text:
Sun Life Financial Study Shows Rise in Catastrophic Stop-Loss Claims of $1 Million or More
Cancer remains the most costly catastrophic claim for second consecutive year
WELLESLEY, MA (June 5, 2014) – The U.S. business group of Sun Life Financial, Inc. (NYSE: SLF, TSX: SLF) today reported a tenfold rise in the number of individual $1 million or more catastrophic claims paid by the company over the past four years. These findings are based on a study released today by Sun Life Financial U.S., the largest independent writer of stop-loss insurance in the U.S., with $915 million of in-force premium as of December 31, 2013.
The most significant rise related to complications surrounding dependent infants, including premature births, failure to thrive newborns and congenital anomalies, according to Sun Life. While there was no single explicit driver for the increase in these particular complications, Sun Life continues to monitor the underlying business, specific claims, and potential trends related to health care costs and demographics. The Company also notes that these diagnoses often stemmed from normal pregnancies that unexpectedly turned into catastrophic claims, reinforcing the need for protection against "unpredictable" catastrophic claims.
"Sun Life is seeing more catastrophic stop-loss claims with higher price tags," said Karin James, Assistant Vice President of Strategic Operations for Sun Life's Stop-Loss business. "In 2013 alone, we paid more than double the number of individual $1 million or more catastrophic claims compared to the prior year, by far the biggest annual jump in the study. We anticipate costs will only continue to rise as new technologies are adopted, advanced drug therapies are introduced, and the Affordable Care Act increases access for participants."
The study ranks the top ten mostly costly stop-loss catastrophic claims filed between 2010 and year-end 2013 by Sun Life Stop-Loss insurance policyholders with up to 100,000 employees. In the four-year period, Sun Life Financial processed over 100,000 claims and reimbursed over $1.9 billion in catastrophic claims to self-funded employers. The report shows the aggregate cost for each claim condition reimbursed by Sun Life. The cost reflects two factors: (1) severity, or the underlying cost of the claim and, (2) frequency, or the number of times the claim occurs.
"We believe sharing insights on the scale and trend of catastrophic claims can help self-insured employers, brokers, and TPAs devise better strategies to manage the costs of catastrophic illness," added James. "Without stop-loss insurance, the self-insured employers in our study would have paid an additional $2 billion in catastrophic medical costs from 2010 to 2013. The findings of this year's study also reveal the need to protect against claims from routine health events that are not expected to be catastrophic."
The report's top ten claims conditions remain mostly the same as last year's rankings, with cancer remaining the costliest, followed by chronic renal disease. Below are the key findings on the costliest claims:
- The ten costliest claims conditions comprise over half (53%) of the $2 billion in claims that Sun Life reimbursed to its Stop-Loss policyholders between 2010 and 2013.
- The three most costly conditions -- malignant neoplasm (cancer), chronic/end state renal disease (kidneys), and leukemia/lymphoma/multiple myeloma (cancer) -- represent over a third (34%) of all stop-loss claims payments that Sun Life made to policyholders from 2010 to 2013.
- Cancer continues to be the most costly stop-loss catastrophic illness by a significant margin, comprising one quarter (25%) of all stop-loss payments during the four-year period.
- Malignant neoplasm (cancer) was the costliest single condition, representing just over 17% of all stop-loss claims reimbursements.
The ten catastrophic medical conditions from 2010 to 2013, ranked by aggregate cost:
|Medical condition
|Percentage of paid stop-loss claims
|Value of paid top-loss claims
|Malignant neoplasm (cancer)
|Chronic/end stage renal disease (kidneys)
|Leukemia, lymphoma, and/or multiple myeloma (cancer)
|Congenital anomalies (conditions present at birth)
|Disorders relating to short gestation and low birth weight (premature births)
|Cerebrovascular disease (brain blood vessels)
|Congestive heart failure
|Complications of surgical and medical care
|Pulmonary collapse/respiratory failure (lungs)
|Septicemia (infection)
To help employers devise a set of cost-containment best practices, the Sun Life report also provides important questions for the employer to consider, such as whether the following approaches are in use:
- Workplace wellness and early detection programs;
- A benefit program that offers protection against cancer at both the employer and employee level;
- An administrator with a direct focus on active claim management, including early detection through the use of predictive modeling and data analysis;
- A partnership with an administrator and stop-loss carrier that provides access to nationwide cost-containment vendors;
- A "no new lasers at renewal" option with a renewal rate cap included in the stop-loss policy.
"Self-insured employers, brokers, and third party administrators have the chance to implement cost containment strategies that protect both their employee's quality of care as well as the company's bottom line," said Sun Life Financial Stop-Loss Claims Director Laura Rollinson, R.N., who led the claims study. "We believe a best-in-class stop-loss program can be a win for all parties."
To request the full research report, please visit: Sun Life Financial: What are the Latest Top Ten Stop-Loss Catastrophic Claims?.
About Sun Life Stop-Loss
Sun Life Financial is the largest independent writer of stop-loss insurance in the United States. At year-end 2013, the Sun Life U.S. Stop-Loss business had more than 1,600 policyholders, $915 million in annual premium, and approximately 4.6 million covered lives.
About Sun Life Financial
Sun Life Financial is a leading international financial services organization providing a diverse range of protection and wealth accumulation products and services to individuals and corporate customers. Sun Life Financial and its partners today have operations in key markets worldwide, including Canada, the United States, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Hong Kong, the Philippines, Japan, Indonesia, India, China, Malaysia, Vietnam, and Bermuda. Sun Life Financial Inc., the holding company for the Sun Life Financial group of companies, is a public company. It is not an insurance company and does not offer insurance products for sale in the United States or elsewhere, and does not guarantee the obligations of its insurance company subsidiaries. Sun Life Financial Inc. trades on the Toronto (TSX), New York (NYSE), and Philippine (PSE) stock exchanges under the ticker symbol SLF. In the United States and elsewhere, insurance products are offered by members of the Sun Life Financial group that are insurance companies.
In the United States, Sun Life Financial provides a range of products and services to employers and their employees, including Group and Voluntary Life, Disability, Dental, Critical Illness, Accident, and Stop-Loss insurance products. Product offerings may not be available in all states and may vary depending on state laws and regulations. For more information, please visit www.sunlife.com/us.
Media contacts
Tim Stone
Sun Life Financial
SLPC 25887 05/14 (exp: 05/19)


