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Announcing PowerApps environments
Later this week, we will be introducing a new concept called "environments" to PowerApps. Put simply, an environment is a space to store, manage, and share your organization's business data, apps, and flows. They also serve as containers to separate apps that may have different roles, security requirements, or target audiences. How you choose to leverage environments depends on your organization and the apps you are trying to build, for example:
- You may choose to only build your apps in a single environment.
- You might create separate environments that group the Test and Production versions of your apps.
- You might create separate environments that correspond to specific teams or departments in your company, each containing the relevant data and apps for each audience.
- You might also create separate environments for different global branches of your company.
Environment scope
Each environment is created under an Azure AD tenant and its resources can only be accessed by users within that tenant. An environment is also bound to a geographic location, like the US. When you create a app in an environment, that app is routed to only datacenters in that geographic location. Any items you create in that environment, including connections, gateways, flows using Microsoft Flow, and more, are also bound to their environment's location.
Every environment can have zero or one Common Data Service databases, which provides storage for your apps. The ability to create a database for your environment will depend on the license you purchase for PowerApps and your permission within that environment.
When you create an app in an environment, that app is only permitted to connect to the data sources that are also deployed in that same environment, including connections, gateways, flows, and Common Data Service databases. For example, let's consider a scenario where you have created two environments named 'Test' and 'Dev' and created a Common Data Service database in each of the environments. If you create an app in the 'Test' environment, it will only be permitted to connect to the 'Test' database, it will not be able to connect to the 'Dev' database.
Environment permissions
Environments have two built-in roles that provide access to permissions within an environment:
- The Environment Admin role can perform all administrative actions on an environment including the following:
- Add or remove a user or group from either the Environment Admin or Environment Maker role.
- Provision a Common Data Service database for the environment.
- View and manage all resources created within an environment.
- Set Data Loss Prevention policies.
- The Environment Maker role can create new resources within an environment including apps, connections, custom APIs, gateways, and flows using Microsoft Flow.
NOTE: Users or groups assigned to these environment roles are not automatically given access to the environment's database (if it exists) and must be given access separately by a Database owner.
Users or security groups can be assigned to either of these two roles by another Environment Admin.
Environment Makers can also distribute the apps they build in an environment to other users in your organization by sharing the app with individual users, security groups, or to all users in the organization (just like in preview).
The default environment
A single default environment is automatically created by PowerApps for each tenant and shared by all users in that tenant. Whenever a new user signs-up for PowerApps they are automatically added to the Environment Maker role of the default environment; no users will be added to the Environment Admin role of the default environment automatically. The default environment is created in region that is closest to the default region of the Azure AD tenant.
The default environment is named as follows: "{Azure AD tenant name} (default)"
Choosing an environment
With the introduction of environments, you will now see a new experience when you come to https://web.powerapps.com. The apps, connections, and other items that are visible in the site will now be filtered based on the current environment that is selected. Your current environment is specified in the environment picker in the top bar on the right. To choose a different environment, click or tap the picker, and a list of available environments appears. Click or tap the one you wish to enter.
An environment will show up in the picker for you if you meet one of the following conditions:
- You are a member of the Environment Admin role for the environment
- You are a member of the Environment Maker role for the environment
- You are not an Environment Admin or Environment Maker of the environment, but you have been given 'Contributor' access to at least one app within the environment. NOTE: in this case, you will not be able to create new apps in this environment. You will only be able to modify the existing apps that have been shared with you.
Creating an environment
Users will be able to create new environments from https://web.powerapps.com, and from the PowerApps admin center. If a user creates an environment, they will automatically be added to the Environment Admin role for that environment. There will not be a limit on the number of environments that a user can be participate in as a member of the Environment Admin or Environment Maker role.
What will change for PowerApps Preview users?
Any user that has participated in the PowerApps preview will see some changes in their experience with the introduction of environments. The following table lists what U.S. users and non-U.S. users can expect:
User | What happens |
Preview user that created a Common Data Model (CDM) database | You will see an environment called "{Your name}'s environment" that contains your preview CDM database and any other apps that you built against the database.
You will be added to the Environment Maker role and Environment Admin role of this environment and as a Database owner of the database. When PowerApps enters general availability, we will be upgrading the metadata of the CDM. The impact of this change means that you will still be able to use the entities & apps you have already built against your preview CDM database, however you will not be able to create new fields or entities in your preview CDM database. We will soon publish guidance on how you can create a new environment with a database that contains the upgraded metadata and migrate your apps over to that environment. NOTE: If any of your apps that were built against your preview CDM database also leverage a custom API as a data source, they will be temporarily broken in this environment since all custom APIs will be migrated to the default environment. You will need to re-create the custom API in this environment to repair any affected apps. |
Preview user in U.S. |
You will see your tenant's default environment and the following resources you created during the PowerApps preview period will be available there:
Preview user not in U.S. | In addition to the default environment, you will also see an environment called "{Azure AD tenant} (from preview)" that contains the following resources you created during the PowerApps preview period:
You will be added to the Environment Maker role of this environment.| |
Two weeks after PowerApps enters general availability (GA), environments containing preview content will be marked as read-only (with the exception of the default environment); all existing apps & flows will continue to work in these environments, but you will not be able to create new apps or flows. We highly recommend that users of these environments migrate their content to the default environment or another custom environment. Please refer to the following blog (which will be posted this week) for more information about the migration process: https://aka.ms/cdspreviewtoga.
Example environments for a preview user in U.S.
Example environments for a preview user not in U.S.
Managing environments for your organization
With the introduction of environments, we will also be launching a new PowerApps admin center, which will allow you to manage all of the environments that you have created or to which you have been added to the Environment Admin role. From the Admin center you will be able to perform all administrative actions on an environment including the following:
- Add or remove a user or group from either the Environment Admin or Environment Maker role.
- Provision a Common Data Service database for the environment.
- View and manage all resources created within an environment.
- Set Data Loss Prevention policies. For more information see the link to the DLP article.
- Set database security policies (as open or restricted by database roles).
Members of their Azure AD tenant Global administrator role (includes Office 365 Global admins) will also be able to manage all environments that have been created in their tenant and set tenant-wide policies from the PowerApps admin center.
Join me for the PowerApps webinar on 10/27
If you have any questions around the changing coming to PowerApps with the introduction of environment, join me for 10/27 PowerApps where I'll be giving an overview of environments and answering questions.
When: October 27, 2016 10:00 AM – 11:00 AM PST


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Many of you may have seen Aaron Smith-Levin's video posted on Tony Ortega's blog yesterday.
If you missed it, here it is again:
In response to the video a large number of people contacted The Foundation offering their assistance and making donations. The response was heart-warming and greatly appreciated.
Scientology can try to prevent The Foundation from helping people leave scientology — but they will never succeed. The members of the board of the foundation are not cowed by scientology in the least. We are aware of their dirty tricks. We anticipated there would be people sent in to try to disrupt our activities. It's the price of trying to help the victims of scientology and it is a price worth paying. It only makes us more determined and more convinced that the foundation has a vital role to serve. We feel a greater need to be effective and active, not less. And even Morgan and Cinjin should not be viewed with scorn but with compassion — for they are classic victims of scientology. The control over how people think and act, using their families as weapons against them, is enormous.
We never publicize information about those we are helping, until they specifically ask to do so for this reason. We don't want scientology to know so it minimizes the possibility they will be messed with. We always try to err on the side of doing what is best for the victims and take them at their word. If we become cynical and overly suspicious we will never be able to help anyone. We do what we can to avoid plants and suspect requests for help, but a few failures are inevitable. So far The Foundation has been very successful in assisting those who need help to leave scientology — especially those trying to escape the Sea Org and staff. A lone loss back to the cult is a pretty good batting average.
Aaron mentioned in the video there have been two VERY recent departures from "ideal orgs" that we have helped. One of them wants to go public shortly, so stayed tuned for that story. It gives some fascinating insight into the true state of "ideal orgs" — things we all know, but it is interesting to hear it from someone with VERY recent first hand experience.
