Silence in your life

Question: As we all here linked somehow with sound and it can be vital part in our life -
What role in your life silence plays?
Comment: The idea of silence is a bit frustrating for me thanks to constant tinnitus. Heh.
Answer: This made me think about what silence actually is. It's interesting... it seems that silence is defined by what we can hear. Like Tim's experience in anechoic chambers (i'd love to go to one of those); i've heard that when you're inside one, you begin to hear your body's various systems (digestive, circulatory, etc.) at work. Whereas when you're trying to be quiet in silence, like Filipe said, your own movements seem extra loud.
Once upon a time, i lived in a small town, and would fall asleep in silence every night; now i think too much quiet would keep me awake. These days, i associate silence with work, as sound suites and vo booths (ideally) are the only quiet places i know.
The other night we had some fog in NYC, and the neighbourhood where i live was unusually deserted. It was really eerie.
Answer: I think for me silence is when I remove myself from the noise source (talking, etc) and quiet is when I remove noise from my life.
Silence is huge for me in my personal and professional life.  It allows me to observe and not make an instant inpression.  I love to talk, so for me this is a learned concept.  It's hard for me to listen when other people are talking or other noises are going on around me since I have so many thoughts/comments welling up in my brain.  For me, silence is turning off the talking/response part of my mine and opening up the listening portion.
Quiet is another thing.  For me, I view quiet as removing artificial sources of noise.  I feel that I am in quet when I am at an empty beach with waves crashing.  I am also in quiet when I am in bed and hear my wife breathing next to me and crickets outside.  I've never felt at peace at a concert, while watching a movie, or while music is playing.  Queit is essential for me to keep my sanity.
I feel like I've gotten a bit abstract....
Comment: @VCProd That's a cool perspective on the artificial noise / natural sounds
check out this documentary if you haven't: http://vimeo.com/1737899
Answer: Of course silence doesn't exist, except in space where we can't hear it ;)
I only have 3 memories of experiencing near-silence, each was profound

Anechoic chamber, Canterbury University, Christchurch, NZ (25 years ago)
Field recording on a foggy still night in remote Dennistown, West Coast, NZ (10 years ago)
Anechoic chamber, ICC Gallery, Tokyo, Japan (5 years ago)

Each experience was very different due to the context & environment, but each time it was equal parts exhilirating, meditative and unsettling... I felt changed by the experience...
Quiet coloured diffuse spacious ambiences are personally more interesting to me than attempts at finding silence - the gentle sound of rain on a tin roof, or the distant sound of clean wave breaks on a beach, or the drone of my modular synth, or the gentle rustle of tape through my space echo, or the quiet of morning before the birds wake up....
Comment: @Tim I don't know if someone was pulling my leg, but i've heard (from what should be a reliable source) that anechoic chambers have emergency exits in case the quietness is too intense and freaks someone out; is that true?
Comment: both the anechoic chambers i visited had a single solid massive concrete door - i think keeping out extraneous external sound is more the focus than people in it freaking out...
Comment: Yeah... I thought it sounded strange too.
Comment: I think they're ususally not for people :)  It's just fun to step inside as a demo.
Comment: I dont know about emergency exits but I have heard of a few and am sure many other people have freaked out as hearing and experiencing your own internal sounds is quite a strange and uncomfortable experience for many.
Answer: An absolute necessity! I like fifteen minutes or a half hour of silence every day if I can get it. Helps reset everything... Of course TOTAL silence is impossible, but just enough away from the noise of the world that I can hear the sounds in my head again. When I'm composing, it's even MORE critical.
Comment: yes, it helps me to concentrate on sounds in a head too.
have you heard about floating cameras?  i always wanted to try one of those. there is a near total silence.
Comment: I don't know that I'd want TOTAL silence... I like just enough to get below the "noise floor" of my own thoughts, if you will.

As an interesting note, John Cage noted that after a while in an anechoic chamber he actually could hear both his own heartbeat and a high pitched whine which he attributed to his own nervous system... so much for total silence!
Answer: For awhile i would wear earplugs anytime when i was in transit or walking somewhere
Answer: You may be interested in this book by George Prochnik, "In Pursuit of Silence: Listening for Meaning in a World of Noise"
http://www.amazon.com/Pursuit-Silence-Listening-Meaning-World/dp/0385528884
It's a sort of cobbled together anecdotal book of one man's quest to find total silence in this noisy world. Has some interesting info, though...
Answer: Apart from when I am trying to get to sleep I actually find silence quite uncomfortable. Mainly as my mind races and inevitably I end up thinking about the stressful/unpleasant things in my life.
I'm the same as others here tiptoeing around home trying not to wake my wife (who's chronically ill with ME/CFS and would be unwell for days after a disturbed night) in the morning while I get ready for work.
It's interesting Tim that you mentioned a sort of implied silence, just like in film sound ;)
One of the quietest places I've been was a cave about 50ft underground in South Wales. Apart from our own noise and an occasional drip it was total silence. It had the pitch blackness to match too. We all only lasted about 2 or 3 minutes until someone wanted a light turned back on.
Comment: Interesting turn with uncomfortable feeling
Answer: I love silence and the concept of it. It doesn't make me uncomfortable at all and it has become a very important component in my life.
The quietest experiences I've ever had was twice in Iceland; on a farm a couple of hours from Reykjavik and on a high altitude mountain plain near Thingvellir. Silent notes whenever the wind settled and even the wind gradually muted after some time.
Silence for me is as much a state of mind, what I remember from the icelandic instances is just a warm feeling of just being (in danish "være"), observing everything from a vacuum. I hope to experience that again someday.
Answer: The only times I've been in near-absolute silence - hearing really only my own body - is while caving/spelunking. In fact, an interesting phenomenon is that the silence seemed greater with the lights on, since I was looking outside myself for possible sound sources. With the light doused, I heard the blood rushing in my ears, and my own slow breath - when you focus on such things, they can perceptually seem pretty loud. It was quite amazing, albeit short-lived.
My health and balance requires alternating significant sound and significant quiet, a word I'd use in favor of silence. I love intense, loud music and barely-audible ambient music. I love the yelling of people in the street, and I love hushed rural areas with crickets. Can't have one without the other.
All life requires negative space at regular intervals, spatially, temporally, visually, and aurally. That's what gives us sanity and perspective.
Comment: @NoiseJockey
"silence seemed greater with the lights on" - i was thinking about comparison Light/Dark space with Noisy/Quiet and Quiet and Dark place seems for me more natural match than Light and Quiet. Proceeding from a fact that White colour is a mix of all colours in same time, as Noise consists of all frequencies.
I would feel uncomfortable in bright quiet space as here is a link with intimacy for me too.
Answer: I meditate when I need silence. Just turning myself off from physical noise and chaos.
Answer: Silence (or attempting it) is an essential part of my morning routine right now.  Tip-toeing around the house getting ready for work and trying my best not to wake up the baby!
Striving for silence makes me keenly aware of the little sounds around the house I wouldn't normally notice - every creak in the floor, the weird suction sound the fridge makes when you carefully pry the door open, the noise a dimmed incandescent bulb makes, etc.
Answer: I think recently the more silent things are the more unsettled I get! Strange how I always used to hate the sound of a ticking clock in anyone's house if I stayed overnight. Had to take the battery out to sleep! But now, since my girlfriend insists on having a clock in the room I find it hard to sleep if theres NOT the sound of a ticking clock :/ Helps calm me down somehow..
Answer: Like Unicity mentioned, when you have to be quiet, every little sound is a big deal.
Although in my case, i wasn't being quiet not to wake up a baby, but to sneak out of my parents house to go do some late night party mischief.... Every little clothing scrub was to much :D.
Also when i lived in Vancouver BC, i was amazed by how much the snow dampened traffic noise...
everything sounded so peaceful!
And like Chris, now i wear earplugs all the time.
Answer: wow guys thanx for the answers! so interesting to read!
but i didnt expect that some of you will take it literally :)
its just expanded a question.
My answer would be - i love silence. My home is planned with everything that can reduce unwanted noises - fridges, computers, clocks... and its so pleasant to be in silent place after all that subway, traffic jams, crowds, Particularly when im not using earplugs.
I think when i am working with the sound, i should be especially careful with what i hear and selectively listen only pleasant sounds. Thats why i can say something like "i like silence and only tiny fragile sounds".
Also i like underwater silence. Its like another world...
Answer: Like Tim, I only have a couple of experiences with what felt close to complete silence, and "profound" is definitely the word for the resulting sensation.  Both were while location recording - one in a field in Texas, the other in the desert of southern California.  I could hear my heartbeat and breathing (if I focused on them), but nothing else.  It was eerie, but I loved it.
Another book recommendation -- I found this one quite interesting and relevant. http://www.amazon.com/Zero-Decibels-Quest-Absolute-Silence/dp/1416599592/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1288312435&sr=1-2
(I identified with the author right away when he mentioned the stigma associated with covering one's ears when the subway comes.  I always feel like I'm the only guy in L.A. covering my ears to shield from passing fire trucks and ambulances...)
Answer: Silence is a perceptual thing. Yes there is space, anechoic chambers etc. The places that I have found silence- Northern Ontario at night, Northwest Territories, my head. I have managed to record very quiet moments but not silence. I would love to experience underwater silence- must be magical.
Answer: i often leave music playing when i get into bed. i like the fall asleep to it.
i can't hear it while i'm sleeping.
there is a beautiful moment before i wake up, usually about 3 seconds before, when i know i'm sleeping, i acknowledge that i'm sleeping, and i still don't here anything.
and as if someone turned the speakers on, the music starts.
that is as much as i know about silence.

