are often slightly cheaper, but give you a lot less tape. If you are only repairing a single patch these may be better value.
To improve the lifetime of your repair cut your tape/patch into a circle or lozenge as the corners peeling up if generally what causes the repair to fail.
For large rips it may be worth sowing the hole shut first, as this will improve the strength of the repair and stop the hole growing. For sleeping bags and jackets this is probably not necessary in most cases as they do not often undergo high forces and it makes the repair significantly more difficult. If you do so use a reasonably strong thread and as thin a needle as possible to minimize further damage to the fabric.
Answer: According to this German blog post either duct tape, the Tenacious Tape mentioned by Greg Hewgill in his answer or – and I was a bit surprised about that – also bicycle tube patches should be OK for an on-trail repair.
However, the post also argues that normally these do neither look very nice nor are they very durable. Instead, they suggest to get the hole fixed either by the manufacturer of the respective gear or some professional repair service for down gear as soon as you get home again.
Answer: So far I've far avoided needing to make such a repair but most of the repairs I've seen in the wild have either been gaffer tape or a patch of fabric stuck on with seam sealant. Sometimes if its a small hole just pinching it together and covering with seam sealant.
Six Moon Designs has a useful guide for which sealants are best for which materials and a recipe to make your own. I'll summarize below encase the link becomes dead.
silnylon use McNett's SilNet
Polyester Fabric use McNett's Seam Grip or McNett's Seam Sure
Cuben Fiber use McNett's SilNet or McNett's Seam Grip
DIY seam sealant

If you wish, you can save some money when seam sealing SilNylon shelters. You can easily make your own sealer that'll work as well as the commercial stuff. It'll also give you a better looking seal.

Purchase the following items. They should be are available from most local hardware stores.

GE Silicone II clear tub and sink caulk - The small tube will make enough to seal several tents. The large tube will make enough to seal everything you own and then some.
Mineral Spirits - Commonly used for cleaning paint brushes. Preferably the odorless kind. Your nose will be thankful.
Small brush to apply the sealer - A 3/4" foam brush works well.
Paint stirrer attachment for an electric drill.

Dilute Silicone In a glass jar, mix one part mineral spirits with one part silicone caulk (1 ounce of mineral spirits and 1 ounce of silicone should be enough). When mixture is the right consistency, it will be smooth and milky, and flow evenly when applied. If it's too thick or lumpy, the waterproofing won't flow well into the seams, or be absorbed by the exposed threads.

Hint #1: You can mix by hand with a regular paint stirrer, but caulk is stiff, so will take much longer to mix. Using an paint stirrer in an electric drill will give your sealer a smooth silky appearance. It will dry faster and clearer.
Answer: The old school way to repair it was:

Sew the hole closed with long stitches -- this keeps the feathers in place
Use nylon patch material coated with adhesive and apply over the hole.
Sew a fabric patch over and around the hole.

I took a 45 year old nylon/down sleeping bag that had been patched this way on a 9 day trip, and had no issues whatsoever.

Repairing down stuff?


Can I share the dishwasher or other appliance lines from adjacent room lines?

Question: I've read the posts by Tim and Mitch posted in Sept. I'm remodeling the kitchen with all new wiring. I've never had a dishwasher, but will at some point. I only have enough space for a 24"er, so probably not a huge draw. There's a sink to the right. To the left is a 6" space with a hinged door. I had planned on placing the dishwasher appliance receptacle in there for quick access. Being that it's within 6ft of water I had planned on a GFCI. I am short on available lines in my 100 Amp box, so I was wondering if I could tap into a new line from the adjacent living room? That line is already GFCI, 20A/120V, 12-GA with four outlets in the lvg room, one receptacle on the front porch, and one in the attic only to plug in a short length of of roof de-icer cable. These outlets are rarely used.
  I was also wondering about using that same living room line, or another nearby low usage line (furnace), to share with the kitchen gas stove and overhead exhaust filter?
Answer: The most relevant NEC section is:

210.23(A)(2) (2)Utilization Equipment Fastened in Place. The total rating of utilization equipment fastened in place, other than luminaires, shall not exceed 50 percent of the branch-circuit ampere rating where lighting units, cord-and-plug-connected utilization equipment not fastened in place, or both, are also supplied.

Roof icer plus dishwasher sounds like a bad combination.  Putting all your fixed items together (e.g. furnace) is reasonable.


Is it viable to use one or more BFR tankers as interplanetary boosters

Question: Is it viable to Start the BFR mars burn while the ship is attached to one or more refueling boosters? (Imagine interplanetary booster) Using their combined engines the ship can achieve greater velocity reducing the travel time to less than 3 months. Also, the tankers will refill the ship and on separation, the ship will have maximum fuel again. Fuel that can be used to decelerate to achieve stable mars orbit. All the refueling boosters will go back to Earth so everything is still reusable.
The BFR is connecting now back to back, but imagine the old way of the ITS.
Comment: Engine power (thrust) and velocity achieved have nothing (well very little) to do with each other once you are in orbit. If you have a ton of fuel and a small but very efficient engine which takes a long time to burn all the fuel you will still end up going faster than if you burned it quickly in a large, but less efficient engine.
Comment: The IAC2017 presentation showed them connecting back to back so no way to use engines while connected.
Answer: Ignoring the issue that the refueling mode is expected to be tail to tail, and thus blocking the engines, you are trying to re-invent staging.
However, with 6 or 9 (IAC 2016 differed from 2017, and will likely differ from reality when it actually flies) or whatever the current design has in terms of Raptor Vac engines, the booster is quite sufficiently powered. There is probably just enough thrust already for the boost to Mars.
So extra thrust is not helpful. The extra fuel is helpful. Thus unload it and ditch the mass of the refuler booster, why carry extra weight that is not needed, nor helpful?
Answer: No, this is not viable for SpaceX.
If they used a booster to do the Trans-Mars orbit insertion burn, so the upper stage can save it's fuel, then the booster would not be recoverable.  The booster would be traveling too fast to turnaround and land back on Earth.  Elon Musk is all about not throwing away his rockets.  He would see this as not being viable.
Comment: @user1685367 does this answer your question?


Angular Velocity

Question: Hey,
 I have a particle that is hit with a force F at a particular position on the ball P. How can I calculate the angular velocity of the X,Y and Z axis? The actual rotating of the object should be fine, but it's the values of the angular velocity (Vector3) that I'm not sure of. Sorry I can't show any code, but I'm not really sure where to start. Thanks for any help.
Answer: I assume you're already calculating the linear momentum change from the collision so I won't cover that. Essentially, angular momentum works in the same way as linear but with Force replaced by Torque and Mass replaced by Inertia.
dv = T / I
where dv is the change in angular velocity, T is the torque from the collision and I is the moment of inertia which for a sphere is
I = (2/5)MR^2 (solid sphere)
I = (2/3)MR^2 (shell)
where M is the mass of the sphere and R is the radius.
The torque, T, is calculated from the cross product of the force with the vector from the collision point to the center of the sphere:
T = F x (P - O)
where O is the center of the sphere.
Putting it all together:
dv = (F x (P - O)) / ((2/5)MR^2)
Comment: Thanks a lot. You're right, I've got the linear momentum change working. Am I right in thinking that I would simply add a negative constant to the final equation in order to ensure that it stops spinning over time?
Comment: @Skoder Not exactly. Think about how your linear momentum is reduced over time (hint: other forces act on the object like friction and air resistance). You just need to do something similar for the angular momentum.

Angular Velocity


What are some words I can say to acknowledge or let the other person know that I am listening?

Question: I always use "ok" when I talk to my coworkers and want them to know that I listen and understand what they say. I found that it's redundant and repetitive and want to know alternative words that mean the same thing.
Comment: Since you are just *listening and understanding* whatever is being said and **not** necessarily **agreeing** it, I think the best thing works is 'hhmm' *without* nodding and 'okay'!
Comment: This kind of feedback is known as [backchannels](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Backchannel_%28linguistics%29). I found a good page about it: http://www.cs.utep.edu/nigel/bc/. On the page, it lists a few common backchannels in American English: *yeah, uh-huh, hm, right, okay*. More interesting part is the [pitch contours of some backchannel examples](http://www.cs.utep.edu/nigel/bc/4cues.png). Also, be careful, as noted on the page: "Obviously one can backchannel when the other person has the floor, but backchanneling just anytime can be rude."
Comment: Too much "backchanneling" can be taken as a sign of impatience, so here in our  lab we train the droids to just nod now and then and to use eye contact.
Comment: I just say "yes".
Comment: @MaulikV As someone who *nods* a lot, I'd say that nodding doesn't always mean "agree". Even saying "okay" in this manner (as a backchannel) doesn't always mean "You're correct". Actually, I think it doesn't mean that, most of the time.
Comment: @DamkerngT. it's a bit of a cultural thing as to what's an agreement and what's a backchannel. Some will take even a nod as a sign of agreement because they'd expect you to interject if you disagree, some will *absolutely* and *yes, of course* their way through your speech before revealing they didn't agree with a word of it.
Answer: -Aha (with lips either open or shut!)
-I see
-ok
-following
-listening
-yes/yep
-Oh really?
-Got it
-Okey Dokey
Answer: Downvotes have made me think over this question and I found that you want words that show that I am listening and understanding (and NOT agreeing) what you're saying.
There are many ways. A few of them are here-

I see  yeah  fine   got it  hmm etc.
Comment: My version is even shorter! "Hmmm" ;)
Answer: If you're speaking face-to-face, a simple attentive look towards the speaker is sufficient-- you don't have to stare, either. Overdoing it with "okays" and "yeahs" is pretty annoying, in my opinion. When I listen to someone speak, I don't say anything unless they're saying something I actually want to agree with or re-affirm. At that point, I usually say one of the following:

Right.  [That's] correct.  Yes.  Yep.  Definitely.  Absolutely.

