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This 433MHz Raspberry Pi HAT Makes It Easy to Control Wireless Outlets | Before the Internet of Things and the need to make every single item in your home a smart device, wireless home automation was commonly done with simple radio signals in the 433MHz band. Nothing connected to the internet, and the radio signals were sufficient for applications like wirelessly flipping a switch. These days WiFi-connected IoT devices are more popular, but 433MHz radio is still good enough for some jobs and Redditor 4_string_bass made a Raspberry Pi HAT to send those signals.
The idea behind 433MHz radio control is very simple: each device to be controlled has dip switches that can be set to create a unique code that it will respond to. All the control device needs to do is send a radio signal with that code, and the remote device will turn on or off. It’s completely unsecure by modern standards, but that’s not a big deal if you’re not controlling anything that’s actually important. The benefit of using 433MHz radio is that it’s very cheap, and it works without internet or even a local network.
To create their HAT, 4_string_bass placed a very cheap 433MHz transmitter and receiver on a piece of perf board. The other side has pins that match the Raspberry Pi’s GPIO header. The Raspberry Pi runs a custom Node.js web server that can be pulled up on a smart phone or computer to control the transmitter. All 4_string_bass has to do is enter in the specific control codes for whatever devices he wants it to work with (which are commercially available), and the Raspberry Pi will send them off through the custom HAT. | https://medium.com/@cameroncoward/this-433mhz-raspberry-pi-hat-makes-it-easy-to-control-wireless-outlets-889fbc275563 | ['Cameron Coward'] | 2019-03-20 19:46:01.274000+00:00 | ['Makers', 'IoT', 'Smart Home', 'Raspberry Pi', 'Technology'] |
Top 9 Blog SEO Tips | 9 Blog SEO Tips to Assist Your Blog Rankings
Photo by Merakist on Unsplash
Tip 1: Benefit Of Exact Keyword Targeting
Use Google Keyword Tool to investigate your catchphrase thoughts and to finish up what watchwords and watchword phrases are the best applicable expressions in your focus on advertising and coordinate them into your blog. Nearby organizations ought to consistently be exact and contain their administration zone.
Tip 2: Accurate Use of The Tags
Web crawler spiders give explicit consideration to page titles, so ensure you utilize your watchwords here. These catchphrases in the title tag ought to be positioned by significance from left to right, so put your best watchwords first in the title.
Tip 3: Create Unique Heading and Description Tags for Each Page
Ensure each page inside your blog has its own extraordinary, watchword rich, and illustrative title and portrayal meta tag. Essentially don’t utilize a similar title and portrayal for every one of your pages.
Tip 4: Use Quality Backlinks
It is esteemed generally important to have applicable and conspicuous locales connect to yours. In the event that you own a Landscaping business in Chicago, getting joins from arranging flexibly organizations would be ideal, as would trading joins with non-contending finishing organizations in various geographic areas.
Photo by Bryson Hammer on Unsplash
Tip 5: Right Use of Anchor Text in Backlinks and Internal Links
The backlinks that you get from different locales, just as your own inward connections, ought to incorporate your essential catchphrase or watchword state.
Tip 6: Fitting Use of Alt and Title Attributes
Give the pictures on your site engaging and catchphrase improved alt qualities. Web index bugs search text, not pictures. Title qualities can likewise be utilized to help portray different components, for example, tables, divs, and joins.
Tip 7: Use Descriptive Keyword Rich File Names
Be certain that your picture and page record names are graphic and contain your watchwords whenever the situation allows.
Tip 8: Create a.XML sitemap
A sitemap place connects to each page on your site in one spot, making it simpler for web crawler creepy crawlies to discover every one of your pages. Most destinations decide to connect to sitemaps in their footer. For a free and simple module, attempt: Google XML Sitemaps.
Tip 9: Create New and Relevant Content
For most extreme outcomes, the substance on your blog should join the above cycle with elegantly composed, helpful, and special substance.
It’s been discovered that executing these 9 Blog SEO Tips to Assist Your Blog/Website Rankings is the genuine equation for getting your blog found via web indexes.
Photo by Green Chameleon on Unsplash
FAQ’S
How Do Bloggers Seo?
Bloggers Use Search Description, Labels, and Meta Tags which are the most important Element for Bloggers SEO Optimisation to attract more Traffic to Your Blog Or Website.
to attract more Traffic to Your Blog Or Website. It can be Hard At First the more you produce relevant content the more you Optimise SEO your Blog
2. Is Blogging Good For Seo?
If I say blogging is Perfect for SEO Would You Believe if NOT let me share you the 3 Blogs which are Ranking higher then the Website with this SEO Tool . — — Healthline , CNBC, Neil Patel.
Would You Believe if NOT let me share you the 3 Blogs which are Ranking higher then the Website . — — Healthline , CNBC, Neil Patel. A blog Is better than Just A site for SEO And you can Optimise your Ranking with this SEO tool which just helped me to Rank on 1 Page of GOOGLE.
3. How Can I Improve my Blog SEO?
As I Mentioned this Answer Above the Tools you can Get started for Free For SEO Ranking which Optimise your Blog.
4. How Often Should I Blog For SEO?
If I would Suggest Post 1 Blog a Day Containing an article 1500 Words that can Really boost your Blog SEO. And I mentioned above too Go With The Low Competitive Keyword To Outrank with This TOOL.
Use this Tool To Rank Your Blog SEO And Outrank Right Away. | https://medium.com/@businessmonk/top-9-blog-seo-tips-5215d6289475 | ['Businesstips Solutions'] | 2020-09-06 20:29:35.466000+00:00 | ['Seo Tips', 'Blogging Tips', 'Blog', 'SEO', 'Seo Services'] |
Co-Sleeping: Should Your Child Sleep In Your Bed? | Co-sleeping is the practice where the child sleeps in bed with his parents. Not surprisingly, it is one of the most hotly debated and controversial topics related to pediatric sleep. Let’s see why.
Some people argue that co-sleeping is the right and natural way to raise a child because the practice fosters a stronger bond and a more secure attachment.
Conversely, others will tell you that co-sleeping is risky, ridiculous, or even dangerous and they don’t want it for their family.
So, which approach holds the truth?
First, it’s important to understand that co-sleeping is not magic. Although some proponents of the family bed would disagree, numerous couples have reported that their babies did not necessarily sleep deeper or longer because their parents were close by. In fact, some parents found that their child slept longer and woke less frequently when they stopped co-sleeping and moved him into his own crib.
However, whether families choose to co-sleep or have their children sleep independently is a personal decision, and if both parents and child are safe, rested, and fulfilled, then co-sleeping is nothing to worry about.
If you decide do co-sleep, this commitment requires some very careful thinking about what you and your spouse feel is right for you as individuals, as a couple, and as a family.
Ask yourselves the following questions:
• Is it nice to think about enjoying the coziness of sleeping in close proximity, or does one or more of us tend to stay active during sleeping — potentially disrupting the others?
• Does everyone in our family want to co-sleep, or are we leaning toward it because one of us feels strongly?
• Are we willing to commit to being quiet after our child falls asleep, or do we like to watch TV or talk in bed?
• Will we enjoy being able to feed our baby more often throughout the night, or will having him next to us make it tougher to wean nighttime feeds?
• Are we agreeable to getting into bed when our child does, to ensure his safety?
• For working parents, does sleeping next to our child allow us to feel more connected to him?
As expected, co-sleeping has both advantages and disadvantages.
Let’s take a closer look at them.
Advantages:
• Constant closeness whenever the child is awake. Many children and parents enjoy this feeling.
• Immediate action and support for any sleep-related problem
• The ability to nurse and respond to other nighttime wakings without getting up
• More time to spend with the child
• Possibly better sleep for both the child and the parents, if the child was sleeping poorly to begin with
Disadvantages:
• Parents may sleep poorly if their children are restless sleepers
• Parents may end up sleeping in separate rooms, and they may become angry at their child or with each other
• Children’s and adults’ sleep cycles do not coincide
• Parents may have to go to bed at a very early hour with their children and be left with little time for their own evening activities
• Parents have little privacy
• There may be a slight increase in the risk to the infant from SIDS and related causes.
The decision to co-sleep should be yours, made by the parent — or parents — and based on your own personal philosophies, not on pressure from your child or anyone else. Another family’s good or bad experience with co-sleeping should not influence your decision: your child is unique and your family is not the same.
click here for more details | https://medium.com/@christian4christ2018/co-sleeping-should-your-child-sleep-in-your-bed-5196aee19622 | ['Online Money Making'] | 2020-04-12 13:43:45.720000+00:00 | ['Baby Sleep Consultant', 'Sleep Disorders', 'Sleep Better', 'Baby Sleep', 'Baba Miracles'] |
Conscious Entrepreneurship: May I introduce Dr. Joseph Salim | Conscious Entrepreneurship — May I introduce: Dr. Joseph Salim
Migrating to the United States at age 18 for college, without knowing anyone in 1983 was a difficult yet exciting new beginning. Having fled Iran less than a year earlier after the Islamic Revolution at age 17, on the back of a camel without food and water for 3 days, was a surreal experience where the lines between life and death and success and failure were completely blurred. Once given the opportunity to study in this country, it was of utmost importance to succeed, find ways to give back through a career in a health-related profession, and found an organization to focus on sustainable development programs in education and healthcare to help women and children in the underdeveloped regions of the world.
Coming from a diverse background and heritage that included Persian, French, Russian, and Italian roots, having compassion was of utmost personal importance. A career in healthcare, dentistry, practiced with kindness and care and further developed by starting the Virtue Foundation after the tragic events of 9/11 has been the driving force behind how life can be more meaningful and balanced while contributing to the greater good.
CONSCIOUS ENTREPRENEURSHIP — What meaning do you give this term?
It is about realizing your dreams, creating organizations and entities that not only are successful as growing concerns but seek to contribute to the greater good. It is based on developing a business and a work environment where lines between legality and morality are not blurred. It is where one realizes that just because something is not illegal, it doesn’t make it moral or ethical. It is the realization that you can be a successful professional while helping others along the process. It is where you are conscious and aware of your decisions and actions before they are taken. It is knowing that you can still make money and achieve your dreams while doing the right thing. It is understanding that there is “taxation” on your success, meaning the more you make it, the more you should feel obligated to give back. When we give back to others, we are actually the ultimate beneficiary of such actions, as it makes our lives more purposeful and much richer than before.
MENTORS — We all need a little help along the journey. Who has been an invaluable mentor for you? Can you share a story about how they made an impact?
My father-in-law has been a great mentor to me. A retired pediatric surgeon, medical school professor, and author, he has always balanced his professional life with the spiritual side of life. Throughout his career in both France and Iran, he has always tended to patients who were poor and unable to pay him, has always respected the rights of others no matter who they are, and has always been focused on his personal development and growth as a human being, even more than his professional accomplishments. When after the events of 9/11, I discussed the idea of starting the Virtue Foundation with him, he was fully supportive and encouraged me to do my utmost to make it happen while always remaining humble and true to myself. He has always reminded me that doing good for others should be done because helping the less fortunate is our human duty, and we should never seek fame and accolades while doing so. He has always reminded me that good actions should always be accompanied by great intentions, not for personal gains or recognition.
TO THRIVE — When you see yourself thriving: Do you see yourself opening up opportunities for others along the way to participate in your success, and how?
Sharing your success with others, and watching them also reach their goals and dreams, could be as rewarding as personal success. As an extension of personal growth and development from a spiritual perspective, one should always look for opportunities to contribute to the lives of others in a meaningful and sustainable manner. As an example, when I find investment opportunities that look promising, whether it is in real estate or equities markets, I like to share that knowledge and information with others, and over the years, I have been able to do that for many friends and relatives alike. Even though I don’t draw any material compensation for sharing these opportunities with others, witnessing my friends prosper and succeed has been a very rewarding experience for me. Moreover, as it pertains to the charity I have founded, the Virtue Foundation, by bringing others on board and building on previous successes, I have not only been able to help many more people in the process, but I have also seen these recruited volunteers also thrive in their respective roles, sharing the spotlight with me. According to the great Persian thinker, Ostad Elahi, a true human being rejoices in the joy of others and shares in their sorrows.
CAUSE — What are the causes close to your heart, and you are supporting right now? Can you share a story how you got involved? How did it make you feel?
The closest cause to my heart is the Virtue Foundation, a nonprofit organization with Special Consultative Status to the United Nations I founded after the tragic events of 9/11. It focuses on sustainable development models in healthcare, education, and access to justice, by empowering women and children in particular, in the underdeveloped world. To date, we have been to over 20 countries, helping thousands of people in the process. By training locals in rendering healthcare, educating them properly, and giving them the tools, instruments, techniques, and technologies they need, we have been able to build successful development programs in healthcare in some of the most impoverished regions of the world, in places such as Ghana, Mongolia, and El Salvador.
One story that I like to share is about a project we did in the state of Louisiana after the mass devastation caused by Hurricane Katrina. What started as a small-scale project where our donations and efforts focused on sixty 6th graders from two of the worst-performing public schools in the state, where these underprivileged students were given Apple iMacs and the proper training and quality of education they sorely lacked, grew to an amazing success story. When ABC’s Nightline picked up the story, the momentum generated by it paved the way for us to receive over 600,000 dollars’ worth of laptops from Apple, plus over 300,000 dollars’ worth of software and training from Microsoft. This enabled 6th graders from many more Louisiana schools to receive the computers and training they so desperately needed. Over a year later, the late and outgoing governor of the state appropriated several million dollars to be used for this project statewide, as all 6th graders were able to receive the same benefits. Something that started with 60,000 dollars of Virtue Foundation’s money had now grown into 6,000,000 dollars helping many needy children in our own country, which made me feel very happy by realizing that one never knows what could happen if you start something good and dream bigger.
THE FUTURE — How do you see the face of entrepreneurship in 5 years? How do companies /brands need to adapt to secure their place in the future?
