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Accelerating EDA innovation through SoC design methodology convergence
According to Dr. Walden C. Rhines, chairman and CEO, Mentor Graphics Corp., verification has to improve and change every year just to keep up with the rapidly changing semiconductor technology. Fortunately, the innovations are running ahead of the technology and there are no fundamental reasons why we cannot adequately verify the most complex chips and systems of the future. He was speaking at the recently held DVCON 2014 in Bangalore, India.
A design engineer's project time for doing design has reduced by 15 percent from 2007-2014, while the engineer's time for doing verification had seen 17 percent increase during the same time. At this rate, in about 40 years, all of a designer's time will be devoted to verification. At the current rate, there is almost no chance of getting a single-gate design correct on first pass!
Looking at a crossover of verification engineers vs. designer engineers, there is a CAGR designers of 4.55 percent, and for CAGR verifiers, it is 12.62 percent.
The on-time completion remains constant, as we look at the non-FPGA project's schedule completion trends, which are: 67 percent behind schedule for 2007, 66 percent behind schedule for 2010, 67 percent behind schedule for 2012, and 59 percent behind schedule for 2014. There has been an increase in the average number of embedded processors per design size, moving from 1.12 to 4.05.
Macro trends
Looking at the macro trends, there has been standardization of verification languages. SystemVerilog is the only verification language growing. Now, interestingly, India leads the world in SystemVerilog adoption. It is also remarkable that the industry converged on IEEE 1800. SystemVerilog is now mainstream.
There has been standardization in base class libraries as well. There was 56 percent UVM growth between 2012 and 2014, and 13 percent is projected growth in UVM the next year. Again, India leads the world in UVM adoption.
The second macro trend is standardization of the SoC verification flow. It is emerging from ad hoc approaches to systematic processes. The verification paradox is: a good verification process lets you get the most out of best-in-class verification tools.
The goal of unit-level checking is to verify that the functionality is correct for each IP, while achieving high coverage. Use of advanced verification techniques has also increased from 2007 to 2014.
Next, the goal of connectivity checking is to ensure that the IP blocks are connected correctly, a common goal with IP integration and data path checking.
The goal of system-level checking is performance, power analysis and SoC functionality. Also, there are SoC 'features' that need to be verified.
A third macro trend is the coverage and power across all aspects of verification. The Unified Coverage Interoperability Standard or UCIS standard was announced at DAC 2012 by Accellera. Standards accelerate the EDA innovation!
The fourth trend is active power management. Now, low-power design requires multiple verification approaches. Trends in power management verification include things like Hypervisor/OS control of power management, application-level power management, operation in each system power state, interactions between power domains, hardware power control sequence generation, transitions between system power states, power domain state reset/restoration, and power domain power down/power up.
Macro enablers in verification
Looking at the macro enablers in verification, there is the intelligent test bench, multi-engine verification platforms, and application-specific formal. The intelligent test bench technology accelerates coverage closure. It has also seen the emergence of intelligent software driven verification.
Embedded software headcount surges with every node. Clock speed scaling slows the simulation performance improvement. Growing at over 30 percent CAGR from 2010-14, emulation is the fastest growing segment of EDA.
As for system-level checking, as the design sizes increase emulation up, the FPGA prototyping goes down. The modern emulation performance nmakes virtual debug fast. Virtual stimulus makes emulator a server, and moves the emulator from the lab to the datacenter, thereby delivering more productivity, flexibility, and reliability. Effective 100MHz embedded software debug makes virtual prototype behave like real silicon. Now, integrated simulation/emulation/software verification environments have emerged.
Lastly, for application-specific formal, the larger designs use more formal. The application-specific formal includes checking clock domain crossings.
SEMICON Europa 2014 calls for innovators
SEMICON Europa 2014 will be held at Grenoble, France, on October 7-9 October, 2014. The event will see over 400 exhibitors, which means, the exhibition area has expanded by over 40 percent vs. 2013. There will be over 70 programs featuring 300+ speakers. SEMI expects 6,000+ visitors.
A feature of the event will be the Innovation Village that will feature 35 start-ups. I have been just informed that four start-ups have cancelled. So, that leaves 31 start-ups: ActLight, Aryballe, Avalun, Bluwireless Technology, CALAO Systems, Enerstone, Euresis, Epigan, Evaderis, Exagan, Feeligreen, Genes'Ink, Grapheat, Gridbee, Heyday, Hotblock Onboard, Imagsa Technology, Irlynx, Madci, Metablue Solution, Nessos, Nocilis Materials, Noivion, PETsys Electronics, Pollen Technology, Scint-X, Sepcell, Silicon Line GmbH, Smoltek, Sol Voltaics and Wavelens.
A few start-ups are given below:
ActLight SA: It focuses in the field of CMOS photonics.
AVALUN SAS: It currently develops the LabPad®, a next – generation mobile point-of-care (POC) device.
CALAO Systems: It is the specialist of onboard connected computers.
eVaderis: It offers energy efficient, low power mixed – signal data – centric control processors.
Enerstone: It works with rechargeable battery manufacturers and integrators to improve the charge quality of their batteries.
Exagan: It is a leading supplier of Gallium Nitride based transistor devices.
Feeligreen: It provides micro – current devices for dermo – cosmetics and dermo – therapeutics.
Grapheat: It is a young startup specialized in the production and integration of monolayer high – quality of graphene on wafers and substrates for specific applications.
Gridbee Communications: It is developing Innovative long range Mesh Network solution for connected objects.
Heyday: It develops semiconductor ICs for the power conversion market.
Irlynx: It develops and commercializes infrared sensors.
Nessos Information Technologies SA: Nessos is a highly qualified software development company.
Nocilis Materials: It offers various silicon based semiconductor materials.
Noivion: It developed and patented a new thin film deposition technique named Ionized Jet Deposition (IJD).
PETsys Electronics SA: It developed new PET detectors for next generation of medical PET scanners.
Pollen Technology: It is a software company.
Scint-X: It develops and produces cutting – edge structured scintillators.
Silicon Line: A leading global provider of innovative ultra – low power optical link technology for mobile and consumer electronics markets.
Smoltek AB: It offers a proprietary conductive nano – scale carbon technology.
Wavelens: It is developing disruptive optical MEMS solutions.
On October 7, there will be a five-minute pitch for each start-up participating. It will be followed by a panel discussion: 'Fundraising for the Future Champions of European Electronics: Strategies, Challenges and Opportunities. Day two will host the Innovation conference.
DVCon India 2014 aims to bring Indian design, verification and ESL community closer!
DVCon India 2014 has come to Bangalore, India, for the first time. It will be held at the Hotel Park Plaza in Bangalore, on Sept. 25-26. Dr. Wally Rhines, CEO, Mentor Graphics will open the proceedings with his inaugural keynote.
Other keynotes will be from Dr. Mahesh Mehendale, MCU chief technologist, TI, Janick Bergeron, verification fellow, Synopsys, and Vishwas Vaidya, assistant GM, Electronics, Tata Motors.
Gaurav Jalan, SmartPlay, chair – promotions committee took time to speak about DVCon 2014 India.
Focus of DVCon 2014 India
First, what's the focus of DVCon 2014 India? According to Jalan, DVCon has been a premiere conference in the US contributing to quality tutorials, papers and an excellent platform for networking. DVCON India focuses on filling the void of a vendor neutral quality conference in the neighbourhood – one that will grow over time.
The idea is to bring together, hitherto dispersed, yet substantial, design, verification and ESL community and give them a voice. Engineers get a chance to learn solutions to the verification problems, share the effectiveness of the solutions they have experimented, understand off the shelf solutions that are available in market and meet the vendor agnostic user fraternity. Moving forward the expectation is to get the users involved as early adopters of upcoming standards and actively contribute to them.
Trends in design
Next, what are the trends today in design? Jalan said while the designs continue to parade on the lines of Moore's law there is a lot happening beyond the mere gate count. Defining and developing IPs with a wide configuration options serving a variety of application domains is a challenge.
The SoCs are crossing multi billion gate design (A8 in iPhone6 is 2 billion) with multi-fold increase in complexity due to multiple clock domains, multiple power domains, multiple voltage domains while delivering required performance in different application modes with sleek foot print.
Trends in verification
Now, let's examine the trends today in verification. When design increases linearly, verification jumps exponentially. While UVM has settled dust to some extent on the IP verification level, there is a huge of challenges still awaiting to be addressed. The IP itself is growing in size limiting the simulator and encouraging users to move to emulators. While UVM solved the methodology war the VIPs available are still not simulator agnostic and expecting a emulator agnostic VIP portfolio is still a distant dream.
SoC verification is still a challenge not just due to the sheer size but because porting an env from block to SoC is difficult. The test plan definition and development for SoC level itself is a challenge. Portable stimulus group from Accellera is addressing this.
Similarly, coverage collection from different tools is difficult to merge. Unified coverage group at Accellera is addressing this. Low power today is a norm and verifying a power aware design is quite challenging. UPF is an attempt to standardize this.
Porting a SoC to emulator to enable hardware acceleration so as to run usecases is another trend picking up. Teams now are able to boot android on an SoC even before the silicon arrives. With growing analog content on chip the onus is on the verification engineers to ensure the digital and analog sides of the chip work in conjunction as per specs. Formal apps have picked so as to address connectivity tests, register spec testing, low power static checks and many more.
Accelearating EDA innovation
So, how will EDA innovation get accelerated? According to Jalan, the semiconductor industry has always witnessed that startups and smaller companies lead the innovation. Given the plethora of challenges around, there are multiple opportunities to be addressed from both the biggies and the start-ups.
The evolution of standards at Accellera definitely is a great step so as to bring the focus on real innovation in the tools while providing a platform for the user community to come forward sharing the challenges and proposing alternates. With a standard baseline that is defined with collaboration from all partners of the ecosystem, the EDA companies can focus on competing on performance, user interface, increased tool capacity and enabling faster time to market.
Forums like DVCON India help in growing awareness on standard promoted by Accellera while encouraging participants from different organizations and geographies join to contribute. Apart from tools areas where EDA innovation would pick up include new IT technologies and platforms – Cloud, Mobile devices.
Next level of verification productivity
Where is the next level of verification productivity likely to come from? To this, Jalan replied that productivity in the verification improves from different aspects.
While faster tools with increased capacity comes from innovation at EDA end, standard have played an excellent role in addressing it. UVM has helped in displacing vendor specific technologies to improve inter-operability, quick ramp up for engineers and reusability. Similarly on power format, UPF has played an important role in bridging the gaps.
Unified coverage is another aspect where it will help in closing early with coverage driven verification. IPXACT and SystemRDL standards help further in packaging IPs and easier hand off to enable reuse. Similarly other standards on ESL, AMS etc help in closing the loop holes that prevent productivity.
New, portable stimulus specification now being developed under Accellera that will help in easing out test development at different levels from IP to sub system to SoC. For faster simulations, the increase in adoption of hardware acceleration platforms is helping verification engineers to improve regression turn around time.
Formal technologies play an important role in providing a mathematical proofs to common verification challenges at an accelerated pace in comparison to simulation. Finally events like DVCON enables users to share their experiences and knowledge encouraging others to try out solutions instead of struggling with the process of discovering or inventing one.
More Indian start-ups
Finally, do the organizers expect to see more Indian start-ups post this event? Yes, says Jalan. "We even have a special incubation booth that is encouraging young startups to come forth and exhibit at a reduced cost (only $300). We are creating a platform and soon we will see new players in all areas of Semiconductor.
"Also, the Indian government's push in the semiconductor space will give new startups further incentive to mushroom. These conferences help entrepreneurs to talk to everyone in the community about problems, vet potential solutions and seek blessings from gurus."
Apple continues to 'wow' all over again!
Apple has done it again! Trust the Cupertino-based company to come up with great products — time after time, after time!
Today, the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus have been announced! These were followed quickly by announcements regarding the Apple Watch and Apple Pay.
The phones have 4.7-inch and 5.5-inch Retina HD displays, and packed with innovative technologies in an all-new dramatically thin and seamless design. Also, they are engineered to be the thinnest ever. Both models run on the all-new A8 chip and include iOS 8, the very latest version!
