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a Cut at Home Design Team Project
Hello everyone, I have many viewers tell me over and over again that they love what I do but they can't do it themselves. I'm here today to tell you that anyone of you CAN make a mini especially with what I share with you today.
I'm using a new product from Heartfelt Creations called the 3D Flip Fold Album. This is a pre-made base for your mini. I think this is what intimidates a lot of you is creating your base with the spine and pages from scratch. Well this is your solution everything is constructed for you, all you need to do is pretty it up! And that's what I'm going to share with you today.
I'm going to marry Heartfelt Creations album with Graphic 45's new Children's Hour collection and share with you the first page I've done. I want to inspire you to take a stab at this yourself if you've never done a mini. Or if you're old hat try it anyway because there are always times when the benefit of having something pre-made out weighs the time of making it yourself. So come join me.
Today I'm using primarily the two March papers from the Children's Hour Collection and some black cardstock. As the mini progresses I will use from all three paper pad sizes (today I've used mostly the 12x12" pad) and the majority of the other products in the collection, stamps - stickers - tags and pockets.
On video I'm going to share how you can start with just a mat and add your photos or continue to step the basic page up to fancier with surprises galore. I've precut everything so you can simply watch the thought process and see how I put it all together. If I get a positive response to share the making of each of the rest of the pages I will turn this in to a series and share how I created each page just as I've done with this one. So if this is something you're interested in seeing please let me know in the comments or on the video comments.
As always today's video will also include lot of tips and tricks I've stumbled upon while making minis, why I do what I do, and a host of other tidbits. Of course there will be many more still photos as well. So come join me on today's video and be sure and stop by Cut at Home and check out all the fabulous things they have in their store. Linked at the bottom of the post are the items I used today.
Measurements for this page:
Solid black mats 6 1/4" x 8 1/4" (I cut 10 because I know I'll need one for each of my pages the front and back insides will require larger mats)
Decorative mats 6" x 8"
Top Insert 5 1/4" x 7 1/4" (this is the maximum this insert can be, you might even want to cut it down to 5" x 7")
Side Insert - 5 3/4" x 7 1/2" (again this is the largest you'll want it to be to allow for easy in and out access from the side, you might want to cut it down to 5 1/2" x 7 1/4" to allow for even more ease.)
Inserted folder: 10 1/2" x 4 1/4" score in the middle and fold at 5 1/4" to make booklet
NOTE: I suggest using the larger measurements for the inserts, seeing how they fit after you make the pockets, if they don't glide in and out easily re-cut them using the smaller measurement. Nothing is worse than struggling to slide your inserts into the pocket, better to cut smaller than to be frustrated and hey this is going to be a fun thing so no frustration allowed!!!
HCFA1-432: Heartfelt Creations 3D Flip Fold Album
4501228: Graphic 45 Children's Hour Collection
HCD 727: Heartfelt Creations Vintage Floret dies
HCPC 3500: Heartfelt Creations Open Vintage Floret stamps
SCT-001: Spellbinders Celebra'tions Linen Thread
SCI-001: Spellbinders Celebra'tions Berry Black Ink
TIM19541: Tim Holtz Distress Ink – Black Soot
Supplies from my stash:
Coredina'tions Black Cat Cardstock 8 1/2" x 11"
American Crafts Black Textured Cardstock 12" x 12"
Decorative brads
Strong double sided tape 1/8", 1/4" 1/2"
Strong wet glue


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Red Hat releases Fedora 17
Red Hat has released its Fedora 17 'Beefy Miracle' distribution just over a month after Canonical released its Ubuntu 12.04 distribution.
The Red Hat sponsored Fedora project serves as the proving ground for new features that eventually end up in the firm's Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) operating system. Now Red Hat has announced that it has released Fedora 17 including updates to Gnome, Eclipse, GIMP and Openstack along with numerous patches.
Canonical's Ubuntu Linux distribution might have shunned Gnome 3 in favour of its Unity desktop interface but Red Hat continues to stick with Gnome in Fedora, shipping Gnome 3.4 as its default window manager. Fedora 17 also includes GIMP 2.8 and Openstack Essex, while developers who like to live on the edge can run Eclipse Juno, the full release of which is expected later this year.
Fedora project leader Robyn Bergeron said, "I am extremely proud of the Fedora 17 release. The addition of projects such as Ovirt [virtual machine management] and JBoss Application Server 7, enhancements in Openstack, and continued support for fresh releases of desktop environments demonstrate the Fedora Project's commitment to deliver rich features and capabilities. This, combined with our leading-edge innovations at the operating-system level, truly makes Fedora 17 a comprehensive and robust operating system for all types of users."
Like Canonical's regular Ubuntu releases, the Fedora Project releases new versions of Fedora every six months. Unlike Ubuntu, the Fedora Project doesn't pitch its operating system as being the most user-friendly Linux distribution out there, however due to its six month release schedule hardware support is excellent and Fedora gives firms considering RHEL a glimpse at some of the features that will appear in RHEL six months to a couple of years down the road.
via The Inquirer

subset: commoncrawl


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By Abdelia Estrada -- Fondo Natura (FUNDENIC) in collaboration with several private enterprises, NGOs and diplomatic representatives of Nicaragua, organized the first Carrera Verde, or Green Race, that included a 5km run, an environmental festival and a reforestation project. This ecological outreach was realized with the help of various local businesses and organizations.
The race was held on the 13th of May, with the start and finish line in the parking lot of the mall of the Galerias Santo Domingo. The environmental festival was held over two days starting the day prior to the race in the area next to the Galeria parking lot. Admittance was free and included a concert where the participants enjoyed the music of La Cuneta Son Machin, Katia Cardenal, Phillip Montalvan, Malos Habitos and many more.
|Directors of the blueEnergy Managua and Bluefields offices
The reforestation days will be led be volunteers of the civil society of environmental commitment, volunteers of the sponsors, runners of the Green Race and students from the colleges and universities.
|Lal Marandin, coordinator of the bE Managua office shaking hands with the German ambassador


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I said I'd add in the detail about the Export DDL and just how it's done, and I will... I do just want to point out that Kris and Donal have written up more specific details about the 2 main aspects of SQL Developer 1.2. So, if you've not already seen them:
Kris and the APEX updates: SQL Developer 1.2 will support the upcoming Oracle APEX release.
Donal and the New Migration Workbench: Donal walks through the top new features and what you can expect from the new integrated Migration Workbench.
Migrating Subversion to Git with LFS
6 months ago


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Note: This ARC was provided by the author via InkSlinger PR in exchange for an honest review.
A star baseball player and a gifted physical therapist are the main characters in bestselling author K. Bromberg's brand new series, The Player, with book one sharing the same name as the series. Easton Wylder is one of the best catchers in professional baseball but one devastating injury during a dirty play has him chomping at the bit to return to the game and he's more than ready to put in the work required to do so. That also means that he'll need the physical therapist contracted by his team to sign off on his return, but when he meets the one charge of his PT, it isn't the legendary "Doc" that he finds--it's Doc's daughter, Scout Dalton. He doesn't think too highly of her, but then the feeling is rather mutual, even if the physical attraction between them is palpable. But Scout's out to prove that she can carry on her father's legacy and that a female is more than capable helping to heal the sport's injured players. She's never allowed herself to be distracted before, but the more she's around Easton, the more tempting he becomes. There are rules to be followed, secrets to be kept, but it's no secret that love and lust know no rules.
The Player is only my third K. Bromberg read but the author has given me something different this time around--a sports romance with a lot of heart and heat plus a fair amount of humor and angst. In short, she's more than sated the romance genre-loving fan in me. Scout and Easton know all too well what it's like to carry on a revered and well-respected parent's legacy. They're pressured to not live up to the negative expectations of not being as good as their respective fathers, but they also want to be able to forge their own way and make names for themselves. When they meet, it's not your typical swoony meet-cute. They're equally feisty and flirty, and that's a combination that continues on throughout the story. I loved these two together and they proved to have more in common than meets the eye. I won't give more details other than this first book does end in a cliffhanger. Book two, The Catch, is set to be released in late June, so feel free to wait till then to read the full duet or join me and others who've read book one in lamenting how far June is. Either way, I have a feeling it'll be worth the wait. Five stars for The Player. ♥
Date Read: 19 April 2017
Learn more about K. Bromberg.


