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Mary Triller, MDiv, MTH
Life Consultant
Personal, Professional and Spiritual Fulfillment
What does it mean to be fulfilled? It's that indescribable sense of well-being and equanimity that is born out of knowing we are living the moments of our lives and relationships from our best, most evolved selves. It's the peace and contentment that arises when we are capable of making conscious, aware and positive choices about how we show up day to day – choices that honor ourselves and those we care about. Living a fulfilled life is reflected in the ability to let go of habits, beliefs and patterns which no longer serve us, and reach out for, grow into and actualize the qualities of the person we most desire to be.
It would be my deepest privilege and honor to help you step into the most fulfilled life possible: personally, professionally and spiritually. My clients receive the benefit of thirty years of professional experience and expertise resulting in competent and caring guidance customized from a wide range of personal growth, therapeutic and healing modalities, offered in an environment of compassion, grace, safety and trust.
I provide integrated and insightful assistance in three areas of life:
- resolving relationship struggles
- expanding self-awareness and self-care
- navigating life transitions
- healing from grief and loss
- managing stress and anxiety
- building resiliency and letting go of shame
- enhancing physical, mental and emotional well-being
- Career and life purpose exploration
- Resolving workplace challenges and dynamics
- Constructing work and life balance
- Entrepreneurial and business management consultation (tax deductible)
- Growth and discernment on the spiritual journey
- Deepening connections with that which is greater than ourselves
- Mindfulness and meditation practices
- Creating a foundation of meaning that informs all aspects of life
- Awakening to and living from our True Self
No one ever contacts me saying, "My world is perfect, can you help me fix it?" It's when some aspect of our lives or relationships has become painful, puzzling or challenging that we look to outside resources. Family and friends care deeply about us and want to provide support. But often we benefit most from an objective and professional perspective, someone who doesn't have a stake in what we're going through or what the outcome will be and who can help us see the bigger picture.
I believe that no matter what you are currently facing or struggling with, that you are not, and have never been broken or anything less than whole. As Leonard Cohen wrote in the lyrics for "Anthem," "There is a crack in everything. That's how the light gets in." I commit to helping you, as I have hundreds of others, get in touch with your own innate light, wisdom and wholeness so you experience living from joy, meaning, authenticity, integrity and fulfillment.
In addition to meeting with people in my Scottsdale location, I'm also available via Skype, FaceTime and phone for at-distance sessions. My clientele is international.
About Me
Who am I? I'm someone very much like you.
We're alike in the vital ways necessary for me to help you transform your life and relationships into what you dream they could be.
As long as I can remember I have felt a deep yearning for my own world to be increasingly rich and meaningful, with less pain and struggle, with more joy and well-being.
Like you, I have:
- experienced heartache beyond what I ever believed possible
- made mistakes in a variety of ways
- failed in relationships, hurting others and myself
- made choices resulting in regret and shame
- known profound loss, was wounded as a child and betrayed as an adult by people I loved and trusted
- walked through a dark night of the soul, wondering if I would ever find my way out of the pain
How does my having intimate and personal knowledge of the difficult side of life make me a qualified, competent and deeply compassionate resource for you in your life transitions and transformations?
The answer is that my life journey has been and continues to be the powerful motivation for on-going exploration personally, professionally and academically into all aspects of our amazing, and sometimes confusing and challenging, human journey.
I am constantly motivated by a desire to understand:
- how to get unstuck from the ways we get stuck
- how to live in less fear and more strength and courage
- how to stop doing the unhelpful things we do
- how to hurt less and love more
- how to forgive others and, most importantly, ourselves
- how to go from being confused and lost in life to being focused and clear
- how to choose and maintain lives and relationships that are fulfilling and meaningful
That same desire causes me to dive deeply into the meaning of life, the "what's it all about, anyway" arena. In the process:
- I've collected degrees and certifications, attended countless workshops and conferences, participated in many groups, read way too many books (Amazon loves me!), worked with hundreds of clients in all walks of life and consistently engage those who cross my path in the "how do we transform our lives?" conversation.
- I've practiced actualizing personal growth through my own life experience, personal and professional development and career path.
- I've researched and integrated ways to create positive and meaningful relationships, learned how to heal wounds and move on from grief and loss, tested formulas created to transform us more fully into who and how we are meant to be (are born to be).
- I've gained an intimate understanding of how to be instruments of our own liberation instead of causing ourselves more suffering.
- I'm on an on-going spiritual pilgrimage, searching the world's religions and countless spiritual paths for core truths, beauty and goodness.
In other words I've done, and continue to do, the homework and research for me AND you. This journey I've described, this living always more consciously, intentionally and responsibly, is what I care most about in my own life and what I believe I'm here to help people do in theirs.
Hand in hand with my passion for my own personal transformation and spiritual depth is a calling to walk with others on their path of healing, growth and as they learn to live from a place of possibility, potential and joy.
The Nature of Consciousness
"The part of you that is unhampered by illusion – the illusion of time, the illusion of powerlessness, the illusion of impossibility – is waiting for you to slow down and open up so it can speak to your consciousness. In some unguarded moment you will hear its wildly improbable words and know that they are guiding you home."
– Martha Beck –
About You
This may be the first time you are taking an intentional step to build relationships with more meaning and a life with more purpose. You may be unsure what to do, how to do it, what resources would be best for you or which direction to turn for help. You just know you want things to be different than they are.
Or, it could be you have already identified some of what is getting in the way of real and sustainable change:
- An old or current wound, a grief that holds you captive, a sense of sadness, a fear of the unknown, of failure, rejection, being vulnerable, or being seen.
- A struggle filled relationship that looms large and takes energy to manage and survive.
- An inability to clearly see the path, repeatedly falling into painfully familiar ruts and holes.
Maybe you are already focused on transforming your relationships and life:
- You read books, take courses, attend workshops, meditate and use a variety of personal growth methods, but you are still stuck and perhaps even paralyzed.
- You have ideas and insights but are unsure how to incorporate them in everyday life. You know better, but you are having trouble doing things differently.
- You succeed in making change temporarily but fall back into old patterns and end up feeling discouraged, frustrated and maybe even hopeless about ever really changing.
Or, perhaps you are making headway and have a taste of a more fulfilling life. Now you want to go even deeper, to transform even more of your world in meaningful ways. You long to more fully serve your highest purpose, honoring yourself and the people you care most about.
If any of the above feels familiar you've come to the right place at the right time.
The Nature of Choice
"At any given moment you have the power to say: This is not how the story is going to end."
~ Christine Mason Miller ~
Clarity Call
Free 20-minute Clarity Call: A first step in discovering whether working together would be life and relationship transforming for you could be for us to set up a free 20-minute Clarity Call.
Prior to the call I'll send a list of questions that will:
- help you outline the desired quality and meaning of your life and/or relationships
- bring into focus what you want to accomplish in our sessions
- identify how the landscape of your life would change in positive and tangible ways as a result of our sessions together and your investment in yourself
During the call we'll cover the information you've provided, as well as explore any additional insights or questions that come up during our conversation.
Engaging in a Clarity Call gives both of us important and necessary knowledge:
- You will get a good sense of whether you feel comfortable, confident and trusting of who I am and how I work.
- I will be assessing whether I have the skills and abilities necessary for what you want to accomplish. (The most effective professionals are people who clearly know their area of expertise and ethically won't take clients they can't assist)
- If you have worked with a professional resource of any kind, you know that personality fit can be as important as skills and expertise in a successful partnership. We both need to feel a sense of comfort and ease with each other.
- If you've not engaged in support services before, I promise you'll intuitively know within these 20 minutes whether or not I'm someone you want to spend time with and if I can make a positive difference in the quality of your life and relationships.
If the outcome of the Clarity Call is "Yes, let's work together!" the next step is to determine what course of action best fits your unique situation. We'll go over the programs and service I offer, including the cost of each, and decide which one best suits your situation.
Or, if it becomes clear during our call that moving forward isn't feasible for you and/or me I will gladly offer any direction I can regarding what other options you might want to consider.
Lastly, many people find that just the process of filling out the questionnaire, plus the Clarity Call, is enough to see the landscape of their lives in a new light which then opens up fresh possibilities. That outcome, in and of itself, uncovers new paths and directions that weren't visible before.
So trust yourself and give yourself the gift of a Clarity Call. I look forward to talking with you!
Beyond Brokenness
There is a brokenness
out of which comes the unbroken,
a shatteredness
out of which blooms the unshatterable.
There is a sorrow
beyond all grief which leads to joy
and a fragility
out of whose depths emerges strength.
There is a hollow space
too vast for words
through which we pass with each loss,
and out of whose darkness
we are sanctioned into being.
There is a cry deeper than all sound
whose serrated edges cut the heart
as we break open to the place inside
which is unbreakable and whole,
while learning to sing.
~ Reshani Rea ~
Professional Profile
Following her calling to be a catalyst in the world for heart-centered and purpose driven lives, Mary began her fulfilling career working in nonprofit therapeutic settings counseling clients having a wide range of life and relationship issues. She then helped create and co-owned a successful counseling agency. It was from here that Mary was recruited to join the Employee Assistance Program (EAP) of one of the largest financial services companies in Canada. There she added to her growing experience by counseling employees regarding personal, family and work-related challenges.
Mary became Manager of the EAP which provided counseling services to over six thousand employees and their families throughout Canada. She was a key member of the:
- Human Resources Team
- Workplace Wellness Initiative
- Medical Advisory group
In the above role Mary played a significant part in the creation of a business environment maximizing employee effectiveness and well-being.
Later in her career, Mary managed the corporate contract for a nation-wide network of mental health professionals to provide 24/7 services to the organization's employees and their families. As well, while acting as an internal consultant to management at all levels of the organization, she advised on how to best support troubled employees, restore productivity and enhance performance. She also provided training and education on a wide range of workplace, personal and family issues.
Working in the corporate world, Mary honed business related coaching and consulting skills as well as in-depth counseling expertise in the vast continuum of issues that several thousand employees and their families represent. Her empathy for the human experience is based on the privilege she has had to work with so many people along their life journey.
Returning to a private counseling practice for individuals, couples and families, Mary spent 30 years using her multi-faceted expertise and deep insight to help clients create personal relationships rich with connection and meaning and lives abundant with purpose and value.
During the last five years Mary has integrated all aspects of her career experience, professional training and personal journey into the role of Life Consultant, assisting clients in reaching personal, professional and spiritual fulfillment.
An abiding belief in the sacredness of life and the transforming and healing power of grace, hope and compassion provides the foundation for Mary's personal life, professional work and spiritual journey.
Mary enjoys living in Scottsdale, AZ. Time with family and friends is her first love, followed by reading on a vast array of topics, poetry and soaking up all forms of theatre.
Mary earned a Master's degree in both Divinity and Theology, majoring in counseling. An extensive two year counseling internship program at Interfaith Counselling Centre in Kitchener, Ontario, Canada (accredited by the American Association of Marital and Family Therapy) gave Mary the foundational expertise to work with individuals, couples and families as well as a deep regard for diversity.
Training Experience
- Managing Stress
- Creating sustainable change
- Understanding Personality Style
- Surmounting workplace challenges and navigating career paths
- Healing from grief, loss and relationship and life wounds
- Marriage and relationship skills
- Family dynamics and pressures including parenting, eldercare and blended.
- Coping with mental health challenges
- Critical Incident Debriefing
- Grief and Loss
- EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing )
- EFT (Emotional Freedom Technique)
The Nature of Belief
"A belief is only a thought you continue to think. A belief is nothing more than a chronic pattern of thought, and you have the ability -if you try even a little bit- to begin a new pattern, to tell a new story, to achieve a different vibration, to change your point of attraction."
~ Esther Hicks ~
Services I Provide
Grief Recovery Method
Are you suffering from a broken heart?
Did a death, divorce, or the end of a romantic relationship cause it? Or was it caused by any of the forty other losses that a person might experience such as moving, pet loss, or a change in finances? Regardless of the cause, you know how you feel and it probably isn't good. You might feel sad, distracted, or confused. You are not alone. The Grief Recovery Method has been helping people feel better following a loss for 40 years.
We aren't going to tell you, "We know how you feel," because we don't. Neither does anyone else. What we will do is provide a safe environment where you will be given specific tools to help you recover from loss and ultimately lead a happier life.
The Problem
Grief is the normal and natural emotional response to loss, but most of the information we've learned about dealing with loss is intellectual. Although working through the Grief Recovery Method involves some educational elements, effective Grief Recovery must deal with your broken heart, which requires emotional support instead of intellectual explanations.
Myths about Grief
Time heals all wounds
Replace the loss
Grieve alone
Be strong
Don't feel bad
Keep busy
The Solution
People say you have to let go and move on in your life, but they don't tell you how. The Grief Recovery Method, developed and refined over the past 30 years, teaches you how to recover from loss with supportive guidance every step of the way.
Who Is It For
The Grief Recovery Method is for anyone who has experienced any kind of loss.
Is it Ever Too Soon to Start Grief Recovery
No! It is never too soon to address your grief. If you broke your leg would you wait to call the doctor? Then why wait to get help when you break your heart? You've probably heard that time heals all wounds. That piece of misinformation creates the idea that you just have to wait to feel better. We have known people who have waited ten, twenty, thirty, and forty years, and still didn't feel better. And they would tell you that not only had time not healed them, but also it compounded the pain. It's not time that heals, but what you do within time.
A Grief Recovery Method Specialist assists you to look at your old beliefs about dealing with loss, which losses have affected your life, and take actions that will lead you to complete unresolved emotions that may still be causing you pain.
Don't wait any longer. Time alone will not heal your broken heart.
(The above information was taken from www.griefrecoverymethod.com)
Mary Triller, MDiv, MTh, is a Certified Grief Recovery Specialist and provides Grief Recovery at Optimal You.
Emotional Freedom Techniques (EFT) - Tapping
What is EFT – Tapping?
Millions of people are settling for lives filled with poor health and emotional baggage. Not knowing how to achieve the joyful and satisfying lives they desire, they're stuck accepting a lifestyle of emotional trauma, chronic physical pain, compulsions and addictions, or perhaps just an empty feeling inside. Along with these problems come pills to kill the pain, sleep at night, and suppress anxiety – but this is hardly better than the disease.
If you're like many people, you feel trapped, caught in this cycle. You're tired of feeling sad, depressed, anxious, discontent, and unwell. You're sick of the expensive and ineffective treatments. You're fed up with relinquishing the power over your health and happiness to psychologists and doctors. You'd like to grow, flourish, and thrive, putting the past in the past. You want to be your best, living a life that is filled with peacefulness, joy, and fulfillment, from day to day and moment to moment.
With Tapping, you can do that. You can discover the vital secret for emotional wholeness and physical relief. You can take your physical and emotional well-being into your own hands. It's simple for anyone to master, and it's free.
Tapping provides relief from chronic pain, emotional problems, disorders, addictions, phobias, post traumatic stress disorder, and physical diseases. While Tapping is newly set to revolutionize the field of health and wellness, the healing concepts that it's based upon have been in practice in Eastern medicine for over 5,000 years. Like acupuncture and acupressure, Tapping is a set of techniques which utilize the body's energy meridian points. You can stimulate these meridian points by tapping on them with your fingertips – literally tapping into your body's own energy and healing power.
Your body is more powerful than you can imagine… filled with life, energy, and a compelling ability for self-healing. With Tapping, you can take control of that power.
So How Does It All Work?
All negative emotions are felt through a disruption of the body's energy. And physical pain and disease are intricately connected to negative emotions. Health problems create feedback – physical symptoms cause emotional distress, and unresolved emotional problems manifest themselves through physical symptoms. So, the body's health must be approached as a whole. You cannot treat the symptoms without addressing the cause, and vice-versa.
The body, like everything in the universe, is composed of energy. Restore balance to the body's energy, and you will mend the negative emotions and physical symptoms that stem from the energy disruption. Tapping restores the body's energy balance, and negative emotions are conquered.
The basic technique requires you to focus on the negative emotion at hand: a fear or anxiety, a bad memory, an unresolved problem, or anything that's bothering you. While maintaining your mental focus on this issue, use your fingertips to tap 5-7 times each on 12 of the body's meridian points. Tapping on these meridian points – while concentrating on accepting and resolving the negative emotion – will access your body's energy, restoring it to a balanced state.
You may be wondering about these meridians. Put simply, energy circulates through your body along a specific network of channels. You can tap into this energy at any point along the system.
This concept comes from the doctrines of traditional Chinese medicine, which referred to the body's energy as "ch'i." In ancient times, the Chinese discovered 100 meridian points. They also discovered that by stimulating these meridian points, they could heal. Call it energy, call it the Source, call it life force, call it ch'i… Whatever you want to call it, it works.
In some ways, Tapping is similar to acupuncture. Like Tapping, acupuncture achieves healing through stimulating the body's meridians and energy flow. However, unlike Tapping, acupuncture involves needles! "No needles" is definitely one of the advantages of Tapping.
Acupuncture also takes years to master. Acupuncture practitioners must memorize hundreds of meridian points along the body; the knowledge and training take years to acquire.
Tapping is simple and painless. It can be learned by anyone. And you can apply it to yourself, whenever you want, wherever you are. It's less expensive and less time consuming. It can be used with specific emotional intent towards your own unique life challenges and experiences. Most importantly, it gives you the power to heal yourself, putting control over your destiny back into your own hands.
The Science Behind Tapping's Success
Like many healing arts that draw upon ancient wisdom, Tapping has been met with a fair share of skepticism. Many doctors and psychologists have been quick to dismiss it as "woo woo", despite the heaping anecdotal evidence from practitioners and people who have used EFT on their own.
In recent years however, there's been a growing pool of undeniable research that proves what millions of people the world over have known for some time now: that EFT produces real, lasting breakthroughs and significantly improves or even eliminates conditions that hospital treatments, medication and years of psychotherapy often fail to adequately deal with.
Studies done at no less than Harvard Medical School verify these assertions. Research done at the prestigious university during the last decade found that the brain's stress and fear response – which is controlled by an almond-shaped part of your brain called the amygdala – could be lessened by stimulating the meridian points used in acupuncture, acupressure, and of course, tapping.
Although these studies focused on acupuncture and as such, used needles, follow-up double-blind research revealed that stimulating the points through pressure, as we do in tapping, gave rise to a similar response!
Another exciting set of research was undertaken by Dr. Dawson Church. His team performed a randomized controlled trial to study how an hour-long tapping session would impact the stress levels of 83 subjects. To do this, Dr. Church and his team measured their level of cortisol, a hormone secreted by the body when it undergoes stress. Their findings? The average level of cortisol reduction was 24%, with a whopping reduction of almost 50% in some subjects! In comparison, there was no significant cortisol reduction in those who underwent an hour of traditional talk therapy.
Dr. Church also created The Stress Project, which teaches tapping to war veterans suffering with PTSD. The results have been astounding: an average 63% decrease in PTSD symptoms after six rounds of tapping. It's mind-blowing and exciting research, which has converted many non-believers in the scientific community along the way. All signs indicate that this trend of revealing research and swayed skeptics will continue as millions of people around the globe continue to discover the power of tapping.
(The above information is taken directly from www.thetappingsolution.com. Visit the website to learn more about the history of tapping, an introduction to the tapping points, a basic tapping sequence for anxiety and additional resources.)
Mary Triller, MDiv, MTh, is a Certified Level II Practitioner in Emotional Freedom Techniques – Tapping and provides EFT – Tapping at Optimal You.
Energy Psychology
Energy psychology (EP) is a mind-body approach to understanding and improving human functioning. EP focuses on the relationship between bioenergy systems, neuro and electro physiological processes, and mental functions involving thoughts, emotions, sensations, and behavior.
EP applications incorporate natural energetic components into the treatment process that include, but are not limited to, meridians, chakras, biofields, and bio-electrical and electromagnetic activity of the body, the nervous system and the heart.
EP practitioners often combine cognitive and physical interventions with activation of one or more of the human bio-energy systems. Some practitioners focus on the way in which thought and intention are expressed in the bioenergy system, and explore the therapeutic value of precise use of language and congruent intention. EP approaches are often exceedingly rapid, have little to no adverse effects, are usually experienced as self-empowering by clients and patients, and are easily amenable to self-help protocols.
EP models have been beneficially applied to assessment and treatment of trauma, anxiety, depression, pain, stress, psychophysiological issues, and self-sabotaging behaviors by a broad range of healthcare providers, to regulate affect and promote emotional and physical health.
"Treatment results have been shown to be enduring and relatively rapid. There are currently over 60 research studies, including multiple Randomized Controlled Trials (RCT) published in professional and refereed journals, confirming the treatment value of EP. Taken as a body of knowledge, these findings suggest that EP meets the criteria for evidenced-based treatment." (ACEP website)
Read more at www.energypsych.org
Spiritual Direction
Spiritual direction is the practice of being with people as they attempt to deepen their relationship with the divine, or to learn and grow in their own personal spirituality. The person seeking direction shares stories of his or her encounters of the divine, or how he or she is cultivating a life attuned to spiritual things. The director listens and asks questions to assist the directee in his or her process of reflection and spiritual growth. Spiritual direction advocates claim that it develops a deeper awareness with the spiritual aspect of being human, and that it is not psychotherapy, counseling, or financial planning.
Transpersonal Psychotherapy
Transpersonal psychotherapy is concerned with the study of humanity's highest potential, and with the recognition, understanding, and realization of unitive, spiritual, and transcendent states of consciousness (Lajoie and Shapiro, 1992).
The goal of transpersonal psychotherapy goes beyond healing trauma to the awakening and attainment of our highest potential. The tenets, philosophies, and practices of the world's spiritual and wisdom traditions are integrated with Western science, philosophy, and theory to create a full-spectrum psychospiritual developmental model. This model takes us from birth and normal Western developmental phases, to the awakening of spiritual consciousness and the awareness of our interconnection to all living things through a shared energy field, as depicted in Eastern and Native spiritual traditions (Siegel, 2018).
Going beyond conventional psychology's continuum of maladaptive to adaptive emotions and behaviors, transpersonal psychotherapy recognizes an expanded view of human wholeness, transformation and inter-connectedness via the development of higher levels of spiritual consciousness. As consciousness shifts, the context of one's experience shifts, insights become more profound and transformative healing occurs. Clients transcend their egoic or personal perspectives, seeing events from an expanded state of awareness, often with new solutions and elevated understanding.
Through the use of attunement to each client's needs, resonance with higher levels of consciousness, guided imagery, various mindfulness practices, breathwork, and tools from ancient spiritual traditions, transpersonal therapists guide clients to their own inner wisdom, facilitating shifts in consciousness, understanding, well-being and ultimately to living their fullest potential.
Mindfulness Practices
"Mindfulness" describes a mental state of nonjudgmental attention to and awareness of the present moment -- along with calm acknowledgment of feelings, thoughts, and bodily sensations as they arise. Mindfulness can also describe a type of meditation practice which cultivates this awareness, a quality all human beings possess.
According to Mindful.org, "mindfulness is the basic human ability to be fully present, aware of where we are and what we're doing, and not overly reactive or overwhelmed by what's going on around us."
Mindfulness meditation comes from early Buddhist traditions over 2500 years old, developed to foster
- clear thinking
- compassion
- open-heartedness, and
- the alleviation of suffering
Despite its Buddhist origins, mindfulness meditation requires no special religious or cultural belief system. In fact, Jon-Kabat-Zinn PhD is internationally known for bringing these practices to the West – creating a research-based program called "Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction" that has benefited people from all walks of life. This program has been a helpful ancillary form of treatment for many patients with conditions such as cardiovascular disease, diabetes, cancer, depression, anxiety, psoriasis, and other chronic conditions caused or exacerbated by modifiable lifestyle factors.
This is a way of having a look at our struggles from a unique perspective. Our personal history is a story we tell ourselves. This story creates our identity and sense of purpose. Sometimes we have chosen to tell a story that has kept us stuck in some way in our lives. By utilizing techniques such as journaling or retelling our stories we can narrate our stories in a different way. We can use the strengths and skills we have found along the way to look at our problems and struggles and create new chapters and solutions to lead us forward in our lives.
All Optimal You professionals apply some form of mindfulness principles or practice in their work.
For a New Beginning
In out-of-the-way places of the heart,
Where your thoughts never think to wander,
This beginning has been quietly forming,
Waiting until you were ready to emerge.
For a long time it has watched your desire,
Feeling the emptiness growing inside you,
Noticing how you willed yourself on,
Still unable to leave what you had outgrown.
It watched you play with the seduction of safety
And the gray promises that sameness whispered,
Heard the waves of turmoil rise and relent,
Wondered would you always live like this.
Then the delight, when your courage kindled,
And out you stepped onto new ground,
Your eyes young again with energy and dream,
A path of plenitude opening before you.
Though your destination is not yet clear
You can trust the promise of this opening;
Unfurl yourself into the grace of beginning
That is at one with your life's desire.
Awaken your spirit to adventure;
Hold nothing back, learn to find ease in risk;
Soon you will be home in a new rhythm,
For your soul senses the world that awaits you.
~ John O'Donohue ~
In Scottsdale I am available weekdays. At-distance sessions (Skype, FaceTime, phone) are scheduled when convenient for all parties.