People and entrepreneurs need to be more inclusive, tolerant, and compassionate. They need to realize that just because something is not illegal, it doesn’t make it moral and ethical. Oftentimes, the lines between legality and morality are blurred enough that people seek to take advantage of that for their sole benefit and at a detriment to others. Entrepreneurs need to realize that you can still succeed, make money, and grow your business, without hurting others and the environment. If they can afford to do so, they should support worthwhile nonprofits and charities that fit their corporate missions, and they should find ways to give back to the greater good. They should hire people based on their talents, aptitudes, and potentials, and not on their ethnicity, race, religion, sexual orientation, or skin color. Companies need to see that consumers are much more conscious and aware of the world around them and that they have many choices. They should not take their customers’ loyalty for granted, and they should be much more socially, culturally, and environmentally conscious. This will sometimes mean that they should not put corporate profits above all else and that they should show compassion and seek to also become a solution to the world’s many problems.
ADVICE — What kind of advice would you like to give to an aspiring entrepreneur who feels limited due to their background or lack of resources?
I always say that life is full of both overachievers and underachievers. The latter individuals may think big, may have the talents and tools necessary to succeed, but they are either overtaken by fear of failure or gravitate towards feeling victimized by life’s circumstances. All their aptitudes remain as potentials, and they never go from an in vitro modality to an in vivo one. They end up blaming others or even the environment for their lack of success, instead of seeking empathy and sympathy of others while playing the role of life’s victims perfectly. The former people are fearless and don’t make excuses for their own lack of effort. They are relentlessly in pursuit of personal and professional growth and development and are willing to give their utmost efforts and make all the necessary sacrifices to succeed. They don’t want to be victims. Instead, they seek to lead themselves and others towards achieving their goals, are humble enough to realize that there is a lot they don’t know and that they constantly make mistakes along the journey. They are interested in learning from those mistakes and are willing to make the necessary adjustments to move forward. They are not afraid of failure, and they seek to surround themselves in empowering situations, by associating with and emulating those that are better than them. For example, someone who is extremely interested in losing weight should frequent people who are in excellent shape, as this empowering environment will motivate him to lose the necessary weight. if he chooses to spend time with others who are even heavier than he is, what motivation will he have in this disempowering environment to lose the weight he so much wanted to shed?
DRIVE — Do you sometimes feel bad for “wanting more out of life”, and if so, why? What is your personal motivation that leads you through the hardships of entrepreneurship?
What I want most out of life is learning from everything and everyone, for as long as I live. It is a lifelong pursuit of personal growth and becoming a better human being each and every day. This philosophy will never allow me to feel bad for wanting more out of life, as I realize that I will always remain a work in progress, and there will be improvements to be made in every aspect of life. Knowing that I can always get better and be better has created a constant source of motivation for me that has been quite sustainable. Throughout the years, I have also realized that hardships and adversities teach us a lot more about ourselves and life than successes do. When we succeed, the ensuing happiness and the emotions it engenders often prevents us from seeing or even looking for the underlying life lessons. We are simply too happy and too proud to look for those lessons. However, facing hardships and adversities will allow us to delve within, peel off the layers of materiality and its associated distractions, and find the invaluable lessons of life. What I have learned in life through hardships, conflicts, and failures has been a lot more valuable than what I have learned while experiencing success and victories. Knowing that these apparent hard times can teach me the most important lessons of life has enabled me to want to face them head-on, instead of shying away from them.
CHALLENGES — Entrepreneurship is very challenging. We each have our own coping mechanism. Mine is humor. What is yours? Can you share a story?
We all need our own coping mechanisms and venues through which we can vent and let go of some of the inevitable pressures that are bound to be built within us over time. I use two vehicles as my personal coping mechanism; one being humor and the other is playing competitive soccer. For the former, I always try to make others laugh, by telling them funny stories based in reality but sometimes exaggerated to make them even more humorous. For the latter, I organize competitive soccer matches that oftentimes include many friends younger than me. As their captain, I motivate them to play hard throughout the entire game and yell at them when they don’t. If they show any lack of effort or if they are not giving it their utmost on every play, I will be right in their faces, pointing out what they did and didn’t do, and what they should have done. Sometimes, some of them may get upset at me during the game, but none of them carries this outside the field when the game is over. These soccer games have allowed me to cope much better with life’s many challenges throughout the years.
YOU — Is there anything you would like to share that we have not asked you here?
I consider myself an eternal student of life, fully believing that we all have a purpose and a mission in life we must accomplish. I believe everything in life happens for a reason, and each life’s event and each person we encounter can teach us valuable lessons. I believe life is a long journey, congruent to a heavyweight boxing match when we need to go the full 15 rounds of 3-minutes. We earn our livings and fulfill our missions during those individual rounds that last three minutes. However, we all need those one-minute breaks between every two rounds to regroup, refresh, strategize, rest, refocus, and tend to our aches and pains before the boxing match resumes. We need to bring more balance into our lives, and we tend to our psychological, physical, and spiritual needs as we strive for professional success. We need to think of others who are less fortunate than we are, and to the extent of our abilities, we need to do whatever we can to help them. We need to constantly challenge ourselves to become better people, and we need to understand that throughout life, we are bound to make many mistakes, but the key is to learn from them and reduce them in number, while knowing we will never reach a mistake-free life.
THANK YOU!
The Virtue Foundation’s mission is to increase awareness, inspire action, and render assistance through healthcare, education and empowerment initiatives. The foundation seeks to provide both short-term impactful and long-term sustainable development solutions to communities across the globe. Follow The Virtue Foundation on Facebook. | https://medium.com/@demeekoch/conscious-entrepreneurship-may-i-introduce-dr-joseph-salim-d5b5c9889af6 | ['Demee Koch'] | 2021-01-27 18:37:50.595000+00:00 | ['Social Entrepreneurs', 'Social Entrepreneurship', 'Nonprofit', 'Founder Stories', 'Founders'] |
On A Dove, Taking to the Sky | for Naya Rivera, STTL.
The Lord in Heaven teaches us to dream
and, someday, we return unto that host;
all metaphors belie that spirit-stream
beyond our comprehension. At the most
we see a jagged light, a rainbow cast
in ultraviolet, well beyond all sense;
a promise of the kingdom that will last
despite the heat death destined to commence.
Now you will never need these bones again
no matter shall pin down your vital force.
We bid you go and rest with saintly kin
without egregious grief or long remorse
for we are temporary in these shapes;
forever only lives in our escapes. | https://medium.com/sonnetry/on-a-dove-taking-to-the-sky-31b396f4c533 | ['Zach J. Payne'] | 2020-07-13 21:53:19.608000+00:00 | ['Loss', 'Love', 'Grief', 'Death', 'Poem'] |
The Golden Buddha | The Golden Buddha
A Poem
Photo by Gaelle Marcel on Unsplash
I am the Forgotten One.
The Lonely.
The Cast Aside One.
The One who would Rather eat Cake!
They starved me from your affections.
Anything will do
so long as it is from you.
I am a World of Pain and Spite.
I ruminate, cry, and throw temper tantrums.
But none of it even calls you to me.
It’s almost a compulsion now.
This insistent waterwork of gushing energy
etching lines into my face
while drying the well up.
I can’t even look away from you.
You are my God.
Like a Golden Buddha in the sky.
Behind your darkness lays such beauty and treasure.
You are all that sparkles in this world …to me …for me…
All the Power in the world can’t touch you.
Really,
I just want to worship you like a God …all the rest of my days.
Amanda Dalmas ~Dec 23rd, 2020 | https://medium.com/scrittura/the-golden-buddha-2fd7d0bc8b54 | ['Amanda Dalmas'] | 2020-12-24 05:42:19.352000+00:00 | ['Scrittura', 'Poetry', 'God', 'Love', 'Poem'] |
THE SONG REMAINS THE SAME | When it comes to the safety of journalists, Mexico hasn’t changed
By Témoris Grecko
Témoris Grecko is a Mexican journalist and political analyst, author of “Killing the Story” and documentary “The Truth Shall Not Be Killed”.
On October 29, two gang members shot local TV anchor Arturo Alba Medina, 49, in Ciudad Juárez, right on the Texan border. His body was found in his car with eleven bullet wounds. Three days later, a similar fate awaited independent reporter Jesús Piñuelas Montes, 43, in Ciudad Obregón, Sonora State. On November 9, Israel Vázquez Rangel, 31, was shot dead while investigating the discovery of human remains in Salamanca, a city in Central Mexico. That’s three murdered journalists in just twelve days.
On the same day that Israel was killed, in the east of the country, in Cancún, a women’s rights protest was attacked by police. Officers appeared without warning, shooting overhead but sometimes aiming at protesters. Five people were wounded, including the two journalists. Meanwhile, in the south, the city of Iguala in Guerrero, reporters were figuring out how to react to a message sent to their private WhatsApp accounts by an organized crime group. They were told to stop covering crime. If any of them dared to disobey, one of the journalists said, “someone will be murdered the same way our colleague Pablo Morrugares was shot dead back in August.”
Renowned journalist Javier Valdez was murdered in May 2017 by unidentified gunmen. Valdez covered organized crime and drug trafficking in Mexico, particularly the powerful Sinaloa cartel.
In 2017, twelve journalists were killed in Mexico, the highest number in the world, equal only to Syria, according to Reporters Without Borders.
Then, on November 15, reporters in the Pacific resort of Mazatlán staged a public demonstration in support of photojournalist Carlos Zataráin, 25, fearing for his life as he had been abducted the previous night. He was released a few hours later.
I feel like I am back in March 2017, the most violent month in history for Mexican journalists. In that month alone, three reporters were murdered; there were direct attempts on the lives of three more (a reporter’s bodyguard was killed); a colleague who was covering a street fight between groups in a workers’ organization was wounded in the crossfire; three foreign correspondents were stopped, interrogated, and robbed in the countryside; and a group of seven journalists was beaten up and robbed at night on a highway by a mob of intoxicated teenagers goaded by a criminal gang. Despite being threatened with death, they were eventually released. All within four weeks, in nine states.
That year, twelve journalists were killed in Mexico, the highest number in the world, equal only to Syria, according to Reporters Without Borders.
In Mexico, “It’s infinitely more dangerous to report on an assassination than it is to commit it.”
Violence was one of the reasons motivating a massive, historic popular vote in 2018 against all parties who had ruled Mexico thus far. Andrés Manuel López Obrador, a maverick Leftist candidate, steamrolled his rivals, garnering 53% of the votes (30 points ahead his nearest competitor), campaigning on a platform against corruption and impunity.
On his inauguration day López Obrador announced the dawn of a new era. He portrayed a country that had changed overnight. We knew that was impossible, but we gave him time to fulfill his promises. We still are. The tune we hear now is no different from before. The number of murdered journalists may not be as high as it was under Peña Nieto, but it’s getting there, and the last two weeks have left us with a sense of a dejà vu. Already, in 2020, eight reporters have lost their lives in Mexico, double the number of the country with the next highest number of murdered journalists: Iraq. Pakistan, Syria, and Honduras have each seen three journalists killed.
Journalist Miroslava Breach was murdered in March 2017 in retaliation for uncovering a politician’s ties to the Sinaloa cartel.
Journalist John Gibler says that, in Mexico, “It’s infinitely more dangerous to report on an assassination than it is to commit it.” This is because killing a journalist comes without penalty. The vast majority of cases do not even go to trial, and in the very rare cases that they do, those charged are usually restricted to those who directly carried out the killing. The intellectual authors of these crimes never find themselves in court.
López Obrador had little to say about the violence against journalists. He is deep in an ongoing feud with the country’s most influential media: the one that lined their pockets under previous regimes and now feel aggrieved at their loss of power and revenue. Every day, the president and the media trade attacks. He despises them, and as a result, he seems to despise all journalists. Although he defends freedom of speech, he ignores the fact that non-partisan journalism still exists and that journalists are still working in conditions of extreme peril nearly two years into his administration.
When it comes to the safety of journalists, Mexico hasn’t changed and it doesn’t seem to be changing, certainly not while politicians, businessmen, and gang members know that they can get away with murdering any reporter they are unhappy with. Two years after López Obrador announced a new era, the song remains the same.
Killing the Story: Journalists Risking Their Lives to Uncover the Truth in Mexico is on sale now. Support your local independent bookstore and order through Bookshop.org. | https://medium.com/@thenewpress/the-song-remains-the-same-74b2bc021663 | ['The New Press'] | 2020-12-18 17:59:15.072000+00:00 | ['Javier Valdez', 'Human Rights', 'Drug Trafficking', 'Journalism', 'Mexico'] |
My College Essay | A butterfly effect is where one small occurrence in initial conditions can create a significantly different outcome. Due to swift changes in life, this beautiful world can be torn away instantaneously without notice. Yet, I have found that showing kindness to someone, spreads like a chain reaction. I have concluded that the smallest of moments to one person, can easily impact someone else’s life in a vast number of ways.
As my teenage years began, my resentment and inherent agitation with others grew. I often disrespected others around me, and I easily started arguments with my family and friends. There was a longing for authority in my life and repetitive panic attacks to remind me of my lack of control. That is when I met Marie, during the summer entering seventh grade. I saw her sitting alone at lunch, and I had asked to sit with the lonely, short raven-haired girl with brown doe eyes. Looking back, I recognize this moment to be the beginning of my own butterfly effect. Marie and I became inseparable, my anxieties were swept away in the wind and I changed into the person I was longing to be. We dreamed of going to Paris, learning French, and continuing to be as close as we were that summer. We created homemade water slides and laughed at the little things; we argued and loved each other as sisters. She wasn’t everyone’s favorite person, but she was mine, she was kind, sympathetic, altruistic, and smiling in all the things she did. She always had a smile from ear to ear.
The perfect burning hot Summer came to an end like many great things, with its memories tucked away in the forefront of my subconscious where I would regularly remember how extraordinary it was. January 17, of 2016 could easily be one of the worst days of my life. Marie had Leukemia and due to complications in her treatments, she passed away. I attended her wake with my mother and sister. When I walked up to the closed casket, I looked at her picture and couldn’t believe it was happening. Marie’s mom hugged me and said, “Your kindness meant much more to her then you will ever know, she will always be watching over you now.” I will never forget the way she said it with tears rolling down her face. She explained how Marie loved spending time with me, and always came back home with a smile on her face. There is a difference between merely being part of someone’s life and changing it for the better. If I never gave that one, simple act of kindness to ask to sit with her, Marie would never be given the opportunity to facilitate such an unfathomable impact on my life.