The Apple Pay now allows a very easy way to securely pay for physical goods and services in stores or apps with the touch of a finger. You can pay securely and conveniently in stores by holding the phone near the contactless reader and keeping a finger on Touch ID. There is absolutely no need to unlock your iPhone or launch an app!
The Apple Watch introduces a specially designed and engineered Digital Crown that provides an innovative way to scroll, zoom and navigate. It is Apple's most revolutionary navigation tool since the iPod Click Wheel and iPhone Multi-Touch.
Analysys Mason believes that smartwatches will become the dominant wearable smart device by sales in early 2017, and that, Apple will drive this market. Analysys Mason also feels that Apple has an advantage in the race for mobile commerce and payments dominance.
IHS reports that Apple rarely invents new markets, despite its reputation. But when Apple launches a new product category, it attempts to redefine the market. Apple Pay may also get introduced internationally as soon as possible.
All of my blogs are now up for sale! ;)
My dear friends, I am now in the process of selling off Pradeep's Point! as well as all of my other blogs! 🙂
As most of you are probably aware, Webstatsdomain.org estimated Pradeep's Point! at a whopping $19.1 billion in July 2014. As I write this post, the number has slightly reduced to $16.6 billion. Pradeep's Point! is my flagship blog! 😉
It's been a long time! I started Pradeep's Point! back in 2007, having just returned to India after my second stint in Hong Kong and China. Actually, it was initially placed under Blogspot as Pradeep Chakraborty's Blog – when it won the first international award – Pradeep Chakraborty's Blog was selected as the best in the world in the Electronic Hardware category for 2008-10, by Electronics Weekly, UK. I remember and would again like to thank all of those folks who voted for me to the first ever international title! 🙂
Next, Pradeep Chakraborty's Blog received an Honorable Mention @ Blognet Awards 2009! That's also the time when someone succeeded in adding malware to that blog, and there was absolutely no fault of mine, and it was later removed by Google! I recall spending an entire night migrating the content to WordPress, where I had a secondary blog – Pradeep's Point!
I moved on to WordPress, migrated all of the posts, and Pradeep's Point! was reborn, or rather, born!
Thereafter, it has been hugely satisfying journey for me! I managed to pick up at least one international award / international recognition for all of my blogs, every year, till this year! 😉 These are:
* PC's Semicon Blog awarded the Top Digital Media Blog by Online IT Degree (in November 2010).
* Green Gadget of Texas, USA, awarded Pradeep's Point! as the "Featured Tech Site" for 2011!
* In 2012, Gorkana, UK, selected Pradeep's Point! as the Blog Influencer 2012!
* PC's Telecom Blog listed among Best VoIP blogs by HostedSwitch, USA.
* In Feb. 2013, PC's Electronic Components Blog selected as 100 Top Resources for Electrical Engineers on ElectricalEngineeringSchools.org, USA.
* In August 2014, PC's Electronic Components Blog was ranked 11th in the "Top 101 Best Resources for Electrical Engineers."
Now, this year, the huge estimation of Pradeep's Point! by Webstatsdomain.org! 🙂
As I write, two folks – from Bangalore — are trying to gather funds to buy Pradeep's Point! Although, my personal preference is for a very good friend! 🙂
The other five blogs up for sale are:
* PC's Semiconductors Blog. (Won an award)
* PC's Solar Photovoltaics Blog.
* PC's Electronics Blog.
* PC's Electronic Components Blog. (Won two awards)
* PC's Telecom Blog. (Won an award)
I hope that the blogs will all remain, as will the content, but the owner (or owners) will be different! Perhaps, the blogs could have a different name!
Maybe, the new owners will try and keep me on board, too! 😉 (I hope, they do).
I already have feelers, again from Bangalore, for buying out PC's Semiconductors Blog and PC's Electronic Components Blog. Again, I would prefer, if a friend, hopefully, tried to buy all of them, together! One blog definitely can't do without the other – that's my estimation! 😉 Well, let's see what happens!
So, my dear friends, once again, it has been a pleasure serving you all via my blogs! Now, they are in the process of being sold off. Whoever buys those, will definitely have a great future! 🙂 (In case, I change my mind, the blogs will remain as they are! 😉 )
About time 😉 I guess!! Thanks everyone, for your tremendous love and continuous support! 🙂
"I'd rather attempt to do something great and fail, than to attempt to do nothing and succeed!" — Robert H. Schuller.
Yes, I definitely agree! 🙂
Cadence now realizing EDA 360 vision: Nimish Modi
The EDA 360 was an industry vision. It reflected a change in market requirements. It was application driven system design. From a Cadence perspective, the company has done system design enablement, according to Nimish Modi, senior VP, marketing and business development, Cadence Design Systems Inc.
In Apple's case, the iOS is unique. Cadence feels that the heart of the design is the SoC. The electrical analysis is becoming very important. For instance, how do you optimize before tape-out? Hardware and software conversion presents a huge problem as well. The IP plays an important part. Cadence did IP-as-a-service. It now has an IP strategy.
Today, EDA is about possibility, not productivity. Cadence provides tools and content for semiconductor and systems companies. It is now realizing the EDA 360 vision.
On IP
According to Modi, each IP is immensely complex. Standards based or interface IP is not enough! Silicon-proven design is the need of the hour. Now, more and more IP blocks are said to be coming together.
FPGA-based prototyping
Cadence is offering the Palladium XP, and its primary use is for system verification. Software development is becoming a little bit difficult. People are providing software prototypes. The Palladium compile, turnaround and debug are very fast, best-in-class. All memory, clocking, partitioning, etc., is now automated.
The capacity of the Protium platform is 100 million gates. It will enable hardware and software developers. The use model for Protium is:
* Hardware folks use it for hardware regression.
* Software folks use it for early software development.
The main value proposition is the faster bring-up time. Also, the Palladium hybrid model helps customers overcome the boot problem. It is a hybrid of emulation and virtual prototyping. The dynamic power analysis is another issue. The Palladium hybrid model helps to do the testing.
Collaboration with ARM
ARM provides processor IPs. Cadence works closely with ARM. Cadence is also co-optimizing its tools to provide the best PPA. Physical libraries and tools get optimized. Cadence's tools are optimized for ARM architecture. Cadence is also the first ones on the access to the V8 ARM models.
Need for efficient product development ecosystem: CDNLive 2014
According to Vasudevan Aghoramoorthy, VP at Wipro Technologies, a product-centric approach targets multiple customers as well as diverse needs.An example is the desktop server. He was delivering the guest keynote on day two at the CDNLive 2014 in Bangalore, India.
For an app-centric approach, it addresses one specific market and has multiple end customers.Examples are set-top boxes and mobile phones. A services-centric approach addresses the service providers' needs. Examples would be PoS machines, base stations, ATMs, patient monitors, etc.
A customer-centric approach has diverse needs. These are faster time-to-market, diversification into complementary markets, reduction in product costs, completion of product portfolio, market development, expansion and customization, as well as leveraging analytics.
As a case study, he referred to Wipro engineering a low-cost, low-power ATM with battery back-up. It has been implemented with multi-language display and voice instruction, with spoil-proof keyboard. It also has a fingerprint biometric reader, and serves as a tamper-proof machine for secured transactions.
What did the product development process achieve? Product cost was reduced by 60 percent, and power consumption was reduced by 50 percent. The concept to deployment time was 10 months. An innovative design was used to address the strict power requirements. Wipro used an agile approach to develop the product.
Another case was of a patient-monitoring machine at a fraction of the cost. There was cost reduction by 5X at the physician's end and 50 percent at the patient's end. There was ease of use for physicians as connectivity options were enabled for smartphones and tablets.
All of these cases tell us that the product development ecosystem must be efficient. Product management and understanding use cases are key. In Wipro's case, the development methodology was adapted to market needs. Product differentiation can be done by software. There is a need for cross-disciplinary engineering skills. It will lead to newer methodologies, enabling joint reviews in collaboration for cross-disciplinary projects.
Market opportunities are available for product development and retaining value. Market-driven needs drive innovation, and possibly, lead to the growth of the ESDM sector in India.
Diverse requirements for IoT evolving: Charlie Huang
According to Charlie Huang, senior VP, Worldwide Field Operations and System & Verification Group, Cadence, today, we are talking about tremendous data growth. Mobile has been driving the growth of semiconductors, besides medical, industrial, consumer and automotive electronics as well. Trends are also driving disruptive opportunities — from driving growth in China to growth in India. He was delivering the keynote on day two at the CDNLive 2014 in Bangalore, India.
"We can innovate to build things that are yet to be imagined. Greater things are yet to come for the Indian semicon design opportunities.
"Today, the iPad has become a system of systems. Now, everyone is waiting for the next big thing. People are also talking about the IoT. Everything will get revolutionized by the newer SoCs. Diverse requirements for IoT have been evolving. There are development challenges from all directions. More functions also means that more IP cores need to be integrated and verified. The IP cores per SoC is likely to be 123 in 14nm, from 108 in 20/22nm. The complexity is just unimaginable!
"Eighty percent of SoC development costs come from software, verification and validation. We should now look at innovating software design with SoC design.
Cadence has invested substantially in IP. It enables system design enablement from end product down to chip level. System-level design with high level synthesis is used to shorten the development cycle and get better quality of results (QoR).
IoT gathering pace as revolution: Guru Ganesan
IoT gathering pace as revolution: Guru Ganesan
By 2020, there will be over 8 billion people on our planet. This will also bring tremendous innovations and challenges. ARM has been connecting intelligence at every level, said Guru Ganesan, president and MD, ARM India.
He was delivering the guest keynote at the recently held CDNLive 2014 event in Bangalore, India.
Newer apps are helping connect with the world. As per Gartner, $27 billion worth apps were downloaded in 2013. By 2020, this is estimated to rise to $80 billion.
According to Ganesan, consumer trends are driving innovation in embedded apps, including rich user interface (UI). ARM is also at the heart of wearable technologies, for example, Smart Glasses from Google. Some examples from India include Lechal from Ducere Technologies, GOQ Pi remote fitness companion, Fin+ navigation and device control gesture based device from RHLVision, and Smarty Ring that brings instant smartphone alerts to your fingers from Chennai.
So, what are the key requirements for wearables? These are video/image, audio, display, software, OS, connectivity and battery life! In 2013, over 1 billion smartphones were shipped. Further, mobile data 12 times over between now and 2018.
In medical electronics, besides humans, it has extended to keeping the cattle healthy and have intelligent agriculture with OnFarm, by using sensors. IoT as a revolution is gathering pace. As per a survey conducted by ARM, 95 percent of the users expect to be using IoT over the next three years. Common standards are being developed for interoperability. Similarly, mobility and connectivity are also happening in automotives.
Now, let's see the development challenges for high-end embedded. Embedded applications today integrate more functions. Consequently, design and verification challenges continue to grow. Further, lot of smart devices are now generating lot of data. The question is: how are we using that data?
Ganesan added that by 2020, there will be new challenges in transportation, healthcare, energy and education. Once devices start communicating with each other, we are likely to see the evolution of a smart infrastructure.
Innovating in system of systems: Lip Bu-Tan
There have been several innovations of innovations happening in the global technology industry. The IoT, mobility, cloud computing, etc., are creating opportunities for the system of systems, according to Lip-Bu Tan, president and CEO, Cadence Design Systems Inc.
Tan was delivering the main keynote. at the recently held CDNLive 2014 in Bangalore, India,
Some of the trends driving the global semiconductor market growth in the end markets include automotives at $24 billion, computers at $76 billion, industrial electronics at $14,1 billion, medical electronics at $12.5 billion, and mobile phones at $100 billion. In India, especially, a lot of fabless companies are said to be coming up.
The tablet is a system of systems. It has communications, navigation, recording and photography, etc. Even the automotive vehicle is a convincing example. Next, there is the IoT. There are said to be diverse needs for the IoT.
There are said to be several challenges for the system of systems. Some of these are more IP and software requirements, and more needs for low power and mixed signal. System design enablement requires system integration, packaging and board, etc.
Cadence has a comprehensive SoC IP solution. The mixed signal verification solution ensures functionality, reliability and performance. Cadence also introduced the Voltus-Fi custom power integrity solution in Shanghai the week before. Its Quantus QRC extraction solution gives up to 5X performance.
Next, the Jasper acquisition expands the Cadence development suite. Cadence also provides the FPGA-based prototyping with Palladium flow for software development.
Tan concluded that new technologies always require closer collaboration — from IP through manufacturing. Cadence is here to help designers innovate — from systems to silicon.