Silence in your life


Need help finding smallest value of $x^2 + y^2$

Question: I need to find the smallest value of $x^2 + y^2$ with the restriction $2x + 3y = 6$. This chapter focuses on the vertex formula.
Comment: What's the "vertex formula"? Are you talking about [this](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quadratic_function#Vertex)?
Comment: @Srivatsan yes, -b/2a
Answer: Using the Cauchy-Schwarz inequality, we have $6^2=(2x+3y)^2\leq (x^2+y^2)(2^2+3^2)$, which gives the minimum value of $x^2+y^2$ to be $\frac{36}{13}$.
Edit:Equality occurs for $\frac{x}{2}=\frac{y}{3}$.
Comment: This is great!+1
Answer: Rewrite $x^2 + y^2$ in terms of one of the variables (either $x$ or $y$) using the restriction given to you which will give you a quadratic equation. That should help move you along to the answer.
Answer: For fun, we give a couple of solutions that are not the intended ones. The solutions are very similar, but the first is expressed algebraically, while the
second brings in the geometry.
$1$) Note that
$$(2x+3y)^2+(3x-2y)^2=13(x^2+y^2).$$
Thus, given that $2x+3y=6$,
$$13(x^2+y^2)= 36+(3x-2y)^2.$$
If we can manage to make $3x-2y=0$, then $13(x^2+y^2)$ will be as small as possible. But the system of two linear equations $2x+3y=6$, $3x-2y=0$ has a solution.  There,
$$13(x^2+y^2)=36,$$
so the smallest possible value of $x^2+y^2$ is $36/13$.
$2$)  Look at the problem geometrically. We want to find the smallest radius $r$ such that the circle $x^2+y^2=r^2$ meets the line $2x+3y=6$. If we draw a picture, we can see that for this smallest $r$, the line $2x+3y=6$ will be tangent to the circle.  Let the point of tangency be $T(a,b)$.  The line from the origin to $T$ is perpendicular to the tangent line.
The line $2x+3y=6$ has slope $-2/3$.  So the line from the origin to $T$ has slope the negative of the reciprocal of $-2/3$. Thus
$$\frac{b}{a}=\frac{3}{2}.$$
This equation simplifies to $3a-2b=0$. We also have $2a+3b=6$. Now we can solve for $a$ and $b$. But let's not bother. Use the fact that
$$(3a-2b)^2+(2a+3b)^2=13(a^2+b^2)$$
to conclude that $r^2=a^2+b^2=36/13$.
Answer: Let's solve for $y$ in the equation $2x + 3y = 6$. This gives $y = 2 - \frac{2x}{3}$.
After rewriting $x^2 + y^2$ in terms of $x$, we have
$x^2 + y^2 = x^2 + (2 - \frac{2x}{3})^2 = x^2 + (4 - 2 \cdot \frac{4x}{3} +\frac{4x^2}{9})$
This is a quadratic "in $x$" that we would like to minimize. You can write it in standard form $ax^2 + bx + c$ and then use the methods you have learned.
Answer: While this particular problem can be solved more simply, it is worthwhile to solve the problem through Lagrange mulutipliers, which is less ad hoc, if slightly more involved.
Let $f(x,y)=x^2+y^2$ and $g(x,y)=2x+3y-6$.  Then a minimum of $f(x,y)$ subject to the constraint $g(x,y)=0$ must satisfy $\nabla f = \lambda \nabla g$ for some real number $\lambda$.  Writing vectors in coordinates, this yields
$$(2x,2y)=(2 \lambda, 3 \lambda)$$
or, $\lambda=x=2/3 y$, and the system of equations $x=2/3y$ and $2x+3y=6$ can be solved to determine, $x,y$ and $x^2+y^2$


What is background binding?

Question: I'm reading a journal article about mitochondrial protein import and it mentions that one of the mutant proteins tested showed background binding with another protein. What the heck is background binding?
Comment: "Background binding" usually refers to aspecific binding between two proteins. The details depend on the test that was used.
Comment: can you post a link to the article?
Comment: Was an IP involved by any chance? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immunoprecipitation#Background
Answer: Background binding in this case would be the extent to which two proteins associate together by chance.
A hypothetical example: you may have a mitochondrial protein import complex.  Usually cases there is a specific peptide sequence the import complex binds to , but proteins without an import peptide sequence will occasionally be bound to the import complex.  This is called the background binding for the protein complex.  The experimentalists might have measured this by cutting the import peptide sequence off a mitochondrial protein for instance.
Any candidate would have to bind to the complex more than the background case to be considered a target for mitochondrial import.

What is background binding?


Solar maximum and minimum

Question: What are solar maximum and solar minimum?
Is there a relation between sun spots and solar maximum and minimum?
Thank you!
Answer: Solar maximum
Solar maximum or solar max is a normal period of greatest solar activity in the 11 year solar cycle of the Sun. During solar maximum, large numbers of sunspots appear and the sun's irradiance output grows by about 0.07%.1 The increased energy output of solar maxima can impact Earth's global climate and recent studies have shown some correlation with regional weather patterns. source
Solar minimum
Solar minimum is the period of least solar activity in the 11 year solar cycle of the sun. During this time, sunspot and solar flare activity diminishes, and often does not occur for days at a time. The date of the minimum is described by a smoothed average over 12 months of sunspot activity, so identifying the date of the solar minimum usually can only happen 6 months after the minimum takes place. Solar minima are not generally correlated with changes in climate but recent studies have shown a correlation with regional weather patterns. source

Solar maximum and minimum


Game testing on Android - emulator or real devices?

Question: I am working at a localization agency and we have been approached by a client about testing their games on iOS as well as Android. Testing on iOS seems fairly easy as we can just buy a couple of devices and we should be covered.
For Android it seems to be completely different. From what i found, the emulator can cover all API levels, screen sizes and such, but i hear it's buggy and nothing could replace testing on real devices. With the vast amount of Android devices out there and the rate at which new devices are released it seems impossible to keep up.
How can i test games (localization and functional) on Android covering all compatible devices?
Comment: Back in the J2ME days, indeed, you couldn't trust the emulators and had to test on as many device as possible, testing the highest priority first. I would be surprised this had changed today with the rise of Android.
Answer: The only real thing that is different is the amount of devices, Apple just sell 1-2-3 new product each year, Android offers 1 new product every day/week.
The emulator it's not buggy, it's just not intended for profiling, if you want to profile an Android application you have to do the same thing that you have done for iOS: consider the lowest profile device that match your requirements and buying it.
You are supposed to have at least a basic know-how about the ARM architecture, otherwise you can make a difference between all the devices on the market, begin to outline the hardware features that are important for your application and buy that device for real testing.
Answer: In our company we prefer not to use emulators as they don't show real picture especially in terms of performance, instead we select several real devices to cover most popular screen size / gpu vendor / form factor combinations, more about how we select test devices on our blog http://developers.nravo.com/best-test-devices-for-game-development/
Answer: The Android emulator provided by the SDK has serious performance issues on all systems.  Proper "functional" testing as you describe is probably completely invalid using emulators only.  Also as far as I know, the emulator doesn't cover manufacturer-specific implementations of the Android OS.  So even if you spoof, say, all the hardware of a Samsung Galaxy SII with the emulator, you may still get bugs specific to the Samsung implementation of Android.  Lastly, you simply can't multi-touch with a mouse...
The only valid solution I can imagine is buying as wide a range of the most popular Android devices you can afford (in dollars) for your functional testing, and then use the emulator to test as many other specifications of phones as you can afford (in man hours).  Fortunately the Android platform is robust enough this usually covers the majority of issues, but weird edge bugs still occur on some specific devices.
Answer: The solution to this might be test partitioning.
Consider partitioning into a low-end, medium/normal, and high-end device, for example. You can reasonably expect (in terms of performance) that if the performance is X on a certain low-end device, it will be reasonably similar on a similar low-end device.
With this in mind, you can judiciously choose devices that represent a "class" of devices and test of those.
And ultimately, as anyone who shipped an Android game will tell you, every phone has its own unique quirks and bugs. Make sure you use some sort of analytics tool (I used Flurry Analytics) that allows you to capture errors; you can eventually diagnose and fix a number of these, increasing the range of devices on which your game works on.
In my opinion, the emulator is only good for functional tests; it neither has decent performance, nor does it represent device-specific bugs. I would avoid it. If you want a decent alternative with decent performance, go with BlueStacks, which is an implementation of Android on Windows.


How do I spot a difference between a 4 color process print vs Spot color print?

Question: What does the difference look like?  What is the advantage of using Spot Color over CMYK?
Comment: Linked: http://graphicdesign.stackexchange.com/questions/9397/what-is-a-pantone-colour
Answer: Spot colors are premixed ink. It will often print more precisely than CMYK, since the CMYK color space has some limitations in the range of colors it can produce.
Sometimes CMYK colors are muddier or darker than spot, but it depends on the color. Certain colors like metallics and some pastels can't be reproduced in CMYK and must be printed spot.
If it's a color which is possible to reproduce in CMYK, the main benefit of spot is color accuracy. This could be for a corporate color, like Coca-Cola Red or IBM Blue. Printing a color in spot, or printing it in a "double hit" (printing it once in CMYK and a second time, the same color, as a spot) can make it pop against a complex layout or on a magazine cover.
Whether you use spot or CMYK depends on your document, your color requirements, and your budget (as it could be a "fifth color" or "fifth plate" on top of the CMYK you're already printing).
Answer: As Lauren says, there are colors that you can achieve with Pantone (or any of several other, similar brands) spot colors that are impossible in CMYK. Bright oranges and rich blues are beyond the capability of regular CMYK, for example. Color accuracy (or, perhaps, color certainty) is another major reason to employ spot inks.
If you look on the Pantone website you'll find some videos that explain (and extol the virtues of!) the system. Note that the solid colors are specified as "formula guides." That's because the colors are specified as exact mixing "recipes" of the standard Pantone base inks (14 of them), so that what the printer gives you will match what's in the Pantone swatch book.
In many cases, particularly stationery, the printing is done using only two or three exact colors: generally black plus one or two spot colors. A two-color job is often less expensive, and always more accurate, than a CMYK rendition of the same thing. This is the norm for stationery printing, and small shops catering to that market quite often won't even have a 4-color press.
If you are working in InDesign or Illustrator, you can select colors from the Pantone Solid Coated or Uncoated ranges for your artwork. It is very important, though, to keep "Overprint Preview" turned on while working with them, so you get an accurate rendition on screen of what will hit the paper when it's printed. This is particularly important if there's any transparency in your layout.
If you plan to work with Pantone solids, you should definitely buy swatch books for the colors you're likely to use. There are separate books for metallics and "pastels and neons". Don't rely on your monitor, no matter how well it's calibrated.
Comment: neons! forgot about those.
Comment: What? You mean you don't own any Day-Glo socks?
Comment: I should have said "reliable" not "good" :)
Comment: Dude, not since like 1985. I threw those out with my legwarmers, shoulder pads, and fingerless lace gloves. :) Although I do have an extensive collection of '80s music. Only Lady Gaga is writing Madonna songs any more.
Comment: "Don't rely on your monitor" Indeed, using a swatch book to specify all spot colors, you could use a black and white monitor and get good results.
Comment: @horatio: Depending on your choice of colors, of course. :-D
Answer: The difference is CMYK is printed with 4 colors (use a loupe to see the dot patterns, called a line screen, of all 4 colors). Spot colors are individual colors. They may be screened back but are often printed as a solid block of color.
Spot colors come in way more colors than what you can achieve with CMYK.
Note that both are often used together...4 color printing with one or two spot colors (This was a trademark of Wired Magazine back in the day...4 color printing and then they'd add one or two more spot colors in a metallic or day-glo color)