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Category: Home Improvement
Related Links:
| Home Improvement |
Maintenance: Inside |
Maintenance: Outside
Nikki Willhite
Spring is here, and with the warmer weather, many people start
planning home maintenance chores. I would like to encourage everyone to do what
you can this year to beautify and repair any property that you own. This is for
your benefit, as well as your neighbors and community.
While it does take money to keep your property in good repair,
it is cost effective. If you don't take care of it, it will lead to problems
that will take a LOT of money to fix.
No matter now simple your house, it can be made to look nice if
both it and the yard are well maintained. If you don't have a lot of time to
work on your landscaping, remove any high maintenance items. You don't have to
have flower and shrub beds next to your foundation. If you can't take care of
them, it would look better to just grow the grass straight to the house.
Here are some of the things that can happen if you
neglect your home
Roof shingles not replaced in time cause water damage to the
underlying plywood, which then has to be replaced.
Gutters not kept clear of debris back up. They no longer do
their job. This causes more water damage.
Siding not painted and protected becomes warped, and cracked.
Again, water may reach the plywood underneath the siding. Usually the siding is
so ruined it will never look good, even when painted.
Insufficient caulking = water damage, both inside and outside
the home. Sub flooring and the foundation of your home may be compromised. I've
seen people have to find someone to crawl under their home and replace the whole
foundation. Add several zeros to that repair amount!
Overgrown foliage touching your house provides secret tunnels
for insects to invade your home. Large trees planted too near your home will
spread their roots through your drainage pipes (not covered by insurance) and
push up sidewalks and foundations. In some areas, not spraying your foliage
leads to ugly gray scales on the branches, that you can never get rid of.
Neglected lawns turn into nothing but weeds and moss. Often they have to be
totally stripped and replanted.
Water Damage and Insect infestation are the biggest consequences
of neglecting your home. One leads to another, as insects love wet, rotting
wood. Termites and carpenter ants can destroy your home.
Home ownership is a big responsibility. While you own it, that
home is under your stewardship. Like all things, it's better to leave it better
than you found it. Keep up with your home so that it doesn't become an
overwhelming job to fix it up.
You can keep the costs as low as possible by doing most of it
yourself. There is nothing wrong with taking shortcuts. You may not have to
replace all the shingles on your roof. Sometimes you can just patch it. You can
spray for pests yourself. You can just paint the south side of your home, which
usually takes the biggest beating, and so forth.
Back to Top |
Category: Home Improvement
Related Links:
| Home Improvement |
Maintenance: Inside |
Maintenance: Outside


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Running an On-Premise web analytics or Advanced Analytics is important as it helps to continuously monitor website leads and past customers when they execute actions such as making a purchase, or filling out of lead forms. Beside leads and customers, there are some other segments of website's visitors that are not likely to become possible prospects, therefore, the first step in tracking prospects is knowing who is and who is not a prospect. In creating consumer segmentations, it is much easier to analyse customer behaviours and lead behaviours, as these users have essentially taken important steps such as filling out forms and making purchases.
The first step in figuring out how to improve conversions is by gathering consumers' feedback and analysis. This is because data-driven decision making process for business is extremely effective in optimizing the entire customer lifecycle on your website.
The idea of using CustomerEngagePro on-premise analytics has become important in business, for making better business decisions and for winning in the market. It happens only when the business owners and managers are continually making informed decision rather than making decision based on experience and intuition. A websites' user that views about five pages in the job section of a website and never views a product page is not likely to become a real prospect to purchase a product. In CustomerEngagePro Enterprise Analytics you understand your customer's engagement with your website and how they interact with your products, which enables you to know if a particular prospect can convert to lead.
While it is very difficult to know who is visiting your business website to execute product research before they are known leads, CustomerEngagePro Web analytics tool enables website owners to understand how this large unknown segment of users consume content and utilize the website tools. CustomerEngagePro provides clients a concise understanding of prospects by gathering their visitor's data and understanding their behaviours to know how to convert this prospects to leads. CustomerEngagePro is a private analytics software, therefore, you have 100% data ownership by CustomerEngagePro Analytics tool guaranteed when you use our software.
With correct audience behaviour data on the number of prospects visiting your website, you can start to grasp how much of your site needs to be focused on product research and product education and to determine how to nurture leads and sales assistance. While most uninformed websites owners are highly focused on lead generation, businesses that understand the need of prospective customers to execute due diligence research before converting to a lead will perform better in turning their prospects into leads and customers.


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The Sail Loft
For more information regarding availability and prices please call020 7205 7506
Alternatively, simply fill in your name, email address and phone number in the form below and we will call you back to confirm.
The Sail Loft is a great addition to Greenwich.
Being on the riverside it is a best place to relax and enjoy the day or night out.
You will taste the delicious food made all fresh in the kitchen as well as a wide range of beers and wines.
With spectacular views over the River Thames, The Captain's Cabin is an exclusive private space. Perfect for private dining three course meal, or drinks and canapés alike, it can accommodate a wide variety of occasions, that are sure to leave your guests feeling ship-shape!
Great river view overlooking the Cutty Sark, O2 Arena and the City, delicious freshly made high quality pub food and refreshing drinks from Fuller's Brewery will create a great atmosphere.
Please note that the Captain's Cabin can be also reserved as a meetings space.
Contact the event's manager Akvile for more details.


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You have no items in your shopping cart.
Product Description
From the adorable Minnie Rocks the Dots Collection
Super cute, delicate 14kt white gold-plated bracelet featuring Mickey/Minnie's head in silhouette form with tiny bead detailing. Closes with a trigger clasp.
Adjustable sizing which measures approx 16cm-18.5mm (6" - 7.5")
Presented in a branded Disney packaging.
A little TLC goes a long way - to keep your jewellery in tip-top condition, avoid all exposure to moisture, perfume, lotions and chemicals.
Due to the inherently delicate nature of jewellery, young children should only wear jewellery with supervision.
Additional Information
Additional Information
|Presented in a branded Disney packaging
|Disney Theme
|Mickey & Minnie


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Young teachers: Talented, eager — and lost in the shuffle
Christopher Magan, Pioneer Press, February 2, 2013 – Katrina Jacoway moved across the country in hopes of a stabler job market for teachers, but it wasn't enough to guarantee her a spot in the classroom.
The Georgia native's story is an example of the roller coaster many young teachers ride as they struggle to get established.
"You just don't know," Jacoway said of the ups and downs of her four years of teaching in three school districts in two states. "I always felt comfortable of my odds of being re-employed. I realize now how important it is to find the right district, the right fit."
Nearly half of young teachers such as Jacoway leave the profession within five years because of low pay, job dissatisfaction and tight budgets, national data show. This upheaval strains school staff and can inhibit learning, especially among high-risk students.
It's also expensive. National research estimates that teacher turnover costs U.S. schools as much as $4.9 billion a year. The economic downturn made the problem worse where tight state and local budgets forced administrators to lay off promising young teachers.
Jacoway started as a preschool instructor and soon decided she wanted a career as an educator. She earned her teaching license and taught a year at an Atlanta elementary school before budget cuts eliminated her position.
On the advice of a sister-in-law, she relocated to the Twin Cities in 2008 and went back to school to earn certification to teach special education. After 18 months at Edison High School in Minneapolis, her job again was cut.
Last summer, she was hired at Como Park High School in St. Paul. She hopes to finally put down some roots. The district has the strongest support program for first-year teachers Jacoway has experienced, and she says that will help her succeed.
"It genuinely feels like they want to help me become a better teacher," she said. "That really makes a difference in how I approach the classroom and my lessons."
Christine Osorio, executive director of curriculum, instruction and professional development for St. Paul Public Schools, said 11 mentor teachers on special assignment work closely with first-year teachers such as Jacoway. The mentoring program's goals are to retain teachers and to ensure high-quality instruction in the classroom.
"We invest a lot in our new teachers, and we want to keep them," Osorio said. "We also want to provide continuity in our classrooms and throughout the district."
Teachers' departures force even small school districts to spend thousands of dollars on recruiting and training. The National Commission on Teaching and America's Future estimates teacher turnover costs Chicago Public Schools $46 million a year.
Richard Ingersoll, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania who studies teacher supply and demand, said high turnover has created what he calls the "greening" of the profession.
"There is a ballooning of beginners," Ingersoll said. "It has become a revolving door."
It is unclear how having a growing number of inexperienced teachers in the classroom is affecting student achievement. This much is clear: Experience matters, especially in the early years.
"There certainly are a number of studies out there that show experience counts," Ingersoll said.
High turnover has created the perception of a teacher shortage, Ingersoll said. While teachers in some subjects, like math and science, are in high demand, attrition plays a big role in the need.
"It's not that we are producing too few — it's that we lose too many," he said.
New teachers' reasons for leaving are consistent, Ingersoll said his research has found. They include low pay, poor working conditions and the lack of individual control.
"Giving teachers a voice in the school building, that is a management issue that can be changed without spending money," he said.
Robust teacher induction programs like St. Paul's have emerged as an effective way to train and keep promising young teachers. But these efforts also are vulnerable to financial shortfalls.
"We have a lot of research that mentoring and induction does make a difference," Ingersoll said. "On the other hand, these things cost money and are often the first thing on the chopping block."
Professional development and teacher-support programs across the metro have suffered during the economic downturn as administrators have been forced to cut spending.
Linda Madsen, superintendent of Forest Lake Area Schools, says the mentorship of new teachers is a priority in her district, but budget cuts have forced a nearly 75 percent reduction in staff dedicated to the effort.
"Through years of budget cuts, we have tried to maintain it the best we can," Madsen said.
Some teacher-support programs work better than others.
In her first year as a Spanish teacher, Valene Beckman was assigned a mentor — a retired teacher who had never worked in her building. They had a hard time connecting.
"Mentorship programs can be good, but not if there is a to-do list so big that it stresses you out, and not if your mentor cannot relate to what you teach," she said.
Like Jacoway, Beckman experienced employment uncertainties early in her career. She worked in four districts in four years before settling in Forest Lake. During that time, she found her co-workers to be her best resource.
"They never judged because they knew exactly what I was going through, and most of the time they had gone through it, too," she said.
The team approach to teacher support has become an increasingly popular way of training teachers not just in their first years, but throughout their careers.
Nancy Allen-Mastro, superintendent in West St. Paul-Mendota Heights-Eagan schools, said her district is overhauling professional development to focus on a teacher's entire career.
"If they stop growing, that's when we begin to see teachers lose their edge," Allen-Mastro said. The district will focus on individual support and small teams along with building- and district-level development.
"It a teacher is part of a network early on, they'll know what it takes to become the teacher they want to be."
Allen-Mastro believes that if teachers see a defined career track that includes support, they will be more likely to stick it out.
"I think we lose as many as we do because teachers work hard, but they don't have the proper support and they feel like they are alone," she said. "Teachers who work in isolation are not as effective as those who are part of a team."
For every young teacher struggling to hang onto a job, there's one like Eric Nelson, who's unsure whether he wants to stay in the classroom. Last year, he almost left teaching, but he decided to give it one more year.
"Not many things get me thinking about teaching 10 or 20 years from now and not feeling complacent," he said.
Since Nelson started at North Lakes Academy Charter School in Forest Lake four years ago, his salary has been stagnant. He was picked to serve on the charter school's governing board, but despite his leadership role he has a hard time seeing a long-term career in teaching.
"Everything I read about why teachers leave I can relate to," Nelson said. "I think one of the reasons I come back is because my small school lets me have a voice."
In order to get more young teachers to stay with the profession, Nelson says, they have to think they can make a difference. Constant testing and top-down mandates kill that sense of purpose, he said.
"I don't know that more money is the answer, but a culture of empowerment and making school relevant," he said. "In the long run, I feel there is potential. I don't think I'd still be teaching if I hadn't found it."
Statewide, about 30 percent of Minnesota's teachers leave the profession within their first five years, according to a 2011 survey by the Minnesota Department of Education. That number is lower than the national rate but still means hundreds leave each year.
Tom Dooher, president of Education Minnesota, is no stranger to teacher turnover. He spent his first three years as an educator working in three districts because of budget cuts.
"It's tough. You have to be committed to get in there," Dooher said. "It's a drain on morale."
The leader of the state's largest union is hopeful that talk at the Capitol to increase and stabilize education funding will help solve the retention problem.
In the short term, an influx of cash could help districts replace some of the positions and programs they were forced to cut in recent years, he said. "If there is a more predictable and sustainable funding system, it could help to get rid of some of this ebb and flow."
The long-term remedy, he said, is to return respect to the profession.
For that, Dooher is looking to the new teacher evaluation system developed by lawmakers, union members and administrators. The system of coaching and evaluations will help teachers improve and show their value, he said.
The system is an answer to a growing demand nationwide that teachers be held more accountable for student outcomes.
"When I'm talking about this with members, I'm telling them, 'This is taking charge of your profession,' " Dooher said.
But in order for teacher evaluations to make a difference, he says, lawmakers must fully fund them.
"We support this law, and it is important to do. In states where it wasn't funded it fell apart," he said. "This evaluation thing could really lift up the profession and our students, or it could be a huge unfunded mandate that crushes our schools."
For young teachers such as Jacoway, stepped-up retention efforts are a welcome change to the uncertainty they now face.
"It can feel uncomfortable not knowing for sure whether you will be back at school, especially if it's a school that you like," Jacoway said. "As a new teacher, you just want to be effective and have a positive impact on the students you teach, and in the end you hope that it is recognized by the district and principals."