text: Hi Bryan, What would Erlang - SOAP interoperability mean exactly? The standard Erlang distribution does not contain a SOAP library. I am aware of 2 'user contributions' that implement some kind of support for SOAP: - erlsoap, by Erik Reitsma (I think), modified by Anton Fedorov. - soap support for YAWS, implemented by Tobbe and me (part of the YAWS distribution). The YAWS based contribution consists of functions for the server side (using YAWS) and the client side. The intention was to cover basic profile 1.1. In practice I believe that the current version will work pretty well if you use 'document-literal' binding and HTTP transport and if the WSDL consists of 1 part (no wsdl-imports - there may be imports in the type definitions - xsd-imports and -includes). I am sure that there are quite a few other limitiations, and it would be useful to have some feedback. What would you expect to see? Regards, Willem On 4/8/07, bryan rasmussen <rasmussen.bryan@REDACTED> wrote: > > Hi, > > In many of the SOAP libraries produced outside of the major players, > mainstream programming languages there are lots of interoperability > problems reported (actually now that I think of it there are lots of > interoperability problems reported between the maintstream languages > also [java, .Net framework languages, C++]) > > Currently I am doing a report in which interoperability problems with > be part of the report, if you have any interoperability horror stories > between Erlang and other languages using SOAP I would like to hear > from you. (basically I need Erlang because I am pretty familiar with > the interoperability problems of Python, Perl, PHP) > > Cheers, > Bryan Rasmussen > _______________________________________________ > erlang-questions mailing list > erlang-questions@REDACTED > http://www.erlang.org/mailman/listinfo/erlang-questions > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <http://erlang.org/pipermail/erlang-questions/attachments/20070409/12b9bde5/attachment.htm>

