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Macworld Impressions
First, a small disclaimer. We both grew up in the country and usually get sick when we visit large cities for more than three days. Boston is no exception to this rule. That put a damper on things, and the 95% humidity and occasional downpours didn't help in the damp category either. But we still enjoyed ourselves.
It was a good show, although only a few products were introduced, which cut down on the surprise value a bit. Some who had been to the San Francisco Macworld said there was no reason to have gone to both this year. Most major Macintosh companies were there, though there were some notable absences, such as Quark, Letraset, and Symantec, and several other firms such as Pinnacle Micro and PCPC canceled at the last minute. We were especially distraught about the last two, since we had wanted to see Pinnacle Micro's 130 megabyte erasable optical drive and PCPC's Flipper monitor
The companies having the most fun were clearly Delta Tao Software and Baseline Publishing. Delta Tao showed off its inexpensive 32-bit paint program, Color MacCheese, and a utility called Polly MacBeep, which allows you to assign weights to different beep sounds so the Mac will pick a semi-random (biased by the weightings) sound for each beep. Polly MacBeep was $10 and we bought it, partly to support the company, which has a refreshing view on the software market (make software fun and cheap and give the workers titles like "Foundling" and "Girl Friday.") Delta Tao was also giving away demo disks and t-shirts to anyone who could make a basket with Nerf basketballs, an endeavour which a surprising number of people were good at. Baseline Publishing (which also sells Color MacCheese) was staffed by people who were having trouble taking things seriously because its main product is the latest incarnation of the Talking Moose, that Bullwinkle-clone who pops up and tells you things you may or may not wish to hear during periods of inactivity. Baseline had Moose t-shirts as well but weren't giving them away for feats of athletic prowess.
WordPerfect won the prize for best demo, as they managed to garner the enthusiasm of a high school pep rally without resorting to peer pressure. They appealed to a much baser instinct, greed, by giving watchers M&Ms and passing out freebies like WordPerfect mugs, pens, and shoulder bags during the demo. We recommend the M&M trick for giving a demos since it keeps audience members happy, raises their blood sugar to keep them awake, and lets them do something with their hands while watching. Extremely effective. Worst try goes to Microsoft with its Network News-style demos that had two announcers and lots of glitz on multiple monitors. It probably didn't help that Microsoft didn't have any new Mac products and couldn't get away with showing Windows.
The most satisfying companies to talk to were Paragon Concepts, Software Ventures, and Delta Tao. The satisfaction level increases with the importance of the person you talk to, which made the hour-long discussion we had with the president of Paragon, Jerzy Lewak, about the features of Nisus 3.0 and the things which he hadn't gotten to fixing yet, a good way to solidify product loyalty. We enjoyed talking to Leonard Rosenthol, the programmer of MicroPhone II, about the new interface to CompuServe that will be included with the next version of MicroPhone II (from what we saw, it will be better than the dedicated interface that CompuServe is pushing to compete with America Online). Delta Tao was fun too, since the only staff they had there were people who worked on Color MacCheese and Polly MacBeep. Nothing like talking to a programmer in a t-shirt as opposed to a suited-up salesthing.
LaCie won the award for best prize with the bright red Mazda Miata it was giving away, but the more realistic prizes were better at the LaserMax booth, where we each received a copy of Guy Kawasaki's "The Macintosh Way" after listening to a demo. Unfortunately, the salesthing there didn't know the first thing about printer controllers and engines, so we felt a bad about getting free hardcover books for two minutes of asking unanswerable questions. GCC was giving away lots of sun glasses and frisbees and beach balls if you scratched off the three circles on its game card, but we won a Polaroid One-Step Flash camera that way. The person at the booth was surprised, but gladly gave it to us.
Perhaps the most coveted freebie of the show was Apple Developer Technical Support's Moof! buttons, which are small green buttons with a dogcow and the word Moof! underneath. We received buttons for doing TidBITS (thanks to Mark Johnson!) and while we were there another Apple employee came to get another button because someone had ripped hers off of her blouse the day before. Some people will stop at nothing for a dogcow :-).
Information from:
Adam C. Engst — TidBITS Editor
No More Peanuts
The computer industry is by its nature wasteful of natural resources. A computer may last for a number of years, but have you ever heard of recycling a dead computer? Some companies are trying to reduce waste, most notably Hewlett-Packard, which isn't too surprising considering that David Packard's daughter, Julie, is a prominent environmentalist. HP announced a toner cartridge recycling program a few months ago that recycles cartridges from people who would otherwise throw their cartridges away. PC WEEK has run articles on what Apple does to recycle paper and other goods used in general office life, and cited amazing figures – Apple recycled over 365 tons of paper, 600 pounds of aluminum, and 4.6 tons of glass from last October to this April.
More recently, though, MacConnection has started to do its part and in a way many of us will see. The company has stopped using styrofoam peanuts as packaging material, moving instead to better sized boxes and newsprint, which can be recycled. (Ever wonder what the half-life of a styrofoam peanut is? I figure the cockroaches will be living in them after the human race has gone by the wayside.)
The only use we found for peanuts was to stuff them into a large beanbag we got from an old housemate. With use, the peanuts gradually crunch down and make room for new ones as new packages arrive. It works well, although the Poof was a bit full after we ordered a keyboard from MacWarehouse that came in box the size of a 19" television, chock full of pink peanuts. In any event, hats off to MacConnection for taking a stand on the issue. They even included the book "50 Simple Things You Can Do To Save The Earth" in the bag of software we bought at Macworld. Admittedly, it was a big bag and we bought small software so there was lots of room, but we were surprised and pleased to find the book.
Another way to preserve natural resources is to avoid using them. That was one of the motivations behind the distribution methods we use for TidBITS. Short of a small amount of electricity that would probably be used anyway and the occasional disk, the only resource TidBITS uses is time, and we don't think of the time as wasted. The other advantage is that costs are low, something which Delta Tao Software found with its Polly MacBeep. Like shareware programs, you only get a disk. No fancy packaging, no shrink-wrap, no printed manual. Delta Tao was able to sell Polly MacBeep for $10 (even numbered prices are pleasantly refreshing), which is less than many shareware fees, although Delta Tao does get its money up front and thus probably makes more.
Information from:
Adam C. Engst — TidBITS Editor
Related articles:
PC WEEK — 16-Jul-90, Vol. 7 #28, pg. 117
PC WEEK — 30-Jul-90, Vol. 7 #30, pg. 117
Coming Soon, Version 2.0
As we've said, Macworld wasn't a show full of innovation this year. We did see some neat things, and we saw some stuff so expensive we didn't even bother to look at it, but mainly it was the show of the upgrade. Unfortunately, many of the upgrades weren't to be had for mere mortals.
The most notable absentee upgrade was HyperCard 2.0, though developers were able to show their stuff running under beta versions. Kevin Calhoun, the project leader, gave a nice demo of HyperCard 2.0 to the brave souls assembled at the User Group Breakfast at 7:00 AM, including a stack listing the top ten tongue-in-cheek reasons why HyperCard is not shipping. I stopped taking notes when I graduated from Cornell, so you'll have to guess at what they are.
CE Software demoed QuicKeys 2.0 (shipping soon for a $49 upgrade fee, $39 if you picked up a form at Macworld), and it looks like it has added nice features, like a recorder that records your movements and plays them back with the same timing as the original. The Quick Reference Card is "hot" now, in that you can click on a macro listing to run the macro, rather than having to quit the card and remember the keystrokes.
Later this fall, WordPerfect 2.0 will become a true Macintosh word processor (while still retaining the code system for people who find it an aid in analyzing document weirdness), with a better interface that allows easy manipulation of column, tables, rulers, and the like. WordPerfect 2.0 includes a hefty graphics editor that can put graphics under text, on top of text, or within the text. The macros are editable and are probably pretty similar to the macro language in WordPerfect 5.1 for the PC. Good, but my money's still on Nisus.
Adobe hasn't been sitting around either. It announced version 3.0 of Illustrator, its high-end graphics package. New features include improved text handling – ATM 2.0 will be bundled with it – graphing abilities, and an improved interface.
CE Software — 515/224-1995
WordPerfect — 800/336-3614 — 801/226-5522
Adobe Systems — 415/961-4400
Information from:
Adam C. Engst — TidBITS Editor
Related articles:
MacWEEK — 07-Aug-90, Vol. 4 #27, pg. 3
MacWEEK — 31-Jul-90, Vol. 4 #26, pg. 1
Here And Now, The Sequels
The amount of upgrades that you can actually buy now is impressive. Nisus 3.0, which sports a full programming language for fancy text manipulation, is shipping. Paragon included most of the features I asked for, so if you have any suggestions, by all means, call them, they do listen. Ashton-Tate upgraded Full Impact to 2.0 and the program might have gotten its act together enough to seriously compete with Excel. About time.
The only impressive hardware upgrade I remember well was the new Bernoulli drives from Iomega. They are a bit more expensive than the Syquest mechanisms and are as reliable and crash-free as ever, but now they sport access times and transfer rates as fast as the Syquests. They look like a good backup medium if you can compress your hard disk into 44 megabytes.
Utility-wise, a number of popular programs hit the 2.0 and 3.0 mark. Salient Software's DiskDoubler is now at version 3.0, which marks its third upgrade since this spring. We're using it and like it a lot so far (in other words, it provided another 5 megabytes of space). After Dark 2.0 from Berkeley Systems is a significant upgrade and includes more modules (with Fish! from Tom and Ed's Bogus Software), sound capabilities, and the ability to show more than one module at once, either overlapping or in separate tiles. StuffIt Deluxe looks interesting, and although we didn't get a chance to look at it closely, it can do things like move files from archive to archive in a manner just like copying files in the Finder. Finally, Adobe's ATM 2.0 doesn't include any new features, unless you count doubled speed and better screen display quality.
Paragon Concepts — 800/922-2993 — 619/481-1477
Ashton-Tate — 213/329-9989
Iomega — 800/456-5522
Salient Software — 800/326-0092 — 415/852-9567
Berkeley Systems — 415/540-5536
Aladdin Systems — 408/685-9175
Adobe Systems — 415/961-4400
Information from:
Adam C. Engst — TidBITS Editor
Related articles:
MacWEEK — 07-Aug-90, Vol. 4 #27, pg. 22
MacWEEK — 14-Aug-90, Vol. 4 #28, pg. 5
MacWEEK — 31-Jul-90, Vol. 4 #26, pg. 5
Do It By Hand
Perhaps the largest growing market in hardware is for hand scanners. Just a short while ago, there were only one or two brands which used the same hardware and were unimpressive unless you regularly scanned images less than four inches wide. They required a steady hand and even spawned small plastic guides to help you scan straight. And if you wanted to scan a full page, have fun stitching the images together in your paint program.
The early scanners were at the show in newer forms, each with better features than before, but still lacking in utility in my eyes. However, several companies were showing hand scanners that broke through the old limitations. My personal favorite was Mouse Systems PageBrush, which does work as advertised. You put a picture under a piece of plexiglass and scan it. It really is like wiping the fog off of a bathroom mirror or the condensation from a windshield. You can re-scan small parts if you make errors in the image manipulation, which is a wonderful way to provide Undo capabilities. Also, because the plexiglass panel is flexible and movable, you can scan uneven surfaces or vertical surfaces (like wallpaper). The software it came with was decent, although we were so amazed at the PageBrush itself that we didn't look to closely at the software. It's fast and only requires 2 megabytes of RAM and can save as TIFF files, which OCR programs can import and process. Oh, and the whole thing doubles as an optical mouse when you don't want to scan. All for a list price of $699. What more could you want?
Color, for one. Asuka has a hand scanner which beats the PageBrush's 64 shades of grey cold with the ability to scan 4096 colors. Supposedly the software will have some way of automatically stitching images when it ships, but they couldn't show us then. Otherwise the Asuka scanner is nothing different from the other, older ones. Same method of use, same shortcomings, same price range.
Easy OCR, for two. Caere, the people who do OmniPage, were showing a new hand scanner called Typist, which does on-the-fly OCR into word processors. It also scans graphics, but that was downplayed. The Typist sends its output into the keyboard buffer, which is why you can use it with any word processor, although we didn't actually see it working with Word, so don't hold us to that "any." Caere uses the same type of mechanism as the standard hand scanner, but it increased the width to five inches, which is too small for my tastes, but which can get a letter-sized page in one pass if you have really wide margins. It can theoretically knit together two halves of a page, though, so with two passes, you could scan a regular letter-sized page. It's better for magazine work because the columns are thin and the software knows to automatically cull out graphics and the halves of columns on either side of the one you are scanning. Pretty snazzy.
Information from:
Adam C. Engst — TidBITS Editor
Asuka propaganda
Caere propaganda
Related articles:
MacWEEK — 07-Aug-90, Vol. 4 #27, pg. 1