Maintaining good grades, being a competitive Irish dancer, soccer player, friend, daughter, and sister are made nearly impossible when it feels like the world is collapsing around you. With untimely deaths, comes a moment where your breath is kicked out of your lungs and you feel the weight of the world on your shoulders. Grieving at a young age sparked many emotional issues such as intense anxiety and depression, but it also created a wise insight into the world around me. Pushing past a hardship, such as grieving, opens one’s mind to new questions along with opening and closing doors to opportunities to relay the kindness and compassion reciprocated during a time of need.
After Marie’s passing, an overwhelming feeling that my life was not fulfilled had ensued. However, after trial and error and the cycle of friends coming and leaving, I learned that my momentous accomplishments are simply through kindness. I now believe fortitude and consideration alone can withstand the most substantial changes. While I may always struggle with Marie’s passing, I now comprehend the importance of kindness and compassion in all situations. | https://medium.com/@tinaleigh1031/my-college-essay-cc081865749e | ['Tina Mullan'] | 2020-12-18 04:58:46.056000+00:00 | ['High School', 'College', 'College Essay Writing'] |
Sundays with Ray Bradbury | “I can imagine all kinds of worlds and places, but I cannot imagine a world without Bradbury.” — Neil Gaiman
Ray Bradbury (1920–2012) had a remarkable writing career. Author and screenwriter, here is a partial list of his writing projects:
Novels
1950 The Martian Chronicles
The Martian Chronicles 1953 Fahrenheit 451
Fahrenheit 451 1957 Dandelion Wine
Dandelion Wine 1962 Something Wicked This Way Comes
Something Wicked This Way Comes 1972 The Halloween Tree
The Halloween Tree 1985 Death Is a Lonely Business
Death Is a Lonely Business 1990 A Graveyard for Lunatics
A Graveyard for Lunatics 1992 Green Shadows, White Whale
Green Shadows, White Whale 2001 From the Dust Returned
From the Dust Returned 2003 Let’s All Kill Constance
Let’s All Kill Constance 2006 Farewell Summer
Collections
1947 Dark Carnival
Dark Carnival 1951 The Illustrated Man
The Illustrated Man 1953 The Golden Apples of the Sun
The Golden Apples of the Sun 1955 The October Country
The October Country 1959 A Medicine for Melancholy
A Medicine for Melancholy 1959 The Day It Rained Forever
The Day It Rained Forever 1962 The Small Assassin
The Small Assassin 1964 The Machineries of Joy
The Machineries of Joy 1965 The Vintage Bradbury
The Vintage Bradbury 1966 Twice 22
Twice 22 1969 I Sing The Body Electric!
I Sing The Body Electric! 1975 Ray Bradbury
Ray Bradbury 1976 Long After Midnight
Long After Midnight 1980 The Last Circus and the Electrocution
The Last Circus and the Electrocution 1980 The Stories of Ray Bradbury
The Stories of Ray Bradbury 1983 Dinosaur Tales
Dinosaur Tales 1984 A Memory of Murder
A Memory of Murder 1988 The Toynbee Convector
The Toynbee Convector 1990 Classic Stories 1
Classic Stories 1 1990 Classic Stories 2
Classic Stories 2 1996 Quicker Than The Eye
Quicker Than The Eye 1997 Driving Blind
Driving Blind 1997 The Golden Apples of the Sun and Other Stories
The Golden Apples of the Sun and Other Stories 1998 A Medicine For Melancholy And Other Stories
A Medicine For Melancholy And Other Stories 1998 I Sing The Body Electric! And Other Stories
I Sing The Body Electric! And Other Stories 2002 One More for the Road
One More for the Road 2003 Bradbury Stories
Bradbury Stories 2004 The Cat’s Pajamas: Stories
The Cat’s Pajamas: Stories 2005 A Sound of Thunder and Other Stories
A Sound of Thunder and Other Stories 2007 Now and Forever: Somewhere a Band is Playing & Leviathan ’99
Now and Forever: Somewhere a Band is Playing & Leviathan ’99 2007 Summer Morning, Summer Night
Summer Morning, Summer Night 2009 We’ll Always Have Paris: Stories
We’ll Always Have Paris: Stories 2010 A Pleasure To Burn
There are a couple of Bradbury quotes I want to include in my book The Protagonist’s Journey: Character Driven Screenwriting and Storytelling:
“Plot is no more than footprints left in the snow after your characters have run by on their way to incredible destinations.” “Stand aside, forget targets, let the characters, your fingers, body, blood, and heart do.”
You can see why I like those quotes!
Like many Bradbury observations, they float around online without attribution to the original source. Therefore, I recently picked up Zen in the Art of Writing written by Bradbury and am reading through it to see if I can find those two observations on the craft..
As I began with the book, it occurred to me: Why not share Bradbury’s wisdom with Go Into The Story readers? Hence, a new series: Sundays with Ray Bradbury. Today: From Zen in the Art of Writing , “The Secret Mind,” pp. 87–88. | https://gointothestory.blcklst.com/sundays-with-ray-bradbury-d0467758564c | ['Scott Myers'] | 2020-12-20 15:02:28.981000+00:00 | ['Creative Writing', 'Writing', 'Fiction', 'Screenwriting', 'Creativity'] |
Pinknode’s Quarterly Update— 1st September 2021 | Greetings Pinknodians, we bring you updates of great importance today. The past 3 months have been nothing short of eventful and we thought you’d like a rundown of what happened while the market went quiet.
On 5th July 2021, Pinknode launched its beta v0.1 platform to the Polkadot ecosystem.
The team went on overdrive mode ever since and achieved all milestones set. 😎
TL;DR 📑
In this 3 short months after catapulting ourselves into the world of blockchain infrastructure, the team has:
launched a working product with actual users
established partnership with 15 active teams developing on Polkadot
developing on Polkadot partnered with several parachains and upcoming candidates to provide quality API endpoints to their users and participate in their network as a collator
delivered more than 200m requests in less than 3 months with our MVP
in less than 3 months with our MVP resolved several bottlenecks on our network
built elastic infrastructure on Google Cloud Platform (GCP) for greater processing capabilities at low operating costs
on Google Cloud Platform (GCP) for greater processing capabilities at low operating costs Successfully conducted multiple liquidity mining programs
Ambassador program is in full swing with over 200 applicants
Partnerships & Ecosystem 🔗
We have experienced first hand the drive and professionalism of the teams building the future of Web 3.0. We feel extremely fortunate to be part of this Polkadot movement, where everyone is putting their best foot forward to collaborate for growth of the ecosystem.
Below is a list of our collaborators and a summary of each:
Polkafoundry — Parachain contender gunning to be a one-stop hub for DeFi and NFT dApps Splyt Network — Enhanced decentralized e-commerce protocol with eNFT PL^Gnet — Network to enable asset custodians to leverage any asset from any network in its synthetic form StackOS — An open protocol that allows individuals to collectively offer a decentralized cloud where you can deploy any full-stack application, decentralized app, blockchain privatenets, and mainnet nodes. NewsCrypto — An all-in-one crypto ecosystem covering everything from education to industry-leading proprietary trading indicators and tools. Dfyn — A network of DEXes across multiple Layer 1 and Layer 2 blockchains, allowing Dfyn to plug into multiple liquidity sources across chains, including the cross-chain liquidity ecosystem being developed by Router Protocol. Reef Finance — A DeFi operating system that gives users access to a wide variety of products spanning multiple blockchains, including Ethereum, Avalanche, Polkadot, and Cosmos. Kylin Network — A cross-chain platform powering the data economy on Polkadot, through its provision of a comprehensive data analytics suite and its decentralized oracle services. UniFarm — A decentralized farming pool for crypto projects. Polkabridge — A decentralized all-in-one financial applications platform that facilitates cross-chain AMMs, farming, lending, NFTs, and more. Pontem Network — A canary network of Diem by connecting it to the Polkadot network Astar Network — parachain-owning dApp hub of Polkadot which supports Ethereum, WebAssembly, dApp Staking, and Layer 2 solutions Equilibrium —The first Polkadot-based interoperable DeFi money market that combines pooled lending, synthetic asset generation, and decentralized trading Konomi Network — A full suite asset management solution for cross-chain crypto assets which enables users to manage their crypto holding positions, trade assets and earn a profit on decentralized money market products Crust Network — A decentralized storage protocol that utilizes a unique combination of Guaranteed Proof of Stake and Meaningful Proof of Work to create a decentralized cloud storage market that prioritizes individual data sovereignty and privacy
Network Upgrades & Adoption 🔧
We have delivered more than 200M relays on our public endpoints and early adopters Increased our load limit per node to sustain more than 6000 requests per second Built elastic infrastructure on GCP to greater processing capacity at low operating costs. GCP was chosen as it had the infrastructure configurations and features available for a production-ready system Moved to Kubernetes to better address scale and stability Whitelisted by several parachains to participate as collators
Token & Liquidity 🌌
Currently listed on Uniswap & token holders crossed the 2000 mark this month built on the momentum of organic growth Private round tokens final disbursement was completed on Aug 14th, 2021 Volume on DEX maintained at a very healthy level of daily average $300,000 Attracted over $350,000 (~100% increase) liquidity through our LP Mining Programs Issued 349,000 PNODE in liquidity rewards worth $58,000
❗ ️Attention: We are extending our liquidity mining program from 2nd September 2021 to 1st October 2021. The total mining rewards has been adjusted to 75,000 PNODE, which will be released by the block.
*Expected APY stands at approximately 45%.
Be reminded that you are allowed to withdraw your PNODE at any time you wish. However, you should bear in mind that gas fees might result in a net loss at the time of withdrawal.
(Recap) Step-by-Step Guide to Providing Liquidity 🌊
Go to Pinknode’s PNODE-ETH Pair pool on Uniswap here Enter the number of $PNODE tokens you would like to add to the pool. Click “Approve PNODE” to allow Uniswap to access $PNODE tokens in your wallet and accept the transaction via your Metamask window. Ensure that you are using a medium to high gas fee. Potential network congestion may lead to your transaction taking longer to complete. Upon confirmation, click “Supply” and use Metamask to accept the transaction. Again, please be sure to pay a medium to a high gas fee. You will receive a Uni V2 LP token that represents their share of the liquidity pool Once you receive your LP token, you need to go to the Pinknode page to deposit your LP tokens in order to receive LP mining rewards.
Marketing & Community Updates 🌏
Grown our Twitter to close to 18,000 followers and more than 10,000 community members on Telegram Featured on CoinTelegraph, Decrypt, Yahoo Finance, and several other publishers for our monumental partnership with Pontem Network to bridge Facebook’s Diem. Launched Ambassador program, received more than 200 applications in less than a week. 1 million tokens issued as a marketing grant to support the program that will be run by the community. Introduced a new program where we host a cross-AMA with our partners for the benefit of both communities to learn more about the Polkadot ecosystem. Hosted 2 successful cross-AMAs with the founders and representatives of Pontem Network and Konomi Network
Goals for next quarter 🎯
FRONTEND IMPROVEMENTS
- Pinknode v1.1 — we are going LIVE with full release with dashboard and website revamp
- An enhanced dashboard will provide our users with analytics and management tools that drastically improve user experience
- Users will be able to create accounts, generate their custom endpoints, and gain access to the networks in 3 steps NETWORK UPGRADES
- Support multi-region for lower latency and while maintaining optimal redundancy
- Configure and optimize our K8s clusters to manage nodes more effectively
- Design and implement CI/CD pipeline for maintenance and upgrades
- Active R&D into one click deployment of dedicated nodes, token issuance on Polkadot, and node staking functionality PARTNERS & USERS ONBOARDING
- Spin up parachain full nodes and integrate with our system
- Set up dedicated virtual machines to host collator nodes in a contained environment to maximize uptime and mitigate security risks
- Roll out adoption plan for new users through multiple channels and programs
- Onboard other parachain partners
We’re really pumped to take Pinknode to the next level! 👷💪
ONWARDS!
About Pinknode
Pinknode is a Polkadot-specialized Infrastructure-as-a-Service provider with the goal of accelerating adoption and empowering innovators to build on the most promising Web 3.0 ecosystem. By providing API endpoints through a streamlined onboarding process and maintaining secure, reliable and scalable node infrastructure, Pinknode helps innovators jumpstart development quickly and accelerates their product life cycles.
If you want to know more about Pinknode, check out our website, follow us on Twitter, and join our Telegram to get in on the conversation. | https://medium.com/pinknode/pinknodes-quarterly-brief-1st-september-2021-25ae426794e3 | [] | 2021-09-01 15:39:07.523000+00:00 | ['Polkadot', 'Mining', 'Kusama', 'Node', 'Infrastructure'] |
Flutter firebase service | Firebase Analytics
Firebase Crashlytics
Firebase auth: Google, Facebook, Apple
Firebase storage: select image + upload, gen URL download file
Cloud functions
Firebase messaging + local push notification
Integrate firebase
https://medium.com/@nhancv/flutter-create-a-firebase-project-183b681e4cb5
Integrate firebase Analytics
https://medium.com/@nhancv/flutter-analytics-integration-768ae76a8077
Integrate firebase Crashlytics
https://medium.com/@nhancv/flutter-crashlytics-integration-17530e24ba5c
pubspec.yaml
# Firebase
firebase_core: ^0.5.2+1
firebase_analytics: ^6.2.0
cloud_firestore: ^0.14.3+1
firebase_storage: ^5.1.0
image_picker: ^0.6.7+14
cloud_functions: ^0.7.1
firebase_crashlytics: ^0.2.3+1
firebase_messaging: ^8.0.0-dev.9
flutter_local_notifications: ^3.0.1+6
firebase_auth: ^0.18.3+1
google_sign_in: ^4.5.6
apple_sign_in: ^0.1.0
flutter_facebook_login: ^3.0.0
android/build.gradle
buildscript {
ext.kotlin_version = '1.3.50'
repositories {
google()
jcenter()
}
dependencies {
classpath 'com.android.tools.build:gradle:3.5.0'
classpath 'com.google.gms:google-services:4.3.4'
classpath 'com.google.firebase:firebase-crashlytics-gradle:2.3.0'
classpath "org.jetbrains.kotlin:kotlin-gradle-plugin:$kotlin_version"
}
}
allprojects {
repositories {
google()
jcenter()
}
}
rootProject.buildDir = '../build'
subprojects {
project.buildDir = "${rootProject.buildDir}/${project.name}"
}
subprojects {
project.evaluationDependsOn(':app')
}
task clean(type: Delete) {
delete rootProject.buildDir
}
android/app/build.gradle
...
dependencies {
implementation "org.jetbrains.kotlin:kotlin-stdlib-jdk7:$kotlin_version"
implementation 'com.google.firebase:firebase-analytics:17.5.0'
implementation 'com.google.firebase:firebase-crashlytics:17.2.2'
} apply plugin: 'com.google.firebase.crashlytics'
apply plugin: 'com.google.gms.google-services'
android/app/src/main/res/values/strings.xml
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<resources>
<string name="app_name">AppName</string>
<!-- Replace "000000000000" with your Facebook App ID here. -->
<string name="facebook_app_id">000000000000</string>
<!--
Replace "000000000000" with your Facebook App ID here.