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Contact info: [email protected]
Marius Sandbu is a Principal Tech Lead for Cloud working for Sopra Steria in Norway. Primary focusing on Cloud-based services and software-defined data center solutions.
He also extensive experience on end-user computing solutions such as VMware Horizon, Citrix XenDesktop, Microsoft RDS and also on Cloud solutions like Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud, Amazon Web Services, EUC Cloud solutions such as Citrix Cloud and Horizon Cloud and other products such as Office365 and Microsoft EMS.
Before joining EVRY, he worked for Commaxx where he was responsible for all Microsoft technical related and also worked part-time for Microsoft Norway as an Infrastructure Ranger for Server and Tools department. He is also a frequent speaker at Nordic Infrastructure Conference, and Citrix User Group and has been one of the few external speakers on the Citrix NetScaler Masterclass and also had speaking sessions on Citrix Synergy and on MYCUGC (My Citrix User Group)
More info on my Linkedin Profile
My Slideshare
Certified Instructor:
Citrix Networking 2013 – 2015
Microsoft MCT 2012 –
Veeam 2013 –
Nutanix 2016 –
Microsoft MVP Azure
Citrix CTA
Citrix CTP
VMware vExpert
VMware vExpert NSX
Veeam Vanguard
NVIDIA GRID Community Advisor
Previous Awards:
Nutanix Technology Champion
Dell Tech RockStar
Books I've authored:
Mastering Citrix NetScaler
Implementing Citrix NetScaler
System Center Configuration Manager – High Availability and Troubleshooting
Community work:
Group leader Networking SIG on MYCUGC (https://www.mycugc.org/)
Microsoft Technology User Group Norway
Citrix User Group Norway
All opinions and publications on this blog / website are my own and not that of my employer.