15 month baby never sleeps through the night

Question: I have a 15 month old daughter who slept great when she was 3 and 4 months old, but never again after that. She's never had a pacifier and she has her own crib, but it's in our room. Our current living conditions prevented me from teaching her good sleeping habits. Me, my husband, my four year old daughter, and the baby all sleep in one room together. I tried letting her cry it out, but all the noise gets my other daughter up and it's harder that way. I tried a soother but she always rejected it. I tried a comfort toy but that didn't work as well. She weighs 21 lbs but we still rock her in our arms because that's the only way she'll fall asleep. She wakes up every hour or two, sometimes even every half an hour, expecting to be rocked again. And we do, otherwise she screams violently and then wake the other one up. My husband and I go to work at 5am and sometimes I go with very little or no sleep, and it's very disruptive to our lives. I realize that these problems are all my fault but I honestly don't know what to do anymore. Help please.
Comment: That's a tough situation. I know how hard it can be when you're not getting sleep. It'll get better though.The responses to this question might help you: http://parenting.stackexchange.com/questions/3002
Comment: A [funny article](http://www.today.com/moms/exhausted-new-moms-hilarious-take-expert-sleep-advice-goes-viral-6C9559908) on the topic.
Comment: I really wish people like this would come back and tell us how things turned out! I'm in the same boat and could really use some hope :( or some information on what to expect, anything, really.
Answer: Children associate things with sleep, with my daughter it was drinking milk.  It took a couple of nights of letting her pitch a fit before she unlearned the association.  My daughter is 2 1/2, and it took us 2-3 nights.  It might be a little more difficult with a 15-month-old.
The way I see it is that you have a couple of options:

Start transitioning your older daughter to her own room.  I realize this might not be possible depending on your housing situation, but it's a piece of the puzzle that might make things easier and allow you to sleep train your younger daughter in whatever way you feel is appropriate.
Sleep train your younger daughter anyway and accept that everyone is going to be tired and cranky for about a week until she gets sleep trained.

Regardless of what you choose, both options are going to lead to more sleepless nights before they lead to fewer.  If you go with option one, you will probably battle the 4-year-old getting out of her bed and wanting to come get into bed with you for a few nights and then after that you still have to sleep train your younger daughter.  On the plus side, once she got accustomed to sleeping in her own room she wouldn't be disturbed by your other daughter crying in the middle of the night while you sleep train her.  For me, having a non-cranky four-year-old might make it worth the effort.  With option 2, you cut down on the amount of time you personally are going to lose sleep (most kids I know that respond to CIO are sleeping better by the end of about a week), but everyone in the house is going to be pretty miserable--including your 4-year-old.
Whatever you choose to do, both you and your husband are going to have to be on board because you're going to have to work together to do get it done.
Good luck to you!  It's so tough, but it will get better.
Comment: In our experience, it was way more difficult to sleep train both of our children in the 15-18 month age bracket than it was to train them later.  It was even more difficult to sleep train our oldest when he was in the 6-9 month window.  Maybe some kids are easier to train when they're younger, but ours were not.  And my daughter (our second) was ridiculously more difficult to train than my son. However, I also firmly believe that if a child is not responding to your attempts at sleep training (however you choose to go about it) after about a week, then he/she is probably not ready
Comment: I'm surprised that you think that unlearning sleep associations is more difficult with a 15 month old than a 2 1/2 year old.  Everything I've read and heard on the subject indicates that older is harder.  The book Bedtiming even lists 12-16 months as the second best window (after 5.5-7.5 months) for sleep training from the perspective of what's going on developmentally.
Comment: I'll emphatically plus one your last sentence.  A week is definitely long enough to figure out if you are seeing improvement in a child's sleep or if your efforts are not working.
Answer: I think you will suffer much less if you find a way to change your child's sleep association as soon as possible. You deserve to be well-rested, and it will help your relationship to your child too. Kids brains are incredibly flexible because of all the neurons. Right now she has a habit that is working very well for her to get back to sleep and not well at all for you. If you trust her and use a gentle, firm, consistent method, she will learn a new habit and you will feel so much better.
I suggest the book, Solve Your Child's Sleep Problems, by Dr. Ferber. I found his writing very well-reasoned, and his method very detailed so I knew what to do. It worked to change my son from his association with rocking and nursing back to sleep, and it took three days before I went from getting 1-2 hours of sleep in a row at night to getting 7-8 hours. Afterward, my son's schedule was going to bed at 7:30 or 8pm and getting up at 7am.
I know it is hard to do any project when you are tired, but it is so worthwhile to have the results. I suggest you read the book through and take some notes, and plan your strategy. Pick a time when you can either bear to be extra tired for 3-5 days or else have some help around the house, or both. Ask a friend or parent to do this with you if you can, ask your partner to take some sick/vacation days if you can so he can help out, and/or ask a relative to take the other little one so at least someone is getting good sleep.
After I read the book and made my plan, I did Ferber's method with my mom in shifts, while my son's more soft-hearted dad was out of town. We wrote down "the rules" we wanted to follow for sleep training and kept a log about how it was going, because it is very hard to stick to it, but also very important. When it was my mom's shift I slept for four hours in a row with earplugs in, and even though I was upset about sleep training and hearing my son cry, the extra sleep felt like heaven because I was so exhausted from waking up every hour or two to rock my son back to sleep.
The first night is the hardest, and it gets a little better each night after that. I love my son and can't bear to hear him cry, and I toughened myself and sleep trained him because I knew it would give our family the best life together over the long term. It helps while you are doing it to remember that if it isn't better after 5 days, you can always try something else.


Minimization under non-linear constraints

Question: There is a linear function of two variables that I am trying to minimize under an equality constraint. But, the constraint is non linear in the variables. Is there any technique to solve this? or can I use approximations and linearize the constraint?
Answer: You need Lagrange multipliers (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lagrange_multipliers).
Answer: In addition to the tip about using Lagrange multipliers, take a look at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nonlinear_programming which has a small paragraph about methods for solving nonlinear optimization problems.
If you can know (or can show) that the problem is convex and you want to learn techniques for convex nonlinear optimization, take a look at the following textbook http://www.stanford.edu/~boyd/cvxbook/ (pdf available)
Answer: To be precise, the constraint equality is exponential in the two variables. Will Lagrange multipliers help here?
Answer: As I understand, your problem looks like this:
$\min_{x,y} \Phi=a_{1} x + a_{2}y$
s.t.
$f(x,y) = 0$
where $f(x,y)$ looks something like this: $f(x,y) = a_{3} \exp{(a_{4}x)} + a_{5} \exp{(a_{6}y)}$
This looks like a nonconvex NLP can be trivially solved using any NLP solver.
Or are you looking for a closed form solution?
Normally, the first thing I would try is to see if I can substitute constraints into the objective to transform the problem into an unconstrained one, but it looks like it's not possible here.
As mentioned above, you can write the first order optimality conditions for the above system and solve the resulting nonlinear system of equations.
$\nabla L(x,y,\lambda) = \nabla\Phi + \lambda \nabla f(x,y) = 0$
In your case, it would be:
$a_{1} + \lambda a_{3} a_{4} \exp{(a_{4}x)} = 0$
$a_{2} + \lambda a_{5} a_{6} \exp{(a_{6}x)} = 0$
$a_{3} \exp{(a_{4}x)} + a_{5} \exp{(a_{6}y)} = 0$
Solve the above system for $x,y,\lambda$. And bam! You're done.


Upgrade experiences from 8.04 LTS to 10.04 LTS?

Question: I am running 8.04 desktop as a server and hosting my own web server, has anyone experienced any issues with upgrade from 8.04 to 10.04?
Comment: I'd suggest you re-word the question as "Has anyone experienced problems upgrading desktop from 8.04 LTS to 10.04 LTS?"  The question right now is a bit vague and technically I could answer "No" and that would still be a valid answer.
Comment: I understand but some of the answers below would sound different if I change the title now.
Answer: I have tested this myself on a VM. And as Andrew said, this was heavily tested before the release.
Answer: Yes, I upgraded a production system, and worked fine.
Answer: While I haven't, that is one thing that gets heavily tested in LTS releases prior to their release.
Answer: I upgraded a production system from 8.04 to 10.04. I had to switch from gdm to kdm because gdm would not find any users to log in (but one could log in through a VT.)
I've filed the bug in Launchpad but it was never even triaged, not even with a request for more info! At least it saved me from having to reinstall the box.
Otherwise no hiccups. I removed Flash and Nvidia binary blobs from the machine (user requested it) before upgrading and then reinstalled them from the packages later. The new nouveau drivers are slick (VTs actually work with nouveau.)
Answer: Done on a VM, using the desktop edition.
 Seen no issue.
Answer: I had some issues on Desktop Edition once, something about the packages I had installed made the upgrade process go a little funky, and it kinda screwed up my python (had to manually find and compile module dependencies, and then I ended up having to reinstall later anyway to rid myself of wubi, and everything went fine there). On a clean install, or a production server, that shouldn't be an issue.
Answer: I'm having problems with a new install of 10.04 on an old AMD machine with a small memory footprint. It runs fine but installing a new kernel causes GRUB2 and/or the Kernel to become unbootable, I just get dumped at the Grub command line prompt. No warnings no error message just……..
I can still manually boot the original kernel but nothing since.
Looking at the bug list there are lots of people having similar problems but little apparent activity to resolve the problem.
I am very sad as the very heavily updated 8.?? was working fine with no problems just a bit of a dirty disk.
Answer: I actually upgraded from 8.04 to 10.04 but not in the replacement sense. Instead, I did a fresh install of 10.4 in a dual-boot configuration. I did experience problems (see my other postings here) but I eventually solved all of them. The experience is amazing and very rewarding. Highly recommended.
Answer: I installed the desktop version of 10.04 as a triple-boot option on a system with both 8.04 and Vista.  I ran into two issues, both of which surprised me as I am used to Ubuntu installations running absolutely smoothly.  Firstly, GRUB2 identified my Windows recovery and Vista partitions incorrectly and wouldn't boot either. This was fixed by customizing the boot menu using the correct drive identifiers.  The second problem was that after the first update the machine wouldn't boot at all with the error message "udevadm trigger is not permitted while udev is unconfigured".  The latter issue was fixed using information posted on the web.  All three operating systems now seem to be functioning flawlessly.