The other case I would speak is when I have something to correct them on, or disagree with. I am of the view that your actual response to their statements provides better evidence that you are paying close attention than robotically saying "hmm" or "yes" after every other sentence. Hearing other people do that annoys me because I can no longer tell if they are actually listening or just pretending to listen.
Answer: There are many ways in responding to the speaker's message, verbally and non-verbally. You could say other words such as "yes", "all right", and "sure" being some of them. Nodding is the commonly used response and one way of responding to someone talk.
Answer: Same issue as with Ruchir M's answer - your question was about something else. Due to this, I've updated my answer:

carry on
  until now all fine
  understand
  oki doki

etc.


Partition/install issues

Question: I am new to Ubuntu and tried to install 10.1 as dual boot option from a USB. At first I encountered the error when in partition dialogue of installation process that cannot find root directory. I did a search on Ubuntu forums and did this as in one of the posts.

Make sure that the partition file system you wish to install Linux, Ubuntu or Backtrack on it is ext4, ext3 or ext2, and not FAT32 or NTFS.
Then mount / on it:
During the installation process press "change" on the partition you wish to use
Make sure "do not use this partition" scroll is not chosen, scroll to ext4, ext3 or ext2
On the "mount" field write /
Click ok, then next a message will appear saying something like "swap area was not defined, do you wish to continue or choose a swap area?", click "ok" and continue or click "go back" and choose another partition and click change, on the file system scroll choose "swap" and click "ok" and next

All good but when I rebooted I could not find Windows  vista as in dual boot option. Plus I could not see wireless networks and in the process of trying to find out what went wrong the soft switch somehow turned off and as I cannot boot in Windows  I have no idea what to do.
Again searching internet I found a post which said the dual boot problem can be overcome by installing gparted but when I tried I got the message

Reading package lists... Done Building dependency tree Reading state information.. Done E: Couldn't find package gparted

I thought I am going to copy my stuff from my hard disk and try to install Windows  but I found out that I have two partitions which are different from what I had before installing Ubuntu. I now have filesystem partition1 119 GB ext4, swap partition 5 1.1 GB swap and extended partition 2 1.1 GB. And I cannot mount 119 GB where all my personal videos, photos are if still there.
Now I cannot boot from Windows  even. Need help on what to do? Best case scenario would be to be able to copy my stuff before I mess up the system further. Else a dual boot system and if not then how do I install vista again. I have Windows  CD.
Cheers guys and thanks in advance.
Answer: All drives must be shown when you are on Ubuntu. Just to double check, you could try to start Ubuntu from a Live-CD. Upon logging in, you must be able to view all your drives. And if you have managed to keep your Windows drive safe, you can copy your stuff to an external storage media.
Again to clarify, if your Windows partition is safe, you would not need to re-install Windows.

Partition/install issues


Should competitors be able to run games for KoTHs?

Question: In this question, every "game" takes about 5 seconds. Ten thousand runs, maybe eight thousand, are planned. Running these on a single computer would take forever, so I suggested letting competitors and volunteers run some of the games. However, this result in cheating. My question is: should this be allowed?
Comment: My KotHs typically run anywhere from 2 to 24 hours.  Yeah, you can get help, but personally, I simply see it as a time commitment that I need to give when I post a KotH.   (I also like to keep current scoreboards, so my computer is basically constantly running while a KotH is going)
Comment: I don't know if this is a question meta can answer as in general, but in this case, another option is to offload the work to a free cloud server - for eg. koding.com and MS Azure both seem to have free trials (though both require credit card details for verification - and there may be other options that I don't know about). Ten thousand runs of 5 seconds comes out to about 14 hours (possibly less on the server machine), you can just let it run there and check back for results.
Comment: Well, in general, it would be nice to know. Plus, as bots get more complex, that could easily escalate to 15s per round
Comment: Just reduce it to about 500 runs.... or limit runtime of bots.
Comment: Or tell everybody to optimize their bots first
Comment: Even if the bots are what are taking up most of the time, it may sometimes still be possible for the KotH author to speed things up to some extent. For example, if there is a limited set of inputs and bots are required to be deterministic, then outputs may be cached.
Answer: Yes, but not competitively
The controller should be made available by the person running the KotH, to allow people to test and experiment, however they should not have a part in the final run that determines the winner. It should be up to the original poster to plan ahead of time how they intend to run the game, and if their game takes a long time to run, they should either optimize their controller, or have thought about that before hand (and made a less complex game).
One solution would be to have a cutoff date for entries, and at that point begin running the controller with all available entries, perhaps on a server somewhere, so that it can be left running as long as it needs. Then once the controller has finished, results can be posted.
Comment: @RedwolfPrograms there are a couple of things I've seen effective at providing incentive for fast bots:  1. Provide a "helper" API the bots can use for common operations that are fast.  People also copy/paste bots, so having efficient "starter bots" are also useful. 2. Measuring bot response time.  This is commonly said as "Your bot must respond in X ms", but I think it is far more effective to say "Your bot must have an average response time of X ms measured over Y turns"
Comment: @RedwolfPrograms That is a concern that should have been taken into consideration before posting the KotH. As I said, I believe it's the poster's responsibility to ensure they have the means to run the KotH properly before posting, hence why I have no qualms with KotHs requiring certain languages (or at least stating that the language choice must include basic instructions on how to run it on [insert machine the poster intends to run the KotH on]). The poster could ask for participants to optimize their entries, especially if optimizations are easily spotted, but should not *expect* they do so
Comment: The bots are what needs optimization...There're at least 30 at the moment, and nearly all of them have at least 2 for loops


Illegitimate children

Question: this is the situation:
a children is born from fornication years ago when the couple were young, years passed the guy married. the women gave the child for adoption. Now the women brings up the child (who is an adult now) to the guy who is happily married. What does the Buddhist texts or teachings say about the illegitimate children born from fornication?,
Is there anything  that mentions this?
Answer: Buddhism concerns itself with the behaviour of people rather than birth status. Refer to MN 98.
In other words, an ethical person who was an illegitimate child is regarded to be superior or happier than an unethical person who was a legitimate child.
Comment: Good answer and very true.
Answer: Sex outside marriage without the intention of becoming married may be against the third of the five precepts.
However, there is nothing wrong about the illegitimate child himself (or herself).
From the Sundarika Sutta (SN 7.9) (below), birth (i.e social class or social status) is unimportant. Conduct is important.

Then Sundarika the brahmin went up to the Buddha, and said to him:
"Sir, in what caste were you born?"

"Don't ask about birth, ask about conduct.
For any wood can surely generate fire.
A steadfast sage, even though from a low class family,
is a thoroughbred checked by conscience.

Also please see Legends of Somdet Toh, by Ven. Thanissaro. It chronicles tales from the life of a famous and well-loved monk who lived in Thailand in the 19th century. He is the illegitimate child of a noble man who later became King Rama II. His status as an illegitimate child was apparently known to the monks who ordained him.
Comment: so the child should be welcomed between the marriage?
Comment: @Solstice There is no reason why the illegitimate child should not be welcomed.

Illegitimate children


Why would security ultimately cost freedom, equality, justice, and liberty?

Question: I am trying to study for my Social Studies 30-1 Diploma Exam. One part of the exam will require me to analyse a source. A source example I am reading shows a picture of the words liberty, justice, freedom and equality. Some letters have been cut out of these words to form the word security. My interpretation of the source is giving up some liberty, freedom, equality, and justice in order to get security. My question is: Why would giving up some freedom, liberty, justice, and equality be necessary in order to obtain security?
Comment: Security is a matter of protection from other people's choice of behaviour, and to achieve this someone must be empowered to participate in the protecting. From this alone, you should  be able to infer how at least two of the three liberal virtues are undermined by prioritising security.
Comment: Yes, if that is the only way to achieve security, then does one have to give up some justice, too? That just doesn't make sense to me. There is fair, and there's unfair; there is no in between. So, perhaps the source is illogical?
Comment: Agreed that justice should be something that need not be sacrificed in order to have security, but where then does the author intend to find the letter "s" in order to make the intended point.
Comment: I realise I'm late for your exam, Kelsey, but @knighthawk I wouldn't dismiss justice so quickly in this source. Justice would determine that we not deny a person asylum or entry to our country based on their ethnicity, and yet we regularly sacrifice this justice in order to prioritise security.
Answer: I think one answer is that people are fearful. Others having liberty (to do something others don't like), freedom (to protest what others respect), equality (mixed cultures when others prefer conformity), and justice (which sometimes lets the guilty go free) may make many fearful, for example from the parentheticals I provided.
I happen to agree with Benjamin Franklin: "Those Who Sacrifice Liberty For Security Deserve Neither", but lots of people are very willing to do this out of fear. It's a big problem, in my view, and drives lots of unfortunate political behavior.
Answer: One person's freedom and liberty ends abruptly where that of another person's begins. Historically we have had to give up some measure of freedom in order to limit others from the ability of abusing their freedom to cause harm. That has long been the argument.
I believe that in this particular instance the words equality and justice were added simply to assist in making a point and to gather the required letters to spell security.
Answer:
My question is: Why would giving up some freedom, liberty, justice, and equality be necessary in order to obtain security?