text:
Since 0.5.0, the config has been split into two different files.
System config is documented on the rest of this page, and has been moved
bosun.toml unless overriden on the command line. Changes to these
settings require a Bosun restart in order to take effect. The TOML
format is documented here.
The example config file is a good place to start when writing a configuration.
The file does not follow the tradition of commenting out defaults, which are instead mostly documented below.
This file is documented here. It includes settings that do not require a Bosun restart to take effect e.g. alerts, templates, notifications.
The hostname that Bosun uses to construct its links. The common use case is in any template functions that construct links.
Hostname = "bosun.example.com"
The URL that Bosun uses to construct its links. The common use case is in any template functions that construct links. the default is "http"
Scheme = "https"
HTTP IP and Port to listen on. The default if not specified is to
listen on
:8070. However, if
HTTPSListen is defined and
is not defined there will be no default, and Bosun will only listen on
HTTPListen = ":8080"
HTTPS (SSL) IP and Port to listen on. This requires that
TLSCertFile and
TLSKeyFile are defined.
Path to the PEM encoded certificate Bosun should use for
HTTPSListen. May contain intermediate certificates followed by the
leaf certificate to form a chain.
TLSCertFile = "/etc/ssl/certs/bosun.example.com.crt"
Path to the PEM encoded private key that corresponds to the
TLSKeyFile = "/etc/ssl/certs/bosun.example.com.key"
Minimum interval that alert checks will run at on a schedule. The format
of the value is the same as Go's duration
format. By default, alert
checks are run at every
CheckFrequency multiplied by the
DefaultRunEvery value. This defaults to "5m".
CheckFrequency = "1m"
By default, alert checks are run at every
CheckFrequency multiplied by the
DefaultRunEvery value. This can be overridden in an alert definition
with the
runEvery keyword. This defaults to
e.g. If
CheckFrequency = 1m and a
DefaultRunEvery = 5, alerts by
default will run every 5 minutes. But you could have some run as
frequent as every "1m", and others that run less often (any multiple of
DefaultRunEvery = 5
Selects algorithm to distribute alert checks to decrease system load spikes. There is no distribution by default. This means, if there are several checks with same period, they all will happen at the same points in time. This method is used if the option is not specified or equals to empty string.
The single alternative option is
simple. If specified, the alert checks with the same period will be uniformly distributed on second marks.
AlertCheckDistribution = "simple"
Path to the file containing definitions of alerts, macros, lookups, templates, notifications, and global variables which are documented here. If saving is enabled, this file can be written to by Bosun via the API or Save UI. Mandatory.
RuleFilePath = "dev.sample.conf"
If set, this will allow bosun to delete rendered templates from its' data store. It will remove all rendered templates for alerts that have been closed for longer than this time (in days).
MaxRenderedTemplateAge = 30 # retain old templates for only 30 days
Used to configure time zones that will be linked to in Bosun's dashboard. It is an array of timeanddate.com zones (the page that gets linked to from Bosun's UI.) It has no impact on what time zone Bosun operates in. Bosun is expected to use UTC and does support other timezones.
TimeAndDate = [ 202, 75, 179, 136 ]
Bosun's UI can generate short links using Google's goo.gl URL Shortener service. If you are hitting their API limits, you can get an API key and specify here, and that key will get used.
ShortURLKey = "aKey"
Bosun's dashboard will use grouping logic on the dashboard if there are many similar alerts (in name, or tag/key pairs).
MinGroupSize sets the minimum number of alerts needed to create a group in the UI and defaults to
If you have a lot of grouping, it often means you should refactor the alert to have a less granular scope. Therefore, it is recommended that this is used as a "protection mechanism" from flooding the dashboard with too many alerts.
MinGroupSize = 5
Bosun will group all unknowns in a single check cycle (alerts on the same
CheckFrequency and
RunEvery) into a single email. This sets how many unknowns would be sent in a single check cycle before a group is created. The default value is 5.
This is done because unknowns are generally caused by the data "disappearing". So if your TSDB Provider is broken or behind, it can generate a lot of unknowns. This alleviates flooding in the specific case of unknowns.
UnknownThreshold = 5
If set to
true, Bosun will ping every value of the host tag that it has indexed and record that value to your TSDB. It currently only support OpenTSDB style data input, which is means you must use either OpenTSDB or Influx with the OpenTSDB endpoint on Influx configured.
Ping = true
How long Bosun should wait before stopping to ping host tags it has
seen. e.g. If the value is the default of
"24h", if Bosun has
not indexed any data points for that
host value, then it will stop
attempting to ping that host until it again sees data points that have that
PingDuration = "24h"
Controls how long autocomplete and items in UI will show up since being indexed by Bosun. The format of the value is the same as Go's duration format and the default is 3 days. The goal is to make it so you don't have old items showing up in the UI. However, if you are using OpenTSDB and graphing page, you can still query metrics that don't autocomplete if you remember what they were (or look them up using OpenTSDB's native UI autocomplete).
SearchSince = "72h"
Enables saving via the web UI. It is disabled by default. When enabled, users will be able to save the rule configuration file via the UI and Bosun will then write to that file on the user's behalf.
EnableSave = true
Sets if reloading of the rule configuration should be enabled. If
EnableSave is
true, then reloading gets enabled regardless of this
setting. Reloads can be triggered via
/api/reload in the REST
API as well.
EnableSave = true
When enabling saving, and a user issues a save, you have the option to run a executable or script by specifying this parameter. This allows you to do things like backup the file on writes or commit the file to a git repo.
This command is passed a filename, username, message, and vargs (vargs is currently not used). If the command exits a non-zero exit code, then the changes will be reverted (the file before the changes is copied back and Bosun doesn't restart). When the configuration is saved via the user interface, any messages to standard error will be shown to the user when there is a non-zero exit code.
CommandHookPath = "/Users/kbrandt/src/hook/hook"
Current code documentation says:
// GetInternetProxy sets a proxy for outgoing network requests from Bosun. Currently it
// only impacts requests made for shortlinks to https://goo.gl/
But not sure I trust that.
All your key value pairs must be defined before any sections are defined. Sections are used for things that have multiple values to configure them. In particular the various time series database providers.
Allows definition of variables that will be turned into global
variables available to definitions under
$sys.. This is designed for when you have some secrets you don't want
exposed in the definitions file. The values of these variables can
still be accessed from Bosun's rule editor and expression UI. This
merely hides them so you don't accidentally include them in
screenshots or when copying and pasting your config.
CHAT = "https://chat.example.com/1?key=mySecretKey"
foo = "baz"
The above could then be used in the rule configuration like:
notification chat {
post = ${sys.CHAT}
runOnActions = false
They can also be accessed in templates with the
V() function
Defines what internal storage Bosun should use. There are currently two choices, a built-in redis-like server called ledis or redis. Redis is recommended for production setups.
The default is to use ledis. If Both Redis and ledis are defined, Redis will take preference and the ledis configuration will be ignored. Ledis is the default, so if
RedisHost is not specified ledis will be used even if you have no
DBConf configuration defined.
Upgrading the database to newer versions only works with redis. With ledis you will have to delete the database to use a new version that involves a migration (schema upgrade) to the db.
The Redis hostname and port.
Optional integer database to store bosun data. Defaults to 0.
Optional password to use when connecting to Redis.
Optional key defining the sending of client's name
bosun to Redis. Defaults to true.
If you use Netflix/dynomite then RedisClentSetName must be set to false.
The redis sentinels list. Redis sentinel list will be used only if parameter
RedisMasterName was set as well
The redis master name within sentinel. If it is set bosun will use sentinel to receive information about cuurrent redis master.
Directory in which ledis will store data. Default:
LedisDir = "ledis_data"
Ledis host and port. Default:
LedisBindAddr = "127.0.0.1:9565".
Redis Configuration:
RedisHost = "localhost:6389"
Ledis Configuration:
RedisHost = "localhost:6389"
LedisDir = "ledis_data"
LedisBindAddr = "127.0.0.1:9565"
SMTP server configuration for email sending.
Address from which emails will be sent.
Outgoing SMTP server hostname or IP address.
SMTP username
SMTP password
EmailFrom = "email@example.com"
Host = "mail.example.com"
Username = "username"
Password = "fe8h392wh"
AzureConf enables Azure Monitor specific functions in the expression language. Multiple clients may be defined allowing you to query different subscriptions and tenants from a single Bosun instance.
Default Azure client to use when the Prefix key is absent or is there and set to "default". When ysing multiple clients the string
default can change to whatever you want to use in expressions to access this particular client.
The Azure Subscription GUID for the client. See Getting your Azure Subscription GUID (new portal) for instructions on finding this with Azure's portal.
The Azure Tenant GUID for the client. To get the tenant you can access it via "Azure Active Directory > Properties > Directory ID in the Azure portal" as per Azure's How to get an Azure Active Directory tenant documentation.
The Azure Client GUID for the client. This will be the GUID listed as the "Application ID" when you get when create the app registration under Azure Active Directory.
The Azure generated secret for tor the client. This will be under Settings :: Keys for the application as referenced in ClientID above.
For expressions that need to make multiple http requests like
azmulti(), this sets the amount of concurrent http requests that will be made at a time. In other words, the number of request workers.
This is an optional parameter, If not set or set to
0 then it will be the default value of
10 workers. A value of
1 means no concurrency since there will only be one worker.
If set to
true then HTTP requests to the Azure API's will be logged to stdout. This is an optional parameter with a default of
If set to
true then HTTP responses from Azure API's will be logged to stdout. This is an optional parameter with a default of
# Default instance will be queries when the prefix key is absent or is there and set to "default". If only defining one client for azure you would use this.
SubscriptionId = "52c5bef7-d925-4d0e-9bcd-969dbdbb1068"
TenantId = "60730c79-4f4c-4782-9eca-3325638b8f9c"
ClientId = "2a434dc4-48df-43b8-ad0e-020798bcb36c"
ClientSecret = "AzureMakes+Aweso//meSecrets="
Concurrency = 5
SubscriptionId = "4b5922c6-0c5a-462f-876f-07072e842ade"
TenantId = "2e8abf15-1328-458b-8762-192139857055"
ClientId = "3a6d47ca-53eb-4a18-aa77-d3e2d764ba31"
ClientSecret = "AzureCreate+Grea/tSecrets="
Enables an OpenTSDB provider, and also enables OpenTSDB specific functions in the expression language. This also enables the Graph tab in Bosun's UI as that is OpenTSDB specific. However, you can still graph other time series DBs in Bosun's UI by using the Expression tab.
OpenTSDB hostname and port to connect to.
Either 2.1 or 2.2. Default: 2.1. If set to 2.2, certain features that correspond to new OpenTDSB features are enabled e.g. filter support.
Causes requests to error if the OpenTSDB response is larger than this setting in bytes. This is useful to catch alerts that are pulling in more data then they need to (i.e. maybe downsampling can be used.)
This does not cancel the query with OpenTSDB, but Bosun will stop processing the response.
Host = "ny-tsdb01:4242"
Version = 2.2
ResponseLimit = 25000000
Enables querying multiple Elastic clusters. The elastic expression functions become available when this is defined. The functions are designed more to be used for querying log formatted data and stats from those logs.
The functions that would allow you to use Elastic effectively as a time-series based backend do not currently exist.
Default cluster to query when PrefixKey is not passed to the elastic expression functions.
List of hosts that are members of the cluster. Elastic uses these hosts to discover all the other hosts in the cluster, so you don't have to specify every host in the cluster. This article on Sniffing describes how this discovery functions.
Boolean determining when setting true periodic health checks and sniffing will be disabled. This is useful when you want to query from a single or fixed number of Elastic nodes.
Advanced Elastic client options e.g. basic authentication, http schema etc.
Hosts = ["http://ny-lselastic01.example.com:9200", "http://ny-lselastic02.example.com:9200"]
Hosts = ["http://ny-lselastic01.example.com:9200", "http://ny-lselastic02.example.com:9200"]
SimpleClient = true
Hosts = ["http://ny-lselastic01.example.com:9200", "http://ny-lselastic02.example.com:9200"]
Enabled = true
BasicAuthUsername = "admin"
BasicAuthPassword = "testing"
Scheme = "https" => default http
SnifferEnabled = false => default true
SnifferTimeoutStartup = 10 => default 5s
HealthcheckEnabled = false
Enables querying Graphite server and exposes its query functions to the expression language.
Graphite connection host and port, e.g.
Host = "localhost:80".
Headers as key / value pairs (one per line) that will be sent with each Graphite request.
Host = "localhost:80"
X-Meow = "Mix"
Enables querying multiple Prometheus TSDBs via the Prometheus HTTP v1 endpoint. The Prometheus Query Expression Functions become available when this is defined.
Default cluster to query when PrefixKey is not passed to the prometheus query functions.
URL = "https://prometheus.kubea.example.com"
URL = "https://prometheus.kubeb.example.com"
Embeds the annotation service. This enables the ability to submit and
edit annotations via the UI or API. It also enables the annotation
related expression functions. Currently the only supported database for
annotate is Elastic. It can be the same cluster as the one defined in
ElasticConf or a different one.
The format of annotation configuration may change before the final 0.6.0 release.</a>.
As for ElasticConf.
As for ElasticConf.
As for ElasticConf.
The Elastic index to store annotations in. If not set the default is "annotate".
Hosts = ["http://ny-lselastic01.example.com:9200", "http://ny-lselastic02.example.com:9200"]
Index = myAnnotate
Hosts = ["http://ny-lselastic01.example.com:9200", "http://ny-lselastic02.example.com:9200"]
SimpleClient = true
Index = myAnnotate
Hosts = ["http://ny-lselastic01.example.com:9200", "http://ny-lselastic02.example.com:9200"]
Index = myAnnotate
Enabled = true
BasicAuthUsername = "admin"
BasicAuthPassword = "testing"
Scheme = "https" => default http
SnifferEnabled = false => default true
SnifferTimeoutStartup = 10 => default 5s
HealthcheckEnabled = false
Enables the Influx TSDBProvider and makes its query functions available via the API.
Full URL that Influx should use to connect to. e.g.
URL = "https://myInfluxServer:1234"
Timeout for Influx queries, formatted as per the Go
duration format. e.g.
Timeout = "5m"
Setting to
true allows you to connect to a Influx server even if the
https certificate is not validated correctly.
Influx connection username.
Influx connection password.
User agent that Bosun should identify itself as when querying Influx.
URL = "https://myInfluxServer:1234"
Timeout = "5m"
UnsafeSSL = true
Bosun authentication settings. If not specified, your instance will have no authentication, and will be open to anybody. When using Auth, TLS should be used so credentials are not sent in clear text.
A secret string used to encrypt cookies Bosun sets in client browsers to prevent token forgery. We recommend a longish random string here.
Supplying this will activate "token authentication", where you can generate api tokens that external apps and services can use to interact with Bosun. Should be a long random string.
Disable authentication. Set to true to allow any user to access and change Bosun. The main use case for using this vs omitting
AuthConf altogether is setting to true,
and also enabling token auth to generate tokens before fully activating Authentication.
LDAP authentication configuration.
LDAP Domain name.
Host and port of LDAP server
Set to true to skip certificate validation if you are running self-signed certs, for example.
Default permissions that will be applied to any user who can authenticate to LDAP.
Base search path for searching group and user memberships. Not needed if not specifying Group level permissions. Usually just
DC=myOrg,DC=com is sufficient.
Allows you to set permission levels per LDAP group. See example for usage.
Allows you to grant permissions to individual users. See example for usage.
Various parts of the config allow you to specify permissions. These fields accept a comma seperated list of roles or permissions. Available roles and permissions are defined in the Bosun source. Any of the description values can be used as a permission in the config. See example for some examples. If a user matches multiple Group or User permissions, they will have the aggregate of all permissions granted to those groups and users, as well as the defaults.
CookieSecret = "MAPpHDIjciqzTg708Ef0AXLeid0o9ghrwKReyj57RPUCk80QffmLvVVHqc4w+A=="
TokenSecret = "hEgeP7DJn0e2RmhOEQLaNItzNN0fm8fWyyX1F3PB3qUbD9859xFxdL1JPLknuQ=="
Domain = "mycompany"
LdapAddr = "ldap.mycompany.com:3269"
DefaultPermission = "Reader"
RootSearchPath = "DC=ds,DC=mycompany,DC=com"
Path = "CN=Sysadmins,OU=Security Groups,DC=mycompany,DC=com"
Role = "Admin"
Path = "CN=Developers,OU=Security Groups,DC=mycompany,DC=com"
Role = "Writer"
jSmith = "Actions,Create Annotations,Silence"

