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Poor Elon Musk just can't catch a break. After admitting that Tesla hasn't yet figured out how to weld (a fairly critical task for auto OEMs), blowing through Model 3 production deadlines (which probably had something to do with rumors that 'the most advanced auto OEM in the world" was making components by hand), and firing 100's of employees, the embattled company now finds itself locked in yet another employee lawsuit...this time filed by over 100 black employees alleging racial discrimination.
Filed in the Superior Court in Alameda County, Musk's latest legal nightmare alleges, among other things, that his Fremont manufacturing facility is a "hotbed for racist behavior" in which employees and supervisors "regularly use the 'N word.'" Per Bloomberg:
Tesla Inc.'s production floor is a "hotbed for racist behavior," more than 100 African-American employees claimed in a lawsuit in which they alleged black workers at the electric carmaker suffer severe and pervasive harassment.
The employees are seeking permission from a judge to sue as a group and are seeking unspecified general and punitive monetary damages as well as an order for Tesla to implement policies to prevent and correct harassment.
"Although Tesla stands out as a groundbreaking company at the forefront of the electric car revolution, its standard operating procedure at the Tesla factory is pre-Civil Rights era race discrimination," the employees said in the complaint, filed Monday in California's Alameda County Superior Court.
The lawsuit was filed on behalf of Marcus Vaughn, who worked in the Fremont factory from April 23 to Oct. 31. Vaughn alleged that employees and supervisors regularly used the "N word" around him and other black colleagues. Vaughn said he complained in writing to human resources and Musk and was terminated in late October for "not having a positive attitude."
Of course, this seems to be the continuation of a lawsuit filed by 3 workers in Alameda County last month (we noted it here: Tesla Sued For "Hostile Work Environment" After "Racist Drawings, Epithets" Appear In Factory) which also alleged that Tesla effectively contributed to the creation of a "hostile work environment" after "racist drawings and epithets" were found sprinkled around the Fremont plant.
Three former Tesla factory workers charge in a new suit the company's factory is a hostile environment for black workers, adding to earlier accusations of racial harassment.
The men, who are African-American, claim in a new complaint filed Monday in state court that Tesla supervisors and workers used racial epithets and drew racist graffiti on cardboard boxes.
The suit, filed in Alameda County Superior Court, claims Owen Diaz and his son, Demetric, were called the N-word while they worked at the Fremont factory, and supervisors did little to stop it. A third man, Lamar Patterson, also claims he was subjected to insensitive racist remarks.
Demetric Diaz complained about the regular use of epithets to the staffing agency and another supervisor, the suit said. The supervisor told him he was just a replaceable temporary worker. Diaz was dismissed less than a week later in October 2015.
Making matters even worse, this latest lawsuit also disclosed an email from Musk in which he tells minority workers that they need to "be thick-skinned."
According to the complaint, Musk sent an email to Tesla factory employees on May 31.
"Part of not being a huge jerk is considering how someone might feel who is part of [a] historically less represented group," Musk wrote in the email. "Sometimes these things happen unintentionally, in which case you should apologize. In fairness, if someone is a jerk to you, but sincerely apologizes, it is important to be thick-skinned and accept that apology."
Not surprisingly, Mr. Vaugn's lawyer was quick to point out that there is no legal precedent requiring employee's to "have a thick skin."
"The law doesn't require you to have a thick skin," Organ said in an interview Monday. "Tesla is not doing enough. It's somewhat akin to saying 'stop being politically correct.' When you have a diverse workforce, you need to take steps to make sure everyone feels welcome in that workforce."
Perhaps someone with some level of people skills should handle all firm-wide email blasts going forward...just a thought, Elon.


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The Bookshelf
NEW BOOK ALERT! Get them here: Lars Bergen Amazon page in paperback and Kindle. Click +Follow there to get notified of new extraterrestrial books.
Recent Posts
- My Mother Was an E.T.
- Extraterrestrial Ants and the Power of Illusion
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- Alien Abduction Day 2017
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Star Borne
The United Nations on Mt. Hermon
The United Nations set up shop on Mt. Hermon, and this sent the conspiracy theorists into overdrive, because of the significance of Mt. Hermon. This mountain was highlighted in the Book of Enoch, which is one of the books that …
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subset: commoncrawl


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Calling all Car and Motorcycle fanatics! The OTC Transportation Technology Department and Rick's Automotive are proud to present the Annual Fall Car and Motorcycle Show. See some of the area's finest and rarest classic cars, motorcycles, and high-performance vehicles.
Got a vehicle that you would like to show off? Register your ride for only $20. Trophies awarded to the best vehicles in several different categories.
Spectators welcome free of charge! Car show proceeds will support SkillsUSA student member activities.
Register online by clicking here!


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Meet Seth. Seth is a composite of millennial habits, traits, attitudes and expectations. If you don't know Seth very well, it's time you've met.
Within minutes of waking each morning, Seth reaches for his smartphone and begins to interact with his world which is filtered through a variety of social apps, news feeds and text streams. Making some educated guesses on his behavior based on Goldman Sachs's survey data. [1]
Seth most likely begins with Snapchat to connect with friends, then he likely moves on to Twitter before checking with Amazon Alexa for a weather update and to see how his local teams did. All of this without use of TV, newspapers, telephones or other communication devices of yesteryear.
It's not just a perception, millennials are definitely glued to their smartphones. More millennials (77%) own smartphones — and spend more time on them (over two hours a day) — than any other age group, according to a 2014 report that examined the behavior of more than 23,000 adults, and was released by Experian.[2] Smartphone use is up among all groups as well. Consider that from 2011 to 2016 the percentage of Americans who own smartphones jumped to 77% from 35%, according to Pew Research Center. In addition, Pew found that more than one in ten Americans are "'smartphone-only' internet users – meaning they own a smartphone, but do not have traditional home broadband service."
Seth's omnipresent smartphone is heavily integrated into his day. He's not just using it to communicate. Seth is summoning transportation, watching movies, shopping and ordering dinner.
In fact, Seth probably interacts more with his phone than humans.
Nearly four in 10 millennials (39%) say they interact more with their smartphones than they do with their significant others, parents, friends, children or co-workers, according to a recent Bank of America survey. Similarly, Deloitte's annual survey on smartphone usage captures powerfully how smartphones in particular have become central to consumers' lives:
So the question becomes, what else is Seth doing on his phone all day?
The majority of Millennials (61.2%) say they most prefer to do their banking with mobile apps, and 69.1% said they'd done just that during the previous week. In addition, 82.7% had used a mobile banking app during the past month, according to an MFour survey of 1,000 millennials. Mobile was the most preferred banking method across all racial and ethnic demarcations, age groupings and income brackets. The groups most likely to make mobile banking their first choice were Hispanics (71.1%) and Millennials with incomes of $75,000 or more (65.5%).[3]
And it's not just banking. Mobile platforms continue to drive development at most online brokers.
Seth will likely never see the inside of a bank or brokerage branch office, except maybe to use the free notary public services for some out of date paperwork process like a loan refinance.
Adapting to the Digital Financial Life
Based on our work with clients and analysis of consumer trends, we define today as the era of the Digital Financial Life. This era needs to fulfill consumer expectations to take ownership of their financial lives completely through ubiquitous technology. These consumers exhibit characteristics specific to their era:
- Comfortable, confident understanding of living digitally, especially as it relates to an ability to view and manage finances.
- Autonomous in decision making. Willing to receive advice but preferring complete control of their financial life and decisions.
- Empowered (and desiring empowerment) by an ability to see their financial life holistically and clearly.
For financial firms targeting millennials, it's crucial to provide innovative Client Experiences – including information and functionality. The entire experience should be consistent from a desktop to a smartphone, to a tablet to a digital assistant.
Millennials' favorite apps provide a good model for determining what these consumers expect. The library of apps with high functionality has created a new level of expectations. Consumers shopping on Amazon or Zappos apps have the ability to see a massive menu of products, execute transactions, see their accounts and maintain a live history. Spotify enables them to listen to any song imaginable instantly. Snapchat and Facebook integrate information from other social accounts, consolidating Tweets and Likes and all kinds of personal information. All of it works seamlessly and effortlessly for consumers.
These expectations carry over to financial services. These consumers want an experience on par with using Amazon or Netflix – they value efficiency, speed and convenience. All their information should be accessible in real time and transact on any device, anywhere in the world – securely. They want to be able to conduct transactions, use self-service tools and have the option to interact – but not necessarily speak – with an expert. Many millennials in fact prefer interacting with an expert via social apps or chats rather than speaking to a live person.
As smartphones increasingly are the central hub for most activities in consumers' lives – especially millennials – the burden is on financial institutions to adapt their customer experience to serve their changing expectations.
Click here to find out how Wealthsqope can help your organization adapt to the new Digital Financial Life and transform your digital client experience.
[1] CNBC, 5/10/17 [2] Marketwatch, 6/21/16 [3] MFour Millennials Insights Project