I would not be surprised if you completely misunderstood the assignment, especially because of Ben Franklin's often-cited old chestnut that "those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."
The source example you quote might as well have been intended to visualize how liberty, justice, freedom and equality are prerequisites for security.
Answer: Two of these are easy to respond to:
If everyone had 100% liberty and/or freedom, they would be free to steal from you, kill you, or otherwise harm you.  So in order to give you security/protection from harm, we have to curtail this hypothetical person's liberty/freedom.
Equality should not need to be sacrificed for security.  It should be possible to limit each person's freedoms equally to provide equal security for each person.  It is possible to sacrifice security for equality (steal from the rich to give to the poor), or allow inequality to pursue more security, but shouldn't be necessary.
I don't see how Justice fits here at all.  Improving Security across the board should increase Justice.  Even at some extreme end, where we imprison everyone in their own little boxes in order to protect everyone from everyone else, if we are doing this across the board, it is still "just".


What is the meaning of perdition as used in the Quran?

Question: Shakir: And spend in the way of Allah and cast not yourselves to perdition with your own hands, and do good (to others); surely Allah loves the doers of good. (2:195)
Comment: The word translated as *perdition* by Shakir is التهلكة which is from [ه ل ك](http://corpus.quran.com/qurandictionary.jsp?q=hlk)
Answer: First note that most translators translated the word التَّهْلُكَةِ in verse (2:195) as destruction, but perdition might also apply if we consider the final destination of those who cast themselves to destruction in the context of this verse (which is jahannam/hell).
The verse in first place is a invitation or order for spending for the sake or cause of Allah!
Here some evidences about the revelation of the verse:

Narrated Abu Wail:
  Hudhaifa said, "The Verse:-- "And spend (of your wealth) in the Cause of Allah and do not throw yourselves in destruction," (2.195) was revealed concerning spending in Allah's Cause (i.e. Jihad). (Sahih al-Bukhari)
Narrated Aslam bin 'Imran At-Tujibi:
  "We were in a Roman city, when a large column of Romans came out to us. So about the same number or more of the Muslims went towards them. The commander of the people of Egypt was 'Uqbah bin 'Amir, and the commenter of the (our) group was Fadalah bin 'Ubaid. One man among the Muslims reached the Roman line until he entered amidst them, so the people started screaming: 'Subhan Allah! He has thrown himself into destruction!'
  Abu Ayyub Al-Ansari said: 'O you people! You give this interpretation for this Ayah, while this Ayah was only revealed about us, the people among the Ansar, when Allah made Islam might, and increased its supporters. Some of us secretly said to each other, outside of the presence of the Messenger of Allah (ﷺ): "Our wealth has been ruined, and Allah has strengthened Islam, and increased its supporters, so if we tend to our wealth then what we lost of it shall be revitalized for us." So Allah, Blessed and Most High, revealed to His Prophet (ﷺ), rebuking what we said: 'And spend in the cause of Allah, and do not throw yourselves into destruction. (2:195)' So the destruction was tending to the wealth and maintaining it.' Abu Ayyub did not cease traveling in Allah's cause, until he was buried in the land of the Romans."
  (Jami' at-Tirmidhi and a similiar version in sunan abi Dawod -note that Abu Ayub has narrated the meaning an verdict while the narration was narrated by Aslam bin 'Imran at-Tajubi أَسْلَمَ أَبِي عِمْرَانَ التُّجِيبِيِّ as a witness of what happened. The same narration is also narrated by an-Nasa'i, ibn Hebban and al-Hakim according to ibn Hajar in Bulgh al-Maram)

The point in this is that when the verse about spending was revealed some said that if we keep spending for the cause of Allah we will become poor, which was quoted by Moqatil and Sa'id ibn al-Mussayib in tafsir al-Baghawi.

وقال سعيد بن المسيب ومقاتل بن حيان : لما أمر الله تعالى بالإنفاق قال رجل أمرنا بالنفقة في سبيل الله ولو أنفقنا أموالنا بقينا فقراء فأنزل الله هذه الآية

In tafsir ibn Kathir you amy read (quotes from qtafsir):

(And spend in the cause of Allah and do not throw yourselves into destruction.)

"It was revealed about spending.'' Ibn Abu Hatim reported him saying similarly. He then commented, "Similar is reported from Ibn 'Abbas, Mujahid, 'Ikrimah, Sa`id bin Jubayr, 'Ata', Ad-Dahhak, Al-Hasan, Qatadah, As-Suddi and Muqatil bin Hayyan.''
Abu Bakr bin 'Aiyash reported that Abu Ishaq As-Subai'y related that a man said to Al-Bara' bin 'Azib, "If I raided the enemy lines alone and they kill me, would I be throwing myself to certain demise'' He said, "No. Allah said to His Messenger :
  (Then fight (O Muhammad ) in the cause of Allah, you are not tasked (held responsible) except for yourself.) (4:84) That Ayah (2:195) is about (refraining from) spending.'' Ibn Marduwyah reported this Hadith, as well as Al-Hakim in his Mustadrak who said; "It meets the criteria of the Two Shaykhs (Al-Bukhari and Muslim) but they did not record it." Ath-Thawri and Qays bin Ar-Rabi` related it from Al-Bara'. but added:
  (You are not tasked (held responsible) except for yourself.) (4:84) "Destruction refers to the man who sins and refrains from repenting, thus throwing himself to destruction.''
Ibn 'Abbas said:
  (And spend in the cause of Allah and do not throw yourselves into destruction)  "This is not about fighting. But about refraining from spending for the sake of Allah, in which case, one will be throwing his self into destruction."

Finally ibn Kathir explains:

The Ayah (2:195) includes the order to spend in Allah's cause, in the various areas and ways that involve obedience and drawing closer to Allah. It especially applies to spending in fighting the enemies and on what strengthens the Muslims against the enemy. Allah states that those who refrain from spending in this regard will face utter and certain demise and destruction, meaning those who acquire this habit. Allah commands that one should acquire Ihsan (excellence in the religion), as it is the highest part of the acts of obedience.

Imam al-Qurtobi in his tafsir added an explanation of a statament on the authority of ibn 'Abbas:

ولا تمسكوا عن الصدقة فتهلكوا

(My own translation take it with care)

"Do not refrain from sadaqah, that you will perish"

This means if you don't give the poor people sadaqah they will not help you nor stay at your side in a battle and you will be defeated!
Scholars also concluded from this verse that one shouldn't harm himself or do something which clearly will lead to a danger where one may risk his life.
Therefore ibn hajjar said:

Al-Haafiz Ibn Hajar (may Allaah have mercy on him) said:
As for restricting it to that -- meaning restricting the verse to the matter of not spending for the sake of Allaah -- that is subject to further discussion, because what counts is the general meaning of the wording. End quote.
Fath al-Baari, 8/185 (source islamqa #117275)


Relative pronoun

Question: Relative pronoun that is usually preceded by its own object For instance - All that glitters is not gold. But if I say All is not gold that glitters It seems to me a bit odd, is it?
Comment: It is somewhat archaic, or perhaps jocular. Btw, "that" is a subordinator, not a relative pronoun.
Answer: I wouldn't recommend using Shakespeare quotes as a guide for what is and isn't acceptable use in modern English. The language has changed in the last 500 years, and his writing was more poetic than directly clear even when it was first written down; he's using an unusual reversed syntax in this particular phrase.
Both of the constructions you have here are equally valid and equally confusing; we're just familiar with one of them as a set phrase.
"All is not gold that glitters" might be slightly more confusing only because it introduces ambiguity about what 'that' means -- it could be read with 'that' acting like a 'which', marking the clause as giving more information about the previous noun.  That is to say, it kind of reads like "All is not [gold, which glitters]", which would just mean "not everything is gold".
If you wanted to say it naturally in modern English you'd just say, "Not all that glitters is gold."

Relative pronoun


Do black holes violate the first law of thermodynamics?

Question: When a black hole absorbs matter is it destroying that mass, thereby destroying energy, therefore violating the first law of thermodynamics?
Comment: The premise of your question is broken. Where did you hear that black holes "destroy energy", whatever that means?
Answer:
Do black holes violate the first law of thermodynamics?

No. See Wikipedia re the first law of thermodynamics: "The first law of thermodynamics is a version of the law of conservation of energy, adapted for thermodynamic systems. The law of conservation of energy states that the total energy of an isolated system is constant; energy can be transformed from one form to another, but cannot be created or destroyed". If you throw a one-kilogram object into a zillion-kilogram black hole, the black hole mass increases by one kilogram. The object might get destroyed, but you can't destroy energy. Or create it. There are no perpetual motion machines. Energy is fundamental. Everything is made of it, including light and matter, and black holes.