text:
Uploaded by VillUnderLondon on Feb 2, 2012
Interview with Darren Partington and Andy Barker from 808 State before
they performed a live electronic set at Village Underground. They talk
in typical jovial length about the Manchester early Acid House days,
getting the recording contracts and heading out on the road again.
Very informative. Acid house truned into making albums. I wasn't familiar with 808 State's British Acid excursions even though I bought 90 and Ex:cel. When retro started to become fashionable again I remember buying Newbuild on Rephlex and not liking it much but a lot of newer people seem to like that album. Kind of strange how music perceptions change over time.
808 State: In The Cab
Discuss 808 State and related.
Moderators: Pob, markus, nickking, Ancodia
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subset: commoncrawl


text:
A Massachusetts man was sentenced to 17 years for a plan to attack the Pentagon with remote-controlled model planes. WHDH's Christa Delcamp reports.
BOSTON - A Massachusetts man was sentenced to 17 years in prison on Thursday for a plot to attack the Pentagon and the U.S. Capitol building in Washington with explosives loaded into remote-control model airplanes.
Rezwan Ferdaus, who was arrested in September 2011 and pleaded guilty in July to terrorism-related charges in a deal with prosecutors, told the court he had devoted a lot of time to self-reflection while in jail awaiting sentencing and that he accepted his fate.
The 26-year-old was arrested after an FBI sting operation in which he requested and took delivery of plastic explosives, three grenades and six assault rifles from undercover FBI agents who he believed were members of the al-Qaida network.
Ferdaus, a Muslim who has a physics degree from Northeastern University, delivered a long, soft-spoken statement in which he offered no apology for his actions but thanked his family and friends for supporting him.
He spoke of "a world filled with injustices," but also said "no dehumanization can serve as justification for inhumanity in other places."
The 17-year sentence, which also includes 10 years of supervised release, was the result of a July plea agreement worked out between his attorneys and prosecutors.
Read more Security stories from NBC News
Ferdaus pleaded guilty to charges of attempting to destroy and damage a federal building and attempting to provide material support to terrorists. Prosecutors dropped four other counts that could have raised the total possible sentence to 35 years.
Before approving the sentence, Stearns told Ferdaus that he was impressed by his self-reflection.
USAMA via AFP - Getty Images
A remote-control model of a 1950s U.S. Navy Sabre jet fighter that prosecutors said belonged to Rezwan Ferdaus is seen in this undated photo released by the United States Attorney's Office District of Massachusetts.
"You don't need any lecture from me. Your statement convinces me that you have the character and the capacity to search your own soul," Stearns said. "I'm going to leave it to you to finish that journey."
Parents: Depression led to mental illness
In a letter to Judge Richard Stearns, Ferdaus' parents, Showket and Anamaria Ferdaus, said he slipped into a depression during his senior year at Northeastern, which led to mental illness that was "obviously visible" to his family since late 2009.
They said they tried to get him to see a doctor but he would not.
"We took a very cautious approach. After all, he was over 18 and we could not force him to see a doctor. That is the American way. We felt helpless," they wrote in their letter.
Islamist leader jailed for inciting deadly attack on US Embassy in Tunisia
Ferdaus' attorney, Miriam Conrad, told reporters after the hearing that her client had shown no interest in terrorism before FBI investigators approached him.
"There was no evidence ever produced that Mr. Ferdaus sought out contact with any outside groups before the government became involved or even after the government became involved," Conrad said.
'Wanted to become a terrorist'
Assistant U.S. Attorney Jack Pirozzolo disagreed.
"He was a person who decided that he wanted to become a terrorist," Pirozzolo said, adding that before the FBI investigation began, Ferdaus had tried to obtain weapons illegally from an area gun shop and performed surveillance on a train station in his hometown of Ashland, Massachusetts.
"Those events predated the undercover operation that unfolded here," Pirozzolo said.
NYT: The case of the biker, the jihadist and the 'terrorist bride'
Ferdaus planned to carry out the attacks on the Pentagon, located in Arlington, Virginia, and the Capitol using a scale model of a U.S. Navy F-86 Saber fighter jet about the size of a picnic table, which he kept in a storage locker in suburban Boston, authorities said.
Authorities said the public was never in danger from the explosives, which they said were always under the control of federal officials.
The government had alleged that Ferdaus told undercover agents of his plans to commit acts of violence against the United States by "decapitating" its "military center" and killing "kafirs," an Arabic term meaning non-believers.
Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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text: bourbonmed Posted September 25, 2000 Check out the current issue of Stuff magazine. It has a beautifully photographed spread titled "Bourbon Warfare" with hilarious reviews of some of our favorites. The big 5 star winners were Woodford Reserve ..."a sipping whiskey with hints of maple and citrus that goes down smoother than a hippo on a Vaseline-greased Slip 'n' Slide", and Blanton's..."a holy hand grenade as solid as the bronze stallion fixed to its stopper". 4-stars went to Bookers ..."toenail-curling 127 proof should be sampled with a belly full of catfish and hushpuppies -- or else suffer a punch to the gut that'll leave you flatter than a post tornado trailer park", Maker's Mark, and Knob Creek..."spends 9 years in solitary confinement -- in virginal white oak barrels, charred more than the old Branch Davidian compound". Getting 3 stars were Wild Turkey Rare Breed..."this gobbler comes blazing out of the glass a-peckin' and a-scratchin' like a 24-pounder the day before Thanksgiving," and Bulleit..."has a salty aroma -- kind of like a shrimp basket at Red Lobster and can burn a hole though your chest the size of a cathead buicuit..."But all joking aside, I kinda liked the Bulleit bottle. It has lots of character...frontier whiskey label and all. Any word on where to purchase it?Cheers, Omar Share this post Link to post Share on other sites


