text:
An Adaptive Whitening Filter in Java
Java Programming Notes # 2352
- Preface
- General Background Information
- Preview
- Discussion and Sample Code
- Run the Program
- Summary
- What's Next?
- Complete Program Listings
DSP and adaptive filtering
Second in a series
This is the second lesson in a series designed to teach you about adaptive filtering in Java.
The first lesson, entitled Adaptive Filtering in Java, Getting Started, introduced you to the topic by showing you how to write a Java program to adaptively design a time-delay convolution filter with a flat amplitude response and a linear phase response using an LMS adaptive algorithm. That was a relatively simple time-adaptive filtering problem for which the correct solution was well known in advance. That made it possible to check the adaptive solution against the known solution.
An adaptive whitening filter
In this lesson, I will show you how to write an adaptive whitening filter program in Java, which is conceptually more difficult than the filter that I explained in the previous lesson. This lesson will also show you how to use the whitening filter to extract wide-band signal from a channel in which the signal is corrupted by one or more components of narrow-band noise.
Viewing tip
You may find it useful to open another copy of this lesson in a separate browser window. That will make it easier for you to scroll back and forth among the different listings and figures while you are reading about them.
Supplementary material
I recommend that you also study the other lessons in my extensive collection of online Java tutorials. You will find those lessons published at Gamelan.com. However, as of the date of this writing, Gamelan doesn't maintain a consolidated index of my Java tutorial lessons, and sometimes they are difficult to locate there. You will find a consolidated index at www.DickBaldwin.com.
General Background InformationReview of DSP concepts
Before getting into the details of the program, I need to prepare you to understand the program by reviewing some digital signal processing (DSP) concepts with you.
Sampled time series, convolution, and frequency spectrum
First there is the matter of the spectrum of a signal as well as the concepts of convolution and sampled time series. In order to understand this program, you will first need to understand the material in the following previously-published lessons:
- 100 Periodic Motion and Sinusoids
- 104 Sampled Time Series
- 108 Averaging Time Series
- 1478 Fun with Java, How and Why Spectral Analysis Works
- 1482 Spectrum Analysis using Java, Sampling Frequency, Folding Frequency, and the FFT Algorithm
- 1483 Spectrum Analysis using Java, Frequency Resolution versus Data Length
- 1484 Spectrum Analysis using Java, Complex Spectrum and Phase Angle
- 1485 Spectrum Analysis using Java, Forward and Inverse Transforms, Filtering in the Frequency Domain
- 1487 Convolution and Frequency Filtering in Java
- 1488 Convolution and Matched Filtering in Java
- 1492 Plotting Large Quantities of Data using Java
Data predictability
The adaptive design of the whitening filter in this lesson is based on the predictability, or lack thereof, of a time series. Predictability is a measure of the degree to which it possible to use the current sample and a set of previous samples to predict the value of the next sample.
White noise versus a single-frequency sinusoid
The two extremes of predictability are given by white noise on one hand and a single frequency sinusoid on the other.
(Recall that insofar as sampled time series are concerned, white noise is represented by a time series that is composed of equal contributions of all frequencies in the spectrum between zero and the Nyquist folding frequency, which is one-half the sampling frequency.)
Generating white noise
The easiest way to generate sampled white noise is to take the values for the samples from a random number generator. If you take a sufficiently long series of such values and perform a spectral analysis on that time series, you will find that as the length of the series approaches infinity, the spectrum approaches the ideal case of an equal contribution of energy at all frequencies.
(If that doesn't happen, then the values produced by your random number generator aren't truly random.)
Random values are uncorrelated
If the series of values produced by the random number generator is truly random, then the value of each sample is totally uncorrelated with all previous values. If there is no correlation between successive values, then it is not possible to successfully predict the next value (except through pure chance) based on a knowledge of some subset or all of the previous values.
(For example, given a true coin and given the outcome of any number of previous tosses, it is not possible to predict the next toss with a probability of success greater than one chance in two. In other words, knowing the outcome of many previous tosses doesn't improve your likelihood of correctly predicting the next toss to better than one chance in two.)
Therefore, if white noise is equivalent to a series of values produced by a random number generator, it is not possible to predict the value of a white noise sample using any number of previous samples.
A sinusoid is predictable
On the other hand, a pure single-frequency sinusoid is completely deterministic. There is nothing random about it. That is to say, given a small number of successive values from a pure sinusoid, it is easy to design a convolution filter that will process that sinusoid to produce a perfect prediction of the next value given a small set of previous values.
Predictability is inversely related to bandwidth
In the real world, signals and noise are neither pure sinusoids nor completely random. However, the narrower the bandwidth of a time series, the easier it is to predict the next value given a set of previous values. Similarly, the wider the bandwidth of a time series, the more difficult it is to predict the next value given a set of previous values. The program in this lesson will take those facts into account to adaptively design a convolution filter that will extract wide-band signals that have been corrupted by additive narrow-band noise.
Why would we want to do this?
This is not an unusual circumstance. Wide-band signals corrupted by narrow-band noise can occur in a variety of real-world situations. Some of the most common are situations in which wide-band signals are corrupted by additive reverberation noise. This can occur in a theatre, for example, where specific audio frequencies tend to reverberate due to the architecture. Another common example is an audio system that is corrupted by 60-cycle hum.
Reflection seismology
One of the earliest applications of digital whitening filters (although not necessarily adaptive) took place in the industry that searches for underground petroleum deposits using reflection seismology.
In reflection seismology, a burst of energy is "shot" into the earth where it is reflected back to the surface by the different layers in the earth. The reflected energy that arrives back at the surface is measured by sensors on the surface. The two-way travel time of the energy to and from each layer is different. Thus, the reflections from the shallow layers arrive back at the surface before the reflections from the deeper layers. The output from each sensor (or possibly each group of sensors added together) is digitized and treated as a sampled time series.
Repeat the process many times
This process is repeated over and over moving along a straight line on the surface of the earth. Then the sampled time series are plotted on the same display with equal spacing between the "traces" as they are often called. Each trace represents a point on the surface of the earth, and the peaks and valleys in the time series represent reflections from the various layers in the earth below that point.
Orient the display
If this display is then oriented such that the zero time reference is at the top of the display and time increases going down the display, the peaks and valleys on the individual traces can be correlated by eye to trace out the layering in the earth. Examples of such displays are shown in Figure 2 at the following URL:
Each of the panels in Figure 2 at the above URL consists of hundreds of seismic traces with time going down the page. To the trained eye, the layering in the earth is evident in those images.
Initially used on shore
Reflection seismology was first used to search for underground petroleum deposits underneath the land masses on the earth. In this case, the shot of energy often consisted of a small explosion with the explosive material being tamped into a shallow borehole in the earth. The sensors for each different shot point were often placed on the surface of the earth in a line.
Moving offshore
Around the turn of the twentieth century, this technique was moved offshore to those portions of the earth covered with shallow water along the continental shelves. The purpose was to find underground petroleum deposits under these shallow water areas. In this case, the sensors were often trailed along behind the boat on a cable that was slightly submerged. The shots consisted of a variety of acoustic energy sources such as small explosions, or the release of a burst of air into the water from a high-pressure pneumatic device.
A special new problem was encountered with the transition to offshore exploration. When the shot was fired in an attempt to inject energy into the earth, a large percentage of the energy became trapped in the water layer and continued to bounce back and forth between the surface of the water and the surface of the earth below the water. This is a form of narrow-band reverberation.
The level of the reverberation energy was greater than the level of the reflections from the deep layering of the earth. Thus, the reverberation energy appeared as narrow-band reverberation noise in the output from the sensors, and the reflection energy of interest appeared as wide-band signals. The reverberation energy tended to mask the reflections from the different surfaces in the earth making it difficult to interpret the results.
Mathematical solutions
Different mathematical techniques (usually involving matrix inversions) were used to design convolution filters that could be used to filter out the narrow-band noise and to make the wide-band signals visible in the displays. These filters were called whitening filters, and the overall process was often referred to as deconvolution.
If you are interested in learning more about the reverberation problem and deconvolution in exploration seismology, visit this site or go to Google and search for the keywords seismic and deconvolution.
An adaptive solution
The adaptive algorithm that I will present in this lesson is an adaptive approach to the matrix inversion solutions that were frequently used to solve this reverberation problem.
The algorithm is also appropriate for use in a variety of other application areas involving wide-band signals corrupted by narrow-band noise.
Before getting into the details of the program, I am going to present and explain some experimental results that were produced using the program.
How does it work?
In the previous lesson, you learned how to use a least mean square (LMS) adaptive algorithm to adjust the individual coefficients in a convolution filter. The setup was such that when the filter was applied to one sampled time series it would attempt to cause the output to look like another sampled time series.
In the scenario presented in the previous lesson, the second sampled time series was simply a time-shifted version of the first time series. As a result, the convolution filter that resulted from the adaptive process was a filter with a flat amplitude response and a linear phase response. When the filter was applied to the first sampled time series, the output was a time-shifted version of that time series that matched the second time series.
We will use that same approach in this lesson, but will apply the approach to a different scenario.
