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8th Halmstad Summer School on Testing, HSST 2018
Organized in cooperation with TOCSYC Network
June 11-14, 2018 - Halmstad University, Sweden
- 1 Introduction
- 2 Tutorials
- 2.1 Model-based Mutation Testing: the Science of Killing Bugs in a Black Box, Bernhard Aichernig, TU Graz, Austria
- 2.2 Testing concurrent and distributed systems, Mauro Pezzé, University of Lugano, Switzerland
- 2.3 Model-Based Testing: Theory, Tools, and Applications, Jan Tretmans, ESI by TNO and Radboud University Nijmegen, The Netherlands and Halmstad University, Sweden
- 2.4 Automated testing of applications at the GUI level, Tanja Vos, Technical University of Valencia, Spain and the Open University, The Netherlands
- 2.5 Real Bugs, Real Projects, Real Impact, Andrzej Wasowski, IT University of Copenhagen, Denmark
- 3 Program
- 4 Registration
- 5 Ph.D. Student Presentations
- 6 Venue
- 7 History
- 8 Organizers
Testing and debugging account for a major part of software development cost and effort, yet the current practice of software testing is often insufficiently structured and disciplined. There have been various attempts in the past decades to bring more rigour and structure into this field, resulting in several industrial-strength processes, techniques and tools for different levels of testing. The 8th Halmstad Summer School on Testing provides an overview of the state of the art in testing, including theory, industrial cases, tools and hands-on tutorials by internationally-renowned researchers.
Model-based Mutation Testing: the Science of Killing Bugs in a Black Box, Bernhard Aichernig, TU Graz, Austria
In this tutorial I will discuss the combination of model-based testing and mutation testing. Model-based testing is a black-box testing technique that avoids the labour of manually writing hundreds of test cases, but instead advocates the capturing of the expected behaviour in a model of the system under test. Out of this abstract model, test cases can be generated automatically. In model-based mutation testing we inject faults into models and generate test-cases that cover these faults. The resulting test suite aims at detecting these kind of faults in a system under test. Hence, we anticipate what could go wrong and generate test-cases that protect against these bugs. The tutoriaI will introduce the toolset MoMuT (momut.org) implementing this technique. We will cover its different modeling styles, its scientific foundations and industrial applications.
Testing concurrent and distributed systems, Mauro Pezzé, University of Lugano, Switzerland
Concurrent systems find applications in many domains, from multi-core architectures to distributed systems, and are rapidly spreading in commercial applications. Concurrency introduces new types of faults that are particularly difficult to find, due to both the nondeterministic nature of their occurrence and the combinatorial explosion of the thread interleavings. Disciplined design approaches, modern programming languages, and novel analysis techniques can reduce but not eliminate the presence of concurrency faults, which can lead to severe and critical problems. Testing approaches address the distinguishing features of concurrent systems with techniques to control the nondeterministic and combinatorial explosion of execution threads. We will discuss the nature of concurrent faults, identify the problems of testing concurrent systems, and define a coherent framework to frame the different testing approaches. We will learn the main classic as well as modern approaches for testing concurrent systems, and identify current and future research directions in the field.
Model-Based Testing: Theory, Tools, and Applications, Jan Tretmans, ESI by TNO and Radboud University Nijmegen, The Netherlands and Halmstad University, Sweden
We build ever larger and more complex systems. Systematic testing plays an important role in assessing the quality of such systems. Testing, however, turns out to be error-prone, expensive, and laborious. Consequently, better testing methods are needed that can detect more bugs faster and cheaper. Classical test automation helps but only for test execution. Model-based testing (MBT) is a promising technology that enables the next step in test automation by combining automatic test generation and test result analysis with test execution, and providing more, longer, and more diversified test cases with less effort.
In the lecture, we first discuss the basic ideas and principles of MBT, with motivation, perspectives, and pitfalls. Second, we discuss the ioco-theory for model-based testing. The ioco theory, on the one hand, provides a sound and well-defined foundation for labelled transition systems testing, having its roots in the theoretical area of testing equivalences and refusal testing. On the other hand, it has proved to be a practical basis for model-based test generation tools and applications. The latter is illustrated in the third part of the lecture, where we will introduce TorXakis (https://github.com/TorXakis/TorXakis), an MBT tool that implements the ioco-testing theory. We will discuss how TorXakis deals with such aspects as compositionality, concurrency, abstraction, and uncertainty (nondeterminism), that are ubiquitous in current systems. Finally, some simple examples, with the opportunity for hands-on experience, and some industrial applications are presented.
Jan Tretmans, Model Based Testing with Labelled Transition Systems. In R. Hierons, et al., Formal Methods and Testing. LNCS 4949, pp. 1-38, Springer, 2008. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-78917-8_1.
Jan Tretmans, On the Existence of Practical Testers. In J.-P. Katoen, et al., ModelEd, TestEd, TrustEd. LNCS 10500, pp. 87-106, Springer, 2017. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-68270-9_5.
Automated testing of applications at the GUI level, Tanja Vos, Technical University of Valencia, Spain and the Open University, The Netherlands
Graphical User Interfaces (GUIs) represent the main connection point between a software's components and its end users and can be found in almost all modern applications. This makes them attractive for testers, since testing at the GUI level means testing from the user's perspective and is thus the ultimate way of verifying a program's correct behaviour. To be effective, GUI testing should be automated.
A substantial part of the current state-of-the art for automating UI testing is still script-based. Scripts can for example be recorded with Capture and Replay (CR) tools or Visual Gui Testing (VGT) tools. A known concern of these approaches is that it creates a critical maintenance problem because the test cases easily break when the UI evolves, which happens often.
For a couple of years now we have been researching a scriptless approach to automated GUI testing called TESTAR (http://www.testar.org) (Test Automation at the user inteRface level). Using TESTAR, you can start testing immediately and you do not need to specify test cases in advance. TESTAR automatically generates and executes test sequences based on a structure that is automatically derived from the UI through the accessibility API. Without specifying anything, TESTAR can detect the violation of general-purpose system requirements through implicit oracles like those stating that the SUT should not crash, the SUT should not find itself in an unresponsive state (freeze) and the GUI state should not contain any widget with suspicious words like error, problem, exception, etc.
While our application is automatically being tested for stability, crashes and undesired outputs, we can start adding more and more oracles that test more specific requirements of our application. This way we incrementally create the requirements, this is something that turns out to be very helpful when dealing with legacy systems.
In this tutorial we will explain GUI testing and its challenges. We will introduce TESTAR and show the internals of how the tool works, the different options that exist for action selection, online and offline oracles. Moreover, we will do a hands-on do it yourself session.
T.E.J. Vos, P.M. Kruse, N. Condori-Fernández, S. Bauersfeld, J. Wegener: TESTAR: Tool Support for Test Automation at the User Interface Level. International Journal of Information System Modeling and Design, IJISMD 2015, vol.6(3), uly-September 2015, pp. 46-83.
Real Bugs, Real Projects, Real Impact, Andrzej Wasowski, IT University of Copenhagen, Denmark
I will present a summary of collaboration with open source projects around understanding historical bugs and building tools for detecting new bugs.
In the first part, I will report the state of the union for bugs in two complex software systems : the Linux kernel (which is likely the most popular operating system on the planet) and the ROS operating system (which is not an operating system at all, but likely the most popular robotics middleware on the planet). In both cases, we will look into programming language aspects of problems observed in the very rich histories stored in the source code repositories of this projects. In the Linux kernel case, we will additionally focus on challenges introduced by the highly configurable aspect (bugs hidden well in rare configurations). For ROS, we will emphasize robotics-specific bugs and problems hidden in intensive modularity of the ROS applications architectures.
In the second part, we will ask basic methodological questions: Why a tool builder fighting with bugs might want to search and understand real bugs? What is the cost of studying bugs? How and what kinds of benchmarks can reduce this cost? What can be learnt from real bugs? What are the challenges of studying real bugs, and what methods do we have to reproduce real bugs, in order to use them for experiments later? How can we create benchmarks that will survive a long time, without bit rotting?
Finally, in the third part, I will show the EBA tool, specifically designed to uncover resource manipuation bugs in the Linux kernel; in response to some requirements presented in the first part of this lecture. EBA (an effect-based analyzer) creates a program abstraction performing a type inference in a rich type system tracking regions (a memory abstraction), simple shapes (hierarchies of pointers nested in structures) and side-effects of computations. This abstraction is then overlayed on a control-flow graph and fed to a reachability checking algorithm that identifies suspicious sequences of effects: for instance a lock taken twice. I will describe how EBA works, and how we used it to uncover about a dozen sequential double-lock bugs in the Linux kernel.
Joint work with: Claus Brabrand (ITU), Iago Abal (Prover), Stefan Stanciulescu (ABB), Jean Melo (ConfigIt), Marcio Ribeiro (UFAL), Gijs van der Storm (TU Delft), Jon Azpiazu (Tecnalia, San Sebastian), Jon Tjerngren (ABB Vesteras), Jonathan Hechtbauer (Fraunhofer IPA), Andre Santos (U. Minho), Chris Timperley (CMU), Harshavardhan Deshpande (Fraunhofer IPA).
June 11 (9:00-17:00)
09:00-09:15 Arrival and Registration
09:15-09:30 Welcome, opening remarks (Mohammad Mousavi)
09:30-10:30 Bernhard Aichernig, Model-based Mutation Testing: the Science of Killing Bugs in a Black Box Slides
10:30-11:00 Coffee Break
11:00-12:30 Bernhard Aichernig, Model-based Mutation Testing: the Science of Killing Bugs in a Black Box Slides
12:30-14:00 Lunch Break
14:00-15:30 Mauro Pezzé, Testing concurrent and distributed systems Slides
15:30-16:00 Coffee Break
16:00-17:00 Mauro Pezzé, Testing concurrent and distributed systems Slides
June 12 (9:30-18:00)
09:30-10:30 Andrzej Wasowski, Real Bugs, Real Projects, Real Impact Slides
10:30-11:00 Coffee Break
11:00-12:30 Andrzej Wasowski, Real Bugs, Real Projects, Real Impact Slides
12:30-14:00 Lunch Break
14:00-17:00 Social Event: Ostrastrand's Go Karting
18:30-22:00 Social Dinner: Fridolfs Krog
June 13 (9:30-12:30)
09:30-10:30 Tanja Vos, Automated testing of applications at the GUI level Slides
10:30-11:00 Coffee Break
11:00-12:30 Tanja Vos, Automated testing of applications at the GUI level Slides
12:30-14:00 Lunch Break
14:00-15:30 Ph.D Symposium
- Lars Luthmann. Sampling Strategies for Product Lines with Unbounded Parametric Real-time Constraints.
- Mukelabai Mukelabai. Verification of Migrated Product Lines.
- Oscar Luis Vera Pérez. Improving test suites by detecting pseudo-tested methods.
15:30-16:00 Coffee Break
June 14 (9:30-14:00)
09:30-10:30 Jan Tretmans, Model-Based Testing: Theory, Tools, and Applications
10:30-11:00 Coffee Break
11:00-12:30 Jan Tretmans, Model-Based Testing: Theory, Tools, and Applications
12:30-14:00 Lunch and Departure
Please register yourself at the registration page and make your payment via bank transfer as specified in the registration form.
The registration deadline is
May 1 May 15, 2018 (Extended).
If you have any dietary requirements, or would like to attend only certain days, please indicate it in the registration form.
The registration fee is 3800 SEK (approx. 380 EUR, ) and covers lunches, coffee breaks, the study material, the social event and a dinner (excl. drinks). The registration fees include Value Added Tax and is hence, VAT deductible for governmental organizations.
Ph.D. Student Presentations
We have 8 time slots for Ph.D. presentations, where each student has 10 minutes to present her/his research project (and possibly results) and receive feedback from our experts. We solicit abstracts of 2 pages in the EasyChair Style in order to make a selection. The abstract should be solely authored by the Ph.D. student, but reviewed and approved by her/his supervisors. Please submit your abstracts using the HSST 2018 EasyChair page.
The deadline for submissions is May 15, 2018.
The summer school will be held on the campus of Halmstad University in Halmstad, Sweden. Halmstad is a popular holiday destination located on the Swedish west coast. Just a few minutes by bicycle or bus takes you from campus to city centre, sandy beaches or forested Galgberget Hill.
Directions to/in Campus
Directions for getting to campus can be found at http://www.hh.se/english/abouttheuniversity/visitus.307_en.html
The campus map can be found here. The summer school will be located at the HAV lecture hall, which is located at the 22nd floor of the H building (Trade Centre). Coffee breaks will be held at the same building. Lunches will be served in the ground floor of the Spiro restaurant in the G building.
Directions to Halmstad
Trains take you directly to Göteborg in about 1 hour, to the Malmö-Copenhagen area in about 2 hours and to Stockholm in 4.5 hours. There are also daily flights from Halmstad Airport to Stockholm.
If you are flying internationally it is generally easiest to fly into Copenhagen (CPH) airport (also known as Kastrup). The best thing about flying into CPH is that you just buy a train ticket when you arrive at the airport and simply take a train from the airport directly to Halmstad. The train leaves from the airport itself approximately once an hour on weekdays. We recommend that you check the time-table at the Swedish Railways site and allow one hour from touchdown to getting to the train station (just outside customs). (It seems that you can take an earlier or a later train on the same day regardless of the exact train you booked, but obviously you will lose your seat reservation if you have made one.) To get to your hotel, you can combine a taxi booking with your train ticket at the Swedish Railways site and a driver will wait for you with your name mentioned on a board once you arrive in Halmstad.
In Halmstad, everything is either in walking distance or a short taxi ride away. Usually there are taxis at the station. If there are none there is a phone that connects directly to the local taxi company. For the eventuality that the phone is not working, it is good to have a cell phone handy. The number for the taxi company is written on the phone.
Note that CPH is in Denmark (and not in Sweden). So, if you need visas for European countries, make sure you get one that works for both.
If for some reason you cannot or do not want to use CPH, the next best international airport is in Gothenburg (GOT), locally known as Landvetter. The tricky thing about using that airport is that you would first have to take a 45 minute shuttle from the airport to the Gothenburg train station, and then take the train to Halmstad. That is one transfer and one wait. You can buy a combined shuttle and train ticket from the the Swedish Railways site.
We have made a pre-booking for a group of rooms at Hotel Continental.
If you would like to use this offer, please send an email to the hotel reservation and mention the booking code "Summer School 2018".
Here are some other suggestions for the accommodation, with an indication of their price range, (obtained from booking.com) and their distance to the summer school venue
- Scandic Hallandia (~160-200 EUR / night, 2km)
- Hotel Amadeus (~100-120 EUR / night, 2.5km)
- First Hotel Martenson (~130-150 EUR / night, 2km)
- Quality Hotel Halmstad (~80-100 EUR / night, 3 km)
- STF Halmstads Hostel Kaptenshamn (~80-100 EUR / night, 2km)
An annotated Google Map with suggestion for restaurants can be found here.
This is the eighth edition of the summer school. Information about some of the previous editions is provided below.
- HSST 2017 (June 12- June 15, 2017)
- HSST 2016 (June 13- June 16, 2016),
- HSST 2015 (June 8- June 11, 2015),
- HSST 2014 (June 9- June 12, 2014),
- HSST 2013 (June 3- June 5, 2013),
- Second Summer School on Accurate Programming (May 30 - June 1, 2012)
Please do not hesitate to contact us if you have any questions or enquiries:
- Stella Erlandsson (Local Organization, email@example.com)
- Wojciech Mostowski (Organization Co-Chair, firstname.lastname@example.com)
- Mohammad Mousavi (Program Co-Chair, firstname.lastname@example.com)
- Richard Torkar (Program Co-Chair, firstname.lastname@example.com)
- Maria Vesterlund (Local Organization, email@example.com)