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Midland Avenue Mixed-Use Development
LOCATION: Lexington, Kentucky
SIZE: 75,000 SF / 3 stories
Mixed-use development featuring local-owned retail, 40+ residential units (market rate and affordable), parking and grocery
CLIENT: Community Ventures
TYPE: New Construction
The MET mixed-use development brings long-needed grocery, retail and affordable housing to Lexington's East End. The project includes a three-story, 75,000-square-foot building along Third Street, which will connect to the existing Community Ventures structure on the corner of Third and Midland. The development features street-level local-owned retail and a much needed grocery. Upper floors will include 44 residential units, 30% of which will be affordable housing.


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Belfast born Clugston is known as "The Posh Radio 4 Lady" or "The PR4L" and is BBC Radio 4's continuity announcer. This witty lady's voice is familiar to millions as a result of this but she's also the female Irish voice for TomTom satellite navigation systems and the creator of the "Radio4minus1letter" Twitter based game. In her spare time, she plays the ukulele.
I love her voice. She is so reassuring and I bet she's friendly in real-life. I didn't imagine her looking like this but thank you for sharing this with us.


text: In a 4-0 vote, with Supervisor Robert Rivas absent, the San Benito County Board of Supervisors on Feb. 16 passed a resolution to award a $58,000 contract to Vanir Construction Management, Inc., to implement cost containment mechanisms in relation to a $5 million expansion of the county jail. The resolution also granted Ray Espinosa, county administrative officer, the authority to make changes to the contract if necessary. To read the rest of the article, click HERE. AB109 jail planning is just one of the services Vanir provides. Learn about some of Vanir's other services.


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A Place Called Purgatory 30 X 12
Click Image to Enlarge
After a hike up a desert canyon we find an area suitably named by the pioneers who discovered the place "Little Purgatory". It is hotter than any where around as it is an enclosed basin, only desert tortoises and a few selected desert creatures can tolerate the searing heat and dry conditions found here. For humans, scaling down the cliffs would be a perilous activity. Looking over the scene is a plant known as a Century plant (Agave Americana), as beautiful as this plant is, it is semelparous, meaning it flowers once and then dies, usually living for 30 years, but some plants have been recorded as old as 80 years. However, the flower can grow up to 30 feet high with the leaves at 5 feet long at the base covering up to 10 feet in diameter. The plant leaves suckers from which new plants germinate.


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Inheritance in property settlements
In a marriage or a de facto relationship it is not uncommon for one of the spouses to receive an inheritance. If the parties separate, the question often arises as to how the inheritance should be dealt with in the couple's property settlement.
There is also the situation where a parent may have a provision in a Will for their child (the spouse) to receive a large inheritance. This raises the question of whether a prospective inheritance should be considered when deciding a property settlement. If it is included, what is the outcome?
The extent to which an actual inheritance or a prospective inheritance will impact on a property settlement will depend on the individual case. However, previous cases do provide guidance on what can happen.
Inheritance received during the relationship
When an inheritance is received by a spouse which benefits both spouses of the relationship, often the spouse who is the recipient will argue in the property division that the financial benefit was only intended for them and not the other party.
The starting point, is to determine whether the payment was intended to benefit both of the spouses or, only the child of the parent. This situation arose (in the context of a gift) in the case of Kessey, in which the wife's mother had contributed large amounts of money to improve the matrimonial home. The court determined that the contribution by a parent of a spouse to the property of the marriage will be considered as a contribution on behalf of that spouse, unless there is evidence which indicates this was not the parent's intention. The alternative situation would be that the parent intended for both spouses to benefit, not solely the child of the parent.
Can a prospective inheritance be taken into account?
If the parent of a spouse has a provision for an entitlement in their Will – but they are not deceased, then the provision cannot form part of the "property pool" for division. However, the "entitlement" is relevant in determining what the percentage apportionment of the existing "property" will be.
The determination of each spouses "percentage entitlement" involves a careful consideration of all of their respective "contributions", as well as their "future needs". It is in the context of "future needs" that any "prospective inheritance" becomes relevant.
In a situation where a spouse's parent has made a Will leaving an inheritance to the spouse and they no longer have the testamentary capacity to change their Will, the court has stated that (in such a situation) where the spouse's parent is leaving a significant estate, it would be "shutting one's eyes" not to give real consideration to this in the property proceedings, by way of a percentage adjustment.
The consideration and treatment of a "prospective inheritance" has been considered in several cases – here are some showing how the position has changed:
- White and Tulloch v White: in this case the wife's mother was a widow and aged 81. She was in good health and had two children, one of which was the wife. The husband filed a subpoena which required the wife's mother to produce her Will but not documents detailing her financial situation. The court identified that the "future needs" consideration in determining any percentage adjustment will depend on the particular facts of each individual case. The court found that, although it seemed likely that the wife's mother would benefit one, or both, of her children, she had no moral obligation to do so and could choose other persons to benefit. Therefore, the Full Court held that the prospective inheritance was not a financial resource (and was not considered as a "future need" factor) and would not be factored into the property settlement percentages.
- Milankov: the husband's father had testamentary capacity. He had set up a Trust with property worth $2.8million. Although the husband's father was 72 years old and had three other children, this "prospective inheritance" of $2.8million was taken into account in the property settlement between the husband and his former wife. The husband tried to appeal this decision, however the appeal was dismissed. Therefore, the Full Court agreed with the decision that the wife receive a 40% adjustment increase to her portion of the $800,000 matrimonial pool, as a result of the possibility that the husband would receive $2.8million upon his father's death. It should be noted here that the husband's father still had testamentary capacity which meant he could change his Will at any time until his death, yet the court still factored this into the property division.
Other Situations
The person leaving an inheritance does not need to be a spouse's parent for the court to take it into consideration in a property settlement. In one case, the husband's new wife had a terminal illness and was likely to die within the next two years. The husband was living in the wife's home and it was likely he would continue to do so after the wife passed away. The court found that by the husband having a home to live in indefinitely was a valuable "financial resource" and a percentage adjustment was made in the former wife's favour.
If an inheritance has already been received, this amount will be included in the "property pool" and seen as a percentage contribution by that spouse. In situations where a party is likely to receive a "prospective inheritance" the court will not make a percentage adjustment for property settlement in all situations, it will depend on the case. The court has pointed out that a clear connection must exist and the monetary value of the estate needs to be of such significance that it would have an impact on the parties' financial situation. It must also be more than "mere likely" that the party will receive that inheritance.
It is important that everyone gets Family Law advice on their own specific circumstances. To speak with one of our experienced family lawyers, call (07) 3221 4300 to arrange a no-obligation fixed fee appointment, or fill in our online form here.


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UofL announces top scholars for 2016
The University of Louisville has unveiled the names of the 2016 scholars who have earned some of the most prominent awards in academia. This group of students and recent alumni will travel to destinations around the globe as part of their award.
Here are the top scholars for 2016:
U.S. Student Fulbright Awards
Harry S. Truman Scholarship
Critical Language Scholars
Whitaker International Fellows Award
Congress-Bundestag Youth Exchange for Young Professionals
Mary Churchill Humphrey Scholarship
Etscorn International Summer Research Award
Patricia Condon, who heads the National and International Scholarship Opportunities office, has spent years building UofL's program and working with the campus community to create a pipeline of academically gifted, top-notch scholars
UofL was lauded as one of the nation's top institutions for producing student Fulbrights for the 2015-2016 academic year.