**NOTE**: The scheme needs to start with `fb` and then your ID.
-->
<string name="fb_login_protocol_scheme">fb000000000000</string>
</resources>
AndroidManifest.xml
<manifest xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
package="com.app.nft">
<uses-permission android:name="android.permission.INTERNET"/>
<!-- io.flutter.app.FlutterApplication is an android.app.Application that
calls FlutterMain.startInitialization(this); in its onCreate method.
In most cases you can leave this as-is, but you if you want to provide
additional functionality it is fine to subclass or reimplement
FlutterApplication and put your custom class here. -->
<application
android:label="AppName"
android:requestLegacyExternalStorage="true"
android:usesCleartextTraffic="true"
android:icon="@mipmap/ic_launcher">
<activity
android:name=".MainActivity"
android:launchMode="singleTop"
android:theme="@style/LaunchTheme"
android:configChanges="orientation|keyboardHidden|keyboard|screenSize|smallestScreenSize|locale|layoutDirection|fontScale|screenLayout|density|uiMode"
android:hardwareAccelerated="true"
android:windowSoftInputMode="adjustResize"
android:showWhenLocked="true"
android:turnScreenOn="true">
<!-- Specifies an Android theme to apply to this Activity as soon as
the Android process has started. This theme is visible to the user
while the Flutter UI initializes. After that, this theme continues
to determine the Window background behind the Flutter UI. -->
<meta-data
android:name="io.flutter.embedding.android.NormalTheme"
android:resource="@style/NormalTheme"
/>
<!-- Displays an Android View that continues showing the launch screen
Drawable until Flutter paints its first frame, then this splash
screen fades out. A splash screen is useful to avoid any visual
gap between the end of Android's launch screen and the painting of
Flutter's first frame. -->
<meta-data
android:name="io.flutter.embedding.android.SplashScreenDrawable"
android:resource="@drawable/launch_background"
/>
<intent-filter>
<action android:name="android.intent.action.MAIN"/>
<category android:name="android.intent.category.LAUNCHER"/>
</intent-filter>
</activity>
<!-- Don't delete the meta-data below.
This is used by the Flutter tool to generate GeneratedPluginRegistrant.java -->
<meta-data
android:name="flutterEmbedding"
android:value="2" />
<!-- A custom Android Notification Channel to deliver FCM notifications on a non-default channel -->
<meta-data
android:name="com.google.firebase.messaging.default_notification_channel_id"
android:value="high_importance_channel" />
<!-- Facebook config https://pub.dev/packages/flutter_facebook_login -->
<meta-data android:name="com.facebook.sdk.ApplicationId"
android:value="@string/facebook_app_id"/>
<activity android:name="com.facebook.FacebookActivity"
android:configChanges=
"keyboard|keyboardHidden|screenLayout|screenSize|orientation"
android:label="@string/app_name" />
<activity
android:name="com.facebook.CustomTabActivity"
android:exported="true">
<intent-filter>
<action android:name="android.intent.action.VIEW" />
<category android:name="android.intent.category.DEFAULT" />
<category android:name="android.intent.category.BROWSABLE" />
<data android:scheme="@string/fb_login_protocol_scheme" />
</intent-filter>
</activity>
</application>
</manifest>
android/app/proguard-rules.pro
#https://github.com/MaikuB/flutter_local_notifications/blob/master/flutter_local_notifications/example/android/app/proguard-rules.pro
## Flutter wrapper
-keep class io.flutter.app.** { *; }
-keep class io.flutter.plugin.** { *; }
-keep class io.flutter.util.** { *; }
-keep class io.flutter.view.** { *; }
-keep class io.flutter.** { *; }
-keep class io.flutter.plugins.** { *; }
-dontwarn io.flutter.embedding.**
## Gson rules
# Gson uses generic type information stored in a class file when working with fields. Proguard
# removes such information by default, so configure it to keep all of it.
-keepattributes Signature
# For using GSON @Expose annotation
-keepattributes *Annotation*
# Gson specific classes
-dontwarn sun.misc.**
#-keep class com.google.gson.stream.** { *; }
# Prevent proguard from stripping interface information from TypeAdapter, TypeAdapterFactory,
# JsonSerializer, JsonDeserializer instances (so they can be used in @JsonAdapter)
-keep class * extends com.google.gson.TypeAdapter
-keep class * implements com.google.gson.TypeAdapterFactory
-keep class * implements com.google.gson.JsonSerializer
-keep class * implements com.google.gson.JsonDeserializer
# Prevent R8 from leaving Data object members always null
-keepclassmembers,allowobfuscation class * {
@com.google.gson.annotations.SerializedName <fields>;
}
ios/Runner/Runner.entitlements
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd">
<plist version="1.0">
<dict>
<key>aps-environment</key>
<string>development</string>
<key>com.apple.developer.applesignin</key>
<array>
<string>Default</string>
</array>
</dict>
</plist>
Info.plist
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd">
<plist version="1.0">
<dict>
<key>CFBundleDevelopmentRegion</key>
<string>$(DEVELOPMENT_LANGUAGE)</string>
<key>CFBundleExecutable</key>
<string>$(EXECUTABLE_NAME)</string>
<key>CFBundleIdentifier</key>
<string>$(PRODUCT_BUNDLE_IDENTIFIER)</string>
<key>CFBundleInfoDictionaryVersion</key>
<string>6.0</string>
<key>CFBundleName</key>
<string>AppName</string>
<key>CFBundlePackageType</key>
<string>APPL</string>
<key>CFBundleShortVersionString</key>
<string>$(FLUTTER_BUILD_NAME)</string>
<key>CFBundleSignature</key>
<string>????</string>
<key>CFBundleVersion</key>
<string>$(FLUTTER_BUILD_NUMBER)</string>
<key>ITSAppUsesNonExemptEncryption</key>
<false/>
<key>LSRequiresIPhoneOS</key>
<true/>
<key>NSAppTransportSecurity</key>
<dict>
<key>NSAllowsLocalNetworking</key>
<true/>
</dict>
<key>NSCameraUsageDescription</key>
<string>App requires access to the camera for avatar upload</string>
<key>NSPhotoLibraryUsageDescription</key>
<string>App requires access to the photo library for avatar upload</string>
<key>UIBackgroundModes</key>
<array>
<string>fetch</string>
<string>remote-notification</string>
</array>
<key>UILaunchStoryboardName</key>
<string>LaunchScreen</string>
<key>UIMainStoryboardFile</key>
<string>Main</string>
<key>UISupportedInterfaceOrientations</key>
<array>
<string>UIInterfaceOrientationPortrait</string>
</array>
<key>UISupportedInterfaceOrientations~ipad</key>
<array>
<string>UIInterfaceOrientationPortrait</string>
<string>UIInterfaceOrientationPortraitUpsideDown</string>
<string>UIInterfaceOrientationLandscapeLeft</string>
<string>UIInterfaceOrientationLandscapeRight</string>
</array>
<key>UIViewControllerBasedStatusBarAppearance</key>
<false/>
<!-- Put me in the [my_project]/ios/Runner/Info.plist file -->
<!-- Google Sign-in Section -->
<key>CFBundleURLTypes</key>
<array>
<dict>
<key>CFBundleTypeRole</key>
<string>Editor</string>
<key>CFBundleURLSchemes</key>
<array>
<!-- TODO Replace this value: -->
<!-- Copied from GoogleService-Info.plist key REVERSED_CLIENT_ID -->
<string>com.googleusercontent.apps.1022986619993-tgkhigi1onm47tbp2iic1cnbuun9l788</string>
</array>
</dict>
<dict>
<key>CFBundleURLSchemes</key>
<array>
<!--
Replace "000000000000" with your Facebook App ID here.
**NOTE**: The scheme needs to start with `fb` and then your ID.
-->
<string>fb000000000000</string>
</array>
</dict>
</array>
<key>FacebookAppID</key>
<!-- Replace "000000000000" with your Facebook App ID here. -->
<string>000000000000</string>
<key>FacebookDisplayName</key>
<!-- Replace "YOUR_APP_NAME" with your Facebook App name. -->
<string>YOUR_APP_NAME</string>
<key>LSApplicationQueriesSchemes</key>
<array>
<string>fbapi</string>
<string>fb-messenger-share-api</string>
<string>fbauth2</string>
<string>fbshareextension</string>
</array>
<!-- End of the Google and Fb Sign-in Section -->
</dict>
</plist>
AppDelegate.swift
import UIKit
import Flutter
@UIApplicationMain
@objc class AppDelegate: FlutterAppDelegate {
override func application(
_ application: UIApplication,
didFinishLaunchingWithOptions launchOptions: [UIApplication.LaunchOptionsKey: Any]?
) -> Bool {
if #available(iOS 10.0, *) {
UNUserNotificationCenter.current().delegate = self as? UNUserNotificationCenterDelegate
}
if(!UserDefaults.standard.bool(forKey: "Notification")) {
UIApplication.shared.cancelAllLocalNotifications()
UserDefaults.standard.set(true, forKey: "Notification")
}
GeneratedPluginRegistrant.register(with: self)
return super.application(application, didFinishLaunchingWithOptions: launchOptions)
}
}
my_app.dart
import 'dart:async';
import 'dart:isolate';
import 'package:firebase_crashlytics/firebase_crashlytics.dart';
import 'package:firebase_analytics/observer.dart';
import 'package:firebase_core/firebase_core.dart';
import 'package:flutter/foundation.dart';
import 'package:flutter/material.dart';
import 'package:flutter/services.dart';
import 'package:flutter_localizations/flutter_localizations.dart';
import 'package:nft/generated/l10n.dart';
import 'package:nft/pages/home/home_provider.dart';
import 'package:nft/pages/login/login_provider.dart';
import 'package:nft/pages/play/play_provider.dart';
import 'package:nft/services/app/app_dialog.dart';
import 'package:nft/services/app/app_loading.dart';
import 'package:nft/services/cache/credential.dart';
import 'package:nft/services/cache/storage.dart';
import 'package:nft/services/cache/storage_preferences.dart';
import 'package:nft/services/app/locale_provider.dart';
import 'package:nft/services/firebase/firebase_push.dart';
import 'package:nft/services/firebase/firebase_tracking.dart';
import 'package:nft/services/firebase/local_push.dart';
import 'package:nft/services/rest_api/api_user.dart';
import 'package:nft/utils/app_constant.dart';
import 'package:nft/utils/app_route.dart';
import 'package:nft/utils/app_theme.dart';
import 'package:provider/provider.dart';
import 'package:provider/single_child_widget.dart';
Future<void> myMain() async {
/// Start services later
WidgetsFlutterBinding.ensureInitialized();
/// Force portrait mode
await SystemChrome.setPreferredOrientations(
<DeviceOrientation>[DeviceOrientation.portraitUp]);
// Initializing FlutterFire
await Firebase.initializeApp();
// Initialize Crash report
const bool enableCrashlytics = !kDebugMode;
await FirebaseCrashlytics.instance
.setCrashlyticsCollectionEnabled(enableCrashlytics);
// Pass all uncaught errors from the framework to Crashlytics.