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UH West Oahu invites the Leeward Oahu community to join faculty, staff and students at annual UH West Oahu Day
Annual event celebrates the 31st anniversary of UHWOUniversity of Hawaiʻi
Chancellor's Office
Kristen Bonilla, (808) 956-5037
External Affairs & University Relations
PEARL CITY, Oʻahu — The University of Hawaiʻi—West Oʻahu (UHWO) is celebrating its annual UH West Oʻahu Day on Tuesday, April 10, and invites the community to join faculty, staff and students for a day of games, entertainment and celebration. The campus will welcome Governor Linda Lingle, who will address the crowd, as well as state legislators and other community leaders for the festivities, which are scheduled for 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. at the Pearl City campus.
"This year's UH West Oʻahu Day celebration holds particular significance for the West Oʻahu campus community as we anticipate the arrival of our first freshman class this fall and make great progress towards our new campus in Kapolei," said UHWO Chancellor Gene Awakuni. "We are honored that Governor Lingle, our state legislators and community members will join us in this celebration, and we are grateful for their support as we continue to work towards meeting the higher education needs of Leeward and Central Oʻahu."
The annual event is a commemoration of the campus' 31st anniversary and is presented by the Associated Students of the University of Hawaiʻi—West Oʻahu. UHWO clubs will participate, and entertainment will be provided by student groups from Pearl City and Waipahu High Schools.
UH West Oʻahu Day is an opportunity for Leeward Oʻahu communities to visit the campus and learn more about the programs offered and the plans for moving forward as a four-year university and towards a new campus in Kapolei, which is scheduled to open its doors in Fall 2009. UHWO will welcome its first freshman class this fall.
UHWO is located at 96-129 Ala Ike in Pearl City at the Diamond Head end of the Leeward Community College campus. Free parking will be available. For more information, call 454-4750 or visit UHWO's website at www.uhwo.hawaii.edu.