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Sometimes you just need to run. Sometimes… there's just no other option. It's times like these You wish you had played Canabalt HD. If you had, you'd know what to do. Lucky for you guys, I picked this up during the Humble indie bundle for android #2 that was released earlier this year on March 19th, and will be giving you the breakdown here so you can prepare for that moment when you will ultimately have to save yourself by racing against time and making death-defying leaps. I've spend an innumerable amount of hours during the first week or so I had this game, powering through its endless running style of gameplay. There's not much to the game, just running, but that's what makes it so great! It's simple, yet addictive.
Canabalt HD is a fairly simple platformer that will have you playing as some random dude who just has to escape the dangers of a building he is currently inside to avoid his untimely death. To keep the momentum going, you must run and run and run all the while dodging falling space debris, hopping over boxes on rooftops and leaping for your life across buildings to get to the next safe spot. The more you jump without interruptions, the faster you run, and the further you can jump. Buildings will be falling all around you and even some of the buildings you're jumping onto will start to fall, so make sure you have a good speed or you might not make it across the next gap!
The game offers an experience like no other game you will play with its combination of smooth visuals, awesome soundtrack and simple yet fast paced layout. The game will originally start-up with its 3-D HD graphics set, but you have the option to scale it down to 2-D non HD graphics as well. Which comes in handy for those of you wanting to get in on this action on lower end devices. Not only that, but the game has a pretty sweet soundtrack to it as well, with selection of three different tracks in total to play in the background. When I first sat down to play it almost had a sort of TRON like feel to it. Not because this game is at all in any way like TRON or having anything to do with it, but because I had Just watched TRON Legacy and the music reminds me of the music from the movie. In any case, the music rocks, the gameplay is a lot of fun and the best part, is that it has a pick up and play anytime type of mentality that was developed into it so you can hash out a session for ten minutes or two hours. However long you can last is the limit. I myself have not lasted longer than 20 or 25 minutes before I always die. Think you can do better? Well then go and pick up the game and post your screenshots in the comments thread below. If you haven't checked this game out yet and you'd like to, ive taken the liberty of posting the games link from the Play store just below as well as some screenshots and a Video. RUN FOR YOUR LIFE!!!!!


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Community Development
Supporting the growth and development of your community, your way, reducing costs and improving quality in a scalable and sustainable way.
Working together to build safer communities
Custom designed solutions to meet your specific needs; supplemental, ongoing, or full-service management of your community development department.
Superior Service QualitySAFEbuilt sets the industry standard for quality and customer satisfaction in delivering services that are done right the first time.
Risk ReductionSAFEbuilt reduces your operating risk by removing staffing, resource and compliance liabilities associated with running the department in-house – especially during fluctuations in workload, periods of reduced revenue, or increased costs.
Cost EffectiveEconomic solutions that transform your community development department's fixed costs to variable with increased revenues.
"Thank you for your consistently high standards and your kind assistance to our citizens and business community. With associates like you, we are demonstrating that a tag line, be the exception, is not just words… it is what we do day in and day out."Community Relations, City of Johns Creek, Georgia


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When singing (or in this case, rapping) along with Kanye, do we say a certain racially insensitive word or do we censor ourselves?
Valid arguments were made for both sides.
Saying the N-word
Pro: Remaining true to Kanye's artistic vision, saying his words, each of them, exactly as he intended, even the ones that might not be so artistic.
Con: Inciting a full-scale race riot and/or getting our arses kicked.
Not saying the N-word
Pro: Showing our support at the ugliness of the word, the hatred of a term filled with venom.
Con: Drawing even more attention to the word as a mostly white audience goes mute, leaving only Kanye to say it, thus inciting a full-scale race riot and/or getting our arses kicked.
We ultimately decided to self-censor, but we also faced another dilemma: what word do we say in its place? Sure, Kanye helped us with "Now I ain't saying she's a golddigger, but she ain't messing with no broke, broke," but there was nothing to save us from Jesus Walks' lyrics in which restless (N-words) might snatch your necklace or jack your Lexus before being told who Kanye West is.
Rap music is all about the rhythm and flow of the words, so it's not really possible to just replace the N-word with a more politically correct term – "Now I ain't saying she's a golddiger, but she ain't messing with no broke African-Americans."
Rap Concerts Can Pose A Problem
I feel like this is a real problem for white rap fans.
Eminem doesn't drop n-bombs. Chamillionaire also stopped cursing — and his records don't feel like they've been toned down.
But megastars like Kanye and Jay Z haven't. Not to mention that even if they did, there's a long legacy of music that we aren't going back and re-cutting, like some rap version of George Lucas, trying to uncover the "original artistic vision".
I've personally started using 'brother' in my head since it's the most reasonable approximation that doesn't destroy the continuity ("Where'd you get the beauty scar, tough guy? Eating pineapple?"), ends in -er, and it's not terrible for rhymes that require the hard 'g' sound. Plus, in "Golddigger", you get a nice consonance on the 'b': "I ain't sayin' she a golddigger, but she ain't messin with no broke brother".
I do think this is interesting, because racism is an issue that's gone on for generations, and I wonder if things like Kanye saying "okay just this once" is a way of breaking the ice and improving the social (not economic) situation. It'll be interesting to see how this progresses over the next 40 years.


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In this day and age, here comes a great relief in music. I just received the debut release by a new rock goddess, Sabrina Korva. Canadian born Korva uses cutting edge melodic hard rock with a hint of the vocal style of Sandi Saraya. The CD starts with a good rocking song that has catchy hooks called "Rock on the Wild Side." On this track, Korva shows that she knows how to control her powerful vocals. Track-two, "Somethin's Gotta Give, " is a killer track. It is perfect in showing Korva's versatility. The song starts slow like a ballad and then bursts in to an amazing arrangement with drums pounding into a flow of ecstasy… ending with whispers of "Somethin's Gotta Give." "In Your Face" is another great tune that has been getting some airplay in Vancouver on the Fox station 99.3. It is also being used for Clear Channel's campaign for the National Breast Cancer Foundation.
Daddy's Girl" is reminiscent of the old 'pop' style music from the 80's, slow-paced with good , mellow, soothing vocals and some humming in the background. The only thing that can improve this CD would be the production quality that a major label could bring. Some of the songs towards the end are somewhat muffled as compared to the ones in the beginning of the CD. Otherwise, Sabrina could be on her way.


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We rely on contributions from our viewers and listeners to do our work.
Please do your part today.
StoryMar 27, 2020
An award-winning filmmaker, journalist and photographer. He's the co-director of a documentary on the case called Paradise Lost: The Child Murders at Robin Hood Hills. The film sparked an international movement to "Free the West Memphis Three." The third film in the series, Paradise Lost 3: Purgatory, will cover the release of the men and will be released soon on HBO.