Again, thank you to everyone who supports the Aftermath Foundation, everyone who supports Leah Remini Scientology and the Aftermath, everyone who supports this blog and everyone who supports the victims of scientology in any way. The large numbers of vocal supporters of this cause have changed the game. And it gives strength to those on the front lines and helps encourage reinforcements to join. Because this is a war to end abuses. For decades scientology has believed they could outspend and thus outlast anyone who challenged their imperious disdain for the law. They may still be able to outspend us, but they will NOT outlast us. And by a long way they no longer outnumber us.

subset: commoncrawl


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Parts Used & Where Grown
This prolific plant grows in Europe, North America, and Asia. A number of species are used as garden ornamentals. The flowering tops of yarrow are used in herbal medicine.
Our proprietary "Star-Rating" system was developed to help you easily understand the amount of scientific support behind each supplement in relation to a specific health condition. While there is no way to predict whether a vitamin, mineral, or herb will successfully treat or prevent associated health conditions, our unique ratings tell you how well these supplements are understood by the medical community, and whether studies have found them to be effective for other people.
For over a decade, our team has combed through thousands of research articles published in reputable journals. To help you make educated decisions, and to better understand controversial or confusing supplements, our medical experts have digested the science into these three easy-to-follow ratings. We hope this provides you with a helpful resource to make informed decisions towards your health and well-being.
3 StarsReliable and relatively consistent scientific data showing a substantial health benefit.
2 StarsContradictory, insufficient, or preliminary studies suggesting a health benefit or minimal health benefit.
1 StarFor an herb, supported by traditional use but minimal or no scientific evidence. For a supplement, little scientific support.
This supplement has been used in connection with the following health conditions:
Used for | Why |
1 Star Amenorrhea Refer to label instructions | Yarrow has traditionally been thought to stimulate absent or diminished menses, though it has not been studied clinically. Herbal emmenagogues traditionally regarded as stimulating absent or diminished menses are motherwort, rue, partridge berry, and . None of these herbs has undergone modern clinical trials to determine their efficacy. All emmenagogues should be avoided in pregnancy, as they may possibly cause a spontaneous abortion. |
1 Star Colic Refer to label instructions | Yarrow is a gas-relieving herb used in traditional medicine to treat colic. It is generally given by healthcare professionals as teas or decoctions to the infant. Several gas-relieving herbs used in traditional medicine for colic are approved in Germany for intestinal spasms. These include , garden angelica (Angelica archangelica),peppermint, cinnamon, and fumitory (Fumaria officinalis). These herbs are generally given by healthcare professionals as teas or decoctions to the infant. Peppermint tea should be used with caution in infants and young children, as they may choke in reaction to the strong menthol. |
1 Star Common Cold and Sore Throat Refer to label instructions | Yarrow is a diaphoretic herb that has been used for relief of sore throats. Boneset is another immune stimulant and diaphoretic that helps fight off minor viral infections, such as the common cold. In addition, linden and hyssop may promote a healthy fever and the immune system's ability to fight infections. is another diaphoretic that has been used for relief of sore throats, though it has not yet been researched for this purpose. |
1 Star Crohn's Disease Refer to label instructions | Yarrow is an anti-inflammatory herb historically recommended by doctors for people with Crohn's disease. A variety of anti-inflammatory herbs historically have been recommended by doctors for people with Crohn's disease. These include , chamomile, licorice, and aloe juice. Cathartic preparations of aloe should be avoided. No research has been conducted to validate the use of these herbs for Crohn's disease. |
1 Star Indigestion, Heartburn, and Low Stomach Acidity Refer to label instructions | Yarrow is a digestive stimulant widely used in traditional medicine in North America. Bitter herbs are thought to stimulate digestive function by increasing saliva production and promoting both stomach acid and digestive enzyme production. As a result, they are particularly used when there is low stomach acid but not in heartburn (where too much stomach acid could initially exacerbate the situation). These herbs literally taste bitter. Some examples of bitter herbs include greater celandine, wormwood, gentian,dandelion, blessed thistle, , devil's claw, bitter orange, bitter melon, juniper, andrographis, prickly ash, and centaury.. Bitters are generally taken either by mixing 1–3 ml tincture into water and sipping slowly 10–30 minutes before eating, or by making tea, which is also sipped slowly before eating. Some bitters widely used in traditional medicine in North America include , yellow dock, goldenseal, Oregon grape, and vervain. Oregon grape's European cousin barberry has also traditionally been used as a bitter. Animal studies indicate that yarrow, barberry, and Oregon grape, in addition to stimulating digestion like other bitters, may relieve spasms in the intestinal tract. |
1 Star Inflammation Refer to label instructions | Traditional herbal medicine in Europe, China, and India has used yarrow to to treat inflammation in a number of conditions, especially in the intestinal and female reproductive tracts. Traditional herbal medicine in Europe, China, and India has used yarrow to to treat inflammation in a number of conditions, especially in the intestinal and female reproductive tracts. |
1 Star Premenstrual Syndrome Refer to label instructions | Based on anecdotal evidence, yarrow tea may be beneficial when the main symptom of PMS is spastic pain. Based on anecdotal evidence, tea has been used by European doctors when the main symptom of PMS is spastic pain. Combine 2–3 teaspoons of yarrow flowers with one cup of hot water, then cover and steep for 15 minutes. Drink three to five cups per day beginning two days before PMS symptoms usually commence. In addition, 1–3 cups of the tea added to hot or cold water can be used as a sitz bath. |
1 Star Ulcerative Colitis Refer to label instructions | Yarrow is an anti-inflammatory and soothing herb that may be effective in the treatment of ulcerative colitis. Aloe vera juice has anti-inflammatory activity and been used by some doctors for people with UC. In a double-blind study of people with mildly to moderately active ulcerative colitis, supplementation with aloe resulted in a complete remission or an improvement in symptoms in 47% of cases, compared with 14% of those given a placebo (a statistically significant difference). No significant side effects were seen. The amount of aloe used was 100 ml (approximately 3.5 ounces) twice a day for four weeks. Other traditional anti-inflammatory and soothing herbs, including calendula, flaxseed, licorice, marshmallow, myrrh, and . Many of these herbs are most effective, according to clinical experience, if taken internally as well as in enema form. Enemas should be avoided during acute flare-ups but are useful for mild and chronic inflammation. It is best to consult with a doctor experienced with botanical medicine to learn more about herbal enemas before using them. More research needs to be done to determine the effectiveness of these herbs. |
Traditional Use (May Not Be Supported by Scientific Studies)
Traditional herbal medicine has used yarrow in three broad categories.1 First, it was used to help stop minor bleeding and to treat wounds. Second, it was used to treat inflammation in a number of conditions, especially in the intestinal and female reproductive tracts. Third, it was utilized as a mild sedative. Some or all of these historical uses occurred in Europe, China, and India. The ancient Chinese fortune-telling system known as the I Ching first used dried yarrow stems, then later replaced them with coins.2
How It Works
How It Works
A number of chemicals may contribute to yarrow's actions. The volatile oil, which is rich in sesquiterpene lactones, and alkamides has been found to have anti-inflammatory properties in test tube studies.3, 4 Animal studies have shown this herb can reduce smooth muscle spasms, which might further explain its usefulness in gastrointestinal conditions.5 The alkaloid obtained from yarrow, known as achilletin, reportedly stops bleeding in animals.6 No human clinical studies have confirmed the traditional uses of yarrow.
How to Use It
The German Commission E monograph suggests approximately 1 teaspoon (4.5 grams) of yarrow daily or 3 teaspoons (15 ml) of the fresh pressed juice.7 A tea can be prepared by steeping 1–2 teaspoons (5–10 grams) of yarrow in 1 cup (250 ml) boiling water for ten to fifteen minutes. Three cups (750 ml) a day can be taken. A tincture, 1/2–3/4 teaspoon (3–4 ml) three times per day, can be taken. The tea, or cloths dipped in the tea, can be used topically as needed for minor skin injuries.
Interactions with Supplements, Foods, & Other Compounds
Interactions with Medicines
1. Castleman M. The Healing Herbs. New York, Bantam Books, 1991, 550-4.
2. Castleman M. The Healing Herbs. New York, Bantam Books, 1991, 550-4.
3. Zitterl-Eglseer K, Jurenitsch J, Korhammer S, et al. Sesquiterpene lactones of Achillea setacea with antiphlogistic activity. Planta Med 1991;57:444-6.