When a black hole absorbs matter is it destroying that mass, thereby destroying energy, therefore violating the first law of thermodynamics?

No. It destroys the matter, but the total mass stays the same, as does the total energy. In the scenario above, you start with one zillion and one kilograms, and you end up with with one zillion and one kilograms. The black hole's gravitational field increases a little because you increased its mass-energy by one kilogram.
Comment: Small note: I don't think it has been established that black holes *destroy* matter that falls into it. What does destroy even mean in this context? Perhaps this could be addressed as well. Otherwise a good answer.
Comment: Thanks @Danu. I guess nobody knows for sure, but one hears about [spaghettification](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spaghettification) and firewalls and GRBs, and [we can read Kip Thorne saying this](http://www.space.com/17086-bizarre-black-holes-kip-thorne-interview.html): _"The matter of which a star is made, the atoms of which a star is made, are destroyed at the center of a black hole, when the black hole is created. The matter is gone, but the mass, in the sense of mass and energy being equivalent, has gone into the warped space-time of the black hole."_
Comment: @JohnDuffield Note that the "birth" of a black hole is something different from it absorbing outside matter, so the quote does not apply; I'm pretty sure most physicists wouldn't dare claim that infalling matter is really destroyed at the Schwarzschild radius. The singularity itself is a different issue, but when we talk about matter being absorbed by black holes, we talk about it passing the Schwarzschild radius (or an analogous boundary in more general black holes).
Comment: @Danu : some physicists claim the infalling matter is destroyed _[before](https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Firewall_(physics)&oldid=587309921)_ it gets to the Schwarzschild radius! But IMHO we need a separate question on that.
Comment: Well energy conservation is violated sometimes because of symmetry breaking(time symmetry). See energy conservation due to noether's theorem.  However a black hole is not one of those times. See:https://physics.stackexchange.com/questions/296/is-energy-really-conserved.
Answer: No, it does not.
If it did, then it would not curve spacetime and it would not be a black hole.
Comment: I know, but the point is that it doesn't improve the OP's understanding of physics. Your answer doesn't say what happens to the energy nor does it show the connection between "black holes curve spacetime" and "black holes don't destroy energy".
Comment: This doesn't really answer the question, or at least it doesn't explain why the energy doesn't disappear.
Comment: @Javier It is a 100% valid answer to say "if it worked that way, then general relativity wouldn't be correct," because the contrapositive of that statement is "General relativity implies that it doesn't work that way." It is perhaps not very respectable if you are looking for low-level kinematics, but that's a huge can of worms that is not needed to answer this question.
Comment: On those counts I'm guilty as charged, although it more or less stands to reason that if a black hole doesn't destroy inbound mass-energy then that mass-energy goes inside the black hole.
Answer: Yes, a black hole can violate conservation of energy. According to JamelS' answer at Energy conservation and General Relativity, energy is not necessarily conserved in general relativity. According to my answer at Energy conservation and General Relativity, the electric field of a charged black hole can accelerate a charged particle but an electric field can't accelerate a charged black hole. If you have two charged black holes orbiting each other, they will accelerate each other only with their gravitational field and not with their electric field so total of their gravitational potential energy and the energy of their gravitational waves will remain constant but their electric potential energy will keep changing as they spiral into each other.
Comment: Energy is not conserved in general relativity, but it is conserved in asymptotically flat spacetimes, which means that it's conserved for the purpose of the present discussion.


Format Preserving Encryption - Generating coupon codes

Question: If I use cycle FPE with AES to generate 20 digit coupon codes, what is the probability that an attacker could generate a valid coupon?
Answer: That depends on what coupon codes are accepted rather than the details of the FPE. FPE is a pseudo-random permutation that depends on the key. If the attacker inserts any encrypted coupon code in the specified domain (in this case 20 digits) then it will with certainty result in a 20 digit coupon code after decryption.
So what chance is there that the coupon code is accepted? Well, it is exactly the same as a normal coupon code. If the coupon allows any 20 digit code then the likelihood of it being accepted is of course precisely one. Commonly though a coupon code also contains a method of verification. Then it depends on the verification method what chance there is of a random coupon code to be accepted.
Say there is one decimal check digit and a calculation that results in a uniform distribution given random input of the other digits. In that case the chances of generating a probability of generating a valid coupon code is of course one in ten.


Does a larger creature's size make it easier to hit?

Question: If a creature is a bigger size should I get a higher accuracy, or advantage?
Comment: Do you mean a bigger size than the attacker? Or a bigger size than a typical creature of that type?
Answer: A creatures size is directly correlated into their AC, along with armor, stats, and abilities. Whatever their listed AC is, that's what you have to beat, simply being larger does not grant you advantage on attacks against them
Comment: I deleted my answer -- this one is better because it doesn't try to justify the answer with math (which, when broken down results in there being no difference between a medium and a large creature of equal dexterity and wearing no armor).
Comment: I wonder if some discussion of cover might be useful here?
Answer: Under normal circumstances, there are no benefits to fighting a larger creature. However, there is an optional maneuver in the DMG that might be what you are desiring if your DM approves:

As an alternative, a suitably large opponent can be
  treated as terrain for the purpose of jumping onto its
  back or clinging to a limb. After making any ability
  checks necessary to get into position and onto the larger
  creature, the smaller creature uses its action to make
  a Strength (Athletics) or Dexterity (Acrobatics) check
  contested by the target's Dexterity (Acrobatics) check.
  If it wins the contest, the smaller creature successfully
  moves into the target creature's space and clings to its
  body. While in the target's space, the smaller creature
  moves with the target and has advantage on attack rolls
  against it.
  Page 271 of the DMG.

For Medium creatures, this might be available against Huge and Gargantuan creatures. For Small creatures (gnomes, halflings), this extends to Large.
Answer: No
AC, like HP and many other elements of the game, is an abstraction.  It does not purely denote an opponent's ability to avoid getting it.  It is a simplified way to determine if an attack as successful at bringing one closer to death.  It might be from missing due to the opponent evading, or due to a magic displacement effect.  It could be that the attack connects, but is too weak to pierce the opponent's armor or skin (this bumps up against DR, but an abstraction can having multiple levels).  It could be a little of both, the opponent moves far enough out of the way that the attack bounces lightly off the opponent's shield.  If the opponent hadn't had the shield, the attack would have cut their arm (armor bonus to AC), or if they hadn't partially evaded, the attack would have hit the shield harder, numbing the opponent's arm and ringing in her ears.
So just because the dragon is the size of a small apartment complex, and you are swinging your sword from two feet away, doesn't mean you have the skill and luck to cut between its scales instead of just hitting the scale dead on and doing nothing.
Answer: There is a good example in the PHB p. 213. Look for the Animate Objects spell. There is a table where you can see that the size affects the Dexterity which in turn affects the AC. It also shows that the bigger the stronger a creature gets.
Obviously, this table is not set in stone, but I still think it gives a general idea of what happens in correlation with the size of a creature.
However, there is no mention of Advantage or Disadvantage in any way just because of size. Even a creature that does not have a displacement, such as a Water Weird (MM p. 299) in a small fountain does not give advantage.
Answer: As the other answers have mentioned, there is no official rule.
However, I play with a house rule where you have +5 on attack rolls against creatures that are Gargantuan (controlling a 20-feet-by-20-feet space or larger). However, if you match the creature's AC with the +5 roll (in other words, it is because of this house rule that you were able to hit), then the creature takes only half damage from the attack. I just think it makes no sense to be about five feet away from a creature that is about 20 feet wide and just miss; however, I can understand its defense being too strong, but that usually isn't the case when I describe attacks.
Comment: Welcome to RPG.SE! Take the [tour] if you haven't already, and check out the [help] for more guidance. How has your house-rule worked, in your experience? Also, there is no size category above Gargantuan; anything that controls a 20-feet-by-20-feet space or larger is Gargantuan.


How to do surface preparation of walls before painting them?

Question: I am planning to paint my house but i don't know how to prepare a good surface before painting the walls. Please give me some ideas and suggestions?
Comment: See also [What is your top tip for painting?](http://diy.stackexchange.com/q/5611/2196) and [How do I prepare an already painted wall for new paint?](http://diy.stackexchange.com/q/1380/2196)
Comment: What color is the wall now, and what color are you going to? Are the walls damaged at all? Is there any paint chipping or peeling off of the walls?
Comment: Interior or exterior?
Answer: I assume it's drywall.  It's tough to advise without knowing the existing conditions, but you'd probably be safe with a primer.  If it's a new wall that has not been painted, it depends if it's finished with drywall mud.  If not, you'll need to mud the wall and sand it prior to applying primer.
Answer: Assumptions:

Interior.
Repainting
It's been a longtime since the last time.

Here's my plan for our dining room which has 2 story loft.  It has a paneled ceiling, so that is being ignored.

At ground level remove all the plug and switch covers.  I put the screws back into the electrical device, as being harder to loose.
Wash the walls.  This gets the loose crud off.  In my case the dining room is next to the kitchen which also has a wood stove,so the walls have a film of grey that is hard to remove.  A scant teaspoon per quart of wash water will help with grease.
Washing the walls will also help you find all the nicks and dents.  Picture frame nail holes.  Small holes and cracks, patch with dry wall mud.  Serious cracks (more thatn 1/8") probably mean something going on with your foundation.  If they haven't changed in a couple years, mud, tape, mud.