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Distributed systems/applications are very popular these days as the applications that are being developed now don't fit on a single computer. There can be various possibilities, such as the application generating a humongous amount of data or it has tons of users worldwide, and these things factors keep increasing day by day. At times, hardware fails to meet the increasing demands of CPU, memory, and disk space by the applications. That is where datacentres and the cloud come to the rescue to meet the increasing demands of resources.
Mesos is an open-source project that helps manage clusters by providing efficient resource allocation and isolation across distributed systems or applications.
A distributed system is typically a model where all the components are distributed over networked systems, interact with each other by passing messages, and work toward achieving a common goal. Now to enhance this architecture, a coordinator is introduced which is in sync with some number of workers and coordinate the execution.
The coordinators do the following tasks:
They're responsible for running multiple processes and tasks simultaneously.
They make the system fault-tolerant by handling process failures.
They optimize the overall performance of the system.
Mesos orchestrates your computer cluster and shares resources efficiently across applications and frameworks. In Mesos anatomy, the distributed application is a framework, the coordinators are called schedulers, and the workers are tasks or executors.
where does mesos come into picture?
Mesos actually provides a layer of abstraction that is away from systems but towards resources. In the diagram shown below, the scheduler is in sync with 'n' executors. By introducing Mesos into this, it provides some level of indirection, i.e., rather than the scheduler needing to communicate with each of the executors, it will just communicate with Mesos and Mesos manages all the machines under the cover.
From a programmer's perspective, every distributed application has the following common functionalities, like task distribution, task monitoring, task cleanup, failure detection, task startup, task killing, etc. All these functionalities are included in Mesos as API that programmers can leverage for their distributed applications. Also, Mesos makes it easy to run multiple distributed systems on a single cluster by sharing the resources dynamically and efficiently.
From a SysAdmin's perspective, Mesos sits between IaaS and PaaS. Unlike IaaS, Mesos isn't really about provisioning and managing instances; neither is it like PaaS where we deploy and manage applications and services. Developers build and run frameworks with resource layers abstracted. One can run Mesos on AWS EC2, Azure VM, or OpenStack, and also build a PaaS on top of Mesos to leverage Mesos API.
Mesos is comprised of a master daemon that manages agent daemons running on each node of the cluster and Mesos frameworks that run tasks on those agents. Master is responsible for fine-grained resource sharing across frameworks by giving them resource offers. Each resource offer consists of a list of following parameters:
<agendID, resource1: amount1, resource2: amount2, etc.>
The framework running on top of Mesos comprises of a scheduler and executors. Scheduler registers itself with Mesos Master and executor is a process that is launched on agent nodes to run framework's tasks. The master decides how many resources are offered to each framework whereas, frameworks' scheduler decides which resources to use from the offered resources.
Once the scheduler offers the resources, it sends Mesos a description of tasks it wants to run on them. Mesos, in turn, launches the tasks on corresponding agents.
A framework can be thought of as an application written directly against Mesos REST APIs and connects to one of the Mesos master. A framework can schedule/execute tasks on resources provided by the master. Slave consists of executors that will run different types of tasks.
The programming model that Mesos uses is very low level, unreliable, and one-way message passing. The calls are messages that the scheduler sends to Mesos master, and the events are something that Mesos master generates and send to scheduler.
The calls that scheduler makes are as follows:
Lifecycle Management Calls: REGISTER, REREGISTER, UNREGISTER
Resource Allocation: REQUEST, DECLINE, REVIVE
Task Management: LAUNCH, KILL, ACKNOWLEDGE, RECONCILE
The events that scheduler can receive are:
Lifecycle Management: REGISTER, REREGISTERED
Resource Allocation: OFFERS, RESCIND
Task Management: UPDATE
Let's walk through the timeline of these events to understand the flow:
The diagram above shows the event flow between the scheduler and Mesos (master).
Whenever a scheduler wants to run some task on Mesos, it will send a REGISTER request to the Mesos master. The Mesos master interprets the request and after authentication sends a REGISTERED response to scheduler.
After registration, the scheduler can make a resource REQUEST to Mesos master if it has any. If there are no specific requests from scheduler, it will start receiving OFFERS from Mesos master.
Once the resources are allocated, scheduler can now decide what tasks to run. So it will send LAUNCH request to the master. Master then uses that information to propagate among the slave nodes.
The UPDATE about the task will be sent by Mesos master to the scheduler. This update will convey if the task is RUNNING, if it FAILED, or if it is LOST.
The OFFER and UPDATE are continuous events. Mesos master keeps sending resource OFFER to scheduler and UPDATE the task ran.
REGISTER events get triggered in a situation of failover. There is a certain possibility that scheduler's communication with Mesos master might fail. During such a situation, another framework scheduler can take over and reconnect to Mesos master with the same framework ID, get authenticated, and resume the responsibility of the previous scheduler. Roles in Mesos can be referred to as a service, group, or framework which consumes resources from the pool. By default, the Mesos master uses the weighted Dominant Resource Fairness (wDRF) algorithm to allocate the requested resources. Every role has a weight of 1 assigned to it by default. Weights can also be assigned to customize the resource allocation process.
The scheduler gets a resource offer from Mesos master when it registers itself with Mesos Master. If the scheduler has specific requirements of resources, it can REQUEST it from Mesos master. So allocation of resources is offered allowing the framework to pick and choose which resources to run tasks at. Scalar, ranges, and sets represent the three different types of resources that Mesos agent has to offer. A single offer only consists of resources from a single slave. Also, the resources associated with an offer will not be re-offered to a particular framework unless the framework has already rejected those resources or the resources have been rescinded.
Launch event launches tasks once the offer is successful/accepted by the scheduler. Resources are concurrently offered to multiple frameworks at a given time, and the first framework to launch tasks using those resources will be able to use them. A framework that attempts to launch tasks using an invalid resource offer will get a TASK_LOST update for those tasks.
A task is a process that we run on a slave. Tasks can be run in one of two ways:
- Task with a command
- Task with an executor
Task with a command is a task that executes some shell command. One can run multiple tasks on the same slave with different commands.
Task with an executor is where an executor gets launched, and the task is passed to the executor. It is in the hands of the executor to decide how that task is going to run. Multiple tasks can be run using the same executor. These tasks can be shell commands, threads, etc.
Containerization comes into picture at tasks level. Containers can be just the tasks or the combination of Tasks and Executors together. As we pass multiple tasks to the executors, it will allow us to change resource constraints on that particular container dynamically. So the containers can be scaled in and scaled out based on the number of tasks it is running.
We shall now look at installing and configuring Mesos on an Ubuntu server. Zookeeper is also required here, which will allow all our hosts to connect to the correct master servers. Zookeeper is nothing but a distributed hierarchical key-value store for maintaining configuration information, naming registry and synchronization service. Zookeeper nodes use hierarchical namespaces to store their data which is much like a tree data structure. In Mesos, zookeeper is used to coordinate the master nodes.
Installing and configuring mesos