text:
WACO, Texas (AP) — Waco police say a man and a woman have been arrested after leaving their 7-week-old daughter alone in a hotel room when they went to a grocery store to get a cigar product used to smoke marijuana.
Police believe that during the parents' absence of about 30 minutes Saturday, smoke from marijuana use set off the room's smoke alarm. Police say a housekeeper responding to the alarm found the infant and notified police.
Police say 29-year-old Nicholas Howlett was arrested for possession of marijuana and abandoning a child, and 19-year-old Leah Omollo was arrested for abandoning a child. Both remained jailed Sunday. Howlett's bond was $26,000, while Omollo's was $25,000. Jail records didn't list an attorney for either.
Police say Child Protective Services placed the infant with family members.
(Copyright (c) 2023 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)

subset: commoncrawl


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PMEngineering magazine article on Longbranch Solar Thermal system installed 2011.
Read the logistics of installation and read remarks from the installers. Bob Kingston remarks, "It's on the edge of Breckenridge's historic district. That meant we needed to make it fit within how Breckenridge wanted to see the community. Bobby Craig ensured the design fit within the aesthetic need of Breckenridge."


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Fantasy City Painting – Cover Art for Age of Azmoq: The Valantian Imperium! (more images inside)
The final COVER art FOR NOVEL BY author Rajamayyoor Sharma.
So above, we have the final version of Raj's cover for the Age of Azmoq. A beautiful fantasy city on a stone pedestal, the sunset, and beautiful lush fields. Rolling hills. Tiny little villages below.
This was not the first rendition, however. This painting went through several stages to get to where it is now. This journey was to best suit Raj's vision for his extensive and detailed fantasy world. The worldbuilding contained in his new released book, the Age of Azmoq: The Valantiam Imperium is extensive, and I have created several pieces of art to enhance his worldbuilding.
Villasboro Map, a small fantasy map of a village location where his main character starts out.
The Fantasy Continent map of Valentia, the entire continent the novel is set in.
And finally a route map of Welaholla to Khratosh with insets to illustrate features along the enormous highway, and isometric views of the cities themselves.
The original artist
My version of the map, however, is not the original. Credit for the entire underlying Photoshop to the artist Teodora Chinde. I don't have a link for her portfolio or blog, but you can read a bit more about her cover design here on Raj's blog and see the original design.
Be sure to check out Raj's book, available now on Amazon. Age of Azmoq: The Valantiam Imperium.
This book really is an exploration of a fantasy world in the style of the great fantasy authors such as Tolkien. It's rich and full of enormous detail. I know that just this fantasy city alone makes me want to read it! I will add my review to this post once I've completed the book. 🙂