In my case I'm making one pass at ground level cleaning, then a pass patching.  While I've got the sander out for the patches, I do a run over the walls to catch bumps, previous paint drips.  Sand those too.
(If the paint job dates back to the early 80's, test it for lead. If the paint has lead, you have a different problem beyond my scope.)
Then the scaffold comes in and I do a second pass with 1 story of scaffold.  If you don't have wheels for your scaffold, put a thick sock on each leg, or several layers of rag, and tape them to the leg.  I prefer to do one operation per pass even if it means moving the scaffold every 10 minutes.
Part of the prep pass is taping the edges unless you are better with a brush than I am.
Once I finish the prep pass, then paint.  If the wall is clean you can probably do it in one coat if the colours are similar.  Covering dark with light is tough, and will likely take 2 coats.
Painting happens from the top down.  Drips are more obvious because I haven't been there yet.


How accurate is the calorie burn measurement of the Fitbit Charge 2?

Question: In academia calorie burn gets measured about the produced heat in a closed system. How accurate is the Fitbit Charge 2 when compared against that gold standard?
Comment: The problem with the calorie burn trackers is that they are only good at tracking calories for joggers or bikers on pretty flat terrain.  And when I say good I mean somewhat adequate.  Within a few years someone will make one where you can use special inputs for the activities you don't trust your watch with - being on a real stair stepper for instance.  I could wear a tracker and it shows 300 calories and the machine shows 1000...   You have to understand how a body burns calories - vertically more than horizontally - and what things improve metabolism to lose weight long term.
Answer: The calorie burn estimates that Fitbit provides takes into account the person's basal metabolic rate based on gender, age, height, and weight as well as the step activity recorded and any activities they log manually.
My impression is that the calorie burn reported by Fitbit trackers is really just a ballpark estimate and those in the Fitbit community often question the accuracy and consistency of the calculations. An article in Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise stated that a study by Ball State University in Muncie, Indiana  showed Fitbit and other trackers were highly inaccurate regarding calories to burn especially on non-step based activity, as much as 50% off.
Comment: Could you reference the university study in question?
Comment: I will preface this with the fact I actually love Fitbit trackers despite the inaccuracies. The study was done by Ball State University in Muncie, Indiana. From pubmed, https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/m/pubmed/27015387/
Comment: Anecdotally, when I used my FitBit Flex and tracked both my activities and my caloric intake, my weight loss paced very closely to my expected weight loss given a 3000kcal net burn = 1 lb lost ratio.
Answer: To me, this seems close to being an X-Y question. The medical professionals (and to some extent the laboratory equipment manufacturers) are pushing back against these low-cost, continuous measurment sensors, because they're not accurate - but failing to appreciate that there are probably other gains to be made from replacing high precision with high volume data (both in time, and across populations).
In common with lots of embedded applications, the Fitbit doesn't measure calorie burn directly. What it does it take some more tractable measurements and user data to provide an estimate based on identified modes of activity (for example -sleeping, jogging, walking). Across a group of individuals, there is potential for significant variation between the observed parameters and actual calorie burn.
Where the data can be expected to be more accurate is in comparing relative calorie burn with different days for a specific individual, and the obvious advantage is the trivial instrumentation overhead compared with attempting any precision calorimitry in an open-air activity.
Its important to appreciate that the calorie number is an estimate, but when does anyone care about anything precise with calories? Even with blood pressure, the value is being able to identify changes over time in the majority of even medically monitored applications (rather than one-off diagnostic measurements).
Some effort does need to be made to formalise the value of herd measurements like this, educate professionals to work with low quality data, and educate users to appreciate this cheap data is not always individually informative.
Comment: If you want to lose weight you might have the option between two different kinds of exercise. Either you do 30 minutes exercise A and your device tells you it burns 600 calories or you do 30 minutes exercise B and it tells you it burns 800 hours. It's worthwhile to know whether you can trust the device to accurately tell you that one exercise burns more calories than the other.
Comment: OK, so these are your best estimates. Nothing else will give you any better estimate unless you're a professional athelete, or taking part in a clinical trial. The challenge is adapting to using new information that has poorly defined precision. In the round, many other factors will influence which mix of A and B is more effective long term for any individual.
Comment: There are different heuristics for choosing an exercise than trusting a Fitbit. Whether or not it makes sense to trust the Fitbit to inform the decision with it depends on the data quality.


When does patent US512340 A expire?

Question: My question is, "When will the Tesla Coil patent expire?", What year will it expire?, how soon? and after it expires, will anyone have access to mimick the invention?
Answer: This patent was issued January 9th of 1894. Back then, I believe US patents lasted for 17 years from their grant date so it should have expired January 9th of 1911 (more than 100 years ago). Since 1995, US patents expire 20 years after their filing or priority date.
Once a patent expires, anyone can use the technology described in it. This is the basic premise of patents. In return for teaching the world about a new technology, you get a limited term of exclusivity. You always need to be aware, that there is the potential for other relevant patents such as refinements to the original so a patent search is often a good idea.

When does patent US512340 A expire?


How Can I find All the SharePoint 2013 Groups a User Belongs To?

Question: We validate our SP users against AD, but we use SharePoint groups to control access, not AD groups. Is there a way to search for all of the SharePoint groups a person belongs to? When someone leaves, the previous admins have been going through every group looking for that person and deleting them. I'm pretty sure there's got to be a better way, a webpart or app that can list a user's groups.  It can probably be done with PowerShell, but although I'm fairly familiar with PowerShell for server and Exchange, I've never used any SharePoint PowerShell commands. Can anybody point me in the right direction here?
Comment: Single site collection or multiple site collections?
Answer: You can do this without Powershell,

Just go to site settings > Users and Permissions > Site permissions > From the above ribbon > click on Check permission > type the user account. > This will list all groups that user belongs to on this site.

Meanwhile, If you need to achieve that via PowerShell check the following CMDLET
<code>$urlWeb = "http://Qassas"
Get-SPUser -Web $urlWeb | select UserLogin, @{name="Exlicit given roles";expression={$_.Roles}}, @{name="Roles given via groups";expression={$_.Groups | %{$_.Roles}}},Groups | format-Table
</code>
For more details check Powershell script to find permissions for a specific user
Comment: how to get all the SP groups a specific belongs to across multiple site collections


Possible Python Automation With This Particular Material

Question: I just had a quick question.  I am starting to get a bit more adequate with Blender in terms of getting to photorealism.  In the picture below is a model that I got online and I am wanting to edit the material for the keys to make them look more photoreal.  My question, is if there is a way of automating the material so that after I have one photoreal material on one key it will do it for the rest of the keys?  I know that I can make one material, assign that for all of the keys, and go in and change the images for each one but I feel like there is a way to automate this with python.  Any thoughts?
Comment: @drSybren's answer is better than what I had come up with, which effectively did the same thing in a very convoluted way rather than using the tool that was designed for it. (:
Comment: Looks like a job for the Object Index pass. I can't answer right now, but I should be able to whip up something later.
Comment: Yeah that'd be great!  @seaturtle
Comment: I added a preliminary answer on the Object Index pass. More info coming later about your specific use case (separate images for keys, etc.).
Comment: Hey sounds good @seaturtle.  That makes sense and thanks for sharing!  Will look for the images/letters and get back to you after that as well
Answer: I would use two UV maps for each key. One is shared between all keys and maps to the key texture without letter. The second is a different UV map for each object, with one big texture containing all the key letters; having a different UV map for each key, each gets their own letter. No need to worry about the material itself then.
You can even use the UV Project modifier to project the letters on each object; no need to manually make all those UV maps.
Comment: That's smart! Probably easier than my answer, too.
Answer: It sounds like you want to use the same material on multiple objects, but be different on each object. You don't need Python for this.
What you need is the Object Index pass.
To set it up, go to the Object properties (the cube) and change the Pass Index, for example 0, 1, 2, and so on:

Then use the Object Info node to do something with it in your node tree. For example:

Which gives this result:

(The Multiplexer node is a node group that acts like a Mix node with more than two inputs. More info in my question here. You don't need it, I just found it helpful.)
Comment: More info coming later, on different letters/images in specific. I don't have time for that right this moment, though.


Compiz Window Previews stay for too long after my mouse has long moved away. (Gnome Classic and Xubuntu) Fix?

Question: Whenever I use Window Previews Compiz plugin, the previews stay even once I have moved my mouse elsewhere, this happens in Gnome Classic and XFCE too. Any ideas how to solve this?
Answer: Compiz requires good hardware acceleration to work well, which generally means that you'll have to have a relatively recent graphics card. If your graphics card is an old Intel's accelerator, a VIA, or even an old Nvidia 4000/5000, consider either staying away from Compiz or upgrading to more modern hardware.
If you have a decent card, then something is probably misconfigured.


why do i get a deformed mesh in weight paint mode and object mode but in Edit mode, the mesh appears the way it should?