The only thing that is required to carry out this guide is an Ubuntu server running on the platform of your choice; be it AWS, Azure, or Virtual Box on local. For this lab, I shall be using Ubuntu Server 16.04 on AWS to install and configure Mesos.
For folks who want to use alternate options, follow the instructions given here to create a VM in Virtual Box. We shall use Ubuntu image to create a VM instead of CentOS given there. To create VM in Azure, follow the instructions given in this guide. The following ports are required to be open: 22, 2181, 5050 in Azure, AWS, or any other platform.
Mesos is generally installed along with Marathon which is a container orchestration tool for Mesos and DC/OS. Marathon is designed to launch long-running applications and can run almost any process that can be launched by regular shell. It will ensure that the launched process keeps running even if the slave node on which the process is running fails.
Provision EC2 instance
1. Log in to AWS Console and navigate to EC2.
2.Click Launch EC2 instance and select Ubuntu Server 16.04 LTS AMI (Eligible for Free tier) as shown below:
3.In Instance type, select t2.micro and proceed to Configure Instance details. Select VPC and Subnet (default). If you have a custom VPC, you can select that, but make sure Auto-assign Public IP is Enabled for this lab. Leave other settings as default. Click Add Storage.
4. We will leave the storage option as default. 8 GB General Purpose SSD as root volume mounted at /dev/sda1.
5.Next step is to add tags to EC2 instances. Tags are key-value pairs to identify our instance. Ideally, one should add two tags, i.e., Name and Environment. You can follow your own convention here.
6.Create a security group as shown below. Ports 22, 2181, 5050 need to be open. If you're planning to install Marathon, open port 8080 also for Marathon UI.
7.Click on Review and Launch. Review and verify the details and click the Launch button. Select the key pair if you have any or create a new one. Download the Key Pair and click Launch.
8.Once your instance is up and running, SSH into that instance using the Public IP Address and the downloaded key pair. If you're using Windows, generate a .ppk file using the downloaded pem file using PuTTyGen.
9.From Linux machine, you can SSH directly using pem and the IP address of the mesos instance using the following command:
ssh –i /location/of/pem ubuntu@MESOS-IP
NOTE: Make sure the pem file has only read permissions. Execute chmod 400 before SSH. If you intend to write on that file use chmod 600.
10.From Windows machine, generate .ppk file and use PuTTY to SSH into Mesos instance. Enter Public IP in Hostname and click SSH > Auth > select .ppk file there. Click Open. Login as ubuntu.
Installing Java 8 and Mesos
1. Once logged in, install Oracle Java JDK 8 (Java 8). Use the following commands to install:
[root@ip-10-102-5-183 ~]# sudo add-apt-repository ppa:webupd8team/java
[root@ip-10-102-5-183 ~]# sudo apt-get update
[root@ip-10-102-5-183 ~]# sudo apt-get install oracle-java8-installer
2. Execute the following command as root user to add OpenPGP key for Mesos packages from Ubuntu's keyserver. If the below command fails try the other command.
[root@ip-10-102-5-183 ~]# sudo apt-key adv --keyserver keyserver.ubuntu.com --recv E56151F
[root@ip-10-102-5-183 ~]# sudo apt-key adv --keyserver keyserver.ubuntu.com --recv DF7D54CBE56151BF
3. Next step is to add Mesos repository by forming correct URL for our Ubuntu release
[root@ip-10-102-5-183 ~]# echo "deb http://repos.mesosphere.com/ubuntu xenial main" >> /etc/apt/sources.list.d/mesosphere.list
As we are using Ubuntu 16.04, the codename for it is xenial. If you're using a different version, check the codename using the following command:
[root@ip-10-102-5-183 ~]# lsb_release -cs
4. Execute apt-get update to update package indexes.
5.Now we will install Mesos. Zookeeper binaries included with Mesos will also get installed. Execute the following command:
[root@ip-10-102-5-182 ~]# apt-get -y install mesos
Before we start mesos-master and mesos-slave, we need to configure and verify few things. Run the hostname -f command and note the hostname of the instance.
Configuring Mesos
1.Navigate to /etc/zookeeper/conf directory. Edit the zoo.cfg file as shown below. Uncomment server.1 and replace zookeeper1 with your hostname. As we are using a single machine, localhost will also work. If you want to configure clustered environment, have other zookeeper nodes in place and uncomment those lines by updating the hostnames.
2.Edit myid file inside /etc/zookeeper/conf directory. Put integer 1 as the value in file myid. This integer is the server id for each zookeeper instance inside the cluster. It should be unique and shouldn't be repeated in zookeeper cluster. It ranges from 1 to 255:
[root@ip-10-102-5-183 ~]# echo -n "1" > myid
3.Navigate to /etc/mesos directory and edit the zk file to point to the zookeeper instance. As it is a single machine, localhost will work fine, but we will still provide instance hostname as given below. Do the same for all mesos-master in cluster (if any). Internal IP can also be used instead of complete hostnames. In case of multiple zookeepers, this property can be set as:
4.Switch to /etc/mesos-master directory and edit the quorum file with an integer. A replicated group of servers in the same application is called a quorum, and in replicated mode, all servers in the quorum have the same configurations.
Note: The quorum should be set in a way that 50 percent of the master members should be present to make decisions. Ideally, this number should be greater than the number of masters divided by two. Since we are running single node, we set it to 1.
5.Next, we want to configure the hostname and IP address for our mesos-master. Create two files, ip and hostname, inside /etc/mesos-master directory with appropriate values.
Note: If the mesos is deployed in private subnet, use private IP for both files ip and hostname. But if deployed in public subnet for POC, use Public IP in hostname and private IP in ip file. Public IP will allow you to access Sandbox and view logs.
Starting zookeeper, mesos-master and mesos-slave
1.Now all the configurations are in place. We can now start mesos-master and mesos-slave. Use the following commands to start required services.
[root@ip-10-102-5-183 ~]# service zookeeper start
[root@ip-10-102-5-183 ~]# service mesos-master start
[root@ip-10-102-5-183 ~]# service mesos-slave start
2.Once all the services are started, make sure they're running without any errors. The following should be the desired output on shell:
3.Once all the services are up and running, open your browser and browse PUBLIC_IP:5050 to view Mesos UI.
Now unless, or until, there are no frameworks created/running in agent, nothing will show up in Mesos UI. We can run any simple shell commands using mesos-execute as shown below:
[root@ip-10-102-5-183 ~]# mesos-execute --master=<HOSTNAME>:5050 --name="echo-test" --command=echo "Hello, World"
Let's create a simple HelloWorld.jar that we will give to mesos-master to run on slave.
Creating a simple HelloWorld JAR
1. Create directory demo at any accessible location. Preferably in home directory:
[ubuntu@ip-10-102-5-183 ~]# cd
[ubuntu@ip-10-102-5-183 ~]# mkdir demo
2. Create a file HelloWorld.java inside demo directory using any editor of your choice (vi, vim or nano) and paste the following contents, then save and exit:
[ubuntu@ip-10-102-5-183 ~]# vim HelloWorld.java
public class HelloWorld {
public static void main(String[] args) {
System.out.println("Hello, World!");
System.out.println("This will run on mesos-slave");
3. Run the following command to compile the java file which will create a class file:
[ubuntu@ip-10-102-5-183 ~]# javac HelloWorld.java
4. Create a MANIFEST.MF file with the following contents:
Manifest-Version: 1.0
Main-Class: HelloWorld
5. Run the following command to create an executable jar file using java file, class file and MANIFEST.MF:
[ubuntu@ip-10-102-5-183 ~]# jar cmf MANIFEST.MF HelloWorld.jar HelloWorld.class HelloWorld.java
6. Now try running the generated jar using the command shown below:
Now we will run this jar using mesos-execute to run it on mesos-slave. Execute the following command to run this jar on mesos-slave:
[root@ip-10-102-5-183 ~]# mesos-execute --master=<HOSTNAME>:5050 --name="running-jar" --command="java -jar /location/of/jar/HelloWorld.jar"
The output of the execution is hsown below. Status 0 indicates that the task executed successfully and status 1 indicates that the task failed.
Now if you go to Mesos UI > Frameworks in the browser, you can see the following details:
Click on any of the IDs from the list to view more details about the task.
So this is how we can install, configure, and run tasks on Mesos. In the next guide, we will leverage Marathon along with Mesos to orchestrate Docker containers.
Sources / Resources
Learn more about DevOps and Containers from Linux Academy with new hands-on courses added every quarter. Learn more, Grow more!