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Tar, Feathers, and Other Historical Details
Some historians had a chance to see parts of the upcoming H.B.O. miniseries on John Adams in their role as reviewers for the news media. And of course historians are particularly touchy about details of, well, history. Here are a couple of the responses I've seen.
In a review for The New Yorker, Harvard professor Jill Lepore suggests that, while this miniseries might reflect how John Adams would have liked to see history portrayed, maybe—just maybe—he wasn't responsible for everything good that happened in the American Revolution. It was, after all, a mass movement that involved millions of people.
Lepore likes some of the dirty detail of eighteenth-century life:
Actually, the inoculation of Abigail and the Adams children against smallpox—more blood; also pus—is nearly the most terrifying scene in the four episodes made available to reviewers. It's second only to the tarring and feathering of a British customs official in Boston, the brutality of which Adams watches with horror, in a masterly sequence that exposes the violence of insurrection and helps explain the future President's enduring fear of democracy.But the manners ring false for her: "Everyone is far too frank with everyone else (the eighteenth century was nothing if not coy)."
And what about that tar and feathers scene? Boston 1775 reader Ira Stoll, who's working on a biography of Samuel Adams, sent me a link to his New York Sun critique:
In the first episode of HBO's "epic seven-part miniseries event" John Adams, one of the most riveting scenes occurs at Boston Harbor, when a customs inspector or informant challenges John Hancock (Justin Theroux) for evading the taxes imposed by the British. "Teach him a lesson, tar the bastard," Hancock commands a mob, which proceeds to do exactly that to the poor accessory of the crown. This being HBO, there's a glimpse of full frontal nudity that is promptly drenched with hot tar. Hancock looks on, as do John Adams (Paul Giamatti) and his cousin Samuel (Danny Huston). "God, Sam, that's barbarism," John cries to his cousin, who stands silent. "Do you approve of this? Answer me, Sam, can you?"Indeed, both the Liberty riot on 10 June 1768 and the first tar-and-feathering in Boston on 28 Oct 1769 are documented in detail through the complaints of the victims and other Customs officials. If any of those men had seen or heard about Hancock, Adams, or any other well-known Whig leader directing, encouraging, or even silently watching the mobs, they would have publicized that detail.
It's a telling scene, because there is no historical evidence that it ever happened. . . . There was a riot in June of 1768 over Hancock's ship, the Liberty, in which customs officials were beaten, but there is no evidence that Hancock or either Adams was at the scene of that riot, nor is there any record that anyone was tarred in the event. . . .
The scene does convey, accurately, John Adams's hostility to mob violence. . . . But it does so by inaccurately, well, tarring the reputations of Hancock and Samuel Adams, and by conjuring a situation that there is no evidence existed.
Such are the compromises attendant in turning history into a seven-part miniseries for television. . . . [David] McCullough is so deservedly celebrated as an author not only for his skill as a storyteller but for his care with research and facts. So it is disappointing to see the television version of his bestselling biography make such departures.
As Stoll notes in his review, the top Whig leaders actually discouraged violent attacks on Crown officials and supporters, on the grounds that they discredited the cause. At different times in 1770 William Molineux kept a crowd from lynching Ebenezer Richardson after he shot young Christopher Seider, and Dr. Thomas Young helped to prevent Scottish merchant Patrick McMasters from being tarred and feathered.
There's actually a link between the seizure of the Liberty and that first tar-and-feathers attack, which might have been why scriptwriter Kirk Ellis combined them. Though the smuggling case against Hancock was eventually dropped, the Customs service kept his ship and used it to chase down smugglers off Rhode Island. One of the sailors it employed, George Gailer, was spotted in Boston in October 1769. A mob seized him, stripped him, and covered him with tar and feathers.
Gailer sued seven people for this assault: Newport merchants Eleazar Trevett, Jr., and Benjamin Trevett; Newport mariner Daniel Vaughan; Boston mariner Edward Mathews; Boston tailors David Bradlee and Pool Spear; and a minor named David Provence. The defendants responded with a demurrer in Inferior Court, neither affirming nor denying the allegation but suggesting Gailer had no cause to sue. That court decided in their favor in January 1770. Gailer appealed but failed to appear in August 1771, and the case was dropped.
Based on an account-book entry, the attorney who represented David Bradlee in this matter was that opponent of mob violence, John Adams.
(The details of Gailer's case appear in the first volume of The Legal Papers of John Adams. The picture above is a London portrayal of a Boston mob's tar-and-feathers attack on John Malcolm in 1774.)


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(Reuters) – Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway Inc eliminated its stake in Dish Network Corp in the fourth quarter and added a stake in financial giant Goldman Sachs, according to a regulatory filing on Friday.
Berkshire had taken the Dish position in the second quarter. The regulatory filing does not disclose exactly when in the fourth quarter that Berkshire sold its 547,312 shares in the satellite TV company. The stock jumped about 36 percent from the end of the second quarter to the end of last year.
The changes were disclosed in a U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filing made public on Friday, which detailed Berkshire equity investments as of December 31.
U.S. regulators require large investors to disclose their stock holdings every quarter, and the disclosures can offer a window into their strategies for buying and selling stocks.
The filing also showed a new addition of 12,631,531 shares in Goldman Sachs Group Inc. Berkshire Hathaway disclosed in the previous quarter that it had exercised its warrant to buy shares of Goldman Sachs.
Berkshire converted warrants in Goldman Sachs acquired during the financial crisis.
Buffett received the warrants when his investment in Goldman was seen as a vote of confidence in the bank, which was reeling from turmoil in the credit market.
Calls and emails to Dish, Berkshire Hathaway and Goldman Sachs were not returned immediately.
Berkshire owns more than 80 businesses in such areas as insurance, railroads, utilities, chemicals and food.
(Luciana Lopez and Steven C. Johnson in New York; additional reporting by Bangalore newsroom; Editing by Peter Galloway)


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I do not have a GIS background and was hoping that someone could point me in the right direction as to the best procedure / software to do the following.
Starting with a current LiDAR survey, I need to be able to compare an older survey (contours in a DWG) and create a composite surface that is the lower of the two at any point. These are both too large, and too close in elevation to deal with the triangulated surfaces in AutoCAD (which is my default right now). Also, moving forward I will have to continue to integrate new survey into this surface to maintain a "cleanup floor", which AutoCad does poorly, as it does not easily allow for just integrating the cut portion of any new survey.
My gut tells me there must be a simpler method to do this by converting them both into a uniform grid (DEM is the convenient output from AutoCAD), and then comparing them in a GIS software but I have no idea which software to go to, or what the simplest methodology would be.