4. Muller-Jakic B, Breu W, Probstle A, et al. In vitro inhibition of cyclooxygenase and 5-lipoxygenase by alkamides from Echinacea and Achillea species. Planta Med 1994;60:37-40.
5. Tewari JP, Srivastava MC, Bajpai JL. Pharmacologic studies of Achillea millefolium Linn. Indian J Med Sci 1994;28:331-6.
6. Duke JA. CRC Handbook of Medicinal Herbs. Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press, 1985, 10-1.
7. Blumenthal M, Busse WR, Goldberg A, et al. (eds). The Complete Commission E Monographs: Therapeutic Guide to Herbal Medicines. Boston, MA: Integrative Medicine Communications, 1998, 233-4.
8. McGuffin M, Hobbs C, Upton R, Goldberg A (eds). American Herbal Products Association's Botanical Safety Handbook. Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press, 1997, 3.
9. McGuffin M, Hobbs C, Upton R, Goldberg A (eds). American Herbal Products Association's Botanical Safety Handbook. Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press, 1997, 3.
Last Review: 05-23-2015
Copyright © 2024 TraceGains, Inc. All rights reserved.
Learn more about TraceGains, the company.
The information presented by TraceGains is for informational purposes only. It is based on scientific studies (human, animal, or in vitro), clinical experience, or traditional usage as cited in each article. The results reported may not necessarily occur in all individuals. For many of the conditions discussed, treatment with prescription or over the counter medication is also available. Consult your doctor, practitioner, and/or pharmacist for any health problem and before using any supplements or before making any changes in prescribed medications. Information expires December 2024.
This information does not replace the advice of a doctor. Healthwise, Incorporated, disclaims any warranty or liability for your use of this information. Your use of this information means that you agree to the Terms of Use. Learn how we develop our content.


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The below press release came out exactly ten years ago today. It would change the world, my life and probably yours as well, the product that started it all…
Apple Presents iPod
Ultra-Portable MP3 Music Player Puts 1,000 Songs in Your Pocket
CUPERTINO, California—October 23, 2001—Apple® today introduced iPod™, a breakthrough MP3 music player that packs up to 1,000 CD-quality songs into an ultra-portable, 6.5 ounce design that fits in your pocket. iPod combines a major advance in portable music device design with Apple's legendary ease of use and Auto-Sync, which automatically downloads all your iTunes™ songs and playlists into your iPod, and keeps them up to date whenever you plug your iPod into your Mac®.
"With iPod, Apple has invented a whole new category of digital music player that lets you put your entire music collection in your pocket and listen to it wherever you go," said Steve Jobs, Apple's CEO. "With iPod, listening to music will never be the same again."
Next Generation Player
iPod represents the next generation of portable music players that store music on an internal hard drive, yet are only 20 percent of the volume of today's hard drive-based players. iPod stores up to 1,000 CD-quality songs on its super-thin 5 GB hard drive, and features up to 20 minutes of shock protection for nonstop playback when running, biking or other activities.
iPod's built-in FireWire® port lets you download an entire CD into iPod in under 10 seconds and 1,000 songs in less than 10 minutes—30 times faster than USB-based players.
iPod plays up to 10 hours of continuous music, powered by its rechargeable lithium polymer battery, and recharges automatically whenever iPod is connected to a Mac, using power supplied over the FireWire cable. Every iPod comes with a compact, FireWire-based power adapter for traveling. iPod's high-capacity 5GB hard drive doubles as a portable FireWire hard drive for storing presentations, large documents, graphic images and digital movies.
iPod plays music in the popular MP3, MP3 VBR (variable bit rate), AIFF and WAV formats and can support MP3 bit rates up to 320-Kbps. Its upgradable firmware enables support of future audio formats. For CD-quality sound, iPod is equipped with a high-output 60-mW amplifier that delivers 20 to 20,000 Hz frequency response for deep bass and crystal-clear highs. iPod's earbud-style headphones are built with neodymium magnets for enhanced frequency response and high-fidelity sound.
iPod also features a 160-by-128-pixel high-resolution display, with a white LED backlight to give clear visibility in daylight as well as low-light conditions.
Legendary Ease of Use
Apple has applied its legendary expertise in human interface engineering to make iPod the easiest to use digital device ever. Simply rotate iPod's unique scroll-wheel with your thumb or finger to quickly access your entire music collection by playlists, artists or songs. The scroll-wheel makes it possible to hold and operate iPod with just one hand and features automatic acceleration when scrolling through long lists so you can find your music in seconds. iPod also features customizable settings such as shuffle, repeat, startup volume, sleep timer and menus in multiple languages including English, French, German and Japanese. iPod can display song data in any of these languages, enabling users to mix and match songs from all over the world.
iPod's revolutionary Auto-Sync feature makes it easy to get your entire music collection into iPod and update it whenever you connect iPod to your Mac. Simply plug your new iPod into your Mac with the supplied FireWire cable, and all of your iTunes songs and playlists are automatically downloaded into iPod at blazing FireWire speed. Then just unplug and go. Whenever you plug iPod back into your Mac it will be automatically updated with your latest iTunes songs and playlists, usually in seconds. There has never been a faster and easier way to always have your up-to-the-minute music and playlists with you wherever you go.
Pricing & Availability
iPod will be available beginning on Saturday, November 10, for a suggested retail price of $399 (US) from The Apple Store® (www.apple.com), Apple's retail stores and Apple Authorized Resellers. An iTunes 2 CD, earbud-style headphones, FireWire cable, and FireWire-based power adapter are all included. iPod requires iTunes 2.
Apple ignited the personal computer revolution in the 1970s with the Apple II and reinvented the personal computer in the 1980s with the Macintosh. Apple is committed to bringing the best personal computing experience to students, educators, creative professionals and consumers around the world through its innovative hardware, software and Internet offerings.


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Pianos are beautiful instruments; however, when it's time to part ways due to a move, an upgrade, or any other reason, the process can be daunting. Don't worry — that's where The Junkluggers of Central VA comes in!
At The Junkluggers of Central VA, we understand the unique challenges of piano disposal and recycling, which is why we are equipped with the right tools and experience to make it effortless for you. If you're ready to sing goodbye to your piano, trust us to handle the job.
When you choose The Junkluggers for your piano removal needs, you can feel confident that the process will be smooth and hassle-free. We understand that pianos are not just ordinary pieces of furniture; they often hold sentimental value and memories. Instead of automatically sending your piano to a landfill, we explore recycling and donation options whenever possible. By choosing The Junkluggers, you contribute to a greener tomorrow while creating more space in your home!
Pianos We Take:
Insured + Professionally Trained
Our team of luggers is trained in handling pianos of all sizes and types.
Safe Disassembly
If your piano needs to be disassembled before removal, our team is skilled in safely taking it apart. We handle each piece with care to avoid any damage.
Specialized Equipment
Pianos can be heavy and awkward to move. That's why we come prepared with specialized equipment to safely handle the lifting and loading.
Respect for Your Property
We understand piano removal often occurs in homes, apartments, or other personal spaces. Our team will treat your property respectfully, ensuring minimal disruption and leaving the area clean and tidy.
At The Junkluggers, we believe in sustainable practices and aim to keep pianos out of landfills whenever possible. Our commitment to a better, greener future means we prioritize recycling and donating pianos whenever feasible. When you choose us for your piano removal needs, you contribute to a more environmentally responsible approach to disposal.
Contact us today for a free quote!


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Your smartphone extracts plenty of money from you to pay for basic service as well as apps, tunes, and other accessories. Why not let your phone send some money back to you for a change? An increasing number of apps exist that will pay you for performing various tasks.
Your phone will not be spitting out dollar bills at you like an ATM (wouldn't that be nice?), but you will be paid upon completion of tasks through gift cards, discounts on goods or services, or directly through PayPal or similar money transfer options.
These apps tend to fall into a few distinct categories, as outlined below.