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The weeks leading up to Thanksgiving and the subsequent holiday season is often the start of increased capacity constraints and a precursor to the supply chain challenges that typically remain for the rest of the year. In the current market, there is already a lot of activity that is drawing from normal OTR capacity, and things have gotten tight throughout many direct-to-consumer (DTC) channels.
This year, additional natural events such as hurricanes, earthquakes and fires have exacerbated the tightening of capacity, creating an even more demand-stricken environment. So, what can shippers do as the holidays are getting closer to mitigate potential supply chain troubles?
The Driver Shortage and Scheduling Woes
First, it's becoming increasingly more important to support the driver base. According to the American Trucking Association (ATA) president and CEO, the "industry is short 50,000 drivers. And if the trends continue, that number will double to 100,000 in just five years." Journal of Commerce also reported that concerns may continue to grow as the ELD mandate goes into full effect and some drivers may opt to retire rather than adapt to the new technology.
During the holidays, many drivers also want to be able to shift their schedules to have some time home with their families. Therefore, carriers will exhaust their efforts to reposition their assets so that their drivers can have that time. As capacity tightens, it becomes increasingly more difficult for carriers to alter their commitments as well as balance their drivers' schedules.
The Amazon Effect
In recent years, there has certainly been a shifting mindset from retailers – the "Amazon effect" is real, and it's being driven by consumers. The Amazon effect is dictating that shippers get to their customers faster – sometimes in only one or two days – and we've likely only scratched the surface of this trend. So, what can organizations start doing inside of their own transportation networks to meet evolving consumer expectations?
As the market continues to shift, it's clear that companies are exploring every option and thinking long-term. Meeting DTC needs requires an agile supply chain, exceptional supply chain planning and processes and technology that enhance execution. It also requires comprehensive connectivity with all business partners – from suppliers to manufacturers and distributors, retailers and transportation companies.
Forecasting Supply Chain Hurdles
An important thing that shippers can do during the holidays is to ensure alignment with the supply chain as it relates to expected forecasts. This, along with an understanding of the open/close hours and staffing levels of all shippers and receivers, is critical. Shippers and receivers could be closed for as much as a three to four day stretch, so it is important for shippers and carriers alike to ensure that they get the right information regarding how they will staff and execute operational procedures during impactful holiday times.
It's also critical to ensure that the transportation and supply chain departments are tightly aligned with the rest of the organization to facilitate these strategies. Even mature companies sometimes forget to share with the supply chain group that there's a big promotion going on. For maximum operational success, cross-functional communication throughout a shipper's entire organization is key not only going into the holidays, but throughout the entire year.
How are you preparing your supply chain operations for the holidays?
With instant quotes, real-time tracking, and 24/7 access to trusted carriers, Uber helps streamline your operations.
With upfront pricing, instant booking, free Quickpay, and facility ratings, Uber Freight puts you in the driver's seat.


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Top Architecture Colleges in India
Given below is the List of Top Architecture Colleges in India 2017 with their Ranking under JEE Main, JEE Advanced and NATA.
Architecture is an important and ineffaceable discipline of life. So much so that the great civilizations of the world have also been known and recognized for their architecture. This science of building shapes human existence. With the passage of time and tide this discipline has become complex but at the same time there is a constant need for innovation and application. This stream is branched out into many other specific fields that include interior designing, civil engineering, urban industrial development and planning. The Architectural schools and Institutes in India are considered among the best in the world. Understanding this below is a compilation of Top 10 Architectural Colleges in India. Each College mentioned in this list is complete with details like address, affiliation, faculty and detailed list of various Architectural degrees and academic programs offered by the college.