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Should you wonder why keyDown-Events don't fire in a Webbrowser, when that Browser runs in a VM in Parallels, don't look any further than this forum post.
The Workaround ist to edit the
config.pvs file and set
OptimizeModifiers to
1 instead of
0. To edit the File on a Mac, find the File for your VM, right click it and "show package contents", then edit the file.
With the update of Safari 6.0.4 i realized the Web Inspector changed in a way which makes it almost unusable for my needs. In 6.0.4, the Inspector wouldn't even properly show cascading css properties or inheritance for a selected element anymore! See the screenshots below for a comparison between Safari's and Chrome's Inspector.
I posted my frustration on Twitter and thanks to some keyword search running somewhere in a lonely cloud, a Safari Engineer got back to me. So thank you very much, Timothy! This blogpost is for you, because i couldn't fit it into 140 characters.
In this post, i will focus on one aspect of the Inspector only: Working with CSS. Because that's what i do most and because for JavaScript development, the tools at hand generally get the job done well for me.
Web Inspectors showing information for the exact same element (Safari to the left, Chrome to the right):
Shortcomings in the Safari Web Inspector and a lot of rendering bugs in Safari (which seem to be mostly ironed now) forced me to use Chrome more and more for my development needs. I never wanted to. I care for Safari. I still prefer the Safari UI over Chrome (just look at Chrome's Preferences-Screens – shudder) and don't know if i like where Google (the company) is headed to. But Chrome has compelling features and before i knew it, i was using Chrome during 95% of my development time.
Features i miss most in Safari's Inspector
- Being able to select an element in the source view of the Inspector and keep the element selected between reloads and navigating a site. Chrome supports this and if i remember right, Safari did at one time in the past.
You won't believe how important that is for me and how often i need that during the day. Webdev often is rinse, repeat, reload (preferably via the Live Reload plugin).
- Edit a linked css file directly in the browser. This is often more convenient than fiddling with css in the styles pane of the inspector. Chrome supports that. Safari never did, afaik.
- Plugins, that work with file:// URLs. The live reload plugin is a huge timesaver when developing for the web. Unfortunately, Safari plugins are not allowed to work with file:// URLs, which i do most of the day while i develop (i just drag and drop a html file into my browser window). Chrome doesn't have that limitation.
- Easily check inheritance of certain values. Sometimes i just want to select an element in the source and e.g. quickly find out, where it inherited its font-size from, without having to endlessly scroll through all the rules and parse striked-through rules etc. I'd like to look at a property in the "Computed Style" section, klick on a little icon and together with a link to the respective line number in the css source, see the classname or id of the rule in the CSS displayed, which ultimately set the property. Chrome has this, but with a UI from hell.
- A toggle to simulate :active, :focus, :hover and :visited pseudo classes
- Inspector Preferences. Chrome's Inspector Preferences and Overrides are very, very useful. Also, as one get's older, a font-size setting for the inspector ui comes in pretty handy.
Features Safari's Inspector will hopefully soon get
Timothy suggested i should check out the Inspector in Webkit Nightly (which i haven't done in a while). So that's what i just did. I looked at Webkit Nightly Build 8536.29.13, 537+. If all i see there makes it into Safari soon, things don't look so bad at all. Here's my comments on what i saw in the Nightly related to my above laundry list:
- Live editing of linked css files is supported
- Toggles to simulate :active, :focus, :hover and :visited pseudo classes are there
- The proper display of cascading rules seems restored
New in Nightly: Nicely cleaned up Rules-Section with new pseudo elements toggles and a Button to quickly add a new rule (you missed a button to easily delete an added rule though). Further above you see a pretty nice new tooolbar.
Features still missing
Here's what's left from my above laundry list with comments about the nightly added (in bold):
- Being able to select an element in the source view of the Inspector and keep the element selected between reloads and navigating a site. Chrome supports this and if i remember right, Safari did at one time in the past.
Selecting an Element in Source and reloading a page is totally buggy in the nightly (it's a beta, so that's ok).
- Edit a linked css file directly in the browser. This is often more convenient than fiddling with css in the styles pane of the inspector. Chrome supports that. Safari never did, afaik.
- Plugins, that work with file:// URLs. The live reload plugin is a huge timesaver when developing for the web. Unfortunately, Safari plugins are not allowed to work with file:// URLs, which i do most of the day while i develop (i just drag and drop a html file into my browser window). Chrome doesn't have that limitation.
- Easily check inheritance of certain values. Sometimes i just want to select an element in the source and e.g. quickly find out, where it inherited its font-size from, without having to endlessly scroll through all the rules and parse striked-through rules etc. I'd like to look at a property in the "Computed Style" section, klick on a little icon and together with a link to the respective line number in the css source, see the classname or id of the rule in the CSS displayed, which ultimately set the property. Chrome has this, but with a UI from hell.
- A toggle to simulate :active, :focus, :hover and :visited pseudo classes
- Inspector Preferences. Chrome's Inspector Preferences and Overrides are very, very useful. Also, as one get's older, a font-size setting for the inspector ui comes in pretty handy.
Inspector Design in Webkit Nightly
I am pretty sure, that the design we see in the nightlies won't make it into Safari without some additional designer-love, but let me offer some brief remarks anyway. Just in case. I really hope though, the new toolbar (i love it!) makes it into Safari (the current one is kind of overloaded and confusing).
- The icons in the toolbar seem too big for me (in relation to the label text-size), even when i set it to display small icons. I'd keep the icon size similar to the size of the 2 icons displayed to the left of the toolbar (the icons to close or dock the window).
- I prefer the design of the icons very much over the coloured icons currently visible in the Safari Inspector. However, i think we don't need gradients in the icons. We also don't need color to indicate the selection, just make the icon for the selected section darker. Keep it simple.
- I love the new "Instruments" display, where you - at a glance - see the number of resources loaded, total size, load time, console -logs, -errors and -warnings. However, i won't use fake glass. This is not a 90's version of iTunes. I believe an inset shadow around the area and light borders between the individual sections on hover will do. PS: the icon-size in here feels just right. That'd be a good size for the other toolbar icons too.
- The area with the pseudo class toggles consumes too much vertical space. It should me much more condensed. Have a look at the chrome toolbar and use an 11" Air when you look at both toolbars, then you get my reasoning.
- Same goes for the new "+ New Rule" area. Far too much top- and bottom-padding.
I was genuinely worried. Looking at Webkit Nightly, things look much better and some of my confidence is restored. Given, that what i see in the nightlies really makes it into Safari soon.
I still wonder, how it could happen, that Inspector in Safari 6.0.4 is in such a bad state and lost valuable features which it previously had. Is this just a bug that slipped in there due to sloppy QA or is it a case of terrible product management?
I hope, the importance of good developer tools in the form of the web inspector is clear to Apple. If we developers don't like the tools or if the tools slow us down, why should we use them? If we don't use them, we won't develop with the unique features of the platform (used) in mind and thus won't help drive it forward or keep afloat.
Thanks again Timothy for getting back to me! That was totally unexpected. If this feedback, which touches only very few specific points, is of any value to you and the Safari team, i can certainly post some more from time to time.
Blue Beanie Day, showing our support for web standards by wearing a blue beanie.#bbd09
This morning i was shocked to see tweets of people i don't follow. Turns out it's half as bad as it initially looked and the reason is an API change from twitter.
For whatever reason, Twitter seems to have rolled out an api change before Twitter Clients have implemented the necessary changes to deal with them.
The changes are concerning retweets. There's a new way retweets are handeled in a users timeline XML. Twitter is effectively stripping out the RT parts of the tweet text (making them invisible to the user) and includes them as meta data into the XML:
<retweet_details> <retweeting_user> ... </retweeting_user> <retweet_count>1</retweet_count> <retweet_id type="integer">4043457594</retweet_id> <retweeted_at type="datetime">2009-09-17T01:15:32+00:00</retweeted_at> </retweet_details>
Today, there's only few Twitter-Clients which already support this new XML and this is where the problem starts. As the RT part of a tweet is now effectively hidden to anyone not supporting the new XML format, a retweet might be displayed as if it is a message from someone you do not follow (if someone you follow retweets someone you don't).
TwittelatorPro 3.2 already supports the new format and indicates the retweet (RT) in the upper right corner of a tweet
Twitterrific (3.2 Mac) doesn't support the new API and thus it looks as if i received a tweet from Trisha which i do not follow. Shock and awe!
Update 1: These changes are clearly documented on the twitter API site, but contrary to the documentation, the changes affected friends_timeline.xml (at least for me) also and not only the new home_timeline.xml!
Update 2: It is possible, that i misinterpreted this and twitter didn't accidentally roll out any changes to friends_timeline. It may well be, that Andrew Stone (he retweeted Trisha as seen in the screenshots above and i am following him) was simply testing the new features using the statuses/retweet API call.
But still, even if he did, the RT shouldn't have arrived in my friends_timeline (in that new format).
That is why other services use versioned APIs and don't bend live APIs at will!
This effing progress bar won't ever finish. It stands still at the exact position you see above. And MT silently fails to republish "ALL" (after a template change or such).
Worst of all, i am a web developer and have no clue how to fix this (emphasis on MT, not my abilities), nor does MT give me any hint as to what might be going wrong.
This could be such a lovely relationship but MT doesn't stop to show its ugly face every once in a while. Oh well, i love Movable Type.
Have you ever used Google Analytics (or any other tool) to compare your metrics to the previous month's or any other past timeframe?
Did you then realize, that the graphs shown didn't really tell you a story?
So here's a tip – which in case you haven't already discovered this yourself – is so simple, that you'll probably bang your head against the desk.
This tip probably applies to most Web Analytic Tools out there. As i have no access to any other tools, i'll use Google Analytics here for the examples.
Google Analytics has a nice date-picker which lets you select the timeframe used to display its verious reports. The timeframe is usually defined by a start- and end-date. In order to let you compare metrics to the past, there can even be two start- and end-dates.
Let's assume you want to look at your dashboard, and compare your statistics for April to the ones from March (the previous Month).
The Default
By default, you'll define a date range by either clicking on the month name (April) which automatically inserts 04/01/2008 and 04/30/2008 into the date fields or you fill in the date fields by hand (or even use the fency Timeline slider or what have you).
You then repeat this step for the timeframe in the past you want to compare your metrics to, click on Apply and you're done defining your timeframes and your report is being displayed.
The defined timeframe as seen in the little calendar view
In your dashboard, you'll see all kinds of graphs and probably also one for Absolute Unique Visitors which might look just like the image below:
As you can see in the graph to the left, we have a nice pattern, as the data used for this example is from a B2B Site which has an audience browsing the site mainly during weekdays.
The blue line represents April's trend and the green line represents visitors in March. You'll notice, the pattern is somehow repeated in the green line for March.
What the graph to the left fails to communicate however is the data you might probably be interested in most: The difference in quantity between the two months. Did April have more unique visitors or March?
The graph simply fails because there is too much noise and the pattern isn't aligned.
If your traffic doesn't show any patterns and you have the same amount of traffic every day, please stop reading, as all i say here doesn't apply to you.
The Hand Tuned, Meaningful Beauty
Now here's the simple trick. Let's align the patterns by adjusting our timeframes in a way, that makes sense for our scenario: Instead of picking whole months, we need to align our timeframes by a specific Weekday, which will be the same day for the current and past timeframe. We'll also make sure, both timeframes have the same length.
Adjusted timeframes with similar lengths and the start days aligned at a Monday.
We're looking at four weeks each.
Look at the graph to the left. Isn't this a beauty? Get the story this picture is telling you? Huge difference. We can still immediately identify the patterns from the previous graph, but can also see a meaningful, comparable representation of quantities.
I believe everybody will now be able to immediately spot the decline in March's visitors which lasts from the middle of week three until mid of week four.
This trick is so simple, i wish google had "Align by Weekday" build right in to Google Analytics already.
I hope this was news to at least some of you and that this little nugget will be helpful to you as you are crunching your numbers.
PS: If you're into Web Analytics and don't read him already, do yourself a favor and have a look at Avinash's Blog.
Seems Network Solutions runs a year early:
Domain Name: ALISTAPART.COM
Registrar: NETWORK SOLUTIONS, LLC.
Updated Date: 13-may-2008
Creation Date: 07-may-1998
Expiration Date: 06-may-2009
I wonder how anyone can still trust this company. Time to move to a different registrar i'd say.
Once again, Twitter.com is in maintenance-mode. Hopefully -- as usually -- for the win.
There's one thing i realized which really puzzles me. It is the way, they serve their temporary maintenance page (pictured in parts in the screenshot to the left).
This time (i haven't checked this during any of their downtimes before), they publish their temporary page in an extremely stupid way:
Twitter is serving a 404 status for every URL on twitter.com. The page you see during maintenance is a customized 404 "Not Found" error page. The 404 HTTP status means, that the url you tried to access doesn't exist and you should never use this url again, as it is bogus. This is not very clever. Now you can argue how important a proper google-index for twitter.com is, but even if you'd not care about google (and any other search engine) throwing every twitter-page out of it's index due to the 404 the crawler gets with every request, it still is wrong. HTTP statuses are there for a reason and serving a 404 during maintenance is not what the 404 status was meant to be used for.
The proper way to handle this would be to do a temporary redirect by serving a 307 or, even better, simply serve the maintenance page with a 503 status, which is the perfect fit for a maintenance. HTTP Status 503 stands for "Service Unavailable" which is exactly what is happening during a maintenance break.
Serving a 503 would deal with search engines nicely and clients like Twitterrific could also nicely parse it and inform the user correctly. For instance hahlo.com is momentarily just serving black frames, making their users believe something is wrong with hahlo. Pockettweets on my iPhone also confuses the user as Mobile Safari is simply alerting the user about too many redirects.
Hopefully someone from twitter will read this and not make the same mistake again in the future.
Justin Mason of SpamAssassin fame recently published a perl-script on his blog, he developed to check health of some of his servers using perl and posting alerts to Jaiku.
Since i use twitter, i modified his script to post alerts and extended the functionality a bit. The script cureently only checks webservers via HEAD requests. If a host does not respond, it posts an alert to a given Twitter account, remembers the host and will post a host-up notification to twitter, should the host come up again.
The benefit of this is, that you can get Tweets via SMS providing you a nice 24/7 monitoring solution. In order to receive SMS alerts, you basically need 2 twitter accounts. One where you send the alerts to and a second one which you use to follow the first one in order to receive notifications vis SMS (as you can't receive notifications from your own account, this is not possible using just one account).
The script is usually run by cron. To run it, you need Perl and the Perl LWP module as well as a configuratio-file which is described in the header of the perl-script.
Download checkandtwitter.pl V 0.2 here and enjoy.
Here's my little christmas gift to all of you having either Saft or any SIMBL PlugIns installed and want to work with the WebKit nightly bulilds without crashing or having to manually disable the above mentioned PlugIns:
is a simple AppleScript App, that just does the following:
- Rename /Library/InputManagers to /Library/xInputManagers
- Start /Applications/WebKit (the nightly build you have installed)
- Rename /Library/xInputManagers back to /Library/InputManagers
Installation notes:
Download, unpack and doubleclick.
Note: as this script needs to rename a folder in /Library, it will only work when you have Admin rights for your Mac!
Tada! No more hassle.
PS: i wonder why the nightlies do not just already disable all input managers so we don't have to.
Jacob Cord wrote a very nice little converter which takes a tab-text file, exported out of your Google Analytics Geo Map Report and converts it to a KML file which you can import into Google Earth.
The output of the original script didn't look all that exciting, so i modified it a little to produce some awesome visualisation of website traffic.
Click the image to see an animation (QuickTime required)
The longer the lines, the more pageviews are represented. If the pageviews are above a set limit, the lines are drawn in red instead of yellow.
Now isn't that an entirely different approach to website statistics visualisation? I'll soon follow up with a Mac OS X PPC binary of the converter and instructions.
Just read an interesting Article over at ALA which also mentions new techology like AJAX and the like being too much hyped and immediately being used without thinking about the user and his needs first.
Let's make a test. I recently developed something at work, where many would see AJAX written all over it. Look at the movie below:
Is this using AJAX? Let me know in the comments (sorry, TypeKey login required now due to crazy comment spam)!
BTW: the above is a live recording right out of my browser window. No editing involved other than scaling the movie down to 60%.
Dear Webmaster,
surely you are having a contact form somewhere on your site where i can contact you by providing my Address, Phone and such. It'll probably look something like this:
Please be aware that many countries do not need any States in a postal address. In fact, in many countries it is totally uncommon to have a state included in a postal address - some don't even have any states at all.
So please, please, please do not make the STATE fields on your contact forms mandatory. If you're clever, you can decide on making them mandatory depending on the Country chosen. But please, once i selected Germany or such (you'd have to research that country-list on your own - i was to lazy to research it and only make states mandatory IF USA was selected as country) do not make the State Field mandatory!
Oh, and while we're at it: Our phone numbers are also formatted differently and might have a different total length, so don't force us to format them like 123-123-1234 (German area codes might have 4 to 5 digits for example).
Thanks so much for not being ignorant about foreign countries!
This is driving me mad for almost a decade now.
I hope someone has a suggestion to get around one of the nasty "features" coming from Redmond:
Internet Explorer on Windows has some funny logic implemented to add some PADDING to SUBMIT-Buttons (<input type=Submit>) of forms. The Longer the content/text of the VALUE tag is, the more PADDING it adds automagically. Thus we have real ugly looking form buttons on our pages which take up valuable space.
This padding can not (to my knowledge) be set using CSS.
I'd appreciate if anyone knowing of a workaround to get rid of the padding IE is adding could let me know.
Look at the grey buttons in the screenshot below (click on the image for larger display) to get a picture of what i am talking about:


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My Product Origin Story
My journey into product management is a bit convoluted. It took some trial-and-error and a few different roles, but I eventually found my home. So my story is pretty much like everyone else's who has gotten into product management. But I'll tell it anyway.
My first taste of product management was in a role I had at the computer labs at BYU. My title was Student Manager of Personnel. So many of my responsibilities were around hiring, scheduling, promotions, etc. But another aspect revolved around managing different products for all of the computer labs and its employees.
One such product was a brand new internal employee website. This was really the heart of our organization, where everyone could find their schedules, swap shifts with other employees, manage their training, do reviews and find all other information for their work. And we set out to rebuild it completely. I had the chance to work closely with the developers building it (an extremely talented group) in order to make changes, give input, and guide the overall flow. Having been there for a long time, I knew many of the features that needed to be incorporated and added. I also had the chance to talk with other users to get feedback and ideas. It was my first chance to really do product management at some level (though I didn't know it at the time).
Unfortunately my time in that role had to come to an end as I graduated. And I had to start on another path. Goldman Sachs was building out some new teams in Salt Lake City, and (ironically) one of them was a product management team within the fixed income group. Again, I still didn't have a full understanding of product management, but was excited to help build out a group in a new office and the role seemed like it had a lot of great opportunities, so I jumped at the chance.
Now, product management at Goldman Sachs has a lot of different flavors. At its heart, it is the same as any traditional product management role. You work cross-functionally across the business. That includes working closely with sales teams, marketing teams, management, traders, operations, etc. On the technology side, it means working closely with a variety of technology groups to build out functionality, both internally and externally. And of course, it includes understanding clients and users. Anticipating their needs and developing products and features to help them. Now at a place like Goldman Sachs, that includes financial products like mutual funds and investment strategies. But it also includes many of the technology focused components as well. External websites, online tools and internal reports and tools. The things you think of when you think of traditional product management.
Many people go into product management at Goldman Sachs with the view of moving to one of the teams they work with eventually. That may mean sales or trading or portfolio management. A few will stay within product management as well. My original intention had been to go into portfolio management after working on the product team. So that is the path I started down. I took two levels of the CFA exam (pretty much a designation centered on portfolio management). But I began to realize that I didn't want to do portfolio management, I wanted to be a product manager.
With that new realization, I started to shift my focus. Since product managers tend to wear many hats at a place like Goldman, I wanted to start working with a group where I could really be a product manager (as opposed to a junior portfolio manager or something like that). And I was fortunate enough to find just the right group. As I began working on our money market products, my role became more and more product management every day.
I've had the chance to work on many different products and features. That includes the launch of multiple new mutual funds (it is Goldman Sachs after all). But I also led a team in redesigning our existing external site. And then helped lead the effort to start to sunset our existing site and create a brand new external site with lots of new functionality. Internally I led a team redesigning some of our regulatory reporting. This involved all the data and software tools we used to create these reports and working with internal and external stakeholders to create a new process and end product. I've also had the chance to work on many other features and products within this group. I'll be detailing more stories in other posts, so be sure to check back.
So that is how I got into product management. It has been an exciting journey and continues to be something that I love.
Changes for 2017
I'm really excited about a few changes for 2017.
First, I've just completed a new personal site. I coded it myself and am quite pleased with how it came out. It is still a work in progress, but it is coming along nicely.
Second, this blog is going to expand. I expect to be posting here much more regularly, as well as on Medium. I'll be working here first and then adding things to Medium as I'm ready. I'm planning on leaving most of my previous posts up on this blog, though you'll notice the focus shifting a bit from some of the previous topics. More product management and personal stories.
Finally, I'll be catching up on a lot of Product Management reading that I've had on my list and haven't had a chance to get to. This goes along with the second point, as I'll be writing more about it as well, both here and on Medium. So I'd love to get your input and thoughts. Just don't judge as I'm catching up on the product management books that you've already read.
So those are a few things in the works. Lots more to come in the near future, so I'm excited for 2017.
My personal musings on a variety of topics.
January 2023