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This week, we'll tackle some questions from one of our members. The issues raised are ones we are all probably grappling with in a world dominated by politicians and central bankers.
Hi Guys
A macro question, and probably more property than shares oriented. Intuitively the idea of saving your pennies and investing them wisely (i.e. according to value investing principles) has always felt 'right' to me. I've been quite proud of my contrarian 'not running with the herd' streak, especially when it came to not taking on large amounts of debt to buy expensive property. I'm originally from Ireland so I've seen the damage this can do and benefited from not getting involved.
However of late I've started to think I'm the mug. It seems like anyone I know who's bought property (I haven't), especially 3 years ago has done extremely well for very little effort. In fact the more they borrowed the more they have been rewarded. Throw in negative gearing on top and it seems like the decks are stacked in favour of borrowers.
For the last 5 years and looking into the future, because personal debt levels are so high and governments are so dependent on consumption (especially via property) to generate growth, all I can see is savers being penalised and borrowers being rewarded through ultra-low interest rates and the inevitable asset appreciation that follows.
It would seem that for savers to be rewarded and borrowers to be penalised, we would need a huge recession. That is, a situation that will bring asset prices, especially residential property, down by about 40%. Even in the event of a China blowup, this seems unlikely. Bottom line, because borrowers (public and private) are such a large and favoured proportion of the population, it looks like savers will always get shafted.
Now, probably the worst thing I could do is chase assets (especially property) when they're already expensive but I'm starting to wonder if the rules of the game have changed and aggressive investors (borrowers) will be favoured over conservative investors for the foreseeable future? I already think (barring a huge recession) I've missed the boat on property but I'm wondering if in general I need to change my basic philosophy of only buying assets when they're 'cheap' because having a significant portion of my portfolio in cash/fixed interest (45%) waiting for asset prices to fall is starting to look like a fools game when the game's rigged (in Australia and even more so in US/Europe/Japan) in favour of borrowers.
These are very interesting points that will test anyone who's trying to stick to a sensible saving and investing path (myself included). Seth Klarman, founder of Baupost group, has been through this dilemma twice in the last decade (just recently and in 2004). His views make for great reading.
Let's look at the performance question first. There might be pockets of property that have done exceptionally but most people won't have done as well out of property over the last three to five years as shares.
Over the last five years STW (the ASX 200 tracking share ETF we have in our model portfolios) has returned about 12% a year. Some international funds, like Magellan Global Fund, are north of 15% over that period (the returns get even better over three years)
Median property prices on the other hand have gone up 6% per annum (according to the ABS index), perhaps giving you 9% per annum total with some generous net rental yield assumptions. Note though that those figures don't account for stamp duty, transaction costs like real estate agent fees and renovations.
Hot markets, like inner city Sydney and Melbourne, might have done better (the ABS says 9% for Sydney) but then the hot shares have done a lot better again. Even Telstra has almost doubled over the last five years (plus made substantial distributions).
The property obsession
I tend to think the main difference with property is that everyone talks about it. Plus we watch reality TV shows highlighting the exceptional results. You rarely see a TV show focusing on the property investors who've ended up with a strata fight, concrete cancer or termites. Nor do you see TV shows about the self-funded retiree who bought Telstra instalment warrants and cleaned up.
That's not meant to be an advertising campaign for shares but simply to point out that the last five years or so of extreme monetary policy (ultra low interest rates) have been a great time to own assets generally. Property is up, Australian shares are up, international shares are up and so are bonds. When interest rates are manipulated downwards it makes everything paying a half-decent return attractive in comparison. The benefit that the non-property assets had (and why they've provided better returns) is because they suffered a proper correction post-GFC (that is, they were cheap).
Of course, one thing property does have in its favour is our cultural obsession with it. At times it feels like the entire population has a negatively geared investment property and the recent Federal budget suggests subsidising property investors is more important to the Government than the age pension.
This national obsession creates buying pressure, which creates demand for an array of borrowing products that enable people to speculate with money they don't have (and won't have for another couple of decades), leading to more buying pressure. Government policies (both negative gearing and capital gains tax concessions) and banking regulations (banks get generous capital treatment of home loans) work towards feeding the beast and driving prices north.
Of course when things go bad, sheer number of voters speculating on property prices means the Government of the day is always going to have a strong incentive to subsidise them, or bail them out, at the expense of the savers. So I can certainly understand the doubts about trying to play it smart and at times it can feel like the Government and central bankers primary role in life is to try to screw over non-speculators.
But a few things I try to remind myself are:
1. Monetary policy is a blunt instrument. Property prices are absurdly expensive in most markets, which constrains their returns. But loose monetary policy also finds its way into the price of other assets, which often aren't as expensive. Telstra returned more than hot properties over the last five years because it was cheaper to start with. Investing in better value assets puts you on the same side as property speculators when it comes to the central bankers, but with lots more upside if things pan out. More importantly, better value means less downside if they don't.
2. How do you value a property? Residential property valuations are nonsensical, like internet stocks in the late 90s and 2000s, Dutch tulips and the rest. An official property valuation is a comparison to other expensive properties. It seems to me that residential property (especially in capital cities) is a hybrid bet on a combination of factors including Chinese demand, immigration, supply constraints, banking regulation, monetary policy and taxpayer subsidies. I honestly don't know how you value such a bet, or how you assess your downside risk. Again, I think it's better to look for the things that are priced on fundamentals (like how much income they'll make you each year).
3. Property performance statistics are often rubbish. Our Aggressive Portfolio has returned about 15% over the last year and the median Sydney property about the same, with some rental income included. But the median Sydney property has council rates, repairs and maintenance, management fees and possibly also renovations and land tax. Plus, to buy it took a lot of running around to inspections and auctions and, to sell, a lot of preparation. The median Sydney property owner also paid stamp duty and transaction costs on the way in and a selling agent's fee (plus more transaction costs) on the way out. All these costs affect the actual returns people experience from property and it's only actual returns that you can spend.
4. It's a long game. One of the difficulties with investing is that the long-term timeframes involved are much greater than the 'long-term' we apply to our lives generally. Doing a university degree takes three to five years, many jobs last less than five years, yet investing requires you to have a decade plus horizon. Plus, the major events affecting our investments are unpredictable. The next financial crisis will happen, it's just a question of whether it's a year or two, or a decade, from now. The danger with following an overly aggressive path (especially when leverage is involved) is that you take the risk that a crisis wipes you out. Sensible investing eliminates that risk.
Emotional aspects of investing
I can't help but think Australian residential property is one of the greatest examples we'll see of the Fairstar principle. It's had so many wins (and publicity) over the last couple of decades (magnified by leverage into very large wins in some cases) that it starts to feel like that's the way it's destined to be.
But equilibrium only needs to be restored once and leveraged property investors (and probably all leveraged, overly aggressive investors for that matter) will be crushed. We saw in the United States that property prices can easily fall 20% in a property downturn, enough to wipe out the equity of many property owners.
Remember that our Government doesn't have the firepower to bail out the property market (and the banks) in a true property downturn, especially as a recession would probably occur at the same time (either because it's the cause, or as a result). Plus there's a limit to what they can do politically. The Government can reduce aged pensions to keep negative gearing, but I don't think they'd be able to cut the aged pension completely to introduce larger taxpayer subsidies of loss-making real estate.
As an investor, it's important that you're in a position to survive a recession. Many leveraged property investors won't.
The other emotional aspect that's tough for sensible investors (whether they're conservative, or sensibly aggressive) is that the 'winners' in the investment game are always going to be those who take the most risk, not those with the best strategy. So a sensible investor has to accept the proposition that they'll never be first.
To use a hypothetical example, imagine you're one of a group of one hundred investors. The other ninety nine are going to make leveraged investments in highly speculative ventures, but you've come up with an investment strategy that guarantees you'll have the tenth best returns, year in, year out.
Locking in that result, with such certainty, would require investing genius. But even as a genius, you'll never get the best results. Year in, year out, nine others (some of whose investments might be downright crazy) will beat you.
The trick here is that, at the start of the year, the genius knows he'll be in the top 10%. The others don't know if they're going to be number one, or broke, like the investors who come 70th through 100th.
The investors who take on the most risk will always be the ones you see at the extremes when it comes to performance. Think of it as the 'Nathan Tinkler principle'. Tinkler didn't get rich because he was a great investor (and that's not to say he was bad either). He grew rich by taking on massive amounts of risk and being one of the ones for whom it paid off (for a while, at least).
There's probably others who took on just as much risk at around the same time, who went broke. But we'll never hear about them.


