I'm trying to identify a Scifi/Fantasy novel book I read about 10 years ago, some time in the early to mid 2000s   I think there are more books about this setting (I think I read two) Protagonist is not human, belongs to an alien species (but looks human - I think) He has to prove himself worthy in an maze-like trial with a lot of different levels (including deadly traps and fights) There are a lot of references to these trials He has excellent combat/survival skills  He uses a "ship" to travel through dimensions, visiting other worlds/dimensions Works as a spy(?) and has a hidden agenda    Story-related    At some point he visits a machine-powered world inhibited by dwarf-like creatures  I think the dwarfs work mostly to retain functionality of their (maybe floating) world He/it rescues some inhabitants from destruction and travels with them in his ship  He/it has a conflicted personality, although he rescues some of the creatures he is not stereo-typically "good" (e.g. he doesn't prevent fights among them caused by the long journey in a small vessel).
I'm trying to identify fantasy book series I encountered some time ago. Here are things I remember:   it was a fantasy setting but with some s-f elements; with many worlds and possibility to travel between them; resembling  setting a little, the two main races were non-human and probably hostile to each other,  a labyrinth (?), which somehow played an important role in the plot, a protagonist was some kind of emissary and was sent on a mission to another worlds  time period: 80s - 90s    Does anyone know what it is the name of the series?
LIGO has announced the detection of gravitational waves on 11 Feb, 2016. I was wondering why the detection of gravitational waves was so significant?   I know it is another confirmation of general relativity (GR), but I thought we had already confirmed GR beyond much doubt. What extra stuff would finding gravitational waves teach us? Is the detection of gravitational waves significant in and of itself, or is there data which can be extracted from the waves which will be more useful? I process all my photos to black and white. Although I use a polariser where possible, I often find myself wanting to drop the luminance of the sky further which I do using a Black and White adjustment layer (in Photoshop). This usually results in a lighter halo following the line of the horizon, where the blues of the sky meet whatever the colour of the land is.  My current solution to this problem is to run a brush along this margin with a colour set to the same as the sky and the blend-mode set to Darken. This effectively paints in the lighter band with the sky colour while not laying down the colour on top of the darker horizon. Whilst this is effective, it is very time consuming.  Is there a better approach to dealing with these halos?  Here is a video that illustrated the Darken solution that I mention: How to create a progress bar? Is $f(x,y)=(xy)^{2/3}$ differentiable at $(0,0)$? I looked at the graph of $f(x,y)=(xy)^{2/3}$ at the origin, and no matter how far I zoom in it has four corners along $x=\pm y$, so it doesn't look like it is differentiable as $z=0$ doesn't look like a tangent plane.  I also found that its partial derivatives are not continuous at $(0,0)$, e.g.  $$ \lim_{(ky^2,y) \to (0,0)} \frac{\partial f}{\partial x} = \lim_{(ky^2,y) \to (0,0)} \frac{2}{3}x^{-\frac{1}{3}}y^{\frac{2}{3}} = \frac{2}{3}k^{-\frac{1}{3}} $$ (although $\frac{\partial f}{\partial x}(0,0) = \frac{\partial f}{\partial y}(0,0) = 0$)  I also tried to prove/disprove its differentiability by definition, and for it to be differentiable I need $$ \lim_{(x,y) \to (0,0)} \frac{f(x,y)-0}{\sqrt{x^2+y^2}} =0 $$ but then I got stuck. Am I even on the right track?  [UPDATE] I need to do the same thing for $f(x,y)=(xy)^{\frac{1}{3}}$... I think the answer is that $(xy)^{2/3}$ is differentiable but $(xy)^{1/3}$ is not, according to my professor but I'm not sure So I have been extruding a cube to make a low poly banana and when I go from edit to object mode half the edges don't appear as well as half is dark.      I tried looking for an solution couldn't find one and its making me feel like I am doing something wrong so I decided to come here. Can you make an opportunity attack against a moving object? Find probability using distribution function method Let $X_1$ and $X_2$ be two independent random variables with distribution $U(0,1)$. Let $Y=|X_1-X_2|$. Find the distribution function and density of $Y$.   Solution:  f(x1)=1 whenever x1 between 0 and 1          =0 Else where f(x2)=1 whenever x2 between 0 and 1          =0 Else where f(x1,x2)=1 whenever x1,x2 between 0 and 1           =0 Else where G(y)= P[-y &lt;= x1-x2 &lt;= y]       =\int_{-y}^y \int_{x1_y}^{y+x1} 1 dx2 dx1       =\int_{-y}^y -2y dx1       =4y^2 when y between 0 and 1       =0 when y less than 0       =1 when y greater than 1 Thus, g(y)= \diff G(y) =8y  Is it correct? How can I break on an unhandled exception in ASP.NET? When debugging an application in Visual Studio, there are 2 options for breaking on exceptions. Break as soon as an exception is thrown, and breaking only when an exception isn't caught. This works fine when developing desktop applications. However, when developing ASP.NET applications, all exceptions are eventually caught by the code in IIS.  Is it possible to disable this behavior, so that the debugger breaks when my ASP.Net application code fails to catch an exception?  