The scenario for this lesson
In this lesson, we will have a sampled time series that consists of the sum of unpredictable wide-band signal and narrow-band (predictable) noise. The objective is to produce a replica of the narrow-band noise and then to subtract it from the original time series consisting of signal plus noise. If successful, this will produce an output consisting mainly of the original wide-band signal.
Will predict the next sample in the series
We will set the adaptive algorithm up so that it uses the current sample plus a specified number of history samples to develop a convolution filter that is capable of predicting the value of the next sample.
Because the narrow-band noise is largely predictable and the wide-band signal is largely unpredictable, the filter coefficients will adjust themselves to make a good prediction of the narrow-band noise. When we apply this convolution filter to the time series consisting of signal plus noise, the output will be an estimate of the waveform of the narrow-band noise. We will then subtract that waveform from the time series consisting of signal plus noise, leaving an estimate of the wide-band signal.
The quality of the results
The quality of the estimate of the wide-band signal will depend on a variety of factors including but not limited to:
- The number of narrow-band noise components that are added to the signal.
- The signal-to-noise ratio.
- The number of coefficients in the convolution filter.
- The feedback gain factor.
- The number of iterations allowed for the adaptive process to converge to a solution.
Some experiments
Before getting into the details regarding the program code, we will perform some experiments where we will vary the factors in the above list and observe the results.
First, however, I want to discuss of the difference between a prediction filter and a whitening filter, and to introduce you to the graphic output produced by the program.
The whitening process
In the above discussion, I explained that we will develop a convolution filter that can be applied to a sampled time series consisting of signal plus noise to use the current sample plus a specified number of historical samples to produce an output value that is an estimate of the value of the next sample.
I also explained that in order to separate the signal from the noise, we will subtract the estimate of the next sample from the actual value of the next sample. The combined process of applying the prediction filter and performing the subtraction process can be thought of as a whitening processing.
The whitening filter
I hope that by now you are sufficiently familiar with the convolution process that you will recognize that we can combine these two steps simply by concatenating a coefficient value of -1 onto the end of the prediction filter and applying this filter to the sampled time series consisting of signal plus noise.
I will refer to the filter that is created by concatenating a coefficient with a value of -1 onto the prediction filter as the whitening filter. I will show you an example of a whitening filter shortly.
The time-series output
This program uses a class named PlotALot07 to display various sampled time series involved in the adaptive process.
(In fact, much of the code in this program involves displaying various results for explanation purposes having nothing to do with the actual adaptive process.)
An object of the PlotALot07 class produces multiple pages of plotted data with multiple traces or time series on each page. Figure 1 shows an example of one of the pages produced by this program.
Figure 1
Each page displays six different sampled time series plotted horizontally with time increasing from left to right. (At this point, I will start referring to the sampled time series as traces.)
Figure 1 shows the page produced by the program at the beginning of an adaptive run for a specific set of parameters.
The output from the whitening filter
The black trace at the top of Figure 1 shows the output from the whitening filter. Ideally this trace contains the wide-band signal with the narrow-band noise having been removed. However, in Figure 1, the top trace is still significantly corrupted by the narrow-band noise.
Figure 2 shows the graphic output produced by the same run after approximately 500 adaptive iterations. At this point, the narrow-band noise has been largely removed by the application of the whitening filter leaving only the wide-band signal in the top trace in Figure 2.
Figure 2
The wide-band signal
The second (red) trace in Figure 1 and Figure 2 shows the raw wide-band signal prior to adding the narrow-band noise. This wide-band signal consists of samples taken from a random number generator. Therefore, this is a white signal containing equal contributions of all frequency components between zero and the Nyquist folding frequency.
Ideally, the top trace should look exactly like the second trace once the narrow-band noise has been removed. This is pretty much the case after 500 adaptive iterations in Figure 2.
The narrow-band noise
The third (blue) trace in Figure 1 and Figure 2 shows the narrow-band noise that was added to the wide-band signal for the purpose of purposely corrupting the signal. For the case shown in Figure 1 and Figure 2, the narrow-band noise consisted of a single sinusoid with a peak-to-peak amplitude roughly twice the peak-to-peak amplitude of the wide-band signal.
The wide-band signal plus the narrow-band noise
The fourth (green) trace in Figure 1 and Figure 2 shows the sum of the wide-band signal and the narrow-band noise. This is the time series that is processed by the whitening filter to produce the output shown in the top trace.
You might note that at the beginning of the adaptive run in Figure 1, the output of the whitening filter in the top trace is very similar to the fourth trace except for a time shift. However, by the end of 500 adaptive iterations, the output from the whitening filter bears little resemblance to the fourth trace, but instead looks much more like the second trace, which is pure signal.
Output from the prediction filter
The output from the fifth (violet) trace is the output produced by applying the prediction filter to the fourth trace consisting of the sum of signal and noise. At the beginning of the adaptive process in Figure 1, the output from the prediction filter is essentially zero for all output values. (This is because all of the initial coefficients in the prediction filter were initialized to a value of zero.) However, by the end of 500 adaptive iterations, the output from the prediction filter in the fifth trace is a very good replica of the narrow-band noise in the third trace. Thus, subtracting the prediction filter output from the input that consists of the sum of signal and noise leaves a good estimate of the signal.
The adaptive target
The sixth trace at the bottom is the target time series that is used to control the
adaptive process.
(I explained the use of an adaptive target in the previous lesson.)
This trace displays the next sample beyond the samples that are processed by the prediction filter during each adaptive iteration. This trace is essentially the signal plus noise with a time shift as you can see by comparing it to the fourth (green) trace in Figure 1 and Figure 2. The prediction filter attempts to predict the value of this trace during each iteration and the adaptive process is designed to improve the ability of the prediction filter to perform that prediction in a high quality fashion.
The impulse response and the frequency response
As another approach to explaining how adaptive whitening works, Figure 3 shows the impulse response and the frequency response of the whitening filter at the beginning of the run, and at the end of every 100 iterations of the iterative adaptive process.
The impulse responses of the whitening filters at those points in time are shown in the panel on the left of Figure 3. The frequency response of each of the impulse responses is shown in the panel on the right of Figure 3.
Figure 3
The impulse response of the whitening filter
First consider the impulse response of the whitening filter. The top trace in the left panel shows the impulse response at the beginning of the run before the adaptive process begins. Each of the traces below that one shows the impulse response at the end of each set of 100 adaptive iterations, ending with the impulse response at the end of 500 iterations.
The impulse response of the whitening filter always ends with a coefficient value of -1.
(Recall that the whitening filter is constructed by concatenating a coefficient with a value of -1 onto the end of the prediction filter.)
The impulse response of the prediction filter
Thus, the impulse response of the prediction filter consists of all of the coefficient values to the left of the coefficient having the value of -1. These coefficient values are initialized to values of zero at the beginning of the adaptive process as shown by the top impulse response in Figure 3.
As you can see by examining each impulse response going down the page, the adaptive process causes the prediction filter coefficients to take on different values as the adaptive process proceeds through 500 adaptive iterations.
As you can also see, the coefficient values for the prediction filter have pretty well stabilized by the end of 300 iterations for this set of conditions.
The frequency response
Although the format can be a little confusing, the right panel in Figure 3 shows the amplitude and phase response of each of the whitening filters shown in the left panel. Each of the plots in the right panel shows the frequency response from a frequency of zero on the left, to the Nyquist folding frequency (one-half the sampling frequency) on the right.
The red and black traces
To get your bearings, consider the red trace and the black trace at the bottom of the right panel. The black trace with the notch near the bottom of the right panel shows the amplitude response of the whitening filter in the bottom of the left panel. The red trace at the bottom of the right panel shows the corresponding phase response for the same whitening filter plotted over an interval of +180 degrees to -180 degrees.
Each such pair of red and black traces corresponds to the phase and amplitude response of the whitening filter immediately to the left of the red phase response.
A notch filter
Consider first the amplitude response shown by the black trace at the bottom of the right panel. This amplitude response shows a reasonably sharp notch at a frequency about one fourth of the way between zero on the left and the Nyquist folding frequency on the right. The location of the notch matches the frequency of the narrow-band noise that was suppressed by the adaptive process.
A flat wide-band response
The frequency response of the whitening filter is relatively flat at all frequencies on both sides of the notch. When this filter is applied to the input consisting of wide-band signal plus narrow-band noise at the same frequency as the notch, the filter does a reasonably good job of preserving the wide-band signal and suppressing the narrow-band noise. That agrees with what we saw in the time series output in Figure 2.
The adaptive progression
If you examine the amplitude response curves at each level from top to bottom, you can see how this notch develops as the adaptive process converges. As was the case with the impulse response, the position of the notch and the flatness at surrounding frequencies was pretty well established and stabilized by the end of about 300 adaptive iterations.
The phase response
Another important characteristic of the whitening filter is the phase response. The output of a filter with a flat amplitude response and a phase shift of zero degrees simply reproduces the input. That is probably the best case scenario. A phase shift of 180 degrees (or -180 degrees) reverses the algebraic sign of the input values. This is probably the next best scenario because this phase shift is relatively easy to compensate for.
(Note that a -180-degree phase shift is the same as a +180-degree phase shift.)