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*This contest has already begun
Wednesday, April 3, 2013
The Fiction Train
*This contest has already begun
5 comments:
How do we keep from everyone continuing from spot one - the awesome opening, if we are all starting from the same prompt? This looks like loads of fun. :)ReplyDeleteReplies
Hi Denise, the idea is to follow the new author's addition in the comments and continue from there. The first post will appear tomorrow morning. Read the post and then check the comments below. Have fun!!!Delete
This looks like total fun and could come up with some hilarious results. What a wonderful idea!! I am sharing this all around.ReplyDeleteReplies
Thanks for sharing. Yeah, I think this could be a hoot. Let's take this story to some outrageous places ;-)Delete
Actually the idea 'continue the story' has been a writing prompt for battling writers block many years. It's also used in creative writing shops all over the world. I have no idea who came up with it first.ReplyDelete
However, I've never heard of it as a fiction train - that one I think you hold all the credits too.


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Cloud 9 - You Got Me Burnin' (Ray Keith & Nookie Remix) (Moving Shadow, 1993)
In addition to parts of his introductory speech (see yesterday's post) there's another Rev. Jesse Jackson line from Wattstax that has been sampled in dozens of electronic and hip-hop tunes, taken from his intro to a track by The Soul Children: "Brothers and sisters, I don't know what this world is coming to". Most people sample it from Public Enemy's 'Rebel Without A Pause' where it appears clean at the beginning and it has turned up on tracks such as 'Pump Up The Volume' by M/A/R/R/S, 'Sisters, I Don't Know What This World Is Coming To' by DJ Sprinkles (from his excellent Midtown 120 Blues album) and the original version of this classic by Cloud 9 AKA Nookie.
On the Cloud 9 Remix EP Ray Keith and Nookie gave the track a deeper remix and although it doesn't feature the Rev. Jesse Jackson line it retains the numerous other samples from the original. It opens with a repeated "You see house is a feeling" vocal which is the voice of Chuck Roberts from Rhythm Controll's 'My House', the accapella of which has been sampled by numerous house records and is best known in the UK as the vocal from 'Can You Feel It' by Fingers Inc. This is joined by a four to the floor beat and Loleatta Holloway's "You got me burnin up" vocal from her also heavily sampled disco classic 'Love Sensation' before an Amen break punctuated by some extreme timestretching comes in along with a tough bassline. The remix drops the ravier synth stabs of the original but keeps the darker main riff along with the awesome siren-like sound from Quincy Jones' 'Ironside', perhaps better known these days from its appearance in Tarantino's Kill Bill. What really makes this remix though is the gorgeous piano/synth section that starts just after the four minute mark, the layers of sound gradually built up to spine tingling effect and accompanied by the Think break. A stunning remix that surpasses the original.
The digital is available to purchase over at Beatport. You can hear the track a few minutes into this back 2 back set from Fabio and Grooverider at Dreamscape 8 on NYE 1993:
Fabio Back2Back Grooverider Dreamscape 8 'The Big Bang' 31st Dec 1993 by Old Skool Rave Tape Archive on Mixcloud
Discogs link


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Today I'm thinking about a few things.....
- The fifty people that will arrive at my house on Sunday. Umm, yeah. There's a tent, caterers, balloons, and oh yeah.....I'm not nearly prepared for it.
- The four inches of water that was in Flipper's basement. And the #%$@^ insurance adjuster who just seems to be taking his time. Meanwhile, back at the ranch, the ceiling tiles are warping along with the walls because of the humidity. Hellloooo soggy carpeting!!
- The ancient spastic lab of mine who is now beginning to tip over for no apparent reason. My time with him is limited and its killing me.
- The thumb that I so thoughtfully crushed in the car door last week. Still hurts and damn inconvenient. Why must I always damage the dominant hand??
- The leak that keeps re-appearing in my family room ceiling.


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Anti-heartworm youth 'in it for the pets'
FAIRFIELD -- About a dozen slender magazines that cater to pet lovers were spread across the dining room table in Annie Blumenfeld's house.
Blumenfeld, 17, and her dog Teddy, a 4-year-old bearded collie/otterhound mix, are featured in each -- Dogs Life, Cesar's Way, Pets Magazine and more.
They are spreading the word about heartworm disease.
"Dogs shouldn't have to suffer," said Blumenfeld, a junior at Fairfield Warde High School.
Three years ago, searching for a shaggy rescue dog, Blumenfeld found Teddy, who had been saved from a high-kill shelter in Texas. As adoption procedures began, the dog was taken to a vet, who discovered Teddy had a serious case of heartworm.
An affliction caused by a parasitic worm, heartworm disease is spread by mosquitoes. It can attack a dog's heart, lungs and blood vessels, and can be fatal. Heartworm disease has been diagnosed in all 50 states. Treatment involves keeping the patient inactive in a crate for two months and injections of an arsenic-based drug. Treatment costs from $600 to $2,000.
"It was a long, scary process," Blumenfeld said. "It broke my heart to learn that he could not understand why he was in this situation. It was completely preventable."
More InformationTale of the tail
To learn more about Annie Blumenfeld's work and heartworm disease, go to: http://wags4hope.org/
So Blumenfeld, then in the eighth grade, decided to raise money to fight the disease.
She started by selling her paintings of Teddy. So far, 250 have been sold or donated to individuals, clinics and hospitals, including Yale-New Haven Hospital.
"It was a nice, easy way to raise money," said Blumenfeld.
But she wanted to do more.
She formed a nonprofit with 501(c)(3) status so she could apply for grants. She is now the president and sole board member of Wags 4 Hope.
"To be legitimate when you are reaching out for money, and donating to shelters, you do need that," Blumenfeld said.
She also started a school club to raise money, a website called Wags 4 Hope and a Facebook page and a blog called Teddy's Tales.
To date, Blumenfeld said, the charity has raised about $35,000, which has been distributed to rescue groups from the Humane Society of Danbury to Los Angeles.
Chewable vaccines to prevent the disease cost about $50 a year, said Barbara Naugle, director of development for the Connecticut Humane Society in Newington.
Naugle called Blumenfeld's cause -- to tackle heartworm disease -- a noble one.
"Annie is just outstanding," Naugle said. "She is just a sweet kid, in it for the pets."
A couple of Blumenfeld's paintings hang in Naugle's office.
While some may find it unusual for someone so young to be philanthropically involved, Naugle points out that the Humane Society of the United States was started by a teenager in 1881. The National Council of Nonprofits says that youngsters taking up charitable causes is not uncommon. The number who go the extra mile to form a nonprofit also seems to be growing, officials there said. Most are aided by an adult, who can provide legal guidance.
Blumenfeld, who said she spends a minimum of five hours a week on her charity, is also on the hunt for colleges. She doesn't plan to major in veterinary medicine, or even art, but in business and government.