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Affordable innovation in Turkey
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This is an OEM (Original Equipment Manufacturer) product and is intended to be installed and licensed on the hard drive of a fully assembled computer system. This product does not qualify for any free technical support from Microsoft. A retail (FPP) version of this product is available that includes technical support.Why Buy From SoftwareMedia?
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Good business attorneys know the law and how it applies. Great business attorneys know that too, but they know something else that's just as important. They know how to understand a client's goals and how to craft their representation with the singular aim of achieving that client's goals. Fast.
The Slinde Nelson team was built with intention. Many of our lawyers have built and run companies of their own. They've been on your side of the table. They know what clients want because they've been clients. We're a different kind of law firm because we are made up of a different kind of lawyers.It's about time.


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The Westminster Kennel Club Annual All Breed Dog Show has never been mistaken for -- nor intended to be -- a mirror of America's dog-loving soul. A public clinic on the standards of conformation for the various breeds, yes. A celebration of all that's wonderful about Man's Best Friend, no doubt.
But when terriers of various breeds win Best In Show at Westminster more than a third of the time (45 wins and counting), and fox terriers alone are almost 40% of those winning terriers (17 to date), a vague sense of an "elite" in the dog world gnaws at the leash.
Add to that nine Best In Shows at Westminster for poodles, six for English Springer Spaniels and five for pointer dogs (the symbol of the WKC), and the lyric "you ain't nothin' but a hound dog" delivers an opprobrium more cutting than Leiber and Stoller might have intended. "You ain't never caught a rabbit" indeed—you hounds ain't never caught a Best In Show at Westminster (unless you're a well-coiffed Afghan Hound in 1957 or 1983).
Change, however, may be trickling down to one of our oldest sporting entertainments. The WKC's 134th running of the dogs on Monday and Tuesday at Madison Square Garden may very well find the country's second longest running sporting event (the Kentucky Derby has gathered more moss) reflecting the "change" polls say the citizenry desires.
That being said, the Scottish Terrier named Sadie has steamrolled through the major dog shows of 2009, winning every Best In Show of consequence, and is next week's heavy favorite at Westminster, according to dog people as well as wise guys in Las Vegas. The Wynn Hotel Race & Sports Book is in its fourth year of offering odds on breeds winning Westminster (as opposed to individual dogs). This year Scottish Terriers are the 8/1 favorite to win Best In Show; one may assume Sadie is the only calculus in that computation. Sadie is a beautiful example of her breed: she has 100 Best In Show career wins, and she won the Terrier Group at last year's WKC show. Scottish Terriers have won Best In Show at Westminster seven times, making 8/1 look like a lock.
But note: after Sadie (oops, Scottish Terriers) the Vegas dog walkers like Golden Retrievers at 15/1. The American Kennel Club has regularly reported that Labrador retrievers are the number one registered breed in America, and Golden Retrievers are usually the second, third or fourth highest registered breed. Anyone who walks a dog in these United States knows Goldens are as common as delivery men on bicycles.
Nevertheless, no retriever, Golden or otherwise, has ever won Best In Show at Westminster. (Neither has a dachschund, also one of America's favorite breeds. There will be 63 dachschunds at the Garden on Monday.) Why is Vegas so excited about Golden Retrievers? A Golden named Treasure is ranked number four among all dogs in 2009 competitions in the US, and the 15/1 odds are based upon Treasure's success.
A Puli named Conrad enters next week's WKC show as the third-winningest dog in the US in 2009; last year Conrad won the Herding Group trophy at Westminster but saw Best In Show go to the Sussex Spaniel, Stump (more on him in a moment). The Puli is the best know of four great breeds of shepherd dogs in Hungary. Its corded coat, usually solid black, suggests a Rasta floor mop, and the breed arrived in the US only in the 1930's. But thanks to Contrad, Pulis are 16/1 on the Vegas board.
Stump's Best In Show win last year at Westminster was not just out of left field, it was clear out of the visitor's bullpen. Think of it this way: a Sussex Spaniel winning Westminster is like the LA Clippers winning the NBA title. Not only was Stump the best of a very obscure breed; he was 10 years old when he won (the previous oldest Best In Show at Westminster wasn't quite eight years old), and before last year's show Stump hadn't been in a show ring for almost four years. Stump's downtime was not due to laziness or rehab—he had contracted a life-threatening viral infection that put him in the veterinary hospital at Texas A&M University for 19 days during which time, says his owner/handler Scott Sommers, "he had a temperature of 105.5 degrees and every major organ in his body would shut down on a daily basis." Stump was almost euthanized.
But Stump won Best In Show at Westminster. The year before, in 2008, a crowd-pleasing beagle named Uno won Best In Show against a star-studded bunch of Group winners; it was arguably a vote for both Snoopy AND "change." (A beagle had never won before at Westminster.) In 2006 a Colored Bull Terrier won Best in Show. That makes three renegade breeds in four years strutting out of the Garden with dogdom's most highly prized trophy.
Are tectonic plates shifting under the pillars of Westminster? Is 2010 finally the year a basset hound gets it done? Or will a fox terrier put its four paws down and restore order and decorum?
Stay tuned—Sadie will undoubtedly have something to say about it.


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MONTREAL — One out of every five Jewish children has some level of learning difficulty, the same ratio as in the general population.
"There are 7,000 Jewish children in public schools, which means that 1,500 or so have some level of learning disability," said Nathalie Myara, who has been working with the organized Jewish community to help these kids.
Since 2008, Myara, co-ordinator of a master's program in special education at the Université de Montréal, has, with her husband Eric Ifergan, been behind the Lanaar Achievement Center for the enhancement of learning potential. The program is designed to help Jewish public school students who have learning or "adaptive" problems.
Two years ago, the couple also created Banav, which is run out of designated rooms at the YM-YWHA Ben Weider JCC lent out by the Communauté sépharade unifiée du Québec (CSUQ) and is specifically geared to providing Jewish schoolchildren with learning difficulties the fundamentals of a Jewish education.
The issues the children face range from the relatively benign, including dyslexia or attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, to more intrusive difficulties.
"There's just not enough out there," said Myara, who lived in Israel for nine years and is a disciple of renowned Israeli educator Reuven Feuerstein. She said there's a dearth of overall resources for Jewish children attending both public and Jewish schools.
Myara noted that some local Jewish schools have "resource classes" for children with learning difficulties, but they are outside the regular classroom environment and run only a few hours each week. Those schools include Solomon Schechter Academy, JPPS-Bialik and more Orthodox schools like Hebrew Academy and Yeshiva Yavne. The latter two work with the private, specialized Vanguard School for children with learning disabilities.
Public schools do have a certain level of designated funding for kids with learning disabilities, which Myara said could be a factor in the decision made by some families to leave the Jewish system.
But she added that there are not enough resources for children with learning disabilities in either the Jewish or the public system. Supports they could profit from in the Jewish system, such as a child having someone "shadow" them all day, are not there.
That may also be a factor, Myara said, in her getting calls from parents seeking her professional, individualized intervention.
Myara's techniques are based on Feuerstein's pedagogical philosophy of allowing the children, in effect, to show you how they learn best, "according to their own characteristics."
She said she has been meeting with officials from the Bronfman Jewish Education Centre (BJEC) to figure out ways, using an interventionist model she developed, to have kids improve within the regular classroom environment.
Meanwhile, the Lanaar and Banav programs for public school Jewish kids with learning disabilities that she and her husband developed continue to attract increasing numbers, Myara said, with the basics of Jewish traditions being introduced. During the school year, those after-school classes take place four days a week (except Friday).
"One idea I am working on with BJEC," Myara said, "is to open a Banav program at a Jewish day school."
She expects the number of classes involved in the two programs to increase significantly and there is a waiting list, she said.
For more details about the Lanaar and Banav programs, contact Eric Ifergan at 514-677-2458 or email [email protected]


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All News Releases By Date
EPA Postpones April 13 Public Meeting and Hearing on Jordan Development Disposal Well
Release Date: 04/08/2011
Contact Information: Media Contact: Phillippa Cannon, 312-353-6218, email@example.com
CHICAGO (April 8, 2011) - Due to uncertainty regarding appropriations for the federal government, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is postponing an April 13th public meeting and public hearing on a proposed underground injection permit for Jordan Development. The meeting and hearing were scheduled to be held at Springdale Township Hall, corner of Glovers Lake Rd (602) and Lake Rd (669) in Springdale, Michigan.
EPA will reschedule the public meeting and public hearing.
Search this collection of releases | or search all news releases
View selected historical press releases from 1970 to 1998 in the EPA History website.