subset: commoncrawl


text:
Fees and Registration
Summer Season Registration
To enquire about a spot within a team, please email: email@example.com
Once your registration is complete, payment can be made in one of three ways:
By bank deposit (preferred):
Account Name: Merinda Park Basketball Club
Bank: Bendigo Bank
Account Number: 156763492
By EFTPOS at the training dates above
By cash or cheque at the training dates above. (please place in a sealed envelope with player name, team name and a contact number on the front of the envelope).
Please note: any players with outstanding fees are not eligible to register until all outstanding amounts are paid in full, and clearances will not be provided should they wish to play for another club.
Starting this season, Casey Basketball Association have increased the costs for registration of teams and weekly game fees, mostly to help cover the cost of the new stadium build. As a result, you'll notice a moderate increase to our fees to cover this cost. Being a family focused club this is something we were reluctant to do, and our fees have remained consistent for the past four years, however, with the increase in costs we (like other clubs within Casey) have no alternative but to pass this on to members.
The Winter 2019 fees for junior players are $240
The Winter 2019 fees for senior players are $300
The season fees cover all game fees, registration fees and training venue hire (where applicable). Click here to download a copy of our fees document.
- MPBC Summer 2019-20 Season fees letter Senior V1.0
- MPBC Summer 2019-20 – Season fees letter Juniors V0.1
Payment in full
We will continue to provide discounts for "Early Bird Payments" if the season fees are paid, in full, prior to 23rd of September 2019. Discounts are available for junior players, and are based upon the number of players within a family, and are not applicable to as follows:
1st player: $20 discount
2nd player: $30 discount
3rd player: $40 discount
For families with more than 3 players, a discount of $40/player will apply to any additional players.
Eligibility to train and play:
To ensure that players are eligible to train and play, season fees must be paid up to date based on the fees policy and payment dates. If fees are not paid up to date then players will not be allowed to train, or take to the court for games.
As a not-for-profit club, we rely solely on player payments to function and cannot subsidise players who have outstanding fees. Families with outstanding fees will be subject to a late payment charge of up to $50 per player.
If you require assistance with fees, please contact:
Dominique firstname.lastname@example.com
Merinda Park Basketball Club Committee


text:
Private Equity Fund MalaysiaCourse Code: PEF
Dates: 25 Mar - 29 Mar | 29 Jul - 2 Aug | 21 Oct - 25 Oct
Price: $3950
Duration: 1 Week /s
Course Objectives
Asset strippers or corporate saviours? Whatever the perception, the private Equity (PE) sector plays a significant part in the functioning of the global capital markets. This course provides a comprehensive insight to PE shareholder objectives. Topics explored include deal appraisal and execution, regulation, and the participants that target returns from the turnaround of distressed corporate entities
Who Should Attend?
-Business Development candidates entering the private equity space
-Financial Technologists needing a deeper business understanding
-Private equity staff needing a wider perspective on their business
-Those new to private equity
Prerequisite Courses
Course Overview
Defining Private Equity
-Concepts and objectives
-Corporate models and incentives
-Current landscape (UK, US and Global)
Deal Entry to Exit Strategy
-Public/private perspectives (inclu.De-lists)
-Common entry criteria
-Attribute of an exit strategy
Deal Origination and Structuring
-Intermediation (M&A, etc.)
-Deal flow
-Funding structures and sourcing
Deal Execution
-Due diligence
-Success (failure) criteria
Implementation Deal Objectives
-Analytical process and reporting
-Management / financial restructuring
-Assessing products and services
Defining Entry / Exit
-Understanding key metrics (e.g. EBITDA)
-Exit options (e.g. IPO, Sell-on) and planning
Private equity participants
-Shareholder profiles and objectives
-Investment Bank
-M&A intermediaries
-Private equity firms
-Risk management
-Current directives and emerging themes
Reviewing Private Equity Operations
-Technology evaluation criteria
-Deal workflow
-Current Challenges
The Future
-Regulatory demands
-Deal flow projections
-The global perspective
Learning Goal
At the end of the course, delegates should have:
Conversancy in the language and business of private equity
A solid understanding of private equity concepts and the objectives
Clarity on the private equity business (equity/exit cycle) + workflow
Course Materials
Course notes, handouts


text:
Bring the Fresh (BTF) is a training website and community teaching individuals how they can make money online through internet marketing and building niche sites. The site was created by Kelly Felix a successful online marketer jointly with Mike Long. Kelly manages BringTheFresh.com after Long left.
He is also the creator of multi-million dollar RichJerk.com an online advertising company and Bring the Fresh Gold. BTF uncovers ways that Kelly has been successful online and how others can emulate him and achieve the same. It now has more than 18,000 members and has proven to be a fresh start. Some of the members are extremely successful as they make 6 and 7 figure income.
About Kelly Felix
Kelly himself did not have smooth way to success and had a sad upbringing. He moved to Los Angeles after high school to attend college. At the time, Kelly worked as an actor on several television shows between 1999 and 2002. It then dawned on him that he needed to find other ways of earning instead of depending on casual parts. This is the time he turned to his other interest, the internet as a source of income. He started with numerous small and mid range successes before beginning TheRichJerk.com.
The Rich Jerk
"The Rich Jerk " was the fictitious character who sold an e-book program on earning money online. The Rich Jerk might have been fictitious but with genuine teachings as Kelly taught the proper and exact way of generating traffic and sales online. Kelly maintained his anonymity as R.J raked in millions of dollars in profits and made the highest e-book sales on Clickbank for many years. After using Rich Jerk to turn him to a rich jerk which is something he claims he did not like, Kelly sold Rickjerk.com and decided to rake a break for a few years from online marketing business.
Kelly then teamed up with Mike Long for brainstorming and after a lot of planning, they decided to team up and create BringTheFresh as a way for other people to learn how they could gain success with online marketing.
Bring the Fresh Gold Review
It is a ready to go online affiliate marketing site to help people convert quickly and proper in precious metals. The site is another creation by Kelly Felix. The connection between Kelly and precious metals is that Kelly is also one of the partners in precious metal investment company, Regal Assets.
He was given responsibility to develop Regal Assets affiliates program which is exclusive to others within the industry. The commissions are 10 times more than that of the other firms and also for PPL (pay per) lead income. The top Regal affiliates consistently make 20,000 to $50,000 per month!
BTF Gold engineered by Kelly will soon be launched to help individuals who want to prosper in the lucrative precious metal business. He put many hours into creating the site for the members with an intention to make everybody's smile to shine brighter like the precious metals.
What are chances of success with Bring the Fresh Gold
This program has high chances of making people to success if it does emulates the BTF model. Everyone can use its training from beginner up to advanced levels. BTF has fast start guide and videos that give visitors step by step instruction on how they will get up and run with their first site in a few days.
Members start at basic level, get training, PDFs and have access to a forum on how to begin building their niche affiliate sites. There are available upgrades to Full Disclosure and the Project Profits section with advanced SEO training and techniques to earn quicker.
It is not all about Kelly. The main value is in community and forum that lays out niches, SEO techniques and Keywords making big bucks. They update information regularly to share what is working on their respective sites in promotion and SEO terms. You therefore get many results worth thousands of dollars for you to test and apply to your sites.
BTF has true will to help others and share success stories to inspire each other and newbies. The owners of the websites interacting in the forums have a long successful track record in their industry hence they know what they are saying. Kelly Felix is also active in the forums and if Bring the Fresh Gold will follow similar steps, its worth trying.