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During NVIDIA GTC 2018 in Europe NVIDIA announced the new Turing T4 Graphics card. On Twitter this card got a lot of love as it looked like a good evolution of the (now) mainly suggested Tesla P4 (you remember last year it didn't even appear on NVIDIA's slides – now it's their primary suggestion – thanks for listening NVIDIA). I saw the first details about the card in John Fannelis Presentation on the first day. They looked really promising. Here is the picture I with the shown card details (sorry for the head in front of it – I didn't expect I need it for a blog post…):
You can find the P4 data in this PDF.
Let us compare the data of both cards that we have until now.
CUDA Cores
Frame Buffer (Memory)
vGPU Profiles
Form Factor
PCIe 3.0 single slot
PCIe 3.0 single slot
Max Power
As you can see both cards are really similar. The just need a single slot. Thus, you can put up to six (or sometimes eight -yes there are a few servers that support eight(!) cards – just check the HCL) cards in one server and have a limited power consumption. The only difference is that the T4 uses the new Turing chip and has doubled Frame Buffer (16 GB). That means you can run 16 VMs each with a 1 GB Frame Buffer on this card. Although I don't know if the touring chip offers enough performance for that (as I have no testcard until now @NVIDIA) it might be a good option to have 8 VMs with 2 GB Frame Buffer on one card. That would help in many situations where 1 GB Frame Buffer is not enough. In this situation you could only put 4 VMs on one card.
So, at this point I also thought that the T4 is a good evolution of the P4. The only main point I was missing was a price as this could be an argue against the price. But then I attended another session. Here they also showed some details about the T4. There was one detail I noticed quite late and thus I was too late to take a picture. Luckily my friend Tobias Zurstegen made this picture showing the technical information's:
Here are two details shown I didn't find somewhere else. First there are the Max Users – wouldn't be to hard to calculate when you know that the smallest profile is a 1B profile (= 1GB Frame Buffer). But next too that there is the number of H.264 1080p 30 Streams. So, let's add these points to our list.
CUDA Cores
Frame Buffer (Memory)
vGPU Profiles
Form Factor
PCIe 3.0 single slot
PCIe 3.0 single slot
Max Power
Max Users (VMs)
H.264 1080p 30 Streams
What's that? The number of H.264 1080p 30 Streams is lower on a T4 (16) compared to a P4 which has 24 Streams. The T4 has 8 (!) Streams less than a P4?!? If you keep in mind that e.g. in a HDX 3D Pro environment each monitor of a user with activity requires one stream that means that with 8 users having a dual monitor all available Streams can already be used. If you put more users on the same card it might happen that this leads to a performance issue for the users as there not enough H.264 Streams available. Unfortunately, I haven't found anything on NVIDIAs website that proofs that this number of H.264 Streams is correct and was not just a typo in the slide.
But if it's trues I am wondering why that happened? What did NVIDIA change thus the number of streams went down and not up. I would have expected at least 32 Streams (compared to the P4). If it was a card design change that would be contra productive. Let us hope it was just a Typo on the slide.
If someone found some other official document which (not) proofs this number please let me know.
Should the number be correct I hope NVIDIA listens again and changes this before the card is released. I see this as a big bottleneck for many environments. Especially as many don't know about the number of streams and then wonder why they have a bad performance as the graphics chip itself is not under heavy load and they don't know that to many required H.264 streams can also lead to a poor performance. Next to that keep in mind that it's now also possible to use H.265 in some environments – but using that leads possible to less streams as it's encoding is more resource intensive.
It's been quite a long time since I have written an article for the German magazine IT Administrator. Thus I thought it's time for another article. You can find it it in the current IT-Administrator. The article describes how you can use Skype for Business in Citrix Environments and benefit from the Citrix RealTime Optimization Pack.
Citrix möchte die reibungslose Nutzung von Skype for Business in VDI-Umgebungen ermöglichen und hat hierfür das Citrix RealTime Optimization Pack veröffentlicht. Wir wollen uns ansehen, wie dieses Plug-in funktioniert und wie Sie es in Ihrer Umgebung implementieren.
NVIDIA GRID license not applied before the user connects – License Restriction will not be removed until the user reconnects
When you are using NVIDIA GRID, you might know that NVIDIA started to activate license checking in Version 5.0. This means if no license is available, there are the following restrictions applied to the user:
- Screen resolution is limited to no higher than 1280×1024.
- Frame rate is capped at 3 frames per second.
- GPU resource allocations are limited, which will prevent some applications from running correctly
Why ever NVIDIA has not enabled a Grace Period after a VM started – thus the restrictions are active until the VM successfully checked out a license. This has the effect that a user might connect to a just booted VM his session experience is limited. Furthermore, he has to disconnect and reconnect his session when the NVIDIA GRID license was applied to e.g. work with a higher resolution. Currently I know about three workarounds to fix this issue:
1. Change the Citrix Desktopservice startup to Automatic (Delayed Start)
2. Configure a Settlement Time before a booted VM is used for the affected Citrix Delivery Groups
3. NVIDIA Registry Entry – Available since GRID 5.3 / 6.1
Both workarounds have their limitations – thus I would like to show you both of them.
Changing the Citrix Desktopservice to Automatic (Delayed Start)
When you change the Service to an Automatic (Delayed Start) it will not directly run after the VM booted. This has the result that the VM is later registered at the Delivery Controller – it has time to check out the required NVIDIA license – before the Delivery Controller will broker a session to the VM.
To change the service to an Automatic (Delayed Start) open the Services Console on you master image (Run => services.msc) and open the properties of the Citrix Desktopservice. Change the Startup type to Automatic (Delayed Start) and confirm the change with OK.
Now update your VMs from the Master Image and that's it. The VM should now have enough time to grab a NVIDIA License before it registers to the Delivery Controller.
The downside of this approach is that with every VDA update / upgrade you need to configure it again. Instead of doing this manually you can run a script with the following command on your maintenance VM before every shutdown. This command changes the Startup type – you cannot forget to change it (Important: There must be a space after "start=").
sc config BrokerAgent start= delayed-auto
In a PowerShell the command needs to be modified a little bit:
&cmd.exe /c sc config BrokerAgent start= 'delayed-auto'
Configure a Settlement Time before a booted VM is used
Alternatively, you have the possibility to configure a Settlement Time for a Delivery Group. This means that after the VM has registered to the Delivery Controller no sessions are brokered to the VM during this configured time. Again, the VM has enough time to request the necessary NVIDIA license. Howerver, this approach also a down side – if no other VMs are available users will still be brokered to just booted VMs although the Settlement Time did not end. This means if you didn't configure enough Standby-VMs to be up and running when many users connect they still might be brokered to a just booted VM (without a license).
To check the currently active Settlement Time for a Delivery Group open a PowerShell and enter the following commands:
Add-PSSnapin Citrix*
Get-BrokerDesktopGroup –Name "DELIVERY GROUP NAME"
Replace the Delivery Group Name with the Name of the Delivery Group you would like to check
You now get some information's about the Delivery Group. The interesting point is the SettlementPeriodBeforeUse in the lower area. By default, it should be 00:00:00.
To change this Time enter the following command:
Set-BrokerDesktopGroup –Name "DELIVERY GROUP NAME" –SettlementPeriodBeforeUse 00:05:00
With the above setting, the Settlement Time is changed to 5 Minutes – do not forget to replace the Delivery Group Name with the actual one.
If you now again enter the command to see the settings for your Delivery Group you will notice that the SettlementPeriodBeforeUse was changed.
NVIDIA Registry Entry – Available since GRID 5.3 / 6.1
With GRID Release 5.3 / 6.1 NVIDIA has published a Registry Entry to also fix this. The description is a little bit limited but when I got it correct, it changes the driver behavior – thus that all restrictions are also gone when the license was applied after the session was started. Before you can add the registry setting, you need to install the NVIDIA Drivers in your (Master-) VM and apply a NVIDIA License. When the license was successfully applied, create the following Registry Entry:
Path: HKLM\SOFTWARE\NVIDIA Corporation\Global\GridLicensing
Type: DWORD
Name: IgnoreSP
Value: 1
After creating, you must restart the VM (and update your Machine Catalogs if it is a Master-VM). Honestly I wasn't able to test this last solution by myself – so I can't tell if this really fixes the issue all times or only mostly….
That's it – hope it helps (and NVIDIA will completely fix this issue in one of their next releases).
Creating a High Available IGEL Universal Management Server Infrastructure with Citrix NetScaler
When you reach a point where you manage many IGELThin Clients you might think that it's quite helpful that the Igel UMS is still available even if the Server with the UMS fails. Furthermore, you can use this to reduce the load on one systems. For example when multiple Clients update their Firmware at the same time, they all download it from the IGELUM Server. To reach this goal you have two options:
1. Buy the IGEL High-Availability Option for UMS (including a Load Balancer)
2. Load Balance two UMS that use the same Database with a Citrix NetScaler
In this blog post, I would like to show you how to realize the second option. Before we can start with the actual configuration, we need to have a look at a few requirements for this configuration.
1. Database Availability
When you create a High Available UMS Server Infrastructure you should also make the required Database also High Available. Otherwise, all configured UMS Servers stop to work when the Database Server failed.
2. Client IP Forwarding
The UMS Servers need to know the actual IP of the Thin Clients. When you would not forward the Client IP all Thin Clients would have the same IP Address. You then won't be able to send commands to a Thin Client or see their online status. Unfortunately, this leads to another problem. The client connects to the load balanced IP of the UMS Servers. This is forwarded (with the original Client IP) to one UMS Server. This server replies directly to the Thin Client IP. The Thin Client now receives a reply not from the IP Address it initially connected to and ignores the reply. One (easy) way to fix this issue is to put the UMS Servers in a separate Subnet. Add a Subnet IP (SNIP) to the NetScaler in this Subnet and configure this NetScaler SNIP as the Default Gateway for the UMS Servers. When doing this the UMS Servers receive the original Client IP but the reply to the Client still passes the NetScaler which can then replace the Server IP with the load balanced IP Address.
Now let's start with the actual configuration. The first step is to install the Standard UMS (with UMS Console) on two (or more) Servers.
After the installation finished successfully, it's time to connect the external Database (if you are unsure about some installation steps have a look at the really good Getting Started Guide). Therefore, open the IGEL Universal Management Suite Administrator and select Datasource.
In this example, I will use a Microsoft SQL Always On Cluster – but you can select every type of available Database that offers a high availability option. Of course this is nothing that must be – but how does it help you, when the UMS Servers are high available and the database not? If the database server fails, the UMS would also be down – you still would have a single point of failure.