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Aura Attic Fan | CFM: 1800 16″ Diameter 8″ Tall Collar AF-16-C08
Basic dimensions of the Aura Fan and it's identifying attributes. Primary identifying dimensions of vents and fans are the inside diameter of the Head, which equals the diameter of the hole being vented, and the height of the Collar which is the solid tube between the Head of the vent and the Flange which attaches to the roof.
Inside Diameter:
Outside Diameter:
Square Flange (side length):
Height of Head:
Collar Height:
Height of Flange:
Total Height with Collar and Flange:
Louvers are the vertical openings in the vent, which facilitates the flow of air, while keeping animals, insects, debris, and embers out. The combination of inner and outer Louvers on our patented "Aura" series of vents and fans are shaped to create a positive vacuum effect which draws air out of the vent, utilizing a physical principle known as the Venturi effect.
Louver Height (inside):
Louver Height (outside):
Size of opening btwn blades (inside):
Size of opening btwn blades (outside):
Expected snow and rain in your region and the pitch of the roof are the key consideration when choosing the height of the collar of your roof vents. Zones 1 and 2 are not expected to sustain significant snow packs, while zones 3-7 are likely to experience snow, possibly for weeks or months. Vent collars under 4 inches are inappropriate for flat (0/12 pitch) roofs because even heavy rain can splash water into a shorter vent.
Minimum Pitch Capacity:
Maximum Pitch Capacity (Standard Vent):
Maximum Pitch Capacity (Modified):
Free Air Space:
Free Air Space:
1:150 Ventilation Rule:
1:300 Ventilation Rule:
When the Fan is OFF, the Venturi effect is stimulated by even small breezes creates a positive movement of air out of the vent without the need of any part of the vent to move. This movement of air is proportional to the wind speed, and can be measured in Cubic Feet per Minute or Cubic Meters per Minute.
4 MPH Wind:
5.2 MPH Wind:
7.4 MPH Wind:
9.8 MPH Wind:
11 MPH Wind:
AC Motor Horsepower:
Max Amps:
Motor Type:
Airflow With Fan:
Fan Blade Count:
Fan Blade Diameter:
Installation Guides Under Development. Coming Soon.
Aura Fan, Roof Mounted Exhaust Fan 1,800 cfm, 16″ diameter Roof Vent with a 8″ Collar Height and 22″ Square Flange
This attic fan / roof fan EXHAUSTS CONTINUOUSLY whether the electric motor is ON or OFF. When the fan is off, outside air moving against the Aura Ventilator causes the Venturi effect, thereby creating an exhaust. The exhaust is created without the use of electricity or moving parts. On the days when the fan is not needed, the Aura Vent will still operate passively; this increases the life of the motor since it is not in constant use. The Aura Fan Ventilator reduces energy consumption.
1/8th inch opening between the louver blades and all aluminum ("noncombustible") material meets the requirements of California building code 706A.2 Vents to resist the intrusion of burning embers and flame through ventilation openings.
|Actual Package Weight
|37 lbs
|22 × 22 × 18 in
|UPS Dimensional (Billable) Weight
|63 lbs
Active Ventilation Products


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Florida Homeowners Insurance when you have dogs.
If you plan to move the state of Florida anytime soon, and you happen to be a pet owner, then it stands to reason that you're going to want to learn everything possible about Florida homeowners insurance against dogs. The same can be said for those who are planning to purchase a dog, and are curious as to how information regarding Florida homeowners insurance against dogs will impact them. If you are simply looking for a Homeowners insurance policy in Florida then you can contact https://floridainsurancequotes.net/florida-homeowners-insurance/ and get a free quote.
Dogs And Florida Homeowners Insurance
The most important thing to keep in mind with Florida homeowners insurance and dogs is that when it comes to how owning a dog can influence your homeowners insurance costs, it really comes down to what type of breed of dog you own, or what type of breed of dog you're thinking about owning. This is why it's important to get all the facts ahead of time. If you're not sure as to what breed of dog you're planning to own, you will want to speak to your current insurance provider, or include a question of what certain dog breeds mean to homeowners insurance rates and coverage in your research of potential Florida homeowners insurance providers.
Florida Homeowners Insurance FAQ
Here are some questions on the subject of property insurance in Florida against dogs that you should be asking yourself:
- Is there really such a thing as a vicious dogs list? Unfortunately, there is indeed such a thing as a vicious dogs list. As the name implies, a vicious dogs list is a list of dog breeds that are considered by the public and other individuals at large to be vicious, even dangerous more often than not. Pitbull owners can tell you a thing or two about discrimination, based solely on the breed of the dog. The Rottweiler breed appears on this list, as well.
- What does it mean to me if my dog is on the vicious breeds list? The implications of the vicious dog list is that because the dog is considered a greater risk for both the homeowner and guests of the homeowner than other dog breeds, the liability is therefore greater. Some insurance carriers will simply refuse to provide Florida homeowners insurance to someone who owns a Doberman, a Great Dane, or a Chow. Other companies will offer insurance that excludes the dog entirely, which means that in the event something happens with the dog, the carrier will not be responsible.
- Is there a universal vicious dogs list, or does the list vary from one insurance company to the next? Certain breeds (Pitbulls, Akitas, etc) are almost always going to be on an insurance company's vicious dogs list. Other breeds (like a Golden Retriever) are never going to be on a vicious dogs list. The specifics of the list can indeed vary between companies.
- In the event that someone is bitten by my dog, do I still need to get in touch with my carrier? Yes.
- What are my options? Florida dog and canine liability insurance from https://floridainsurancequotes.net/florida-homeowners-insurance/ is well worth investigating. Some type of coverage is always going to be a good idea for everyone.


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Young at Heart is a growing organization and can always use big-hearted people with some time to spare. We need people to help in every aspect of the organization, from taking dogs & cats to vet appointments, to soliciting donations for auction events, to caring for cats in our adoption centers.
If you're in the Northwest Suburbs of Chicago, you can make a tremendous contribution to Young at Heart's wonderful work by volunteering as little as one hour a week. Please check out the volunteer opportunities below and let us know how you would like to help by filling out our volunteer application.
Volunteer Opportunities
At Young at Heart, volunteers must be at least 18 years old to work in the adoption centers, but we welcome junior volunteers in other capacities.
Please review the descriptions of each of the volunteer opportunities below before completing a volunteer application.
Our foster homes are the heart of our organization, where senior pets get the love and comfort of being in a home while waiting for adoption. All of our senior animals are rescued from shelters where they have as few as 3 days to get out or they will be euthanized. Foster homes, whether long term or short term, help us rescue these senior pets from a very sad fate. Without them, we would not be able to rescue the senior pets that we do. The more foster homes we have, the more lives we can save!
Learn more about becoming a Young at Heart foster parent here.
If you are interested in pursuing this opportunity, please a complete a foster application, so we can match a foster pet to you, your home and lifestyle.
Outreach / Adoption Events
Young at Heart holds many adoption events throughout the Chicago suburbs where we bring our available dogs to meet the public. We need volunteers who enjoy working with people and are enthusiastic about promoting animal adoption to help set up, talk to the public about our organization, care for the dogs during the event, and promote adoptions.
Members of this team will be on call to transport our dogs & cats to and from adoption events, vet appointments, shelters, and foster homes. On occasion, team members may be asked to perform a home-safety check.
Special Event Planning
Young at Heart holds a number of special fundraising events throughout the year that are a major source of our revenue. We need volunteers to help in every stage of planning and facilitating these special events.
Marketing & Promotions - Online / Print / Merchandise / Media
If you have an interest and skill in social media networking, graphic design, production, web or app development, copywriting, photography, videography, or online marketing, Young at Heart could use your talents for the creation of print/web marketing collateral (flyers, posters, ads, merchandise, web banners/mini-sites, dog profile descriptions, photos, videos), and social media networking (writing/posting to our Twitter, Facebook, blog).
PR / Press
Young at Heart gets a good deal of press, but we need folks who have some experience reaching out to media. We're looking for folks who can write and distribute press releases, newsletters, etc.
Behavioral Training (Certified trainers only, please)
Young at Heart offers support to our new adopters and foster homes. We are looking for certified dog trainers and behavioral specialists to work directly with our new adopters and foster families.
Pet Food Pantry
Young at Heart's Pet Food Pantry program, Nina's Pet Food Pantry, provides pet food to two local human food pantries so that the clients in need of food can provide food to their four-legged family members as well. Pet Food Pantry volunteers hold pet food drives, bring pet food to and from the storage unit, and deliver to the food pantries on a weekly basis. Must be over 21 and must pass a background check for this opportunity.
Got other skills that Young at Heart can use? Tell us about them and we'll put you to work!
Interested? If you're in the Northwest suburbs of IL and can help out on a regular or on an as-needed basis, drop us a note at firstname.lastname@example.com.