Question: I came a long way modelling this character until i reached the weight painting step. In edit mode, my mesh seems okay though when i swich to weight paint mode or object mode, it gets deformed along the thighs...perhaps i could have grabbed some vertices unknowingly bt how to i get them back to their original position? I tried deleting the vertices assigned to the thigh-bone but still the overall result is the same..Please help.
Comment: If your mesh is rigged, the result of deformations by armature won't be seen in Edit mode unless checking option of the modifier. Try looking in the Pose mode if something has changed unexpectedly.
Answer: I have had a problem like this before. If you have not been able to fall X the mesh by deleting the weight groups then try the following. 1.Go into edit mode. 2. Select all the mesh 3. Press "Shift"+"d" to duplicate the mesh 4. Press "p" and separate mesh by selection.
This will leave you with a new undeformed mesh as a separate object. And the original mesh if you decide to come back to it.


Why child entites binds to parent automatically in entity framework

Question: I don't know this is a good or bad thing and how to adapt this.
Parent-Child has very simple and obvious relation.No big deal. You can see the code below:
Parent Object:
public class Parent
{
    public int Id {get;set;}
    public List<Child> Childs {get;set;}
}

Child Object
public class Child
{
    public int Id {get;set;}
    public int ParentId {get;set;}
    public Parent Parent {get;set;}
}

Somewhere around the code(say index method of the controller)
var parent = parentRepository.FindAll(x=> x.Id == 10).ToList();
var childCollection = childRepository.FindAll(x=> x.ParentId == parent.Id).ToList();

When i run the code above i expect a parent object with Childs Property is null and childCollection that has null Parent property. But this is not happening. After second line of code executed, parent.Childs fills with the child objects and every Parent property in a child object is equal to parent which i don't want it(should i want it?).
Why entityframework behaves like that? And which cases should i be aware off? What happens if i change the childCollection without knowing this behavior?
Answer: Like many modern ORMs, Entity Framework is designed not only to map your queries results to entities (objects), but to map their relationships to properties. If you declare a navigation property (such as you have done with Childs or Parent properties in your classes), EF will (lazily) map those properties to their referenced entities automatically (you can find more about navigation properties here).
This behavior is by design and has the intent to avoid explicitly do queries using joins, and makes it unnecessary to call childRepository.FindAll(x=> ... because all related Child entities are loaded by EF as soon as you access the Childs property in your Parent object.
Remember also that EF implements a change tracking system, so if you modify entities fetched from the database, EF will track those changes and persists them the first time you call SaveChanges on your context.
As a side note, EF architecture is really an example of the UnitOfWork and Repository patterns used together (DbContext is a UoW and each DbSet works like a Repository), so I strongly suggest you to read more about EF to avoid misusing its features or re-implementing them yourself using another abstraction (e.g. your Repositories).
Comment: Thanks for the answer. But one question, what do you mean with the re-implementing? Repository pattern is widely used with the entity framework?
Answer: Yes, that's the normal behavior of EF. At the moment when the childCollection  is materialized calling ToList, when you check parent instance again, relationship fixup will run and check if Child entities whose FK have the same value as the PK of your current parent have been loaded earlier in the object context. If that is the case, the Parent.Childs property will immediately be set with those Child entities. This doesn't have nothing to do with lazy loading, in fact your model doesn't meet all the requirements that lazy loading need, like your navigation properties should be virtual.
This behavior cannot be disabled but if you use AsNoTracking extension method at the time to build your queries, the entities returned will not be cached in the DbContext:
var query= context.Childs.AsNoTracking().Where(c=>c.ParentId==10);

You can also find more details in this excellent post
Comment: Great. I got it. AsNoTrackin() option will save my life. Thanks.


Does anyone knows a work on Mongolian loanwords in Turkic languages?

Question: Especially in Western branch of Turkic languages.
Answer: The standard work on Turkish etymology is Clauson's "Etymological dictionary of pre-thirteenth-century Turkish".
Comment: Most of the Mongolian loan words in Western Branch (especially Oghuz languages) entered after mongolian invasion. Although I don't know the work,since he asked for Western branch, I assume that work may not be satisfactory for him.
Answer: I recommend ESKİ VE ORTA TÜRKÇEDE MOĞOLCA KELİMELER by Tuncer Gülensoy. Not only does it have a good summary, it also includes lots of sources for that topic. I also recommend this paper:

OSMANLICADA  MOĞOLCA  KELİMELER
Answer: found one research in English http://www.sosyalarastirmalar.com/cilt7/sayi32_pdf/1dil_edebiyat/tokat_feyza.pdf
according to the research, below are some words that are similar

castration aḫta /M. aḳda

golden     altun/altan
red        al
sibling    anda
pure       arig
profit     asig
eat        asa
leopard    bars
hero       batur
present    belek
source     bulag
group      buluk
spear      cida
flower     cecek
wise       cecen
face       ciray
secret     dalda
iron       temur
equil      deng
early      erden
knowledge  erdem
speak      keleci
braid      kekul
whole      lab
bread      manto
thousand   min
grow       os
beard      sahal
blind      sokur
absorb     soru
plate      tabag
land       tala
hell       tamu
chattels   tavar
earth      tobarak
net        tor
wedding    toy
law        toru
water      usu
reproduce  uru
big        reke
also found another paper that list lots of words for references
http://userpage.fu-berlin.de/corff/im/Sprache/hugjilt.unx


Specific kind of orbital transfer?

Question: What do you call the kind of transfer that takes an orbiting body from orbiting the planet of the system to orbiting a moon of the system.
I am merely looking for the name of this kind of transfer orbit (if such a name for it exists). For example, a Hohmann transfer takes an orbiting body from one orbital radius to another orbital radius.
Answer: You're looking for injection transfers, which is a type of orbital transfer whereby a spacecraft (or body) is moved from one sphere of influence to another. Specifically, in the Earth-Moon system, this is called a Trans-Lunar Injection.
Injection transfers are not unique to Planet-Moon systems though — for example a Trans-Mars Injection is essentially a Hohmann Transfer between two planets.
Note that this is not the only type of Earth-Moon transfer however: trajectory designs can and have exploited weak boundary effects between the Earth and the Moon called a Low Energy Ballistic Lunar Transfer:

It has been found that low-energy BLTs may be produced by intersecting the stable manifold of an unstable Earth-Moon three-body orbit with the Earth. A spacecraft following such a trajectory is only required to perform a single maneuver, namely, the Trans-Lunar Injection maneuver, in order to complete the transfer. After the Trans-Lunar Injection maneuver, the spacecraft follows an entirely ballistic trajectory that asymptotically approaches and arrives at the target lunar three-body orbit. Because these orbit transfers require no orbit insertion maneuver at the three-body orbit, the transfers may be used to send spacecraft 25 – 40% more massive than spacecraft sent to the same orbits via conventional, direct transfers. From the targeted three-body orbits, the spacecraft may transfer to nearly any region within the Earth-Moon system, including any location on the surface of the Moon.

This effect was first exploited by the Japanese Hiten probe in 1991:

The trajectory Belbruno and Miller developed for Hiten used Weak Stability Boundary Theory and required only a small perturbation to the elliptical swing-by orbit, sufficiently small to be achievable by the spacecraft's thrusters. This course would result in the probe being captured into temporary lunar orbit using zero delta-v (called a ballistic transfer), but required five months instead of the usual three days for a Hohmann transfer. This was the first time a satellite had used low energy transfer to transfer to a moon orbit.

- Hiten, Wikipedia
To answer your question narrowly: no, there is no unique name for these specific types of transfers, although a number of transfer types form a subset of what you're describing.
Answer: The closest I know of is Trans-Lunar Injection.

A trans-lunar injection (TLI) is a propulsive maneuver used to set a spacecraft on a trajectory that will cause it to arrive at the Moon.
A spacecraft performs TLI to begin a lunar transfer from a low circular parking orbit around Earth. The large TLI burn, usually performed by a chemical rocket engine, increases the spacecraft's velocity, changing its orbit from a circular low Earth orbit to a highly eccentric orbit. As the spacecraft begins coasting on the lunar transfer arc, its trajectory approximates an elliptical orbit about the Earth with an apogee near to the radius of the Moon's orbit.

I'm not aware of any specific term to involve the entire combination of TLI and the capture burn (which is the maneuver performed near the moon, in order to change the flyby trajectory into a lunar orbit).

Specific kind of orbital transfer?


How can I use anger as an aspect to contribute to fire spells?