- Shopping/Redemption – iBotta, Shopkick, Perk, and Receipt Hog are examples of shopping sites that allow you to earn cash back, rewards, gift cards, and rebates through mobile activities and shopping you already do.
While there may be some affiliations, these apps are usually not related to any particular store – but there are plenty of similar reward-based apps from individual retailers.
- Reviews – Apps such as FeaturePoints, App Trailers, and Mobile Rewards pay you for reviewing apps, new games, video content, or other media inputs.
- Odd Jobs – These apps are aimed at making a few bucks on the side with minimal time investment, as opposed to apps like Uber that are more time-committed types of independent contracting.
Field Agent, EasyShift, and Gigwalk all connect you with businesses looking for simple jobs to be completed. A typical job may pay anywhere from $3-$10, but some tasks go considerably higher depending on complexity.
Examples include verifying product placement in a store (usually requiring uploading a photo), mystery shopping tasks, app testing, and other relatively quick and simple jobs.
- Direct Advertising – For you patient app users, Locket, SlideJoy, and ScreenPay are all advertising systems that pay you for putting up with an advertisement each time you unlock your Android-based phone.
Would you rather be on the other end of the direct marketing exchange? The Jingit app allows ads to be attached to your Facebook profile page on iOS and Android devices and earns you money depending on the number of clicks each ad receives.
- Opinion Polls – Apps such as survey.com, Surveys on the Go®, and i-Say pay you for your opinion on a variety of issues. Some are purely marketing-oriented; others are directed towards areas such as politics, social media, and trends.
- Contests – ESPN offers the Streak for the Cash app allowing you to predict games and win significant prizes for the longest streak of correct predictions spread over multiple sports. Other apps are available, usually sports-related, that offer similar deals – but beware of out-and-out gambling apps where you put up money to participate.
These are just a few of the options available to you. An hour or two spent on Internet searching will yield many interesting possibilities for you to consider.
Once you have chosen an app or two to use, do some background research on the company involved. The more reputable and established ones will have available reviews that you can use to check out the details of the tasks, terms and conditions, history of payment, and any complaints.
Be sure to check the system requirements of the app. Some apps are available only on iPhone or Android-based systems, and you may require a more up-to-date operating system than what you currently have.
If you have the time, see if any of these moneymaking apps can work for you. You are unlikely to make enough money to pay your entire phone bill – but perhaps you can put a dent in it, and every little bit helps.
This article was provided by our partners at moneytips.com.
To Read More From MoneyTips:
Online Shopping Surpasses In-Store
How To Hire A Free Personal Shopper
Best Online Store Return Policies
Photo ©iStock.com/rasilja


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If you're a traveller with a yearning for adventure, a sense of fun and a wish to escape the humdrum of mainstream tourism – then come and explore Asia, Europe, the Middle East & Latin America with us!
We offer small group adventures to spectacular and remote areas with a degree of comfort but without compromising the sense of adventure.
APT – Luxury Touring & Cruising. Operates unforgettable luxurious cruises & escorted tour packages. Book your escorted holiday online. Cruise Europe Rivers.
Think of A&K as a way of travelling, not simply a portfolio of stimulating and exotic destinations.


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Warning: This page is about Google's older APIs, the Google Data APIs; it's relevant only to the APIs that are listed in the Google Data APIs directory, many of which have been replaced with newer APIs. For information about a specific new API, see the new API's documentation. For information about authorizing requests with a newer API, see Google Accounts Authentication and Authorization.
Video: Watch Trevor Johns go through client library installation, library architecture, and a code walkthrough.
Updated October 2008 (Originally written by Daniel Holevoet)
- Introduction
- Pre-Installation
- Installing PHP
- Installing the Google Data PHP Client Library
- Checking to make sure that you can access the client library files
- Where to Learn More
- Appendix A: Editing your PHP path in your
configuration file - Appendix B.: Using PHP from the command line
- Appendix C: Hints and Solutions
- Revision History
The Google Data PHP Client Library is a powerful collection of classes that allow you to interact with the Google Data APIs. Unlike our other client libraries, it is packaged as part of the popular Zend Framework but can also be downloaded separately. Similar to our other client libraries it is also open-source and designed to be simple and efficient, allowing you to get started on your projects quickly.
PHP may already be installed on your development machine or web-server so the first step is to verify that fact and to make sure that the version of PHP is recent enough to be used for the client library. The easiest way to check is to place a new file into a web-accessible directory on your server. Type the following information into the file:
<?php phpinfo(); ?>
Then make sure that it is accessible from the web by setting the appropriate permissions and navigate to its location from within your browser. If PHP is installed and your server is able to render PHP pages, then you should see something similar to the screenshot below:
The screenshot shows the PHP info page. This page shows you the version of PHP that has been installed (5.2.6 in this case), along with which extensions have been enabled (in the 'Configure Command' section) and the location of PHP's internal configuration file (in the 'Loaded Configuration File' section). If the page is not displayed or if your version of PHP is older than 5.1.4 you will need to install or upgrade your version of PHP. Otherwise you can skip the next section and continue to installing the PHP Client Library.
Note: If you have access to the command line and are planning to use PHP to run command line scripts, please see the command line PHP section of this article.
Installing PHP
Installation varies a bit by platform, so it is important to follow the instructions for your specific platform during installation. Before we dive in, it is worth pointing out that pre-installed packages that also include the Apache web server and the MySQL database along with PHP have gained in popularity. For Windows, Mac OS X and Linux, there is the XAMPP project. Mac OS X users also have the choice of using the MAMP project. Both of these packages support OpenSSL in PHP (which is required for interacting with authenticated feeds).
If you install PHP using the steps that follow below, make sure that you also install and enable support for OpenSSL. More details about that can be found in the OpenSSL section of the PHP site. The following sections are focused on how to install PHP by itself.
On Windows
The easiest way to install or upgrade PHP on Windows is with the PHP installer available on the PHP downloads page.
- Choose the PHP installer option (in the Windows binaries section) corresponding to the newest version of PHP and allow it to download.
- Open the installer and follow the installation wizard's instructions.
- When the wizard prompts you, choose the web server that is installed on your system, so that it configures the server to work with PHP.
- Check your installation by following the steps outlined in the section above.
On Mac OS X
PHP is included in OS X, but before you use it, you should upgrade to the latest version of PHP. To upgrade, you can install any of several free binary packages, or compile it yourself. For details, see the PHP documentation page about installation on Mac OS X.
After installing or otherwise setting up OS X, check your installation by following the steps outlined in the pre-installation section of this document.
On Linux
Depending on the Linux distribution, there may be a built-in or easy to use setup option for PHP installation. For example, on Ubuntu, you can either use a package manager or just type the following on in a terminal:
sudo apt-get install php5
If there isn't a packaged install available with your Linux distribution, you must install from source code. There are detailed instructions for compiling PHP for Apache 1.3 and compiling PHP for Apache 2. PHP.net also has instructions for other servers.
Installing the Google Data PHP Client Library
Now that you have a working version of PHP installed, it's time to install the client library. The client library is part of the open-source Zend Framework but can also be downloaded as a standalone version. If you already have a version of the Zend Framework installed (version 1.6 or higher), you can skip installation, because the Google Data Client Library is included. However, making sure you are using the latest version of the framework will guarantee that you have all the newest features and bug fixes available to you, so it is usually recommended.
Downloading the complete framework will give you access to not just the Google Data Client Library, but also the rest of the framework. The client library itself uses a few other classes that are part of the complete Zend Framework, but there is no need to download the entire framework as we have bundled them into the standalone download.
- Download the Google Data Client Library files. (Search in that page for "Google Data APIs".)
- Decompress the downloaded files. Four sub-directories should be created:
— Sample applicationsdocumentation
— Documentation for the client library fileslibrary
— The actual client library source files.tests
— Unit-test files for automated testing.