FlutterError.onError = FirebaseCrashlytics.instance.recordFlutterError;
// Errors outside of Flutter
Isolate.current.addErrorListener(RawReceivePort((List<dynamic> pair) async {
final List<dynamic> errorAndStacktrace = pair;
await FirebaseCrashlytics.instance.recordError(
errorAndStacktrace.first,
errorAndStacktrace.last as StackTrace,
);
}).sendPort);
// Config firebase message
await FirebasePush.I.configBeforeRunApp();
/// Run Application
// Zoned Errors
runZonedGuarded<Future<void>>(() async {
/// Run Application
runApp(
MultiProvider(
providers: <SingleChildWidget>[
Provider<AppRoute>(create: (_) => AppRoute()),
Provider<Storage>(create: (_) => StoragePreferences()),
ChangeNotifierProvider<Credential>(
create: (BuildContext context) =>
Credential(context.read<Storage>())),
ProxyProvider<Credential, ApiUser>(
create: (_) => ApiUser(),
update: (_, Credential credential, ApiUser userApi) {
return userApi..token = credential.token;
}),
Provider<AppLoadingProvider>(create: (_) => AppLoadingProvider()),
Provider<AppDialogProvider>(create: (_) => AppDialogProvider()),
ChangeNotifierProvider<LocaleProvider>(
create: (_) => LocaleProvider()),
ChangeNotifierProvider<AppThemeProvider>(
create: (_) => AppThemeProvider()),
ChangeNotifierProvider<HomeProvider>(
create: (BuildContext context) => HomeProvider(
context.read<ApiUser>(),
context.read<Credential>(),
)),
ChangeNotifierProvider<PlayProvider>(
create: (BuildContext context) => PlayProvider()),
ChangeNotifierProvider<LoginProvider>(
create: (BuildContext context) => LoginProvider(
context.read<ApiUser>(),
context.read<Credential>(),
)),
],
child: const MyApp(),
),
);
}, FirebaseCrashlytics.instance.recordError);
}
class MyApp extends StatefulWidget {
const MyApp({Key key}) : super(key: key);
@override
_MyAppState createState() => _MyAppState();
}
class _MyAppState extends State<MyApp> {
static FirebaseAnalyticsObserver observer =
FirebaseAnalyticsObserver(analytics: FirebaseTracking.I.analytics);
@override
void initState() {
super.initState();
// Init firebase push
FirebasePush.I.configInAppState();
// Init local push
LocalPush.I.configInAppState(
onSelectNotification: (String payload) async {
print('onSelectNotification $payload');
},
onDidReceiveLocalNotification:
(int id, String title, String body, String payload) async {
print('onDidReceiveLocalNotification $payload');
},
);
// Example about load credential to init page
WidgetsBinding.instance.addPostFrameCallback((_) async {
final bool hasCredential =
await context.read<Credential>().loadCredential();
if (hasCredential) {
context.navigator()?.pushReplacementNamed(AppConstant.homePageRoute);
}
});
}
@override
Widget build(BuildContext context) {
// Get providers
final AppRoute appRoute = context.watch<AppRoute>();
final LocaleProvider localeProvider = context.watch<LocaleProvider>();
final AppTheme appTheme = context.theme();
// Build Material app
return MaterialApp(
navigatorKey: appRoute.navigatorKey,
locale: localeProvider.locale,
supportedLocales: S.delegate.supportedLocales,
localizationsDelegates: const <LocalizationsDelegate<dynamic>>[
S.delegate,
GlobalMaterialLocalizations.delegate,
GlobalCupertinoLocalizations.delegate,
GlobalWidgetsLocalizations.delegate,
],
debugShowCheckedModeBanner: false,
theme: appTheme.buildThemeData(),
//https://stackoverflow.com/questions/57245175/flutter-dynamic-initial-route
//https://github.com/flutter/flutter/issues/12454
//home: (appRoute.generateRoute(
/// const RouteSettings(name: AppConstant.rootPageRoute))
/// as MaterialPageRoute<dynamic>)
/// .builder(context),
initialRoute: AppConstant.demoPageRoute,
// initialRoute: AppConstant.rootPageRoute,
onGenerateRoute: appRoute.generateRoute,
navigatorObservers: <NavigatorObserver>[appRoute.routeObserver, observer],
);
}
}
demo_page.dart
import 'dart:async';
import 'dart:io';
import 'package:cloud_firestore/cloud_firestore.dart';
import 'package:firebase_crashlytics/firebase_crashlytics.dart';
import 'package:flutter/cupertino.dart';
import 'package:flutter/material.dart';
import 'package:habitapp/services/app/app_loading.dart';
import 'package:habitapp/services/app/dynamic_size.dart';
import 'package:habitapp/services/firebase/cloud_firestore.dart';
import 'package:habitapp/services/firebase/cloud_functions.dart';
import 'package:habitapp/services/firebase/cloud_storage.dart';
import 'package:habitapp/services/firebase/firebase_error.dart';
import 'package:habitapp/services/firebase/firebase_error_type.dart';
import 'package:habitapp/services/firebase/firebase_login.dart';
import 'package:habitapp/services/firebase/local_push.dart';
import 'package:habitapp/utils/app_helper.dart';
import 'package:habitapp/utils/app_log.dart';
import 'package:habitapp/utils/app_style.dart';
import 'package:habitapp/widgets/p_appbar_empty.dart';
import 'package:habitapp/widgets/w_dismiss_keyboard.dart';
import 'package:image_picker/image_picker.dart';
import 'package:provider/provider.dart';
class DemoPage extends StatefulWidget {
@override
_DemoPageState createState() => _DemoPageState();
}
class _DemoPageState extends State<DemoPage>
with WidgetsBindingObserver, DynamicSize, FirebaseError {
CloudFireStoreSnapshot _cloudFireStoreSnapshot;
StreamSubscription<DocumentSnapshot> snapshotSubscription;
@override
void initState() {
super.initState();
print('page1_initState');
WidgetsBinding.instance.addObserver(this);
WidgetsBinding.instance.addPostFrameCallback((_) {
if (_cloudFireStoreSnapshot != null) {
snapshotSubscription =
CloudFireStore.I.listenUser(_cloudFireStoreSnapshot);
}
});
}
@override
void didChangeDependencies() {
super.didChangeDependencies();
print('page1_didChangeDependencies');
}
@override
void didUpdateWidget(covariant DemoPage oldWidget) {
super.didUpdateWidget(oldWidget);
print('page1_didUpdateWidget');
}
@override
void deactivate() {
print('page1_deactivate');
super.deactivate();
}
@override
void dispose() {
print('page1_dispose');
snapshotSubscription?.cancel();
WidgetsBinding.instance.removeObserver(this);
super.dispose();
}
@override
void didChangeAppLifecycleState(AppLifecycleState state) {
super.didChangeAppLifecycleState(state);
print('page1_didChangeAppLifecycleState: $state');
}
@override
Widget build(BuildContext context) {
initDynamicSize(context);
return PAppBarEmpty(
child: WDismissKeyboard(
child: Container(
width: double.infinity,
child: Column(
mainAxisAlignment: MainAxisAlignment.center,
crossAxisAlignment: CrossAxisAlignment.center,
mainAxisSize: MainAxisSize.max,
children: <Widget>[
FlatButton(
onPressed: () {
FirebaseLogin.I.signInGoogle();
},
child: const Text(
'Google Sign in',
),
),
FlatButton(
onPressed: () {
FirebaseLogin.I.signInFacebook();
},
child: const Text(
'Facebook Sign in',
),
),
FutureBuilder<bool>(
future: FirebaseLogin.I.isAppleSignInAvailable(),
builder: (_, AsyncSnapshot<bool> isAvailable) {
return isAvailable.data == true
? FlatButton(
onPressed: () {
FirebaseLogin.I.signInApple();
},
child: const Text(
'Facebook Apple',
),
)
: Container();
},
),
FlatButton(
onPressed: () {
LocalPush.I.schedule(
id: 0,
message: 'local push',
notifyAt:
DateTime.now().add(const Duration(seconds: 3)),
payload: NotyPayload(0, data: 'default'));
},
child: const Text(
'Local push',
),
),
FlatButton(
onPressed: () {
firebaseCallSafety(
CloudFunctions.I.getHelloWorld,
onStart: () async {
print('Start call function');
},
onCompleted: (bool status, void _) async {
print('Call function status: $status');
},
onError: (dynamic error) async {
print(error);
},
);
},
child: const Text(
'Hello world',
),
),
FlatButton(
onPressed: () {
// Forcing a crash
FirebaseCrashlytics.instance.crash();
},
child: const Text('Crash'),
),
FlatButton(
onPressed: () {
firebaseCallSafety(CloudFireStore.I.addUserWithId,
onCompleted: (bool status, void _) async {
print('User added with status: $status');
});
},
child: const Text(
'Add User',
),
),
FlatButton(
onPressed: () {
firebaseCallSafety(CloudFireStore.I.updateUser,
onCompleted: (bool status, void _) async {
print('User updated with status: $status');
});
},
child: const Text(
'Update User',
),
),
FlatButton(
onPressed: () {
firebaseCallSafety(CloudFireStore.I.removeExtraField,
onCompleted: (bool status, void _) async {
print('User remove extra field with status: $status');
});
},
child: const Text(
'Remove extra field',
),
),
FlatButton(
onPressed: () {
firebaseCallSafety(CloudFireStore.I.deleteUser,
onCompleted: (bool status, void _) async {
print('User deleted with status: $status');
});
},
child: const Text(
'Delete user',
),
),
FlatButton(
onPressed: () {
firebaseCallSafety(() => CloudFireStore.I.readUser(),
onCompleted: (bool status, String value) async {
print('User read with status: $status, value: $value');
if (status == true) {
AppHelper.showToast(value);
}
});
},
child: const Text(
'Read user info',
),
),
ChangeNotifierProvider<CloudFireStoreSnapshot>(
create: (_) => CloudFireStoreSnapshot(),
builder: (BuildContext context, _) {
_cloudFireStoreSnapshot =
Provider.of<CloudFireStoreSnapshot>(context,
listen: false);
return Selector<CloudFireStoreSnapshot, DocumentSnapshot>(
selector: (_, CloudFireStoreSnapshot p) => p.userSnapshot,
builder: (_, DocumentSnapshot snapshot, __) {
print('update changes page1');
return Text(snapshot?.exists == true
? snapshot.data()['full_name'] as String
: 'null');
},
);
},
),
IconButton(
icon: const Icon(Icons.photo_library),
onPressed: () {
_selectImageSource(context);
},
),
],
)),
),
);
}
Future<void> _selectImageSource(BuildContext context) async {
// Close keyboard
FocusScope.of(context).requestFocus(FocusNode());
// Define max size of image
const double maxWidth = 350;
const double maxHeight = 500;
// Show choose image source
final List<String> source = <String>['Camera', 'Gallery'];
final List<CupertinoActionSheetAction> actions = source
.map((String it) => CupertinoActionSheetAction(
isDefaultAction: true,
onPressed: () {
// pop value
Navigator.pop<int>(context, source.indexOf(it));
},
child: Text(
it,
style: boldTextStyle(14, Colors.black),
),
))
.toList(growable: false);
final int index = await showCupertinoModalPopup<int>(
context: context,
builder: (BuildContext context) => CupertinoActionSheet(
actions: actions,
cancelButton: CupertinoActionSheetAction(
isDefaultAction: true,
isDestructiveAction: true,
onPressed: () {
// pop null
Navigator.pop(context);
},
child: Text(
'Close',
style: boldTextStyle(14, Colors.red),
),
),
),
);
if (index != null) {
final ImagePicker _imagePicker = ImagePicker();
final PickedFile image = await _imagePicker.getImage(
source: index == 0 ? ImageSource.camera : ImageSource.gallery,
maxWidth: maxWidth,
maxHeight: maxHeight,
);
if (image != null) {
final File file = File(image.path);
// Upload media image
firebaseCallSafety(() {
return CloudStorage.I.uploadFile(file);
}, onStart: () async {
AppLoadingProvider.show(context);
}, onCompleted: (bool status, void _) async {
AppLoadingProvider.hide(context);
if (status) {
AppHelper.showToast('success');
}
});
}
}
}
@override
Future<void> onFirebaseError(dynamic error) async {
final FirebaseErrorType firebaseErrorType = parseFirebaseErrorType(error);
print(firebaseErrorType);
AppHelper.showToast(firebaseErrorType.message);
}
}
firebase_tracking.dart
import 'package:firebase_analytics/firebase_analytics.dart';
import 'package:flutter/foundation.dart';
class FirebaseTracking {
FirebaseTracking._() {
disableLog = !kReleaseMode;
}
static FirebaseTracking I = FirebaseTracking._();
// Firebase analytics instance
final FirebaseAnalytics _analytics = FirebaseAnalytics();
FirebaseAnalytics get analytics => _analytics;
// When the debug slider is ON and no event data is sent
bool _disableLog = true;
set disableLog(bool value) {
_disableLog = value;
_analytics.setAnalyticsCollectionEnabled(!value);
}
/// Log button tapped event
void logEvent({String name, Map<String, dynamic> parameters}) {
if (_disableLog) {
return;
}
if (name == null || name.isEmpty) {
return;
}
_analytics.logEvent(name: name, parameters: parameters);
}
/// Tracking screen
void trackingScreen(String screenName) {
if (_disableLog) {
return;
}
_analytics.setCurrentScreen(screenName: screenName);
}
}
firebase_error.dart
import 'dart:async';
import 'package:cloud_firestore/cloud_firestore.dart';
import 'package:nft/services/firebase/firebase_error_type.dart';
import 'package:nft/utils/app_log.dart';
mixin FirebaseError {
/// This function was called when trigger safeCallApi
/// and apiError = true as default
Future<void> onFirebaseError(dynamic error);
/// Call api safety with error handling.