Phase or waveform distortion
Except for the unique case of a linear phase shift (see the previous lesson), phase shifts between the two extremes of zero degrees and 180 degrees usually introduce phase or waveform distortion into the signal. This is usually undesirable and can be difficult to compensate for.
The phase response curve
The red phase response curves in Figure 3 are plotted against a black axis that represents zero degrees. As you can see, at the end of 500 adaptive iterations and at most frequencies, the phase shift is either +180 degrees or -180 degrees, indicating that there will be very little phase or waveform distortion in the signal as it passes through the whitening filter. The only frequencies where this is not true is in the narrow band of frequencies in the near vicinity of the notch in the amplitude response. Thus, we can expect a small amount of phase distortion for those signal components on either side of the notch in the amplitude response.
Overall, as we saw in Figure 2, this whitening filter does a reasonably good job of suppressing the narrow-band noise while preserving the wide-band signal with very little phase or waveform distortion.
Required input data
The user is required to provide the information shown in Figure 4 as command-line parameters to the program.
(If the user fails to provide the required command-line parameters, default values are used. The results shown in Figures 1 through 3 resulted from the default values.)
feedbackGain: The gain factor that is used in the feedback loop to adjust the coefficient values in the prediction/whitening filter. (A whitening filter is a prediction filter with a -1 appended to its end.) If the value of the feedbackGain is too high, the program will become unstable. If too low, convergence will take a long time. Values toward the low end tend to converge to better solutions. It is possible for the feedbackGain value to be low enough to avoid instability but high enough to cause the adaptive process to bounce around and never find a good solution. Typical useful values for feedbackGain in this program are around 0.00001. numberIterations: The is the number of iterations that the program executes before stopping and displaying all of the graphic results. predictionFilterLength: This is the number of coefficients in the prediction filter. This can be any integer value greater than zero. The program will throw an exception if this value is zero. Typical values are 15 to 30. Longer filters tend to produce better results in terms of the narrowness of the notches at the noise frequencies and the flatness of the filter between the notches. signalScale: A scale factor that is applied to the wide band signal provided by the random noise generator. The random noise generator produces uniformly distributed values ranging from -0.5 to +0.5. Scaling values of from 10 to 20 work well in terms of producing a wide-band signal that is of a suitable magnitude for plotting. Set this to 0 to see how the program behaves in the presence of noise and the absence of signal. noiseScale: A scale factor that is applied to each of the sinusoidal noise functions before they are added to the signal. The raw sinusoids vary from -1.0 to +1.0. Scaling values of from 10 to 20 work well in terms of being of a suitable magnitude for plotting. Set this to 0 to see how the program behaves in the presence of wide-band signal and the absence of narrow-band noise. numberNoiseSources: This value specifies the number of sinusoidal noise components that are added to the wide-band signal. Must be an integer value from 0 to 3.
Figure 4
The default values
For the record, the default values that produced the output shown in Figures 1 through 3 are as shown in Figure 5.
Using following values by default: feedbackGain: 1.0E-5 numberIterations: 500 predictionFilterLength: 26 signalScale: 20.0 noiseScale: 20.0 numberNoiseSources: 1
Figure 5
A more difficult problem
Now let's look at the experimental results for a considerably more difficult scenario. The parameters for this scenario are shown in Figure 6.
Using following values from input: feedbackGain: 1.0E-5 numberIterations: 1000 predictionFilterLength: 45 signalScale: 20.0 noiseScale: 10.0 numberNoiseSources: 3
Figure 6
The main thing that makes this scenario more difficult is the fact that there are three narrow-band noise components instead of only one. This means that the adaptive process will be required to build a whitening filter with a frequency response that has three notches but which is otherwise flat.
To accommodate this added difficulty, I increased the prediction filter length to 45 coefficients and extended the number of adaptive iterations from 500 to1000. I didn't change the feedback gain.
The time-domain output
Figure 7 shows the time-domain graphs at the beginning and at the end of the adaptive run after 1000 adaptive iterations.
Figure 7
As you can see in the bottom panel of Figure 7, the whitening filter output in the top (black) trace is a reasonably good representation of the actual wide-band signal shown in the second (red) trace. This indicates that the adaptive process was successful in designing a whitening filter that suppresses the three narrow-band noise components while preserving the wide-band signal.
The impulse response and the frequency response
Figures 8 and 9 show the impulse and frequency response curves for the whitening filter as the adaptive process converges. The traces at the top of Figure 8 show the impulse response and frequency response of the whitening filter before the adaptive process began. Each successive set of traces shows the response curves at the end of 100 adaptive iterations.
Figure 8
The traces at the bottom of Figure 8 show the response curves after 500 adaptive iterations.
Figure 9
The fifth set of traces down from the top in Figure 9 show the response curves at the end of 1000 iterations.
Three notches are visible
You can see the three notches in the frequency response develop as you examine the curves from the top of Figure 8 to near the bottom of Figure 9.
Reasonably flat amplitude response
Although some ripple is evident in the amplitude response near the bottom of Figure 9, the amplitude response outside the areas of the three notches is reasonably flat.
Well-behaved phase response
Also, outside the areas of the three notches, the phase response is very close to either 180 degrees or -180 degrees indicating that there should be very little phase or waveform distortion for the wide-band signal. This agrees with a visual comparison of the first and second traces in the bottom panel of Figure 7.
Enough talk, let's see some code
Now that you know what to expect from the behavior of this program, it's time to examine the program code in some detail.
The program named Adapt02 illustrates one aspect of time-adaptive signal processing. This program implements a time-adaptive whitening filter using a predictive approach.
Input signal plus noise
The program input is a time series consisting of a wide-band signal plus up to three sinusoidal noise components. The program adaptively creates a filter that attempts to eliminate the sinusoidal noise while preserving the wide-band signal.
Time series output
The following time series are displayed when the program runs:
- -err: This is the negative of the error which is actually the output from the whitening filter. Ideally this time series contains the wide-band signal with the sinusoidal noise having been removed.
- signal: The raw wideband signal consisting of samples taken from a random number generator.
- sineNoise: The raw noise consisting of the sum of one, two, or three sinusoidal functions.
- input: The sum of the signal plus the sinusoidal noise.
- output: The output produced by applying the prediction filter to the input signal plus noise.
- target: The target time series that is used to control the adaptive process. This is the next sample beyond the samples that are processed by the prediction filter. The prediction filter attempts to predict this value. Thus, the adaptive process attempts to cause the output from the prediction filter to match the next sample in the incoming signal plus noise.
Examples of these six sampled time series outputs are shown in Figure 1 and Figure 2 above.
Frequency response of the whitening filter
Although not required by the adaptive process, the frequency response of the whitening filter is computed and displayed once every 100 adaptive iterations. This output is provided to help you to understand the adaptive process.
Ideally the amplitude response will be flat with very narrow notches at the frequencies of the interfering sinusoidal noise components.
Both the amplitude and the phase response are displayed once every 100 iterations. This makes it possible for you to see the notches develop in the frequency response of the whitening filter as it converges on a solution. It also makes it possible for you to see how the phase behaves at and between the notches in the amplitude response.
An example of the frequency response output is shown in the right panel in Figure 3 above.
Impulse response of the whitening filter
The individual time-domain whitening filters, (on which the frequency response is computed), are also displayed once every 100 iterations. An example is shown in the left panel of Figure 3.
Command-line input
The user provides six command line parameters to control the operation of the program. These command-line parameters are described in Figure 4 above. If the user doesn't provide any command line parameters, six default values are used instead.
In addition to the class named Adapt02, this program requires the following classes:
- PlotALot01
- PlotALot03
- PlotALot07
- ForwardRealToComplex01
I provided the source code for and explained the class named PlotALot01 in the earlier lesson entitled Plotting Large Quantities of Data using Java. Therefore, I won't repeat that explanation in this lesson.
I also provided and explained the class named PlotALot03 in the earlier lesson entitled Plotting Large Quantities of Data using Java, and I won't repeat that material here either.
I provided the source code for and explained the class named ForwardRealToComplex01 in the earlier lesson entitled Spectrum Analysis using Java, Sampling Frequency, Folding Frequency, and the FFT Algorithm. Once again, I will simply refer you to that lesson and won't repeat that material here.
The class named PlotALot07 is new to this lesson. The source code for this class is provided in Listing 22 near the end of the lesson. The class named PlotALot07 is a simple extension of the class named PlotALot04, which I explained in the lesson entitled Plotting Large Quantities of Data using Java. I will refer you to that lesson for a general explanation of the class and won't provide further explanation of the class named PlotALot07.
Program testing
This program was tested using J2SE 5.0 running under Windows XP. J2SE 5.0 or later is required due to the use of Generics and the use of static import directives.
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Source: http://rollercoasters-bunker.blogspot.com/2007/03/make-dvd-iso-from-cd-isos-of-fedora.html
allright people.. lots of ya all seem to be interested in this.
it is quite simple. Since things have gone multi-giga-byte now a days, handeling one DVD is way easier then poppin n jiggling six CDs one after the other.
Ok here are the steps.
What u need:
1. The CD isos of Fedora core 5 ofcourse(the 1st five only, as sixth is rescue)
2. Magic ISO to edit images. or any other free alternative
3. An editor.
4. A Dvd Burner.
5. Daemon tools(makes life easier and lessens the free space req.)
6. 4 Gb free HDD space(+ the space the CD isos are taking up)
1. Copy the CD1 to a temp folder.(there should be 4 GB space on this drive)
2. Open Magic ISO and browse for the file.
3. From the root of the image see for a file named ".diskinfo"
4. Right click and extract on desktop.
5. Open a command promp and type "edit"(notepad doest work with this nicely, u can use textpad too)
6. Browse to the ".diskinfo" file. it will look like this:

1142397842.393345
Fedora Core
x86_64
1
Fedora/base
Fedora/RPMS
Fedora/pixmaps

7. Edit the file to look like this, basically append ",2,3,4,5" after "1" in line 4.

1142397842.393345
Fedora Core
x86_64
1,2,3,4,5
Fedora/base
Fedora/RPMS
Fedora/pixmaps

8. Save the file.
9. Drag and drop it to the open iso in Magiciso.
10. Right click on daemon tools in the taskbar and goto virtual CD/DVD-ROM>set no of deviced>4 Drives.
11. After the drives have been created left click on daemon tools again and select "Device 0" and Browse to the 2nd CD image to mount it.
12. Repeat the above step for Cds 3 thru 5. (and select device 1 thru 3 respectively). You should have cds 2 thru 5 loaded in virtual drives. check thru My computer.
13. Next, for each drive(mounted image) go to Drive:FedoraRPMS and select and drag and drop all files onto the magic iso window under the folder FedoraRPMS.(alternatively add then thru magic iso, whatever, just add all). You will be asked to over write a file "TRANS.TBL" each time u drag and drop. just select yes(for explanation see page 3 of this thread).
14. After you have added all rpm files. select File>save under magiciso. rename the file to DVD from CD.
15. You are all done. Now Burn and enjoy!!!
Clean UP:
1. Left click on deamon tools and select unmount all.
2. Right click deamon tools and goto virtual CD/DVD-ROM>set no of deviced>1 Drives
3. Delete the CD isos if u want to free up space(1st check the DVD Image to be sure)
4. Delete ".diskinfo" from desktop
SHORTCOMING: This media will NOT pass the media check. so do no test it. If u are paranoid'nf then load a virtual machine and emulate the linux setup and "media-check" the individual cd isos there. To make it pass the media check u need to regenerate the checksums. which is beyond the scope here and worthless for home users. others google.
__________________________________________________ __________________________________________________ ______________
EDIT: src2206 and aditya.shevade were interested in the reverse i.e. DVD to CD iso…
(this is a painfull method)
1. Go to the fedora website hosting the CD isos.
2. Directly mount the CD isos one by one in deamon tools via the webaddress(suppose drive x)
3. Run "CMD" and execute the following commands:
4. Change directory to drive x by typeing "x:"
5. type "copy .diskinfo c:cd1.diskinfo"
6. Type "tree > c:cd1.txt"
7. Load the next iso in deamon tools and repeat the two commands above but keep changing the 'cd1' to cd2 and so on(in both commands).
8. Now after u have all the directory structure u gotta get working. load the DVD iso in deamon tools
9. Now using explorer create five folders named CD1 … CD5
10. See the directory structure but running CMD and using the edit utility.
11. Now for each folder duplicate the contents by copying the files from DVD according to the CD structure.
12. Rename each "cdx.diskinfo" file to ".diskinfo" and place in respectibe CD folder
13. Make iso using magiciso or nero.
14. Varify the file size.
15. Any files u dont find in the DVD, copy them off by loading the CD iso
again in Deamon tools directly from the web.
I sincerely dont think u will go thru the above painfull process.
I am not aware of any simpler processes except downloading the ISO images.
Just think of my effort to write this procedure and try it. give feedback.
I havent tried the above so no promices but logically it should work.


text:
After two road straight games in which he described Florida's wins over Auburn and Alabama as "we won the battle but we lost the war," Billy Donovan wanted his 6th-ranked Gators to play with a sense of desperation – desperation as in winning the hustle plays, getting to loose balls, getting to the double team on time and rotating properly to cut off passing lanes to the shooters.
Desperation as in starting to play like a team with championship aspirations.
"Coach had this reoccurring theme of being desperate – being desperate as if this is a championship game and each possession is a championship possession," is how Patric Young described Florida's mindset coming into Saturday's game with the Tennessee Vols at the sold-out Stephen C. O'Connell Center.
This wasn't a championship game, but the Gators (17-2, 6-0 SEC) played the way a championship team is supposed to play, particularly on the defensive end where they locked down the Vols and turned what was expected to be a white knuckler into a 67-41 blowout before a crowd of 12,475.
This is what desperate looked like:
The Vols only scored 19 first half points and just 22 in the second half.
Tennessee was 5.3% from the 3-point line on 1-19 shooting.
The Vols were 15-56 overall from the field (26.8%).
Take away the 6-9 shooting effort that resulted in 16 points by Jarnell Stokes and the Vols were 9-47 from the field and good for 25 points.
Jordan McRae, an All-SEC performer last year who came into the game averaging 19.2 per game, went 1-15 from the field and scored only five points.
"I don't know if Jordan McRae is the top scorer, but he's top five in our league," Young said. "When you can hold him to five points and he gets frustrated and their coach has to take him out, then your team did something right."
Doing something right meant challenging McRae and keeping him from hitting a couple of confidence-building shots early on. He was 1-9 in the first half and was 1-6 in the second when Tennessee coach Cuonzo Martin pulled him out of the game.
"I thought we made him take some tough shots early," Donovan said. "I thought outside the one play when we gave him a three – DeVon Walker got hung up on a screen and gave him a fairly decent look – outside of that I thought most of the shots we made him take were really difficult. He didn't have a lot of wide open looks. Most of the shots were challenged."
The Gators challenged shots. That is the best thing you could say about their defensive effort and it all started with Donovan demanding that they play with more focus, effort and intensity on the defensive end. The two previous games – road wins last week when they allowed 61 points to Auburn and 62 to Alabama – were the learning lab. Florida won both games but didn't come anywhere close to playing at the level he expects or that the Gators capable of playing.
So he challenged them Friday at practice to take their game up a notch.
"I told our guys coming out of Auburn and coming out of Alabama that we won the battle and lost the war," Donovan said. "What I meant by that was I thought our team – in terms of a standard that I want to see our guys play up to not that we're going to be perfect – we lost that war. The outcome was a W against those two teams on the road but we didn't play to the level of expectations that I feel we could play at defensively. Our numbers proved that out. Our breakdowns proved that out. There were times when we were just very mediocre and sometimes we were very good but there was a level of consistency that wasn't very good."
The consistency was there against Tennessee.
When the Vols tried to get the ball inside to their power guys – Stokes, who is 6-8, 260, and Jeronne Maymon, also 6-8 and 260 – the Gators collapsed the defense and made life very difficult with double and sometimes triple teams that made passing impossible and turned power up moves into exhausting shows of strength.
On those occasions when the Vols got someone open on the perimeter, the shots were rushed because it was rare when a Gator wasn't running full tilt at the shooter.
And then there was the press. It didn't force that many turnovers, but it changed the tempo of the game and forced the Vols to play at Florida's pace.
On the offensive end, the Gators weren't spectacular but they were efficient. They hit 26-54 from the field, a respectable 48.1%, and they were just good enough shooting the 3-ball to stretch Tennessee's defense.
Michael Frazier, who killed Alabama with five 3-point daggers, was 3-6 from long distance, but he expanded his game, scoring twice on drives to the basket and adding 4-4 from the foul line as part of a 17-point effort that led all scorers. Frazier also added another dimension by finding Patric Young, once on a first half cut and the second time on an alley-oop off the dribble, for a pair of vicious dunks.
It was a far cry from last Saturday when Frazier was good for a donut against Auburn.
"That's what happens when you have a double threat like that when you can drive or you can shoot the ball," Frazier said. "You keep them on your toes. That's what happened tonight. I was able to get down the lane a couple of times and then I was able to get an open shot."
Help came from Scottie Wilbekin (13 points), Casey Prather (12), Young (10) and Dorian Finney-Smith (9). It was the kind of balanced scoring that Donovan wanted and combined with the defensive effort it was the kind of game that Donovan sees as his team's identity.
And what is the Gators' identity? It is about pressing and playing sound defense in the half court. It's about being disciplined enough to carry out assignments and to share the ball offensively.
It's also about playing with a sense of desperation.
"You have to create these kind of situations where you've got to be desperate and a lot of times you have to be desperate each situation," Donovan said. "Human nature is you can get a little complacent and look at the scoreboard. We need to play with a little bit more desperation. I don't think the last two games we've played with much desperation. Today we did a lot better job of being desperate. It's a loose ball. It's a hustle play. It's getting where you're supposed to be. It's being on time on a post trap. It's the ball goes up and it's kind of bobbled around and you dive head first.
"It's a gift to be desperate. It's a gift. That's the one thing we talked about with our guys and I thought our guys played like that."
GAME NOTES: Prather scored in double figures for the 17th time this season. His 12 points give him 285 this season. He scored 276 in the 90 games he played his first three seasons at Florida … The win over Tennessee broke a 3-game losing streak to the Vols. Billy Donovan had never beaten Cuonzo Martin until this game … Finney-Smith led Florida with eight rebounds … In addition to his 16 points, Stokes pulled down 10 rebounds.


text:
Meet the Nominees: Most Inspiring Person of 2007
Check out the amazing people who are up for Beliefnet's annual award.
For seven years Beliefnet has honored extraordinary individuals who have made the world a better place through their amazing accomplishments. This year's candidates are equally remarkable. Here are our nominees for the Most Inspiring Person of the Year.
Click here to meet the first nominee.
At the end of the gallery you may read in-depth profiles on each of the nominees.