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What is it?
How will history judge plug-in hybrids once the revolution is complete and we're all driving zero-emission electric cars? Right now, it already feels they're a half-way house for those who are motivated to join the EV era, but understandably don't yet have the confidence in our charging infrastructure.
In other words, this latest hybrid Mercedes-Benz E-Class is a car for the here and now. We know where the future is taking us, but we're not there yet – and a compromise is what's needed. Does the c-word sound like a critical verdict? It's not meant to. It's just a reflection of the reality this car represents.
The E330e is powered by a 2.0-litre 4-cylinder petrol engine, plus an electric motor that when fully charged via a cable offers a standalone range of around 30 miles. Two cables are provided to charge from a standard three-pin socket in around five hours or via a 7.2kW charger in just an hour and 25 minutes.
There are four modes of operation to choose from: hybrid, E-Mode (electric only), E-Save (engine only) and Charge (engine only, but battery is charged). Some charge is also reclaimed by the powertrain as the driver lifts off, recycling energy to improve efficiency though a combination of (apparently) optimised gear changes and operating temperatures. All clever stuff.


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North and South Korean leaders hold historic summit: Highlights
Media center gasps as Kim crosses DMZ
Around 2,000 journalists are gathered at a media center in Ilsan, South Korea to cover the summit.
The room was tense as the journalists massed inside the Kintex Conference Center waited for their first sight of Kim Jong Un.
An audible gasp ran through the room as Kim walked down the steps towards the military demarcation line, followed by a loud cheers and applause from South Koreans in the room as the historic handshake took place and Kim stepped onto the south side.
A crowd of people gathered at Seoul station to take in the summit, many taking photos of the moment Kim Jong Un and Moon Jae-in shook hands. when Kim crossed the military demarcation line, people applauded and wowed.
Ji Kwang-jin, seen in the yellow shirt in the above photo, told CNN he was happy to see such a positive reaction.
"I came here to just watch the moment along with the other people since it's a historical moment I wanted to be with the public the moment I watch it," he said.
Moon Jae-in: "Spring (is) spreading in South Korea"
Kim Jong Un and Moon Jae-in each delivered opening remarks with the press present in the meeting room.
This is some of what they said, according to the official translation provided by the South Korean government.
From Kim:
The expectations are high and we have learned a lesson from previous times and even if we have good agreements and implementations don't follow they will disappoint people who had high expectations. I hope the 11 years have lost in the past until this time don't go to waste, and we can meet more often and put our minds together and the 11 years will not be wasted. I hope to write a new chapter between us. I believe that we are able to make a new beginning, and it is with such commitment I come to this meeting.
From Moon:
Spring (is) spreading in South Korea. I believe our encounter is extremely important for all of us. That of course means there is a huge burden on our shoulders. Comrade Kim, for the first time in our history you crossed the military demarcation line. It is no longer a symbol of division but a symbol of peace. I would like to pay tribute to the courageous and bold decision made by you, Chairman Kim.
The room where the two leaders will meet underwent a dramatic makeover
Seoul gave the room where North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and South Korea's President Moon Jae-in will meet.
The room underwent a dramatic makeover and was redecorated with symbolic tidbits throughout.
The normal rectangular table has been replaced by an oval one. Moon's office hopes the shape will encourage the summit's participants to talk candidly.
Other design features focus on the shared history between the two countries, including incorporating elements of a Hanok, a traditional Korean house.
Here's what it looks like:
Kim Jong Un: "A new history starts now"
After entering the Peace House for the inter-Korean summit, Kim Jong Un wrote in the guest book "a new history begins now" and "an age of peace, at the starting point of history."
Moon's office posted a picture of Kim's message.
White House: "We wish the Korean people well"
The White House has issued a statement on the Moon-Kim meeting:
"On the occasion of Republic of Korea President Moon Jae-in's historic meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, we wish the Korean people well. We are hopeful that talks will achieve progress toward a future of peace and prosperity for the entire Korean Peninsula. The United States appreciates the close coordination with our ally, the Republic of Korea, and looks forward to continuing robust discussions in preparation for the planned meeting between President Donald J. Trump and Kim Jong Un in the coming weeks."
The two leaders retreated to a meeting room
The pomp and circumstances of the initial encounter has concluded. Kim, Moon and their delegations are now retreating to the meeting room for a quick chat before serious talks get underway.
The talks are taking place at the Peace House, located in what's known as either the Truce Village, the Joint Security Area (JSA) or Panmunjom. The Peace House is in the only part of the DMZ where troops from the two Koreas stand off face-to-face.
Kim signs guest book at Peace House
Kim Jong Un has entered the Peace House on the southern side of the demilitarized zone, where the summit meetings will take place, and signed the guestbook.
Kim and Moon posed with children for a photograph after greeting and shaking hands
After crossing into the southern side, Kim and Moon were photographed with two children from Daeseong-dong, the South Korean village inside the DMZ. They smiled and posed with the leaders at the start of the welcoming ceremony.
Kim and Moon shake hands on both sides of demarcation line
Kim Jong Un and Moon Jae-in first shook hands as each stood on either side of the military demarcation line that divides the two.
In a symbolic move, Moon then joined Kim on the northern side of the line before both leaders stepped over to the southern side, where Friday's summit will take place.
They then took in a performance of arirang, a traditional Korean folk song known in the North and the South.
Kim did not appear to look at the South Korean military guards, instead staring straight ahead.


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Hungarian President János Áder has expressed his condolences to his Italian counterpart Sergio Mattarella over the collapse of a motorway bridge near the port city of Genoa.
In his telegram, President Áder expressed his sympathies to Mattarella and the families of the victims and wished those injured in the disaster a speedy recovery.
House speaker expresses condolences to Italian counterparts
Parliamentary Speaker László Kövér has expressed his condolences to Italian Senate President Maria Elisabetta Alberti Casellati and Speaker of the Chamber of Deputies Roberto Fico over the collapse of a motorway bridge near the port city of Genoa, parliament's press chief said on Wednesday.
Kövér expressed his deepest sympathies with his Italian colleagues and the families of the victims of the tragedy and wished a speedy recovery to those who had been injured, Zoltán Szilágyi said.
On Tuesday, an 80m section of a concrete bridge built on the A10 motorway came down during a sudden and violent storm near Genoa, killing at least 42 people, according to the latest reports.
Photo: MTI/EPA/Luca Zennaro
Source: MTI


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The Lucy Necklace is named after Sarah Jane's mother. A Saint favorite. This gold heart bee necklace tells a story of love, artistry and determination. Like all Saint By Sarah Jane Jewelry pieces, the Lucy Necklace is made entirely by hand. Starting with its custom made woven link chain, where every single link is hand soldered. To the flirtatiously off set 18k gold winged bee. And last, but certainly not least - the small 18k gold Julep Heart Pendant abundant with stories and memories to warm the heart.
Bee (Buzz) • Overcome obstacles
Don't tell a bee that its small-sized wings make it aerodynamically incapable of flying. That would only slow it down. Put on a piece from Saint's signature bee collection and something happens. You feel like you can do anything. You believe. In yourself.
Treat yourself to the very best in quality, design, materials and first class personal service.
- Artisan made | Hand crafted heart necklace with bee accent and heart pendant on silver link chain
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- Measurements: Bee 1/2" L x 5/8" W, Heart 3/4" diameter, Links 1/2" L x 1/2" W
- Necklace length is 16" adjustable to 18"
- Arrives in a proprietary Saint By Sarah Jane packaging
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text:
This thesis describes and analyses in three substudies how home-based measures for children are expanding and why an open care idea are established as part of the Swedish child welfare. The first substudy describes the national increment of what today can be considered as a treatment policy – non-institutional care in child welfare. The results are analysed with Kingdon's agenda setting theory and shows that the factors of what Kingdon describes as problems-, politics- and policyflow influenced the national increment. Significant mechanisms have primarily been, the profession, the society's concerns for socially disadvantaged children, negative experiences of institutionalisation and a political position to deinstitutionalise all care. The second substudy focuses on how knowledge and research contributes to ideological, professional, and organizational change in child welfare by analysis of Research & Developments reports and articles from the professional journal Socionomen. Based on the neo-institutional concepts of organisational fields and isoformism the study's results shows that a consequence of adaptation strategies and "rationalized myths" are a number of similarities in how home-based measures are organized and which measures that are used. The third substudy, a case study, analyses how we can understand a local development of ideas in social services for children with concepts from neo institutional theory. Interviews and municipal documents are analysed and shows that the local translation of an open care idea is characterized by discretion, personal preferences and action and affects the choice of method and organization. The study also shows a political mistrust of institutional care while there is at the same time political confidence in the individual social worker's ability to find solutions that allow non-institutional measures to be an alternative to institutional care.
An overall conclusion of the thesis is that there is now a treatment policy in social services for the children, which involves extensive efforts at home and it has led to that more children receive support from social services. One result of non-institutional care increment is that it led to increased costs for municipalities for intervention for children and young people when out-of-home care has not decreased. Another general conclusion is that translation and adaptation of ideas to local contexts is something that generally fits street-level bureaucrats need for discretion.
This dissertation is a case study in two parts, which describes how ideas about open-care treatment of youth aged 13-20 years are interpreted and concretized in a local context. The study, i.a., aims at creating deeper knowledge about target group, content of treatment, and reported results concerning a form of treatment in social care which has hitherto been sparsely researched in Sweden. The results of the interview study demonstrate that the driving forces for developing local forms of open care treatments have first and foremost been to offer better care and to improve the professionalism of the social worker. Studies of the social welfare documents of 97 young people reveal that most of these youngsters are in bad need of treatment and that they have experiences of various kinds of treatment before the present efforts. The study also demonstrates that the efforts are rarely evaluated and lack systematic documentation. Finally, the study reveals that more than 60 per cent of the youth get some sort of continuous support by the social welfare system after the open-care treatment has come to an end. The results from both parts of the study are analysed by means of neo- institutional theory. According to this theory the local open-care treatment consists of an indistinct target group, family-oriented methods, and activities that have been legitimised by strong proponents, good timing, professional development, and by representing important political values.
In conclusion, the author argues that open care treatment shows signs of a beginning institutionalisation, a taken-for-granted-ness, which he thinks is risky, as we still do not know if open-care treatment is more favourable to the young people than different kinds of 24-hour care. In addition, the author holds, that the future role of the social worker should include knowledge that decreases unfounded taken-for-granted ideas.