Using indicator-appmenu in maximized mode only

Question: I like the mac like global-menu or appmenu whatever you call it. But I was wondering if there is a way that I use it only when I maximize the application window ?
Answer: I'm afraid that's not possible right now.
Answer: Trusty Tahr 14.04 brings a solution to this.
Go to "System parameters"/"Appearance"/"Behavior" than switch "Show the menus for a window" to "In the window's title bar".
The menus will then appear when hovering a non-maximized window's title bar.
Answer: I would like to second the request. I'm hoping it will be implemented as an option soon.
In the mean time, removing 'indicator-appmenu' with 'sudo apt-get remove indicator-appmenu' will stop the menu moving to the top bar on all windows. If you have your focus to follow your mouse as I do, this is an essential change (as otherwise you can't reach your menu options). In fact, it's a pretty nasty bug for non-click focus users.
IMO, it would be best for there to be an option to only put the menu in the top bar when maximised, as it makes the most sense (and best use of display space) then.


$\sum_{m=0}^n (m-np)^2 {n \choose m} p^m q^{n-m} = npq$

Question: How to show that:
$\sum_{m=0}^n (m-np)^2 {n \choose m} p^m q^{n-m} = npq$
Comment: do you really want to show it this way or can you use the binomial random variable?
Answer: Here is a way to see it without having to expand anything in the sum. Consider a random variable $X$ following a binomial distribution with parameters $n,p$. By definition, it is the sum of $n$ i.i.d. Bernoulli$(p)$ random variable, who have expectation $p$ and variance $pq$. So since
$$
X=X_1+X_2+\cdots X_n,
$$
it's expectation is the sum of the expectation of all $X_m$, so $E[X]=\sum_{m=0}^nE[X_m]=np$. Since the $X_m's$ are independant, the variance of their sum is the sum of their variance so
$$
Var[X]=npq,
$$
$(q=1-p)$.
By definition of the variance, you also have
$$
Var[X]=\sum_{k=0}^{n}(m-np)^2\binom{n}{m}p^{m}q^{n-m}.
$$
thus, both are equal.
Answer: $(m-np)^2\binom n m=\{m(m-1)+(1-2np)m+n^2p^2\}\binom n m=n(n-1)\binom{n-2}{m-2}+(1-2np)n\binom {n-1}{m-1}+n^2p^2\binom n m$
as $m\binom n m=m\frac{n!}{m!(n-m)!}=mn\frac{(n-1)!}{m\cdot(m-1)!\{(n-1)-(m-1)\}!}=n\binom{n-1}{m-1}$ for $m\ge 1$
and $m(m-1)\binom n m=m(m-1)\frac{n!}{m!(n-m)!}$
$=m(m-1)n(n-1)\frac{(n-1)!}{m(m-1)\cdot(m-2)!\{(n-2)-(m-2)\}!}=n(n-1)\binom{n-2}{m-2}$ for $m\ge 2$


Risk-neutral models for rights issues

Question: A rights issue is the granting by a corporation to its shareholders of a right to purchase $N$ new shares for each $M$ shares they already hold at a (often discounted) price $K$. Thus, it superficially resembles a call option, but because every shareholder is holding such options, dilution of the stock value is unavoidable. Are there any papers out there which would contain a description of a risk-neutral valuation of rights issue, e.g. using a modified Black-Scholes model?
Answer: I think Hull treats dilution in his book, and it's extensible to this case.  For what it's worth, the strike is typically set low enough that there's little doubt about exercise, meaning there's not much point in modeling the optionality.  Most people concentrate on the dilution alone -- particularly the question of the change in fully diluted versus undiluted shares outstanding.

Risk-neutral models for rights issues


Probability (usage of recursion)

Question: In an hour, a bacterium dies with probability $p$ or else splits into two. What is the probability that a single bacterium produces a population that will never become extinct?
Answer: \begin{align}
r & =\Pr(\text{posterity lives forever}) \\[10pt]
& = \Pr(\text{split})\cdot\Pr(\text{at least one offspring lives forever}) \\[10pt]
& = (1-p)\cdot(1-\Pr(\text{both lines eventually die out})) \\[10pt]
& = (1-p)\cdot(1-(1-r)^2).
\end{align}
So
$$
r = (1-p)(1-(1-r)^2).
$$
That's a quadratic equation in the variable $r$.  One solution is obviously $r=0$, so the polynomial $(1-p)(1-(1-r)^2)-r$ can be factored as
$$
(1-p)(1-(1-r)^2)-r = r\cdot\text{something}.
$$
Then write $\text{something}=0$ and it's not even quadratic.
Answer: Let $x$ (for "extinction") be the probability that the colony dies out.  This can happen in two ways: either the first bacterium dies immediately (with probability $p$) or it splits and then neither of its children has infinite descendants.
This means we can write $x$ as
$$x = p + (1-p)x^2$$
which is a quadratic with two real roots.  One solution is $x=1$ and the other is $x=\frac{p}{1-p}$. The latter is a valid probability (ie, it's between 0 and 1) only when $p \in [0,1/2]$ when the graph looks like this:

So extinction is guaranteed for $p \geq 1/2$ and then decreases as shown in the graph above as $p$ decreases.  Survival is guaranteed, of course, if $p=0.$

Probability (usage of recursion)


Conformability and Matrix Derivatives

Question: What is the formula for the derivative of the product of two matrices when they are different sizes? Further, what is the formula for the derivative of a Hadamard product when the derivatives of the inputs aren't the same size as the inputs?
Here's what I'm thinking: assume an $n\times 1$ vector $x$, a $n\times n$ symmetric matrix $S$, $f(x)=Sw$, $g(x)=w'Sw$, $h(x)=\frac{f(x)}{g(x)}$, and $j(x)=\operatorname{had}(x, h(x))$ where $\operatorname{had}(a, b)$ is the Hadamard product between the two vectors.
For $f(x)$ and $g(x)$ the derivatives are $S$ and $2\cdot Sw$, respectively. One would think that the derivative of $h(x)$ would be $\dfrac{g(x)f'(x)-g'(x)f(x)}{g(x)^2}$ from the quotient rule. However, the numerator is $n\times n$ and the second part is multiplying a $n\times 1$ vector by an $n\times 1$ vector, which doesn't work.
Similarly, I found a formula for the derivative of Hadamard product and applying it to this would give $\operatorname{had}(x, h'(x)) + \operatorname{had}(I, h(x)) =\operatorname{had}(x, h'(x)) + h(x)$. Since $h(x)$ is $n\times 1$, $h'(x)$ must be $n\times n$. However, the Hadamard product of an $n\times 1$ and $n\times n$ matrix doesn't work. Similarly, the opposite is the case in the second term. So far as I can tell, the terms that are $n\times 1$ need to be copied over to become $n\times n$. This would indicate that the proper formula is something like $\operatorname{had}(\operatorname{kron}(x,\operatorname{ones}),h'(x))+\operatorname{had}(I,\operatorname{kron}(h(x),\operatorname{ones}))$, where $I$ is an $n\times n$ identity matrix and ones is a $1\times n$ vector of ones.
I think that's on the right track since I found a matrix calculus guide that connects the problem to Kronecker products.
However, I still had the problem of conformability when using their product rule formula.
Comment: I think that you mean *Hadamard*... Capital H.
Answer: Someone has provided the answers to me.
He noted that $g'(x)$ is $1 \times n$ not $n \times 1$ so there is no conformability problem with $h'(x)$. Second, the derivative of the Hadamard product $f(x) \circ g(x)$ is $\operatorname{diag}(g(x)) f'(x) + \operatorname{diag}(f(x)) g'(x)$.

Conformability and Matrix Derivatives


What does rate of change actually mean?

Question: If we have a function, say, $y=x^2$, then $dy/dx=2x$.
Now $y=1,4,9,16...$ for $x=1,2,3,4...$
and $dy/dx=2,4,6,8...$ for $x=1,2,3,4...$
Now as $dy/dx$ represents rate of change of y w.r.t x but I can't understand how these particluar
values of $dy/dx$ represent change ?
I mean for x=3, the rate of change is 6. What does it mean ?
Comment: Note: there are numbers other than integers...
Answer: You could think of it this way: taking the value of $\frac{dy}{dx}$ at some point $x_0$, tells you approximately how much the value of $y$ changes for values very close to $x_0$. So in your example, if $x_0 = 3$, the change is $6$: if you consider the value of $x^2$ at a point $x_0 + \epsilon$ for some small number $\epsilon$, the change in the values of the function from $x_0$ to $x_0 + \epsilon$ will increase by approximately $6\cdot \epsilon$.
You should try this with some numbers. Take  $x_0 = 3$ and $\epsilon = 1$. Then $3^2 = 9$, while $(3+1)^2 = 16$. The change is $7$, which is close to $6\cdot \epsilon = 6$. If you take $\epsilon = \frac{1}{2}$, you can check that the change will be $3\frac{1}{4}$, which is close to $6\cdot \epsilon = 3$. Notice that as you make $\epsilon$ smaller, the error becomes smaller as well.
You should check wikipedia.
Comment: Thanks for explaining with an example.
Answer: When you let $x$ take the values 1, 2, 3, etc., you are taking fairly large steps, and then you don't see very well what the derivative $dy/dx$ means. Think of $dy/dx$ as measuring how much $y$ changes when $x$ changes by a very small amount, like when changing the value of $x$ from 3 to 3.00001; then $y$ changes by about 6 times as much, from 9 to approximately 9.00006 (the exaxt value is 9.0000600001).
Answer: I find it helps to consider $x$ as a time variable. So let's write $t$ instead of $x$.
Suppose you've got a good racing car, and at time $t=0$ you're at the position $y=0$. You're planning to race along a straight road. Your car can accelerate in such a way that after $t$ seconds, the speed is $2t$ metres per second (that won't work very long ...). Then you can show that after $t$ seconds you'll be $y=t^2$ metres away from where you started.
Now let's check if that makes sense in terms of a rate of change: Your position at time $t$ is $y=t^2$, and the rate of change is $dy/dt = 2t$. OK, so the rate of change $dy/dt$ is just the current speed (wheras $y/t = t^2/t = t$ would be the avarage speed between time 0 and $t$).