text:
factor360 needed a new web page design and created a contest on 99designs.
A winner was selected from 33 designs submitted by 11 freelance designers.
Electronic University Consortium
The EUC is a single point of contact for information and access to distance education and training available from the six South Dakota public universities. Based upon more than 80 years of effective off-campus education, South Dakota is committed to serving:
* Working adults
* Part-time students
* Time- and place-bound individuals
* K-12 students, teachers and administrators
* Employees seeking career development skills
* Government and military personnel
* Persons with disabilities
This is primarily a marketing website. It will be used to highlight online program offerings and course offerings from a group of public universities.
- The design should feature the logos from the 6 participating universities (they have been attached as files)
- The design should contain an area for a "Featured Academic Program" in the sidebar somewhere. Maybe give this a bit of a unique look and feel
- The client likes the site "http://www.minnesotaonline.org/"
- The client is looking for a generally clean design
- Please include the EUC logo (also attached), however, feel free to change the colors to whatever you would like.
- There is no specified color scheme required, be creative!


text:
I decided to ditch the Tigger/Winnie the Pooh quilt idea...at least for now. I don't know...I saw my friends buying their kid a $10 stuffed Tigger at Wal-Mart yesterday without a second thought and that got me thinking of all the other Pooh bear and Tigger stuff he already has (and probably doesn't need). Movies, stuffed animals, decor, this bouncing Tigger thing, etc. Suddenly I just don't feel like making him a Tigger quilt when he already has a lot of Tigger stuff and will probably be getting more before, during, and after Christmas.
I came up with an alternative idea. Not sure if I'm going to go with it, but its the best idea I've come up with so far.


text:
Master of Arts in English
Shouhua Qi, Graduate Coordinator, Literature
Phone: (203) 837-9048
Professor Casey Rudkin, Graduate Coordinator, Writing
Phone: (203) 837-3943
Email: email@example.com
Laurel Richards, Secretary
Phone: (203) 837-9041
Fax: (203) 837-8912
Email: firstname.lastname@example.com
English Overview
The Master of Arts (M.A.) in English at WestConn has two options: Literature Option and Writing Option. The program is housed in the English Department, which coordinates the Literature Option, whereas the Department of Writing, Linguistics and Creative Process coordinates the Writing Options.
Program Mission, Goals and Objectives
The M.A. in English offers courses of study that students can apply toward advanced degrees or toward careers as writers or as teachers on the primary and secondary levels. All students graduating with the M.A. in English are expected to have developed an advanced knowledge of authors, literary genres and literary periods, also an advanced ability to analyze texts, contexts and important literary issues, using current critical approaches. Research, critical thinking and writing skills are integral components of all course work.
Admission Requirements
Applicants for the M. A. in English program must hold a baccalaureate degree from an accredited institution of higher education. In general, students who have completed a substantial number of credits in English at the undergraduate level will receive preference for admission to the program. However, the M. A. in English program welcomes applicants from diverse educational backgrounds. Applicants with other undergraduate concentrations or majors will be considered. In all cases, a record of strong undergraduate academic achievement will merit preference over any other criterion for admission.
Prospective students for the Literature Option must include the following in their application:
- A 500-word statement of purpose explaining why they want to pursue graduate studies in English
- A writing sample, i.e., a substantial research essay on a literary topic (approximately 10 pages, typed, double- spaced, printed on 8 1/2" by 11" white bond paper).
Prospective students for the Writing Option must include the following in their application:
A substantial writing sample, an essay, 1,250 words minimum, typed, double-spaced, printed on 8 1/2" by 11" white bond paper. The department welcome business reports, conference papers and articles on nonacademic subjects, as well as formal research papers previously submitted for undergraduate or graduate credit.
Examples of creative writing and/or lesson plans do not satisfy the writing requirement. All submissions will be retained by the Department of Writing, Linguistics and Creative Process.
All applicants must have an entrance interview with the appropriate graduate coordinator. After the entrance interview, the graduate coordinator recommends whether or not to accept the applicant, or whether to accept the applicant conditionally (i.e., students may be asked to make up academic deficiencies), and forwards this recommendation to the Graduate Office.
Teaching Assistantships available.
Contact Chris Shankle (firstname.lastname@example.com), Associate Director of Graduate Studies, for details.
Degree Requirements
Students in the Literature Option have two paths to fulfill degree requirements: Thesis or Comprehensive Examination, whereas a thesis is required of all Writing Option students (see below).
Literature Option students electing to take the comprehensive examination to complete their graduate studies in English will be tested on a reading list prepared by the English department. The three-hour comprehensive is a closed-book exam administered in November and April of each year. Students should indicate in writing to the graduate coordinator of the English Department their intention to take the comprehensive at least one full month in advance of either the November or April examination. The graduate coordinator will announce the specific time and place for each examination. "Comprehensive Examination Guidelines" is available from the graduate coordinator.
Literature Option students electing to write a thesis must register for ENG 592, Independent Thesis Research in English. A student electing to write a thesis must do so under the guidance of an English Department faculty member who agrees to direct the student's work. The English department's graduate committee must approve all thesis proposals and final drafts. Students choosing the thesis path should therefore consult with the graduate coordinator as well as the thesis director and closely follow the department's "Thesis Guidelines."
The Writing Option student must obtain a copy of the Writing Department Thesis Guidelines and follow the procedures described therein.
Master of Arts in English - Literature Option (30 SH)
Completion of the following
ENG 502 Critical Theory (3 SH)
ENG 506 History of the Language and Linguistics (3 SH)
One course in English literature (ENG 509, 513, 532, 534, or 541) (3 SH)
One Course in American Literature (ENG 552, 567, or 568) (3 SH)
One Course in Topic/Genre Studies (ENG 544, 570, 572, or 574) (3 SH)
Path A: Thesis
One more literature course in the MA program (3 SH)
ENG 592: Independent Thesis Research in English (6 SH)
Path B: Comprehensive Exam
Three more literature courses in the MA program (9 SH)
Completion of the Comprehensive Exam
Any other two courses in the MA program (6 SH)
Master of Arts in English - Writing Option (30 SH)
Completion of four English writing courses (12 SH)
Completion of the following
One course in English literature (ENG 509, 513, 532, 534, or 541) (3 SH)
One Course in American Literature (ENG 552, 567, or 568) (3 SH)
One Course in Topic/Genre Studies (ENG 544, 570, 572, or 574) (3 SH)
One more course in the MA program (3 SH)
Completion of Thesis
ENG 592: Independent Thesis Research in English (6 SH)


text:
No. 7 GNB Voc-Tech dropped the first two games but stormed back, winning the next three to upset No. 2 Pembroke, 3-2, Tuesday night.
PEMBROKE — No. 7 GNB Voc-Tech dropped the first two games but stormed back, winning the next three to upset No. 2 Pembroke, 3-2, Tuesday night.
"It took us a little while to kind of wake up," GNB Voc-Tech coach Erika Vassal said. "The first two matches, we were kind of beating ourselves. It took us a little while to get going."
The Bears (17-6) will travel to Duxbury Thursday for a Div. 2. South Sectional Semifinal matchup with the sixth-seeded Dragons (15-5), who upset No. 3 Dennis-Yarmouth Tuesday night.
SOUTHCOASTVARSITY MVP: Sophomore Bridget Grime was thrust into the starting lineup after a starter was injured over the weekend and responded with six kills. "Kids in that situation can go one of two ways: They can get nervous or step up to the plate, and Bridget stepped up today," Vassal said. "We pulled her up from JV halfway through the season to get her some varsity experience but she had never started before. She was great today."
NOT WORRIED FOR A SECOND: Down 2-0 on the road to the No. 2 seed didn't seem to bother Vassal and the Bears. "I know these kids and knew they had the potential to come back," she said.
GNB Voc-Tech stats: Senior Casey Lopes led the way with 21 kills. Ryana Antoine added 17 and setter Kayla Boyd totaled 26 assists.
LITTLE ON THEM, LOT ON US: Vassal said that although Duxbury has a couple of players with some height (six feet and over), the main thing the Bears have to worry about is correcting their mistakes. "We have a couple of things to work out at practice (today). We need to focus more on what we do and get better."