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Welcome to NCACCExchange.org, the North Carolina Association of County Commissioners' new portal for processing online sponsorships, associate memberships, advertisements, and subscriptions.
Please note the following features of this system:
- You may register for multiple items at one time.
- Mastercard and Visa are the accepted forms of online payment
- You may choose the option to have an invoice generated and sent to you, which will be done via email and/or post mail
- A registration confirmation email from "North Carolina Association of County Commissioners" will be sent to any emails listed on the registration form, and the email address entered with the payment information will receive a "Transaction Receipt from North Carolina Association of County Commissioners" with detailed payment information from our payment gateway provider, Authorize.net. The email will come from Auto-Receipt <email@example.com>.
If you have questions, contact Matt Gunnet (email@example.com) or Matt Bigelow (firstname.lastname@example.com) at (919) 715-2893.


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Religious tensions of Jakarta election mark new page in Indonesia politics
Issued on: Modified:
In Indonesia, early polling results show Basuki Purnama, the ethnic Chinese Christian governor of Jakarta, has lost his bid for re-election to his Muslim challenger, former education minister Anies Baswedan, after a campaign of religious tensions that has shaken up the country's pluralistic political culture.
Official results will not be known until early May, but independent polls show Baswedan came out of Wednesday's election with a lead of 55 to 60 percent of votes over Purnama, who is commonly known as Ahok.
Once favoured to glide easily to re-election, Ahok has been dogged by accusations of hardline Islamist groups that he insulted the Koran, which he denies, but which also led to him going on trial for blasphemy and see his support drop.
"First is the fact that the entire election itself was framed by Anies's supporters, saying Ahok was blaspheming against Islam and that we are not supposed to be led by Christians," says Yohanes Sulaiman, lecturer in politics at Jenderal Achmad Yani University, south-east of Jakarta.
"And then the fact that he's under trial for insulting the Koran, that's really hurt him since October […] and the fact that he was even able to win the first round of the election was kind of a record."
Despite the trial and the uproar around it, observers are still taken aback by the degree to which religion has been decisive in this election.
"The margin is quite wide, and I think Jakarta electors are beyond religion, but I guess not so much yet," says Tobias Basuki, a researcher at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies in Jakarta.
"He promised other programs as well, which was attractive whether they are realistic or not, but I'm sure religion was the biggest factor that brought Anies to victory over an incumbent whose track record has been proven very good."
Chinese presence also criticised
Religion was not the only factor that gave an advantage to Baswedan's campaign, which also benefited from some anti-foreign and namely anti-Chinese sentiment.
Ahok and his ally, current President Joko Widodo, have opened up Jakarta and the country to Chinese investment, which hit a record amount equivalent to nearly 2.5 billion euros last year.
But the policy of openness has also brought some backlash that was turned into political fodder.
"Anies is not a hypernationalist or a true conspiracy theorist, so things will not turn overnight into a closed system," Basuki says. "But groups who have put forward anti-Chinese sentiment will have a bigger play in the next few years, especially in national government.
"Basically Anies's victory means the opposition controls the capital, and [Widodo's] moves in building infrastructure and cooperation with China would be somewhat impeded."
Religion in politics nothing new, but never so heated
Despite its tradition of pluralism – whereby ethnic Chinese figures like Ahok can play leadership roles in public life – the 95-percent Muslim nation has seen religion and anti-Chinese sentiment become political issues in the past.
"This is the first time it's happened on this level and seen so much national and international media attention," says Chris Chaplin, who researches conservative Islamic groups' influence on Indonesian politics at the Royal Netherlands Institute of Southeast Asia in Jakarta. "But the use of Islamic symbols and anti-Chinese rhetoric has occurred before, notably in the 2010 mayoral elections in Medan, for example.
"So the methods here are perhaps tried and tested in a certain way, although it's the level of it, especially with Ahok being tried for blasphemy, seems to have taken it somewhere else, where it hasn't been before."
Even if religion and foreign presence played a significant role in Baswedan's victory, though, Chaplin believes the result shows Jakarta's seven million voters are divided along sectarian lines.
"Jakarta's Muslim population is about 87 percent, by certain counts, and although it does look like Ahok has lost, the fact that he is averaging about 40 to 44 percent of the vote means that there is a significant part of the Muslim population that does not see religion as the most important issue," Chaplin says.


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The Jensen Global JG27-1.0HPX High-Precision Polished 27-Gauge Needle has a polypropylene-plastic threaded hub with burr-free passivated stainless steel canula and is bonded with a UV-cured adhesive. The JG27-1.0HPX is manufactured using a silicone-free process. This item is for industrial use only.
Note: All Jensen Global needles, syringes, and products are for industrial use. They are not sharp, non-sterile, and not for medical use.
Benefits & Features of the Jensen Global JG27-1.0HPX High Precision Polished 27-Gauge Needle:


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I love the Look Good...Feel Better program for breast cancer patients and survivors. Now the program is going digital, and you are invited. I urge any one in the midst of the battle or feeling ravaged by breast cancer to register and take advantage of this wonderful opportunity.
Note from the editor: Since 1989, Look Good…Feel Better has hosted thousands of workshops nationwide that bring together beauty professionals and cancer patients with the goal of helping patients to cope with the outward effects of treatment.
On Thursday, July 14, 2011, from 12:00 PM to 2:00 PM, Look Good…Feel Better will take this workshop format digital, hosting an online forum that will impart tips and techniques from two of LGFB's top trainers, and allow participants to ask questions, LIVE.
For more information and to register for this free workshop, visit this link.