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KABUL - Afghanistan has enough evidence to try only 16 of 88 prisoners that the United States considers a threat to security and plans to free the remaining detainees, the president's spokesman said on Thursday.
The move will further strain relations between the two countries that are already near breaking point over President Hamid Karzai's refusal to sign a security deal to shape the US military presence after most foreign troops leave this year. Without a deal, Washington could pull most of its troops out after 2014.
The United States is strongly opposed to their release because it says the prisoners have been involved in the wounding or killing of US and coalition troops.
The Afghan government says, however, there is no evidence against 45 of the 88 prisoners, while the evidence against a further 27 detainees is not enough to put them on trial. "We cannot allow innocent Afghan citizens to be kept in detention for months and years without a trial for no reason at all," Karzai's spokesman, Aimal Faizi, told Reuters. "We know that unfortunately this has been happening at Bagram, but it is illegal and a violation of Afghan sovereignty and we cannot allow this anymore."
The president's decision came after the head of Afghanistan's spy agency presented the cases against the prisoners at meeting on Thursday morning. US senators visiting Afghanistan last week said releasing the prisoners would irreparably damage ties with the United States, but stopped short of saying it would prompt a full military withdrawal.
Karzai has called the so-called "zero option" an empty threat and suggested any security deal can wait until after the presidential elections in April.
The United States says it needs time to prepare a post-2014 mission.


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A collection of scholarly works about individual liberty and free markets. A project of Liberty Fund, Inc.
The Intellectual Portrait Series: A Conversation wth Israel Kirzner (Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 2000). https://oll.libertyfund.org/titles/978,
|Available in the following formats:
|MP3 Audio for your computer or iPod.
|MP4A Audio for your computer or iPod.
|MP3 mono
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Kirzner discusses the differences between Austrian economics and neo-classical economics, his experiences as a student of Ludwig von Mises, and his careeer as a professor of economics at New York University.
The copyright to this edition, in both print and electronic forms, is held by Liberty Fund, Inc.
This material is put online to further the educational goals of Liberty Fund, Inc. Unless otherwise stated in the Copyright Information section above, this material may be used freely for educational and academic purposes. It may not be used in any way for profit.


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This week on Cult Sci-Fi we've got big news surrounding one of the most fantastic indie flicks staring Elvis, Bubba Ho-Tep. Bruce Campbell's deranged fight as an aged Elvis against a mummy that is haunting the halls of his old folks home is by far and away one of the strangest and most enjoyable little monster fights I've seen, and my delight was raised when the rumor that there would be yet another Bubba movie, Bubba Nosferatu, began to circulate. But as the years went by, the vampire 60s/70s Elvis flick was long since forgotten — until Paul Giamatti decided to bring the Elvis tale back from the grave. Plus more trailers and flicks to enjoy.Even though the original Ho-Tep writer Don Coscarelli was connected to Bubba Nosferatu, Bruce Campbell's decision to pass on the idea seemed to doom this picture to development purgatory. But this week, Ain't It Cool News brings us news from Paul Giamatti that hope is not lost. And it sounds like instead of doing a story about an Elvis impersonator, they are thinking about doing a fake story about an actual "lost" Elvis movie.
I don't want to give too much of it away! So yeah I'll be playing Col. Parker, who… You know part of the great thing about this is not only are these wonderful genre movies, but he's actually taking a weird, interesting take on the whole Elvis myth and kind of investigating the whole Elvis myth in a really interesting way, so it's got a lot of stuff about Col. Parker being responsible for a lot of what happened to Elvis and kind of literally making him a vampire in some ways, you know? A kind of a blood sucker… It plays on a lot of things, this movie, in a great way and it's got Sitting Bull in it and there's a peyote trip in it that is amazing and it's just a big leap beyond the other movie. It's ten times more insane and bizarre and it's great and hilarious, too. It's funnier than the other one is even. It still ends up being this great character study of this Elvis guy.
But more importantly tam all of this is the news that Ron Perlman is being vetted for the role of Elvis:
And his movies are amazing. They are totally unique, you know? So then he asked me if I was interested in doing this one and I was just like "You have got to be kidding me. Yeah, absolutely!" I said, "I have a little production company and we can help you guys do this" and he brought me in onboard and now we have got Ron Perlman interested in playing Elvis.
Now, I know that Campbell played the aged Elvis impersonator, but I'm not entirely sold that Perlman can pull off The King. I wish they would just approach Campbell again to play Elvis as he did such an amazing job last time, and it would be pretty hard to top. Perlman is great and all, but I dunno - Is there really an actor out there that can fill the shoes of Campbell? His chin alone would take at least 4 actors. I mean, Perlman can deliver playful lines as Hellboy, but does he have the snide and charisma of Campbell? Does anyone? I put it to you dear readers: Who do you think can top Bruce? Sadly though it sounds like Giamatti and friends did everything they could to get Campbell involved and he just wasn't interested. Sad. Bubba Ho-Tep Trailer:
Erasure Children: But not to leave you trailer free, we've got word of a crazy new low budget called Eraser Children, and just the name sounds like a total trip. The movie takes place in the future where Misner Corporation runs the land and will fine you for any violation they see fit (even if you laugh too loud). In this dystopia, you can buy your dreams... but you may be subjected to a few police beatings. Check out the trailer below, and for more information check out the official Erasure Children site. [AICN and Quiet Earth]


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All kinds of weather today but good viewing as I watched the team train prior to leaving for Naaaaarch.19 on show including Lopes + keepers today as they set off after a briefish talk from the boss and into the usual early warm up stuff.Keep ball circles with a difference followed.
There were 3 circles but it appeared each time the tacklers won a ball 2 players sprinted from one group to another.It was sprint too as Kolarov had to be warned off once as he tore into a new group and looked like he might launch into a tackle.He didn't of course as he's a sensible bloke. (?) Added to the the group during the circles session I think was Kreis (NY City FC ).I wasn't 100% sure from a distance.Looks quite a fit bloke from the evidence I saw.
In the background I think Nicola was recording some of her daily City news feature.Then it was time to do more practice on corners and free kicks .From the right side to the left and pretty well every variety you can think of.If anyone was spying on this work I don't think it would be easy,maybe impossible,to work out what is likely to be used in matches or if there is any signal or obvious movement to determine what is going to happen.I was impressed by the variety and execution.Seems the players knew which is all that matters.The defenders did very well in all this and were helped out on one occasion as Vinnie cleared off the line.Trouble is he was an attacker at the time and trying to get out of the way.
It ended with edge of the box direct free kicks and penalties.The master from the edge of the box was Aleks as he usually is.Took 2 scored 2 I think.The penalties were fun.Even Micah took one and left with a 100% record.The main competition was Yaya v Joe which Joe won and called for Yaya to be demoted from taking penalties.All good fun and Yaya was not 100% concentrated on the task but rather trying to bluff and double bluff Joe.Aleks and Negredo were very good and Lopes took 2 beauties.
On the way out I got another quick view of Garcia and Nasri working outside one to one with a physio and then just as was leaving ,and the rain hammered down, Kun appeared to do a little running I assume.More good news.