text:
Jamie L. Vernon, who has been a terrific recent addition to Chris Mooney's The Intersection as a guest blogger, has a new post that should intrigue any of us who have been exasperated by the deep-seated anti-scientific denial that plagues discussions of climate change, evolution, vaccines and autism, and other topics. In "'Deathers' Offer a Unique Case Study for the Formulation of the Denialist Mentality," Jamie considers the idea that we seem to be watching a new species of denial in its birth throes: refusal to accept that Osama bin Laden died in the assault on his compound last week. The precise details of that denial can vary; some say that bin Laden is still alive but being held in secret custody, while others think that bin Laden is dead but not under circumstances in any way resembling those that have been officially released. (Those details have been getting revised, of course, which certainly helps to feed the suspicions.) As Jamie writes:
We are currently witnessing the de novo formulation of a new denialism in regards to the death of Osama bin Laden. As I was listening to C-SPAN radio, just yesterday, two callers a Democrat and a Republican agreed that bin Laden was not dead and the entire hullabaloo was orchestrated for political gain. Because we are now armed with at least a superficial understanding of the mechanisms behind this type of thinking, we can ask questions and test hypotheses while observing the development of this particular case of motivated thought.
Read his post for the full argument, but in brief, Jamie suggests that the rise of the "Bush, not Obama, deserves credit for bin Laden's assassination" idea—which maybe makes the reality of the terrorist's death more acceptable for those in the U.S. who want to deny Obama credit for any accomplishment—might offer some hints about ways of winning over denialists in other areas such as climate change.
I left the following comment, annotated here with some relevant links:
"Thanks for the smart observation. I like the idea of trying to take a snapshot of the birth of a denial meme. A few thoughts come to mind:
"Somebody else (sorry that I'm forgetting who—Michael Shermer?[Ironically, I later realized it was Chris Mooney himself here]) suggested in the past few days that disaffected, al-Qaeda sympathizing Muslims around the world would be primed for deather denialism because they, too, would be emotionally motivated to reject that it had happened. Of course, al-Qaeda's official acknowledgment that bin Laden is dead may blunt that possibility. (And I suppose it's interesting to speculate why al-Qaeda didn't stay silent longer to feed such suspicions.) But if you're right, we might still see deather denial among such populations, for whom the "let's credit Bush" dodge wouldn't work, even while the sentiment flounders in the U.S.
"A possible problem with trying to develop similar strategies to build more support on climate change, I suspect, is that they can often be co-opted to other purposes. For example, at least some of the resistance to climate change takes the form of protest that it would destroy the economy, that the greens are anti-business, etc. The rebuttal has been that acting on climate change would actually create new economic opportunities through the development of new energy and conservation technologies, new infrastructure and the like. Of course, some of the climate deniers then turn the issue into a conspiracy aimed at funneling money into Al Gore's pockets. Yet even more progressive voices will sometimes end up saying, yes, let's make these energy policy reforms… but not worry about reforms that would specifically (and essentially) reduce CO2 emissions. Proposals that should be uniting support for action on climate change end up dividing it.
"And of course, there's also the problem from a different quarter that some of these strategies for winning over deniers (or, let's say, the denier-sympathetic) end up alienating some of the supporters who argue that everybody should take the truth straight up. Look no further than advocates for evolution like PZ Myers and Jerry Coyne, who would be quick to say that the Catholic Church's support for evolution is itself unscientific and therefore still not acceptable."
Jamie has subsequently posted a reply to my comment and others, which reads in part:
While it may be true that a subset of climate change deniers oppose action based on economic concerns, economic justifications may not be enough to turn the tide. I suspect there is a threshold that must be met within the denialist population in order to overcome the denialism (as with tobacco and cancer). Reaching that threshold may require addressing multiple motivators.
Economics is only part of what motivates the resistance among some to accept climate change as real, it's true, and I had selected it simply because it was easy to state the problem briefly in those terms. There's every reason to try to find a variety of motivators that might work. I do worry that the variety of those arguments will be used by deniers to say that there's no "real, single" argument and that climate change activists will say anything to fool the public, but of course, they say that already anyway.
So I'm very open to seeing what we can learn from this bin Laden deather nonsense that might be applicable to other anti-science problems. I'm just keeping my expectations low.


text:
Saturday's Zine Release party was great! Contributors to the zine got a personal copy, and other kids checked out copies of the new issue. Everyone did a short autobiographical comic, and got to help paint some more covers of last month's Zine Machine. We had some new faces at the program, and they were pretty excited to hear about their comics being part of the library zine.
A few of the new issues are still available for checkout! They are in the Main Library's Children's Department. In the graphic section, right by That's So Raven and Transformers.


text:
Copernicus' Human Powered Light Bulb is a visually powerful way to explore static electricity. Using the static generated by the human body, the LED begins to glow, with you as the power source! Note: this product has a small lightbulb that may pose a choking hazard to kids under 3.
© Copyright 2017 Kidstructive Fun
Ecommerce Website Design by Off the Page Creations


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LOS ANGELES (AP) — Disney is paying $4.05 billion to buy Lucasfilm Ltd., the production company behind "Star Wars," from its chairman and founder, George Lucas. It's also making a seventh movie in the "Star Wars" series called "Episode 7," set for release in 2015, with plans to follow it with Episodes 8 and 9 and then one new movie every two or three years.
The Walt Disney Co. announced the agreement to make the purchase in cash and stock Tuesday.
The deal brings Lucasfilm under the Disney banner with other brands including Pixar, Marvel, ESPN and ABC.
Kathleen Kennedy, the current co-chairman of Lucasfilm, will become its president and report to Walt Disney Studios Chairman Alan Horn. Lucas will be creative consultant on new "Star Wars" films.
Lucas said in a statement, "It's now time for me to pass 'Star Wars' on to a new generation of filmmakers."


text:
New Trend? Men In Nigeria Getting Pink Lip Tattoos!
:There is a new Nigerian fashion trend sweeping the country's tattoo parlours - so-called "Pink Lips". The process involves young men having their lower lip tattooed with a pink paint so that their lips are no longer a shade of black, but instead - a shade of pink. The reason behind the procedure may be strange but at one tattoo parlour in Lagos, the owner explains: "We help out those with black lips, to clean their lips and make them pink." - Nigeria News
Please click the "Report" button below if the video on this page is not working properly.
Comments will only be displayed by verified emails. No Spamming or Racism.


text:
White House: It's all about Boehner
President Barack Obama thinks the American people have had enough of House Speaker John Boehner. He certainly has.
For the first time in a long time, Obama sounds like he's captured public opinion in his fight against Congress. So instead of trying to convince people he's right, the president is projecting the sense people already agree with him that the House GOP has gone too far.
Story Continued Below
Not so subtly, Obama is leading an effort to direct that into a conversation that's all about Boehner. The speaker's the one who had the power to shut the government down, Obama and his aides say, and he's the one who could just as easily toss the opposition to Obamacare, re-open the government and avoid default.
( WATCH: Boehner calls Obamacare "a trainwreck")
"The only thing that is keeping the government shut down is that Speaker John Boehner won't even let the bill get a yes or no vote because he doesn't want to anger the extremists in his party," Obama said at a Maryland construction company Thursday.
The speaker's clearly been weakened internally and in public opinion — which Obama seems eager to exploit.
A CBS News poll conducted after Monday's deadline showed 72 percent of people opposed to the shutdown, and 44 percent of people blaming Republicans. To Obama, those are the sort of numbers that have created an opening to move from warning about the shutdown to complaining about the "Republican shutdown" to, on Thursday, the "reckless and damaging Republican shutdown."
The Boehner play is the latest in a shifting strategy from the White House — just a week ago, the West Wing were wondering whether Boehner still had enough sway in his conference to even be the one to negotiate with, or whether they'd have to go somewhere else.
( PHOTOS: John Boehner's life and career)
But if Obama's right in trying to break Boehner, he may just get the larger shift in dynamic he's been looking for, ever since the Obamacare argument first went off the rails in the 2009 town hall tea party explosion. If he's wrong, he risks seeming like he's gone too personal and too political, seeming like he's more interested in his own ends than ending the budget crisis, content to gamble the global economy on scoring a few more points.
"It makes sense to create some kind of dynamic where the other guy has to produce," said former Bill Clinton White House press secretary Mike McCurry.
There are a lot of differences between the 1996 and 2013 shutdowns, McCurry said, not the least of which is that Bill Clinton and Newt Gingrich talked nightly, a personal relationship far beyond what's ever existed between Obama and Boehner. Even with that, the Clinton operation focused on Gingrich as an almost mythic figure whom the president was trying to defeat. But unlike Gingrich, whom they always felt comfortable could speak on behalf of his conference, McCurry said, "this poor guy Boehner can't deliver squat."
( PHOTOS: 12 lawmakers who didn't back John Boehner)
Boehner's office shrugged at this latest line out of the White House, saying that if anything, it proves how little Obama understands about how to actually get things done.
"No one in Washington has thicker skin than John Boehner," said Boehner spokesman Brendan Buck. "The White House hasn't a learned a thing over the last three years if they think this pettiness is going to get them anywhere. The speaker is going to do the right things for the right reasons, just as he's always done."
Ironically, in picking the speaker as his new pressure point, Obama seems to be relying on the idea that Boehner wants to negotiate, as goes what's become accepted as conventional wisdom in Washington: Boehner does not want the shutdown, he knows the position he's taken to defund Obamacare is hopeless and he's looking for a way to strike a deal that would get out of this situation, so long as it doesn't cost him his job.
( WATCH: Obama says he "shouldn't have to offer anything")
The predictably unproductive hour-long meeting with congressional leaders Wednesday night didn't help. Stuck in a shutdown and caught for three years in the larger situation that brought things to this point, Obama on Thursday barely bothered with the feint of outreach.


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MORAGA — Cal swim coach Kristen Cunnane will share her inspiring tale of surviving child sex abuse in the Moraga school district in an hour-long show on the Oprah Winfrey Network on Tuesday.
Cunnane, who's story was profiled by this newspaper a year ago, will be featured on "Our America with Lisa Ling" at 10 p.m. Pacific time on Tuesday on OWN.
A physical education teacher was convicted of molesting Cunnane over a number of years and the Walnut Creek resident has sued the school district claiming she was abused by two teachers after administrators failed to report earlier abuse as mandated by law.
OWN can be found on Comcast channel 220; DIRECTV 279; DISH Network 189 or 885; and AT&T U-verse 170 or 1170.