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Mettu Anji Reddy Convention Hall located in Guntur makes it unforgettable experience of memorable wedding for your daughter, for celebrations, an exhibition, or an industry convention. Mettu Anji Reddy Convention Hall disciplined staff are at your service to ensure every last detail of your special day is planned to perfection.
Siri Bridal make up services include everything related to Guntur marriage like Bridal Makeup (Water-proof), Hairstyle, Facials, Mehandi, Sari Draping, Skin Polishing.
Gondi Seetaramaiah Function Hall located in Guntur is suitable for all manners of exclusions, from business meetings to private dinners and wedding celebration. Gondi Seetaramaiah Function Hall will transform your private plot to a memorable wedding venue.
Whether it's Wedding photography, special events, or portraits…Sagar make being photographed / video-graphed a comfortable experience so that you have images to cherish for a lifetime. And while photography continues to change in its style and technology, Sagar stay focused on what really matters…capturing the essence of your moment and your spirit.
Sagar Photography, Best Wedding photography & Videography Services provided in Guntur, Andhra Pradesh, Please take some time and have a look at Sagar Photography website for great services & Quality provided. Sagar Photography are a team of 6 delivering highest quality in photography & Videography ensuring to maintain the customers for long.
Aahwanam and Crystals in Guntur is a venue with stellar facilities for your events like engagements, weddings, receptions, business meetings, parties & get-together, themed events, and other corporate & family events. Aahwanam and Crystals provide excellent banquet services be it for a full day or half day.
Mourya Function Hall located in Guntur is a venue with stellar facilities for your events like engagements, weddings, receptions, business meetings, parties & get-together, themed events, and other corporate & family events. Mourya Function Hall provide excellent banquet services be it for a full day or half day by providing Mourya Function Hall trained & experienced team & ensure that you build unique memories of your events.
Sahaja Function Hall located in Guntur aim has always been to turn every event, whether big or small, into a celebration. To make all your celebrations, whether a corporate event or a reception a grand, grand affair.
Cloud 9 Events Wedding Decorators, Guntur provides complete solutions for personalized events. You can sit back, relax and prepare yourself for the special occasion, while Cloud 9 Events take care of all the detailed requirements, from the people to the props, stag.
Glitters Banquet Hall located in Guntur provide best marriage halls that include food, sitting arrangement, decorations, music system, security and parking system. Most of the marriage hall have a high level of competition to attract repeated client by providing customers the best service allowing everyone to be satisfied as much as possible.
Kalanjali jewellers are a popular Jewelry store from Guntur providing 916 gold and diamond Jewelry to our valued and esteemed Wedding Jewellery customers with best in class service.
Narendra photography accept customized Wedding photography requirements in Guntur. Narendra photography cover events in Andhra Pradesh.
Varasiddi Wedding Photography, Guntur is giving Memories for Life Time. Unforgettable moments in your life.
Vishnu photography started in 1995 in Guntur and expert in wedding photography. Vishnu showing bride like real princess and capture your beautiful memories into the pictures.
Venkatesh Grand is located in the heart of the city of Guntur. The aim of Venkatesh Grand is to provide total event management services which satisfies its customers and their needs. Venkatesh Grand function halls where various events based on the current trend are hosted, be it a Marriage, Engagement, Kitty Party, Birthday Function, Onila / Panchala Perantam, Board Meeting, Corporate Meeting, etc.
Gokulam Function Hall located in Guntur specialize in wedding receptions, business functions, conventions, reunions, celebrations, fine dining, bridal showers, company luncheons & more. Gokulam Function Hall exquisite interior has high ceilings.
Priya Gardens located in Guntur offer an exemplary environment for marriages, wedding receptions, parties, seminars, meetings, cultural programs with service that is unequalled. The Priya Gardens team comprises of experienced personnel's having vast knowledge & experience in the field of event management thus making it an extremely reliable and the most desirable place to have your events organized.
Sreerastu Convention located in Guntur create the perfect setting for a memorable event. Sreerastu Convention give your marriage, birthday party, graduation party an extra touch of elegance.
MorningStar Events, Guntur provides best marriage decoration to the customer. MorningStar Events upgrade with the latest technologies to give the best results to the customer.
Bandlamudi gardens is the perfect Wedding Venues in Guntur to host social gatherings be it Weddings, sangeets, exhibitions, annual Days, conferences or any other event that you want to make special.
Ramaniyam Function Hall located in Guntur professional staff is eager to work with you to ensure that your day is unforgettable. Ramaniyam Function Hall is not just a banquet hall, it is an experience that will transcend and blend with your world and imagination. Ramaniyam Function Hall has been the choice of thousand of brides in Guntur for their Wedding Receptions.
Sindhu's passion for baking Wedding Cakes started in her childhood itself seeing my mom baking cakes at home for bday's. Sindhu had given up my career in science and research and wanted to take her passion for baking to next level by doing more and more challenging orders and bring smiles to my clients faces.
Sowmya convention center bring your special day to life. Experience, paired with flexibility allows to create the perfect setting for a memorable event. Give your casual graduation party an extra touch of elegance, hold your Corporate events with a touch of sophistication, make your wedding sparkle- with Sowmya convention center, everything will be at it's best. It offers the perfect venue for your celebrations and festivities. The air-conditioned hall is located in the heart of Mangalagiri. Features include aesthetic design, ample car parking, modern kitchen facilities, air-conditioned dining and guest rooms. Sowmya convention centre makes it a convenient venue for every occasion.
Chillapalli Nageswararao Parvatila Kalayanmandapam is centrally located, It has spacious dining hall, modern kitchen with sophisticated equipment and A/c Rooms. The amenities here are excellent and incomparable. It is architect designed Kalyana Mandapam and it is best suited for celebrating your auspicious family functions such as Marriage, Reception, Betrothal, Puberty function and so on. It is also an apt place for conducting corporate meetings, conferences etc. Chillapalli Nageswararao Parvatila Kalayanmandapam provide best venue for your wedding is to be best occasion of your life.
CK Convention is newly built, and very conveniently located on Mangalagiri, aesthetically designed hall appears like a star hotel conference hall. It is the centralized A/c hall and separate dining hall. The amenities here are excellent. It is architect designed Function Hall & Conference Hall for Conferences, Get-togethers parties, Seminars and all functions like Birthday parties, Wedding, Neechiatharatham, Seemantham, Baptisam, Wedding anniversary & engagement etc. You will be proud to invite guests CK Convention for your next event.
Your wedding day is a truly special day. It is the start of a wonderful journey with your soulmate. A journey of two souls with a single thought and two hearts that beat as one. From this day forward you shall not walk alone. It's your day and Chavas Grand Function Hall ensure you memories that you will cherish forever. Chavas Grand promise to lend this special day with a sumptuous air that needs to surround a celebration.
Happy Resorts and Recreations is Designed to cater to every body's taste and requirement, be it a Wedding, Corporate or Social event, whether Indoors or Outdoors, the resorts facilities and dedicated team will ensure that you will relax, enjoy and organize your special event in a grand style. Happy Resorts and Recreations consists of 45 luxurious, spacious and well furnished air-conditioned room, the wedding is an epic spectacle with a magnitude of up to 5000 people, this resort can accommodate events of every size and shape whether it is a full day or half day, Happy Resorts and Recreations will give you achieved attention and care.
R Convention is an ultra-modern convention to a host of events ranging from designer marriages to receptions, business meets, exhibitions, concerts and religious gatherings. It is a stunning piece of architectural marvel, fully-equipped with state-of-the-art facilities, glitzy electrical and sanitary fittings, glittering chandeliers and dazzling interiors. R Convention strive to make each event more enjoyable and remarkable. Through this Convention wealth of expertise and attention to every little detail, R Convention are ready to make your next event memorable.
Padmavathi Function Hall is the first and only premium brand offering an entire bouquet of world-class Banqueting, centralizes ac rooms, power back up and catering solutions. With its modern, elegant and spacious Banquets, it creates a perfect celebratory ambience for all the precious occasions. When you host your event here, you can be rest assured about it. Padmavathi Function Hall experienced staff takes care of it all and makes sure that your wedding is a perfect one. While you enjoy the day with your loved ones, Padmavathi Function Hall caterers whip up the perfect feast for you and your guests.


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Uncomplicating the Complicated stuff from a guy who's not can be really technical, with lots of ideas on hand but no time to blog.
Saturday, June 13, 2015
My Online Shopping and Customs Tax, Delivery Experience
I ordered a car On Board Diagnostics (OBD) from an online shopping website in China where I got the tool for $17.00 plus $19 shipping fee from FedEx (yes, the shipping is more expensive than the item) but the item is not available here nor it a similar tool is too expensive) I paid for the item using my Paypal accout, part of my earnings for my profitable main travel blog (than this pathetic and almost forgotten blog due to my lack of time) WHen FedEx called me up, I was informed that Philippine Bureau of Customs is charging me $30 as import duty or tax on my purchase, I simply mentioned that they can have my item, I don't want to pay such tax on improperly assessed tax. I have no issues paying taxes as long as it's fair but this one's just so like a highway robbery. I wonder if I can also do the same with Ali Express via DHL for my solar power needs
Posted by paetechie at Saturday, June 13, 2015 No comments: Links to this post
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Civil societies point out errors in Kenya poll and IEBC tallies
Thursday November 2 2017
Civil societies have highlighted various inconsistencies in the October 26 repeat poll involving the register, number of valid votes cast and vote addition errors.
Under the Kura Yangu, Sauti Yangu (My vote, My Voice) banner, the groups faulted Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) chairman Wafula Chebukati for the errors.
They questioned why the number of registered voters announced by Mr Chebukati differed from the gazetted number of listed voters, both at the national and county levels.
"Mr Chebukati's announced numbers match what is in the gazetted register in only four of the 48 counties [voting areas] (eight percent)," the group said in its assessment of the repeat elections ordered by the Supreme Court.
"In 92 percent of the counties, the gazetted number and Chebukati's announced number are different."
The team also faulted Mr Chebukati's figure of the total number of people that turned up to vote, which the IEBC chief put at 7,616,217.
"That total is not the total of all votes cast. It is actually the sum total of his announcement of candidates' aggregate valid votes. Using his individual county results, the total number of valid votes is 7, 716, 107," they said.
Further, the team said the IEBC chief had got his math wrong in the final declaration, with the figure for three candidates varying from the calculations of the 47 county figures they made.
Instead of the 7,483,895 figure for President Uhuru Kenyatta, the team added it up to 7,583,895, a 100,000 subtraction, with those of Ekuru Aukot and Mohamed Abduba Dida added 100 and 10 votes to 21,333, and 14,107, respectively.
The team also faulted the IEBC voter register, saying it lacked a definitive number of registered voters.
"We noted unexplained differences between the biographic and biometric lists of voters, unexplained increases in the register after registration closed, the presence of over a million dead voters in the final register and serious data gaps in the reference documents used to create the register," said the report by the Kura Yangu, Sauti Yangu group.
While the number of registered voters was 19,611,423 in June after verification and certification, the figure changed to 19,637,061 in August, climbed to 19,728,124 on October 26 when Kenyans voted, 19,671,944 two days later, and was at 19,611, 366 on October 30 when the fresh poll results were declared.
The team said it deployed 2,000 observers in 44 of Kenya's 47 counties to monitor the repeat poll.
Find the Kura Yangu, Sauti Yangu report in the downloads section of this story.


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A khol pencil that adds intensity to the eyes, dressing them with shimmering highlights.
A khol pencil that adds intensity to the eyes, dressing them with shimmering highlights.
Phyto-Khol Star has a unique adaptable texture which allows for gentle yet firm and comfortable application. It contains a beautiful pearl particle content which highlights and glimmers. In addition, it contains a very high proportion of oils and waxes that guarantee glide similar to that of a cream eye shadow, making it quick and easy to apply. The glitter in this skin care-formula creates shimmering highlights and adds intensity to the eyes. Its firm lead lets you draw perfect and precise lines, and is gentle on the delicate eyelid area. An ultra-glide, comfortable texture, for easy application and long lasting hold. The multiple pure, intense shades combine at will for endless effects. Adorned with a genuine Swarovski crystal in the same shade as the lead, Phyto-Khol Star is easily recognisable and a beauty bag essential. Tested under ophthalmologic control. Suitable for sensitive eyes and contact lens wearers
Apply Phyto-Khol Star to the eyelid, as close to the lashes as possible to highlight the shape of the eye.Intensify the eyes by applying a stronger line at the outer corner of the eye. For truly light-infused make-up result, combine with the effects of Phyto-Ombres Eclat Eye Shadows.
Phyto-Khol Star