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Publish Your Design Article and Get Paid
Are You An Accomplished and Creative Writer Who Could Write in Proper English? Can You Choose An Image For Your Article? Can You Take Photos? Can You Write About Design?
We are looking for fluent and creative writers to provide content for the DesignAmid Magazine. DesignAmid magazine features original articled in design and lifestyle niches and the publication is oriented towards a creative, educated audience. Proper English is a must. Articles must be original and well-written. All articles should pass plagiarism filters and checkers.The overall topic of the DesignAmid magazine is Design and Lifestyle. We are especially interested in publishing articles related to Design, Architecture and Arts. Creativity, Innovation and Engineering topics are also considered, yet all topics must relate to Design. For other subjects and disciplines outside Design, Arts, Architecture, Creativity, Innovation fields, the writers must find a way to connect with Design in order to get published.Writers should not plagiarize or copy-paste from other blogs, when quoting, sentences must be paraphrased. Successful candidates must be able to come up with interesting topics related to design or writers should be able to research and reflect on specific design related topics that we might want to feature. Writers should also be able to use image editing software and must be able to browse and find public domain images that can be used together with their articles as described below.Each article on DesignAmid magazine must contain: 1. One (1) Cover Image, 2. Title: A Heading, 3. Description: A Short Sub-Heading, 4. Twenty (20) Short Paragraphs, 5. 1500 Words or more., 6. Five to Ten (5-10) Tags or Keywords, 7. Link to our sponsor company., 8. References or Bibliography., 9. Three (3) Conceptual images.CATEGORY : You choose the category from a select list. Please choose the best category that matches the topic of your article. Your category choice is important to help our audience get suggested articles and topics when they finish reading your article. In another sense, this is the overall and general scope of your article; i.e. it is what we you talking about.ARTICLE TITLE : It is a Short Heading, the title of the article; it is a one sentence summary of what the article is about. The Article Title should preferably between 5 to 12 words; not so short not so long. In SEO Terms, this is the TITLE Tag. A good and catchy article title makes the article interesting and appealing. DESCRIPTION: Description is a a Short Sub-Heading which is a brief sentence summary, abstract of the article. The length is like a tweet; Ideally around 12 - 24 words, less than 140 characters. In SEO Terms, this is the META DESCRIPTION Tag, and is the summary of the article for search engines to index however it must be an eye-catching phrase. We do care that the description is good and to the point. KEYWORDS : These are 5-10 Tags or Keywords related to article. It is important that the keywords written at this section are mentioned in the article paragraphs. In SEO Terms, this is the META KEYWORDS Tag and is essential. You should fill this section at beginning of the article so that you would have anchor points to discuss and refer to while writing your article.PARAGRAPH 1 : This is your opening paragraph of the article. It must be the introduction to the subject. It could cover the importance of topic, how it relates to the readers (i.e. Architects, Designers and Artists) and why this topic is worth talking about. A good opening paragraph makes the article a good read, and gets shared more often. This is around 60-72 words i.e. 3 or 5 small sentences.PARAGRAPHS 2 to 19 : These are development or informative paragraphs, providing in depth information regarding the topic in a structured way. Some writers might use the second paragraph to provide the scope of the article, and likewise the nineteenth article could be conclusive. These are also around 60-72 words i.e. 3 or 5 small sentences.PARAGRAPH 20 : This is a conclusion, a wrap up of the article. It is a summary of findings, statements, points. It re-highlights the key points in the discussed topic, and remind the readers why the topic was discussed as an article. It connects to the evidence and information given in the article; to the topic. The conclusion paragraph is also around 60-72 words i.e. 3 or 5 small sentences.To assess your suitability we need you to complete a simple test of writing a (1) sample article on our blog as described above, your articles must be "approved and published" after being checked by our editor Frank Scott. After passing this test, we will need you to publish (and get approved) 7 more articles. To take the test, register to our magazine and submit your first article here : http://www.designamid.com/index.php?special=submit You will receive notifications regarding your submissions. Take your time for the articles, we prefer quality and original content where you demonstrate your creative writing skills. Payments will be made after each article is approved and published on our homepage. Please bid or let us know the price for a single article. DISCLAIMER: Please be reminded in advance that the ownership of articles and published content will be transferred to DesignAmid Magazine, and our editors will be able to make changes to your article, including updating text, and links. Especially for paid articles, a sponsor link could be used or. Furthermore, our articles are syndicated, distributed and published at our network sites, so editing will not be possible once the articles are published.COVER : Each article on our design blog must contain a Cover Image to match the article, which you must crop 600 x 600 pixels if you would do the cover design. This image must be a public domain or it must be an image you take. The cover image is simply the title text written on a nice looking background with DesignAmid watermark. The background image can taken from MorgueFile.com to ensure it is a public domain image. Alternatively the background image could be a photo you take yourself. Use the WaterMark at designamid.com/watermark.png to add our logo. Type your title, and make it a Cover. Export as JPG. Check other DesignAmid articles to see how covers look. You must do a special cover design for each article. If you cannot do the cover, that is okay, simply choose a good image and add its URL to References or Bibliography section so that we could do the cover for your article.REFERENCES OR BIBLIOGRAPHY : For this section, enter your article references one at a line. For references use APA format if possible. In addition, for the images you choose for the cover of the article and for the paragraphs, please put their URLs to the references section. You can enter up to 40 references to this section.ARTICLE LENGTH & IMAGES : Each article should be around 1500 Words. Your article can be longer in length, but should not be shorter. You should submit at least 3 more images for your paragraphs. Images must be taken from MorgueFile or other public domain sources. Images must match the overall theme, they too could be photographs that you take personally. It is a good idea to use a word processor to type in and save the article before submitting it through DesignAmid interface. This way, you could get auto-corrections for any typos and also your article will be safely saved so that in case online submission fails, you do not need to retype. Please be reminded that all article rights will be transferred to DesignAmid magazine when you submit us an article this way. The fee per article is usually decided via private communication or during article calls. To receive our calls, remember to become a registered member of our website. Registration is free of charge.DesignAmid articles are almost academic; remember to indicate your sources and references when typing the articles. The only expectation of not providing reference is reserved for authors who are writing in their niche for which they had formal training for; i.e. a licensed architect could write about architecture without references, that is okay for us. Otherwise, we believe references are useful also to guide our audience.Contents could be checked for Copyscape or other mechanisms to ensure the content is valid. We also regularly search random sentences within the article to check the originality and ingenuity of the submitted text. We are especially looking for informative articles. If you do not have a specif topic, choose from our category list while submitting articles. You can write about any subject that might be considered useful, comprehensive and educative about design. We are interested in publishing articles about : 1. Designing a particular type of product, service or project. 2. Design tools, news and opportunities, including software. 3. Design Events, Conferences and Symposiums. 4. Scientific Papers in Design, Academic Design Related Publications and Works, Original Design Research 5. Design and Topic Specific Articles etc. Looking forward for all good articles! Exerpt:We are looking for fluent and creative writers to provide content for the DesignAmid Magazine. DesignAmid magazine features original articled in design and lifestyle niches and the publication is oriented towards a creative, educated audience. Proper English is a must. Articles must be original and well-written. All articles should pass plagiarism filters and checkers.The overall topic of the DesignAmid magazine is Design and Lifestyle. We are especially interested in publishing articles relate..
Publish Your Design Article and Get Paid Images:
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File Download: Optional PCL driver package for administrators
- Filename CQ8700-8900_PCL_32.zip
- Version 5.243.20
- Date May 23, 2012
- Size 16.5 MB
Windows XP/Vista/7 Server 2003/2008 32-bit PCL5 driver. This driver uses the Add Printer Wizard - WHQL Certified.
End User License Agreement
Click "Accept" to download, click "Decline" to cancel.


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Hi Jim,
I'm Looking to buy a few books Directly from C.O.T Publications
Due to not been able to get hold of any of the books in the uk for a reasonable price.
A brand new copy of the standard edition of 776½ which i found someone on amazon uk selling was been sold at £70.71 GBP = $119.38USD .
Brand new copy of Mystical and Magical System of the A.:.'A.:. on amazon uk shipped from U.S was £35.00GBP = $59.09USD.
I found out it might be cheaper for UK readers to buy directly from C.O.T Publications
I would like to know if i was buying the collection
Mystical and Magical System of the A.:.'A.:.
Pearls of Wisdom
Visions & Voices
and having them sent priority mail how much would the postage cost be?, would there be a multiply buy discount on the postage?
Thanks for any help or advice 93


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I've been doing this exercise for a while since Chris Brogan first introduced it. Here's Chris Brogan's My 3 Words for 2013. Chris says:
Think of three words that sum up what you want to work actionably on changing/improving in the coming year. It works best when the words are positive in spirit and not negative. For instance: "Fat" isn't exactly a great word, but "Fit" would be better. Think of words that give you more than just a simple goal. For instance, instead of "fit," I'd look to go with "athlete" or "marathon runner" or some person that connects you to those goals.Ze Frank just picked his three words and made a video about them. This made an impression on me.
The idea is to look deeper than a single goal and try to give you an entire mindset to contemplate.
Gregory Ng is changing things up for 2013, and my new friend Nick Kellet creatively chose Be Worthy Together.
I love reading these creative choices and the reasons behind them.
Last year my three words were: Broadcast, Invest, Play.
I really committed to them and did a pretty good job.
For Broadcast I experimented more with live streaming tools and as an on air personality I had a blast hosting some shows and being called in as an expert on local TV. I hope to do more in 2013.
Investing is moving along well. As an Angel Investor I've been working with my portfolio companies and added a new one, Fashion Project, that helps you clean out your closet for charity.
I totally nailed Play this year. Although the specifics of what I wrote down at the beginning of the year got lost in the larger picture, I had a lot of fun.
I'm going to keep this one going for 2013, continuing to focus some of the ways that play worked for me in 2012 including travel and food blogging.
I'm interested in working with high end resorts that are looking to share their story in a personal way via social media.
I'll also try to do better at some of the specifics, from my 2012 post, including reading and golfing.
Back in 2009 my three words were Change, Story and Funny.
In my notes for this year, funny still comes up, along with stories, stage, and laugh.
I'm bringing back FUN for 2013.
Whenever I look at doing a new project, I'll only do it if it's fun. So that's nothing new, but I'll also focus to bringing fun to the forefront in my writing and speaking.
Ze Frank had this one in his video. Ze talked about:
- Trying New Things.
- Being uncomfortable.
- Breaking patterns.
This is a good year for me to do those things too.
What it will mean, I don't know yet, but that's going to be part of the surprise.
What are your Three Words for 2013?
Check out CC Chapman's book, includes the Three Words exercise:
Also, Chris Brogan's:


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loftninjas.org: home of bryan mclellan, aka btm + btmspox <firstname.lastname@example.com>
TechnologyI am a Systems Administrator.
This means I can discern what part of an infrastructure is doing it wrong while the building is on fire without spilling my drink. I also have strong opinions about community and if asked to will wax on about paradigm shifts like cloud computing and configuration management. As open source software is the Right[tm] way and Good, I make a point to contribute and spend a lot of time thinking about how to leverage the core values of the movement in other projects. I used to write about this in the usual fashion on a blog. I hid my old resume as linkedin is more up to date and I'm heavily emotionally invested in Chef and our community anyway.
MeaningI grew up in a small town in the woods and keep relatively close to the earth as a matter of principle. This has also earned me a self-reliant streak. Consequently, I am a useful person to have around and having realized this I volunteer my time to a slew of organizations. Thus, I can sometimes be found in unexpected places. I tried writing up some of my projects for a while.
I lived in Seattle for six years. Beside building my career and meeting a lot of great people through technology, I got involved in bicycle and mass transit advocacy, and helped start an urban farming collective called Alleycat Acres. Building on my experience volunteering at the Common Ground Country Fair growing up, I got involved solving logistical issues for events like Shmoocon, Toor Camp and Burning Man. I also volunteered as a disaster services responder and emergency radio operator for the American Red Cross.
After my father passed away, I moved back to my hometown of Surry, Maine to be near family. While continuing to do tech work remotely, I'm also settling down into working on the family tree farm and flying again. I'm involved in the CGCF fair again, as a communications, traffic and parking coordinator, as well as a member of the fair steering committee. I serve on the board of directors of The New England Museum of Telephony. I'm a lieutenant, communications officer, engineer, and certified structural firefighter for my local fire department.
Outside of work, I spend a lot less time online these days. I run an online store with some friends selling heat pumps. Most of my remaining downtime after the aforementioned hobbies is spent with my wife, young daughter, and our families.
Social NetworkingI believe we can combine information with technology to make our lives better in interesting and useful ways. Thus, the internet knows a lot about me. Some parts of it are a bit old, while other parts may let you know what I'm up to right now. Consider this the index to a hall of mirrors.
linkedin, twitter, facebook, flickr, endomondo, ohloh, foursquare, launchpad, goodreads
slideshare, okcupid, myspace, del.icio.us, jobster, last.fm, youtube, digg, technorati, cafepress, google reader, yelp, youjustgetme
PersonalIt is commonly accepted among people that aren't fools that you can build better systems in the open than behind closed doors. You have to be able to gracefully accept criticism and have patience for misunderstanding, but the ends justify the means. If you have gotten this far and are still interested in learning more about me, I keep my personal journal open to the public. It's been pretty stale since I met my partner and we take care of each other pretty well.
While I've decided that the cost of any consequences there are to my openness are worthwhile, I can't make that decision for other people in my life. Accordingly, names are often reduced to a single character and as I know many people, this habit provides adequate ambiguity. Of course such writing is usually spurred by emotion and ends up lacking context, so I would recommend consuming it through a lens of humility.