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CORAL SPRINGS, Fla. - A woman who survived sex trafficking in South Florida is now working to rescue young women from the growing billion dollar industry.
Katarina Rosenblatt started her new foundation, There is H.O.P.E. for Me, to help women trapped in the world of sex trafficking.
"I go into the jails, I go into strip clubs, I go into group homes. I go wherever there are victims of trafficking, I go there," said Rosenblatt. "I share my story and girls automatically come forward because it is someone they can trust."
South Florida has become a hot spot for sex trafficking, especially Broward County. The industry generates billions of dollars a year for major organized crime.
READ: Combating sex trafficking
"We see girls that are raped, 20 to 30 times a week, for $20 to $30 a trick. It's absolutely horrible the stories that we see," said Homeland Security agent, Carmen Pino.
Local 10 cameras found one girl being trafficked on the streets of Fort Lauderdale.
"Eight out of the nine kids that I recently worked with in a jail facility are returning home, not to foster care, only one was in foster care. Eight," said Rosenblatt. "Their parents had no clue that they were being trafficked. You know how difficult that is to break the news to a parent."
Rosenblatt said recruitment often happens online, including on Facebook. But traffickers are known to use victims to attract others. At age 13, it's how Rosenblatt found herself being sold for sex by her friend Mary.
"I remember when she introduced me to her pimp, he told me I could call him 'Daddy,' and he gave me a dollar for chips and that was it. He said, 'Well, now you're going to owe me,'" said Rosenblatt.
By the time she was 15, Rosenblatt said she was deep in the life and addicted to cocaine -- until her friend was arrested.
"She had gone to jail, and that scared me straight and I never did drugs again," said Rosenblatt.
Rosenblatt escaped trafficking, and is now an instructor at Trinity International University in Davie, where she teaches a course on human trafficking.
"You can make a difference in someone's life," said Rosenblatt. "And it's just a matter of going out there and telling them the truth and that someone loves them and that you don't have to live with this... If there is hope for me, there is hope for you, and I know there is hope for them, and that's why I do what I do."
On Saturday, a panel session will be held at First Baptist Church of Fort Lauderdale will be held beginning at 8 a.m.
Rosenblatt is looking for donors to help with her foundation. To help, email firstname.lastname@example.com.
Copyright 2012 by Post Newsweek. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.


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JOHNSON CITY, Tenn. (Nov. 3, 2009) - Since coming to ETSU in 2007, Buccaneer men's soccer head coach Scott Calabrese had a vision to create a program that would be one of the best in the Atlantic Sun and would compete on a national level.
In only the program's second year, the Buccaneers have already clinched an A-Sun tournament berth and will host the school's first ever tournament match on Saturday at 2 p.m.
"Overall the program has made great strides from its inception," Calabrese said. "We made incredible strides in the spring to get the program where we are now. We spent a lot of time with the SPEC program and our guys are physically fit to compete at a high level. You can see how this team is putting the work in. Their work in the spring and summer has really gotten them to where they are now. The guys really have bought into the goal of elevating this program to the top of the conference."
The men's soccer team had four goals coming into the season: to play a tougher schedule and compete against those teams, to finish the season with a winning record, to finish in the top six of the conference and to bring in a new and effective style of play.
"In terms of those four goals which we established three years ago we are still on track to meet them all," Calabrese said. "You have to give credit to the players because they believe in the goals and they worked hard to achieve them."
The Bucs faced a tough non-conference schedule in 2009 going on the road to ACC opponents Virginia Tech and North Carolina. ETSU got a 1-1 draw against the Hokies, and had the second ranked Tar Heels on the ropes as the Bucs fell 2-1 in overtime as they proved they could play with anyone in the country.
Currently the Bucs are 5-8-3 overall and 4-4-1 in conference and are still on track to achieve their second goal of finishing the season with a winning record if they can win the conference tournament. By earning the third seed in the conference tournament the Buccaneers have given themselves a good chance to make the conference finals as they face Lipscomb at home with the chance to play in the conference semifinals against Stetson with a win on Saturday.
"I think making the conference tournament is exciting," Calabrese added. "But these guys have loftier goals than just to be in the conference tournament. Having played against all of the teams in the conference they believe they can beat anyone in the A-Sun. It's nice to have made it, but we want to see if we can go all the way to the NCAA tournament."
Lately the Bucs have been hitting their stride at the right time having won four of their last four matches coming into the weekend. This success is in part due to the final goal of bringing a new and effective attacking style of play in 2009. The Bucs have had troubles early in the season in finishing chances and winning games they had dominated, but in the last six games the system has seemed to have turned the corner as ETSU has averaged 1.7 goals, posting three goals in three home matches.
"It was a process early on as a team because we had brought in new players and the style of play had changed completely from last year," Calabrese said. "We have been able to switch from a defensive and counterattacking style to a team that attacks more and holds possession. We are starting to find that playing in this new style we are getting results even though early in the season we would dominate games and not get the result we deserved."
For more information on Buccaneer men's soccer or any other athletic news, please visit www.ETSUBucs.com.


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Masspike Miles (Feat. Rick Ross) - Get It Together
Masspike Miles Ft. Rick Ross "Get It Together" The Struggle (coming soon) Life4Life Ent/Maybach Music Group
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Tuesday, July 20, 2010
En Route
FYI: Michele and I are heading up to Napa Wednesday for a special event at Domaine Chandon, but after that it will be back into the kitchen to do what we do. Thanks a million to all of you who commented on the Next Food Network Star YouTube Challenge, as well as defended my honor against the "others." It means a lot. Stay tuned!
8 comments:
- kayleejenn said...
that sounds so much fun
- July 20, 2010 at 1:48 PM
- anugrah15 said...
Hi Chef John...
just posted my comment on Food network...
watched the video you submitted and I just loved the way you tried to smile "innocently" at the end!
I have commented only once on foodwishes before this, but I have been following your blog for more than two years now...
I just want to thank you for the amazing job you have been doing all these years...
now dont think i'm buttering you up! this is what I posted on http://www.youtube.com/foodnetwork :
I have been an ardent fan of his almost for the past three years...
I love his tongue-in-cheek humour...his presentation skills...his personality...and above all, his simple yet amazingly delicious food...
I would say the biggest testament to his skill and influence is the smile he brings to people's faces when they see a new post or video from him...
It would definitely be your loss if you dont catch hold of him for your channel...if having him on Food Network will not increase the number of viewers you have, nothing will !!!"
Just dont forget us when you become a huge STAR!!
- July 20, 2010 at 2:35 PM
- danny said...
John, thank you for a great site. If the food network doesn't give you a show, they're nuts!
I look forward to ALL of your posts when and wherever you can get to them.
Take care and best of luck to you.
Dan Williams
San Jose
- July 20, 2010 at 6:58 PM
- Kosim Buitenzorg said...
I left comment too :-)
Dear Food Network,
Chef John at foodwishes.com has helped me tremendously on how easy it is to cook ( I think ) and most importantly to enjoy it. My wife has been very grateful for all meal I made. And I received alot of compliment from my friends that think I have passion to cook, some even suggested me to put interest in culinary school. All of this, without doubt, because of Chef John who made the cooking easy and pleasant. I would love to see him in the Food Network.
- July 21, 2010 at 12:19 AM
Hey Chef, What's happening on your cookbook front? We had a rash of recipes, and then... no news! Any update?
- July 21, 2010 at 9:43 AM
- Chef John said...
It supposed to be printing now. I hear end of August for sales to start.
- July 21, 2010 at 10:28 AM
- Alberto said...
hey John I got a Foodwish :D
what about SOMETHING with lentils?
I remember my grandmother makes a killer lentil and ham-bone soup... with ham meat... and instead of oil, you guessed it, the ham fat is rendered
- July 21, 2010 at 9:46 PM
- Chef John said...
I believe we've already done a few lentil recipes. Do a search (top left window)
- July 22, 2010 at 12:27 AM