What does rate of change actually mean?


What do I need in order to use TeX on Windows as an eventual replacement for Word?

Question: What do I need in order to use TeX on Windows as an eventual replacement for Word?
What software is available for Windows for WYSIWYG editing of TeX files?
Answer: One thing you need to move from MS Word to TeX and friends is to drop the desire for WYSIWYG. For complicated documents that paradigm is, at best, WYSIPCTYADFWYG: What You See is Probably Close To, Yet Actually Different From, What You Get. (Not the basis of a marketing campaign!)
TeX and friends offer a fundamentally different way to think about document composition.
Lyx, which other answers have directed you to, is WYSIWYG'ish, but the "ish" bears emphasis.
I personally think that while the Lyx folk are awesome, you are best to think of Lyx like training wheels. If you can learn to ride without them, you are better off.
Comment: +1. I like Allin Cottrell's essay on this, "Word Processors: Stupid and Inefficient" (http://ricardo.ecn.wfu.edu/~cottrell/wp.html).
Comment: Having started this whole TeX thing on LyX myself, I can attest to the fact that it is *exactly* a set of training wheels. It gets you used to the idea of being explicit through commands (through a menu system) rather than just mashing your fingers on a keyboard and hoping for the best. I would *never* have been as comfortable as I am now with TeX (with *much* more to learn) if it were not for the year or so I spent with LyX.
Comment: @Chris: I like it, too. But, you've got to pick you audience if you recommend it; not everyone will respond well to marketing that says "what you've been using is stupid."
Answer: MiKTeX is a good bundle on Windows. It includes the LaTeX environment as well as an editor. Should be enough to get you started.
For WYSIWYG there is Lyx (though they call it "What You See Is What You Mean"/WYSIWYM, not WYSIWYG).
Comment: actually, they call it WYSIWYM - What you see is what you mean.
Answer: If you're looking for a direct replacement for Word, you're never going to find it in TeX. They are fundamentally different products, even if there is some overlap in what they're used for.
Word is built from the ground up to be a WYSIWYG word processor, and nothing else. It couldn't care less about actually producing nice-looking text, as long as it's able to present an editor that looks exactly like the output.
TeX is designed from the ground up to actually output professional, nice-looking documents. It does this by sacrificing the WYSIWYG paradigm. In order for TeX to typeset your document, it has to be given freedom to do so. Which means that it doesn't let the user see the document while you're editing it (because the output is constantly changing in non-obvious ways. Line breaks change, ligatures are inserted, the table of contents is updated and so on.)
In a sense, Word allows you to take a document, and insert a character into it. And what you get out of it is precisely that: the same document, but with that extra character of text. All other changes are minimized because it'd confuse the user of the WYSIWYG editor.
TeX on the other hand, doesn't allow you to insert into an existing document. You can generate a new document which contains that extra character of text, but it's a different document from the original one. The entire paragraph you inserted into might have changed, the characters surrounding the one you inserted may have changed, and so on. Tables and images might have been moved to an entirely different page.
As much as I like prefer TeX over Word, I would never recommend it as a direct replacement. Someone expecting to work with MS Word might find OpenOffice acceptable, but they'll just be frustrated by TeX.
Anyway, Lyx might be a reasonable compromise, giving you something like Word's WYSIWYG editor, while still producing TeX-style documents.
For "true" TeX, MikTeX is the de facto standard on Windows. It comes with pretty much everything you need.
Answer: I'd suggest trying out http://docs.latexlab.org. You sign in with an existing Google account, and it has syntax highlighting, docs can be saved 'on the cloud', and everything can be compiled there and saved in pdf format.
Answer: Once you have miktex installed, there are two different latex IDEs you can use.  TexNICcenter is a nice freeware package and WinEdt is shareware but is also quite decent.
Both of these are more customizable than TeXWorks (the default editor that comes with miktex)
Comment: +1 for naming MiKTeX plus TexNICcenter, that combination has been my choice for years now. Would you mind to link the different Tools/Editors to the webpages?
Comment: I also use this combination (Miktex + WinEdt), and haven't come across any issues.
Answer: TeXworks is a great cross-platform, free and open-source editing environment. On Windows it works great, and has a built-in previewer which my previous editing setup with WinEdt did not have.
My most productive setup is having the editor in a window in one half of the monitor, and the previewer in a window in the other half of the monitor. Wide screens make this real nice; you can preview an entire page legibly.
Answer: On Windows I prefer using TeXlipse plug-in for Eclipse. Not WYSIWYG but looks quite convenient for me.

(screen-shot taken from the TeXlipse site)
Answer: For new LaTeX users on Windows, I recommend the proTeXt bundle. It contains the MiKTeX distribution, TeXnicCenter as an editor (both of which have been mentioned here before), and a few other things like Ghostscript, which is software for processing PostScript (*.ps) files. (TeXworks, another editor, is included, too, since it comes along with MiKTeX.)
The biggest plus for an unexperienced user, however, is the included pdf manual (here's an outdated version of it) that leads you through the entire installation step by step. So all you need to do is download one (admittedly large) file and there you go.
Even though it seems alluring in the beginning, I don't recommend using WYSIWYG software for LaTeX. In my understanding, one of the core ideas of LaTeX is about being able to focus on the content rather than the form. You tell LaTeX "This is a chapter heading" and LaTeX takes care of what it'll look like. You tell LaTeX "I'll end this paragraph here" and LaTeX takes care of all the line breaks, hyphenation points and whatnot. While you're writing, you don't have to worry about what your document will look like; it's all about the structure. Once you want to customize your documents a bit further, LyX will likely get you into trouble, that's at least my impression from briefly trying it out and reading questions about it here on tex.sx.
Answer: I'd actually suggest using pandoc. Pandoc converts input from one format to another, and considering markdown is about as human friendly format as one can get (it is, in fact, in use on this very site), you get beautifully typeset documents from a very, very easy to read and write format with the assistance of pandoc and TeX. And if need be, you can get other ouput formats from your very same input (say, a HTML-file for example).
Answer: You can install the Texlive distribution and an editor such as TeXniccenter or even Emacs+Auctex.
Answer: Since you're looking for something WYSIWYG-like, I know two approaches:

LyX is a document processor but WYSIWYM (alread mentioned by other users)
GNU TeXmacs (not yet mentioned) is a free WYSIWYW document processor with TeX export and plugins for Maple, Mathematica, Maxima, Matlab, Axiom, GraphVIZ, GNUplot and more. The latest version has been released in Oct 2008 though (1.0.7).
Answer: I would go with TeXmaker. I am quite happy and comfortable. Give that I used TeXnic Center, I'd personally recommend, TeXmaker.
Here is a link to TeXmaker.
Enjoy the experience with $\LaTeX$.
Answer: I would not go for a wysiwyg solution. It seems to be easier on the beginning but as soon as you get familiar with the syntax then you realize how much faster you can go with an IDE.
On windows I usually go with the TeXnicCenter/MikTeX combo.
Answer: If you want a fully WYSIWYG solution and you are willing to invest money, Scientific Word is also a choice.


Does qin1 cai4 translate to bok choy?

Question: I'm pretty sure celery is 芹菜. qin2 cai4
I heard people referring to bok choy as qin cai as well, but I believe it was qin1 cai4. Is this correct? When I look up bok choy, it is 白菜 bai2cai4 which sounds phonetically similar to bok choy.
Comment: what this mean pakchoy?
what this mean bokchoy?
Why?
what the different pakchoy and bokchoy?
Answer: You probably mean qing1 cai4 (青菜). It is used for green vegetables in general, but is also used for Chinese cabbage.
现代汉语规范词典 has this to say:
1.
名
一般指小白菜或油菜。
2.
名
泛指蔬菜。
小白菜 is typically translated as Chinese cabbage or bak choy in dictionaries and also used like this in  many places in China, in other places people often mean baby bak choy when they use 小白菜.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_cabbage#Commercial_variants_of_Chinensis has this to say:
Baby Pak choi, Shanghai Pak choi, or mei quin choi (Chinese: 上海白菜; pinyin: Shànghǎi báicài; Japanese: 青梗菜, chingensai) refers to greener varieties where the varioles are also green. It is simply a less-mature version that could develop into the white-stemmed variety with more time to grow before being harvested. In Shanghai and other eastern China provinces, it is simply called qīngcài (青菜; literally blue/green vegetable) or qīngjiāngcài (青江菜; literally "blue/green river vegetable").
Answer: 芹菜 is celery.
小白菜 is not actually bok choy.  The proper English name is "baby bok choy".  Bok choy is a much larger vegetable that looks a little bit like a head of lettuce.  It doesn't come in the form of individual stalks and one bok choy weighs a couple of pounds.
Comment: As theGoose mentioned, it depends on where in China you are. In many places 小白菜 really means bak choy and not baby bak choy.
Answer: bok choy in Mandarin (Northern part of China) saying is 小白菜 (baby bok choy). The north don't just say bok choy, it's always added a 小 (baby, little, small) before anything else. That's their culture of saying things than the Cantonese at the southern part of China. The Cantonese saying is just the two words bok choy or 白菜子. The 子 at the end means 'baby,little, small, tiny' refer to as 小 (baby, small) in Mandarin. Mandarin put the '小, baby, little' at the beginning of the phrase while the Cantonese leave it at the end of the phrase. It all ended up the same meaning, it just reverse it.
Answer: qin1 cai4 means 青菜 or 小白菜.
some people used to say qin1 cai4
I'd like call it 小白菜.
白菜 is bigger than 小白菜

Does qin1 cai4 translate to bok choy?


should the chain be uniformly tight on a fixie?