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It appears amusing to believe that a little Chihuahua would certainly be able to quit a burglar. If you assume regarding it, various other compared to babbling and also potentially creating great deals of damage with their sharp little teeth, any kind of criminal might conveniently choose up the Chihuahua as well as the canine's initiative to quit criminal activities would certainly be in vain. The pet dog proprietors allowed her canine's out around 8:00 p.m. as well as a min later on Carly began barking continuously.
The male had actually come prepared with his very own chain as well as had actually attached the chain to Silas's chain. There was no other way that I was mosting likely to have the ability to battle the pet out of his hands so the only point I can believe was simply punch him, claimed Dooling.
It's a problem or an aggravation, you might state, when she does bark, however she's my guard pet dog. As for her pet dogs, Dooling claimed Silas was suppressed for much of the evening as well as following day after the near-theft, while Carly the
Chihuahua was on high alertSharp barking at anything that passed by the windowsHome windows We have actually been reviewing articles on social media concerning individuals specifying that there have actually been efforts to swipe pet dogs from yards.
In addition, if you see that a pal has actually something published on their Facebook of this nature please motivate them to call.
The strange pooch was uncovered by a reporter and also their information staff that were in the Bang Rakam District of Thailand reporting on dry spell problems. The information staff exposed that they detected the pet dog after it ran out of a home near to where they were recording.
A bold dachshund showed herself an unusual type of heroine after she conserved 2 children from a vicious bear strike. The bear tossed him to the ground, started to stomp him, attack him, he got his head, after that shoulder as well as back. I saw – and also ran at the bear.
Now the bear, which currently had an aching head, activated Nikita, gnawing and also clawing him, leaving Stas terrified and also injured. Currently a little dachshund called Tosya showed up on the scene as well as barked intensely at the bear. Currently the monster left Nikita as well as chased after the rushing canine right into the woodland.
Tosya drew away the bear well away from the town, prior to shedding the wild pet and also returning securely residence. Both youngsters were hurried to healthcare facility, with Stas enduring scrapes, attacks as well as swellings, while Nikita had a lot more significant injuries, with deep cuts on his hands, as well as attacks on his legs.
Nikita's mom Maria Nikonova states: "It was a shock. I could not think that bears could assault youngsters in the center of the town. It was dreadful to consider all these lacerations, his split garments all covered in blood.".
Seekers tracked as well as fired the bear, which had earlier left a town pair marooned in their residence as it desolated their yard. A bear cub produced outright chaos by running inside a cafe. The clip reveals the bear cub playing around the coffeehouse and also trying to get on tables.
Giggling could be listened to on the clip, and also everybody was swiftly vacated the method of the bear and also it lacked the store once again. It is assumed that the cub could have been shed and also disorientated or divided from its mommy.
The odor of food, coffee and also breads could likewise have actually drawn in the bear to check out within. Happily, the store markets itself as a location where visitors could obtain near nature – in this situation, much closer compared to any person would certainly anticipate.
A bold dachshund showed herself an unusual type of heroine after she conserved 2 young boys from a vicious bear strike. I saw – as well as ran at the bear. At this factor the bear, which currently had an aching head, transformed on Nikita, gnawing and also clawing him, leaving Stas discouraged as well as injured. At this minute a little dachshund called Tosya showed up on the scene and also barked intensely at the bear. A bear cub produced outright mayhem by running inside a coffee store.


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Vans are generally expected to be worked harder than other vehicles, as they are needed for heavy-duty haulage tasks in different environments. Regular servicing is therefore an important part of van ownership, and we are pleased to offer it alongside accident repairs.
Each of our sites in Maidstone and Harlow have the skills and facilities to complete a full and trusted service as well as certified MOT testing. You can be confident that your own van will be returned in a great condition, as our technicians are trained to spot and fix the smallest faults.
In Harlow, Essex, we also operate a dedicated bodyshop for accident repairs. Here we can fix minor bumps and scrapes or more serious damage that makes your van unsafe to drive. We will not return it until we are completely happy with its condition. These tasks can extend your vehicle's usable life for much longer, helping you to maximise the value from it. They also maintain its value so that you get more back if you trade the van in and upgrade.
You will always be given a competitive and transparent quote when you book in for servicing or repairs at any of our sites. And to keep you on the move, a courtesy van can also be arranged where available.
Scheduling a service, MOT, or accident repairs at one of our three dealerships is quick and easy using the online booking tool. Simply select your preferred location and the tasks that are needed. Your appointment will then be confirmed instantly by a member of the team.