Enter the Host name, Port, User, Schema and Database Name.
Keep in mind that the database is not automatically created – you have to do this manually before. For a Microsoft SQL Server you can use the following script to create the Database. After creating, the database don't forget to make it highly available – e.g. using the Always-On function.
If you prefer a different name change rmdb to the required name. Beside that replace setyourpasswordhere with a Password. The user (Create User) and Schema (Create Schema) name can also be changed .
CREATE DATABASE rmdb
USE rmdb
CREATE LOGIN igelums with PASSWORD = 'setyourpasswordhere',
CREATE USER igelums with DEFAULT_SCHEMA = igelums
CREATE SCHEMA igelums AUTHORIZATION igelums GRANT CONTROL to igelums
After confirming the connection details, you now see the connection. To enable the connection select Activate and enter the Password of the SQL User.
On the first server, you will get the information that there is no schema in the Database that needs to be created. Confirm this with Yes.
You now should see an activated Datasource Configuration. Repeat the same steps on the second UMS Server. Of course, you don't need to create another Database – just connect to the same Database like with the first server.
Time to start with the actual Load Balancing configuration on the Citrix NetScaler. Open the Management Website and switch to Configuration => Traffic Management => Servers
Select Add to create the IGEL UM-Servers. Enter the Name and either the IP Address or Domain Name
Repeat this for all UM-Servers (in my example I added two servers).
Now we need Services or a Service Group containing / for all UMS Servers. I personally prefer the Service Groups but if you normally use Services this is also possible.
After switching to Service Groups select again Add to create the first UMS Service Group. In total, we need three Service Groups.
Port 30001: Thin Client Connection Port
Port 8443: Console Connection Port
Port 9080: Firmware Updates
The first one we create is the Service Group for Port 30001. Enter a Name and select TCP as the Protocol. The other settings don't need to be changed.
Now we need to add the Service Group Members. Select therefore No Service Group Member.
Mark the UMS Servers created in the Servers area and confirm the selection with Select.
Again, enter the Port number 30001 and finish with Create.
The Service Group now contains two Service Group Members.
As mentioned at the beginning we need to forward the Client IP to the UMS Servers. Otherwise, every client would have the same IP – the NetScaler Subnet IP. Therefore, edit the Settings (not Basic Settings!) and enable Use Client IP. Confirm the configuration with OK.
That's it – the Service Group for Port 30001 is now configured.
Repeat the same steps for Port 8443 – but do not enable Use Client IP. Otherwise, you will not be able to connect to the UMS Servers with the load balanced IP / Name inside the IP Range of the UMS Servers itself.
Finally, you need to create a Service Group for Port 9080 – this time you can again forward the Client IP.
At the end, you should have three Service Groups.
Time to create the actual client connection points – the Virtual Servers (Traffic Management => Load Balancing => Virtual Servers).
Like before select Add to create a new Virtual Server. Again, we need three virtual servers for the Ports 30001, 8443 and 9080.
The first Virtual Server we create is for Port 30001. Enter a Name and choose TCP as the Protocol. Furthermore, enter a free IP Address in the separate Subnet of the UM-Servers. The Port is of course 30001.
After this, we need to bind the Services or Service Group to this Virtual Server. If you created Services and not a Service Group make sure, you add the Services of all UMS Servers. To add a created Service Group click on No Load Balancing Virtual Server Service Group Binding.
Select the Service Group for Port 30001 and confirm the selection with Bind.
The Service Group is now bound to the Virtual Server. Press Continue to get to the next step.
When a client connects, we need to make sure it always connects to the same UMS Server after the initial connection and not flips between them. When a client stopped the connection or a UMS Server failed, it's of course OK if the client connects to the other UMS Server. Herefore, we need to configure a Persistence. As Persistence Type, we select Source IP and the Time-Out should be changed to 5. IPv4 Netmask is 255.255.255.255. Confirm the Persistence with OK.
Finish the Virtual Server configuration with Done.
Repeat the same steps for the other two ports – thus you have three Virtual Servers at the end. Of course, all need to use the same IP Address.
To make it more easy to connect to the Load Balanced UMS Servers it is a good idea to create a DNS-Host-Entry e.g. with the name Igel and the IP address from the Virtual Servers. When you added a DHCP Option or DNS Name for the Thin Client Auto registration / connection change them also to the IP address of the Virtual Servers.
You can now start the IGEL Universal Management Suite and connect to the created Host-Name.
After a successful connection, you can see the used server name in the bottom left area and under the Toolbar.
We now need to point the Thin Clients to the new Load Balanced UMS Servers. You need either to modify an existing policy or create a new one. The necessary configuration can be found in the following area:
System => Remote Management => Universal Management Suite (right area).
Modify the existing entry and change it to the created Host name. Save the profile and assign the configuration to your Thin Clients
The last step is necessary to allow the Thin Clients to update / download a firmware even when one UMS Server is not available. By default, a Firmware always points to one UMS Server and not the Load Balanced Host name. Therefore, switch to the Firmware area and select one Firmware. Here you can find the Host. Change this to the created Host name and save the settings. Repeat this for all required Firmware's. If you download a new Firmware make sure you always modify the Host – otherwise a new Firmware will only be available from one UMS Server.
Of course, when you download or import a Firmware using the UMS this is only stored on one of the UMS Servers. To make the Firmware available on both UMS Servers you need to replicate the following folder (if you modified the UMS installation path this would be different):
C:\Program Files (x86)\IGEL\RemoteManager\rmguiserver\webapps\ums_filetransfer
A good way to do this is using DFS. Nevertheless, every replication technology is fine – just make sure (when changing the Host entry for a Firmware) that the Firmware's are available on both UMS Servers.
That's it – hope this was helpful for some of you.
When you install NVIDIA Grid 6.0 on a XenServer you need to manually activate the possibility to Live-Migrate a VM which is using a (v)GPU. Otherwise, you see the following message when you try to migrate a VM:
The VGPU is not compatible with any PGPU in the destination
The steps to enable the migration are described in the Grid vGPU User Guide. To enable the live migration you need to connect to the Console of the XenServer (eg using Putty). Login with the root user. The next step is to edit (create) the nvidia.conf in the folder etc/modprobe.d. Therefore, enter the following command:
vi /etc/modprobe.d/nvidia.conf
Here you need to add the following line:
options nvidia NVreg_RegistryDwords="RMEnableVgpuMigration=1"
Save the change with :wq and restart the Host. Repeat this for all Hosts in the Pool. After restarting you can now migrate a running VM with a (v)GPU on all Hosts that have the changed setting. If you haven't configured the setting or didn't reboot the Host only the other Hosts are available as a Target Server.
My book about Citrix XenApp and XenDesktop 7.15 LTSR (German) is finally available in Store. It was a lot of work (and learnings) but also fun to test out some not so often used features. You can find more details here.
The Citrix XenCenter offers an easy way to update your XenServer (Pools). Furthermore, most updates can nowadays be installed without a reboot. Only a few require a reboot or a XE-Toolstack restart. This process is fully automated. This means that the first host is updated and (if necessary) rebooted. Then the second one follows and so on. To reboot a host the VMs are migrated to another host. This is fine until you use local storage for your VMs. (I don't want to discuss here if this makes sense or not!) When the VMs are using local storage, they cannot be automatically migrated. When they are deployed using MCS they even can not be migrated manually (the base disk would be still on the initial host). In the past, this was not a problem. You could just put the VMs into maintenance mode and update one host.
Therefore, you started the Install Update Wizard, selected the updates you would like to install and had the possibility to select the host you would like to update:
When the update was finished, you disabled the Maintenance mode on the corresponding VMs and enabled it on the VMs on the next host. After some time the VMs from the second host were not in use any longer and you could update the second host. Since XenCenter 7.2, this is not possible any longer. After selecting an Update, you can only select to update the whole Pool:
Luckily, there is a small "workaround" to use the XenCenter to download the updates and copy them to the XenServer. (I really like the Update Overview in XenCenter – no hassle to look online which updates are available.) To use this workaround you start the Install Update Wizard and select the Update you would like to install.
In the next step, select the pool containing the server(s) on which you would like to install the update. Now the update is downloaded and transferred to the pool. It is important that you now do not press Next! When you close this dialog (Cancel), the update will be deleted from the Pool.
Instead, you need to connect to the console (e.g. using Putty) of a XenServer that is a member of the Pool. Now we need to figure out the UUID of the update. Therefore, you need to enter the following command:
xe update-list name-label=HOTFIXNAME
You can find the Name of the Update in the XenCenter Download Window. For example, Hotfix 11 for XenServer 7.1 CU1 has the Name XS71ECU1011. Copy the UUID and note if something is required after the hotfix is installed (after-apply-guidance). Either this can be a Toolstack restart (restartXAPI) or a host reboot (restartHost).
The next step is to install the Update on the required hosts. This can be achieved with the following command:
xe update-apply host=HOSTNAME uuid=PATCH-UUID
Replace HOSTNAME with the name of the XenServer you would like to update and PATCH-UUID with the copied UUID from the Patch. Repeat the same for all Hosts you would like to update. When the patch was applied, no further message is displayed.
That means you have to remember the after-apply-guidance which was shown with the Update UUID. The good thing is – if you have forgotten that you can check in XenServer if another step is necessary. Just open the General area from the Server. Under Updates you can see if an installed Update requires a Toolstack or Host restart. If a Toolstack or Host restart is necessary, do them to finish installing the update.
That is it – now you know how to install an Update to a single server on a XenServer Pool member. There are just two other things I would like to add.
The first is that you can install multiple updates at the same time. Therefore, you start with the same steps. You select an Update in the XenCenter and continue until it was transferred to the Pool. Now you go back with "Previous" to the Select Update area. Select the next Update and continue like before until the Update was transferred to the XenServer Pool. Repeat this for all updates you would like to install. Remember tha you not close the Update dialog – otherwise the update files will be removed from the Pool and you cannot install them any longer. Now note down the UUID from the updates and install all of them. It is not necessary to reboot after each update (which requires a Reboot of the Host / Restart of the Toolstack). Just install all and if an update (or multiple) require a reboot, reboot once at the end.
The next thing I would like to add is that you can also keep the files on the XenServer. Therefore, you need to kill the XenCenter trough the Task Manager when the Updates have been transferred to the Pool.