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When my kids were young, about the worst thing they could say about something was that it was capital-b BORRRING. You know how they stretch out the word, as in why say more?
When I used to work in politics, and people would roll their eyes and look bored, I would shake my head in amazement. How could anyone find politics, especially presidential politics, boring?
This is how. I've started to skim the stories. OK, maybe skim is overstating it. What I really do is skip them -- in favor of an item about a new drug being tested for Alzheimer's, or a shocking death in the Kennedy family, or the latest from Sanford, Fla.
Obviously, the election is important. Obviously, there are important differences between President Obama and Gov. Romney. Obviously, the stakes are high. All of those things that broadcasters and pundits (I plead guilty) say to grab your attention are true. But, at least right now, it's just not very compelling.
It was better when the Republicans were out there tearing each other apart. And I don't just mean better for Democrats. I mean better television. You know things have gotten dull when there are stories about who will play Bob Beckel (no offense, Bob) of "The Five" on "Saturday Night Live."
One of the meanest things anyone ever said about Hillary Clinton was that she reminded every man of his first wife. I don't think that's true. Most men's first wives are no Hillary Clintons -- or for all their troubles, they'd still be married to them (as is her husband).
But Romney? He's the guy you were supposed to like. Good looking, good family, great prospects, nice car. "What could you possibly see in him?" my roommate Abigail would ask me (she grew up with guys like that) during my "preppy rich boy" phase. At the time, I saw everything I wasn't. After a while, I realized it was just as well. Every time I see Romney, now that Newt Gingrich isn't attacking him and Rick Santorum isn't hectoring him, I think of the guys whose names I can't remember.
To be honest, Romney isn't the only one who's boring. The president has moments, like when he talked about gay marriage, that command your attention. But most of the time, at least where I live, he commands my attention by causing traffic backups because he's here again raising millions of dollars from people who pay $40,000 apiece to say "I had dinner with the president last night."
The only consolation to the obscene amounts of money being spent on ads that I don't want to see or hear is that I don't watch them or listen to them. Super-PACs may be an abomination, but what if no one pays any attention to them?
It will get better. Eventually. There will be conventions (which have become, in all honesty, pretty boring) and debates (which, I have to admit, also often are boring, at least for long stretches). There are moments you remember: "Read my lips..." and "I knew Jack Kennedy..." and "Are you better off..." Then again, can you remember anything from the last Obama-McCain debate? Maybe George Bush was just being real back in 1992 when he looked at his watch during his debate with Bill Clinton.
But it's likely to get worse before it gets better. The signs are already there. If you want to know the definition of desperation, it's talking about whom Romney will pick as his vice presidential candidate. Which boring guy is another boring guy going to pick? The answer is crystal clear: It will be someone you (and I) have never heard of and probably won't hear of again once the name comes out. The most interesting day will be the day before we know who it is.
Politics shouldn't be boring. People around the world are willing to fight and die for the right to participate in the political process, even as millions of us change the station. Maybe the television folks and the reporters and, yes, the candidates need to work harder to engage us in the process. Or maybe we just have to do it ourselves.


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Czech President Miloš Zeman is considering using his veto to block the new school law, his spokesman Jiří Ovčáček said, according to the news agency ČTK. Ovčáček did not give reasons for the president's possible stance. President Zeman has in the past spoken out against greater steps at schools towards the inclusion of the minority groups and children with various disabilities but this is not covered in the proposed law. It calls for obligatory leaving exams to include mathematics and for all two year olds to be offered places in schools from 2020. The president later announced his veto, arguing that the changes would put a heavy financial burden on some local councils.
Trading in New World Resources, the company owning the mining company OKD, were suspended from trading on the London Stock Exchange on Wednesday. The ČTK news agency reported that NWR is attempting to get trading suspended on the Prague and Warsaw exchanges as well. The Prague excahgne later said trading would be suspended Thursday. Shares in NWR lost around 20% of their value on the Prague exchange at opening on Wednesday where they were trading at 8 halers each.
Representatives of the Visegrad Four countries meeting in Prague have condemned a European Commission proposal aimed at fine tuning its system for sharing out immigrants. The new proposal includes cash penalties on countries which fail to take their share of the overall quota. Czech foreign minister Lubomír Zaorálek said such a proposal dividing EU countries should not have been tabled. His Hungarian counterpart Peter Szijjarto said the proposal was inadmissible and amounted to blackmail. Polish and Slovak ministers also criticized the proposal. The Visegrad ministers also attacked the Commission proposal to abolish Turkish visas, saying the country should not be given favourable treatment compared with others. Central European counties argue most immigrants don't want to come to their states. The Commission says the latest proposed measures are about solidarity.
Foreign Ministers from the Visegrad Four, currently headed by the Czech Republic, met with their counterparts from the so-called Eastern Partnership in Prague on Wednesday. The ČTK agency said the aim is to discuss the future evolution of the grouping composed of Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, Moldova, and Ukraine. Some bilateral talks were already held on Tuesday. The meeting is also being attended by the European Commissioner for Enlargement Johannes Hahn and diplomats from Germany, Sweden, and the Netherlands. The Eastern Partnership countries are being offered closer economic and diplomatic ties with the EU but not membership of the economic and political bloc.The Visegrad ministers repeated strong support for the partnership and a woillingness to deepen it further.
A court has ruled that the city of Plzeň does not have to pay a development company more than 1.85 billion crowns. The ruling was given Wednesday that compensation does not have to be offered to the company Amadeus whose plans for a large commercial centre in the city were rejected by a local referendum three years ago. The developer lodged a demand for compensation for the thwarted Corso America project in January 2015. It has a similar demand for compensation over a similar project with the city of Ostrava.
In ice hockey, the Czech squad departed for the world championship in Moscow and St. Petersburg on Wednesday. The championships begin on Friday. Czech coach Vladimír Vůjtek admitted at Prague airport that the squad is different from what he might have hoped for because some players were unavailable but that the Czechs were still capable of challenging for medals. The Czech team lost 3:0 to Canada in the last warm up game before the championships on Tuesday night.
A large number of lower house members of parliament surprising backed a motion to debate a Czech referendum on leaving the European Union on Tuesday, the daily Mladá Fronta Dnes reported Wednesday. It said 96 out of 169 members backed putting the issue on the agenda for debate this session. The move was even backed by some lawmakers from the governing Social Democrat and ANO parties, it reported.
The Prime Minister Bohuslav Sobotka, leaders of the other two government coalition parties, Ministers for Industry and Trade, Labour and Social Affairs, and Justice met on Wednesday to discuss the situation surrounding the hard coal mining company OKD. The mining company, which employs around 12,000, on Tuesday filed for insolvency with debts of around 17 billion crowns. Sobotka said later the government wants to stabilize the situation around OKD and ensure operations can continue. One of the main issues now being focused on is who the court will name as insolvency manager. This could have a major influence on how the company is managed in the interim before its final fate is resolved. Minister of Justice Robert Pelikán told Czech Television on Tuesday that the government wanted some say in the naming of the insolvency manager.
Organisers say 10,000 people have already registered to take part in this year's To Work By Bike drive, for which the closing date for registration is May 8. Last year nearly 7,000 people took part in the nationwide event, which is organised by the Auto*Mat civic group. Among those participating in the sixth edition has been the minister of transport, Dan Ťok, who on Tuesday cycled to work for the first time.
Among the winners of the Czech Journalism Prize for 2015 were Hospodářské noviny columnist Petr Honzejk, Martin Veselovský of online debate show DVTV and Magdalena Sodomková from Lidové noviny. Thirteen journalists received awards at Tuesday evening's presentation ceremony in Prague. The Journalism Prize is bestowed by the Open Society Fund Prague. Jury members said a high number of the 360 pieces of journalism they had considered concerned the migrant crisis.


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On the road
I am sitting at the computer this pristine winter morning recovering from two days on the road.
On Thursday, I traveled to central Minnesota to speak to two libraries as a part of their series of "author talks." At the first talk, nobody showed. So I visited with the librarian. Eventually, a woman came with Fertile connections. We shared some Fertile gossip. Then a twelve-year-old who had been too shy to show up on time arrived, chastened, with her mother and we went over a short story she had started. That was fun.
I drove to the second town, took a nap in the car and went to my second presentation. The woman who was hosting was there, as was her mother-in-law, who made it clear that she was just there to keep her daughter-in-law company "in case nobody showed up," which is just what happened.
So, 360 miles, a nice fat check––and no presentations.
Oh well.
Yesterday, I drove to Thief River Falls to a children's writer's conference where I worked with three sections of 5th-7th graders. The presentations were an hour long. The kids were a delight. They are intelligent and they love to read. We had many good laughs.
But the experience required a two-and-a-half hour nap once I got home. I don't know how teachers do it.