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|By Kyle Brown, et al.
Article Rating:
|March 12, 2002 12:00 AM EST
In previous chapters, we learned how to use the IBM WebSphere Test Environment (WTE) inside VisualAge for Java to create and to test servlets. Now we need to understand how to use our servlets outside a test environment. This can be accomplished by deploying our servlets to the IBM WebSphere Application Server, Advanced Edition (WASAE). The WTE is used at development time, whereas the WASAE is used for staging or production purposes.
About the Book
Enterprise Javatm Programming with IBM WebSphere (with CD-ROM)
By Kyle Brown, Gary Craig, Greg Hester, Jaime Niswonger, David Pitt, Russell Stinehour
Addison Wesley Professional
You may purchase this book with a 10% discount at: www.informit.com/promo/wsdj
The IBM WebSphere Application Server, Advanced Edition, provides the necessary tools to deliver J2EE-based applications. The IBM WASAE allows a machine—more commonly called a node—to host multiple application servers. Within each application server, both an EJB container and a servlet engine—known in J2EE parlance as a Web container—can exist. Within a servlet engine, multiple Web applications can be defined. Specifically, this chapter covers
- WASAE architecture
- Testing the WASAE installation
- Using the administration console
- Using the XMLConfig tool
- Configuration issues
However, we point out where configuration steps differ in other environments, such as UNIX.
WASAE Architecture
IBM WASAE, is based on the J2EE specification. Most J2EE products provide a container for each application component type: application client container, applet container, Web component container, and Enterprise Bean container. WASAE provides out-of-the box support for all the containers except the applet container. However, WASAE provides this support, using the IBM Java 1.2.2 Java runtime environment (JRE) with enhancements. We discuss applet deployment issues in a later chapter. Figure 6.1 shows the J2EE architecture.
WASAE is designed for a multinode—multiple-machine—environment. WASAE defines an additional container called a WebSphere domain, which consists of a collection of nodes that can be configured and administered together. All the configuration data for all the nodes contained in a WebSphere domain is kept in a single, shared—but, ideally, replicated—repository. This repository, known as the WAS database, is kept in an RDBMS.2 Using a single database for all configuration data provides a single point of communication for all nodes and enhances the possible solutions for workload management and balancing, replicated services, and maintenance. Additionally, using a single database for all configuration data greatly decreases maintenance. If each node had its own set of configuration files, you would have to edit the files on each node individually in order to administer it. In WebSphere's model, a shared repository contains all the configuration data, so you can manage the configuration remotely from a desktop because WASAE implements its configuration objects as EJBs, using its own EJB support. Therefore, access to the configuration data by multiple nodes is controlled through the use of the transactional and persistent capabilities of the EJB Entity Beans. This access is done through RMI over IIOP, which allows the configuration to be managed securely over the Internet.
Within each node, WASAE allows multiple application servers to be configured. Each application server may contain a servlet engine—a J2EE Web container—and an EJB container. Both the servlet engine and the EJB container within a particular application server operate within a single shared Java Virtual Machine (JVM). Application servlets and various other Web-based services are defined within the context of the servlet engine. EJBs are deployed within the EJB container. A sample WebSphere domain is shown in Figure 6.2. Note that this domain contains three nodes and that you are shown an exploded view of node 1. Also note that only node 3 contains a Web server.3
Because WASAE was designed to work in a multinode environment, you must understand the requirements for each node. Minimally, each node in a WebSphere domain must contain an instance of the WebSphere admin server. The admin server performs many functions, including starting, stopping, and monitoring all configured application servers and providing a location service daemon (LSD), a persistent name server (PNS), and a security server. In addition, the so-called nanny process, a watchdog process, restarts the admin server in case of failure.
In Figure 6.2, node 3 contains a Web server. As is shown, it is not necessary to have the Web server on all nodes. If an HTTP request is sent to node 3, the Web server uses the WebSphere plug-in, possibly with an additional servlet redirector to route the request to the appropriate local or remote application server. The local node then services the request, if possible, or routes it to the proper node, based on the configuration data contained in the EJB Entity Beans using the database.
Some Definitions of WebSphere Components
Now that you have seen the overall architecture of WebSphere's process architecture, it's a good time to learn some of the more detailed definitions of the WebSphere components you will use and how they are configured in WebSphere, Advanced Edition. You will learn about the topology view of the WebSphere administrative console, a view arranged as a tree of configuration objects. But before you begin looking at the view, let's examine the following objects you will see:
- Domain: the root of the WebSphere configuration tree. A domain is a set of nodes that all share a single administration database: a single shared WAS database.
- Node: a server machine. Each node is uniquely identified within the domain by its network name, such as its TCP/IP host name. Server processes—called managed servers in WebSphere—run within a node. WebSphere defines two types of managed servers: an application server, a Java process; and a generic server, or any process, such as a CORBA server or an RMI server. All the processes managed on a node by WebSphere may be started or stopped by a single command in the administrative interface.
- Application server: a JVM that is managed by WebSphere. Each application server may contain a servlet engine and an EJB container.
- Servlet engine: a Web container as defined in J2EE. An application server that contains a servlet engine thus has the infrastructure and the classes to execute servlets. A servlet engine contains a set of Web applications, which are isolated logical groups of servlets.
- Web application: a number of common objects brought together into a unified representation of an application. A Web application may contain a group of logically connected servlets and also defines a class path that the servlet class files and associated files are taken from. The Web application also defines a JSP processor that indicates how JSPs will be interpreted, such as using the JSP 0.91 or the JSP 1.0 specification. In addition, the Web application defines a root URI, which will be a part of the URI of all the servlets it contains, indicating the logical grouping within the URL. Finally, the Web application defines a document root path to locate the JSPs used by this Web application.
- Servlet: the servlet at the bottom of this particular branch of the topology tree. Servlets can be accessed in a Web application in one of two ways. The most common, and most maintainable, way is to individually define servlets by specifying the servlet class name and servlet name, as well as a set of URLs that the servlet will be identified by. Servlets may also be defined within a Web application by including a special servlet, called the "Invoker" servlet, which allows servlets to be invoked with a URL containing their fully qualified class name.
2. In WASAE version 3.5, the WAS database can be installed in IBM DB/2, Oracle, or Sybase for standalone or networked use or in the Instant DB database for standalone use.
3. WebSphere supports multiple options for separating the Web server from the application server. The configuration and setup of these options is beyond the scope of this book. See [Ueno] for details.
4. [ROOT_DIR] is usually a drive letter under Windows NT or a directory mount point under UNIX.
5. If you forget to launch the admin server before opening the administrator's console, you will see a dialog box informing you "The Admin Client failed to connect to the admin server." If this happens, first start the admin server and then try opening the administrator's console.
6. Note that it is a best practice not to use the "Invoker" servlet. We will describe these and more best practices later. Nonetheless, we will use this servlet in our example.
7. This lookup is through the "ServletContext.get Context(String uri)" method, which returns a Servlet Context for a particular root URI.
Testing the Installation
Once WASAE is installed, you can then test the installation to ensure that everything is functioning correctly. In this section, you will test the installation of the WASAE by using the default server, which can automatically be installed for this purpose.
Before You Start the Admin Server
During the installation of an admin server on a node, the WAS database must be identified. Specifying a JDBC URL and a JDBC driver class identifies the database. This information is stored in the admin.conf file, which can be found in the [ROOT_DIR]\WebSphere\AppServer\bin directory, where [ROOT_DIR] is the root directory where the admin server is installed.4ýFor learning purposes, it is best to start with one node before creating a multinode environment. Here, we will assume that only one node exists in the WebSphere domain and that the WAS database is located on the node itself. If the WAS database is implemented in DB2, using the default database name, you will find the following lines in the admin.conf file:
If you want to force the admin server to create the default server application server when it starts, ensure that the install.initial.config property is set to true, as in the following line:
If you have problems because the database becomes corrupted, you may have to drop and recreate the database. To do this, open a DB2 Command window and use the following DB2 commands.
REM ensure DB2 has the correct computer name
setdb2n.exe %computername%
REM Drop the existing WAS database
DB2 DROP Database WAS
REM create a new WAS database
DB2 CREATE Database WAS
REM increase the application heap size to 256
At this point, the admin server has been reinitialized. If you ever need to reinitialize the server again, you can perform these same steps. However, you may want to use the XMLConfig tool, described later, to obtain an export of the configuration data so that it can be reimported into the new configuration database.
Starting the Admin Server
Most commonly, the admin server is started from NT services in Windows NT. The service is named IBM WS Admin Server. A shortcut to this service is in the Start menu of Windows NT under IBM WebSphere.Ap-plication Server V3.5>Start Admin Server. If you need to debug the admin server, you can also start it from a command line window. You will find a batch file that can be used to start the admin server in [ROOT_DIR]\WebSphere\AppServer\bin\debug\adminserver.bat, where [ROOT_DIR] is the root directory where the admin server was installed.
Opening the Administrator's Console
The primary tool used to view and to change the configuration of a WebSphere domain is the WebSphere administrator's console, a Java-based application that acts as a client to the configuration EJBs that are running in the admin server. In WebSphere 3.5, an administrator's console can connect to any available admin server in the domain. In this chapter, we assume that the default configuration, in which the administrator's console connects to an admin server on the same node, will be followed. To start the administrator's console under Windows NT, choose IBM WebSphere.Application Server V3.5.Administrator's Console from the Windows NT Start menu.5
Starting the Default Server
When the admin server is started, it automatically starts all the application servers that were in the "started" state before the admin server was last shut down. If this is the first time that you have started the admin server, the default server application server will not automatically start. Instead, you must ensure that it is started. In order to start a server, you must open the administrator's console as described earlier. The WebSphere Advanced Administrative Console is shown in Figure 6.3.
Select the Default Server. To start this application server, click the Start button. When the server has started, the dialog shown in Figure 6.4 will be displayed.
Starting the Web Server
The last thing that has to be done is to start the Web server. WebSphere supports a number of Web servers, including IBM's HTTP server, which is supplied with WASAE, and Web servers from Microsoft, Netscape, and the Apache consortium. The Web server will listen, by default, on port 80 for HTTP requests and will forward any requests for servlets through the WebSphere plug-in to the applicable application server. From the NT Services panel, select IBM HTTP Server, and then start it. If you are using a Web server other than the IBM HTTP server, start it by following the instructions provided by the Web server manufacturer.
Test Using the "Snoop" Servlet
The "Snoop" servlet echoes back to the Web browser the details of the request, the requested server, and the servlet context. This servlet is part of the initial configuration that comes with the default server. In order to invoke "Snoop" servlet, open a Web browser and type http://localhost/servlet/snoop on the URL line of the Web browser. If WebSphere is installed correctly, the "Snoop" servlet will display a response as shown in Figure 6.5
Creating the "EmployeeSys" Application Server
Now that you have verified that the WASAE product is installed correctly, you need to create a new application server for the book's case study. The case study defines an application server named "EmployeeSys" that contains both an EJB container and a servlet engine (Web container). Additionally, the servlet engine defines a Web application with a root URI of /TimeApp. The steps that follow will help you to export the Java classes from VisualAge for Java and to configure the "EmployeeSys" application server in WASAE.
1. From the Projects tab in the VisualAge for Java Workbench, select the CreateEmployeeServlet class. This class is contained in the WS Case Study project and the com.wsbook.casestudy.servlet package. (Remember that you created this project, package, and servlet in the previous chapter.) Using the pop-up menu from the right mouse button, select the Export option, as shown in Figure 6.6.
2. When the dialog appears, select the Directory radio button and click the Next button. When the next dialog appears, type the export directory:
[ROOT_DIR]\WebSphere\AppServer\hosts\ default_host\TimeAppWebApp\servlets
as the export directory. Click the Finish button to start the export. (See Figure 6.7.) At this point, a dialog will appear informing you that this directory has not been created. Click OK to let WebSphere create the directory.
3. Ensure that the IBM WS Admin Server NT service is still running, and open the WebSphere administrator's console.
4. Inside the administrator's console, you will now use the Start Wizard pull-down menu to start a wizard that will help you create a new application server.
Select Create Application Server from the pull-down menu. The wizard that begins should resemble Figure 6.8.
5. The first panel that is displayed allows you to include either an EJB container or a Web container or both containers. Select both check boxes so that your new application server can service EJBs and Web applications. Click the Next button.
6. Next, you will specify the application server properties: the application server name, command line arguments, working directory, and standard output and standard error. Type EmployeeSys for the application server name. Change the name of the standard output to empsys_stdout.txt, and change the name of the standard error to empsys_stderr.txt. Click the Next button.
7. Specify that the server not be automatically started after creating it. Click Next.
8. Select your node from the list of nodes and click Next.
9. The next panel allows you to specify Enterprise Beans to be installed on this server. For now, do not make any changes to this panel. Click Next.
10. On the General tab, accept the EJB container name EmployeeSys.Container. Click Next.
11. On the Select Virtual Host page, select the default_host virtual host, and click Next. We will not be defining new virtual hosts for this node, so we will use the default host (which refers to the default host name defined for this node in TCP/IP).
12. On the General tab of the Servlet Engine Properties page, accept the servlet engine name EmployeeSysServletEngine. Click Next.
13. On the General tab of the Web Application Properties page, do not accept the default Web application name; instead, type the Web application name TimeAppWebApp. Select default_host as the virtual host. Type /TimeAppWebApp as the Web application Web path. This path will become the root URI for servlets in this Web application. Select the Advanced tab.
14. On this tab, you can change both the document root and the servlet class path. Accept the default document root [ROOT_DIR]\WebSphere\AppServer\hosts\default_host\TimeAppWebApp\web. Accept the servlet class path as [ROOT_DIR]\WebSphere\AppServer\hosts\default_host\TimeAppWebApp\servlets. Click Next.
15. This last page of the wizard allows you to specify system servlets that will be part of the Web application. Uncheck the Enable File Servlet check box. Check the Enable Serving Servlets By Classname check box.6 Select Enable JSP 1.0 so that the JSP 1.0 page compile servlet will be used by the Web application. Click the Finish button to create the application server.
16. When the process has completed, drill down to the "EmployeeSys" application server to show the configuration as in Figure 6.9.
17. Select the Web application TimeAppWebApp in the administrator's console. Then, using the pop-up menu by clicking the right mouse button, select the Create-.Servlet option, as shown in Figure 6.10.
18. When the Create Servlet dialog appears, type the servlet name CreateEmployee. Type a Web application name of TimeAppWebApp and a description of Create an employee. Type the class name com.wsbook. casestudy.servlet.CreateEmployeeServlet, as shown in Figure 6.11.
19. Finally, add a servlet Web path. Click the Add button to display the Add Web Path to Servlet dialog. Type a path URI of /TimeAppWebApp/CreateEmployee, as shown in Figure 6.12. Click the OK button to close the dialog.
20. Click OK on the Create Servlet dialog to finish the addition of the servlet to the "TimeAppWebApp."
21. Having configured all the items, start the application server by selecting the application server "EmployeeSys" and then click the Start button.
22. To test the deployed servlet, ensure that the Web server has been started, and then open a Web browser on http://localhost/TimeApp/ CreateEmployee, as shown in Figure 6.13.
Using XMLConfig
In addition to using the administration console to create and to configure application servers, WebSphere offers an XML configuration management tool called XMLConfig, which allows you to export a complete or a partial configuration from a node or to import configuration into a node. This tool can be used to create and to restore a configuration backup or to copy a configuration between WebSphere domains. If you have staged your servlets and EJBs on one node and now want to move them to another node, the XMLConfig tool is ideal for helping speed this process. You can use XMLConfig to export the entire configuration from a node to an XML file. Change directories to the [ROOT]\WebSphere\AppServer\bin directory and enter the following command to perform the export on the node named my_node.
xmlconfig -export myNodeConfig.xml -adminNodeName my_node
You must then edit the exported file to remove any items that you do not want on the new node and to change most of the tags with action5 "update" on them to action5 "create." In order to import an XML file containing a WAS configuration, type the following command:
xmlconfig -import myNodeConfig.xml -adminNodeName my_node
The XML schema that the XML configuration utility uses is quite simple. Its structure mirrors that of the topology view in the administration console. For instance, consider the following minimal XML configuration file template:
<node name="nodename" action={"create" | "locate" | "update}>
<application-server name = "name"
action = {"create"|"locate"|"update"}>
...insert the parts of the application server here...
If you wanted to update an application server with a new value—for instance, to change its trace-output file—you would simply insert the appropriate tags into the minimal file. To change the trace-output file, you would insert the tag <trace-output>(ROOT)\mytrace.trc</traceoutput> between the <application-server...> and the </application-server> tags. If you wanted to change the definition of a servlet, you would need to also include the tags defining the servlet engine and Web application, and so on.
The CD-ROM that accompanies this book contains a sample XML file (employee_sys.xml) that can be used to configure the "EmployeeSys" application server in the same way that we configured it using the administrator's console. You would configure the new application server by changing the node name in the XML file to match your node name and then running the xmlconfig import as shown previously. You can learn more about how to use the XML configuration tool by reading the product documentation and by browsing through this example output file.
Configuration Issues
Earlier, we went through the steps of setting up an application server with an EJB container, a Web application, and a servlet. In this section, we will present some best practices for configuring your application servers and Web applications.
Application Server Versus Web Application
To understand the best practices for using application servers and Web applications, you need to consider a few more facts about Web applications. Each application server contains a single JVM, whereas a Web application is contained within an application server and shares the JVM with other Web applications. However, each Web application has its own class path and document root because a specialized class-loader class enforces isolation between the Web applications. As such, servlets within one Web application cannot directly invoke or directly utilize public static variables from a servlet within another Web application. In effect, having multiple Web applications divides up a JVM such that each Web application acts as if it has its own JVM. The only way servlets in different Web applications can communicate with one another is through the ServletContext object. You might recall that each Web application has its own ServletContext associated with it. The Servlet API allows a servlet to "look up" other servlet contexts,7 thus allowing communication with servlets in other Web applications.
Earlier, you learned that a Web application is a logical grouping of servlets that share a common root URI. Each Web application also defines a class path; what has not been discussed so far is the fact that each Web application within an application server can be independently "restarted," or made to reload its servlets from the files on the class path. This can happen in two ways. First, a feature called autoreload can be set on each Web application. If autoreload is enabled, whenever a file changes on the class path for that Web application, the application server will dump all the current servlet instances and any other objects that were loaded with the servlets and reload the servlets from the new files on the class path. Second, an administrator can force a reload of a Web application by choosing the Restart Web App menu option from the menu in the topology tree.
This ability to force a reload of a particular Web application makes it possible to change the files related to a particular Web application while leaving running and unaffected all the servlets in the other Web applications within the application server. Thus, you can administer servlets and their associated classes, such as controllers and domain classes, on an individual Web application basis. The only limitation to this administration ability is that you cannot add or remove named servlets from the Web application unless you shut down the entire application server. These facts are key to making the decision between choosing to create a Web application or an application server.
For example, let's say that we have two logically independent sets of servlets that run within the same intranet, although the same notion applies to different applications running within an Internet portal or application service provider (ASP). We will assume that one Web application contains our time card application—"TimeApp," which was built for the human resources department of our fictional company. We can also assume that another set of servlets was developed for the sales department representing an application for setting and monitoring sales quotas: "QuotaApp." Now let's say that both applications have relatively low utilization rates—no more than five concurrent users at a time total—well within the processor utilization capabilities of a single-processor Windows NT or UNIX server.
If we create two application servers, one for each set of servlets, we will need to either deploy the two application servers on different nodes or equip our server with a substantial amount of RAM to run the two servers simultaneously. The reason is that each application server has a substantial memory overhead. An empty application server occupies between 30MB and 60MB of RAM—just the overhead to create the JVM and to load the base WebSphere classes. If you add more application classes, this figure will grow. However, adding a new Web application to an existing application server will not substantially increase its base memory size. So, to avoid the overhead of a new JVM, you should add a new Web application instead of creating a new application server. Your applications can still remain largely independent of one another through the Web application class path feature, but you will not have the unnecessary extra overhead.
Finally, you need to understand the autoreload feature. Autoreload is a computationally intensive process; WebSphere has a thread for each Web application that will "wake up" every few seconds—set in the reload interval—and scan the class path for changes. Although this is fine for servers with low utilization or that are in a test or quality assurance (QA) environment, it becomes an unacceptable amount of "wasted cycles" when in a higher transaction-volume environment. Therefore, we recommend that you turn off the autoreload feature for production WebSphere servers in all but the least-active server environments.
Some advantages of using a Web application are as follows.
Some disadvantages of using Web applications are as follows.
When should you use one rather than the other? The general rule of thumb is to use one application server per set of related applications and to apply Web applications as a way to segment the application into subapplications within a larger application. We would caution you to not group several unrelated projects with different delivery schedules into one application server, as you will inevitably force the other Web applications to have to restart when new servlets are added.
"Invoker" Servlet
As discussed earlier, the "Invoker" servlet can find other servlets by their Java class names and then load and/or invoke them on request. Generally, this servlet should be used only during testing and staging. Using "Invoker" can open up security holes. When "Invoker" is used, the HTML contains the class name of the servlet. As such, the user has more information than is necessary for calling a servlet. This small bit of information might lead an unscrupulous user to attempt to break into your system by using that information. Using "Invoker" can also decrease performance. In order for it to find a servlet by its class name, "Invoker" must use the Java Reflection API to find and to load the servlet. This API is generally slower than using a direct reference in Java. Finally, using "Invoker" limits how you can pass parameters to your servlet. You can only supply initialization parameters to a servlet that has been defined in the administrator's console.
Summary and Preview
In this chapter, you have seen how the WASAE can be used to deploy both servlets and EJBs. You learned about how WASAE implements the containers in the J2EE architecture, how to verify a WASAE installation, how to configure an application server in WASAE by using the administrator's console and the XMLConfig tool, and some best practices for configuration. In the next chapter, we look at WebSphere Studio and how it can be used to manage and deploy a Web application's resources.
- Forget Defining Cloud Computing
- IBM & Cloud Computing: Self-Service Clouds with Fine-Grained Control
- IBM & Cloud Computing: How WebSphere CloudBurst Delivers Consumability
- Cloud Computing and Virtual Images
- Bringing Cloud Computing to SOA
- Five Reasons to Choose a Private Cloud
- What's in a Cloud Appliance?
- Should Developers Care About Cloud Computing?
- Reference Architecture for Cloud Computing
- Confronting The Culture of Cloud Computing