Question: I have a Continuum fixie. I try to tighten the chain and in some areas the chain is nice and tight and when I rotate the pedals in other areas the chain is loose.  My question is should I be happy with it being tight in some areas and not in others?
Thanks
Sheila
Comment: Beware not to tighten the chain so that it has some overtight positions. Always tighten it in its "tightest" position (or solve the problem away with some of the given answers, if possible)
Answer: A little bit of variation is normal, yes. If the chain is so loose at the loose point that the chain falls off I'd call that a manufacturing or assembly defect and take the bike back to where you bought it and get them to fix it.
In more detail the issue is exactly centering the chainring on the bottom bracket/crank, where normally the chainring is not perfectly round or perfectly centred. You can often tweak this a little by slightly loosening the chainring bolts and using the tiny amount of play between the chainring and spider to get a slightly better fit. Loosen the bolts, rotate the crank to the tightest point, pull on the chain to shift the chainring, repeat. You'll almost certainly not be able to entirely fix the problem, but you will probably be able to reduce it.
Comment: You should add that this sort of issue is *completely normal* on a fixed gear bike and is not a cause for concern unless there is a quite large difference between chain tension at the tight spot and loose spot.
Answer: Some irregularity is not surprising. Lower-priced components are more prone to this than more expensive ones, but that is not a big problem providing the chain is not so slack as to fall off or climb over the cog's teeth, neither too tight that it binds the drivetrain, even slightly.
From my experience (fixed and motorcycle) there can be three causes of this symptom:

Off-center chainring (most common);
Off-center sprocket (my current low-end fixie);
Unevenly worn chain (common with motorcycle I had);

Unevenly worn chain is rare, and might occur if you ride a lot having lubricated only part of it. The non-lubed section will wear out faster. Another possibility would be to have a chain reassembled from different chains, but that would be very exceptional.
For the chainring case, the answer provided by Kohi, also mentioned by Sheldon Brown, is the way to go.
Before doing so, it is important to check if the culprit is not the SPROCKET instead of the chainring. By turning the bike upside down and spinning the rear wheel slowly (beware of your fingers on the drivetrain!), watch if the stretching and slacking frequency matches the crank revolutions or the wheel revolutions. If it matches the wheel's, then the sprocket is off-center and the eccentricity cannot be eliminated. In this case, discover the wheel position that is tighter, and adjust the chain slack in that position.
As a final note, when I first installed my crank, I tried to center the ring by loosening the bolts, just to discover that the ring didn't move at all: it was already precisely "seated" in the spider. If it wasn't perfectly centered, it would not be possible to center it using this method (or at least without filing away some metal). Just to make it clear, it was (and still is) the sprocket that was a bit off-center.
Hope this helps!


How to add fruit to beer

Question: What is the best way to add fruit to a beer? I'm afraid boiling it will break down the fruit too much (a muslin bag could fix this I guess), but I'm not sure how to add it to the fermenter without contaminating the beer. I suppose this answer could depend on the fruit, too (bananas, blueberries, cranberries, oranges...)
Comment: You could use canned fruit puree`, I am using vinters harvest canned puree`, no risk of contamination.
Answer: You generally want to add fruit to the secondary fermentation.  At this point, you already have alcohol that can help ward off any meanies hiding in your fruit.  I am having trouble finding a source for this but I remember from a course I took that adding fruit to the primary will add more fruit smell and secondary would add more flavor.  The smell part might be wrong but adding during the secondary definitely imparts more flavor.
As far as sanitation before hand, you have a few options.  Give the fruit a rinse and any prep it needs (cubing, peeling, etc) and decide whether you would like to heating it, freeze it, or just add it.  They all have their own downsides.  Obviously just adding it has the biggest risk of infection, but I have done it successfully with great results.  Freezing is an option (and I usually do this to allow me to save some fruit for later if I want to do multiple additions) but I don't think it actually kills all of the meanies, just puts them into hibernation.  Heating for 10 minutes or so should be good.  The downside to boiling is that you will have pectins, which will create a hazy beer.  Which is fine if you are making a wheat anyway.
Comment: "Freezing does slow down the microbes that cause food to spoil, but it's pretty much useless for killing dangerous bugs." http://www.npr.org/blogs/thesalt/2013/04/04/176242166/freezing-food-doesnt-kill-e-coli-and-other-germs
Answer: It depends on what you're doing really. Adding fruit can be risky as there is always a chance of contamination.
I've made fruit beers before and didn't want to boil them and lose a bunch of flavor. So instead I opted to freeze the fruit, and then slowly thaw it out in the fridge. Now keep in mind that freezing will not guarantee no contamination, but it will reduce the risk. At this point I added it during secondary fermentation. This helps reduce the risk of contamination because all of the fermentable sugars have been eaten, and there's less in there for bad bugs to eat.
If you're really skiddish about adding raw fruit to your beer, but don't want to sacrifice much in the way of flavor, add your fruit during the last 5 minutes of the boil.
Comment: Freezing will also help the flavors get out of the fruit and into the beer.  The water inside the cells of the fruit will crystallize and expand, bursting the cell walls.  This essentially mashes the fruit from the inside out.
Answer: If you're looking to add real fruit to any brew you'll want to do so in secondary to get the most flavor. I've had really good success in taking my fruit of choice and pureeing it in a food processor with little vodka - about 1/4 cup per 2lb of fruit seems a good balance.
The vodka will help kill off any additional bugs that may have made it past washing the fruit, but won't add hardly any alcohol or off flavors to the beer itself. That process worked amazingly will for a mixed berry saison I brewed this past spring.
Answer: We did some fruit pale ales last year with dehydrated fruit. We have a dehydrator and dried the fruit at 165 to kill off baddies and sealed it up till use. We did pineapple, kiwis, strawberries and chili peppers, non had any infection, even 6 months after. So it's an idea.
Also the strawberry tasted amazing!
Answer: I have always just added the fruit to secondary.  I cleaned the fruit, but did not boil it or otherwise try to sanitize it.
The alcohol content in the beer (which will be present when adding the fruit in secondary) should make it difficult for the little buggers to grow.
I have had some issues with infection, especially when doing this with strawberries.  These issues have come about after a couple of months, though, so if you drink it quickly, it should be fine.  Essentially, you get a shorter shelf-life, but if you enjoy your creation soon after making it, you should be fine.
Comment: Though I use strawberries in the boil (and this does add to the cloudiness and detracts from the flavor), I have noticed a significant decrease in fruit flavor after 2 months or so.  My perspective is that especially for strawberries, you don't want to age it.
Answer: If you are really worried about it, you could use fruit extract.  I've done that and wasn't crazy about the flavor.  I made a cherry wit a few weeks ago and I froze my cherries and thawed them in the fridge.  I then added them to a muslin bag at the same time I moved to secondary.
Comment: Along these lines, I wanted to add some grapefruit to a pale ale, but I wanted no risk of contamination so I used some Simply Grapefruit juice. I figured since it was pasteurized, there was little risk involved.
Answer: I like the method described by Dogfish Heads Sam Calagione in the book Extreme Brewing
Method is to do a fruit addition and rest during the wort chill
Chill to 170° and hold for 20 minutes. The book has a nice road map for most popular fruits and their slight temp and time differences. This method is nice as it sanitizes the fruit but doesn't cook it and let's the fruit contribute to the fermentables and giving more fruit profile than a secondary frozen addition.
I've tried the method once but unfortunately I had a defective fermentor and never got a taste.
Answer: I've never had a problem with infection when adding raspberries to the secondary with my chocolate raspberry stout, but by then, the alcohol was at nearly 8%. I usually add about 3# fresh or previously frozen for a crisp, subtle flavor that paired beautifully with the chocolate. It aged in the bottle very well, as the berry flavor stayed intact. I wonder, though, if adding frozen berries to the wort at flameout would bring good results as well, in addition to aiding the speed of the cooling process?
Answer: My friend who made a kick ass imperial cider told me that he baked about 5 pounds of apple slices in the oven, then immediately put them in the freezer for 24 hours.  Then plopped them in the secondary for 2-3 more weeks.  It turned out awesome!
So now I'm going that route. Although I'm not making a cider, I needed to add about 1.5 pounds of apples to my Chai Beer.  So I'm doing it this way.  It's called "Make Them Chai Slowly"....yeah, a little wordy.
Answer: I would try different times/techniques with different fruits. One of my favorite things to do is when I'm trying different things, to split the batch into two 2.5 gal batches so I can compare and contrast. I would definitely say secondary is best. But on how much, whether to freeze/sanitize, etc. take a look at my fruit experiments here. Just don't be afraid to try it! http://brewingoutofbounds.blogspot.c...r-already.html
Answer: I did a small batch of Pale Ale + Fruit in January.  I made a smooth puree and pasteurized it by heating on the stove to 80C and holding that temp for 30 minutes.  I put the puree in the secondary and racked the beer onto it.
I had a fairly vigorous secondary fermentation as the us-05 chewed through all my fruit sugars.  This took away almost all of the fruit flavor I was trying to impart, but made an interesting beer.
Next time I will use flavor extract.  I really wanted to use real fruit, but I feel that this is probably the only way to get the flavor I want.  Silver Cloud Estates seems to be a popular source for beer flavor extracts.
Answer: I make an apricot and raspberry ale and add the fruit right after the boil. I would never have done this but a master brewer at Norther Brewer said that's the way he always does it. His apricot ale has won many 1st-3rd place awards. I changed it up a bit but it now seems perfect. 5lbs at flame out/boil end for a lot of flavor and aroma. 3lbs at flame out if you want less flavor and aroma. The temperature is hot enough to kill all the nasties. It's over 160F and it really works great. The heat really pulls out the flavor and aroma fast plus it kills bacteria.... I have never had any negative issues. The only thing that you have to do is filter out the fruit when pouring your wort into your carboy! Don't make the mistake I made the first time I did this with raspberries. I didn't puree them and the seeds were sitting at the bottom of my bottles! It was still delicious but what a pain. They mostly sat in the sediment but pouring slow helped. Freezing will do nothing for the bad stuff but boost the flavor. Boiling will cause loss of flavor, aroma and cloudiness. Drop your puree in at the end and you will have very clear, "nasty" free brew. Also, with strawberries, no cloudiness! Basically, your fruit will be added so early you won't have the mess in your second carboy and very clear brew. Just a different idea! Good luck and happy brewing.