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Malcolm Boyle, Brett Williams, Ted Brown , Andrew Molly, Lisa McKenna, Claire Palermo, Liz Molloy
Journal of Paramedic Practice, Vol. 3, Iss. 9, 02 Sep 2011, pp 504 - 509
There is a need to identify if current undergraduate paramedic students have the appropriate attributes to ensure they are effective listeners and communicators and whether additional or specific elements need to be added to the paramedic curriculum. The objective of this study was to identify the listening and communication style preferences of undergraduate paramedic students at a major Australian university. Methods: a cross-sectional study using paper-based versions of the listening styles profile (LSP) and the communication styles measure (CSM) were administered to a cohort of students enrolled in the Bachelor of emergency health (paramedic). Ethics approval was granted. Results: students reported a preference for the people listening style and to a lesser extent, the content listening style. Consistent with this, they also reported a preference for the friendly and attentive communication styles and exhibited little preference for the dominant and contentious communication styles. Conclusion: the students' self-reported preferences are well suited for the role of paramedic and it is likely that a disposition towards these styles of listening and communication also lead these people to enrol in a paramedic course given their preferences are associated with an interest and concern for the welfare of others.
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You can email an entry or update to this database with information about past or present prisoners in Iran, who were jailed since June 2009, by following these steps:
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For example, Prisoner Name (English) : Ali Alinezad.
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S: June 5, 2010 - August 31, 2010
BC: 10 Little Fingers and 10 Tiny Toes The Sweetest of Smiles and cute little nose. All these add up to a very Special thing - A BABY The Greatest of Gifts that Life can bring.
FC: June 5th, 2010 - 7.08oz - 20.5 inches | Tristan Cruz Matteo Koehler
1: Mommy decided to go to the Hospital to get checked, The Dr. quickly said..."It's baby time...call who you need too". She called Daddy and he was so excited! Mommy and Daddy have been praying for this moment for a long time. We finally get to meet you! We called Grandma M. for help and support with the labor. Lots of people were anxiously awaiting your arrival... | One Friday... | For this child I have prayed, and the Lord has granted me the desires of my heart. 1 Samuel 1:27
2: Here we go.... | After 6 Hours of pleasant Labor and 6 Hours of Pain and complications, The Dr's rushed us in for an Emergency C-Section. At 4:51am on Saturday morning God blessed our lives with the most beautiful baby boy! xoxoxo | Our Little Piece of Heaven | Anxious Daddy... | Smiling away the pain...
3: Welcome to the World Baby Tristan - You are Simply Perfection! You bring a whole new meaning to the word "Love". There are no words to describe the instant Joy, Happiness and Love you brought into our Lives. | Breathe of Fresh Air... | Pure Love.. | So alert and only minutes old!
4: First Moments... | Your firsts moments were mainly with Daddy as Mommy was was still in Surgery for awhile, and then in recovery. You and Daddy had some very special Bonding Time together. Once Mommy was out of Recovery, she was very anxious to hold, cuddle and kiss you...and never let you go. | Love...
5: Meeting Grandma & Grandpa Mamula | Meeting Grandma and Grandpa Koehler
6: Uncle Mike | Uncle Jason | Auntie Julia | Auntie Emily
7: Meeting Auntie Holly | And Auntie Heather
8: We decided to name you Tristan Cruz Matteo. Tristan meaning "beloved" because we felt so blessed that you were ours and you are so loved! Also, because when Daddy and I found out you were a boy, he said "His name is Tristan, discussion over! Cruz Matteo is after your Italian Side. Mommy wanted two middle names because she loved the names both the same. | Your Name
9: Gift From God... | In the eyes of a child...there is joy, there is laughter...there is hope, there is trust, a chance to shape the future.
10: From the 1st moment we laid our eyes on you, we knew our lives had a whole new meaning and love. You are truly a gift from God. | June 5, 2010
11: 3 Generations - With your Proud Grandpa K. and Proud Daddy!
12: 1st Day into this world and already all the Ladies Adore you!
13: Blessed
14: You had the cutest little feet and fingers and had lots of dark hair... | You had many people who couldn't wait to meet you! | They put you in Mommy and Daddy's arms and we've never been so happy!
15: Meeting Great Grandma Mamula and Great Opa Korthuis! | Precious Baby | You were very awake and had wide eyes taking everything in...
16: June 9, 2010 Finally going home from the Hospital! | Here we go... Starting our New Life as a Family of 3!
17: You have grown under my heart for 9 months, and within my heart forever.... | Tristan, you are a miracle. We cannot wait to see what God has in store for your life.
18: So Peaceful...
19: Meeting Great Grandma Koehler and Great Grandma Kiltau for the 1st time!
20: You Have the most amazing facial expressions...We look forwards to seeing them everyday!
22: Think of all the Wonderful things the Lord has done for you... 1 Samuel 12:24
23: Mommy and Daddy Love you Tristan!
24: Visitors
28: A wee bit of Heaven drifted down from above, a handful of happiness, a heart full of love. The mystery of life, so sacred and sweet. The giver of joy so deep and complete. Precious and priceless, so lovable too, the world's sweetest miracle, baby, is you!
29: Tristan you are sooooo Cute!
30: Tristan's World
32: Laughing, Smiling, and taking in everything around you!
33: Relaxing with Grandpa M.
34: July 31, 2010 Moving Day!!! Moving into our Brand New Home!
36: We Love You Tristan
38: You just love to kick your little legs in the bath tub! We play bed time lullabies while we bath you...You love it!
39: Wanting to stand all the time - Not even 3 months old! You are such an Ambitious Little Boy!
40: Grandma and Grandpa Love you so very Much - xoxoxo
41: Our Family | August 2010
42: I love you so much Tristan, it takes my breathe away.... | Play Time
43: You hold our Hearts with your Smiles! | Growing so fast...
44: Loved by so many! | Every day you are learning and taking in so much...you are so alert and happy to try all sorts of new things...you even love Mommy's singing voice!!! | Li
45: I knew I loved you then, yet I had no idea I would love you like this...I love you so much it almost hurts | Mommy Love...
46: Our Little Family of 3
47: From smiling, to holding your head up by yourself, to rolling over, and laughing...you amaze us with how much you are learning and doing everyday! Tristan, you are a little go-getter! - shoot for the Stars!
48: August 2, 2010 Mommy and Daddy took you swimming for your First Time! At first you didn't know what to make of it, and the water was colder than your bath water, so you didn't like it so much initially....You kicked your little foot and made a splash...which was so adorable!
50: Mommy's Boys!
51: A visit from our special friend Diana
52: Your new room in our new House!
53: More Cuddles from the Ladies....and Grandma....
54: The Decision to have a child is to accept that your heart will forever walk about outside your body.
55: Your Daddy is such a wonderful, and hands on Daddy. It is such a beautiful thing to see the strong bond between the two of you.