Question: My theoretical Wizard has an aspect that has to do anger. Specifically "Fiery Temper."
I'm trying to find a way to invoke that for bonus for fire spells. Would that be acceptable by general rules?
Comment: Hi Moireth, and welcome to the site! We can see you're new, since you only have 1 rep at the moment, so I've edited that bit out of your question. Our community will generally be here to guide you. For now, check out our [tour] if you haven't already. When you reach 20 rep, you'll also be able to join us in [chat](http://chat.stackexchange.com/rooms/11/rpg-general-chat).
Answer: The main limit of what aspects can be used for what actions is basically what the table will accept - your GM and your fellow players.
My rule of thumb is, if I can say it in a sentence with a straight face, it works. I.E. "Because Chivalry's Not Dead Dammit, I hit the demon that's attacking my girlfriend really hard." So lets try that. "Because of my Fiery Temper, I keep good control of my fire spell." That doesn't sound right to me. "Cold Fury" might do, a kind of clarity that comes from anger. However, there are two parts to spellcasting, power and control. "Because of my Fiery Temper, I pump extra power into my fire spell." That does make sense to me, so if I was another player at your table, I'd accept that aspect being used to boost power, but not rolls to control.
The other players might see things differently! Asking your group or the GM if a general kind of action is an acceptable target of an aspect is perfectly fine during character creation, especially if it's something you plan to do regularly. If you wanted to be sure, retooling the aspect to be a little more evocative or specific might be advised; That aspect looks a little bland to me. For example, "Pyromancer's Temper" might let you use it both on control and power rolls, while still getting you the same idea since it's a bit more specific. "I solve everything with fire" is might be more than you wanted, but it certainly will let you use it for fire spells!
Also keep in mind that to be a wizard, you have to have an aspect that makes that clear. (Same for every template really.) You can pretty much always use that to boost your spells. (I think they even mention that specifically in the rulebook.)
Comment: This answer puts a lot on the GM allowing/disallowing stuff, and asking the GM if something's okay. I was under the impression that in Fate, this would be a whole-of-table thing: ask _all_ fellow players if it's okay or not okay and decide with them; the GM doesn't have any exclusive authority in the matter. The get-the-GM's-permission thing sounds more like a trait of D&D's attitude on the DM role, not actually something typically done in Fate (and in fact I've edited mentions of DM to GM in your answer). Is it different in Dresden Files?
Comment: @doppelgreener [*In many places throughout this book, the phrase "the GM decides" is often used interchangeably with "the group decides" regarding some of these issues, because it emphatically isn't the GM's job to run a dictatorship—every player should always be allowed the chance to have a say in those instances. The GM should act as more of a moderator, synthesizing the group's input with her own in order to reach a final decision.*](http://rpg.stackexchange.com/a/21667/4398)
Comment: What BESW said. I use "GM and Table" explicitly in the first sentence, then use "GM" for the rest of the answer. As for DM vs GM, I started in D&D and never saw an important reason to break the habit. Actually, given that I didn't start in D&D you're all lucky I don't use Hollyhock God. If I was inconsistent, thank you for making me consistent.
Comment: @IgneusJotunn Ok, thanks for that. Considering DFRPG's attitude on the GM _not_ necessarily being the one to decide, I feel this answer should probably emphasize group buy-in on the idea rather than talk about what the GM accepts or doesn't. (The GM just being a part of the group, they have no more particular say over accepting something than anyone else does, or at least that's my understanding.)
Comment: I've made an edit to convey what I have in mind about just leaving it to group buy-in, not GM buy-in. Please check to see if you're okay with it and, of course, edit or roll back as you wish.
Comment: The only problem I would foresee if I used say "I solve everything with fire" is if I tried to use different elements to do something. But then again that opens up for compels to receive fate points which wouldn't be too bad. I think I'll use that.  Thank you!
Answer: Yes, that's totally legit.
So long as you can describe how your character's aspect is beneficial to the circumstance of the roll, you can spend the Fate point. The GM (and the rest of the group) may ask for more clarification if they're unsure how you're justifying the use, though. Sometimes it'll turn out they think it's too much of a stretch and the GM will hand back your Fate point, so be thoughtful about your invokes.
Since this is a core concept for your character idea, you should probably talk with the group during character creation about how your wizard's Fiery temper fuels his spellcasting so it's not a surprise to anyone when you bring it up mid-combat ('cause stopping to explain it then would slow things down a lot)--and so you know if there's a limit on the kind of bonus to fire the group will consider reasonable coming from a temper-based aspect. Examples of rage-fuelled fire powers from media (like Zuko in Avatar: The Last Airbender) could help explain your idea.
Comment: "Examples of rage-fuelled fire powers from media (like Zuko in Avatar: The Last Airbender) could help explain your idea." - Or right in the Dresden Files.  e.g. "Fuego! Pyrofuego! BURN!"


Choice to turn off TeX on the main page

Question: It's really annoying that TeX is rendered outside of questions.  On MO, we realized this and turned it off for the question list and main page.  Since the SE overlords have more control, perhaps they could add a checkbox in the user options to turn this on or off, but I personally find it incredibly annoying that I get so much lag every time I go back to the front page.
Comment: I've edited the title to more closely reflect the text of the question.
Answer: The bug tag doesn't seem fair.  This is a feature that some like and some (not just you, to be sure) dislike.
Your idea of having it be togglable seems like an ideal solution.
(Arguments based on the age of your laptop are probably not going to be very convincing.)
Answer: I think that often it is useful to have LaTeX in question titles. I am happy to lose a little time in the rendering of the first page and save more by avoiding to read a question I'm not interested in. I think that without LaTeX many users will turn to more generic titles, so that one has to open the question to figure out.
For instance one may want to give a title like "How to compute $\pi_4(S^3)$", but since LaTeX is not available, change that to "Homotopy group of spheres".
Comment: @Andrea, @Noldorin: The original suggestion was to have an option to toggle TeX rendering on the front page. Keep in mind that you would still be able to leave it on. The question is whether other people should have the choice to disable it.
Comment: It's rare for titles to have TeX that's sufficiently complicated that you need it rendered.  There's very little difference in readibility between $\pi_4(S^3)$ and pi_4(S^3).
Comment: Good point - I agree fully.
Comment: I disagree.  I'm using an old laptop and it takes several minutes to load the page...
Comment: Consider how long it will take to load the page if 20 people decide to use LaTeX in the title, specifically.
Comment: Oh sorry, I did not read carefully. Then I'm all for it!

Choice to turn off TeX on the main page


RPMs are high on kia rio

Question: I bought a car, now it turns out the transmission needs work, and we would like to get a professional's opinion. The engine light came on and I was trying to accelerate to 40 mph, but the RPMs were at 5000. We think it's the transmission solenoids. Now our car is overheating when we have the AC on at the stop light. Any suggestions?
PS when I bought the car, it didn't hesitate to pick up speed at all.
Comment: We need more details. Make, model, year and mileage.
Answer: There's a few things going on here, and they may or may not be related.
Check Engine Light This means the computer has found something wrong with something and has stored a "trouble code" in it's memory. Most auto parts stores will read these codes for free, that should get you started.
Overheating Make sure you have enough coolant. Your coolant should have a MIN line on the side, make sure your coolant is above that. If it's low, add the appropriate coolant (get it from an auto parts store). Then turn the car on with the hood raised, wait for the engine to reach it's normal temperature and then stand there looking at the radiator fan until it starts. You may need to wait several minutes. If the engine temperature climbs above it's normal range (overheating) and the fan doesn't come on, this is your overheating problem.
Transmission Solenoids are simple and inexpensive to replace on many vehicles. It would help your diagnosis if you could narrow it down to which specific solenoid may have gone bad. You need to know how many gears the automatic transmission has. Most Kia Rios have 4, some have 6.
Go for a drive and keep track of which gear the car is likely in (this is a lot easier on empty roads, so I suggest you do this very early in the morning or very late at night). Make sure you are in "D", and first use very mild (10% pedal) acceleration, see if the transmission shifts up every single gear without running the RPMs past 3000 rpm. If the RPMs do go above 3000 rpm, take note of which gear the transmission is in at that point.
Next, use harder acceleration (50% pedal). The RPMs should run higher before shifting, this will make the gears easier to track. Again, note which gear the transmission is in if the RPMs are getting higher than in another gear. The reason for this test is that different solenoids control different shifts, if only 1 or 2 of them are not working well, this is likely the cause.
Comment: Amazing overview. Spot on analysis.

RPMs are high on kia rio


What would be the code for using Arduino UNO to alert by sound or LED when it detects a certain position through GPS?

Question: I am in grade 6. I have a very nice pet dog in my house but it often enters Mom's kitchen to spoil all the foods. So I am thinking of a device to attach with him which can locate its position. But I am totally new to arduino programming. I have found some tutorials of arduino UNO to locate position with GPS. But I don't know how to set up the alarm when my dog reaches the position of our kitchen and what will be the code for it. If I wanna set alarm for different position, like kitchen and two toilets, what would be the code then? I know Java a very little bit. C too. Nothing else. Is there any altruist to help me out, please?
Answer: First things first: do you know that a GPS can locate your dog accurately enough in your home?
Basically, even with a good GPS receiver, the best accuracy you can expect (using off-the-shelf receivers, non-military or DGPS) is maybe 3 m. Typical performance is maybe 4 m, and indoors it will be even worse. The point is, your dog could be 5 m away from your intended location, and you will get an alarm. 5 m in a house might be the room over, two rooms over, or outside the house!
However, if you want to go forward with this, get yourself a GPS module, connect it to your Arduino, install the TinyGPS++ library (one of the better Arduino GPS libs IMO), and play with it. It's easy to figure out how to perform an action when the GPS coordinates are in range of a given coordinate set.
You might have better luck using a different form of dog location detection.
Comment: FYI, you might be interested in my library, [NeoGPS](https://github.com/SlashDevin/NeoGPS).  It's smaller and faster, the examples are more robust, and the docs (hopefully) help new users avoid the many pitfalls in the TinyGPS examples.
Answer: A more low-tech solution might be better. For example, a couple of light beams across the doorway to the kitchen. An human would block both of them as they passed, and a dog only the lower one. You could sound an alarm if the lower one is broken, and the upper one is not broken (within a second).