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This holiday season we are helping a Veteran's Family get back on their feet and have a special holiday. Please consider donating something from their list or gift cards and bring them to the December meeting.
In the Next 100 years…What will New York State Women Accomplish?
It has been 100 years since Women's Right to Vote became a reality.
"What's next for New York State Women Inc, as the coming decades unfold?"
"Will we still be advancing Powerful Women Personally, Professionally and Politically during the next 100 years?"
As announced at the April Meet and Greet, BNC has re-established a connection with the Women's Center at the Buffalo V.A. Attached is their current "wish list" of requested donations, which can be brought to the May meeting.
Veterans One-stop Center of WNY receives requests from local organizations to adopt veteran's families in need for the holiday season. NYS Women Inc. Buffalo Niagara Chapter went over the top to help a female veteran's family of five selected for the Chapter.
We will be Adopting a Military Family (a female veteran's family in need) thru the Veteran's One Stop Center for the holiday season. Help us make the holidays brighter for this veterans family!
Clean Air is a community organization that builds power by developing grassroots leaders who organize their communities to run and win environmental justice and public health campaigns in Western New York. It was founded in 2007 by WNY residents who were impacted by environmental pollution and concerned about the impacts to their health and health of their families.
Janna Willoughby-Lohr took a leap of faith in 2013 when she founded Papercraft Miracles, an eco-friendly stationery and bookbinding studio. They create decorative handmade papers, plantable seed bombs, wedding invitations, handbound journals and photo albums, pop-up books, paper flowers and more.
Kerry Planck is owner of New York State's only organic dairy goat farm and and founder of Alpine Made, an organic soap and skincare business that supports healthy, clean, sustainable living. Not a bad resume but also an evolving one for a business owner and mom who started her career as a USDA inspector.
Kerry Planck might not have originally planned to emulate her grandfather, who operated five different family farms. She pursued degrees in environmental forest biology and a Masters in ecology before becoming an inspector with the US Department of Agriculture. It was in 2009 that she and her then-husband started their family and she reached back to her roots and established her 15-acre goat farm.
Sarah Bachwitz is the founder and president of Empower Camp, a new non-profit created to ignite young women's inner power. It is a non-denominational camp program, open to all cultures, religions and backgrounds for young women ages 14-18.
Empower Camp was founded in the depths of the Gobi Desert. Yes, you read that correctly. The Gobi Desert in Mongolia. Sarah hiked 100 kilometers across the Gobi Desert without the comforts of home and realized that it is not the clothes she wears or her social media or anything else that defines her. Sarah says, "What defines her is her inner power. Her inner power got her through those nine days in the desert and her inner power will continue to allow her to chase her dreams and live boldly."
Originally from Allentown, PA, Joelle Logue has a BA in Political Science/English from the Pennsylvania State University and an M.A. in Journalism from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She has worked as a newspaper editor and advertising copywriter but her passion now is as an advocate for women's issues.
OUR LOCATIONBuffalo, New York
NYS Women, Inc Buffalo Niagara Chapter is a group of women of all ages representing a broad spectrum of employment fields. Since our Charter in 1934, we have promoted full participation, equality and economic self-sufficiency for all working women.


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It's been almost two months since I dipped my toe into this blogging thing. I didn't know what I was getting myself into – I still don't, really!
I honestly thought I'd be out of motivation by post number ten, and this hobby would flame out like so many others. But, no! The words are still flowing, the notebook is filling with ideas and drafts, and there's plenty more I want to share with the world.
So I've decided to wade in a little deeper – up to the waist, I guess! To that end, I've sent some money over the internets (gasp!) and upgraded this blog.
What does this mean?
- I have a shiny new domain: sunshineintensifies.com
- You can email me at email@example.com
- No ads 🙂
I want to say a huge thank you to my online community for your support. I've learned so much already, and I'm convinced that this is the right thing to do. And I've discovered that writing is surprisingly therapeutic – which means I'm not likely to stop any time soon!
Here's to the sunshine. Long may it intensify! ☀


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QASymphony Recognized by The Stevie Awards as Fastest Growing Tech Company
We are incredibly honored and excited to be recognized by the 2016 American Business Awards as a winner of the Bronze Stevie Award in the Fastest Growing Tech Company of the Year – up to 100 Employees category.
This is our first year applying for the award and I am deeply proud of the recognition we received. This award serves as a further affirmation that our philosophy at QASymphony drives success.
"The judges were extremely impressed with the quality of entries we received this year. The competition was intense and every organization that has won should be proud," says Michael Gallagher, president and founder of the Stevie Awards.
Read more about it in our recent press release.
We are seeing an acceleration in demand as development and testing teams look for modern agile solutions to help improve speed and quality. We had a record-setting Q1 and we expect that momentum to continue for 2016 and beyond.
Following are some key accomplishments for QASymphony in Q1 2016:
- Raised a $5 million Series B to accelerate product and channel development
- Signed enterprise customers such as Amazon, Amway, Cisco and Rockport
- Appointed Jonathan Alexander CTO to lead research and development
- Named one of Atlanta's top 10 fastest-growing private companies by Atlanta Business Chronicle
- Named a Top 40 Innovative Company by the Technology Association of Georgia
- Grew channel with the addition of new partners Clearvision and Gallop Solutions
We intend to continue creating the best products and experiences for our customers and the best culture for our employees. Congratulations to the other companies who were recognized by the Stevie Awards. You can view the complete lists of Gold, Silver and Bronze Stevie Award winners by category on the ABA website.
QASymphony will be presented with its award at a gala ceremony at the Marriott Marquis Hotel in New York on June 20. To learn more about the event or to purchase tickets here
About the Stevie Awards
Stevie Awards are conferred in seven programs: the Asia-Pacific Stevie Awards, the German Stevie Awards, The American Business Awards, The International Business Awards, the Stevie Awards for Women in Business, the Stevie Awards for Great Employers, and the Stevie Awards for Sales & Customer Service. Stevie Awards competitions receive more than 10,000 entries each year from organizations in more than 60 nations. Honoring organizations of all types and sizes and the people behind them, the Stevies recognize outstanding performances in the workplace worldwide. Learn more about the Stevie Awards at http://www.StevieAwards.com.
Looking for more information on QASymphony's first quarter growth? Check out our recent press release "QASymphony Kicks Off First User Conference After Record Quarter".


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NFA's CANCELLATION POLICY:
NFA is a limited enrollment training format conducted with a closely monitored coach to player ratio. Our high NFA certified coach to player ratio ensures personal attention and interaction for athletes and the impact on their performance is substantial. The majority of our training events fill up fast with registration closing prior to the start of the event. Because of this, we have a strict cancellation policy.
If you find that you need to cancel your registration, you must inform our main office by phone (866-735-3267) or by email (email@example.com) prior to the starting day of camp. After camp begins, all registration fees are forfeited whether insurance was paid or not.
You can purchase cancellation insurance for $19.99 which allows you the option of receiving a complete refund (less the registration fee of $5.95) if you inform our NFA office of cancellation before starting time the day of camp by phone or email (less the administration fee).
If you do NOT purchase cancellation insurance, you have the option of transferring to another training event in the same season at no charge or your monies will be put on credit with us to be used towards another 3-day or 2-day camp less a $19.99 admin fee. This credit will be good up to 3 years.
If you do NOT purchase cancellation insurance and you are NOT able to utilize transfer credit you will be refunded less 30% of your registration fee.


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We like to mix things up a bit. Why utilize a pancake mix for solely one item? The mix comes perfectly equipped to handle other baking assignments. It's a delicious blend of multigrain flour with eight whole grains and fiber-packed flaxseed. So, the mission: Pancake mix to cookies. … [Read more...] about Coach's Oats Multigrain Mix Cookies
Multigrain Pancake Mix
Multigrain Crepes
October is National Breast Cancer Awareness Month and Yoplait® is pledging its support with the Save Lids to Save Lives program. Using our Coach's Oats® Multigrain Pancake Mix, we made delicious crepes filled with Yoplait® yogurt. Drizzle with syrup or powder with cinnamon, and enjoy! Redeem your … [Read more...] about Multigrain Crepes
Multi-Purpose Multigrain Pancake Mix
It's time to think outside the pan (cake) and create other delicious creations with our Multigrain Pancake Mix. We've heard from fans who have experimented with recipes and are in love with the results. Check out these recipes using our pancake mix and get creative! Let us know if you find something that works best for you. [Read more...] about Multi-Purpose Multigrain Pancake Mix
Multi-Use for our Multigrain Pancake Mix
We're sure you've seen the news. Our Multigrain Pancake Mix was available to purchase online again. In honor of that great news, here is a spin on the traditional pancake. Multigrain Mixture of Pancake … [Read more...] about Multi-Use for our Multigrain Pancake Mix
Those Aren't Bugs in Your Pancakes
They're flax seeds. In developing our All Natural Multigrain Pancake Mix we wanted to create a healthful and delicious product. In addition to the eight whole grains we added flax seed for their added benefits (See the benefits of whole flax seed). Although we are well aware of the advantages of ground flax seed we decided to include whole flax seed (the bug looking stuff) because of its longer shelf … [Read more...] about Those Aren't Bugs in Your Pancakes