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When we hear cleanse, all we can think about is a week with no food, and using the restroom WAY TOO MUCH. Basically the worst 3-7 days of our lives…until the next one.
What if I told you there was a cleanse that you could do EVERY SINGLE DAY, that wouldn't send your digestive tract on a frenzy, you might actually enjoy it, while being able to eat food!
Sounds too good to be true, huh?
Lucky for you, it is not!!
This is probably one of my favorite cleansers, and the only cleanse I do.
**Disclaimer: You will NOT lose 20 pounds in 5 days. You might have a bowel movement quite often. It will be the most delicious cleanse ever**
The Fruit Cleanse.
Yes, that's it. All you have to do is eat fruit! To break this down for you, let's talk about the digestive tract while you sleep.
During our hours of slumber, the digestive tract reserves energy, meaning it gets sluggish. It does minimal digesting (reasons why it is important NOT to eat 2 hours before you plan on sleeping,) As we begin to wake up, the body is in need of energy and the digestive tract is looking for something quick and easy to break down.
Making fruit an ideal candidate.
Fruit has the highest water content of any food, and requires less energy to digest than any other food, and does not digest in the stomach (with the exception of dried fruits, bananas, and dates.) Fruit is also hydrating, cleansing, detoxifying, full of vitamins, minerals, amino acids, fiber, and antioxidants, which is KEY.
So how do you go about this cleanse?
Eat fruit between the hours of 6am-11am. Lots of fruit!!!
Before you start telling me about the carbohydrate count of ONE piece of fruit, let alone multiple…let me stop you.
You will be eating these on an EMPTY stomach. Your digestive tract with break down and use this glycogen immediately. It will not get stored like eating 10 bowls of white rice.
So just take a chill pill.
Now you will be hungry 20-60 minutes after eating this fruit, and if you're still within the hours of 6am &11am… have more fruit.
Seriously, it's so good for you and the nutrition can't be beaten.
After 11am for optimal cleaning wait 20-30 minutes after your last piece of fruit has been eaten to eat a meal! This is because fruit shouldn't be eaten with other foods. The digestive process works very quickly and uses different enzymes to digest fruit.
There is one more rule to this cleanse…fruit paring!!
Fruit pairing is SO IMPORTANT.
Proper fruit combination puts less effort and strain on the digestive system and faster, easier digestion increases the bioavailability of food.
First, you must know the fruit groups: acidic, sub-acid, sweet, and melons.
Acid Fruits
Have the most fiber and are rich in antioxidants. They take 20-30 minutes to digest.
Sub-Acid Fruits
They take 30-40 minutes to digest.
Sweet Fruits
They are more concentrated and take longer to digest. They aren't the greatest of cleansers but they do provide minerals and concentrated sugars.
They take 40-60 minutes to digest.
They are practically water, which means they break down immediately. It's SUPER important not to mix them with other foods, including fruits.
They take approximately 5-10 minutes to digest.
Now that we know our groups, here are a few parting tips!
1 – Separate Acid from Sweet.
Because they are on opposite ends of the fruit spectrum, they do not pair well! They are digested and absorbed at different rates which can be quite hectic on the digestive tract.
2 – Buffer you're acids – pair acids with sub acids.
Because of the acid levels in these fruits, they can be a tad rough on the digestive tract when a large continuous quantity is consumed! So it's best to pair them with a more subtle fruit that is close in digestive time.
3 – Enjoy melons alone
Melons are such a perfect food for humans that they require no digestion whatsoever in the stomach.
Instead, they pass quickly through the stomach and move into the small intestine for digestion and assimilation.
But this can happen only when the stomach is empty and melons are eaten alone, or in combination only with other fresh raw fruits.When consumed with or after other foods that require complex digestion in the stomach, melons cannot pass into the small intestine until the digestion of other foods in the stomach is complete.
So they sit and stagnate instead, quickly fermenting and causing all sorts of gastric distress."
So try out this simple morning fruit cleanse for 2-4 weeks and let us know how you feel!!
If you love it, continue the practice!! Treat your body well, and it will treat you well 🙂
Guest Post By Brittany Bucey
I'm Brittany!
A twenty-something wellness blogger, Nutrition Grad-Student, yoga instructor, vegan who creates easy-to-follow content for every, and anyone who has an interest in taking a holistic, carefree approach at life.
From my favorite lifestyle practices, tips for plant-based eating, favorite products, recipes, and more!
I'm here to show people, it's not so intimidating being comfortable in your own skin.


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SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — U.S. missile launchers and other equipment needed to set up a controversial missile defense system have arrived in South Korea, the U.S. and South Korean militaries said Tuesday, a day after North Korea test-fired four ballistic missiles into the ocean near Japan.
The plans to deploy the Terminal High-Altitude Area Defense system, or THAAD, within this year have angered not only North Korea, but also China and Russia, which see the system's powerful radars as a security threat.
China responded quickly, saying it will take "necessary measures" to protect itself and warning that the U.S. and South Korea should be prepared to bear the consequences.
Washington and Seoul say the system is defensive and not meant to be a threat to Beijing or Moscow. The U.S. military said THAAD can intercept and destroy short and medium-range ballistic missiles during the last part of their flights.
"Continued provocative actions by North Korea, to include yesterday's launch of multiple missiles, only confirm the prudence of our alliance decision last year to deploy THAAD to South Korea," Adm. Harry Harris, head of the U.S. Pacific Command, said in a statement.
Some South Korean liberal presidential candidates have said that the security benefits of having THAAD would be curtailed by worsened relations with neighbors China and Russia.
"China firmly opposes the deployment of THAAD," Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Geng Shuang said at a regular briefing Tuesday. "We will definitely be taking necessary measures to safeguard our own security interest. All consequences entailed from that will be borne by the U.S. and (South Korea). We once again strongly urge the relevant sides to stop the process of deployment and refrain from going further down that wrong path."
China's condemnation of South Korean plans to deploy THAAD has triggered protests against a South Korean hypermarket chain, Lotte Mart, whose parent company agreed to provide one of its golf courses in southern South Korea as the site of THAAD. Visits by South Korean film stars and singers have been canceled and shipments of South Korean cosmetics have been held up at customs.
Experts say China could also send Chinese coast guard ships to escort fishing boats into waters claimed by South Korea, dispatch military aircraft and ships into South Korean air and sea space, and suggest that it might do less to restrain North Korea from provocative behavior.
Russia has supported China's opposition to the system. Militarily, Russia and China could deploy more missiles, especially those with maneuverable warheads to overwhelm THAAD, along with the use of decoys and attempts to jam the system, analysts say.
On Tuesday, China's Global Times, an outspoken nationalist tabloid published by the ruling Communist Party's flagship People's Daily, criticized North Korea over its missile tests.
"By firing four missiles at once this time, the military confrontation between Pyongyang, Seoul and Washington escalates a notch," the newspaper said. "Noticeably, the Chinese public is angry that Pyongyang's nuclear program has provided an excuse for Seoul to deploy THAAD."
An official from South Korea's Defense Ministry, who didn't want to be named, citing office rules, said the equipment that arrived in South Korea included launchers, but didn't confirm how many.
While South Korean media speculate that the THAAD deployment could be completed as early as April, the ministry official couldn't confirm those reports. The official said the plan was to have the system operational as soon as possible.
On Monday, North Korea fired four ballistic missiles in an apparent protest against ongoing U.S.-South Korean military drills that it views as an invasion rehearsal.
The missiles flew about 1,000 kilometers (620 miles) on average, three of them landing in waters that Japan claims as its exclusive economic zone, according to South Korean and Japanese officials.
The North's state media on Tuesday said leader Kim Jong Un supervised a ballistic rocket launching drill, a likely reference to the four launches reported by Seoul and Tokyo. Involved in the drills were artillery units tasked with striking "U.S. imperialist aggressor forces in Japan," according to the Korean Central News Agency.
There was pride and defiance among the elite citizens who live in North Korea's showcase capital, Pyongyang.
"If the U.S. imperialists and their South Korean puppets shoot even just one spark into our sovereign territory, we will completely destroy those aggressors, without any mercy, with our invincible Hwasong artillery, which are loaded with nuclear warheads," Sim Chol Su, echoing the propaganda often found in state media, told The Associated Press.
North Korea uses "Hwasong" to describe a broad range of its ballistic missiles, including Scuds and the mid-range missiles that are referred to as Rodong and Musudan by outside analysts.
South Korea's Joint Chiefs of Staff said the missiles fired by the North were believed to be "improved versions" of Scud missiles. South Korean experts say North Korea's extended-range Scuds and mid-range Rodong missiles are capable of hitting Japan, including U.S. military bases in Okinawa.
Kim "ordered the KPA (Korean People's Army) Strategic Force to keep highly alert as required by the grim situation in which an actual war may break out anytime," a KCNA dispatch said.