- Add the location of the
folder to your PHP path (see the next section)
Checking to make sure that you can access the client library files
The last step is to make sure that you can reference and include the PHP Client Library files from the directory that you are building your project. This is accomplished by setting the include_path
variable in PHP's configuration file (php.ini
). The include_path
variable contains a number of directory location that PHP looks into when you issue a require
or include
statement that pulls external classes, libraries or files into your current script, similar to the import
statement in Java. You need to append the location of the client library files to what has already been set in your include_path
. This can be accomplished in two ways (both of which are explained in detail below):
- Permanently set the
directive in yourphp.ini
configuration file from the command line — requires shell access and write permissions. - Set the
path variable on a "per directory" level — requires the Apache web server and the ability to create.htaccess
files. - Use the
function to dynamically set the include path in your scripts — can be set dynamically in each of your .php files.
If you have shell access and write permissions to the php.ini
file (or if you are writing code on your local machine), simply follow the instructions in appendix A. If you are using the Apache web server and have the ability to create .htaccess files then you can set the include_path
variable on a "per directory" level, which means that all of the files in the directory that you are working in are automatically able to reference the client library directory.
You can specify PHP configuration options as shown in the snippet below:
# This works for PHP5 in both Apache versions 1 and 2 <IfModule mod_php5.c> php_value include_path ".:/usr/local/lib/php:/path/to/ZendGdata/library" </IfModule>
Note: Refer to the PHP Manual for more information about changing configuration settings.
If you don't have shell access to your server and can't modify or create .htaccess files that you can always use the set_include_path
function. Note that you may already have some value set for your include_path
so it may be a good idea to follow the model below to append the new values, instead of overwriting the entire path:
$clientLibraryPath = '/path/to/ZendGdata/library'; $oldPath = set_include_path(get_include_path() . PATH_SEPARATOR . $clientLibraryPath);
Note: Please refer to the PHP manual pages for more details on the set_include_path
Running the PHP Installation Checker
To verify that your include path has been set properly, you can run the PHP Installation Checker script. Simply copy and paste the contents of that file into a new file in a web-accessible directory on your server and navigate to it from your browser. If you see output similar to the below, then everything has been configured properly and you are ready to use the PHP Client Library:
If you see errors (as in the screenshot below), make sure you follow the direction. You may be missing extensions or your path may still not be set correctly. Remember that you may need to restart your server for the changes to take effect. This only applies if you are actually modifying the php.ini
file. The screenshot below shows that the include_path
is set to /path/to/nowhere
Note: Please note that the PHP Installation checker checks the following in succession: (1) are the required PHP extensions installed, (2) does the include_path
point to the directory of the PHP Client Library, (3) can SSL connections be made and lastly, can a connection be made to the YouTube Data API. If a specific test fails, the remaining tests will not be run.
Now that the client library is installed, it's time to try running the samples.
Running the samples
At the root of the Zend/Gdata
directory is a folder of demos — samples to help you get started. Some of these samples are designed to be run from the command line such as demos/Zend/Gdata/Blogger.php
and demos/Zend/Gdata/Spreadsheet-ClientLogin.php
, and you can execute them with php /path/to/example
. The remaining samples can be run from both the command-line and a web browser. If you would like to view them in a browser, these should be placed in whatever directory you would use to serve web pages. These samples should give a basic idea of how to write and run a Google Data application, but when you're ready for more, there are other resources for the inquisitive programmer.
Note: If you are interested in seeing the web-based demos online, please visit googlecodesamples.com and look for the PHP applications.
Where to Learn More
The best places to look for information on the classes that are part of the client library is the API reference guide on the Zend Framework site. Make sure to select the Zend_Gdata package from the drop-down.
At this point you should be all set to start coding. So, go on, write some great applications. We look forward to seeing your results!
You can find PHP developer guides for the following services:
Since the PHP Client Library is an open-source project, support for more APIs is continually being added. Each service has it's own support group, please see our FAQ entry for a listing of available support groups.
If you need help troubleshooting your API calls, there are articles available on debugging API requests using network traffic capture tools and on using proxy servers with the Google Data APIs. There are also a few external articles available on installing XAMPP on Linux and on installing XAMPP on Windows. In addition to all of these articles be sure to check out the posts about the PHP Client Library on the Google Data API Tips blog.
Appendix A: Editing your PHP path in your php.ini
configuration file
The PHP path is variable that contains a list of locations that PHP searches when it looks for additional libraries during loading. In order for PHP to be able to load and access the Google Data PHP Client Library files on your machine or server, they will need to be put into a location that PHP knows about. Or alternatively the location of the files needs to be appended to your PHP path. Note that changes to the php.ini
file typically require a restart of your server. You can always verify the current value of the include_path
variable by navigating to the PHP Info page discussed earlier. Look for the Loaded Configuration File cell in the first table and find the path in the column to the right.
Note: If you find that you are using php from the command line, you may need to modify an additional path variable. Make sure to review Appendix B: Using PHP from the command line.
Once you've found the php.ini
file, follow these steps to append to the path.
- Open the
file in your favorite text editor. - Locate the line referencing the PHP path, it should begin with
. - Append the path you stored the Zend Framework to the list of locations already present, pre-pending your new path with the designated separator for your OS (
on Unix-like systems,;
on Windows). A correct path on Unix-like systems would look something like this:/path1:/path2:/usr/local/lib/php/library
On Windows, it would look something like this:\path1;\path2;\php\library
- Save and close the file.
Note: On Mac OS X, the Finder does not allow access to files that are in system locations such as the /etc
directory. Therefore it may be easiest to edit them using a command line editor such as vi
or pico
. To do so use a command such as: pico /path/to/php.ini
Appendix B: Using PHP from the command line
As of PHP version 5, there is a command-line utility available in PHP which is referred to as CLI for 'command line interpreter'. Using this utility allows for php scripts to be run from the command line. The situations in which this may be useful is if you are running PHP locally on your machine and are looking for ways to quickly test some scripts. On your server of course, this will require shell access. One important thing to note is that PHP typically uses two separate php.ini
files, one contains the configuration options for PHP running on your server, and another for the configurations that PHP uses when running from the command line. If you are interested in running the command-line demo applications from the client library, you will need to modify the command-line php.ini
file as well.
To locate it, type the following commands on Unix-like systems (Mac OS X, Linux, and others):
php -i | grep php.ini
That command should result in the following information being displayed in your terminal:
Configuration File (php.ini) Path => /etc/php5/cli Loaded Configuration File => /etc/php5/cli/php.ini
Note: Of course the actual path locations (/etc/php...
) may differ on your system.
Appendix C: Hints and Solutions
This section contains a brief outline of some of the issue that developers have discovered when working with PHP and the appropriate solutions.
Problem with the dom-xml extension in XAMPP
The PHP client library uses the DOMDocument classes to transform XML requests and responses into PHP objects. The dom-xml
extension can cause problems with XML handling and result in incorrect transformations. Some of our developers have found that when using XAMPP, the DOMDocument constructor gets overriden with an older function call, as explained on the PHP site. To fix this problem, make sure that XML handling is not overwritten in your php.ini
file. Make sure to remove references to php_domxml.dll
from your configuration file.
Requests are timing out when using the client library
If you are using the client library to perform fairly large requests, such as uploading videos to the YouTube Data API, you may need to change the timeout
parameter in your Zend_Http_Client
class. This can be done easily by passing a $config
parameter during instantiation, which sets the timeout
value to something other than the 10 second default:
// assuming your Zend_Http_Client already exists as $httpClient // and that you want to change the timeout from the 10 second default to 30 seconds $config = array('timeout' => 30); $httpClient->setConfig($config);
Some hosting providers do not allow https connections to be made from their servers
We have heard that some hosting providers do not allow you to make https
connections from their default servers. If you get an error message similar to the below, you may need to make your https connections through a secure proxy:
Unable to Connect to sslv2://www.google.com:443. Error #110: Connection timed out
Your hosting provider should have information on the actual address of the proxy server to use. The below snippet demonstrates how a custom proxy configuration can be used with the PHP Client Library:
// Load the proxy adapter class in addition to the other required classes Zend_Loader::loadClass('Zend_Http_Client_Adapter_Proxy'); // Configure the proxy connection with your hostname and portnumber $config = array( 'adapter' => 'Zend_Http_Client_Adapter_Proxy', 'proxy_host' => 'your.proxy.server.net', 'proxy_port' => 3128 ); // A simple https request would be an attempt to authenticate via ClientLogin $proxiedHttpClient = new Zend_Http_Client('http://www.google.com:443', $config); $username = 'firstname.lastname@example.com'; $password = 'barbaz'; // The service name would depend on what API you are interacting with, here // we are using the Google DocumentsList Data API $service = Zend_Gdata_Docs::AUTH_SERVICE_NAME; // Try to perform the ClientLogin authentication using our proxy client. // If there is an error, we exit since it doesn't make sense to go on. try { // Note that we are creating another Zend_Http_Client // by passing our proxied client into the constructor. $httpClient = Zend_Gdata_ClientLogin::getHttpClient( $username, $password, $service, $proxiedHttpClient); } catch (Zend_Gdata_App_HttpException $httpException) { // You may want to handle this differently in your application exit("An error occurred trying to connect to the proxy server\n" . $httpException->getMessage() . "\n"); }
Revision History
October 1, 2008
Updated by Jochen Hartmann. This update contains the following changes:
- Made PHP configuration for web servers clearer by moving sections that refer to command-line PHP into an appendix.