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Retirement plan OregonSaves popular with young workers, now available statewide
OregonSaves, the state-run retirement savings program, is opening its doors to any working Oregonian who wants to put away money for the future.
The program also has found an enthusiastic audience in Oregonians aged 18 to 35, who make up more than half of those enrolled.
OregonSaves launched last year with the goal of alleviating a retirement savings crisis in the state. Approximately 1 million Oregonians had been unable to save for retirement through a work-based plan, according to a 2016 report from the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College.
While employees can choose to save as little as $5 a month, the average monthly contribution is now $114, outpacing earlier expectations, according to state officials.
Homicide:Family remembers Tricia Carver as happy, passionate light
Workers interested in joining the program, now including those who are self-employed, can enroll online.
State Treasurer Tobias Read said that with OregonSaves, officials are providing two things for residents: simplicity and convenience.
Furthermore, "long-term financial security for all Oregonians will put our state on a path to a more prosperous and stable future," Read said in a statement.
Americans are in the throes of a retirement savings crisis where, according the National Institute on Retirement Security, the average worker hasn't saved a penny for retirement. For those who have saved, the typical account balance was $40,000, the institute found in a report issued this year.
Earlier research suggested 66 percent of America's working millennials — classified as those born between 1981 and 1991 — hadn't saved any money for retirement, per 2014 census data analyzed by the institute.
Salem City Council: Salem councilor proposes $2,000 stipends as city faces $6M budget shortfall
Under OregonSaves, however, more than 45,000 workers have set aside more than $9 million for retirement, with 54 percent of those enrolled in the program being aged 18 to 35, state officials said.
"We do know that the savers are all ages, but it skews younger," said Kasey Krifka, engagement director with the Oregon Savings Network, part of the Oregon State Treasury. "We think that's because older workers often rely on their spouse's retirement plans."
Among the younger cohort is Alexus Hazelton, 22, a groomer with Nature's Pet Market & Sunny Paws Grooming in Salem. She's already stashed about $1,800 toward retirement using a 5 percent deduction from her paychecks.
"I love it, because if I don't see that money, it's like it's not really there," she said.
Salem band:West Salem High first in Oregon to compete in marching band nationals
Hazelton said she's pushed 30 percent of her savings into aggressive-risk investments, while placing the rest in more moderate-risk funds. "Kind of makes you feel like more of an adult," she said.
Future financial security is important to Hazelton. In her profession for about five years, she had a medical scare after she had just started grooming when a German shepherd bit hard into her hand, sending her to the doctor.
"I was out of work, and I didn't even know if I was going to get full function in my hand back," she said. "I love what I do, but honestly I don't think I'll want to be 40 or 50 lifting huge dogs."
Coworker Stephanie Whiteside, 24, who enrolled in OregonSaves last year, pointed to increasing financial concerns for people around her age. Atop pricey housing costs, they also have to worry about saving enough money to retire comfortably, she said.
Having a retirement fund eases her mind. "At least I know I always have this to set me up for when I am done," she said.
Terri Ellen, who owns the store and grooming operation, said most of her employees, except the latest hires, have enrolled.
"I'm 73 years old, and I watched my parents run out of money," she said. "My biggest fear is running out of money myself as I get older, and so I jumped on the chance to help my employees."
Ellen said she is excited to see her 20-something employees save for when they're in their 50s, 60s and 70s.
She wants everyone to save for the future: "Even if it was a dollar a week, save something, because no one's going to live on Social Security alone."
Email email@example.com, call (503) 399-6714 or follow on Twitter @jonathanmbach.
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At least once a month we scan the Internet for any new instance of the word "fibropapilloma." A March 22nd routine search turned up an article in the newsletter of the Sea Turtle Club of Bonaire announcing the first appearance of fibropapilloma disease on that island.
We immediately advised the CTURTLE mailing list of this information, and informed George Balazs of the US National Marine Fisheries Service of this situation. In addition, we made email contacts in Bonaire to determine more about the appearance of this disease in that island nation.
The Sea Turtle Club of Bonaire has been especially vigilant and helpful in answering the questions we've asked about the environmental conditions surrounding Lac Bay, where the disease has been reported. Further inquiry resulted in this information:
"In June 1998 the fibropapilloma was reported for the first time. The first dead green with "fibro" was found in November 1998, the second in December and the third in January 1999. They were all big juveniles to sub-adults. All the greens with fibro were seen in or near Lac Bay."
As a result of our contacts, Ursula was able to ask a number of questions. The answers were provided by Coen Vos and Ine Wilms:
Q. So let me ask you. In the past ten years... there been any environmental impacts to Lac Bay?
A. No major events.
Q. Runoff perhaps?
A. No run off, this is actually minimised by dams that have been constructed behind Lac, to hold rain water.
Q. Cattle/agricultural impact?
A. Just donkeys and goats, not many.
Q. I went to the Net and noticed this area has two hotels. What kind of sewage treatment do they use?
A. Those two hotels use cesspits and septic tanks, like almost everybody on Bonaire.
Q. Do streams/rivers flow into the Bay?
A. No streams or rivers into Lac Bay.
Q. Know if there are any groundwater discharges near it?
A. No, only a dried up well.
Q. Increased development in that area?
A. No, just a few houses in the neighbourhood, the two hotels and two windsurfing schools (and some local fisherman)
Q. I'd appreciate knowing the kinds of seaweeds. Notice an increase in the abundance and distribution? I mean increasing?
A. No, not that we know of.
Q. Perhaps choking formerly live coral? (That's what happened to us).
A. No, not that we know of.
Q. And two seaweeds I very much want to know about. Red Hypnea (Hypnea musciformis) and Acanthrophora spicifera. I know both grow in the Caribbean.
A. In Lac Bay we have Acanthrophora spicifera, but not the hypnea musciformis. But we do have Hypnea cervicornis. For other seaweed, see attachment 'seaweed'. This information was taken from the Base-line ecological study (1993).
Q. There is growing evidence that occurrence of FP is related to human-impacted near shore environments. Lagoonal perhaps, low flushing...?
A. Low flushing in the part of the bay where the mangroves are growing. The area is very densely populated with mangroves. So the bay itself is flushing well, but the area behind the bay is not. Until recently (maybe 15-20 years) there was more activity in the mangrove area. Local fisherman and others used creeks which they kept open by cutting away the mangroves. This has not been done for quite some time which may have resulted in less flushing.
Q. Oh... and if your island has a sewage treatment plant, where is it and how long has it been operating?
A. There's no central sewage treatment plant, nor a centralised sewage system. Two hotels have a small sewage treatment plant of their own, but they do not work properly. All the collected waste water is transported by truck to a place in the middle of the island, where it is dumped. This is not in the neighbourhood of Lac.
Q. Have you taken water samples to measure water quality Ł specially nitrogen, phosphate and E. coli?
A. Some samples were taken for the base-line ecological study, but this research was done in 1993. We are looking for more accurate data at this moment.
Q. Just know, Ine, that Bonaire doesn't have to go this alone.
A. We appreciate that very much!
We returned to the Internet, did a search for the exact phrase "bonaire sewage" and dug up a report on a proposed Bonaire sewage treatment facility. The article describes a plan that would provide for a way of processing sewage from the hotels. The consultants warn that if such a sewage treatment system is not put into place, nutrient pollution build-up on the reefs could damage or even destroy Bonaire's top tourism attraction, leading to economic disaster for the island.
In the meantime sewage from the two hotels and windsurfing schools around Lac Bay are driven by truck to the middle of the island and "dumped". We have yet to find out what "dumped" means.
These are pictures of the stranded turtle. We would judge this turtle as having an overall tumor score of 3: heavily afflicted.
In our experience, it takes three years for a Hawaiian green sea turtle to reach this point once it becomes FP symptomatic. This suggests this turtle showed the first subtle signs of FP some time in 1995.
Our own observations show that turtles new to our dive site require, on average, two years before they show the first hint of fibropapilloma disease. In the third year, 80% of juveniles have acquired FP. This indicates that the turtle might have been exposed to the fibropapilloma agent/insult in 1992 or 1993. It would be interesting to know more about the ecology of Lac Bay in those years.
At the 1996 Sea Turtle Symposium, the Sea Turtle Club Bonaire presented a poster entitled:
The abstract for this poster read:
The Sea Turtle Club of Bonaire is a non-profit, non-governmental organization, its main goal being the conservation of the sea turtles around the island of Bonaire (Netherlands, Antilles). A main part of the activities in 1995 consisted of in-sea research on the local juvenile green and hawksbill sea turtle populations residing in the unspoiled coral reefs and sea grass beds around Bonaire.
Through a large sighting network of divers and snorkelers, the juvenile populations have been monitored continuously for six months. More detailed information was collected through direct observations on several "turtle hotspots" around the island. Also included in the 1995 project was a photo-identification trial. The goal was to identify individual sea turtles by means of taking slides of juvenile sea turtles at a fixed location throughout the project. The location chosen was the reef in front of Lac Bay. At daytime, an estimated amount of over 30 green turtles and a few hawksbill turtles reside along this reef. The thought is that the green turtles (both juveniles and subadults) reside here all year round, migrating in to Lac Bay at night in order to forage in the sea grass beds.
Since the STCB has photo identification for 30 green sea turtles from Lac Bay in 1995, there is an unprecedented opportunity for researchers to determine the fate of these 30 in 1999!
In addition, it is important to determine what it is their green turtles feed on. As was pointed out, there are various types of algae in this bay, including Acanthrophora spicifera and Hypnea cervicornis. Both these algae are present at our dive site and in the Indian River Lagoon system, FP hotspots.
Considering that FP researchers have found "preliminary the provocative evidence" linking the presence of certain dinoflagellates to sites with high FP prevalence, and that these dinoflagellates use algae as a resting substrate, we believe that a golden opportunity has presented itself in Bonaire. We urge that algae samples from Lac Bay be examined for the presence of these organisms.
Turtle Happenings
Table of Contents


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Szechuan pepper and ginger appear in her mango sorbet to set off spicy sensors on the tongue and make the iced fruit puree even sweeter. The meat in her lychee duck — savory, rich and almost gamey — is better because of the sugared juiciness and floral aroma that the succulent, grapelike berries provide.
In the kitchen, she seamlessly blends flavors from the East and West. She started cooking in college, when she came to the United States and missed the food from her homeland. But when she began cheffing professionally, she worked with local chefs including Sergio Abramof and Parker Bosley. Her influences are nothing if not diverse. Recounting the creation of a new dish, she says: "I went to a Cuban place and had pulled pork. I loved it." She thought it would go well with Chinese squash but wanted to make it more Asian. So she added cumin and a little black bean sauce. "You don't realize they're there," she says. "But the dish turned out very, very good."


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Our Team at Illume Aesthetics Ashland, OR
Jennifer Bullock, FNP
Jennifer Bullock, FNP is the medical director at Illume Aesthetics and holds advanced education in regenerative medicine, functional health, functional rehabilitation, medical aesthetics including general dermatology, advanced laser aesthetics, and an advanced injectables certification. Jen started her love affair with skin care and aesthetics nearly 15 years ago while working at Ashland Plastic Surgery Associates. She has continued to grow and expand her education and completed her Graduate degree at Graceland University in 2016. She is thrilled to bring her knowledge and expertise to the community at Illume Aesthetics. Jen is available for all new client consultations and performs all advanced laser treatments, ablative procedures, body contouring, wrinkle reduction, laser hair removal, regenerative services, holistic health screenings, pain management and functional rehabilitation, and all advanced injectable procedures.


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Aquaponics is the combined culture of fish and plants in recirculating systems. Nutrients, which are excreted directly by the fish or generated by the microbial breakdown of organic wastes, are absorbed by plants cultured hydroponically (without soil). Fish feed provides most of the nutrients required for plant growth. As the aquaculture effluent flows through the hydroponic component of the recirculating system, fish waste metabolites are removed by nitrification and direct uptake by the plants, thereby treating the water, which flows back to the fish-rearing component for reuse. In my system tilapia will be produced along with a variety of herbs, leafy plants, vegetables, and perhaps fruits.
The aquaponic system I will be utilizing is a scaled down version of the University of the Virgin Islands commercial scale system. It is roughly 1/8th the size of the UVI system, but may be multiplied in accordance with resources and demand.
The UVI system has been producing tilapia for more than a decade. It is a proven system and detailed information relating to it is freely available, including some of this text which I am, honestly, guilty of plagiarizing freely at times. Thank you Dr. Rakocy. I wish I could afford to go to the Virgin Islands and take part in one of your training programs, but I've got to do it the hard way.
Aquaponics has several advantages over other recirculating aquaculture systems and hydroponic systems that use inorganic nutrients solutions. The hydroponic component serves as a bio-filter, and therefore a separate bio-filter is not needed as in other recirculating systems. Aquaponic systems have the only bio-filter that generates income, which is obtained from the sale of hydroponic produce such as vegetables, herbs, and flowers. In the UVI system, which I copy, and which utilizes employs raft hydroponics, only calcium, potassium and iron are supplemented. The nutrients provided by the fish would normally be discharged and could contribute to pollution. Removal of nutrients by plants prolongs water use and minimizes discharge. Aquaponic systems require less water quality monitoring than individual recirculating systems for fish or hydroponic plant production. Aquaponics increases profit potential due to free nutrients for plants, lower water requirements, elimination of a separate bio-filter, less water quality monitoring and shared costs for operation and infrastructure.
The current version of my system can be found here.


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Shelly Peiken: GRAMMY-Nominated Songwriter
Female-empowerment oriented, Shelly Peiken's songwriting, blog, book, and now audiobook have provided an inside look at the profession and its challenges. The audiobook for her Confessions Of A Serial Songwriter is nominated at the 60th GRAMMY Awards for Best Spoken Word Album. Her advice is admired and liked by a growing following. In many ways the same energy she asserted as a songwriter has given her guidance a force that her audience takes seriously.