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The Ninth Circuit's recent decision striking down parts of Idaho's ag-gag law, which aims to deter undercover investigation by making it a crime to lie to gain entry into animal facilities, is the latest court decision to hold that lies and false statements, without more, are protected under the First Amendment, but may ultimately provide a framework for drafters to create an ag-gag law that passes constitutional scrutiny.
In the meantime, the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals heard oral arguments yesterday in a challenge to North Carolina's ag-gag law mounted by a coalition of animal-protection, consumer-rights, and food-safety organizations. The law took effect on January 1, 2016, after North Carolina's Republican-controlled state legislature overrode a veto of the bill by the state's former governor. The coalition, led by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), filed suit days after the law took effect.
Utah, Wyoming, Iowa, and Missouri have all adopted similar laws. Utah's law was struck down in July 2017, and Wyoming and Iowa's laws are currently facing legal challenges. Missouri's law, passed last year, is similar to Iowa's, but includes an exception for anyone sharing pictures or video of animal abuse with law enforcement. That provision appears to have shielded the law from a legal challenge. Legislatures in 14 other states have taken up similar bills.
States began enacting these so-called "ag-gag" laws in the late 2000s in response to highly publicized film footage acquired through undercover investigations at animal facilities. The laws make it a criminal act to lie to gain entry into animal facilities and film their operations without consent from the owner. However, just as quickly as the states began enacting legislation to address this issue, groups such as the Animal Legal Defense Fund ("ALDF") and PETA began challenging the laws as violating free speech rights protected under the First Amendment.
Utah was the first state to face a lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of its ag-gag law. ALDF and PETA filed the lawsuit back in 2013, but the federal district court in Utah only recently issued its opinion on July 7, 2017. In Animal Legal Defense Fund v. Herbert, 263 F.Supp.3d 1193 (D. Utah 2017), the district court agreed with ALDF and PETA that Utah's ag-gag law violated free speech rights protected under the First Amendment and struck down the law in its entirety. Not only did this landmark decision pave the way for future challenges to state ag-gag laws, but it also likely had an effect on lawsuits already pending in courts across the country.
Wyoming was one of those states with an ag-gag challenge pending in federal court. But in Western Watersheds Project v. Michael, 196 F.Supp.3d 1231 (D. Wyo. 2016), the challengers were dealt a blow when the federal district court held that the First Amendment did not protect the activities at issue and dismissed their claims. The victory for Wyoming was short lived as the Tenth Circuit soon weighed in on appeal. The Tenth Circuit issued its opinion in Western Watersheds Project v. Michael on September 7, 2017, and reversed and remanded to the district court. The court did not decide the constitutionality of Wyoming's ag-gag law, but instead resolved the threshold issue regarding application of the First Amendment, and held that it did apply to the regulated activities at issue. With that direction, the court remanded to the district court to determine what constitutional scrutiny level should apply and whether such restrictions on speech would survive scrutiny. While not a wholesale loss for ag-gag law advocates, the situation in Wyoming left many advocates questioning the future of ag-gag laws.
Idaho enacted its ag-gag law in 2014, and the first lawsuit challenging the law was filed shortly thereafter. Idaho's Interference with Agricultural Production law included four provisions. The first three criminalized lying to gain access to, employment at, or records of the agricultural production facility. The final provision related to audio or video recordings without consent once on the premises of such facility. But unlike in Wyoming, in Animal Legal Defense Fund v. Otter, 118 F.Supp.3d 1195 (D. Idaho 2015), the federal district court struck down the law in its entirety. Idaho appealed to the Ninth Circuit, which ultimately decided the issue in its January 4, 2018 opinion.
The Ninth Circuit provided needed clarity on each provision of Idaho's ag-gag law by affirming the ruling on the entry and recording provisions and reversing the ruling on the records and employment provisions. In doing so, the court agreed with the district court in its determination that lies and false statements, without more, are protected under the First Amendment. The court also agreed that the acts of recording audio or video are expressive acts constituting speech protected under the First Amendment. But the more telling analysis came when the court tackled the remaining two provisions.
The court first noted that while false statements are generally protected speech, such speech is not afforded protection if it is "for the purpose of material gain" or it inflicts a "legally cognizable harm." The court's reasoning then followed that false statements made to obtain records from the agricultural facility confer a benefit on the individual making the false statement while harming the property rights of the records' owner. Therefore, the court held that the speech at issue in the records provision was not protected under the First Amendment.
The court upheld the employment provision on similar grounds. The court first noted that the provision was expressly limited in its application to only those who lie to obtain employment with the intent to cause economic or other injury. Therefore, false statements made to obtain employment at agricultural production facilities along with the requisite intent to inflict legally cognizable harm removes that speech from protection under the First Amendment. The court narrowed the harm to include only direct economic loss and excluded reputational and publication damages from its scope. In doing so, the court created a heightened intent requirement involving concrete economic injury beyond the mere publicity or awareness motives generally seen in past undercover investigations.
This opinion from the Ninth Circuit shows that ag-gag laws may not be gagged for good. If anything, the opinion provides a framework to assist ag-gag law drafters in navigating the constitutional labyrinth. One thing is for sure, ag-gag litigation is far from over. A challenge to North Carolina's ag-gag law was recently dismissed on standing grounds, and a lawsuit filed this past October takes aim at Iowa's ag-gag law.


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The industry talks a good game about value of data. But most organisations can only deliver use cases at a cost deficit.
The cost of acquiring, processing and storing the data is greater than the value to resell it or that it brings the organisation.
A recent large financial market data organisation recently told me that for every $1 they spend on purchasing data, they spend 8x on getting it to a state that it can be sold back to their customers.
For organisations like Babylon Health whose mission it is to drive affordable AI-drive healthcare to everyone one the planet based on data, reduce data management costs is a critical requirement to their business model.
Cloud data platforms from the likes of AWS MSK and Microsoft Azure HDInsight have helped. But compute and storage is just a part of the cost. Having worked on Big Data projects in financial services most of my career here are the biggest areas to focus to remove this deficit.
Expensive skills on mundane tasks
Many of the most basic data workloads require highly skilled engineers. As an expensive fast data engineer and architect, I would spend 80% of my time configuring infrastructure rather than focusing on the business value. Business, cares about delivery of projects.
Lack of future proofing & tech debt
Most Data Platform leaders expect data technologies to remain in place between five and ten years. In reality, this ends up being less than three. We end up having to pay to maintain multiple different technologies with custom tooling and scripts and spend months rewriting applications to work across different stacks.
Operational and security friction
Projects and applications end up sitting on a shelf and never getting to production. How will it be deployed? How could the pipeline be secured? How can we give access to data to troubleshoot whilst meeting compliance? These are valid questions that require answers to get sign off. Until they are in production, they are typically not generating value.
DataOps to simplify the data journey
We created Lenses as a DataOps layer to fit an organisation's existing data infrastructure. Technologies such as Apache Kafka and Kubernetes.
The easier and faster we can get streaming data to production, the more value it will deliver.
Our customers range from Babylon Health, Generali, Daimler and Zopa.
We help get streaming data to production faster, increase value and reduce costs in a few different ways:
- By providing secure self-service access to streaming data. This allows developers to troubleshoot faster and puts data directly into the hands of those that understand the data. Playtika benefit from over 300 hours per day in increased engineering productivity.
- By providing a layer of security, governance and monitoring over streaming data and platforms. This addresses compliance, data privacy and data ethics concerns - accelerating projects to production.
- We lower the bar required to build and operate streaming data applications by using skills that already exist in the industry (such as SQL) and allowing an entire application landscape to be managed through configuration via GitOps. Organisations such as Vortexa see a 95% acceleration in their data pipelines getting to production.
All this over any Kafka and Kubernetes environments whether self-managed or cloud services such as AWS MSK and Azure HDInsight.
On Thursday, we're presenting at BigDataLDN 2019 on how we're helping them scale engineering and deliver affordable data-driven healthcare to every person on earth.
Article by lenses.io


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Saba Ahmed's American Flag Hijab Just Sent A Simple, Yet Powerful Message About Religious Intolerance
On Tuesday, November 17, Fox News addressed the "elephant in the room," i.e. Trump's most recent comments regarding the Paris terrorist attacks. While I'll spare you the painful details, here's what you need to know: Trump believes we have "absolutely no choice" but to close mosques in order to stop extremist activity. (Oh boy; this one was so ludicrous, even Fox had to address it.) And so last night, news anchor Megyn Kelly, Trump spokeswoman Katrina Pearson, and Saba Ahmed, the president and founder of the Republican Muslim Coalition, sat down to address his remarks. While the discussion was imperative, and incredible points were made, it is Ahmed's choice of apparel — an American-flag hijab — that is resonating with many.
Why? Because without saying a single word Ahmed made a major statement. Without uttering a single sound she spoke volumes. You see, the short interview consisted of a lot of noise from Pearson. She tried to defend Trump's statement by listing examples of individuals who had plotted terrorists attacks and had belonged to American mosques. She implied something about safety and the greater good, Ahmed new this was coming. Ahmed was ready (hence the carefully chosen hijab) and when she got a chance to speak was quick to interject:
Megyn, we go to the mosque to pray. You wouldn't shut down churches because there were one or two Christians acting badly.
While the segment was brief, and Pearson had a lot (of nothing) to say, her words aren't the ones we will remember from this short segment. It is Ahmed's face and image that carries on because that hijab — that traditional piece of Muslim apparel — showed what many Muslim American's have been trying to express: love of religion does not exclude one from loving their country. The two aren't exclusive, and one doesn't negate the other. Period.
Image: Fox News/YouTube