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Thanks to Kevin Scholla for the second episode of "Breaking It Down with Bristol," which originally aired on SarahNet Radio!
Do you want to be a part of my DWTS journey? Then, e-mail me so I can add you to my mailing list. (My address is BristolsBlog @ gmail.com, without the space! Make sure to use the subject line: DWTS.) I'd love to give you the latest up-to-the-minute reports about the show!
Also, read more on the Faith and Family Channel, follow me on Facebook and this blog on Twitter!


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Sunday, January 17, 2010
I looked up the bodybugg online and was surprised that it could be ordered by an consumer. It wasn't developed only for The Biggest Loser. After a bit of reading I learned that the bodybugg tracks your steps taken during the day, your hours of activity, sleep, etc. The consumer uploads the data taken from the bodybugg into the web based software and then enters the food eaten for the day.
I decided to try it for 30 days. My 30th day has come and gone.
The bodybugg is very simple to use. I tried the bodybugg with the digital display. It is a 'watch' that shows the data as it is recorded. I didn't want to have to wait to see where my rate of burn was at the end of the day when I typically uploaded the information. I wanted to see it as it happened.
The bb wasn't uncomfortable to wear. A velcro band holds the device in place around the tricep. After the initial battery charge it lasted up to 7 days before needing a charge. I usually upload the data at the end of the day - it charges as I plug it into the computer - and again charges while I'm in the shower. The bb isn't waterproof.
I didn't really learn any data that I didn't guess at before, the bb confirmed what I thought I knew. Well, except that maybe my caloric burn during the day is even a bit lower than what I guessed.
Because I have a very slow metabolism, by genetics I'd guess, I wanted to confirm if the slow metabolism was in fact low or if I just thought that it was.
It is.
You know, sometimes it is very easy to miscalculate calories; I of course, tend to miscalculate by estimating too low or by not entering every single morsel that I consume. I know that to get a true picture of my metabolism I need to be very exact, but alas, sometimes it becomes tiresome.
I don't always track, but I do when I am trying to lose fat or gain muscle or complete a 30 day trial.
I've researched diet/activity/hormones/metabolism at length and throughout my own trial and error came up with the conclusion that for me to lose fat I need to consume a diet made up of a maximum of 1400 calories consisting of 50% of calories from protein, 30% from carb and 20% from fats along with 90 minutes of vigorous exercise in the form of cardio. Weight lifting doesn't seem to accelerate weight loss for me. To maintain my weight of 130 pounds I consume 1600 calories a day and can change to 40/40/20; a few more carbohydrates and still getting 90 minutes of cardio in each day. To gain weight I found that I will consume 40/40/20, 1600 calories and drop cardio to 60 minutes. So see, numbers are not equal for everyone. Some people at my exact size would absolutely starve and have no energy to practice any type of exercise at this rate.
The bodybugg confirmed all of the above. I set the parameters with the web based questionnaire, entered all foods, all activity was recorded and I came up with the exact same outcome as above.It was a very interesting trial. I enjoyed watching my rate of burn.
The bodybugg confirmed my daily burn, which I had estimated using many different online calculators, my daily burn (how many calories I wanted to "use") was 2200, I'd eat 1400, creating an 800 calorie deficit..which would equate to a weight loss of 1.5 pounds each week without exercise. (3500 calories per pound of fat loss) This is why I never ate my 'activity points' at Weight Watchers. The numbers just aren't equal for all. I didn't lose 1.5 pounds each week using this method. I needed to create a deficit of 8000 calories (vrs 3500) per each pound of fat loss. Does anyone really lose a pound of fat every time they create a deficit of 3500 calories? Anyone? I'm very curious..
When I first began Weight Watchers many years ago .. like 24 years ago .. I lost weight by eating 1500 calories (21 'points' back then) a day and walking 4 miles..but I was 21 years old and had been eating a very unhealthy diet. Just by adding vegetables and fruits I changed my diet completely. In looking at my records (yes, I keep all workout/diet records) I was 178 pounds at the first weigh in and lost 55 pounds in 14 months. About a pound a week. Of course my body is much more fit and healthy now, it takes more exercise to lose fat but about the same calorie intake. I imagine as I get older it would take more and more exercise to lose fat. Thankfully I am taking care of myself now by building muscle and eating a healthful diet so I shouldn't have to worry about losing fat as I get older. I hope. That should be enough incentive to keep it healthy and lean!
I found a few years ago while tracking my food intake and energy burn with Leanness Lifestyle that I NEVER had any weight loss until I was in the 8000 calorie deficit area. I was tracking every morsel and was just blown away that I wouldn't lose fa by creating a 3500 deficit. No wonder I would become discouraged when it took me a month to lose a pound years ago.
With Leanness Lifestyle I learned every 10-14 days IF I created a total deficit of 8000-10000 calories I would lose a pound of fat; not by the 3500 calorie deficit 'rule', which I guess isn't even a rule but a fact. There are 3500 calories in a pound of fat, so if a person creates a 3500 calorie deficit the theory is that the person will drop a pound of fat..but this doesn't always work for all of us and the bodybugg confirmed that for me. Everytime 10-14 days passed and I had created a 8000 deficit I would drop a pound.
This is why a contestant on The Biggest Loser can lose 35 pounds in one week. The numbers don't always make sense. The metabolism is a very complex individulized system. The contestants aren't creating a 1,272,500 calorie deficit in a week and it isn't all water weight either..they continue (some of them) to lose double digits eacy and every week.
In order to use the bodybugg calculations, graphs, charts, etc. a subscription to Apex is needed. I be live the cost is $20 per month, however it was thrown in with the bodybugg I am using. Costco has the bodybugg for $179 which includes the 1 year subscription to Apex and the digital readout watch.
All in all, it was fun to use, interesting to confirm my rate of burn, but not really necessary for weight maintenance/loss. I didn't really learn anything new about myself.
I think the bodybugg would be a great learning tool for someone who hasn't researched diet/metabolism and is just staring out in figuring out their puzzle.
Yesterday I went out for a huge shopping trip. Mall of America, Shopps of Arbor Lake, 50th and France..I walked alot. I then lifted legs for 65 minutes. The bodybugg showed that I burned 5400 calories during the 24 hour period. Of course this includes a 20 mile run. That is about what I would have estimated it at.
I know that each mile I run burns approximately 100 calories, less if running long and slow, a bit more if running short and fast. Because I did 10 miles of tempo within the 20 miles I would have guessed I would have guessed the 2500 in running energy expenditure, 1500 because I'm not dead (living, breathing, being, 1000 for 7 hours of shopping, 300 for an hour of weights. Pretty close! Guess I didn't need the bodybugg for that.
Again, it was fun to use but I think the Garmin 310XT is the better purchase for me :)
5 comments:
- Heidi Swift - Grit and Glimmer said...
Hi Julie,
I love this very thorough analysis of the bodybugg as I have been curious about it as well.
One question. I don't completely follow this paragraph:
The bodybugg confirmed my daily burn, which I had estimated using many different online calculators, my daily burn (how many calories I wanted to "use") was 2200, I'd eat 1400, creating an 800 calorie deficit..which would equate to a weight loss of 1.5 pounds each week without exercise. (3500 calories per pound of fat loss) This is why I never ate my 'activity points' at Weight Watchers. The numbers just aren't equal for all. I didn't lose 1.5 pounds each week using this method. I needed to create a deficit of 8000 calories (vrs 3500) per each pound of fat loss. Does anyone really use a deficit of 3500 per pound? Just curious.."
I missed the jump in logic about how you figured out that you actually needed to create an 8000cal/pound deficit. Can you expand on that?
I've been using the 3500 rule myself and having things not add up.
- Julie B said...
Great question Heidi! I didn't explain that at all, did I. I'm going back to edit. I appreciate your comment very much!
- Heidi Swift - Grit and Glimmer said...
Thanks, Julie. This is great. By the way, I am ASTOUNDED that you have records for food/weight/nutrition from 24 years ago. And very impressed. Looking back that far is completely fascinating!
Fascinating blog, Julie. I agree with your 8K calorie deficit/to/lose/a pound estimate. Losing/maintaining weight is such an uncomplicated process. It's all about discipline, dedication, and drive. But alas, easier said than done. Thanks for helping me kickstart my own program. Count me in as a regular reader. Jim.
- Unknown said...
It seems like a lot of work and a high price tag but I would still like to try it! Bodybugg Band


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Hey guys, I just want to apologize for not posting much the last couple of days. I've been recovering from my Idaho trip, but also preparing for my Alaska trip. I'll be gone from Wednesday June 24th at noon to Tuesday July 7 at noon. I won an Undergraduate Student Research Award for the ASM conference, which means I'll actually be giving a 15 minute talk there. For those of you not familiar with biology conferences, it's kind of crazy for an undergrad to be doing anything more than presenting a poster, and even that's unusual. So yeah, I've been working my butt off the last couple of days making sure my Powerpoint presentation is perfect and that I'm really comfortable with the material. I think it's going to go well!
I've also been working to make a lot of posts that will go up once I'm gone. I will probably have internet the first week while I'm still at the University of Fairbanks, but after that I'll be hiking. There's a possibility I'll have internet through my phone, but I doubt it since I'll be in the middle of nowhere. Even if I do, the most I'll be able to do is twitter, so if you really can't make it two weeks without me (hopefully not…), follow me there.
Don't forget to also send me random questions! Either comment here or email me at jmccreig(at)purdue.edu, and I'll try to answer your questions in posts.