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In this week's episode of "Inside the Mind", we talk about The Perfect Landing Page Design.
If you like these videos consider subscribing and leave a comment letting me know what you'd like to see covered in future episodes!
In last weeks episode we talked about how to make a sale using social media...
Then it occurred to me, we've talked about sales, networking, strategy, content development, and key performance indicators but we haven't talked about one of the most important pieces in this equation which is Landing Pages. The glue that holds this whole online marketing business together.
So we're going to Tarentino this motha fluffa and work backwards, in part 1 of this special two part guide to landing pages.
In today's episode, you'll learn about different design techniques that go into a compelling landing page, why they work, and why these pages need to have your utmost attention.
(little tommy on shoulder) But wait, can't I just use my regular blog pages to sell stuff?
Well Little Tommy, let's look at this from your customer's perspective.
(v.o) Say you're involved in a back channel chat on twitter. For this example we'll just say it's a chat about twitter tips and you've just happened to write an ebook on the subject. And in this chat, you're on FIRE. I mean you're giving super actionable advice left and right, and like every other tweet you come out with gets retweeted by at least 10-20 people.
Well it's inevitable that someone will think what you're saying is spot on, so they'll go to your profile to click over to your website.
(Split Screen one side Big Tommy and Little Tommy)
Now in one scenario, they go directly to your homepage, which is kind of generic and untargeted, so they might look at for a total of 20 seconds before they go back to the chat. and in another scenario they go to a specialized landing page that acknowledges they're coming from twitter, gives a little background behind who you are, what you do, and your most recent project which happens to be... an ebook on twitter tips.
(little Tommy) Ohhhh
(full screen big and little tommy)
It's at this point the person makes a critical decision, do I buy the book? or do I go away?
And while you could argue there are a number of factors that go into this decision,(little tommy jumps off shoulder and off screen) the design of your landing page has a lot to do with it.
Now while there are no hard and fast "rules" when it comes to designing your landing pages you must remember that they are used to focus the visitors attention, present a high degree of message match and gently guide your users toward their goals with as few negative barriers as possible. (text overlay)
Elements like a strong logo can make a significant impact on whether a person can trust you with their credit card number or email address.
Headlines being one of the first things people read, should not confuse or bore, but invite the visitor to take a closer look. Depending on what your landing page is about, try playing with different fonts to come up with something that accurately reflects the message.
Trust symbols like third party verification or better business beauru logos indicate that you've been verified to be secure. Companies like ACLens saw a 41% increase in conversions once they started using Verisign in a highly visible location on the page.
While we'll talk more about content in next weeks episode, the content has to be there in order for people to learn more about the product. If you skimp on the content you're sure to lose conversions. Things like product descriptions, testimonials or reviews, and guarantees are all big factors in gaining the trust necessary to hand over a credit card or email address..
Make sure too that your videos and images reinforce the wording of the page. Also including video of customer testimonials or reviews, can have a really positive impact on viewers, because when you think about it, you can fake text, but it's really hard to fake being someone else over video.
And finally - A strong call to action should always stand out on the page, and be above the fold. Also, depending on what sort of information you're looking for, your call to action might be above your button, or the button itself.
Orange or Yellow buttons do a very good job at catching viewers eyes.
(Little Tommy) Yeah yeah, but what about colors? How do I know what I want my color scheme to be?
Great question Little Tommy!
There have been various tests showing that people associate colors with different feelings, so depending on what you plan on using the landing page for, will widely depend on what color scheme you use.
Black for example is viewed as powerful and sleek, while pink is seen as romantic and feminine...
I won't bore you with all the details on that, you can just follow the link in the description to read a great article on the subject.
(Little Tommy) ok and what about some of the more advanced stuff?
Ok, so if you're selling a product, show the product. Seems to make sense, but there's still a ton of companies that fail to do this.
Let's take a look at blackberry for example, while their website is beautifully designed, there is very little here that shows their new pho...oh wait there it is... oh it's gone... there's nothing here that gives me a look at what the product actually is, and they're making me look harder to learn more about the newest device.
Apple on the other hand shows me the iphone 4s front and center, and two out of three of the images here show me the improvements of this generation of iphone over the others.
(little tommy) Ohhhh I get it! What else?
Derek over at social triggers turned me onto these three concepts:
As smart as we human beings are, we can't resist certain urges, and three of those urges are as follows:
1. People can't resist following the gaze of other people
2. People can't resist seeing where an arrow points
3. People can't resist following the "line of sight" of objects
In this first example, you can see that the people are looking towards the opt in area which instantly draws your eyes over to that spot. They also make it very clear through the design that all you have to do is enter your email address, then click the button.
Next, people not being able to resist seeing where an arrow points is also very true. Granted, using arrows is about as subtle as a punch in the face, but it also visually tells your visitor to ignore everything else, and look here. You see this quite a bit on Facebook landing pages to call attention to the like button.
people can't resist following the line of sight of objects is also very truel. In Derek's article on social triggers, he shows this image of a baby looking at the headline, then points out that the baby's chin also acts as a subtle arrow to the rest of the text.
When this same image was run through eye tracking software, a study found that a viewers eyes were first naturally drawn to the baby's face, then moved in to a sort of F pattern towards the call to action.
Mega affiliate marketer Ryan Diess has also found that heavy use of "Line of sight" and natural reading patterns has become one of his top converting landing page designs.
In this example he starts with a strong headline, then an image of the product right next to it.
Then he inturrupts your eye pattern with an opt in box, brings your eye to the side of the page with the video and image, the brings it all the way to the bottom of the page with another opt-in box.
(Little Tommy) Woah... that's a lot to take in...
Yeah, it sure is. There's a whole segment of the market that is dedicated to Landing page optimization, because there's a lot that can go into the design of a high converting landing page.
And the final thing about landing page design, is that you should always be testing. If you feel like another design is going to work better, test them against each other to see which one will work best.
If you're like most people, you're on your own. So I've included all of the resources I've used for this video in the description, so you can go and read up on more of this in your own time.
(Little Tommy) Thanks!
(Little Tommy) Alright That's all we've got for today's episode of inside the mind, please be sure to tune in next week for part two when we talk about the perfect landing page copy.
(Big Tommy.) I'm On Facebook, Twitter, and Google +
(Little Tommy) Please be sure to "like this video" and Favorite it for easy viewing
(Big Tommy) If you have a question, please leave a video response by clicking on my face
(Little Tommy) and subscribe if you want to be the first to know when the next video comes out.


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Since the start of February, I've had the urge to break up with my life. I'm not talking about an all-out divorce, but definitely a trial separation. I think my life and I need to evaluate what we want from each other. We need space and time to determine whether we are meant to be together.
My life demands eager attentiveness, ingenuity, constant motherhood, gracious servitude and loyal wifedom. Life doesn't care that I am physically unable to keep up at times. She runs ahead of me, occasionally looking back to mock my aches, pains and sleepless nights. She doesn't think it's important that I'm indeed exhausted and in need of quality me time. My life snickers at my daydreams of packing a bag and leaving for a solitary weekend sabbatical. She knows that I'm too loyal and unselfish to follow through.
She simply says, "Get on with it. Pull up your big girl panties and be WOMAN!"
I would rather play in a sandbox and artfully craft a beautiful rock garden, roll in a grassy field underneath the afternoon sun or write for hours in blessed seclusion and reflection. Could I hop aboard a last-minute flight to an unfamiliar city and explore? I promise to leave a heartfelt note and detailed instructions for the care and feeding of the toddler. I am, after all, a mother.
As I write this on the back of a piece of paper I found at the bottom of my junky purse (the first thing I've written in over a month), I sit alone, but not at all lonely. I'm at one of my favorite restaurants, dining on Japanese noodles and salad. I'm enjoying a forbidden sugary soda – something I can't have at home with a child around because she wants a bite…a piece…a sip…a lick of EVERYTHING she lays eyes on! I'm grateful to not be sharing, talking, answering, explaining, wiping tables, fingers, and cheeks or instructing. I'm just sitting, eating, thinking and in this long overdue moment of clarity, I've found myself unexpectedly writing.
This wasn't a planned lunch date, but a personal intervention of sorts. My life dictated errands and grocery shopping for the afternoon. I was on my way to the supermarket when I suddenly found myself turning into the parking lot. I hadn't eaten anything all day. I hadn't eaten and I hadn't noticed. It was 2p.m. If one could be brought up on charges for neglecting themselves, I would be a candidate for serious time.
So, I'm soaking this time in. I am in no hurry whatsoever.
I've heard women say it countless times, but I didn't understand the meaning of the phrase until now… "I lost myself."
I used to think, how does one lose herself? Is she not attached? Where did she go?
Now, I get it. I see it. I feel it.
When I return home today with a trunk full of groceries, there will be meals to plan for the week, a potty training toddler to wake, a heap of laundry to fold and food to put away. I will have help, but I am the sergeant. I must be vigilant, present and give specific guidance. Then, my life will quickly demand the a change of clothes, waking the toddler and explaining the necessity of going to the potty again, dressing and combing of hair, packing of snacks, water and more snacks and off to church service. After that, my life will yell for more of my time and energy, but I won't dare think that fare ahead.
My life has all of me, but I feel the need to set boundaries with her and take some of my control back. There is so much to do and so many people to please and care for, but what about me? Life's demands have filled my calendar and restricted my freedom and creativity. I stopped striving to be perfect a long time ago, at least. All I want in this season of my life is to be balanced, healthy and sane.
I don't want to look back in sadness and utter those words, "I lost myself."
I realize now that what I have to give will be enough when I purpose to regularly give myself enough of what I NEED – time, peace and quiet, space to be creative, meditation, relaxation, exercise and the regular feeding of my soul. I cannot continue to try and give what I don't have.
My interpretation of what life wanted, left me in my current position – last on the priority list. I'm not even penciled on my own calendar anymore! For this relationship to work, life has to start treating me like she used to with intellectual stimulation, date nights, lunch dates, massages, hair appointments, pedicures and good sleep. I also won't mind the occasional pair of shoes or new handbag – she can afford it.
I might have to sneak away for a few hours and allow some of life's needs to linger, but I purpose to do it without guilt because guilt has brought me to this uncomfortable place on the edge of reason. Guilt has worn me out and left me empty.
Here's to more solitary lunches, walks in the park, coffee shop visits and shopping trips in my near future!


text: Today is Black Friday, historically one of the busiest shopping days of the year. However the last Saturday before Christmas usually beats it out it total sales. Having worked at the mall for many years, I want nothing to do with shopping in stores today. Today is a much better day to shop online. For the most part the stores have the same promo's online that they do instore. I saw this sweater from Old Navy in the store a few weeks ago and thought it was cute. But I refused to pay $50 at Old Navy. When did ON become expesive? Today it was on sale for $15. Score! Click and Ship. So I've done my part for the economy. Has anyone else found great deals this weekend?