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Photo Credit: Susan Punzo
Editor's Note: The following submission is from Raymond Helkio. Have an LGBTQ+ related experience or story to share? Having your article published on this site will automatically enrol you into a raffle to win a $50 Amazon Gift Card. Submit an article today via queerdeermedia.com.
[amazon_link asins='B01N9UUZYW' template='ProductAdRight' store='ourqueerstories-20′ marketplace='US' link_id='156d300f-8ca1-11e7-899e-2b0011e7a58f']All the way through grade school and most of high school, I was picked on. Back then no one ever spoke of 'bullies', no supports of any tangible kind. No anti-bullying campaigns, GSA's or teachers looking out for students. In fact, many teachers perpetuated the bullying by either supporting it or ignoring it altogether. And because no one ever told me these boys were bullies I thought it was my fault.
I couldn't tell anyone because there was no one to tell. As the effeminate kid everyone around me had a theory about how I got that way. As the effeminate kid I didn't know there was anything wrong with how I was until they pointed it out. No one ever told me that these boys were bullies, so I didn't know there was anything I could do.
It was a beautiful snowy winter day and for once I was excited to get to school because our class pictures would be ready. My mom gave me twelve dollars in rolled up quarters to buy the 'Bonus Pack' which was the full monty of pictures. There was one level higher but really, who needs doubles of every shot? Despite not having much money, she spent a small fortune on these pictures because she had already collected years one through three plus junior kindergarten. The entire set was handsomely mounted into a blue faux-marble three ring photo album, each page protected by a clingy clear sheet of plastic.
It was exciting to pick them up and if there was just one good picture in the row of single shots then that would mean there would also be a larger version of it, maybe even good enough for a frame. When the teacher handed me my packet, I ran back to me seat, opened the flap, and pulled one out. BINGO! Three out of the four were not only okay, they looked great! The first one however, you couldn't avoid my hideous cow-lick. I wanted to clip that picture off and burn it right then and there but I'm certain my mom would notice one missing.
It seemed like a longer than usual day but I looked up at the clock and it was 3:20 pm! My heart was pounding, I could hardly wait for the bell so I could run home and show my mom how good the pictures came out. I bundled up in my snow suit, put on my hat with the green neon pom-pom ball, grabbed my over-stuffed knapsack and headed for home. I didn't want to risk bending these in my bag so I held them in front of me with both hands and mittens on ensuring that even if I slipped in the snow I could hold them up and out of harms way.
With the school still in sight, I could see Bobby and his two idiot friends up ahead. Bobby had been picking on me since I got to this school, mostly taunting but since he was in my class it seemed like I was always avoiding him. Most of the time being at this school was like being completely invisible but every few days Bobby would connect eyes with me and remind me of his contempt for who I was. But who the hell was I?
One time he demanded I give him some of my lunch money but when I told him my mother packed my lunch he punched me in the stomach. I was wearing a puffy snowsuit when it happened so it didn't hurt much but it had knocked the wind out of me and because the morning bell was ringing the yard was full of kids, spectators to my tears.
Bobby had already seen me as he turned and gave his friends a playful punch, gesturing in my direction. All three started pushing their way through the snow and I just stood there frozen, wondering how I could hide these pictures before they see them. With his buddies flanking his sides, he steps forward looming over me. He's so close I can feel the heat radiating from his jacket, it smells like pencil shavings and vinegar. I'm stuck and I have no idea what to do so I drop to my knees and hold my pictures close to my body, hiding them as best I can with my big mittens. If he thinks I have nothing of value he'll most likely let just try and embarrass me, then he'll go away.
"Put them down." Bobby demands, grabbing at my elbows. I am frozen and all I can do is stare down at the snow, holding my arms as still as possible. "Put them down!" he snaps. I jump in my skin. His hand smacks the side of my head, he turns around and grabs the boy to his left and says "Sissy probably pissed his pants.". I watch them shuffle away through the snow and I stay on my knees until they are completely out of sight before I stand up. I look down to see a large dark stain around my crotch going all the way down both legs. The steam is rising and I suddenly feel dark. And sick. Did they know?! If they did, tomorrow is going to be real hell. Taking off my mittens, I open the flap and pull out the pictures. They are dry but I hate these pictures now. All of them.
No one ever told me what a bully was so I just assumed that they saw something, that I couldn't. I hated myself more than those boys hated me. And with that thought settled, I set my pictures on the yellow snow and went home.


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So the /Build 2013 keynotes for day one are done and below are some of the highlights from them. If you haven't watched the keynotes, be sure to put that on your list, right after installing the Windows 8.1 Preview.
Warning : Installing anything called "preview" is for advanced/enthusiast folks. Please be responsible and don't install the preview before you have made sure there's nothing on the machine you can't afford to lose. In the unfortunate event of "Something Bad Happening", be prepared to re-pave your machine to get back to status quo.
- Windows 8.1 Preview launched. Download it from http://preview.windows.com
- Redesigned Windows Store in Windows 8.1 to better connect consumers to the apps they want.
- More Monetization Opportunities such as Windows Store gift cards and third party payment systems.
- Leading Design and Devices that showcase developer productivity wit flexible windows states, new live tile designs and automatic updating.
- Preview Releases of Visual Studio 2013, Team Foundation Server and .NET 4.5.1 to make it easier for developers to create apps and services that span across mobile devices and the cloud. Learn about all the new features, and download here.
- Bing Developer Platform to embed intelligent services in apps for Windows 8.1, Windows Phone, Xbox and Office.
- Great new apps via partnerships with the NFL, Facebook, Flipboard and more.
Below are some resources to help you in learning more about the preview of Windows 8.1, Visual Studio 2013 and .Net 4.5.1
Windows 8.1 Preview Guides
- Windows 8.1 Preview Product Guide This all-up product guide is an overview of what's new in Windows 8.1 for everyone.
- Windows 8.1 Preview Product Guide for developers The product guide for developers is an overview of what's new in Windows 8.1 Preview for app builders.
- Windows 8.1 Preview Feature Guide for developers The feature guide covers new APIs and features for developers.
- Migration guide for app builders This whitepaper covers the step-by-step details on updating your app from Windows 8 to Windows 8.1 Preview.
Windows Dev Center updates for Windows 8.1 are now live!
Developer downloads – This single page gives you access to all the downloads you need to build Windows Store apps for Windows 8.1 Preview. You can access the Windows 8.1 Preview downloads, Visual Studio 2013 Preview, code samples, and additional SDKs and tools.
Developer content – The developer content in the Windows Dev Center is updated for Windows 8.1 Preview with new API reference documentation, feature guide, migration guide, and new start to finish narratives on Windows Store app UI, Flat navigation, User interaction, and Media playback.
Design resources – All Windows 8 design resources are located at design.windows.com. See case studies, category guidance, and get updated UX guidelines for Windows 8.1.
Marketing content – We have new "Download from Windows Store" badges in 13 languages and a new Windows Store App Marketing Guide to help app builders promote their apps in advertising.
WindowsStore.com – The app builder campaign will promote the downloads and product guide, and will be updated with new evidence videos soon.
Blogs to read
- Windows Team Blog: This is the blog where you will find information about Windows 8.1 Preview for all audiences and posts about new apps.
- Windows App Builder Blog NEW! This new blog combines our two previous blogs – Windows Store for developers blog and the Windows 8 app developer blog – into a single place with our other Windows blogs. App builders can find best practices to design, build, and market apps from the Windows team. Over the coming weeks, there will be a series of new posts about Windows 8.1 preview published here.
- Somasegar Blog: S. Somasegar is the corporate vice president of the Developer Division at Microsoft. Take a look at his latest Visual Studio 2013 Preview release announcement to find out more about this release.
- Developer Tools Blog Network: This network hosts the top Microsoft developer-related blogs. Check the latest feed to learn about the new features in store for developers.
- Microsoft Advertising Blog: Find out what's new with Ads in Apps and the SDK.
And there's more to come. I'll be looking at some of the more developer oriented features in the weeks to come and providing details posts here. be sure to tune in for the next two days of content on Channel 9