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In a press conference held at the Shanghai International Auto Show on Tuesday, Volvo Car Corporation presented Concept Universe, a design study for a future luxury Volvo sedan.
"Shanghai is the perfect place for the world première of a superb car that is tailor made for the most demanding luxury car buyers", said Stefan Jacoby, President & CEO of Volvo Car Corporation.
Stefan Jacoby also revealed that the first quarter of 2011 was one of the best global sales quarters in the history of Volvo, sales figures up 13.7 percent to 106,827 cars.
"This is the next step in the proud history of luxury Volvo sedans", said Stefan Jacoby before revealing the Concept Universe.
He continued:
"We will listen very carefully to what the Chinese car buyers think of the design. Later, we will also show the Concept Universe in other parts of the world. This brings it into the global context we are aiming for with all our cars."
At the press conference in Shanghai Stefan Jacoby also announced that Volvo Car Corporation is developing an all-new platform architecture for the next generation cars from Volvo: SPA - Scalable Product Architecture.
"When our next luxury sedan arrives in a few years, it will be among the first Volvos built on our new Scalable Product Architecture. All our large and mid-size cars will eventually be based on SPA."
Stefan Jacoby also revealed that the 2010 full year result for Volvo Car Corporation will show a profit when communicated in a few weeks time.
For information on how Volvo Cars process your personal data in relation to Volvo Cars Global Newsroom click here.
Volvo Cars Newsroom makes use of cookies in order to optimize your user experience on this website. The cookies on the website do not store personal information. For more information, read our Cookies Policy page.Accept


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Congratulations to the San Francisco Giants on winning their second title in three years. Did you know that half the teams in MLB have been to the playoffs in the last two years? A quick list I worked up:
Years Since Team 27 KC 20 PIT 19 TOR 11 SEA 9 MIA 7 HOU 6 SD, NYM 5 CLE 4 CHC, CWS 3 LAD, COL, LAA, BOS 2 MIN 1 MIL, ARI, TB, PHI 0 WAS, BAL, CIN, TEX, OAK, ATL, DET, NYY, STL, SF
Not only that, but 20 out of 30 teams have been in the LCS in the last ten years.
Filed under: baseball | Tagged: Giants, playoffs, World Series | Leave a comment »


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How Youth Programs Foster Responsibilityby Wake Forest University March 5, 2018
Youth programs that include boring or difficult tasks are more likely to develop responsibility in teenagers than those that are all fun and games, according to a study of youth programs and responsibility.
Situations that ask young people to make sacrifices and do difficult things for the good of the group are most likely to foster responsibility, said Dustin Wood, assistant professor of psychology at Wake Forest and lead author of the study.
"Some programs for young people probably focus so much on entertaining members that they shy away from the activities that are most likely to help members become more responsible," Wood said. "Our research is a reminder that getting youth to do hard work for a purpose is a key to moving them toward becoming responsible adults."
The study appears in the January/February issue of the journal Child Development. Programs for adolescents need to be engaging. Reed Larson and Jane Brown at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, co-authored the study.
107 high school students
Wood and his colleagues surveyed 107 high school students in 11 extracurricular programs. The programs included 4-H and FFA chapters, a high school production of "Les Miserables," a community-based youth activist group, a school-based media arts training program and a variety of other school and community groups.
Wood wanted to find out what characterizes programs that foster responsibility and determine the role that demands and expectations play in the process.
The teens were interviewed about their experiences in the program and asked how they had changed from participating in the program. The researchers also gathered information from interviews with adult leaders of the programs as well as from site observations.
About a quarter of the students reported becoming more responsible. These youth consistently mentioned performing tasks within their programs as a key to developing responsibility, Wood said.
For one student, that meant caring for a pig for an agricultural project. For another, it meant giving up time with friends to spend long hours in rehearsals. For others, it meant fulfilling the expectations of leadership positions in their group.
Youth Programs, More Responsible
Volunteering for specific tasks was also an important element in the development of responsibility. When teens willingly took on tasks, they were more likely to persevere and to later indicate that they had become more responsible.
Program leaders also influenced the development of responsibility, Wood says. Youth reported becoming more responsible when leaders had high expectations for them. "Leaders who encouraged youth to take ownership over demanding tasks and roles provided conditions for youth to demonstrate that they could be depended on in meaningful situations," he said.
In the study, Wood identified three programs with substantially higher numbers of youth reporting increases in responsibility.
"These programs had leaders who stressed youth accountability," Wood said. "They refused to let youth off the hook if they failed to accomplish tasks they had agreed to complete. In contrast, in programs where youth did not gain responsibility, leaders sometimes finished uncompleted tasks themselves."
Some of the findings would probably surprise a number of psychologists or youth program leaders, Wood said. "They would be surprised by the implication that a more 'hard-nosed' leadership style might be better suited to promoting certain developmental outcomes."
Source: Wake Forest University


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Two days after Maurice Clemons killed four Lakewood Washington police officers at a local coffee shop, Clemons was found in South Seattle.
Seattle police officers checking out a stolen car encountered Clemons and shot him to death when he approached.
Now a photo that could show the aftermath of that shooting is making its way around the Internet with the headline: "This is what happens when you decide to shoot cops."
Needless to say the photo is pretty graphic.
The question here is should we post the crime scene photo?


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Possible Duplicate:
How should I prepare dried chickpeas?
When making food like falafel and hummus, recipes typically ask for canned garbanzo beans (also known as chickpeas). I have on hand a bag of dried garbanzo beans. In the past I have tried to soak these beans over night yet they still never seem to come to the same soft/creamy consistancy that the beans in the cans have.
What steps must I take to rehydrate these beans so that they are similar enough in texture to the canned beans so that I can use the rehydrated beans in its place for the recipes I have?
Additionally, are there any other differences that should be noted between rehydrated garbanzo beans and canned garbanzo beans?


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Isaksen Wins Silver at Mexico World Cup
Colorado Springs Olympic Training Center resident Margaux Isaksen (Fayetteville, Ark.) won the silver medal on Sunday at the first modern pentathlon World Cup event of the 2010 season in Playa del Carmen, Mexico. It marked her best World Cup performance since she won a silver medal in 2008 in Mexico City.
Isaksen, 18, finished 13th in the fencing portion, fourth in the swim, and tied for first in the riding, placing her in seventh place heading into the final event, the combined run/shoot. She was perfect in the second shoot and took first in the combined event, but couldn't chase down Olympic champion Lena Schoneborn of Germany. Schoneborn took the gold with 5476 points, followed by Isaksen's 5432. Russia's Evdokia Gretchichnikova won the bronze medal with a total of 5408.
After the event Schoneborn said "I couldn't believe how well I shot, but I had to if I wanted to win because I had the fastest women in Modern Pentathlon after me in Isaksen."
Full results can be seen at http://www.pentathlon.org/index.php?option=com_wrapper&view=wrapper&Itemid=126


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As I have been studying this passage, I can't help but to think of the history of the Southern Baptist Convention. A few years ago I helped plant a church, The Chapel, in the La Mesa area. We ultimately affiliated with the SBC, but were hesitant for a number of reasons...one being the history of racism within the denomination. The longer I have been Southern Baptist, the more I am growing to appreciate this denomination. Unlike many other denominations, the Southern Baptist Convention has repented from it's sins and moved in the right, biblical, direction.
This week in my study, I stumbled across the statement of the SBC convention repenting of their racist heritage. I wept reading it and thought I was worthy of sharing here:
Resolution On Racial Reconciliation On The 150th Anniversary Of The Southern Baptist Convention
June 1995
WHEREAS, The Scriptures teach that Eve is the mother of all living (Genesis 3:20), and that God shows no partiality, but in every nation whoever fears him and works righteousness is accepted by him (Acts 10:34-35), and that God has made from one blood every nation of men to dwell on the face of the earth (Acts 17:26); and
WHEREAS, Our relationship to African-Americans has been hindered from the beginning by the role that slavery played in the formation of the Southern Baptist Convention; and
WHEREAS, Many of our Southern Baptist forbears defended the right to own slaves, and either participated in, supported, or acquiesced in the particularly inhumane nature of American slavery; and
WHEREAS, In later years Southern Baptists failed, in many cases, to support, and in some cases opposed, legitimate initiatives to secure the civil rights of African-Americans; and
WHEREAS, Racism has led to discrimination, oppression, injustice, and violence, both in the Civil War and throughout the history of our nation; and
WHEREAS, Racism has divided the body of Christ and Southern Baptists in particular, and separated us from our African-American brothers and sisters; and
WHEREAS, Many of our congregations have intentionally and/or unintentionally excluded African-Americans from worship, membership, and leadership; and
WHEREAS, Racism profoundly distorts our understanding of Christian morality, leading some Southern Baptists to believe that racial prejudice and discrimination are compatible with the Gospel; and
WHEREAS, Jesus performed the ministry of reconciliation to restore sinners to a right relationship with the Heavenly Father, and to establish right relations among all human beings, especially within the family of faith.
Therefore, be it RESOLVED, That we, the messengers to the Sesquicentennial meeting of the Southern Baptist Convention, assembled in Atlanta, Georgia, June 20-22, 1995, unwaveringly denounce racism, in all its forms, as deplorable sin; and
Be it further RESOLVED, That we affirm the Bibles teaching that every human life is sacred, and is of equal and immeasurable worth, made in Gods image, regardless of race or ethnicity (Genesis 1:27), and that, with respect to salvation through Christ, there is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female, for (we) are all one in Christ Jesus (Galatians 3:28); and
Be it further RESOLVED, That we lament and repudiate historic acts of evil such as slavery from which we continue to reap a bitter harvest, and we recognize that the racism which yet plagues our culture today is inextricably tied to the past; and
Be it further RESOLVED, That we apologize to all African-Americans for condoning and/or perpetuating individual and systemic racism in our lifetime; and we genuinely repent of racism of which we have been guilty, whether consciously (Psalm 19:13) or unconsciously (Leviticus 4:27); and
Be it further RESOLVED, That we ask forgiveness from our African-American brothers and sisters, acknowledging that our own healing is at stake; and
Be it further RESOLVED, That we hereby commit ourselves to eradicate racism in all its forms from Southern Baptist life and ministry; and
Be it further RESOLVED, That we commit ourselves to be doers of the Word (James 1:22) by pursuing racial reconciliation in all our relationships, especially with our brothers and sisters in Christ (1 John 2:6), to the end that our light would so shine before others, that they may see (our) good works and glorify (our) Father in heaven (Matthew 5:16); and
Be it finally RESOLVED, That we pledge our commitment to the Great Commission task of making disciples of all people (Matthew 28:19), confessing that in the church God is calling together one people from every tribe and nation (Revelation 5:9), and proclaiming that the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ is the only certain and sufficient ground upon which redeemed persons will stand together in restored family union as joint-heirs with Christ (Romans 8:17).