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Reality TV Program [Super Idol] is coming to Singapore to search for potential idol candidates for their 2nd season next month. The talent-grooming show is co-produced by China and Korea, where 30 carefully selected young males will be put through rigorous training and competition in Korea.
Mentored by top Chinese and Korean celebrities, the show will document the rigorous trainings and competitions in Korea followed by their debut and tough journey to become the most popular Chinese idol. The show has already been known especially for its stellar guest appearance lineup of over 50 Chinese and Korean celebrities.
A joint project between Korea's 'MBC MUSIC' and China's 'TV ZONE', the audition program has the strong support of 10 over Korean and Chinese A-listers, making it the first reality program that sees the most celebrity guests appearance.
[Super Idol] is auditioning from outside of China this season, giving potential young males in Singapore a chance to seek Stardom through the program. Successful candidates will take part in the program and flown to Korea as trainees where they will be go through the tough idol training and compete against one another.
Wanna be the next star? [Super Idol] is seeking male candidates from ages 16 to 25 years who can sing, dance and able to withstand the brutal Korean training and cruel competition. Those under 18 who wish to take part must seek parental consent.
Interested parties are required to register at http://goo.gl/RryXjb and registration concludes on 29 September 2015, 9am. Selected candidates will be asked to take part in a live audition with the program's Directors and Korean team between 3rd & 4th October 2015.
For more info, please visit: http://obmusic.com.sg/news/superidol/.
Super Idol Season 2 Singapore Auditions is organized by Ocean Butterflies Music.
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Aircraft parachutes are a mature technology that, statistical arguments aside, undeniably save lives.
It didn't take long for the Cirrus SR22 that made headlines around the world when it descended under its own parachute into a Blue Mountains front yard to become old news. Two days later another Cirrus, with three on board, did the same thing in China, and three weeks later two people walked away from a Cirrus parachute deployment near Boston in the north-eastern US.
The Cirrus parachute deployment over Lawson, NSW happened after a spiral dive or spin that witnesses say continued for at least six rotations before the pilot pulled the chute handle. That action unquestionably saved the three men on board.
Cirrus is the only general aviation aircraft maker to include a ballistic parachute as standard equipment, but at least three US companies, BRS, Magnum, and Second Chantz, also make aircraft ballistic recovery parachutes. Like ejection seat maker Martin-Baker, BRS has a counter on its website. As of August 2014 it showed 312 lives saved.
BRS Australia's Bryn Lockie says at least 20 lives have been saved in Australia by the ballistic parachutes on GA, LSA, experimental and recreational aircraft. There are about 500 BRS parachutes on Australian aircraft, and, worldwide, about one in every 125 BRS parachutes is used in earnest.
As well as the Cirrus SR20 and SR22, BRS makes approved parachute kits for the Cessna 172 and 182. A kit for the larger Cessna 206 is in the certification process, Lockie says.
The availability of a parachute depends on the certification status of an aircraft. For certified general aviation aircraft a supplementary type certificate is required. (In Australia, parachute systems can also be installed under a Part 21M approval.)
For non-certified recreational and experimental aircraft BRS offers about 300 different installations and can help develop custom installations for other types. As with any modification that is not an existing factory option, new LSA aircraft installations require the approval of the manufacturer.
BRS parachutes cost between $A6000 and $A22,000, and are available for aircraft weighing between 272 kg and 1633 kg. The parachutes themselves weigh from 9 kg for the smallest recreational aircraft system to 38kg, with a typical non-certified aircraft system weighing about 13kg.
Service life depends on certification standard. Sport aircraft systems have a 25-year life, with repacking required every six years and rocket replacement after 12 years. Certified systems have a 20-year life, with line cutter replacement required after five years, and repacking and rocket replacement after 10 years.
Nominal maximum deployment speeds range from 100 to 150 kt. However, there have been successful Cirrus deployments at 190 kt. BRS parachutes use a load-limiting slider that controls the opening speed based on aircraft speed. The parachute opens more slowly when the aircraft is at a higher speed, but more rapidly at low aircraft speed. This prevents excessive deployment loads, and also allows fast opening when slow. Nominal lowest deployment height for full inflation is 500 ft but there have been survivable deployments at as low as 100 ft. Like overspeed deployments, low altitude deployments are not recommended unless the alternative is worse—which it invariably is. The BRS operating manual expresses the dilemma succinctly:
'The BRS unit is not guaranteed to fully decelerate an aircraft from extremely low altitudes, but a spin below 500 ft is a grave problem, and the BRS unit may offer your only alternative.'
BRS says its parachutes can be lifesavers in situations including: mid-air collision, structural failure, loss of control, stall/spin on approach, engine failure over hostile terrain and pilot incapacitation.
However, it lists several other scenarios where using the parachute is not the best choice. These have a central theme: if the aircraft can still be controlled, continue flying it to a safe landing.
'Out of fuel, with landing areas within reach If a landing area is available and the aircraft is controllable it should be flown to a normal landing.
Lost, with fuel remaining Getting lost, or being uncertain of control of flight, may seem a life-threatening situation. If sufficient fuel remains and the aircraft is controllable, it should be flown to a safe landing.'
CASA's advice about aircraft ballistic parachutes is that pilots of parachute-equipped aeroplanes should make sure they know how and when to deploy them. They need to be extremely familiar with details such as maximum airspeed and minimum altitude requirements, because there will understandably be very little time to ponder these factors when the chute needs to be used.
There is undeniably a certain scepticism in some sectors of aviation about the usefulness and appropriateness of whole-of-aircraft parachutes. This is not new. About 100 years ago there was similar resistance to providing personal parachutes for aeroplane pilots in World War I.
While it is correct (and a useful personal yardstick) to say, 'a superior pilot uses superior judgment to avoid getting into situations that require superior skill', it is also a fact that safety has two components—avoidance and mitigation.
The pioneer of accident epidemiology, Professor Susan Baker, has this to say: 'We tend to focus all our interest on an event rather than on the human damage we are trying to prevent. It also evokes questions of who is to blame, and that is almost always counterproductive. The big question is: "How do you keep people from getting hurt?"'
Speaking at the 2012 Sun'n'Fun fly-in, BRS founder, Boris Popov, said that those who objected to aircraft parachutes did not have to use them. He followed up with a punch line born of exasperation: 'We sometimes joke about putting a credit card slider in the handle'.
Parachutes and engineers
Ballistic parachute systems are a lifesaver for aircraft occupants but a potential hazard for maintainers and rescuers (if the chute has not deployed in a crash). Like ejection seats on military aircraft, the parachute deployment rocket fires with tremendous, and potentially fatal, speed and force. Only B1- licensed aircraft maintenance engineers who have successfully completed an acceptable training course or have completed a period of relevant experience on the system can undertake any inspection, removal, repair or other maintenance of ballistic parachute equipment. See CAO 100.5 for more.