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Google's 'evil' stock splitApril 1, 2014: 12:38 PM ET
The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Paul R. La Monica. Other than Time Warner, the parent of CNNMoney, Abbott Laboratories and AbbVie, La Monica does not own positions in any individual stocks.
It's been almost 10 years since Google famously told the world in its filing for an initial public offering that "don't be evil" was a guiding principle for the company.
But Google is about to issue new shares to existing investors which have absolutely no voting rights. Isn't that sorta evil?
If you owned Google (GOOG) as of March 27, you will wind up with twice as many shares at half the price when the markets open on April 3. The old Google Class A shares will trade under the new ticker symbol of GOOGL. That comes with the right to a vote at the annual shareholder meeting.
The new Class C Google shares will trade under the old ticker symbol of GOOG. They have no vote. So while the value of your investment will not change, your say over how Google runs the company will.
Related: As Gmail turns 10, a look back at how Google came to dominate e-mail
Why is Google doing this? To further consolidate power among the Google leadership triumvirate of CEO Larry Page, chairman Eric Schmidt and co-founder Sergey Brin.
Keep in mind those three already control more than 61% of the voting power for Google because they are the largest owners of Class B shares. Those shares are not listed publicly ... and they have 10 votes per share compared to one vote for the Class A shares.
Cue the Imperial Death March theme from the original Star Wars trilogy. (I'm pretending Episodes 1 through 3 don't exist.)
Even before this stock split, Google was viewed by some as the New York Yankees of tech stocks: the proverbial Evil Empire. This move is the equivalent of making the Death Star fully operational. (Watch out, Alderaan!)
As the company explained/spun when they first announced the proposal for the split nearly two years ago, the new share structure was "designed to preserve the corporate structure that has allowed Google to remain focused on the long term."
Translation: Nobody else really matters when it comes to decision making. We might as well be a private company.
Unsurprisingly, some shareholders were not pleased with the proposal. The fact that it has taken this long for the split to go into effect is because some shareholders sued to block it.
Google settled with that group last June. Google agreed to stricter board reviews of some acquisitions using company stock and also agreed to compensate shareholders if the new C shares begin to trade at a discount to the A shares with voting rights. And I think that is exactly what should and will happen. But more about that in a bit.
Related: Google and Facebook are in a tech cold war
Google is not the only company to play this game. Many media firms, particularly family-run ones, also have two shares of stock. That's the case for Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. -- (NWS), (NWSA) -- and Twenty-First Century Fox -- (FOX), (FOXA). Ditto for Sumner Redstone's CBS -- (CBS), (CBSA) and Viacom -- (VIA), (VIAB).
And cable giant Comcast has three classes of shares like Google. Two trade publicly: (CMCSA) and (CMCSK). The shares with a symbol ending in A have a vote. The ones with the not-so-special K do not. Comcast's Class B shares are held by a company controlled by CEO Brian Roberts -- whose father, Ralph, founded Comcast.
So why am I making such a fuss of this? Google is supposed to be different than the rest of the tech sector. This is a firm that started as a plucky David going up against the Goliath of Microsoft (MSFT). Google now is worth more than Microsoft. It's no longer fighting "The Man." It is "The Man."
The point of owning a stock is that you don't just profit from the company's success. You also have a say -- albeit small -- in how it is run. Google is throwing that out the window. Ironically, the company that owns YouTube is saying that "You" don't matter.
The notion that Google shareholders have any real rights is a Woody Allen-esque travesty of a mockery of a sham of a mockery of a travesty of two mockeries of a sham. The company wants you to blindly put its faith in Page, Brin and Schmidt and hope for the best.
To be fair, Google shareholders have been rewarded handsomely by that trio so far. Google's stock is up more than 40% in the past year and has surged 220% in the past five years.
And if you were lucky enough to own Google since it went public, you might want to name your sons (or daughters, I'm not judging) after Larry, Sergey or Eric. Google's stock is up an astonishing 1,235% from its IPO price of $85.
Still, isn't it reckless for an investor to throw caution completely to the wind and trust that Page, Brin and Schmidt will never make a mistake? The tech sector is full of companies that were once leaders who failed to adapt to changing times.
Luckily, Google has not made any notable blunders -- well, none that had a lasting impact on the stock. It is a forward-looking company that doesn't worry as much about what Wall Street and short-term oriented traders think about the company.
So while I wouldn't necessarily advise investors to drop Google -- it is, after all, a phenomenal company -- no investor in their right mind should ever buy the new class C shares.
In fact, if I were an existing Google investor, I'd sell the Class C shares I receive in order to buy more A shares. That way, my vote would still count as much in the future.


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Shouty Jay Mariotti says he'll miss Tony Kornheiser on MNF, a man with whom he feuded cattily for indeterminate reasons over the years. This seems mystifyingly bighearted until you realize he's actually writing about himself.
I thank him because he did the sportswriting profession proud in his three years on Monday Night Football. Kornheiser technically isn't a sportswriter anymore, having escaped the dying newspaper business like many of us, but when he was hired for one of the most high-profile assignments in sports television, he was dismissed by many viewers and critics as a columnist painfully out of his league.
As it turned out, he often carried the prime-time broadcast with his sharp observations and well-grooved wit, providing the background knowledge necessary to pull off the sideshow shtick. ... Kornheiser, a journalist at heart, knew that the style couldn't exist without the substance.
I'm sad to say that no one's going to be putting another sportswriter in that booth or any other booth. Kornheiser is the first and last of a breed.
The column is a bro-hug from one increasingly irrelevant sports columnist-cum-TV personage to another, which I suppose is sad in its own way. But then here comes Mariotti, basically using Kornheiser to loudly proclaim his own value in this modern age, when "the written word stopped being more powerful than the spoke word."
I am one of those writers — a regular on Around The Horn, the lively, seven-seasons-and-running debate show that precedes PTI on weekday afternoons — and our target audience of thirtysomethings, twentysomethings and teens clearly likes to watch more than read. ... AOL has an enormous monthly audience of sports readers on FanHouse, and when the site launches video, that's when quantum leaps in viewership will take place. It's a video age.
Point being, the people on the video screen have to be informative and compelling.
People like Tony Kornheiser, Mariotti writes, and here's wagering he can think of another. The psychologists, I believe, call this projection.
Admit it: You'll Miss Kornheiser on MNF [FanHouse]


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A Hue Is Born.
For over 22 years, our team has been widely renowned for professional excellence throughout the nail care industry. Combining our passion for nails and color along with our extensive expertise, we have joined forces to create the stylish, cutting-edge nail polish brand, Polish & Co.
Polish & Co.'s love affair with the art of nails has led to the birth of our debut nail polish line, "Hue Loves Me… Hue Loves Me Not".
The collection consists of 17 unique and enchanting hues, all lovingly designed to compliment a wide variety of skin tones.
Polish & Co. believes that everyone deserves to look beautiful without the worry of harmful chemicals. All of our products are proudly made in the USA and are toxin free without any DBP or cancer causing agents.
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PS: You can also follow them on twitter.
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a Rafflecopter giveaway
* I wasn't paid or didn't receive anything in any way. I'm not responsible for the shipping of the prize. I'm not affiliated with this company.


text:
Knowledge is power. Using it is powerful.
Support teams have a lot of knowledge about customer issues—and the best way to solve them. Zendesk Guide is a smart knowledge base that helps tap into that institutional knowledge and puts it to work. With Guide, you can quickly build a customizable help center, online community, and customer portal so customers get better self-service and agents see improved efficiency and faster resolution. And since it's the only knowledge base native to Zendesk, it integrates seamlessly with Zendesk Support.
Grow what you know
Capture your agents' collective knowledge and build on it over time to respond to support requests more effectively.
Give them the good stuff
Give customers the most relevant answers and information automatically—and in context—for a faster self-service experience.
Be better with bots
AI powered Answer Bot can resolve high-frequency, low-touch tickets by sending customers relevant articles while they wait for an agent.
Get smarter as you go
Measure and score the popularity and effectiveness of your content to see what needs work, and what you should write next.
Support + Guide
A powerful pair
Zendesk Support works with Guide to make your knowledge base smarter. When customers use self-service, Guide tracks that activity and sends it to Support in the form of contextual insights in Pathfinder that help agents analyze customer activity and solve tickets faster. This info is fed back into Guide, which continuously improves and refines the info it offers to both agents and customers.
You have what it takes
With Guide, setting up a well-stocked knowledge base is easy. The Knowledge Capture app allows agents to turn every customer interaction into new content, flag old content for improvements, and even search for articles to share in tickets. Content managers can also rely on their entire team to contribute to content, including everything from approval and publishing workflows to vetting new articles and improving upon old ones — ensuring the best content is presented to both customers and agents.
Know thy self-service
Guide lets you create a single version of your content and then distribute it everywhere at once. You don't have to worry about device incompatibility or what version of content is out in the wild. Articles are automatically optimized so they're easy to find on search engines or on your own help center. And with Zendesk Embeddables, the most relevant articles are matched and recommended to customers based on their browsing activity.
Thanks a bot
The Guide Answer Bot lends agents a helping hand, reducing their workload and freeing them up to focus on problems that require a human touch. Using artificial intelligence, Answer Bot automatically resolves high-frequency and low-touch tickets by suggesting relevant articles to customers while they wait for an agent. And Answer Bot keeps getting smarter. It learns from each customer interaction and trains itself to deliver more relevant and customized content with each solved ticket.