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If the human genome were a car, then the ENCyclopedia of DNA Elements (ENCODE) would be its 'parts list.' Instead of carburetors and gaskets, ENCODE catalogs elements that are part of the genome that control gene activity in cells in response to their circumstances. Many scientists believe that using precise tools such as ENCODE will help them understand how the genome functions and, in time, enable the discovery of much-needed cures and treatments. To make the ENCODE catalog a more researcher-friendly resource, the ENCODE research consortium, organized by the National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI), has published a user's guide and tutorial in the April 19, 2011 issue of PLoS Biology. The user's guide and tutorial work in tandem with online training materials at the ENCODE Portal [genome.ucsc.edu], developed by Open Helix and the University of California, Santa Cruz, the ENCODE Data Coordinating Center.
"With release of this guide and tutorial, ENCODE has taken an important step toward making its data more accessible to a wider range of researchers who are focused on the biology of human disease," said Eric D. Green, M.D., Ph.D., NHGRI director. "This is an essential step towards making fundamental genomic discoveries about the causes of disease and eventually developing treatments."
For many years, researchers thought that protein-coding regions of genes were the primary places to look for answers to the question of what causes diseases. However, as genome research has advanced, it has become clear that other regions outside of those that encode proteins are also important in influencing gene expression and disease.
ENCODE was launched, first as a pilot project in 2003 focused on one percent of the human genome, and then expanded in 2007 to whole-genome analysis, to identify all of the functional elements that exist in the human genome. In 2007, ENCODE findings from the pilot project challenged the traditional view that most of the interesting (consequential) "action" is located at or near the protein-coding regions of genes and revealed a striking complexity in the organization of the genome. It pointed to an intricate network in which genes, along with regulatory elements and other types of DNA sequences that do not code for proteins interact in overlapping ways.
In this new publication, the team describes the data being generated on the entire human genome and provides examples of how these data are shining a new light on important biological questions. As an example, this work shows how the data can be immediately useful in interpreting associations between single nucleotide (single DNA building blocks) differences in individuals and disease. For example, ENCODE data confirm recent observations by other groups that variations in regions of DNA very far from the protein-coding region of the MYC gene change the binding of transcription factor proteins to a genetic control region, leading to changes in expression of the MYC gene and therefore to oncogenesis, the process by which normal cells are turned into cancerous cells. These findings suggest a mechanism for genetic association with multiple cancers lying outside of the protein-coding sequence of a gene.
Similar studies are now possible for the thousands of variants identified in genome-wide association studies, in which the genome of different individuals — those with the disease being studied and healthy controls — are examined to identify variants associated with a disease. The ENCODE catalog can then be linked to genome-wide association study results to help identify the underlying biological changes that lead to disease. As the individual cellular parts and biological pathways give way to new understandings, researchers will be able to develop treatments that specifically target the deleterious changes.
The new tutorials are expected to help researchers, who are not experts in these areas of biological research, use the insights into cellular regulation of the genome and the networks of biological interactions of the parts identified by ENCODE to advance their own studies.
"This project requires collaboration from multiple people all over the world at the cutting edge of their fields, working in a coordinated manner to figure out the function of our human genome," said Dr. Richard Myers, president and director of the HudsonAlpha Institute for Biotechnology and one of the 25 principal investigators of the project. "The importance extends beyond basic knowledge of whom and what we are as humans and into understanding of human health and disease."
All ENCODE data are available and free for immediate use via downloading of data files [genome.gucsc.edu], visualization in the UCSC genome browser [genome.ucsc.edu] and data mining with the UCSC Table Browser [genome.ucsc.edu].
To read the study in PLoS Biology, please go to: A User's Guide to the Encyclopedia of DNA Elements (ENCODE) [plosbiology]
Last Reviewed: November 8, 2012


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Date: December 19 - January 5, 2017
Cruise Destination: Buenos Aires to Valparaiso
It's the season of celebration, and you can enjoy it in true South American style. Begin in Buenos Aires with a fiesta hosted by local gauchos. You will be greatly impressed by their skilled horsemanship, unparalleled talent and traditional music. Meet more "locals" in Port Stanley at the Bluff Cove Lagoon, home to gentoo and Magellanic penguins as well as geese, dolphins, sea lions and other wildlife. To find unique handcrafted gifts, shop at the market in Coyhaique near Puerto Chacabuco. For scenic South American landscapes, it will be difficult to decide which is more amazing: the views from the Train to the End of the World as it chugs through Tierra del Fuego National Park or the vistas from Marina's decks as she sails amidst the magnificent Chilean Fjords.
Special Offer
- Featuring FREE Unlimited Internet, plus choose one of the below FREE:
- 5 FREE Shore Excursions
- FREE House Beverage Package
- $500 Shipboard Credit
Day 1-2: Buenos Aires, Argentina
Discover this elegant city and its beautiful surroundings with a tranquil cruise through the Tigre Delta past islands, mansions and English gardens. Visit the pampas and watch gauchos display their extraordinary horsemanship, or enjoy a fabulous tango show in its birthplace.
Day 3: Montevideo, Uruguay
Explore this charming, cosmopolitan city of parks and colonial architecture. Visit a local vineyard and sample its wines. Or travel to the beautiful Portuguese colonial city of Colonia del Sacramento, first settled in 1680.
Day 4: Punta Del Este, Uruguay (Anchor Port)
Spend the day enjoying this beautiful, chic beach resort, its marinas and interesting shops. See amazing works by Dali, Chagall and Miro at the Ralli Museum. Or venture into the equally stunning countryside and visit a cattle station.
Day 5: Cruising the Atlantic Ocean
At Sea, International Waters
Day 6: Puerto Madryn, Argentina
Explore this wildlife paradise and its surrounding quaint towns. Visit an exuberant sea lion colony, watch for nesting cormorants and magnificent elephant seals, and observe sheep-shearing on an estancia. Or experience a walk through a colony of Magellanic penguins and myriad species of native seabirds.
Day 7: Cruising the Atlantic Ocean
At Sea, International Waters
Day 8: Port Stanley, Falkland Islands (Anchor Port)
Discover this quaint town, its cathedral, authentic English pubs, neat gardens, war memorials and fascinating landscape. Set off for an adventure on this South Atlantic island and visit a penguin colony and watch for albatross and skuas or go to a sprawling sheep farm.
Day 9: Cruising the Atlantic Ocean
At Sea, International Waters
Day 10: Ushuaia, Argentina
Witness the spectacular beauty of Tierra del Fuego's lakes, lush forests, soaring mountains and flora and fauna by train, via all-terrain vehicle or on horseback. Enjoy the expansive views from Garibaldi Pass and watch for sea lions and albatross along the Beagle Channel.
Day 11: Punta Arenas, Chile
Explore the town and its history and enjoy stunning views over the Strait of Magellan to fabled Tierra del Fuego. Discover the scenic Patagonian countryside and visit a local sheep farm. The highlight is the Magellanic penguin rookery at Otway Sound. Or fly to Chile's magnificent Torres Del Paine National Park.
Day 12-13: Cruising the Chilean Fjords
At Sea, International Waters
Day 14: Puerto Chacabuco, Chile (Anchor Port)
Experience a bit of rugged Patagonia with a drive into the Andes Mountains through a stunning valley to the Rio Simpson National Reserve and the town of Coyhaique. Or visit the magnificent private Aikén del Sur Park with its many waterfalls, wetlands, forests and mosses.
Day 15: Puerto Montt, Chile (Anchor Port)
Enjoy the Bavarian ambiance of the Lake District as you visit the edge of the Patagonian wilderness, seeing pristine wood forests, vast lakes, soaring waterfalls, snow-capped peaks and spectacular vistas.
Day 16: Cruising the Pacific Ocean
At Sea, International Waters
Day 17-18: Valparaiso, Chile
Enjoy the charming chaos and color of the hillside old quarter, or visit lovely nearby Viña del Mar and its famed floral clock. Or head inland to Chile's scenic Central Valley, the country's breadbasket, and on to the Andes with their world-class vineyards and ski resorts. Many will want to spend the day in metropolitan Santiago, considered the safest city in Latin America.


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|Photo by Midge Frazel, 27 Dec 2015
As the new year approaches, I will be once again working on ways to deepen my understanding of certain aspects of my genealogy research. For this, I will have to draw upon my experience as an adult educator and talk to my readers about project based learning and problem based learning. These ideas, although commonplace in the world of education, can help genealogists and family historians too.
I first proposed this idea in 2012, so if you read my blog regularly this will seem familiar. Last year, I worked on some aspects of Thomas MacEntee's Genealogy-Do Over and did a lot of work from his wonderful ideas. There is a workbook in Kindle and PDF format.
Project based learning is important because as people work on their ancestors, they often don't stop to analyze the information they acquire. With new information coming daily, it is hard to make a research plan and stick to it! Some days, I can't remember where I left off the day before. Does this describe you?
Project based learning requires more advanced planning and breaks research and the resulting product into manageable steps. What is a product, you ask? It is the result of your work. Sometimes it is a blog post, a printed pedigree chart or a digital story. It depends on what you set as a goal. Projects evolve over time so you can add new information to a project that you worked on previously. Timelines and goals are fluid, and can change with how much you have time to research.
Problem based learning is the little sibling to project based learning. It implies there is a problem to be solved that it takes collaboration with others. We have all experienced this as it can be frustrating waiting for someone else to give us information, a citation, or most importantly a photograph so we can move forward with a project. Genealogy has no end so it is important to deal with the frustrations up front. No one stands alone.
Many of us now work collaboratively. We pass our "brick walls" to another researcher to examine. Fresh eyes and ideas can help us solve problems. This is why I think problem based learning requires asking questions to which there may be no answers. People are not comfortable with no answers.
This is hard for me because I have the concrete sequential learning style. I work steadily and methodically. This annoys my friends who are of the abstract random learning style. They are bouncing around randomly gathering information and assembling it in creative ways. I tend to tap my foot impatiently for them to "get it together". However, their projects are stunning. If we work together with other researchers we can do exceptionally well and blend both worlds.
In the beginning, when I was nine and starting working on my own family, I gathered information and asked a lot of questions. I would not have been able to make projects without those early years. Because I kept a lot of notes and I have remembered conversations with those who are no longer alive, I have been able to help others learn those skills as they learn about family history.
Technology has helped me tremendously in ways I couldn't have imagined. But, I do keep a handwritten journal and use books to help me. (Both worlds. Get it?)
So, regardless of your learning style and whether you are working on a project or a problem, you are learning new concepts and brainstorming new ideas. Join me on this adventure. Yes, there will be plenty of gravestones because I love them and you will find out that I have more in my blood than granite.
Take my hand and walk with me. Your ideas and comments are essential. Let me know what you are thinking?