text: In today's ever changing environment, it's important for any successful business to develop a competitive advantage in the marketplace and mitigate the risks that come along with day to day practice operations. The dental industry is no different. Over the years, increasing overhead costs and reduction of health benefits has eroded profits. Customers are also looking for added benefits when choosing a dental practice and, with the amount of competition in the marketplace, customer retention is becoming increasingly difficult. The Dental Protection Plan (DPP) was created with these things in mind.


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Hi, I'm Tim Tyler - and this is a video about natural production and natural elimination. This pair of concepts represents an alternative to selection and drift when it comes to visualising and modelling the process of evolution. They are extremely basic concepts which arise naturally when attempting to generalise the Darwinian framework.
An understanding that culture evolves along Darwinian lines has led many of those involved to wonder what other systems exhibit Darwinian dynamics.
It has also prompted a revisiting of the foundations of evolutionary theory. I have a whole chapter about Generalising Darwinism in my new memetics book. Here I will describe some of the more significant results.
Natural selection beyond biologyMost people are familiar with the idea of natural selection. However, many people associate the idea with life - and with living systems. In fact natural selection represents the action of a more general principle that also applies systems which are not alive.
The truth of this has long been appreciated. For example, here is Richard Dawkins, writing on page 12 of The Selfish Gene:
Darwin's survival of the fittest is really a specific case of a more general law of survival of the stable. The universe is populated by stable things.In fact, the familiar process of natural selection is not confined to biology. It affects everything that comes into existence. Whether or not it comes into existence via a copying process is irrelevant. Some abiotic examples of the effects of natural selection include:
- Pebbles tend to be made of hard materials;
- Islands tend to include hard rocky outcrops;
- Planets tend to have circular orbits.
New fundamental conceptsEvolution is often visualised in terms of natural selection, sexual selection and genetic drift. However, when generalising Darwinism, there is another useful perspective, which can be obtained by considering evolution to be the result of a balance between the forces of production and elimination. This idea is best introduced by considering the following new categories:
- Natural production - refers to things coming into existence.
- Natural elimination - refers to things going out of existence.
Examples of natural eliminationSome examples of natural elimination:
- Stars that are observed are the ones that have not previously burned out or exploded;
- Atoms that are observed tend to be the stable ones - the ones with long half-lives;
- Mountains tend to be covered in hard rocks - soft rocks there tend to get washed away.
Examples of natural productionNatural elimination is balanced by natural production. Some examples:
- Stars are produced by balls of gas condensing;
- Atoms are mostly produced from other atoms - by the processes of fission or fusion;
- Mountains are produced by tectonic plate motion and erosion.
Observed frequenciesThe frequencies of the things we observe in the world arise as a result of a mixture of processes of production and elimination. Things that are produced frequently and are difficult to eliminate are often observed - whereas things that are produced infrequently and are easy to eliminate are rarely observed. In my book I include a table of examples of these phenomena - including "tall coin stacks" - which are produced rarely and destroyed easily - and "pebbles", which are produced easily and destroyed relatively rarely.
If production rates exceed elimination rates, the number of entites grows - while if elimination rates exceed production rates, the number of entites shrinks. These ideas thus fit very naturally into the framework provided by population genetics.
Note that the approach here can be applied to anything with a measurable frequency. The entities do not have to form a natural kind. They do not need to be to be discrete or particulate either.
For example, you could consider the category of: "men over six feet tall". Production takes place during adolescence, and elimination takes place through death, limb loss, sex changes or degenerative osteoporosis. The results may be more interesting if dealing with natural kinds, but any system where you can measure the frequency with which something occurs can be analysed in this way.
Use in biologyNatural elimination and natural production are most familiar in the context of biological systems. There, production typically takes place at birth, and elimination takes place at death. If birth rates exceed death rates the population grows while if death rates exceed birth rates, the population shrinks. In living systems, natural elimination is selection by death. Natural elimination is a bit different from natural selection, thoug. For one thing, it makes no attempt to exclude genetic drift. The nearest familiar concept in biology to natural production is probably sexual selection. However, sexual selection is not a very general principle. It isn't just sexual organisms that are able to produce varying numbers of offspring. Instead the concept of differential reproductive success is sometimes used. Natural production is a more general concept than this though - since it can be applied to both biotic and abiotic systems.
Another way of considering the difference is to see that natural production is a kind of mirror image of natural elimination - in that production creates and elimination destroys. However, there isn't really any corresponding mirror concept for the idea of natural selection.
Since biological processes involve copying, what is naturally produced is constantly being magnified, while things that are naturally eliminated play an ever-diminishing role. Thus, iterative application of natural production and natural elimination can result in adaptive evolution.
Framing things in terms of natural selection and sexual selection reflects the way in which these ideas were discovered historically - but sexual selection is not a very general concept. Thinking in terms of natural elimination and natural production results in a more general and broadly-applicable framework - one that extends deeply into many kinds of abiotic systems.
Fundamental revisionsWhen taught at all, natural selection is currently taught in biology classes. Natural elimination and natural production should probably be taught first in physics (or mathematics) classes. These are pretty basic explanatory principles, broadly comparable in scope to the idea of entropy, or to self-organisation.
This material may seem very basic - and it is. However, it is not so basic as to be obvious. Something like it does need teaching to children in science classes - with presentation along the lines given here, and with natural selection in biology being given as an example of the results of these principles being applied to a system which involves copying.
For more about this topic, please see my book on Memetics - which is out now.


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The Syrian army said it has recaptured the ancient city of Palmyra from ISIL for the second time in a year with help from allied forces and Russian warplanes. The Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant group seized Palmyra in a surprise advance in December after having been driven out eight months before.
"With backing from the Syrian and Russian air forces, units of our armed forces recaptured the city of Palmyra, in cooperation with the allies," the military said in a statement.
The army and Iranian-backed militia advanced inside Palmyra on Thursday as ISIL withdrew completely, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Britain-based war monitor, said.
ISIL retreated to areas in the east, the Syrian Observatory reported. Government forces took control of swathes of Palmyra and conducted combing operations to clear land mines, it said.
During ISIL's first occupation, which ended in March last year, the armed group destroyed some of Palmyra's priceless archaeological heritage. It is believed to have razed other parts of the historical ruins after regaining control in December.
The Syrian army is also fighting ISIL east of Aleppo city, where it is pushing to reach the Euphrates River, and in the city of Deir al-Zor, where it controls an enclave besieged by fighters.
ISIL is on the back foot in Syria after losing territory in the north to an alliance of US-backed Kurdish-led militias, and to Turkey-backed Syrian rebel groups.
Government and opposition delegations are attending UN-sponsored peace talks in Geneva, where the government's chief negotiator hailed Syrian President Bashar al-Assad for keeping his promise to retake Palmyra. The Syrian opposition, however, declined to congratulate Assad on capturing Palmyra and suggested the city changing hands again was possible.


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The Gyűrűfű Eco-Village, Hungarian Living Villages
47.162494, 19.503304
Gyűrűfű Foundation (www.gyurufu.hu) is an independent environmental organisation focusing its activity on the local watershed situated in the southern hills of Zselic. The foundation was registered in 1991, and has no affiliation to any of the political parties or business enterprises except those established by the eco-villagers. The mission of the organisation is to develop a well-founded, realistic and feasible small scale model of human subsistence with an emphasis on environmental and ecological considerations, taking rural areas, hamlets, villages and agricultural farms as the first priority.
Cultural landscape
At the time the Hungarians came into the Carpathian-basin (in the 9th and 10th century), the land has still preserved its original, pristine state: the settlement area was characterised by wooded steppe on the Great Plain and oak forests in the hillsides. Transformation of the native landscape was initially represented mainly by deforestation: primarily land for farming was eked out this way in the 10-15th centuries, and timber was felled for early mining operations and industrial activities.
Cultural landscape in Slovenia
Cultural landscapes in Slovenia
Artikel und Videos


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We came across this image the other day and it took our fancy. Lovely shiny cars against the backdrop of the brightly lit science lecture theatres. We guess it must be in the early 1960s.
Monday, May 17, 2010
Science block and cars
Posted by The Information and Records Management team at 9:24 PM
1 comment:
wow. .. cool vintage cars. ..I really love it. . .keep it up . .ReplyDelete
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