/// Required:
/// - dioApi: call async dio function
/// Optional:
/// - onStart: the function executed before api, can be null
/// - onError: the function executed in case api crashed, can be null
/// - onCompleted: the function executed after api or before crashing, can be null
/// - onFinally: the function executed end of function, can be null
/// - apiError: true as default if you want to forward the error to onApiError
Future<T> firebaseCallSafety<T>(
Future<T> Function() fireCall, {
Future<void> Function() onStart,
Future<void> Function(dynamic error) onError,
Future<void> Function(bool status, T res) onCompleted,
Future<void> Function() onFinally,
bool skipOnError = true,
}) async {
try {
// On start, use for show loading
if (onStart != null) {
await onStart();
}
// Execute api
final T res = await fireCall();
// On completed, use for hide loading
if (onCompleted != null) {
await onCompleted(true, res);
}
// Return api response
return res;
} catch (error) {
// In case error:
// On completed, use for hide loading
if (onCompleted != null) {
await onCompleted(false, null);
}
// On inline error
if (onError != null) {
await onError(error);
}
// Call onApiError if apiError's enabled
if (skipOnError) {
onFirebaseError(error);
}
return null;
} finally {
// Call finally function
if (onFinally != null) {
await onFinally();
}
}
}
// Parsing error to ErrorType
FirebaseErrorType parseFirebaseErrorType(dynamic error) {
if (error is FirebaseException) {
FirebaseErrorCode errorCode = FirebaseErrorCode.unknown;
if(error.code == 'permission-denied') {
errorCode = FirebaseErrorCode.permission;
}
return FirebaseErrorType(code: errorCode, message: error.message);
} else {
logger.e(error);
}
return FirebaseErrorType();
}
}
firebase_error_type.dart
enum FirebaseErrorCode { unknown, permission }
class FirebaseErrorType {
FirebaseErrorType({this.code = FirebaseErrorCode.unknown, this.message = 'Unknown'});
final FirebaseErrorCode code;
final String message;
@override
String toString() {
return 'FirebaseErrorType{code: $code, message: $message}';
}
}
cloud_firestore.dart
import 'dart:async';
import 'package:cloud_firestore/cloud_firestore.dart';
import 'package:nft/services/safety/change_notifier_safety.dart';
const String defaultDocumentId = 'g5P2RamQ0z00XeL08Kk2';
// dev rule
//rules_version = '2';
// service cloud.firestore {
// match /databases/{database}/documents {
// match /{document=**} {
// allow read, write: if
// request.time < timestamp.date(2020, 12, 27);
// }
// }
// }
class CloudFireStore {
CloudFireStore._();
static final CloudFireStore I = CloudFireStore._();
final FirebaseFirestore _store = FirebaseFirestore.instance;
// Insert
Future<void> addUser() {
final CollectionReference users = _store.collection('users');
final Map<String, String> data = <String, String>{
'full_name': 'test',
'extra': 'empty'
};
return users.add(data);
}
// Insert with defined id
Future<void> addUserWithId({String documentId = defaultDocumentId}) {
final CollectionReference users = _store.collection('users');
final Map<String, String> data = <String, String>{
'full_name': 'test',
'extra': 'empty'
};
return users.doc(documentId).set(data);
}
// Update document
Future<void> updateUser({String documentId = defaultDocumentId}) {
final CollectionReference users = _store.collection('users');
final Map<String, String> data = <String, String>{
'full_name': DateTime.now().toIso8601String()
};
return users.doc(documentId).update(data);
}
// Remove specific properties
Future<void> removeExtraField({String documentId = defaultDocumentId}) {
final CollectionReference users = _store.collection('users');
return users
.doc(documentId)
.update(<String, FieldValue>{'extra': FieldValue.delete()});
}
// Delete document
Future<void> deleteUser({String documentId = defaultDocumentId}) {
final CollectionReference users = _store.collection('users');
return users.doc(documentId).delete();
}
// One-time Read
Future<String> readUser({String documentId = defaultDocumentId}) async {
final CollectionReference users = _store.collection('users');
final DocumentSnapshot snapshot = await users.doc(documentId).get();
if (!snapshot.exists) {
throw Exception('User does not exist!');
}
return snapshot.data()['full_name'] as String;
}
// Real-time Read
// Remember cancel stream in dispose widget
StreamSubscription<DocumentSnapshot> listenUser(
final CloudFireStoreSnapshot cloudFireStoreSnapshot,
{String documentId = defaultDocumentId}) {
print('cloudFireStoreSnapshot ${cloudFireStoreSnapshot.hashCode}');
final CollectionReference users = _store.collection('users');
final Stream<DocumentSnapshot> documentStream =
users.doc(documentId).snapshots();
final StreamSubscription<DocumentSnapshot> subscription =
documentStream.listen((DocumentSnapshot event) {
print('update_cloudFireStoreSnapshot ${cloudFireStoreSnapshot.hashCode}');
cloudFireStoreSnapshot?.userSnapshot = event;
});
return subscription;
}
}
class CloudFireStoreSnapshot extends ChangeNotifierSafety {
DocumentSnapshot _userSnapshot;
DocumentSnapshot get userSnapshot => _userSnapshot;
set userSnapshot(DocumentSnapshot value) {
_userSnapshot = value;
notifyListeners();
}
}
cloud_storage.dart
import 'dart:async';
import 'dart:io';
import 'package:nft/utils/app_log.dart';
import 'package:path/path.dart';
import 'package:firebase_storage/firebase_storage.dart';
// dev rule
//rules_version = '2';
// service firebase.storage {
// match /b/{bucket}/o {
// match /{allPaths=**} {
// allow read, write: if
// request.time < timestamp.date(2020, 12, 27);
// }
// }
// }
class CloudStorage {
CloudStorage._();
static final CloudStorage I = CloudStorage._();
final FirebaseStorage _storage = FirebaseStorage.instance;
// Parse file name
String _parseFilename(File file) {
final String extension = basename(file.path).split('.').last;
final int nowTimeStamp = DateTime.now().toUtc().millisecondsSinceEpoch;
return '$nowTimeStamp.$extension';
}
// List files
Future<void> listFiles() async {
final ListResult result = await FirebaseStorage.instance.ref().listAll();
// ignore: avoid_function_literals_in_foreach_calls
result.items.forEach((Reference ref) {
print('Found file: $ref');
});
// ignore: avoid_function_literals_in_foreach_calls
result.prefixes.forEach((Reference ref) {
print('Found directory: $ref');
});
}
// Upload file
Future<void> uploadFile(File file) async {
final String uploadFileName = _parseFilename(file);
final UploadTask uploadTask =
FirebaseStorage.instance.ref('uploads/$uploadFileName').putFile(file);
final StreamSubscription<TaskSnapshot> streamSubscription =
uploadTask.snapshotEvents.listen((TaskSnapshot snapshot) {
// paused, running, success
logger.d('Snapshot state: ${snapshot.state}');
logger.d('Progress: ${snapshot.totalBytes / snapshot.bytesTransferred}');
});
await uploadTask;
streamSubscription.cancel();
}
// Generate download file url
Future<String> getDownloadURL(String path) =>
_storage.ref(path).getDownloadURL().then((String url) => url);
}
cloud_functions.dart
import 'dart:async';
import 'dart:io';
import 'package:nft/utils/app_log.dart';
import 'package:cloud_functions/cloud_functions.dart';
// Test local with mobile emulator and firebase emulators
const bool EMULATOR = true;
class CloudFunctions {
CloudFunctions._();
static final CloudFunctions I = CloudFunctions._();
final FirebaseFunctions _functions = FirebaseFunctions.instance;
// Call default cloud function
Future<void> getHelloWorld() async {
logger.d('Call cloud function helloWorld');
if (EMULATOR) {
_functions.useFunctionsEmulator(origin: 'http://localhost:5001');
}
// Format return from server:
// response.send({data: "Hello from Firebase!", error: ""});
final HttpsCallable callable = _functions.httpsCallable('helloWorld');
final HttpsCallableResult<String> results = await callable();
final String hello = results.data;
logger.d('From server: $hello');
}
}
firebase_push.dart
import 'package:firebase_core/firebase_core.dart';
import 'package:firebase_messaging/firebase_messaging.dart';
import 'package:flutter_local_notifications/flutter_local_notifications.dart';
/// Define a top-level named handler which background/terminated messages will
/// call.
///
/// To verify things are working, check out the native platform logs.
Future<void> _firebaseMessagingBackgroundHandler(RemoteMessage message) async {
// If you're going to use other Firebase services in the background, such as Firestore,
// make sure you call `initializeApp` before using other Firebase services.
await Firebase.initializeApp();
print('Handling a background message ${message.messageId}');
}
/// Create a [AndroidNotificationChannel] for heads up notifications
const AndroidNotificationChannel _channel = AndroidNotificationChannel(
'high_importance_channel', // id
'High Importance Notifications', // title
'This channel is used for important notifications.', // description
importance: Importance.high,
enableVibration: true,
playSound: true,
);
/// Initialize the [FlutterLocalNotificationsPlugin] package.
final FlutterLocalNotificationsPlugin _flutterLocalNotificationsPlugin =
FlutterLocalNotificationsPlugin();
class FirebasePush {
FirebasePush._();
static FirebasePush I = FirebasePush._();
// Firebase messaging instance
final FirebaseMessaging _messaging = FirebaseMessaging.instance;
// Config place before runApp()
Future<void> configBeforeRunApp() async {
// Set the background messaging handler early on, as a named top-level function
FirebaseMessaging.onBackgroundMessage(_firebaseMessagingBackgroundHandler);
/// Config: https://firebase.flutter.dev/docs/messaging/notifications
/// iOS: Enabling foreground notifications is generally a straightforward process.
/// Update the iOS foreground notification presentation options to allow
/// heads up notifications.
await _messaging.setForegroundNotificationPresentationOptions(
alert: true, // Required to display a heads up notification
badge: true,
sound: true,
);
/// We use this channel in the `AndroidManifest.xml` file to override the
/// default FCM channel to enable heads up notifications.
await _flutterLocalNotificationsPlugin
.resolvePlatformSpecificImplementation<
AndroidFlutterLocalNotificationsPlugin>()
?.createNotificationChannel(_channel);
}
// Place this config in initState of Application Widget
Future<void> configInAppState() async {
// Request permission
final NotificationSettings settings = await _messaging.requestPermission(
alert: true,
announcement: false,
badge: true,
carPlay: false,
criticalAlert: false,
provisional: false,
sound: true,
);
if (settings.authorizationStatus == AuthorizationStatus.authorized) {
print('User granted permission');
////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
// Get any messages which caused the application to open from
// a terminated state.
final RemoteMessage initialMessage =
await FirebaseMessaging.instance.getInitialMessage();
print('initialMessage: ${initialMessage?.notification?.title}');
// Also handle any interaction when the app is in the background via a
// Stream listener
FirebaseMessaging.onMessageOpenedApp.listen((RemoteMessage message) {
print('A new onMessageOpenedApp event was published!');
print('onMessageOpenedApp: ${message.notification.title}');
});
// Listen new message
FirebaseMessaging.onMessage.listen((RemoteMessage message) {
print('message: ${message.notification.title}');
final RemoteNotification notification = message.notification;
final AndroidNotification android = message.notification?.android;
if (notification != null && android != null) {
_flutterLocalNotificationsPlugin.show(
notification.hashCode,
notification.title,
notification.body,
NotificationDetails(
android: AndroidNotificationDetails(
_channel.id,
_channel.name,
_channel.description,
icon: 'ic_launcher_foreground',
importance: Importance.max,
priority: Priority.max,
),
));
}
});
final String fcmToken = await _messaging.getToken();
print('fcmToken: $fcmToken');
} else if (settings.authorizationStatus ==
AuthorizationStatus.provisional) {
print('User granted provisional permission');
} else {
print('User declined or has not accepted permission');
}
}
}
local_push.dart
import 'dart:convert';
import 'package:flutter/cupertino.dart';
import 'package:flutter_local_notifications/flutter_local_notifications.dart';
import 'package:nft/utils/app_log.dart';
import 'package:timezone/data/latest.dart' as tz;
import 'package:timezone/timezone.dart' as tz;
// Payload for notification
class NotyPayload {
NotyPayload(this.type, {this.data});
factory NotyPayload.fromJson(Map<String, dynamic> json) {
return NotyPayload(json['type'] as int, data: json['data'] as String);
}
final int type;
final String data;
String toJson() => jsonEncode(<String, dynamic>{
'type': type,
'data': data,
});
@override
String toString() {
return 'NotyPayload{type: $type, data: $data}';
}
}
class LocalPush {
LocalPush._();
static LocalPush I = LocalPush._();
// Place this config in initState of Application Widget
Future<bool> configInAppState({
Future<void> Function(String payload) onSelectNotification,
Future<void> Function(int id, String title, String body, String payload)
onDidReceiveLocalNotification,
}) {
// Initialise the time zone database
tz.initializeTimeZones();
// Initialise setting
final FlutterLocalNotificationsPlugin flutterLocalNotificationsPlugin =
FlutterLocalNotificationsPlugin();
const AndroidInitializationSettings initializationSettingsAndroid =
AndroidInitializationSettings('ic_launcher_foreground');
final IOSInitializationSettings initializationSettingsIOS =
IOSInitializationSettings(
onDidReceiveLocalNotification: onDidReceiveLocalNotification);
final InitializationSettings initializationSettings =
InitializationSettings(
android: initializationSettingsAndroid,
iOS: initializationSettingsIOS);
return flutterLocalNotificationsPlugin.initialize(initializationSettings,
onSelectNotification: onSelectNotification);
}
static const String DEFAULT_SOUND = 'default';
/// Unit generate notify id by string
/// Format: key@group@extra
/// Ex: stackId@reminder@2020/09/11
int genNewNotifyId(String key, String group,
{String extra = 'default'}) {
return '$key@$group@$extra'.hashCode.abs();
}
/// About notify id: using 32bit integer.