How to add fruit to beer


Archetypes in powered mtg-cube

Question: What archetypes are most common/popular to include in powered cubes (preferably size 540)?
Answer: Mono-Red. Aggressive creatures and burn.
White Weenie. Aggressive creatures, cheap removal and equipment.
Mono-Black Aggro. Aggressive creatures, removal and discard.
U/W Control. Counterspells, board wipes, removal, card draw and a few big finishers.
5-Color Control. Like U/W but with more powerful spells and mana-fixing.
Reanimator. Put fatties in the graveyard and then reanimate them cheaply and quickly. This requires some card draw and filtering to go off reliably. This deck often contains removal and permission like a control deck, too.
Ramp. Spend your early turns putting extra lands on the battlefield and playing mana rocks. Then, start dropping fatties before your opponent can.
Storm Combo. Draw through your deck quickly, upping your storm count until you finish your opponent with Grapeshot or Empty the Warrens.
Land Destruction. Play mana rocks early and then cripple your opponent with a spell like Armageddon or Jokulhaups.

Archetypes in powered mtg-cube


Katakana changes

Question: The katakana changes with time, and so recently they introduced the "v" "ヴ", and I'd like to know if there's a possibility they'll add letters like "si" "セィ" or something similar in the future? Do the Japanese government has some plans for that or not?
Comment: @Nate: Yes, sort of, but it is not accepted as widely as ヴ.
Comment: "Si" already exists as スィ.
Answer: There are no plans that I know of, but I would be surprised if Katakana (and even Hiragana) does not change over time. Writing systems tend to change with time, to better reflect natural changes in the languages they represent. So the real question should probably be whether there will be a change soon.
And maybe there will be change soon, since already some Japanese can perfectly distinguish between [si] and [shi], snd it seems like the Japanese government isn't too conservative about small changes to the gairaigo spelling rules.
Anyway, I'm not sure that there is a definite answer to your question. Unless the Ministry of Education (which is in charge of these things, AFAIK) is working on a solution right now, everything we can say is just speculation.
Answer: I'd be surprised if the カタカナ didn't change at all; they changes with 日本語 to better express 日本語. Sounds like スィ and ウィ likely arose due to a need to better express how a borrowed word is pronounced in the original language.
Over time, 日本語 and カタカナ will undoubtedly change to suit possible new sounds and language constructs as people need to express new things. I agree with Yaniv; it isn't a question of whether it will change, but when or if it will change soon.

Katakana changes


Why does Kies tell me that my Galaxy S has no updates?

Question: Why does Samsung Kies tell me that my Galaxy S GT-i9000 has no OS or firmware updates even though there are downloads available on the internet?
Comment: What "downloads on the internet" are you referring to?  What version of Android is your phone running?
Answer: If by "downloads available" you mean a OS upgrade, that is because those are not official releases, and since Kies is an official Samsung application they do not provide unofficial releases.
Currently, the last official release for the Samsung Galaxy S is Android 2.2 Froyo.
If you are referring to "official releases" and your OS is < 2.2, then you can have some variant system, for which there is no firmware upgrade, or you can have some problems with a not-up-to-date Kies version.
Also, check this thread out!
Answer: Because the updates that Kies offers you depend from whom and where you bought your phone. If you bought the phone in a shop, you purchased normally a country or region specific version. These versions get the update from Samsung one by one. For the Galaxy S you can lookup the release status here.
If you purchased your phone together with an carrier contract, chances are that you have an branded firmware. Then it's the carrier decision when to release an update. You normally also get a reduced set of functionality on branded firmware, like disabled tethering.
The firmware images that you find on the net are mostly leaked pre-version of the upcoming update.


Why doesn't my garage door close?

Question: I have a genie medallion garage door opener. The door opens with the remote but won't close. The wall unit is not working. Not seeing any lights on the sensor, and I just replaced the sensors. I checked the wiring, which looks good.
Comment: See: [this answer](http://diy.stackexchange.com/a/13182/2196)
Answer: Since you've just replaced the sensors, that's where I'd start looking for problems. When you say "I checked the wiring, which looks good.", I'm not sure what that means. While physically examining the wire and connections is a good start, you might have to get out your trusty multimeter and take some readings.
Start by listening to the opener. If you press the button and the motor turns on then off, that means the opener is receiving proper signals from the opener.  If the motor makes no noise, start by checking the opener button and the opener itself.
If it does make noise, start by making sure the door is free in the tracks. Disengage the opener from the door; which is often done by pulling a small plastic handle attached to a rope, and verify that you can manually open and close the door with little resistance.
Check the manufacturers documentation for both the opener and the new sensors, and verify that they are compatible with each other. Also check the openers documentation for error code description and method of display, and troubleshooting steps.  If the sensors on my system detect an object in the way when the door wants to close, the opener flashes the main light 3 times.
Take a closer look at the devices (sensors and opener), and note the voltages, amperage, and resistances involved. Then use your multimeter to verify that the sensors are sending the proper signals to the opener.
If the sensors check out, you'll want to do the same procedure with the opener button.  Make sure the button sends the proper signals for both the up, and down commands.
Once all sensors and switches have been investigated, it's time to look at the opener itself.  Check the control board for visible damage, loose wiring, bad/blown fuses, incorrectly toggled dip switches, or other obvious faults. Use your multimeter to verify all electrons are in their proper locations, and that they flow from one place to another as they should.
Answer: Clean the sensors with rubbing alcohol and a rag as well as making sure that are correctly aligned. When I bought my new $300+ garage door opener a year back the sensors were completely defective. I had clean them every time I left to get the garage to close. I finally removed them and put the old ones back on and am still using my original 13+ year old light sensors. I didn't try it at the time but its possible that the positive and negative wires are reversed and causing this.

Why doesn't my garage door close?


How to shoot whales?

Question: I'm going whale watching with a Pentax K5, I'm thinking of using a Pentax 60-250mm f/4 ED DA* SDM lens only as I don't want to change lenses while out at sea. Do you have any suggestions for shooting settings, lenses, etc?
Comment: Isn't shooting whales illegal in most places?
Comment: It probably is in Wales.
Answer: Except in low light at end/beginning of day it's not too demanding.
Lens sounds good.
Most whales are bigger than most birds (you'd hope) so 250mm is big enough as long as regulations and whale availability allow close approach.
Whales move slower than birds so for most purposes the setup is not too critical and you can use smaller aperture to get good depth of field. Fast action can happen at the transition points - broaching / diving/ spouting so be prepared to take multiple frames per second at these points.
Have some fast access protection to lens and camera can be covered and uncovered instantly. I had  a lens and camera both destroyed during a whale & dolphin spotting trip - although I'm pretty sure that the captain "being funny" played a part.
Dolphins may happen - more speed than whales and if they plane at bow or jump in and out of surface around hull at speed them somewhat higher shutter speed is useful.
While looking for whales, do keep an eye on the birds.
If dolphins then quite probably fish, and so also diving birds. Some of these assume the most amazing tucked in shapes just before impact. They are so fast that the eye does not discern what is happening and high shutter speed and good judgement is necessary to catch them just before and transiting surface at high speed.
Photo below is a Gannet at 1/750s. Normally large fluffyish birds, they turn into something approaching a javelin as they enter the water. This is about 15% of a 12 Mp frame. While the photo quality leaves much to be desired it's the best I've ever seen subject-wise of a tucked in Gannet just before water entry. (There are many many prettier ones on web, but none so spear-like). If you were specifically looking for something like this you may well do better. (That trip we say 1 Whale, maybe 100 Dolphins, countless Gannets.
Bad but unusual Gannet photo:

Somewhat pointed reference to Imgur removed. They have clarified their copyright position and have said in writing that their blanket ownership of rights to material posted on their public system does not extend to the Stack Exchange system. This clarification on their part is most welcome.

Are you ready?
Adding to Gapton's answer on always being prepared for the unexpected shot that you may miss if you blink -
Having your camera ready is essential in any action situation. Whales are generally slower than Wildebeest, but it's still a shame to miss the moment as a broaching whale arcs over and kersplashes back into the water with great spectacle. I've only seen this from a distance (shore watching, Kaikoura) where APSC + 500mm is not really enough - but it applies in many situations. [My sole sea spotted whale was very sedentary].
Most DSLRs will drop back into standby after a presettable period. I usually operate mine at minimum delay (typically 1 minute) to conserve battery life. In situations when action may spring on you at any moment (especially if it's a Leopard :-) ) then setting standby timeout to as long as possible may be useful. Tapping the shutter button (half pressure) keeps the camera awake when  action is happening.
Wakeup-time makes a difference. Sony do not seem to have realised that 0.1 second power on is a very useful feature and my A77 crawls into life over what feels like one second+. Less probably. My older Minoltas were faster. When lifting the camera from a bag or from slung position I tap the shutter button as the very first action so that the camera wiill be alive by the time I am ready for it.
Contingency shot:
An obvious but useful thing to do is to take the first photo that you can of a new event absolutely as soon as you can, and THEN think about what you want to do. I call this my "contingency shot" (tip of hat to Neil Armstrong & co) and in enough cases to make it worthwhile, the first photo in an action sequence turns out the to be the best. Sometimes the 'contingency shot' is the only photo I get. Do let the camera focus before actually taking the shot though.
Comment: Is there an expurgated version? I don't like gannets...
Comment: @StanRogers - of the post or of the photo. I have lots of photos with just a splash where the Gannet was a few mS beforehand. My whale photos are even less remarkable. Dolphin photos are so so but none condescended to assume a javelin shape.
Comment: It was just a Marty Feldman/Monty Python reference (the Bookshop Sketch).
Comment: — copyright policy has been officially clarified. See http://meta.stackexchange.com/a/151459/154627. In short, Imgur's normal terms are irrelevant, and the Stack Exchange content license applies. That means that although you certainly retain copyright, you are putting the image under CC-BY-SA by posting it here (i.e, the same terms of service as your text).
Comment: @mattdm - Thanks for the reference. I hadn't seen the by Sarah on October 15th. She sauid "Imgur and Stack Exchange have an agreement whereby Imgur does NOT maintain the ability to sublicense content uploaded to SE." That's excellent. | CC by SA I'm happy with - I can choose to upload or not on that basis. Open slather was not so good. Not that many are liable to want anything OI'd upload  :-). But ...
Comment: @StanRogers - Added to my education that did. Probably negatively, mind. ["The Bookshop skit"](http://www.inprint.co.uk/thebookguide/bookshop-skit.htm) they call it. Can't say I was ever a great M. Python fan, alas. Closes so many doors to you that does. Nothing like knowing one's M.P to be in with the in crowd. Alas. Mind you, some of those closed doors do look quite attractive in that state. I'm suitably jealous at what a bit on inanity can do for one. Look at Michael P - off all over the world on paid travels and all. Too late to start liking them now I suppose. More's the better, probably.
Answer: Funny enough, I did just that last February with a K5...
Use TAv mode and set a high shutter speed with a good aperture (at least f/8) for depth of field, let the camera pick ISO. Then put the camera in high speed mode and go for the rapid sequential shots. Don't chimp, you might miss a shot, like I did with a whale breach that was maybe 30 feet behind our boat. You either got it or you didn't, looking won't change that.
I think you might find longer reach more useful. I was out with a Sigma 120-400mm and a few times the far end was used. Still, if they're plentiful, you'll get your chances easily with the 250mm. Probably depends on the whale, we were looking at humpbacks off the coast of Maui.