- Added note about multiple php.ini configuration files.
- Added sections on how to dynamically set the include_path.
- Added section on the installation checker script.
- Added link to online samples.
- Added links for XAMPP and MAMP.
- Added an 'Hints and Solutions' appendix.


text:
The Old Gospel and The New
The old gospel of Owen, first of all, contains no less full and free an offer of salvation than its modern counterpart. It presents ample grounds of faith (the sufficiency of Christ, and the promise of God), and cogent motives to faith (the sinner's need, and the Creator's command, which is also the Redeemer's invitation). The new gospel gains nothing here by asserting universal redemption. The old gospel, certainly, has no room for the cheap sentimentalising which turns God's free mercy to sinners into a constitutional softheartedness on His part which we can take for granted; nor will it countenance the degrading presentation of Christ as the baffled Saviour, balked in what he hoped to do by human unbelief; nor will it indulge in maudlin appeals to the unconverted to let Christ save them out of pity for His disappointment. The pitiable Saviour and the pathetic God of modern pulpits are unknown to the old gospel. The old gospel tells men that they need God, but not that God needs them (a modern falsehood); it does not exhort them to pity Christ, but announces that Christ has pitied them, though pity was the last thing they deserved. It never loses sight of the Divine majesty and sovereign power of the Christ whom it proclaims, but rejects flatly all representations of Him which would obscure His free omnipotence.
Does this mean, however, that the preacher of the old gospel is inhibited or confined in offering Christ to men and inviting them to receive Him? Not at all. In actual fact, just because he recognises that Divine mercy is sovereign and free, he is in a position to make far more of the offer of Christ in his preaching than is the expositor of the new gospel; for this offer is itself a far more wonderful thing on his principles than it can ever be in the eyes of those who regard love to all sinners as a necessity of God's nature, and therefore a matter of course. To think that the holy Creator, who never needed man for His happiness and might justly have banished our fallen race for ever without mercy, should actually have chosen to redeem some of them! and that His own Son was willing to undergo death and descend into hell to save them! and that now from His throne He should speak to ungodly men as He does in the words of the gospel, urging upon them the command to repent and believe in the form of a compassionate invitation to pity themselves and choose life! These thoughts are the focal points round which the preaching of the old gospel revolves. It is all wonderful, just because none of it can be taken for granted. But perhaps the most wonderful thing of all – the holiest spot in all the holy ground of gospel truth – is the free invitation which "the Lord Christ " (as Owen loves to call Him) issues repeatedly to guilty sinners to come to Him and find rest for their souls. It is the glory of these invitations that it is an omnipotent King who gives them, just as it is a chief part of the glory of the enthroned Christ that He condescends still to utter them. And it is the glory of the gospel ministry that the preacher goes to men as Christ's ambassador, charged to deliver the King's invitation personally to every sinner present and to summon them all to turn and live. Owen himself enlarges on this in a passage addressed to the unconverted.
"Consider the infinite condescension and love of Christ, in his invitations and calls of you to come unto him for life, deliverance, mercy, grace, peace and eternal salvation. Multitudes of these invitations and calls are recorded in the Scripture, and they are all of them filled up with those blessed encouragements which divine wisdom knows to be suited unto lost, convinced sinners…. In the declaration and preaching of them, Jesus Christ yet stands before sinners, calling, inviting, encouraging them to come unto him.
"This is somewhat of the word which he now speaks unto you: Why will ye die? why will ye perish? why will ye not have compassion on your own souls? Can your hearts endure, or can your hands be strong, in the day of wrath that is approaching?… Look unto me, and be saved; come unto me, and I will ease you of all sins, sorrows, fears, burdens, and give rest unto your souls. Come, I entreat you; lay aside all procrastinations, all delays; put me off no more; eternity lies at the door… do not so hate me as that you will rather perish than accept of deliverance by me.
"These and the like things doth the Lord Christ continually declare, proclaim, plead and urge upon the souls of sinners…. He doth it in the preaching of the word, as if he were present with you, stood amongst you, and spake personally to every one of you. He hath appointed the ministers of the gospel to appear before you, and to deal with you in his stead, avowing as his own the invitations which are given you in his name, 2 Cor. v.19,20,"
These invitations are universal; Christ addresses them to sinners, as such, and every man, as he believes God to be true, is bound to treat them as God's words to him personally and to accept the universal assurance which accompanies them, that all who come to Christ will be received. Again, these invitations are real; Christ genuinely offers Himself to all who hear the gospel, and is in truth a perfect Saviour to all who trust Him. The question of the extent of the atonement does not arise in evangelistic preaching; the message to be delivered is simply this – that Christ Jesus, the sovereign Lord, who died for sinners, now invites sinners freely to Himself. God commands all to repent and believe; Christ promises life and peace to all who do so.
Furthermore, these invitations are marvellously gracious; men despise and reject them, and are never in any case worthy of them, and yet Christ still issues them. He need not, but He does. "Come unto me . . and I will give you rest" remains His word to the world, never cancelled, always to be preached. He whose death has ensured the salvation of all His people is to be proclaimed everywhere as a perfect Saviour, and all men invited and urged to believe on Him, whoever they are, whatever they have been. Upon these three insights the evangelism of the old gospel is based.
It is a very ill-informed supposition that evangelistic preaching which proceeds on these principles must be anaemic and half-hearted by comparison with what Arminians can do. Those who study the printed sermons of worthy expositors of the old gospel, such as Bunyan (whose preaching Owen himself much admired), or Whitefield, or Spurgeon, will find that in fact they hold forth the Saviour and summon sinners to Him with a fulness, warmth, intensity and moving force unmatched in Protestant pulpit literature. And it will be found on analysis that the very thing which gave their preaching its unique power to overwhelm their audiences with broken-hearted joy at the riches of God's grace – and still gives it that power, let it be said, even with hard-boiled modem readers – was their insistence on the fact that grace is free. They knew that the dimensions of Divine love are not half understood till one realises that God need not have chosen to save nor given his Son to die; nor need Christ have taken upon him vicarious damnation to redeem men, nor need He invite sinners indiscriminately to Himself as He does; but that all God's gracious dealings spring entirely from His own free purpose.
Knowing this, they stressed it, and it is this stress that sets their evangelistic preaching in a class by itself. Other Evangelicals, possessed of a more superficial and less adequate theology of grace, have laid the main emphasis in their gospel preaching on the sinner's need of forgiveness, or peace, or power, and of the way to get them by "deciding for Christ." It is not to be denied that their preaching has done good (for God will use His truth, even when imperfectly held and mixed with error), although this type of evangelism is always open to the criticism of being too man-centred and pietistic; but it has been left (necessarily) to Calvinists and those who, like the Wesleys, fall into Calvinistic ways of thought as soon as they begin a sermon to the unconverted, to preach the gospel in a way which highlights above – everything else the free love, willing condescension, patient long-suffering and infinite kindness of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Without doubt, this is the most Scriptural and edifying way to preach it; for gospel invitations to sinners never honour God and exalt Christ more, nor are more powerful to awaken and confirm faith, than when full weight is laid on the free omnipotence of the mercy from which they flow. It looks, indeed, as if the preachers of the old gospel are the only people whose position allows them to do justice to the revelation of Divine goodness in the free offer of Christ to sinners.