text:
Pumpkin Carving Party
I did not realize that Pumpkin Carving was an American tradition. What did we have to do in Australia? Teach them how to carve! So we had a party.
I went to Kikki.K, an expensive store that was having a great sale. I got all the paper goods for under $20.00. As she handed me the receipt she said, "you saved $46.00." Like I said an expensive store with a good sale.
Of course a pumpkin carving party would not be complete without pumpkin food. We had pumpkin mac and cheese, pumpkin pie, pumpkin dip, and pumpkin seeds. I did have a couple of things that were not pumpkin, incase they hated pumpkin. None of the recipes were mine, so I can tell you they were really good. The only thing I had to change was can pumpkin. They don't sell that in Australia. I had to cook the pumpkin fresh, which isn't that hard, and tasted great.
After we ate, we started the pumpkin carving competition. Now, don't worry they did come with the, "big guns." They all brought their own carving tools, one brought their dental tools, and another brought a dremel saw. They had to be creative with their tools. Since they do not really carve pumpkins in Australia they did not have the carving kits.
While we waited on everyone to get finished with their pumpkins everyone played with the photo booth. My friend Courtney helped with this. She went on pinterest and found props, printed them, and glued them to sticks. She also made the cute banner and came up with the # for everyone to post their pictures.
I would say everyone did really well. Most of these pumpkins were carved by first time carvers.
Now, some people may be wondering, why is pumpkin carving so special to me? Years ago, my GrandVol started a tradition with us grandkids. Carving a pumpkin every October. Now, anyone that has been around me for very long, knows I love my GrandVol. He has been gone since 1996, so anything we can do to carry on his traditions, I do.
When GrandVol would carve pumpkins we would have to do the "Pumpkin Dance." Which was everyone line up around the pumpkin and dance around in a circle. I haven't shared that tradition with everyone. I can't let everyone know how crazy my family is, but we made our own version. A competition.
When my cousins and I were in college we would have a competition every year. The competition has continued and now spreading around the world.
What is a family tradition that you like to share?
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April 2018


text:
Sara Khan Biography
Sara Khan Wiki
Sara Khan Now Sara Arfeen Khan is an Indian actress and television host. She is best known for her role as Alka Tiwari in STAR One's hit serial Dhoondh Legi Manzil Humein.She will be soon seen Imran Khan's upcoming Bollywood movie Sargoshiyan.she was last seen in ZeeTv's show Jamai Raja as Aleena.
Sara Khan Early Life
Sara Khan born on 6 August 1989. She is 28 years old. She brought up in Mumbai with her parents. her parents are very supportive of her. she completed her schooling and college studies in Mumbai only. later she focuses her career in acting. she is recently married to her long term boyfriend Arfeen khan.
Sara Khan Carrer
Sara Arfeen Khan aka Sara Khan makes her TV debut with star one's popular show Dhoondh Legi Manzil Humein as Alka Tiwari. she played a lead role in this show. after this, she did many roles in many serials like CID, Zindagi wins, Dilli wali Thakur Girls, Siya Ke Ram, Jamai Raja etc. apart from this she also works in films. she made her debut in Bollywood with movie Total Siyappa starring Yami Gautam and Ali Zafar. She will be soon seen Imran Khan's upcoming Bollywood movie Sargoshiyan.
on next page see Sara Khan's profile, latest news, tv show details


text: The work of John Tenasco is situated between abstraction and realism where myriads of ideas are filtered through a personal perspective. Themes of impermanence and the instability of the image are but two that inform his artistic output. With a combination of gestural or controlled linear strokes an intuitive process begins in a search for form and meaning. The process is achieved either systematically or its foundations are obliterated---leaving only remnants of its origin. Tenasco's work contains numerous influences--not only from other artists but also ideas from philosophy, poetry and music.