/// Note: can use hasCode of string to get int for id
/// Format: '<payloadId>@<category>_millisecondsSinceEpoch'.hashCode
/// Ex: 'stackId@reminder_millisecondsSinceEpoch'.hashCode
Future<void> schedule(
{@required int id,
String title,
@required String message,
@required DateTime notifyAt,
String sound = DEFAULT_SOUND,
NotyPayload payload,
int badgeNumber}) async {
logger.d(
'noti_schedule: id{$id} title{$title} message{$message} notifyAt{$notifyAt} sound{$sound}');
final FlutterLocalNotificationsPlugin notifications =
FlutterLocalNotificationsPlugin();
// sound based on channel
final AndroidNotificationDetails androidDetails =
AndroidNotificationDetails(
'primary_$sound',
'Channel ${sound ?? 'no sound'}',
'Notifications for ${sound ?? 'no sound'}',
importance: Importance.max,
priority: Priority.max,
playSound: sound != null,
sound: sound == DEFAULT_SOUND || sound == null
? null
: RawResourceAndroidNotificationSound(sound),
);
final IOSNotificationDetails iOSDetails = IOSNotificationDetails(
sound: sound == DEFAULT_SOUND || sound == null ? null : '$sound.aiff',
presentAlert: true,
presentBadge: true,
presentSound: sound != null,
badgeNumber: badgeNumber);
final NotificationDetails platformChannelSpecifics =
NotificationDetails(android: androidDetails, iOS: iOSDetails);
if (notifyAt != null) {
await notifications.zonedSchedule(
id,
title,
message,
tz.TZDateTime.from(notifyAt, tz.local),
platformChannelSpecifics,
androidAllowWhileIdle: true,
uiLocalNotificationDateInterpretation:
UILocalNotificationDateInterpretation.absoluteTime,
payload: payload?.toJson(),
);
}
}
/// Cancel notification by id
Future<void> cancel(int id) async {
return FlutterLocalNotificationsPlugin().cancel(id);
}
/// Cancel all push notification
Future<void> cancelAll() async {
return FlutterLocalNotificationsPlugin().cancelAll();
}
}
firebase_login.dart
import 'dart:async';
import 'package:apple_sign_in/apple_sign_in.dart';
import 'package:firebase_auth/firebase_auth.dart';
import 'package:flutter_facebook_login/flutter_facebook_login.dart';
import 'package:google_sign_in/google_sign_in.dart';
import 'package:nft/utils/app_log.dart';
class AuthCanceled implements Exception {
@override
String toString() => 'AuthCanceled: cancelled by user';
}
class UserNotAuthorized implements Exception {
@override
String toString() => 'User not authorized!';
}
class FirebaseLogin {
FirebaseLogin._();
static final FirebaseLogin I = FirebaseLogin._();
final FirebaseAuth _auth = FirebaseAuth.instance;
final GoogleSignIn _googleSignIn = GoogleSignIn();
final FacebookLogin _facebookLogin = FacebookLogin();
Future<bool> isAppleSignInAvailable() => AppleSignIn.isAvailable();
Future<User> signInGoogle() async {
final GoogleSignInAccount googleUser = await _googleSignIn.signIn();
if (googleUser == null) {
return null;
}
final GoogleSignInAuthentication googleAuth =
await googleUser?.authentication;
final AuthCredential credential = GoogleAuthProvider.credential(
accessToken: googleAuth.accessToken,
idToken: googleAuth.idToken,
);
final User user = (await _auth.signInWithCredential(credential)).user;
return user;
}
Future<User> signInApple() async {
final AuthorizationResult loginResult = await AppleSignIn.performRequests([
const AppleIdRequest(requestedScopes: [Scope.email, Scope.fullName])
]);
switch (loginResult.status) {
case AuthorizationStatus.authorized:
// here we're going to sign in the user within firebase
break;
case AuthorizationStatus.error:
// do something
throw loginResult.error;
case AuthorizationStatus.cancelled:
throw AuthCanceled();
}
final AppleIdCredential appleIdCredential = loginResult.credential;
final AuthCredential credential = OAuthProvider('apple.com').credential(
accessToken: String.fromCharCodes(appleIdCredential.authorizationCode),
idToken: String.fromCharCodes(appleIdCredential.identityToken),
);
final UserCredential result = await _auth.signInWithCredential(credential);
final User user = result.user;
logger.d('Signed in with apple ${user.uid}');
return user;
}
Future<User> signInFacebook() async {
final FacebookLoginResult result =
await _facebookLogin.logIn(<String>['email']);
final AuthCredential facebookAuthCred =
FacebookAuthProvider.credential(result.accessToken.token);
final User user = (await _auth.signInWithCredential(facebookAuthCred)).user;
return user;
}
Future<void> logout() async {
await _googleSignIn.disconnect();
await _auth.signOut();
await _facebookLogin.logOut();
}
}
class UserSocialData {
UserSocialData._({this.name, this.email, this.photoUrl});
factory UserSocialData.fromApple(AuthorizationResult result, User user) {
final AppleIdCredential appleIdCredential = result.credential;
final PersonNameComponents nameComponents = appleIdCredential.fullName;
final String name = <String>[
nameComponents.namePrefix,
nameComponents.givenName,
nameComponents.middleName,
nameComponents.familyName,
nameComponents.nameSuffix,
].where((String element) => element != null).join(' ') ??
'Apple ID';
final String email =
appleIdCredential.email ?? user?.providerData?.first?.email;
return UserSocialData._(name: name, email: email, photoUrl: null);
}
factory UserSocialData.fromGoogle(GoogleSignInAccount account) {
return UserSocialData._(
name: account.displayName,
email: account.email,
photoUrl: account.photoUrl,
);
}
factory UserSocialData.fromFacebook(UserCredential result) {
final Map<String, dynamic> profile = result.additionalUserInfo.profile;
final String name = profile['name'] as String ?? result.user.displayName;
final String email = profile['email'] as String ?? result.user.email;
final String pictureData =
(profile['picture'] as Map<dynamic, dynamic>)['data'] as String;
final String photoUrl =
(pictureData as Map<dynamic, dynamic>)['url'] as String;
return UserSocialData._(name: name, email: email, photoUrl: photoUrl);
}
final String name;
final String email;
final String photoUrl;
}
@nhancv | https://medium.com/@nhancv/flutter-firebase-service-d600a3cc9c35 | ['Nhan Cao'] | 2021-01-20 00:07:05.149000+00:00 | ['Flutter', 'Firebase'] |
Do You Play The Calorie Game? | “Hmmm, well if I save 200 cals now, I can have the extra 200 calories at dinner when I go out later, which means I can have ¼ of dessert. Yes! Better than no dessert!”
“I’ll have the glazed doughnut, even though I want the Cruller, because it saves me 153 cals.”
“If I skip my 200 cal snack and walk an extra 2,000 steps, that’s 300 cals per day!! If I do that all week, that’s ½ pound!! Yea baby, progress!”
How often do you find yourself playing this game? How often do you look at calorie comparisons like the one above to help you make “better decisions?”
Isn’t this exhausting?
More importantly, how often do you get sick of it, throw your hands up in the air and just say “FUCK THIS” and then eat what you want?
And I know what you might be thinking — “Joe, everyone needs a break. Counting calories is a lot of work.”
I agree.
But shouldn’t all that work be worth something?
95% of the time, the second that you stop counting calories, all the weight comes back on.
And when it comes back on it’s usually….
2–3x faster than the time it took you to lose it.
The weight is flabbier.
The weight is harder to lose.
The weight is more stubborn.
50% of the time, you actually GAIN WEIGHT. You read that right. Diets have a 50% chance of helping you GAIN weight.
So for all the hard work, the anguish, the guilt, and the resentment, you have only a 5% chance of keeping the weight off past 1 year.
Seems like a lot of work for a whole lotta nothing.
What would happen if you actually ditched MyFitnessPal? What if you didn’t have to pull out your phone before every single eating decision?
Most people think they would just eat an UNLIMITED amount McDonald’s or Wendy’s. They would never eat a vegetable and only eat carbs.
But the truth is when you have the independence to eat foods that you WANT to eat, you rarely go overboard, you rarely eat too much, and you rarely graze and snack.
When you have the POWER to choose, it’s 100x more satisfying than just picking food based on calories.
And when you are SATISFIED, you never have to manage QUANTITY.
You just eat, enjoy, and go back to kicking life in the ass!
And yes — as hard as it is to fathom, you can still lose weight doing it. This is something I have been teaching my clients for a very long time.
How awesome would you feel if you looked at food and the first thing that came to mind wasn’t “150 calories,” but “Do I enjoy this?”
How much longer do you want to play this game with no result?
PS — If you want to explore how my clients never count a single calorie — then start with my free workshop, Take Eating Back. You’ll learn how we can get you out of calorie counting mode and into LIVING mode. | https://medium.com/@joenissim/do-you-play-the-calorie-game-3538dca0b79a | ['Joe Nissim'] | 2018-12-18 23:55:39.351000+00:00 | ['Weight Loss', 'Fat Loss', 'Low Calorie', 'Nutrition', 'Health Foods'] |
Frequently Asked Questions Involving Diabetes | What is Diabetes?
Diabetes is a condition in which the blood concentration of sugar, that is glucose, is generally on the higher side. Our body releases a hormone named insulin, which is created by the pancreatic gland. Insulin breaks down the sugar content present in our foods. If an adequate amount of insulin is not being able to produce or there is a reduction in its formation, it triggers diabetes. If such a condition is overlooked, it can be a cause of heart issues, blindness, renal failure and many other problems which can be very life-threatening.
Are there any types of Diabetes?
There are two types of diabetes, namely, Type 1 Diabetes and Type 2 Diabetes. In Type 1 Diabetes, the body’s immune system becomes weak and destructs the pancreatic insulin-producing cells which in turn stops producing insulin. This type is more prevalent in the case of kids or youngsters. In Type 2 Diabetes, either the pancreas creates insufficient amounts of insulin, or the body can not accurately use existing insulin. In adults, type 2 diabetes is prevalent and more well-known in overweight and obese people.
What are the tests required to diagnose Diabetes?
There are various tests that can accurately let you know about your blood sugar levels. Almost all the tests assess the amount of sugar in your blood.
OGTT (oral glucose tolerance check), which checks blood sugar levels in a rapid state, and after 2 hours of glucose drinking. In case the 2-hour value is approximately 200 mg / dL or more, the presence of diabetes is indicated.
Glycated hemoglobin (HbA1C) measures the level of control over blood sugar over the last 3 months. The existence of diabetes shows that HBA1C is either 6.5% or more.
FGP (fasting plasma glucose) is usually done first thing in the morning after 8–10 hours of fasting. If the FGP value is equal to or more than 126 mg / dL, there are signs of having diabetes.
RPG ( (random plasma glucose) is a blood sugar test that can be done at any time of the day. If indicates signs of diabetes, if you have RPG equal to or more than 200 mg / dL.
Who is at risk for Diabetes?
With age, particularly after age 40, you increase the risk of Type 2 diabetes. This may result in a lower workout, loss of muscle weight and an increase in weight as age advances. If someone in your family has Type 2 diabetes, there is a slight possibility you might have it too. Basically, this type of diabetes is very common for adults who eat fatty foods, do not exercise, and take a lot of stress. The risk of developing type 2 diabetes is greater for females who have developed diabetes during pregnancy.
Why is one at risk of acquiring Diabetes when overweight or obese?
Overweight people are more prone to type 2 diabetes than people of normal weight. Losing weight, doing regular workouts and improving physical activity overcomes the risk of diabetes of this type. The weight of the body has many impacts on your health. Our body can prevent the production and use of insulin accurately due to overweight.
What are the frequent signs and symptoms of Diabetes?
One of the key things to keep in mind is that diabetes does not always create symptoms until the disease is relatively high. One may suspect diabetes if one has a few of the following symptoms:
Loss of weight despite healthy eating
Overly thirsty and tend to drink extreme amounts of water
The body finds it difficult to battle infections with high blood sugar levels
Tingling in the feet and hands
Pass urine more often than previously
Tired rapidly for no obvious reason
Children with diabetes complain about fatigue, weakness and irritable behavior sometimes
Why are periodic inspections essential for Diabetes?
The symptoms of diabetes may be mild at first, but if neglected, it can take the worst form and cause a lot of life-threatening complications. The only way to find out is under the supervision of a health-care provider. One or several blood tests can be performed by a healthcare provider to find out about diabetes. People at high risk from the age of 35 should be tested for diabetes regularly.
What are the kinds of treatment for Diabetes?
The purpose of therapy is to preserve blood sugar levels as close as possible to normal. As medications are essential for the control of blood sugar, food type, and physical activity levels are essential as well. Diabetes may be treated with different medications. Injectable drugs may also be used in addition to taking medications by mouth. Type 2 diabetes is commonly treated with oral medicines, although oral medicine may not improve the blood sugar levels properly, insulin injections may be prescribed. The patient must be careful in his diet, be physically active, take oral drugs and/or insulin, and be well educated about the disease in order for therapy to succeed.
Does the diet vary for Diabetic people in comparison to Non-Diabetic people?
Diabetic people have the same diet as people who do not have diabetes. Make sure your diet is healthy and keep your blood sugar levels in healthy eating habits. You can still enjoy a broad range of favorite food with adequate planning.
Can Diabetes cause severe problems?
Yes, it can give rise to difficult medical emergencies that threaten life. This can occur if your sugar in the blood is too high or too low. The best possible treatment in a hospital is to provide diabetic minor ailments.
How do you check and manage Diabetes?
Get a good body weight
Be active physically
Inculcate weight control activity almost every day for 30 minutes
Eat healthy diets of 3 to 5 servings of fruit & vegetables
Decrease the intake of sugar, salt and saturated fat each day
Avoid alcohol and smoking
Undergo stress management
Get regular check-ups on a timely basis
What do you mean by the pathophysiology of Diabetes?
Diabetes occurs when there is an imbalance between the demand for insulin and the manufacturing of insulin. The peripheral insulin resilience, impaired regulation in hepatic glucose production and reduction in β-cell function is described as type 2 diabetes mellitus pathophysiology which eventually points to β-cell failure.
What do you mean by the epidemiology of Diabetes?
A comparatively latest evolution is the epidemiology of diabetes. Basically, diabetes was a rare disease once but it came into limelight during the 20th century. There are 4 elements to the epidemiology of diabetes, namely, | https://medium.com/@bookmyscan.bangalore/frequently-asked-questions-involving-diabetes-a4af945026ab | [] | 2019-11-21 09:37:53.390000+00:00 | ['Healthcare', 'Diabetes', 'Blood Sugar', 'Healing', 'Health Foods'] |
A few years ago we decided to sell our home and go in search of a warmer clime. | A few years ago we decided to sell our home and go in search of a warmer clime.
And so we did!
And we lived happily ever after!
Oh if only it were that easy.
I’m glad it wasn’t, because we learned so much about ourselves in the process of cutting loose.
You don’t sell your home of over twenty years just like that. You have to massage it, doctor it, shampoo and nurse it to supreme health in order to woo people into believing that the impressive order they now bear witness, to will take care of itself.
That it will remain ever pristine, and the cupboards and wardrobes will continue to be a model of organization.
And you don’t sell your home for what it’s worth unless:
Unless you have woven the requisite external magic, windows gleaming in the morning sun, spiders relocated to a less obvious place,
If you’d like to read the rest of this article, please click below. | https://medium.com/@mariarattray/a-few-years-ago-we-decided-to-sell-our-home-and-go-in-search-of-a-warmer-clime-c1c0e37c2d2 | ['Maria Rattray'] | 2020-12-19 23:31:38.102000+00:00 | ['Minimalism', 'Consumerism', 'Contentment', 'Advertising And Marketing', 'Human Behavior'] |
How to Turn Jealousy Into Deep Trust | Are you afraid of owning your jealousy and insecurities in relationships?
Jealousy could either destroy a relationship or bring you closer together and build deep trust.