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Johnny! enjoy! and don't blow up your beautiful vintage speakers tonight.
Johnny! enjoy! and don't blow up your beautiful vintage speakers tonight.
Happy birthday
Happy Birthday!
"Make it sound like dinosaurs eating cars"
- Nick Lowe, while producing Elvis Costello
Have a wonderful birthday, Johnny! I always look forward to your informed posts. Hearing speakers like yours when they were new turned me on to JBL around 1969.
Clark in Peoria
Information is not Knowledge; Knowledge is not Wisdom
Too many audiophiles listen with their eyes instead of their ears
Congratulations on your first four decades. Now that you've survived the dangerous years of your youth, you can really start to live in the good decades to come.
Best to you!
Happppppppyyyyyy BIRTHDAY and many many more.
Thanks a lot guys.
Had lots of family here for the celebration (1000 miles travel). Four days of celebrating has been just fantastic, with the grand finale on saturday.
Johnny Haugen Sørgård
Happy Birthday, Johnny.
Hope you had a great one!!
Welcome to the 40's. Youth is wasted on the young
Edgewound...JBL Pro Authorized...since 1988
Upland Loudspeaker Service, Upland, CA
Happy Birthday young fella,hope you had a blast
Happy birthday..hope it was one good one
Have a good one!
There are currently 1 users browsing this thread. (0 members and 1 guests)


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I am having troubles developing a sandwich ELISA for a secreted extracellular protein, size 262 kDa, for human serum and other bodily fluids.
I coat with a Chicken pAb and detect with rabbit pAb. I see very high background with an OD of around 0.4 in the blanks and the standard curve seems to saturate with an OD over the entire curve of 1.6-1.5. The samples vary from 1.5 to 0.6 depending on the dilution.
My protocol is:
Coat at 4 ug/ml in 10mM carbonate buffer, pH 9.6 overnight at 4C
Wash 4 times with 250ul of PBS w/ Tween20 0.05%
Block with 3% BSA in PBS, 2hours, RT
Wash 5 times 250ul PBST
Add samples/standard diluted in 1% BSA
Wash 7 times 250ul PBST
Add biotinylated detection Ab diluted in 1% BSA
Wash 7 times 250ul PBST
Add strep-HRP diluted in 1% BSA
Wash 9 times 300ul PBST
Detect with TMB, stop with H2SO4
I use an automatic plate washer and I have cleaned the entire system and made all new buffers in case their was contamination. The Abs do not contain sodium azide so as to interfere with the HRP. This is a very similar protocol to what I used in a previous lab with great results. Maybe its the antibodies?
Any suggestions would be most helpful! Thank you in advance!
Submit your paper to J Biol Methods today!
ELISA not working
Started by alexanam, Aug 07 2009 11:40 AM
No replies to this topic


text: going to the Buffulo rally in mossel bay next weekend , if so pm me an we make a plan to share a beer or 2. Anyone from JHB? My plan is to leave jhb at around 5 AM and pretty much head straight there to get there at about 4 or so stopping for brunch and generally taking a relaxed ride. cheers


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A Sandwich a Day: Crispy Soft Shell Crab at Japonais
Reviews of Chicago sandwiches.
The first thing you'll notice about this sandwich is that it has legs. This isn't a bunch of crab mashed into a nice patty for your sandwich pleasure. It's an entire soft shell crab, and it's a gem on Japonais's sushi-heavy menu.
The crispy soft shell crab sandwich ($14) tastes just how an entire living creature should: fresh. Take away the wow factor, and the truth is only about 50 percent of your bites have crab in them. But the crab you do get is worth it. It's soft on the inside with a thin but crispy shell, which breaks off easily. While presented nicely balanced on the bun, you'll end up having to use your knife and fork by the end (which in my opinion adds to the raw nature of tearing apart a whole animal at lunch).
The wasabi mayo and pickled veggies in the shallot escabeche give a great combination of spicy and vinegar flavor. The avocado and mayo together make it super creamy, almost excessively so, but the crab is good enough for me not to care too much.
600 W. Chicago Avenue, Chicago IL 60610 (map)
All products linked here have been independently selected by our editors. We may earn a commission on purchases, as described in our affiliate policy.


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Story highlights
- People who survived Katrina and the Joplin tornado share their experiences, wisdom
- Their advice: Stand in the ruins of your old life; it's fine to be sad
- Ask for help and give help, no matter how large or small, they say
- They say it will get better, but it will always stay with you
Devastation is devastation, whether a hurricane rips up your home or a tornado takes the person you love most in the world. It's loss, shock and confusion. It's anger and sadness and resentment. It's being flustered like you've never been flustered before.
But it's going to be OK: Take it from the people who survived Hurricane Katrina and the Missourians from Joplin whose town was leveled by the worst tornado in U.S. history.
They want Sandy survivors to know a few things:
You're probably on autopilot right now. You're moving through it. Stand in the ruins of the life you had before the disaster. Understand that was before. The after is when you're good and ready.
Hours will still go by though. Days will happen. You might not remember to eat because you're filling out paperwork and talking to insurance operators. You will get put on hold.
Your life will feel forever on hold.
At some point, when you think you're handling it, you will stumble on something that reminds you of that old life, maybe it's a thing or it's a memory. Maybe this will happen when you finally get the sleep you've gone without since the disaster. You're going to feel really, really awful again for awhile.
Make yourself anew
Eileen Romero still feels the weight on her chest. It has just gotten a little lighter in the years since Katrina. As a nurse, she saw heinous things in the hospital where she worked. Eight years on, it's hard to speak in full sentences without crying.
She watched the wall-to-wall television coverage of Hurricane Sandy, transfixed by the nurses who manually pumped air into newborns after carrying the infants down nine fights of stairs at NYU Langone Medical Center.
"I was right back in that hospital in New Orleans," Romero said. "I know those people. I felt that."
There are always burdens and rewards of being a caregiver. But in emergencies, they are tenfold.
"They need to know it's going to be hard," Romero continued. "I mean, they saved those babies and they should feel good. But later it might hit them what they were able to get through just because they were trained to do that. And I would tell them, 'It's alright to be upset and to take time out to understand what you've been through.' "
It was comforting to Romero to watch the coverage of Sandy. While she was in the middle of Katrina, she didn't consider that it was the world's focus for days.
"I didn't even realize that we were being covered 24 hours a day," she said. "It was only months later that I comprehended that New Orleans was on TV all the time, that people cared so much about it."
Then again, there's another side to massive media coverage. People might feel obligated to talk about their pain if a reporter asks.
If you don't have the words, you don't have to conjure up something for anyone. No one else has the right to your story. Tell it when and how you want.
Romero became a photographer after Katrina because words kept failing her. When she tried to talk about it, her words were inadequate.
"Understand that the life you had before something like this isn't coming back, and that's not always a bad thing," she said. "Discover and make yourself anew."
Look for what's funny
Every day, Romero takes her Yorkies out for a walk. It's a simple, effortless routine that has nothing to do with bad things in the world. Find something like that, or keep doing that one, pure, sweet thing that you always did, she said.
You're going to need lightness. Your sense of humor will be tested. Use it a lot.
You might have to move into a place that you'd never imagined you'd ever have to live, like a trailer or someone's garage. This could last for months, maybe a whole year. Your kids, spouse, in-laws and maybe some strangers will all be crammed in there. They might snore.
There are going to be fights and moments where you swear your head is gonna pop.
Writer Michael Tisserand and his wife, Tami, took damage to their home in Katrina. They and their two kids -- now 11 and 14 -- moved in with a friend.
"We were laughing about sleeping in these two twin beds that were squished together," Tisserand recalled. "We were getting food stamps for food banks for the first time. When you're learning about how it feels to be suddenly dependent on others, you have to look for what's funny."
Ask for help, give help
Don't be afraid to give or receive help, he said. Don't sit inside.
Try not to compare your pain or loss to someone else's. You don't have to swim through your living room to say you've been through hell.
Tisserand remembers being stunned and then weeping uncontrollably when he received a package from a friend.
It was a new laptop.
"You will feel helpless. I just felt like I was not the agency of my life then," he said. "It was so unbelievable to me that someone did that for me."
When anyone gives you anything, small or large, cheap or expensive, know that they are trying to be there for you.
The Tisserands are at home in New Orleans, a city they never want to leave. For many disaster survivors, the tragedy redefines their definition of home.
Take pictures of everything
Kelly Maddy grew up in Joplin, Missouri. The 29-year-old and his wife thought it would be fun to go out and chase a tornado that was set to hit in April 2011. Tornadoes got little more than a shrug in Missouri, so this wasn't really the craziest decision.
It's like choosing to stay at home when there's a Category 1 hurricane forecast for your area. You've gotten through nor'easters before, so what's the harm?
When the Maddys finally made it back to their house, it was kindling. Their cars were gone.
"The night was a blur," he said. "You just stare and wonder what happened to my life? Then the panic."
"Document everything," Maddy said. "Every single insurance person you talk to -- and you'll be bounced around from person to person -- write their name down, write down everything they say. Use your iPhone. Take pictures of everything."
Know what supplies you have and how much you're going to need. Get that stuff soon. Don't put it off, he said.
There's going to be a level of bureaucracy worse than you ever imagined. Insurance workers will be kind, of course, because it's not personal. It's just the system.
Call them constantly. Don't expect them to call you, he said.
The Maddys lived in a basement apartment with their animals until finally rebuilding their house in February.
"Going through all of that almost broke us," he said. "Almost. 'Cause we're still here."