Then, in the second place, the old gospel safeguards values which the new gospel loses. We saw before that the new gospel, by asserting universal redemption and a universal Divine saving purpose, compels itself to cheapen grace and the Cross by denying that the Father and the Son are sovereign in salvation; for it assures us that, after God and Christ have done all that they can, or will, it depends finally on each man's own choice whether God's purpose to save him is realised or not. This position has two unhappy results.
The first is that it compels us to misunderstand the significance of the gracious invitations of Christ in the gospel of which we have been speaking; for we now have to read them, not as expressions of the tender patience of a mighty sovereign, but as the pathetic pleadings of impotent desire; and so the enthroned Lord is suddenly metamorphosed into a weak, futile figure tapping forlornly at the door of the human heart, which He is powerless to open. This is a shameful dishonour to the Christ of the New Testament.
The second implication is equally serious: for this view in effect denies our dependence on God when it comes to vital decisions, takes us out of His hand, tells us that we are, after all, what sin taught us to think we were-masters of our fate, captain of our souls-and so undermines the very foundation of man's religious relationship with his Maker. It can hardly be wondered at that the converts of the new gospel are so often both irreverent and irreligious, for such is the natural tendency of this teaching. The old gospel, however, speaks very differently and has a very different tendency. On the one hand, in expounding man's need of Christ, it stresses something which the new gospel effectively ignores – that sinners cannot obey the gospel, any more than the law, without renewal of heart. On the other hand, in declaring Christ's power to save, it proclaims Him as the author and chief agent of conversion, coming by His Spirit as the gospel goes forth to renew men's hearts and draw them to Himself.
Accordingly, in applying the message, the old gospel, while stressing that faith is man's duty, stresses also that faith is not in man's power, but that God must give what He commands. It announces, not merely that men must come to Christ for salvation, but also that they cannot come unless Christ Himself draws them. Thus it labours to overthrow self-confidence, to convince sinners that their salvation is altogether out of their hands, and to shut them up to a self-despairing dependence on the glorious grace of a sovereign Saviour, not only for their righteousness but for their faith too.
It is not likely, therefore, that a preacher of the old gospel will be happy to express the application of it in the form of a demand to "decide for Christ," as the current phrase is. For, on the one hand, this phrase carries the wrong associations. It suggests voting a person into office – an act in which the candidate plays no part beyond offering himself for election, and everything then being settled by the voter's independent choice. But we do not vote God's Son into office as our Saviour, nor does He remain passive while preachers campaign on His behalf, whipping up support for His cause. We ought not to think of evangelism as a kind of electioneering. And then, on the other hand, this phrase obscures the very thing that is essential in repentance and faith – the denying of self in a personal approach to Christ. It is not at all obvious that deciding for Christ is the same as coming to Him and resting On Him and turning from sin and self-effort; it sounds like something much less, and is accordingly calculated to instill defective notions of what the gospel really requires of sinners. It is not a very apt phrase from any point of view.
To the question: what must I do to be saved? the old gospel replies: believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. To the further question: what does it mean to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ? its reply is: it means knowing oneself to be a sinner, and Christ to have died for sinners; abandoning all self-righteousness and self-confidence, and casting oneself wholly upon Him for pardon arid peace; and exchanging one's natural enmity and rebellion against God for a spirit of grateful submission to the will of Christ through the renewing of one's heart by the Holy Ghost.
And to the further question still: how am I to go about believing on Christ and repenting, if I have no natural ability to do these things? it answers: look to Christ, speak to Christ, cry to Christ, just as you are; confess your sin, your impenitence, your unbelief, and cast yourself on His mercy; ask Him to give you a new heart, working in you true repentance and firm faith; ask Him to take away your evil heart of unbelief and to write His law within you, that you may never henceforth stray from Him. Turn to Him and trust Him as best you can, and pray for grace to turn and trust more thoroughly; use the means of grace expectantly, looking to Christ to draw near to you as you seek to draw near to Him; watch, pray, read and hear God's Word, worship and commune with God's people, and so continue till you know in yourself beyond doubt that you are indeed a changed being, a penitent believer, and the new heart which you desired has been put within you. The emphasis in this advice is on the need to call upon Christ directly, as the very first step.
"Let not conscience make you linger,
Nor of fitness fondly dream;
All the fitness He requireth
Is to feel your need of Him"
so do not postpone action till you think you are better, but honestly confess your badness and give yourself up here and now to the Christ who alone can make you better; and wait on Him till His light rises in your soul, as Scripture promises that it shall do. Anything less than this direct dealing with Christ is disobedience of the gospel. Such is the exercise of spirit to which the old evangel summons its hearers. "I believe-help thou mine unbelief": this must become their cry.
And the old gospel is proclaimed in the sure confidence that the Christ of whom it testifies, the Christ who is the real speaker when the Scriptural invitations to trust Him are expounded and applied, is not passively waiting for man's decision as the word goes forth, but is omnipotently active, working with and through the word to bring His people to faith in Himself. The preaching of the new gospel is often described as the task of "bringing men to Christ " – as if only men move, while Christ stands still. But the task of preaching the old gospel could more properly be described as bringing Christ to men, for those who preach it know that as they do their work of setting Christ before men's eyes, the mighty Saviour whom they proclaim is busy doing His work through their words, visiting sinners with salvation, awakening them to faith, drawing them in mercy to Himself.
It is this older gospel which Owen will teach us to preach: the gospel of the sovereign grace of God in Christ as the author and finisher of faith and salvation. It is the only gospel which can be preached on Owen's principles, but those who have tasted its sweetness will not in any case be found looking for another. In the matter of believing and preaching the gospel, as in other things, Jeremiah's words still have their application:
"Thus saith the Lord, Stand ye in the ways, and see, and ask for the old paths, where is the good way, and walk therein, and ye shall find rest for your souls." To find ourselves debarred, as Owen would debar us, from taking up with the fashionable modern substitute gospel may not, after all, be a bad thing, either for us, or for the Church.
More might be said, but to go farther would be to exceed the limits of an introductory essay. The foregoing remarks are made simply to show how important it is at the present time that we should attend most carefully to Owen's analysis of what the Bible says about the saving work of Christ.
[This is an extract from Packer's Introductory Essay to John Owen's "Death of Death" published by the Banner of Truth Trust.]Latest Articles
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text:
September 17, 2007
An article published in the August issue of Current Directions in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, suggests that infants fine-tune their visual and auditory systems to stimuli during the first year of life, essentially "weeding out" unnecessary discriminatory abilities.
Lisa Scott, a psychologist at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, and her colleagues examined several studies suggesting that infants begin to hone their perceptual discrimination to environmentally relevant distinctions by 9 to 12 months of age. At the same time, the discrimination of environmentally irrelevant, or less frequently encountered, distinctions declines.
In one study, for example, 6-month-old infants were able to differentiate two human a faces as easily as two monkey faces, whereas 9-month-olds could only differentiate between two human faces. Importantly, if infants are familiarized with monkey faces from 6 to 9 months, they maintain the ability to tell the difference between two monkey faces.
This phenomenon, called "perceptual narrowing" also occurs in other perceptual systems. In another study examining speech, 6-month-old infants could discriminate one sound from another from virtually every language, but by 9 months this ability declines —unless, of course, they receive experience with such sounds.
According to Scott, "what is most intriguing about these findings is that they collectively suggest that typical perceptual specialization and development is characterized by the gradual decline of abilities, not just gaining new ones." Coincident with this decline, the brain is experiencing an exuberance of synaptic connections, followed by the pruning of these connections to adult levels.
"It is important to note that this does not suggest a developmental regression, but progression towards greater efficiency at perceiving and processing salient rather than less-salient environmental input," write the authors.
They go on to suggest that environmental input modifies and shapes of these neural connections throughout development, allowing infants to differentiate between non-native sounds, faces, and even musical rhythms.