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Project Development Unit (PDU) is a wing of the Tea Board acting in the field of development with a separate office at Srimongal. It was established in 1980 as a component of the Bangladesh Tea Rehabilitation Project (1980-92) implemented with financial and technical assistance of Overseas Development Agency ( ODA) & European Economic Committee (EEC). Its manpower with 51 posts was absorbed in the revenue budget of the Board in 1988.The Board undertakes various development activities such as, preparation and implementation of development projects, assisting the tea estates in preparation and implementation of development schemes, monitoring of development activities of the tea estates, providing advisory services to the estates for dissemination of improved technology, imparting training to the management personnel of the tea estate, implementation of various labor welfare programs etc through PDU.
A wing of Bangladesh Tea Board, the Project Development Unit works in the field of development and extension. It was established in 1980 as a component of the Bangladesh Tea Rehabilitation Project (BTRP, 1980-92) with financial and technical assistance of the Overseas Development Agency (ODA) and the European Economic Committee (EEC). It has a provision for 51 personnel and was absorbed in the revenue budget of the Board in 1988.
Its main functions are to prepared and review the schemes for tea estates and assist in implementing development projects. It also provides technical assistance to the tea estates aimed at improving quality of production of tea.
As part of the State machinery, PDU arranges funds from Bangladesh Krishi Bank (BKB) to run all approved projects and monitors their progress.
As the title itself hints at PDU, by and large, supports development of the industry and so it shares successful research outcomes that come from Bangladesh Tea Research Institute (BTRI) through the tea estates.
As part of its routine work, PDU organizes training programs for enhancement of the skills of tea laborers and staff members of the tea estates and also organizes special workshops for selected staff members.
With the view to developing manpower in the tea industry PDU organizes special training certificate course conducted by the Management Training Centre (MTC) with joint collaboration of the Bangladesh Management Development Centre (BMDC).
For overall development of physical communications inside and in the surroundings of the gardens PDU assists in constructing and repairing road communications.
PDU is also responsible for updating information related to tea industry in Bangladesh. Although welfare activity is not direct part of its services, it still offers Labour Welfare Fund to the dependants of the workers and also gives away funds for social ceremonies like wedding, puja, etc.
One of the welfare development schemes now being implemented is the Education Trust under which children of the workers receive stipends from the interest of money deposited by the previous governments.
জনাব টিপু মুনশি, এমপি
মাননীয় মন্ত্রী, বাণিজ্য মন্ত্রণালয়
ড. মোঃ জাফর উদ্দীন
বাণিজ্য মন্ত্রণালয়
মেজর জেনারেল মো: সোহায়েল হোসেন খান, পিএসসি
বাংলাদেশ চা বোর্ড


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Here's what he told the LA Times: ""You know what man, it was kind of crazy," Artest said. "People are trying to pull not even pranks, but try to stir something up that doesn't make any sense. It really doesn't make any sense. People call you and then pull pranks. I never shied away from the media. You can't be trying to end people's lives and what you think they have. I wasn't worried about anything. People are trying to start trouble and that's it. You have to move on."
According to Ron's Twitter, he is moving on, but with another Deadspin contributor:
ronartest When is chris Kluwe's next show!! I'm going!!!!!
A match made in heaven, with Mark Cuban's college buddies there to photograph, I hope.
PREVIOUSLY: My Frustrating Sexting Sessions With Ron Artest | On The Phone With Ron Artest, And Matthew Hiltzik, The Michael Clayton Of Dong Shots
Thank you for your continued support of the new-look Dickspin. We had a good month. Tomorrow it'll be August. That sucks. Rabbit rabbit.


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Hey everybody,
I need some help with my code. I have made a class with two methods, both with the intent to create a log file and write in it. Now, I want to call both those methods on another class file. The methods are "public static void write(String s) throws IOException" and "public static void writes(String f, String s) throws IOException". How can I call them from another class file?


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Good Morning!
Before I start, let's take a small moment and think of, say a little prayer for, those people and families in Colorado right now who are fighting the wild fires- the actual emergency crews and the people being displaced, losing their homes, businesses and so on. They are all certainly in my thoughts.
I'll admit, it's been a wee bit crazy for me this morning including disassembling the vacuum because it sucked up part of my phone case, yes I'm serious. So what do I have for you today? A few little sneak peeks that'll have to hold you over until Sunday when you get to see the AMAZING new July Buffet our designers have whipped up for you. For real, I'm ecstatic!
So without further rambling from me let's see what I've got!
Here is a new one from Pixels by Jen. I am super serious about that number paper! And that lined paper! PAPER PAPER PAPER! Maybe that'll be my new addiction?
Here's one from Twin Mom Scraps. I am such a sucker for stars and though it's tucked in behind those cute flowers, I am lovin' that little firework rocket! Looks to me like this new kit will be perfect for our impending American holiday!
I am oogling all these pretty papers from Unforgettable Moment's new release! I love the neutral, earthy tones of Unforgettable Moments' kits and this is no exception. Love the color pallet.
Check out this super cute kit by Connie Prince! I love that little barn! And the chicken! And the ribbon!
Those are some seriously awesome peeks at what's to come I think. Not as many as we might be used to but I PROMISE you there is more coming. You just wait and see!
I don't want to leave you just yet! I've got a couple other things I want to share with you. TONIGHT is our Book Club Chat and I hear there is a participation prize! Even if you haven't read our June Read (The Lucky One by Nicholas Sparks), you can still join us for a "spoilers chat" as one lovely forum member put it (love it!).
Chat is hosted by our lovely JoyLynn of Blue Heart Scraps. All information listed right ^ ^ up there. 😉 Hope to see you there! If you just can't wait for the chat tonight, then do jump into the June book discussion thread in the forum too!
I also hope to see you Friday night at the Night Owls Scrap & Chat!
Every Friday night Terra of Sugar Kissed Designs rustles up some kind of delicious goodie for us and this week she does not disappoint! She's got a super cute mini for everyone who joins the chat! Here is a bonus peek at that mini (which you can find in full in the Night Owls forum thread):
Okay okay, NOW I think I'm done. 😉 It's going to be a hot one today here at home- and I've been hearing from quite a few members of our community that it's been a scorcher for them as well throughout the week. In my opinion, perfect day to stay in the AC in scrap scrap scrap! 🙂 Which is exactly what I intend to do!


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It appears that the fancy footwork Rick Fox used to show on the hardwood for the L.A. Lakers wasn't enough to keep him from being ushered off the dance floor.
The former NBA star was the latest in a line of shocking eliminations on the most recent episode of "Dancing With the Stars," reports Entertainment Weekly, despite the fact that he landed in the middle of the leader board for his foxtrot efforts Tuesday night.
"We were the couple going home," Fox said after the news was announced. "It's a lot of work put in; you don't visualize going home, you visualize being here every week. But it's now something that both [Cheryl Burke and I are] processing for the first time."
U.S. & World
Burke was also let down by their ouster.
"Rick and I have developed such a good relationship and such open communication," she said. "It's something I've never had with previous partners. I've learned a lot from Rick. I'm going to miss his stories and his friendship."
The loss came as a big surprise to other cast members as well.
"Audrina [Patridge] last week, Rick this week," said Derek Hough. "Crazy."
Informed speculation centered on Bristol Palin's luck finally running out, but the daughter of Sarah Palin will live to fight another day.
"I'm relieved and shocked," she laughed after making the cut. "Can't believe we made it another week, but I'm thankful for the fans that voted for us."
Palin has expressed a desire to end her time on the show, saying in the confessional that she's ready to be done with her experience.
"I'm tired. I wanna go home. I wanna see my son. I'm just exhausted," she said.
It remains to be seen if the audience will grant Palin her wish next week.
The episode also featured the return of several old cast members who competed for Special Dance Awards over the course of the evening. Marie Osmond won the "Most Dramatic" award over Kelly Monaco and Kate Gosselin, while Kenny Mayne beat out Master P and Billy Ray Cyrus for the two-left award.
Taylor Swift and Rod Stewart also made special performances on the show, singing some of their best-known hits.
Selected Reading: Entertainment Weekly, E! Online, Los Angeles Times