How to shoot whales?


Common login for websites belonging in different networks

Question: Is there a tool to connect the databases of 2 sites sitting on separate networks with one login allowing them to share a common user base?
I have searched around, but I unable to find a clear answer or a way to be done.
Answer: In case if you are looking for a single sign-on (SSO) solution, take a look at onelogin (paid of course).
A workaround would be to use oauth based sign-up allowing logins which are already centralized  (a bit similar to how stackexchange sites work).
Answer: either, there is one solution which I have not tried yet as I also want to achieve the same. What you can do is you can implement any plugin for user registration, but then you have to mantain the wp-users table in database yourself.
For ex. If Site A and Site B are there and user registers on Site A then you have to manually take entries from Site A's wp-user table and put it into Site B's wp-users table.
Someone told me that there is some - Crone Job Script that can do this for you after a specific regular interval of time.
PS. I asked the same on Quora a while ago, where someone answere this for me.


SharePoint Layered Architecture App

Question: Do you use enterprise layer architecture when creating SharePoint solutions ?
Can you give me a codeplex.com/other site project as example, where I can find a layered design ?  (Interface/BL/DAL)
Comment: A well-designed "starter template" such as that provided when you create a new ASP.NET MVC project would be **so useful** for SharePoint!
Answer: I use layered architecture in all my SharePoint solutions and treat SharePoint generally as the UI layer, keeping it very thin. Any logic goes into the business model and I have DAL wrappers to abstract away the List infrastructure (which also helps with testing).
For a good read on layered architecture in ASP.NET check out this article here. It's ASP.NET and NHibernate, but the principles are the same. There's also a layered architecture sample in .NET here on CodePlex. Again, not SharePoint specific but the principles are the same.
Keep the SharePoint UI thin and resist the temptation to start reading/writing to lists in your web part code. Treat it like a database (because it is!)
Answer: Agree with Bil.
Web parts, web controls, application pages etc should only be the UI layer that calls into a layer that is agnostic of the original calling context; calling context could be an event receiver, console application, timer job, workflow, etc. Always ensure that this shared layer you call into does not have a dependency on SPContext.Current since it isn't always there! Accept SPWebs, SPLists, SPLisItems etc as method parameters and constructor parameters. In a web context you can pass these from the SPContext.Current, but in a Console Application you would construct these yourself.
To improve ease of debugging (just press F5) and shorten the developer feedback cycle, I often start off writing a simple Console Application which calls into the layer that will contain the core logic, passing in an SPWeb which I constructed in the Console Application. Once the core logic is finished, I write a thin WebControl or WebPart to replace the Console app, read the SPWeb from the context instead of constructing it, set up event handlers etc.
Answer: To Bil and Jaap (or anyone else),
I'm wondering what type of objects/interfaces you pass between the layers?  Do you pass back a SPListItem or do you pass back some kind of interface that represents the SPListItem?
SharePoint is a strange beast because the user actually has the ability to change the data structure via the web interface (they can add/remove/modify columns in a list).  If you pass back a object/interface, every time a list is modified by a user, the code would need to be recompiled (and deployed) to accommodate the new column (property).  If you pass back the SPListItem, you in effect break the Layer by allowing direct access to the data source (SharePoint).
Comment: @Jay: You should ask this as a new question. That way you will get the widest audience and people can upvote the best answer for you. Thanks and welcome to SharePoint Overflow! :-)

SharePoint Layered Architecture App


Weird network issues with Lion

Question: I recently bought a MacBook Air with Lion. I have had many issues since, especially when connecting to the internet through "open" wifi networks that redirect you to a login page in the browser (i.e., where you need to authenticate in-browser, not through some WEP, WPA or 802.1X thing); what follows has occurred with at least two distinct such networks.
Here's a list of the weird things that happen:

Can only login to the network using Firefox; not with Safari or Chrome.
When using Safari or Chrome (after logging in to the network using Firefox), I can only visit fairly "regular" sites; most https services (Gmail, Facebook, ...) just won't load.
Most annoyingly (I could just switch to Firefox to "solve" the above issues), other apps such as Mail.app or Twitter won't work. Mail and Safari even freeze quite often (I need to kill them to quit), and Safari won't even load anymore after being killed - I need to restart the Mac to have it "work" again.

My system is quite new and "clean", although I did copy documents and settings from an older Snow Leopard MacBook. I tried creating a new user to override any non-default settings I might have been using, to no avail.
Any ideas about what's going on?
Comment: also, apparently when using webmail services like Gmail (on Firefox, of course…) I'm unable to attach files to an email.
Seriously considering downgrading to Snow Leopard. Please help!
Answer: Make sure you don't have any network proxy settings - you might want to try creating a totally new 'location' in System Preferences -> Networks, select AirPort, click Advanced, then make sure that none of the Proxies are checked.
Comment: does the same thing happen if you create a new user, reboot, log in as the new user?

Weird network issues with Lion


Are there any alternate communication methods in Modern Warfare 2?

Question: How do you communicate with your teammate without a microphone? Is there a kind of body language that players use?
Comment: On which system do you play? Xbox360, Playstation 3, PC?
Comment: Note to self on MW2 body language: even if an enemy player appears to be looking to the side, they're actually still looking right at you and *will* kill you. >.>
Comment: @alexanderpas. I added a tag.
Answer: There isn't any way to do that.  However, I do know of clans which practice regularly and hence know each other's moves and styles.  They often set up signals such as movement patterns and seemingly random bursts of gun fire, to give each other quick information (for those who don't have a mic).  I've seen this before and I was pretty amazed.  But the short answer is, other than morse code and an RPD, you don't have much in the way of means of communication without a mic on a console.
Answer: I've had to resort to a cell phone conference call when a teammate's mic broke.  Using speakerphone or a headset, it's basically equivalent to a mic, especially if you have an easily accessible mute button.  Most cell phone plans now a days offer unlimited talk after a certain time or mobile to mobile to it's not a big deal minute wise.
I use Sit Rep Pro a lot and can therefore can see explosives through walls.  When there is a teammate next to me that I don't know, I typically just start shooting at the wall next to the doorway and most of the time they understand and don't blow themselves up.  That's much easier than trying to read their gamertag and yell out a distinctive enough landmark so they'll understand that you're talking to them.


Electric engine transmission

Question: If we compare a petrol engine and an electric engine car, it is sufficient for the electric engine car (e.g Tesla Roadster) just to have 1 gear (forward), whereas petrol engine can have up to 7.
Why is it sufficient for the electric engine to have a single gear? Is it because it can deliver the required torque always?
Answer: Yes, electric motors can always deliver the required torque. What really matters is the efficiency of the conversion. Over a long range of speeds, the motors may convert 90 percent of the energy to its mechanical form. You know, it's just some electromagnetic fields that may become arbitrarily stronger - depending on how much energy is sent into them - and that always do the required work.
On the other hand, petrol engines are only highly efficient over a relatively narrow interval of the number of revolutions per minute (RPM) of the engine. It takes a certain time for the fuel to get burned or explode, for the pressure to spread in the cylinders, and whatever else needs to be done in each cycle. Moreover, at too high frequencies, the motor could get overheated and damaged, among other things. That's why petrol engines want to keep the number of RPM relatively constant and a gearbox is needed to translate the fixed frequency of the motor to a variable speed of the car.
Answer: Any kind of motor will have a characteristic relation of torque to speed of rotation. Typically at any speed, there is a maximum torque available from the motor.
With combustion engines, the shape of the torque-vs-speed curve is fixed (afaik) and the engine must be operated at significant speed in order to deliver enough power to be effective at moving the car. Since the load conditions vary widely from stopped to cruising at top speed, it's necessary to add a device, the multi-gear transmission, to mechanically transform power at the engine's preferred speed/torque ratio to power at the load's required speed/torque ratio.
Meanwhile, the torque-vs-speed curve of electric motors can be dynamically changed, by alteration of the field strength and commutation angle inside the motor. This means that with modern power electronics, the electric motor can be reconfigured at will, so as to grind out large torques at low speeds, or smaller torques at high speed, to efficiently deliver mechanical power that is already at the correct speed/torque ratio, obviating the need for a mechanical transmission.
Answer: Another important point is that the combustion engine not only has a favored RPM range, but also a favoed output range. If the vehicle is moving at a given speed, but needs little or no torque to maintain speed (say on a slight downhill), the engine is still turning, and various dissapative processes (friction of engine parts, and gas being moved in pistoms etc.), so
efficiency during very low torque conditions is low. At low RPMs, heat loss via conduction through cylinder walls grows as a percentage of the heat of combustion, lowering efficiency.
All told, the relative efficiency between these two types of propulsion will be highly dependent upon the driving cycle. Are there lots of starts and stops (or up hill/down hill)? That would favor electric. If the need for is steady continuous power, the internal combustion engine can be tuned for those conditions (load and RPM), and sized for that level of power, rather than for rapid acceleration, and will look much better.

Electric engine transmission