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WASHINGTON -- The net worth of the typical American household is almost $33,000, but white Americans are more than 10 times wealthier than blacks, according to the government's first comprehensive survey of household wealth.
The Census Bureau's study of household wealth and asset ownership in 1984, based on interviews with 20,000 "representative" households, charts the influence of race, age, sex, education, income and occupation on accumulated net worth.
Based on the survey, the bureau pegged the median net worth of the typical American household, including both families and unmarried people living in the same house, at $32,667. A less comprehensive study done by the Federal Reserve Board in 1983 set median household wealth at $30,550.
Broken down by race, the median household wealth of whites was $39,135, more than 10 times as high as the $3,397 level of blacks. The net worth of Hispanic households was $4,913.
The difference was even more dramatic for households headed by women. White women heads of household had median assets totaling $22,500, compared with just $671 for black women and $478 for Hispanics.
On the top end of the scale, 5.9 percent overall reported wealth of $250,000 or more, led by 6.5 percent of white households, followed by 3.1 percent of Hispanic and 0.6 percent of black households.
Married couples had the most wealth -- $50,116 on the average -- with $54,184 for white couples, $13,061 for blacks and $10,823 for Hispanics.


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Letter Cages
Letter cages are a practical addition to any front door. As well as catching mail and preventing it from getting dirty or being misplaced, letter cages can provide additional security by making it impossible for burgers to pull down the night latch with a hook through the letterbox. Letter cages also keep mail out of the destructive hands and paws of children and pets, and prevent mail from building up and blocking the door when away.
Letter cages come in several shapes and sizes, and are typically made from sturdy wire frames. Smaller models, like the ezlok Small Letter Cage, are ideal for home use, while larger models such as the ezlok Large Letter Cage are more suitable for businesses and blocks of flats. For all purpose use, the ezlok Folding Letter Cage provides a more varied solution. All of these items can be easily installed in just a few minutes, and come with all the accessories needed to fit them. A range of high quality letter cages from leading manufacturers is available from easylocks.


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Rhode Island
Map of Langworthy Corner Rhode Island RI
Langworthy Corner Rhode Island RI Map professionally designed by GreatCitees.com. Feel free to remix and share.
Non-commercial works only please.
We also have maps for nearby towns:
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Langworthy Corner, Rhode Island RI Souvenir Shirt
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Tuesday, March 11, 2014
Potatoes Smothered in Fungus
I made these the other night, and they were SO GOOD!
Bake a potato. Meanwhile, slice some mushrooms. Cook them in a dry pan for a few minutes to concentrate the flavor. Then add some oil or butter or vegan margarine and cook them another couple of minutes. Add some white wine, deglaze the pan, and cook until the liquid is mostly absorbed.
Cut open the baked potato. Smother it with the mushrooms.
I topped it with a medallion of fresh mozzarella and a sprinkle of smoked paprika and some freshly cracked black pepper (not a food snob: I have a cool pepper-cracker that I get a kick out of using).
That's braised cabbage on the side. It was very good, too.
Marian Allen
Fantasies, mysteries, comedies, recipes
Posted by Marian Allen at 7:00 AM
Labels: vegetarian
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Warm Spiced Cider Punch
Total TimePrep: 5 min. Cook: 4 hours
Makes8 servings
- 4 cups apple cider or unsweetened apple juice
- 2-1/4 cups water
- 1 can (6 ounces) frozen orange juice concentrate, thawed
- 3/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
- 3/4 teaspoon ground ginger
- 3 whole cloves
- 2 cinnamon sticks
- Orange slices and additional cinnamon sticks, optional
- In a 3-qt. slow cooker, combine the apple cider, water, orange juice concentrate, nutmeg and ginger. Place cloves and cinnamon sticks on a double thickness of cheesecloth; bring up corners of cloth and tie with string to form a bag. Place bag in slow cooker.
- Cover and cook on low for 4-5 hours or until heated through. Remove and discard spice bag. Garnish with orange slices and additional cinnamon sticks if desired.
Nutrition Facts3/4 cup: 94 calories, 0 fat (0 saturated fat), 0 cholesterol, 14mg sodium, 23g carbohydrate (19g sugars, 0 fiber), 1g protein.
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Jan 2, 2019
Those who had it liked it quite a bit. The smell it adds to the house is festive and inviting, too. We had plenty leftover as I doubled the recipe for a group of 25 (FYI, that is not necessary!). The leftovers were delicious, too. Just reheated by the cupful in the microwave.
Nov 9, 2014
I have to agree this is a bright refreshing drink! Super easy recipe, nice change for a hot drink. I have made 3 of the 18 crockpot hot drinks using cider, this one is the favorite among my neighbors and family! Enjoy!
Nov 2, 2013
I made two totally different crock pot punch recipes for a surprise party this week. This was, hands down, the favorite of everyone there. The house smelled wonderful while it was heating and the taste was perfect for a cool Autumn night. I used apple cider and followed the recipe exactly. However, mine turned out much darker than the picture showed which again was more suitable for the cool weather. I've been asked for the recipe several times already and will certainly be making this again and again.


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Get the expert excerpts about health, fitness & wellness in our distinctive collection.
Into Wellness Private Limited, one of India's leading fitness equipment manufacturing companies is proud to announce that it has been chosen to participate in the first-ever global investment summit to be held in Maharashtra – "Magnetic Maharashtra: Convergence 2018" The three-day event will be held between February 18 -20 and will be inaugurated by Prime …
Introducing the most unique Training Tyre design for the first time in the Indian Market! The unique IW Cross Tyre 180 is a result of our intuitive and innovative design thinking principle. Into Wellness' design experts and engineers have collaboratively explored the untouched benefits and efficiency of the tyre used for various CrossFit training purposes. …
Breathing is such a fundamental part of us that it's easy to forget about it. Any talk of focusing on breathing typically puts yoga in mind for people. But fitness freaks know that along with having a Quality Gym setup, breathing is the secret to good workouts. After all it's been scientifically proven that breathing …


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This years Guy Fawkes & Festival of Fire Celebrations were held on the 19th October 2019 in Hailsham Town Centre.
The Grand Firework Display at 9.30pm held at the Western Road Recreation Ground was watched by a record crowd and enjoyed by all!
If you're interested in helping or joining the society please come along to one of our monthly meetings.
These are held at the 'Hailsham Memorial Institute' on Western Rd. Just let the staff know you are there for the Bonfire Meeting and they will let you in.
We look forward to meeting you!


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Who We Are and How We Help:
Most of us expect our lives to be in constant motion, yet unexpected challenges often bring difficulties that may throw our entire lives into turmoil. At Life Transition Planners, our advisors examine our clients' situation closely and help them personally prepare for some of life's inevitable changes. We help them develop and monitor a financial plan that reflects the changes they might expect with the flexibility to respond to those they hope might never happen.
It is important to us that we understand our client's true passions, their specific situation, and the resources they have available to fulfill the dreams they have for their life. We look at important aspects of their life to let them know where they stand in relation to their goals. We identify strengths and potential shortcomings and offer concrete solutions to mitigate possible difficulties. We help them understand if they are on track to take an early retirement option, to send the kids to college, or purchase their first home.
Our process considers many of life's transitions. Clients may be considering retirement, changing jobs or a career, perhaps a first or second marriage, starting a family, divorce, becoming an empty-nester, or selling a business. Maybe they are called to become a caregiver or to settle an estate, or are worried that they might outlive their assets. Some may possess the good fortune to begin the process of wealth transfer while they are alive and want to do what's best for their heirs. We show clients their options surrounding these critical events and the best strategies for financing them.
At Life Transition Planners, we help clients chart the course from where they are to where they want to be, and we offer a full range of services to facilitate the passage.