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Note: This post was updated on January 10, 2022
The basics of the Streamlined Sales Tax Project (SSTP)
Sovos has been an active industry participant in the Streamlined Sales Tax Project (SSTP) since its inception in the year 2000. Sovos is a certified service provider™ (CSP) under the Streamlined Sales and Use Tax Agreement and both Sovos Enterprise and Small Market sales and use tax solutions are Certified Automated Systems (CAS). Information about the project, Sovos involvement, and the immediate benefits customers realize from using a Streamlined Sales Tax™ (SST) certified solution are discussed below.
What is the Streamlined Sales Tax Governing Board?
The Streamlined Sales Tax Governing Board is an organization of 24 state governments – representing 31 percent of the U.S. population – who have voluntarily chosen to work together in an effort to modernize and simplify sales and use tax administration. The result of their efforts is the Streamlined Sales and Use Tax Agreement, which serves as a set of foundational principles for simplified sales tax to which every member state must adhere. While state membership is completely voluntary, the organization is self-policing. That is, if a member state enacts laws or rules that run contrary to Streamlined principles, they can be removed from the organization by a vote from their fellow members.
Early on, the Streamlined member states recognized the crucial role technology would play in modern tax administration and as part of their foundational principles, created a process whereby tax software providers could have both their technology and content certified as accurate by the members.
The highly effective work of the Streamlined organization in simplifying tax was recognized by the United States Supreme Court in the recent South Dakota v. Wayfair, Inc. ruling. Justice Kennedy acknowledged South Dakota's membership in the Agreement as evidence that the state has undertaken steps to ensure compliance with their laws does not represent an "undue burden."
Why is Sovos involved in Streamlined Sales Tax (SST)?
The member states of Streamlined have always recognized that they should not create rules in a vacuum, and from the beginning sought collaboration from both sellers and solution providers. Sovos immediately recognized the mutual benefit of being involved in Streamlined and has been a collaborative participant in the organization from its inception.
As part of this relationship, Sovos is actively present in meetings of the Streamlined Sales Tax Governing Board (where changes to the agreement and other major decisions are debated and voted upon), the State and Local Advisory Council (SLAC), and the Business Advisory Council (BAC) – which both advise the Governing Board on any variety of issues. Participation in these sessions with the Governing Board member states provides Sovos with a direct line of sight into many sales tax changes before they become law.
What does it mean to be a certified service provider (CSP)?
A certified service provider (CSP) is an agent certified under the Streamlined Sales and Use Tax Agreement to perform all the seller's sales and use tax functions, other than the seller's obligation to remit tax on its own purchases. A CSP is designed to allow a business to outsource most of its sales tax administration responsibilities to organizations with the expertise, tools and resources to streamline the process and limit potential audit risk.
For example, CSPs must offer the following services:
- Integrate the CSP's software with the seller's systems.
- Calculate tax on all relevant sales transactions by applying the correct rate and product taxability rule.
- Maintain a proper record of each transaction.
- Prepare and file the required tax returns.
- Remit the tax to each of the Streamlined member states.
- Resolve any notices or audits by any Streamlined member states.
- Protect the privacy of the tax information it obtains.
CSPs provide these services through a Certified Automated System. Our certified system is called Sovos Global Tax Determination.
Each streamlined full member, contingent member and associate member state has certified the accuracy of the tax rules maintained in Sovos certified solutions. This means they have pored through the Sovos product taxability matrix and confirmed the accuracy of virtually every single sales tax decision contained therein. Further, each state sends Sovos periodic tests to ensure Sovos is capturing every single rate and boundary change enacted in their jurisdiction.
What is the Model 1 seller program?
A "model 1 seller" is a business entity registered under the Agreement that has selected a CSP as its agent to perform all the seller's sales and use tax functions, other than the seller's obligation to remit tax on its own purchases.
Registration as a model 1 seller highlights an important fact. If a customer selects Sovos as a CSP under the SST program under model 1, that seller must use Sovos for both calculation and reporting/remittance.
When Sovos agrees to take on a model 1 customer, Sovos agrees to perform the following services:
- Set up and integrate the certified automated system with the seller's system – including a product mapping exercise performed by the CSP or through a method provided by the CSP.
- Calculate the amount of tax due on a transaction, which includes identifying the relevant taxing jurisdiction, the proper taxation of the product being sold, and the applicable state and local rate.
- Generate and file the appropriate sales tax returns and make the necessary remittance.
- Respond to all notices and audits stemming from the services outlined above.
When acting as a CSP, Sovos must provide implementation, tax determination, and filing/remittance managed services for those member states where the seller is a volunteer (see definition below). Sovos compensation is not paid by the seller but through the member states. The amount of compensation received by Sovos is dictated by the terms of the contract between the Certified Service Providers and the Streamlined Sales Tax Governing Board.
For any member state where the seller is not a volunteer (e.g., they collect and remit for the state as a standard taxpayer) and for any state that is not a member of Streamlined, Sovos would be compensated directly by the customer for our determination and filing services.
What is a CSP compensated seller?
A CSP compensated seller is defined in the contractual agreement between the CSPs and the Streamlined Sales Tax Governing Board. Understanding what the term means is critically important to understanding whether an entity qualifies for certain benefits associated with using a CSP.
A CSP compensated seller is defined as a seller that registers through Streamlined Sales Tax through the Streamlined Sales Tax Registration System (SSTRS) and has no fixed place of business in the state and less than $50,000 of property or payroll in the state. In other words, if you have physical nexus in a given state or have significant people or property in a given state, you are not eligible to be considered a CSP compensated seller.
Assess your status with our CSP compensated seller assessment.
What does it mean to be a Model 1 CSP compensated seller?
All Sovos customers receive the direct and substantial benefit of using software that has been comprehensively reviewed by the member states. However, for those sellers that are eligible, there are three distinct benefits that apply to Model 1 volunteers:
- Compensation – The Streamlined member states pay CSPs directly for calculation and filing services provided to Model 1 volunteers in their states.
- Audits – Sovos is required to supply member states with transactional data supporting the monthly filings of CSP compensated sellers. Further, during an audit of a Model 1 CSP compensated seller, Sovos serves as the first point-of-contact – not the seller. While Sovos may need to obtain additional details from the seller on certain transactions, audit questions may be resolved with the auditor and Sovos directly, relieving the CSP compensated seller from many time consuming and expensive audit tasks.
- Liability relief – Member states cannot assess either a seller or the CSP audit liability for any error in the calculation of tax that flows from any rate, rule or boundary information provided by the member state and properly used by the seller. However, it is important to understand that liability relief is not absolute. If, for example, a seller misidentifies an item being sold, for its CSP to map to its determination engine, and it leads to an incorrect tax result, liability will exist.
What Sovos solutions are available for Model 1 sellers?
When a company partners with Sovos for its SST Model 1 needs, it will utilize the Sovos SaaS-based Global Tax Determination engine, the Sovos filing managed services offering and our certificate management managed services solution.
What services may be separately purchased by Model 1 sellers?
While not required of program participants, sellers may also choose to enhance audit defense further by utilizing the Sovos CertManager solution to aggregate and store exemption certificates, and Sovos Use Tax Manager for vendor invoice validation needs.
In addition, Sovos Intelligent Compliance Cloud solutions can be purchased to cover additional determination and filing needs outside of SST Certified states to consolidate tax strategies and technology with a single provider.
Why should Model 1 sellers select Sovos for SST?
While all Certified Service Providers must comply with the requirements set by the Streamlined Sales Tax Project, Sovos sets itself apart by being the only comprehensive solution for modern tax. In addition to providing the highest accuracy possible in sales tax determination in SST and non-SST states, Sovos also provides solutions for exemption certificate management and vendor invoice validation of sales and use tax on purchases. Sovos works with governments around the world in rolling out new tax solutions and helping global companies in these countries to comply with new regulations quickly, accurately and efficiently. The combination of these offerings is a comprehensive global solution for the modern business, enabling unhindered growth, agile response to change and security from regulatory risks to enable frictionless commerce.
Take Action
Contact us to discuss how Sovos may put the SST project to work for you.


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"We believe in great brands and are confident that, along with their fabulous products, inventive store designs and terrific customer service, Figaro's Pizza and Pizza Schmizza will be two of the top-performing restaurants in the industry," Berger said.
Pizza Schmizza first began contemplating a new owner several months ago when one of its key shareholders and CEO, Doug Wetter, fell ill and could no longer fulfill his day-to-day company obligations. Vice president Rick Glenn suggested contacting Figaro's Pizza, a company where Glenn once worked. After meeting with Berger and hearing his plan for the future, Schmizza founder and president, Andre Jehan and Glenn felt the direction Figaro's was headed mirrored Schmizza's in many ways and felt comfortable moving forward with the sale.
"I've always admired Ron's way of doing business and thought it would not only complement but expand upon Pizza Schmizza's philosophy," said Glenn. "Since acquiring Sargo's Subs last year, Ron had been building an impressive portfolio of restaurants. By consolidating our efforts, we will be gaining product and marketing efficiencies that will be invaluable to our future growth."


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These pancakes are made with sweet potatoes, but you can substitute it with pumpkin, cauliflower or squash. If you don't mind a different color or stronger flavor, try spinach, kale carrots, onions or whatever suits your fancy. Serve with butter and maple syrup or any of your favorite pancake toppings.
Prepare sweet potato puree
To make sweet potato puree, cut potato in half. Keep the peel on because it's easier to remove it after the potato is cooked. Place in pot, cover with water and bring water to a boil. We are doubling the recipe, so two potatoes are shown below.
Once the water is boiling, put a lid on the pot and turn the temperature to medium low. Boil for 20 minutes.
Allow potato to cool and then remove peel.
Use a food processor or blender to puree the potato.
Combine dry ingredients
Add the following to a mixing bowl: flour, baking powder and cinnamon. Wisk until fully combined.
Combine wet ingredients and sugar
In another mixing bowl add the wet ingredients (eggs, milk and butter or vegetable oil) and the brown sugar.
Wisk until fully combined.
Combine dry & wet ingredients
Add the wet mixture into the dry mixture and stir only until combined. Do not overmix.
Cook pancakes
Now you're ready to start cooking! Heat a non-stick griddle to medium to medium-high heat (if it's non-stick, make sure to brush it with oil) and using a small ladle, add about 3/4 cup of batter per pancake.
Allow to cook until bubbling on top and then flip. Cook for a couple minutes more until browned. Serve with maple syrup or your favorite pancake toppings.