Edit: Just to be clear, I don't want to break whenever an exception is thrown, as many times they are handled just fine by my code, and I don't want to stop on every exception. I only want to stop on the exceptions that aren't handled by my code.  Edit: This seems to not be an issue in Visual Studio 2008. In Visual Studio 2003, all exceptions were treated as user handled, because the ASP.NET runtime caught all the exceptions so as not to bring down the web server process. It seems that in Visual Studio 2008, this type of exception catching is not counted when checking for user-unhandled exceptions. I quite enjoy paying attention to how I design my documents and presentations. I usually spend hours thinking over and designing my slides for a workshop or presentation, so that they are aesthetically pleasing and as intuitive as possible. Likewise I recently started revising my CV I figured and I wanted to make it stand out a bit more. (Just to make it clear I don't mean making a clown of a document but just better use of colors, contrast and design elements.)  I have long wondered whether or not this is something that can backfire, since most documents in academic context are extremely plain, at least in my experience. It's very common to see the default Powerpoint slides (white bg, black arial text) or .   My question is as follows: is putting time and effort into design of academic documents something that can backfire? Will I risk being prejudged with first impressions such as "well he put much effort in the presentation his documents, perhaps because the content is sub-par"?     I realize that the question might be somewhat subjective from person to person but I encourage everyone to consider it in terms of this SE blog entry: . Imported 3D scan displays texture in editor, but renders without texture I am new to blender and I have a 3D scan of a stone tablet (which I am unfortunately not able to share, so I will try to be as detailed as possible) which was imported as OBJ and MTL files.  The editor displays the texture and mesh perfectly, but when I render the scene (pressing F12) the texture is not there.  I am trying to use blender to reduce the file size of the tablet for use in a three.js visualizer for a website.  I have tried exporting the file as a JSON file (as well as several other file formats to the same effect) for use in my three.js webapp and thought it was an issue with three.js, but after seeing that blender did not render the tablet with the texture I now believe it is an issue with my blender configuration. I am unable to find within blender or online any way to check what current resources I have displayed and what options I have with them.  I have not applied a mesh or texture to the object, but when I do so it renders with the generated texture applied in the default pink.  I am confused as to where the disconnect is between the editor and the renderer. I am still figuring out what is important and where to find all the relevant information, so any help on that regard would be very much appreciated.  Here is what blender looks like for me with the sensitive parts censored (can't be too careful these days):   I have looked at this question:  And there is no material overwriting the texture - I have not assigned a material to the tablet at all. EDIT: In regards to the duplicate answer, I looked at that one as well and the issue I have is that it doesn't have an actual texture file that I can just put on it.  The OBJ MTL files come with their own file that can't be applied directly to the model.  Blender read the OBJ MTL files and recreated the object inside blender algorithmically - and now I need to know how to get blender to tell me where that texture is and how I can get it to show up in the render.  The texture is not on my hard drive, but entirely within blender which is the issue I am having. Does an Animagus's animal form change along with their Patronus? In the two examples shown of an Animagus capable of casting a corporeal Patronus (Minerva McGonagall and James Potter) both had the same animal as their Patronus and as their Animagus animal.  Now, it is also shown that extreme circumstances can change one's Patronus. I think the only example of this was Tonks, which turned from a jackrabbit into a wolf in response for her love of Lupin.  If Tonks (or any other wizard who had their Patronus change) had been an animagus, would her animagus have changed as well? The ring $ℤ/nℤ$ is a field if and only if $n$ is prime Let $n \in ℕ$. Show that the ring $ℤ/nℤ$ is a field if and only if $n$   is prime.   Let $n$ prime. I need to show that if $\bar{a} \neq 0$ then $∃\bar b: \bar{a} \cdot \bar{b} = \bar{1}$. Any hints for this ?  Suppose $ℤ/nℤ$ is a field. Therefore: for every $\bar{a} \neq 0$ $∃\bar b: \bar{a}\cdot \bar{b}=1$. How can I show that $n$ must be prime ? if $a,b,c$ are non zero positive reals prove $$\sum_{cyc}\frac{1}{a^3+b^3+abc} \le \frac{1}{abc}$$ I have used A.M  G.M  inequality as follows:  $$a^3+b^3+c^3 \ge 3abc$$ adding $abc$ both sides we get  $$a^3+b^3+abc \ge 4abc-c^3=c(4ab-c^2)$$ so  $$\frac{1}{a^3+b^3+abc} \le \frac{1}{c(4ab-c^2)}$$ But since $a,b,c$ are positive reals  $$4abc-c^3 &lt; 4abc$$ so  $$\frac{1}{4abc-c^3} \gt \frac{1}{4abc}$$  but i am unable to proceed here How do I monitor network usage on a Windows server? Illustrator CS5 brick pattern with perspective I created a curving arrow shape that starts wide at the bottom and thins out near the top where the point is. I also created a brick pattern swatch but when I apply it to the shape it appears like the pattern is overlaid instead of like a real road where the bricks follow the shape and narrows near the most distant point. How can I apply a perspective to the brick pattern without looking like I used a clipping mask?  