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Jonathan Roye has launched Mixnotes, the newly designed website of producer / mixer Jonathan Roye.
Mixnotes.tv provides instructional tutorials, gear and plugin reviews aimed at the home recording enthusiast. The new website features free tutorials as well as premium video tutorials users can purchase and keep forever. No subscriptions. No hassle.
Mixnotes tutorials cover everything from the fundamentals of mixing to more advanced tutorials. The basics of EQ, compression, mixing vocals, mixing drums, signal routing, FX sends and returns and parallel compression are some of the many topics covered with more to be added in the coming months.
The website offers full HD video mix tutorials where the user can watch a mix happen from start to finish. Drums, bass, guitars, keys, vocals. You get additional content as well including session templates with audio stems so you can practice at home in whatever DAW you choose to use.
Mixnotes.tv is founded by Nashville producer / mixer Jonathan Roye who has been working in and out of the music industry for the past 7 years with various labels and publishing companies. He has a strong grasp of the fundamentals involved in mixing and music making with a formal education in jazz / classical music. That combined with years of studio work built around pop and commercial music production makes Jonathan a versatile resource for music production.
More information: Mixnotes


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Brad Thomas Parsons is totally bitter.
No. wait. I meant to say, Brad Thomas Parsons (aka BTP) is totally all about the bitters. So much so, he wrote a book that should be out…any…minute…now, called Bitters: A Spirited History of a Classic Cure-All. I –and other cocktail geeks — can't wait to get our Angostura-stained mitts on a copy, when it's released November 1. But you can get a sneak peek, if you come out to Drink.Think on Oct. 19.
In addition to being a shiny new author, BTP also is a writer, blogger, and food and cocktail enthusiast. A former senior editor at Amazon.com, he received an MFA in Writing from Columbia University and has been a contributor to Serious Eats, Omnivoracious, Al Dente, and Seattle Met, among others. He lives in Brooklyn, New York. Visit him at www.btparsons.com.
Don't be bitter. Come on out and say hi on Oct. 19, at Lolita Bar. (6:30 to drink; reading starts at 7pm.)
photo credit: Ed Anderson


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Apple introduces the new iPad Air, demonstrates it on the ObamaCare website
Apple introduced a new iPad and called it the iPad Air Tuesday. The demonstration was amazing. The CEO used an iPad Air to apply for health care on the ObamaCare web site and the iPad Air was put on an eight-hour hold twice as fast as the Google Android was.
Boston Strong was the theme of the World Series pre-game ceremony Wednesday at Fenway Park. They're a proud breed. Over the years the people of Boston have resisted three great enemies–the British Navy, the New York Yankees and Alcoholics Anonymous.
The FBI arrested a young man they caught trying to join al-Qaeda online Friday. The lure is very devious. Al-Qaeda's website not only offers you martyrdom and seventy-two virgins in Paradise but in the meantime it can get you a health care policy in three minutes.
HHS Secretary Kathleen Sibelius will speak tonight at the JFK Library in Boston. That is ironic. If Kathleen Sibelius had been in charge of the Dallas motorcade route, Jack would be ninety-six years old today and still wondering how everybody wound up in Oklahoma City.
President Obama was singing the praises of ObamaCare in the Rose Garden Monday when a pregnant woman standing behind him fainted. The president personally caught her and held her until she was able to regain her breath. Now that's the Platinum Package.
President Obama asked for patience with the ObamaCare rollout and promised that the website will be fixed. It's also very intrusive. It'll save a lot of headaches if we just get rid of the ObamaCare questionnaire and have the NSA fill in the personal information for us.
President Obama said Monday if the wait is too long on the ObamaCare website you can apply for ObamaCare by mail. Now he's achieved something. No one thought that it could be done, but the Democrats have finally invented something slower than the U.S. mail.
Toyota this week started paying off two billion dollars to victims of the car's sudden acceleration and brake problems. The payments were court ordered. The judge stated that Toyota executives were dragging their feet, but they were just trying to stop their cars.
Facebook continued its dramatic rebound on Wall Street this week as the Dow Jones soared. the company went back to basics. Last winter, Facebook decided to stick to doing what it does best, which is letting you know that your friends in high school got fat and old.
Dick Cheney and Arnold Schwarzenegger appeared on Fox News Thursday to lay out their differing visions for the GOP. It was the Terminator versus the Defibrillator. The difference between Cheney and Schwarzenegger is, when Cheney grabs a chest it's his own.
Germany's Angela Merkel blasted the U.S. for authorizing the NSA to monitor her phone calls. We just hit bottom. When you're getting bawled out for snooping by the leader of the country that brought us the Gestapo, it's a clear sign you may have a snooping problem.
Prince George was baptized by the archbishop Wednesday with the Royal Family in attendance at St. James chapel. The newspapers got great photographs of England's future king in the arms of his mother. The infant behaved beautifully and why not, so far so good.
The Justice Department began shaking down J.P. Morgan this week over its actions during the financial crisis five years ago. The idea is to fine them out of cash reserves and make them confess wrongdoing and expose them to class action lawsuits You know your bank is in trouble when you try to cash a check and they tell you to come back with a gun.
- Argus Hamilton on the News: Medicare, Duck Dynasty & Much More! - January 18, 2014
- Argus Hamilton on the News: Duck Dynasty & Much More! - December 21, 2013
- Argus Hamilton on the News: Elton John, Mayor Rob Ford, the NSA & more! - December 11, 2013


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Archive for March, 2008
Jimbo "Hair" Quality and the *Lash All-Niter* Hair Story
How Bub Linden got free prim hair for the noobies by Jimbo Quality In fifty or sixty years, when the people living now are either dead or too daft to argue, historians will start chewing on this time period and work it up into a nice smooth bolus for mankind to digest. Whatever conclusions they [...]Full Story
They Who Cannot be Named
by Kris Dibou, warrior poet/pirate For a year and a half I lived in the worldOf they who cannot be namedI sang of the joys, I sang of the beautyIn the place that cannot be named And as I learned, I helped to buildThis world that cannot be namedI believed when they said that I [...]Full Story
Second Life Ballet Leaders Reject New TOS
inSL™ logo program already helping simplify, stabilize virtual world by Pixeleen Mistral, National Affairs desk TOS and trademark controversy hit the arts in SL As suggested earlier, the inSL™ logo and trademark program can simplify residents' choices — early signs are quite encouraging. For instance, Espresso and Inarra Saarinen decided for legal reasons that they [...]Full Story
ADV: Two Prime Mainland Oceanfront Sims For Sale
Buy this land – get Philip Linden off the ban list in Sanchon and Jinsil [UPDATE: Second Life Herald ads WORK! Less than 4 hours after this ad ran, Sanchon and Jinsil were SOLD to Rockwell Ginsberg of RG HoldCo. We congratulate Mr. Ginsberg on his taste in land, and remind our readers - if [...]Full Story
Second Life Left Unity's Open Letter to LL
Dear Linden Labs We have been a group within your medium for 17 months. We are a political forum, essentially using the forum as a way to link with people of our political persuasion across the world. We felt this media would be a great way to do that and have managed to link people [...]Full Story
LL Introduces "inSL"™
A striking new logo that supports the community and ensures platform stability by Maximilian Proto, Department of Inner Beauty and Contemplation Are you inSL™? Long overdue and demanded by countless residents, Linden Lab introduced a new set of rules for residents and other people on the use of the company's trademarks earlier this week. Much-lauded [...]Full Story
We Are Freak! We Buy Land!
Bots crush humans in land competition — L$1 mainland gone in under 10 seconds by Pixeleen Mistral, National Affairs desk A friend has been holding one of the most inconvenient bits of virtual land imaginable – a 576 m2 diamond-shaped sliver of land on an extremely steep underwater hillside located in the Torch mainland sim. [...]Full Story
Shok Antwerp Post 6 Grrrrrrl
[Note from Justine- Every once in a while I find a model who has a number of different looks, each more fantastic than the one before it. Shok's collection of avatars is impressive and it was very frustrating to have to limit my choices to just three pictures! It was a great pleasure to work [...]Full Story
Human Trafficking Mansion Is Not Just About Sex
"I came here to roleplay a rape, and all the guys just want to hold my hand! Do I have to beg?" by Wendell Holmer Through the hobnailed oak doors of an old monastery, I saw three women huddled around a bar. Their whispers echoed across the stone floor."Anyway, hun," Mary was saying, "the reason [...]Full Story
Vanity: The First Deadly SL Sin
"Mirror, mirror, on the wall, Who's the fairest of them all?"by Sigmund Leominster It's a curious feature that there is one particular piece of furniture that doesn't really translate from RL into SL – the mirror. Here in the Metaverse, people don't really need to see themselves, thanks to the miracle of the third-party point [...]Full Story


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"Lost Ground, 2011" is based on an analysis of 27 million mortgages made over a five-year period. Here are our top-line findings:
The nation is not even halfway through the foreclosure crisis. 6.4 percent of mortgages made between 2004 and 2008 have ended in foreclosure, and an additional 8.3 percent are at immediate, serious risk.
Foreclosure patterns are strongly linked with patterns of risky lending. Foreclosure rates are consistently worse for borrowers who received high-risk loan products that were aggressively marketed before the housing crash.
The majority of people affected by foreclosures have been white families. However, borrowers of color are more than twice as likely to lose their home as white households.
Read the full report: Lost Ground, 2011 (PDF)
Read the executive summary (PDF)
Read about policy solutions, Four Urgent Needs to Address Now
Explore the Data
Check out the Foreclosure Damage Index
Interactive Map: Foreclosures & Delinquencies by State & Metro Areas


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The system first described, vtool, had as its goal the visualization of sequential programs prior to their parallelization. The distribution profiler dtool serves a similar purpose for parallel programs which rely on data distribution for their parallelism. The basic idea is that one can ``watch'' the distribution of a particular data object change as an algorithm progresses. Sample output is shown in Figure 5.14.
Figure 5.14: Data Distribution Analysis
At the bottom of the display is a timeline which looks similar to that used in the event profiler, etool. In this case, however, the events shown are the redistribution operations on a particular data object. Clicking on any event with the mouse causes a picture of the data distribution among the nodes to be shown in the upper half of the display. Other options allow for fast and slow replays of a particular sequence of data transformations.
The basic idea of this tool is to look at the data distributions that are used with a view to either optimizing their use or looking for places in which redundant transformations are being made that incur high communication costs. Possible restructuring of the code may eliminate these transformations, thus improving performance. This is particularly useful in conjunction with automatic parallelization tools, which have a tendency to insert redundant communication in an effort to ensure program correctness.