SOURCE: EurekAlert!, a service of AAAS


text:
Prayer to the Blessed Virgin
O most holy, most amiable and most glorious Virgin, Mother of God,
Mistress and Advocate to whom we are all vowed and consecrated, making it our glory to belong to thee as children, servants and slaves for time and eternity, behold! with common accord, we throw ourselves at thy feet to renew our vows of fidelity and servitude to thee and to pray thee that as we belong entirely to thee, thou wouldst offer, dedicate, consecrate and immolate to the Sacred Heart of our adorable Jesus, ourselves and all that we are, all that we shall do and suffer, without reserving anything for ourselves.
We wish to have no other liberty except that of loving Him, no other glory except that of belonging to Him as slaves and victims of His pure love, no other will or power but that of pleasing Him and contenting Him in everything, even at the price of our lives. And since thou hast all power over the amiable Heart of thy Divine Son, grant, O most charitable Mother, that He may receive and accept this consecration which we make today in thy presence, and through thy mediation, with the protestations of our fidelity, relying on His grace and thy help, which we beg thee not to refuse us.
O, our sweet Hope, make us feel thy power over the amiable Heart of Jesus, and use thy influence on our behalf to lodge us there always. Pray Him to exercise His sovereign empire over our souls, making His love reign in our hearts, in order that He may consume us and transform us entirely into Himself. May He be our Father, our Spouse, our Protection, our Treasure, our Delight, our Love and our All in all things; may He destroy and annihilate in us all that is of ourselves and put in place of it all that is of Himself, in order that we may be able to be pleasing to Him. May He be the support of our powerlessness, the strength of our weakness, the joy of all our sadness.
O Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary, repair all our failings, supply for all that is wanting to us, burn our hearts in your holy ardors; consume all our coldness and cowardice in loving and serving you, since we wish to make all our holiness and happiness consist in living and dying in the state of slaves of the adorable Heart of Jesus, and servants of his holy Mother.
From the book
Devotion To The Sacred Heart
by Fr. John Croiset, S.J.


text:
Statement by H.E. Archbishop Silvano M. Tomasi, Permanent Representative of the
Holy See to the United Nations and Other International Organizations in Geneva
at the General Debate Item 3 of the 14th Session of the Human Rights Council
Geneva, 8 June 2010
Mr. President,
With regard to the right of everyone to the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health, my delegation wishes to raise additional concerns regarding the need for effective action in order to guarantee Universal Access to medicines and diagnostic tools for all persons. The Special Rapporteur focused on this issue during his Report to the Eleventh Session of this distinguished Council[1]. However, continued vigilance must be maintained in this regard.
As the members of this Council already are well aware, the right to health is universally recognized as a fundamental right. Article 25 of the Universal Declaration on Human Rights (UDHR) includes the right to health and medical care within the more general rubric of the right "to enjoy an adequate standard of living."[2] Article 12.1 of the International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights (ICESCR), however, directly recognizes the right to enjoy the best physical and mental condition.[3].
The Committee on Economic and Cultural Rights, in its General Comment No. 14[4], moreover, identified the following minimum requirements for States to ensure: (1) the right of access to health care in a non-discriminatory way, (2) access to basic nutritional level, (3) access to housing, basic sanitation and a sufficient supply of drinking water, (4) the supply of essential drugs, (5) an equitable distribution of benefits and health services, and (6) adoption of national strategies to prevent and combat epidemics.
Mr. President, the Catholic Church provides a major contribution to health care in all parts of the world – through local churches, religious institutions and private initiatives, which act on their own responsibility and in the respect of the law of each country – including the promotion of 5,378 hospitals, 18,088 dispensaries and clinics, 521 leprosaria, and 15,448 homes for the aged, the chronically ill, or disabled people. With information coming from these on-the-ground realities in some of the most poor, isolated, and marginalized communities, my delegation is obliged to report that the rights detailed in the international instruments already mentioned are far from being realized.
One major impediment to the realization of these rights is the lack of access to affordable medicines and diagnostic tools that can be administered and utilized in low-income, low-technology settings. Among the disturbing trends and findings reported by the Special Rapporteur are the following: "Diseases of poverty" still account for 50 per cent of the burden of disease in developing countries, nearly ten times higher than in developed countries[5]; more than 100 million people fall into poverty annually because they have to pay for health care[6]; in developing countries, patients themselves pay for 50 to 90 per cent of essential medicines[7]; nearly 2 billion people lack access to essential medicines [8].
One group particularly deprived of access to medicines is that of children. Many essential medicines have not been developed in appropriate formulations or dosages specific to pediatric use. Thus families and health care workers often are forced to engage in a "guessing game" on how best to divide adult-size pills for use with children. This situation can result in the tragic loss of life or continued chronic illness among such needy children. For example, of the 2.1 million children estimated to be living with HIV infection[9], only 38% were received life-saving anti-retroviral medications at the end of 2008[10]. This treatment gap is partially due to the lack of "child friendly" medications to treat the HIV infection.
Thus the Committee on the Rights of the Child has declared: "The obligations of States parties under the Convention extend to ensuring that children have sustained and equal access to comprehensive treatment and care, including necessary HIV-related drugs … on a basis of non-discrimination.[11]"
My delegation is well aware of the complexities inherent in the intellectual property aspects related to the issue of access to medicines. These considerations, including the flexibilities available to applying the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights, are well documented in the 2009 Report of the Special Rapporteur. We further recognize that serious efforts already have been undertaken to implement the Global Strategy and Plan of Action on Public Health, Innovation and Intellectual Property, established in 2008 by the 61stWorld Health Assembly. However, the intense debates recently pursued at the 63rd World Health Assembly demonstrate that the international community has not yet succeeded in its aim to provide equitable access to medicines and indicate the need for further creative reflection and action in this regard.
Mr. President, my delegation urges this Council to renew its commitment as a key stakeholder in efforts to assert and safeguard the right to health by guaranteeing equitable access to essential medicines. We do so with a firm conviction that "… treatment should be extended to every human being" and as an essential element of "the search for the greatest possible human development… and with a strong belief that "[t]his ethical perspective [is] based on the dignity of the human person and on the fundamental rights and duties connected with it …"[12]
[1] Report of the Special Rapporteur on the right of everyone to the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health to the Eleventh Session of the Human Rights Council, Eleventh Session, A/HRC/11/12, 31 March 2009
[4] Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, Twenty-second session, Geneva, 25 April-12 May 2000, E/C.12/2000/4, 11 August 2000, http://www.unhchr.ch/tbs/doc.nsf/(symbol)/E.C.12.2000.4.En
[5] World Health Organization, Public Health Innovation and Intellectual Property Rights, A Report of the Commission on Intellectual Property Rights, Innovation and Public Health (Geneva, 2006) p. 3.
[6] World Health Organization, World Health Report, Primary Health Care Now More than Ever (Geneva, 2008).
[7] A/61/338, para. 75.
[8] World Health Organization, "WHO Medicines Strategy: Countries at the Core, 2004-2007", (2004).
[9] UNAIDS, 2009 AIDS Epidemic Update, Geneva, November 2009.
[10] Children and AIDS: Fourth Stocktaking Report, UNICEF, 2009, p. 10.
[11] Committee on the Rights of the Child, Thirty-Second Session, General Comment No. 3 (2003), HIV/AIDS and the rights of the child, CRC/GC/2003/3,
[12] Pope Benedict XVI, Address To The Plenary Assembly Of The Pontifical Council For Health Pastoral Care, 22 March 2007, http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/speeches/2007/march/documents/hf_ben-xvi_spe_20070322_pc-salute_en.html


text:
15/09/2009 - 18:12
Landstraße (III.) - Uchatiusgasse
Name: Gloria
Age: 46
From: Vienna
Occupation: Real estate broker
What are you wearing?
T-Shirt: Vintage, from a children's flea market
Dress: Marco Polo
Jeans-Leggings: H&M
Boots: Primopiano
Shawl: Sisley
Bag: Ina Kent
What was the last item you bought?
A Twinset
How much money did you spend on it?
200 Euro
No Comments | Category: 18:00-21:00, 41-50, Female, Landstraße (III.), Michaela Amort | Tags: 1030, curls, H&M, Ina Kent, Marco Polo, Primopiano, Sisley, vintage