Here is a link to what I achieved with a clipping mask - not what I want though. I need the bricks to look like they are inlaid just like in real life. the cop (who's) escorting him One of the cops escorts Tim out of the house and toward a police car. Curious neighbors have gathered outside. Tim spits on the cop (who's) escorting him.   Is &quot;escorts&quot; the more natural choice of verb to use in this context?  Is the emboldened sentence phrased naturally without adding &quot;who's&quot;? How does the new automatic reference counting mechanism work? "What have you tried" epidemic Statistics  () In Q1 of 2012 - 0.0134 such comments per question (~1.33%) In Q2 of 2012 - 0.0167 such comments per question (~1.66%) In Q3 of 2012 - 0.0169 such comments per question (~1.68%) In Q4 of 2012 - 0.0193 such comments per question (~1.92%) In Q1 of 2013 - 0.0223 such comments per question (~2.22%)  The vast majority of these questions need serious help.  Unfortunately, there is a growing trend towards abuse Along with the good, comes some bad -- as usual in life. These comments are bad when  Posting &quot;what have you tried&quot; multiple times per question is severely obnoxious Posting &quot;what have you tried&quot; when the user has clearly shown that they have tried to solve it on their own  It is becoming increasingly common to see &quot;what have you tried?&quot; comments in these scenarios. Some examples     Workarounds Flagging Comments - It is considered a good thing to be liberal with comment flagging -- that helps us clean up after the fact. &quot;Too Chatty&quot; is a no-brainer here. Unfortunately, that only cleans up after the damage has been done. All signs point toward the continued increase of the trend of using &quot;what have you tried&quot; comments. I spend a lot of time editing and cleaning up bad questions. This trend came up on my radar toward the end of last year and it is getting worse. So, I thought at the very least that I'd raise some awareness. Design Review: 3.3V Logic to 12V Logic (Uni-directional and Bi-directional) I'm looking for feedback and improvements on my design below. Specific questions are at the end. I created this as an attempt to answer my own, . From my feedback there, it seems like I needed to be more clear in my requirements. These are screenshots from Eagle. If there's a better way to share, please let me know so I can correct it. Entire board  The overall purpose of this board is to translate between 12V logic, and 3.3V logic. The top portion of the board represents the 12V side. The LEDs are placeholders to indicate whether the 12V signal is HIGH or LOW. In practice, these would be replaced with more , requiring up to 3A. The switches are also placeholders, allowing one to manually turn the 12V signal on and off. They are only for test purposes, the &quot;real&quot; 12V signal would be coming as the output from other relays. The bottom half is the 3.3V side. This will be connected to a  (BBB). The board will connect to 2 output GPIO pins and 2 input GPIO pins of the BBB. Overall, I want to translate the 3.3V I/O from the BBB to the 12V signals on the other side (to control more relays and read their signals). I have designed 3 modules to control both directions individually, and together. 3V3_TO_12V Module  This module converts the 3.3V GPIO output from the BBB to a 12V signal on the other side. When the 3.3V signal is low, the 12V signal is low. When the 3.3V signal is high, the 12V signal is high. To do this, the 3.3V GPIO output is connect to a , which turns a  relay on and off. This switches the 12V power as output of the module to be used elsewhere. 12V_TO_3V3 Module  This module converts a 12V signal to 3.3V signal, to be read by a GPIO input from the BBB on the other side. When the 12V signal is low, the 3.3V signal is low. When the 12V signal is high, the 3.3V signal is high. To do this, the 12V signal simply turns a  relay on and off. This switches the 3.3V power to be read as input by the BBB. DUAL_12V↔3V3 Module  This module combines the previous two modules to create a bidirectional translation. If the 12V side is high, the 3.3V input to the BBB GPIO should be high. If the 3.3V output from the BBB GPIO is high, then the 12V side should be high too. It's similar to a logical OR, if either side is high, the corresponding signal on the other side should be high too. A single 12V signal has to be split into individual input and output signals on the 3.3V side for the BBB. Questions  Is the  and  relay combination overkill for having the BBB GPIO output control the 12V power line? I like the isolation and safety it provides, but it seems too much (in terms of cost and board space) Is there a better solution for the 12V to 3.3V conversion. I like the simplicity of the  relay switching a 3.3V signal, but it takes up lots of room. Does the DUAL_12V↔3V3 Module (which combines each translation direction) even make sense? This seems wasteful to use 2 relays and a high side driver, but I haven't found simpler solution that achieves the same result. Should I add pulldown resistors for the BBB GPIO inputs, or are the internal pulldown resistors good enough?  Any other feedback is welcome. I'm new to electronic design. Tabular with p type columns to fill page width