Or do something with infra-red transmitters / receivers. There are lots of Arduino projects using those. You could have a transmitter in the kitchen pointing towards the doorway, sending some code (eg. 1234). Mount on the dog an Arduino with an IR decoder sketch. When the dog enters the kitchen it will get the code, and then you could sound a beeper. The beeper alone might make the dog change its mind about going in, especially if you go after it yelling "bad dog!" every time the beeper goes off.
Since the IR beam is just light, it would only go in a straight line, and if properly positioned would flood the kitchen, but not hit anywhere else.

Proof of concept
I made up a test of my idea of the IR transmitter.
(Please don't report me to the moderators for being off-topic. I know the question was about a GPS, but the real question is how to detect that the dog has come into the kitchen).
You can get IR (infra-red) LEDs cheaply at any electronics supplier (or eBay). They are like normal LEDs except that they transmit in the IR light range. They can also usually handle higher currents, like 80 mA.

Sender
So, to drive that from the Arduino we need a transistor to boost the output from the Arduino pin, like this:

Note that the positive pin of the LED will have a longer lead. The positive pin goes to the 39 ohm resistor, and the negative (shorter) lead goes to the transistor collector. In the schematic the negative pin (cathode) is at the bottom and has a horizontal line (think of the horizontal line as a minus sign).
The 39 ohm resistor limits current through the LED to 74 mA. Assuming a LED forward voltage of 2.1V we have:
<code> (5V - 2.1V) / 39Ω = 74 mA
</code>
The 470 ohm resistor limits current through the transistor base.

Sender code
Then some simple code to send a IR code (using PWM modulation like TV remotes do). There is a library for that, so the code is very simple:
<code>#include <IRLib.h>

IRsend My_Sender;

const unsigned long DOG_ALERT_CODE = 0xBADA;

void setup()
  {
  }

void loop()
  {
  My_Sender.send (NEC, DOG_ALERT_CODE, 20);
  delay (1000);
  }
</code>
That sends the code 0xBADA (which I just picked at random) every second using the NEC IR protocol.
The objective would be to have this plugged into the power somewhere in the kitchen, and aimed at the doorway. The IR library uses digital pin 3 (on the Uno at least). That happens to be the Timer 2 "B" output to send 38 kHz PWM (pulse-width-modulated) signal, which it interrupts from time to time to encode the code into it.

Receiver
Now we need something on the dog to detect the IR code. The objective is to notice the code above (eg. 0xBADA) and if found, sound a tone on a speaker, otherwise ignore it. That way we can still use remotes in the kitchen, and the speaker won't sound.

The code for the receiver is a bit more complex, but not much:
<code>#include <IRLib.h>
#include <TonePlayer.h>

const byte SPEAKER = 9;  // output pin is fixed (OC1A)
const byte IR_READER = 11;
const unsigned long BEEP_WIDTH = 50;
const int BEEP_FREQUENCY = 880;  // Hz
const unsigned long DOG_ALERT_CODE = 0xBADA;

// pin D9 (Uno), D11 (Mega)
TonePlayer tone1 (TCCR1A, TCCR1B, OCR1AH, OCR1AL, TCNT1H, TCNT1L);

IRrecv My_Receiver(IR_READER);
IRdecode My_Decoder;

void setup()
  {
  My_Receiver.enableIRIn(); // Start the receiver
  pinMode (SPEAKER, OUTPUT);
  }

unsigned long lastTone;

void loop()
  {
  if (My_Receiver.GetResults(&My_Decoder))
    {
    My_Decoder.decode();
    if (My_Decoder.decode_type == NEC)
      {
      if (My_Decoder.value == DOG_ALERT_CODE)
        {
        tone1.tone (BEEP_FREQUENCY);
        lastTone = millis ();
        }  // end of wanted code
      }  // end of NEC type
      My_Receiver.resume();
    }  // end of if we got a result

    // if time up, stop the beep
    if (millis () - lastTone >= BEEP_WIDTH)
      tone1.noTone ();

  } // end of loop
</code>
This also uses the IR library, this time to detect an incoming code. You wire the "Data" pin of the IR detector to digital pin 11 on the Arduino (Uno or similar). The other two pins of the IR detector go to Ground and +5V as marked.
To play a sound get a small piezo speaker and wire that to digital pin 9 (one side) and Ground (other side).
Because of the way that the IR library uses interrupts, I had to use my own Tone library to generate a tone. You can download that from:
http://www.gammon.com.au/Arduino/TonePlayer.zip

Testing
How well did it work? Certainly at short distances (like three feet or one metre) we got a positive result. There could be variance based on the light conditions in the room, and the exact parts you get.
You might want to read the design notes for TV B Gone where they discuss the technicalities of sending IR beams. In particular for their design they used four IR LEDs to give adequate range. You could add more LEDs by duplicating the transistor driver shown above a few times. In other words, duplicate the transistors, LEDs and resistors. They could all be driven from the same output pin.
As mentioned in the TV B Gone article, you can get different IR LEDs. Some have a narrow beam, but go further, others have a wider beam, but go less far.
Also you could arrange them to point in slightly different directions to cover more of the room.
You could also change the length of the beep when the code is detected (BEEP_WIDTH) in milliseconds. And also the frequency (BEEP_FREQUENCY) which I had at 880 Hz. A higher frequency might annoy the dog more but be less audible to humans. I suppose it depends if you want the dog to hear it or the people in the house.

Hardware size and power
You probably want a small Arduino (like a Nano) which is physically quite small. Also powering it could be an issue. You could get 3 x AA batteries, which would nominally output around 4.5V, and connect them directly to the +5V pin of the Arduino.
To save battery power you could have the Arduino sleep for (say) a second, wake and eheck for a code, and then sleep again. See my post about power savings for more details about that sort of thing.

Hardware photos
Comment: I needed the GPS coding but thank you for it. Could you help me with the GPS coding and how to set up the buzzer?
Comment: There are many posts by people who have connected a GPS to an Arduino. Asking to "provide code" goes beyond the scope of this site. We are here to answer questions, and be helpful as much as we can. Writing code from scratch isn't really our purpose. If you find code and have trouble getting it to work, by all means ask about that. I would find something that gets the current position, work out what that position is, for the kitchen, and then detect if you are in the kitchen or not.


How can I type a § in a Microsoft Remote Desktop Connection window?

Question: How can I type a "§" in a Microsoft Remote Desktop Connection (RDC) window? I am using the OS X client software to connect remotely to a computer running Microsoft Windows. In OS X Option ⌥+6 produces the symbol I want to be sent to the remote computer.
Comment: Alt+0167 is the character code for the Section Symbol.
Comment: bopritchard, it would be helpful to explain in your question what "RDC" is and not to assume that everybody understands the acronym. You should explain what the program is and what it is used for. I added this for you.
Comment: And, bopritchard, welcome to AskDifferent!
Answer: Here is the easiest  way to do this. You can copy and paste characters and text between the Mac and the remote Windows session.
On the Mac, open a word processor and type Option-6 to get the "§" character.
Copy this character.
Click on the Microsoft Remote Desktop Client window, click in a word processor on the Windows computer you are connecting to, and Paste. The "§" character will be pasted into your word processor document.
If on the other hand you want to learn how to type various special characters on Windows while using Microsoft Remote Desktop Client on a Mac, here is what you must do.
If you don't want to memorize Windows character codes (such as Alt-0167 as @OghmaOsiris explained above) you can select an alternate software keyboard layout on the Windows computer. On the Windows computer, select the United States-International keyboard. Then you can type Ctrl-Alt-Shift S to produce the "§" symbol.

To set  this up on Windows 7, go to Control Panel and select Region and Language. Under the Keyboards and Languages tab, click the Change Keyboards button. Click the Add button and you can select the United States-International option among many others.
If you select more than one keyboard layout, you can switch between them on the fly by enabling the Language Bar, either floating on the screen or docked in the taskbar.
To look at all the character options in each keyboard layout, use the On-Screen Keyboard app in Windows 7.
Comment: Are you saying that the answer is not possible to generate on the Mac keyboard and instead the user has to use a software keyboard on screen through the remote connection?
Comment: I have amended my answer with the "quick and easy" method, but left my extensive explanation on the "thorough" method after it.
Comment: Vote worthy, a very nice summary.
Comment: With the work that I do in classical music, often I have to type words or phrases in several different human languages (English, French, German, Italian, Spanish, and more) on both Mac and Windows. So I know a lot about this subject.
Comment: Alt+0167 does not work from the MacBook keyboard. Only from a full size.


Transfer game to another phone

Question: My daughter didn't have a phone that allowed the Pokemon go App so we downloaded it on to my S6. She now has a phone that allows the app. Could you please tell me how I transfer her game from my S6 to her Samsung Galaxy Grand Prime? She doesn't want to be forced to start over. I am technology challenged so I the information as simple as possible. Also is it possible to change the email to hers?
Answer: Simply use her new phone to sign in with her Pokémon Trainer Club/Google account(ask whatever she was using before), then delete the app from your phone. Redownload it and sign in as your own trainer if you wish to play the game yourself.

Transfer game to another phone