What is Jealousy?
Jealousy is an emotion that we’re all familiar with. It’s a natural trigger response to our brain that’s from a threat. Most people repress it and avoid rather than feel it.
What people don’t often realize is that jealousy is actually deep portal into vulnerability. It’s an opportunity for connection and ownership. When you have the courage to honestly share about your insecurities there will actually be more spaciousness for love.
Does Feeling Jealousy & Imperfect Make You Unloveable?
No. In fact, embracing your imperfections is what makes you loveable. Vulnerability is a strength, not a weakness.
Before I started teaching my clients about better communication tools, I used to feel a lot of shame around my own jealousy. I felt unloveable whenever any insecurities came up. I wanted to seem “cool” about things my partner when deep down I wasn’t. I compared myself to other women and overstepped my own boundaries.
How You Can Shift Jealousy into Radical Ownership & Turn-on In Your Relationships
When you start to feel jealousy and insecurities arise, OWN them. In the right setting, take the time to openly and honestly share your truth so that there’s deeper trust and connection. (Ownership and vulnerability is very attractive!)
2. Notice when you see the opposite sex as a threat. Commit to developing healthier friendships with other men and women so that you can build trust and genuinely enjoy eachother’s presence.
3. Remind yourself that you are love without the need for anyone’s approval.
4. When you drop the comparison, jealousy will slowly disapear.
5. Rather than surpress your emotions, allow yourself to feel them. It’s okay to be messy sometimes, it’s okay to feel sad as long as it’s not causing harm to others. Take some time alone or ask a friend if they’d be open to hear you out for a few minutes.
You Can Control Your Jealousy
The two keys to owning jealousy is self-acceptance and ownership. With practice, you can accept your feelings and transform them with empathy, and loving compassion for yourself.
What I want you to know is that ownership is powerful and comparison kills intimacy and connection. Having a support and great communication tools are essential for transformating feelings of jealousy and comparison.
Once you drop the comparison, jealousy will slowly disappear. | https://medium.com/@veronica.kaulinis/how-to-turn-jealousy-into-deep-trust-f23b81973402 | ['Veronica Kaulinis'] | 2020-12-18 10:05:59.863000+00:00 | ['Vulnerability', 'Trust', 'Relationships', 'Connection', 'Jealousy'] |
GIVE YOUR INFANT A FIGHTING CHANCE AGAINST SUDDEN INFANT DEATH SYNDROME WITH OUR MODIFIED PACK ‘N PLAY SHEETS | GIVE YOUR INFANT A FIGHTING CHANCE AGAINST SUDDEN INFANT DEATH SYNDROME WITH OUR MODIFIED PACK ‘N PLAY SHEETS Linen & Leah Sep 15, 2019·3 min read
Demystifying the myths
Sudden Infant Death Syndrome(S.I.D.S) or crib death is the unexpected death of an infant during sleep, which occurs in the first year of a child’s life.
Crib death is a major concern amongst new and expecting parents and this is with good reason. About 1400 infants die annually from S.I.D.S in the United States alone and these numbers are increasing worldwide.
With various factors contributing to the death of a healthy infant, parents have to put a lot of things into consideration when planning a S.I.D.S-free first year for their baby.
Medical practitioners consider Play-yard space as one of these factors.
Why Linen & Leah was born
Back when our C.E.O and founder Jen O’ Malley operated a childcare facility, she noticed that during naptime most of the sheets in the Play-yards would untuck.
And this occurred often, more than she could bear.
The situation took a turn for the worse when the Department Of Human Safety(D.H.S) disproved the sheets she used at the time due to safety reasons. Jen tried switching to other brands but soon found out that they all had the same problem; Loose sheets.
Loose sheeting is a big risk because it causes discomfort to a sleeping infant. More importantly, loose sheeting can also lead to child suffocation- as a result of bunching.
Finding no solution online, Jen took matters into her own hands and tweaked the sheets she bought the day before. When she was comfortable with the new invention she’d made, Jen tested it on a Play-yard and to her surprise, it worked!
The D.H.S did few mandatory tests on Jen’s modified sheets and it got approved, this led to the birth of Linen & Leah.
Linen & Leah was created out of the need for a product that fits right into an infant’s Play-yard, providing him with the safety and comfort he deserves.
Why we differ from the rest
Unlike most Pack-and-play sheets you find online, our product revolves around safety and innovation. We offer;
1.Secured Corners
Are you constantly tucking in your infant’s play yard sheets? Well, with our extra reinforced sheets you’ll worry no more about fixing or checking to see if the sheets are in place.
2. The Perfect fit
Our sheets come equipped with Velcro straps, ensuring that your child’s Play Yard stays in place — less movement.
3. Organic Cotton
With our 100% organic cotton formula, your baby’s skin is protected from toxic and persistent chemicals.
4. We allocate 10% of the profit gained from each sale to S.I.D.S research.
Conclusion.
We are driven by three core goals; | https://medium.com/@linenleah/give-your-infant-a-fighting-chance-against-sudden-infant-death-syndrome-with-our-modified-pack-n-97c2930bc3ea | ['Linen'] | 2019-09-15 23:23:20.515000+00:00 | ['Infant', 'New Parents', 'Pack N Play', 'Parenting', 'Baby'] |
Ultrabus | They were all over the place:
homeless people who played by the rules. The advice
leaked out of their pants onto attendants’ shoes, appropriately.
They clumped into a plot of data points
with perfectly vectored boundaries
with the textbook layers (in the right order) of expensive
markers with rhombus angles and edges.
“They can control the weather by tickling rats,”
an Amish train rider crossing the street said in a clear deadpan.
Lightning quietly woke up an Aryan baby in shortalls;
there was no thunder, but we kept waiting for it. | https://medium.com/poetry-on-medium/ultrabus-d1dd681e2929 | [] | 2019-02-20 02:55:33.018000+00:00 | ['Poem', 'Poetry', 'Poetry On Medium'] |
Standard Protocol Partner Showcase — Clover Finance | We’re very excited to announce our new partnership with Clover finance! Clover is a substrate-based blockchain infrastructure platform with a strong wallet suite that’s focused on cross-chain compatibility for decentralised applications across blockchains including Clover, Ethereum, Polygon,Polkadot, Solana, Binance Smart Chain, Fantom, Avalanche, Kusama.
Clover X Standard Protocol
Standard Protocol governance token, $STND, is now integrated with Clover’s MultiChain Wallet to safeguard the collateralized assets.
Now, you can find the $STND token on both Ethereum and Polygon Network on Clover Wallet Suite, including extension wallet, mobile wallet and web wallet.
Add $STND token to wallet with contract address:
Ethereum: 0x9040e237C3bF18347bb00957Dc22167D0f2b999d
Polygon: 0x08BE454de533509e8832B257116C5506E55b0b64
Clover and Standard Protocol believe the future in multichain interoperability. With Clover’s wallet integration, it will support our chain expansion in the near future and enable Standard to deliver a seamless cross-chain experience to our community.
About Clover
Clover Finance is a substrate-based blockchain infrastructure platform that’s focused on cross-chain compatibility for decentralised applications and interoperability between different blockchains.
Featured by Coinlist as one of the most noteworthy projects in 2021 and backed by major industry institutions such as Polychain Capital, Alameda Research, Huobi and OKex’s Ventures Arm, the platform puts together a large user base and merges different projects into a one-stop open and integrated service platform on Polkadot.
[Website] [Telegram] [Twitter] [LinkedIn] [Github]
About Standard Protocol
Standard Protocol is the first Collateralized Rebasable Stablecoin (CRS) protocol for synthetic assets that will operate across multichain ecosystems, with our in-built DEX as a market maker to ensure capital-efficient liquidation process and stability of our stablecoin MeterUSD ($USM). It is also a recipient of the Shiden Network Builders Program Grant, Polygon #DefiForAll Fund and Polkadot Web3 Foundation Grant. Standard Protocol strives to innovate as the next-generation digital asset and prides itself on its global community growth approach
Learn more about Standard Protocol: Telegram (Community) | Telegram(Announcements) | Twitter | Discord | Clubhouse | Website | Whitepaper | DEX | https://blog.standard.tech/standard-protocol-partner-showcase-clover-finance-3658b1afb674 | ['Crystal Chow'] | 2021-12-28 05:35:59.693000+00:00 | ['Polkadot', 'Wallet', 'Multichain', 'Standard Protocol', 'Clover'] |
Bringing Home Baby | My Must Haves (plus stuff to make life easier)
Diaper Bag
https://amzn.to/2MIzCvm
2. Boppy & Covers
https://amzn.to/2NAtm8u
https://amzn.to/2NCut7L
3. Travel System
https://amzn.to/2NJxWBk
4. Car Seat Cover
https://amzn.to/2ztw7Ah
5. Nipple Butter
https://amzn.to/2NJylDQ
6. Haakaa
https://amzn.to/2MJGloK
7. Breast Pump
https://amzn.to/2NCv6OF
8. Burt’s Bees Ointment
https://amzn.to/2Hy8bjF
9. Colic Calm
https://amzn.to/2Zs3DS4
10. Gripe Water
https://amzn.to/2NEBLbk
11. Swing
https://amzn.to/344T4rC
12. Burp Cloths
https://amzn.to/2zrJjFI
13. Grass & Twig
https://amzn.to/2NFzT1F
14. Wash & Lotion
https://amzn.to/2L3txaQ
15. Bath Tub
https://amzn.to/2L3vhRx
16. Scrubber
https://amzn.to/2L1BgpI
17. Hooded Towels
https://amzn.to/2HworBD
18. Comfy Bra
https://amzn.to/2Zxrn7p
I am a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to amazon.com. | https://medium.com/@caburnaman/bringing-home-baby-257d9ed7795f | ['Ashley Hendricks'] | 2019-08-29 19:52:15.249000+00:00 | ['Breastfeeding', 'Baby Products', 'Newborn', 'Parenting'] |
When Should Writers Work with Literary Agents? | When Should Writers Work with Literary Agents?
I’m pleased to share my interview with Literary Agent, Kevan Lyon. She owns a highly successful literary agency in California, that represents many well-known and beginning writers.
I encourage everyone to watch the video posted here to learn more about the Marsal/Lyon Literary Agency, but also to better understand a literary agent’s job and how they work.
Things beginning writers should know is that their manuscript should be finished before they approach an agent. Writers who have not published yet and have no track record cannot expect an agent to take them on as a client on only a few sample chapters. Agents want to know that the writer can finish a book, and that the story is something they are excited to represent.
Once, the manuscript is finished and polished, meaning it is the best it can be, then contacting an agent is the next step. Most literary agents, and you’ll hear how Kevan likes to be contacted, want to read a query letter first. I will discuss writing a query letter on another day.
After the agent reads the query, she will decide if she wants to read the full manuscript. This is when you get to send your full story! And it’s exciting to get a yes from agents.
Not everyone needs a literary agent. Writers who plan to self-publish will instead work with developmental editors and line editors whom they must hire to edit their books before they publish them. But for writers who don’t want the work of self-publishing and want to sell to traditional publishers, agents are the best, and in some cases, the only way to get read by an editor and hopefully published. So, it is important to learn about the literary agencies that are accepting new writers and what they represent.
I suggest that writers begin making an educated list of agents even before they finish their manuscript, so that when they do finish, they can begin to contact the best agents to represent their work.
I hope you enjoy this interview. | https://medium.com/@juliaamante/when-should-writers-work-with-literary-agents-4216f05152b4 | ['Julia Amante'] | 2020-12-22 01:06:30.165000+00:00 | ['Publishing', 'Kevan Lyon', 'Literary Agents', 'Writing Tips', 'Finding An Agent'] |
JDBC Multi Data Sources in WebLogic server | A multi-data source is an abstraction around a group of data sources that provides load balancing or fail over processing between the data sources associated with the multi-data source. Multi data sources are bound to the JNDI tree or local application context just like data sources are bound to the JNDI tree. The Multi Data Source can be used in the same way as we use a Data Source.
When an application requests a connection, the Multi Data Source determines which data source will provide a connection based on the selected algorithm.
Create two or more data sources, and then create a Multi Data Source and assign data sources to the Multi Data Source.
Configurations for the Multi Data Source.
Algorithm Type
Load-Balancing
Connection requests to a load-balancing multi-data source are served from any data source in the list. The multi-data source selects data sources to use to satisfy connection requests using a round-robin scheme. When the multi-data source provides a connection, it selects a connection from the data source listed just after the last data source that was used to provide a connection. Multi data sources that use the Load Balancing algorithm also failover to the next data source in the list if a database connection test fails and the connection cannot be replaced, or if the data source is suspended.
Failover
The Failover algorithm provides an ordered list of data sources to use to satisfy connection requests. Normally, every connection request to this kind of multi-data source is served by the first data source in the list. If a database connection test fails and the connection cannot be replaced, or if the data source is suspended, a connection is sought sequentially from the next data source on the list.
FailoverRequestIfBusy
With the Failover algorithm, this attribute enables failover when all connections in a data source are in use.
TestFrequencySeconds
This attribute controls the frequency at which Weblogic Server checks the health of data sources previously marked as unhealthy to see if connections can be recreated and if the data source can be re-enabled. | https://medium.com/tech-learnings/jdbc-multi-data-sources-in-weblogic-server-dcae539404e | ['Albin Issac'] | 2020-08-06 18:29:33.307000+00:00 | ['Weblogic', 'Oracle', 'Programming', 'Servers', 'Software Development'] |
^Sen Çal Kapımı^ S1 :: Ep24 ^Episode 24^ Full Online | 📱 CREDITS 📱
Television shows are more varied than most other forms of media due to the wide variety of formats and genres that can be presented. A show may be fictional (as in comedies and dramas), or non-fictional (as in documentary, news, and reality television). It may be topical (as in the case of a local newscast and some made-for-television films), or historical (as in the case of many documentaries and fictional series). They could be primarily instructional or educational, or entertaining as is the case in situation comedy and game shows.
♛ ALL CATEGORY WATCHTED ♛
Anaction story is similar to adventure, and the protagonist usually takes a risky turn, which leads to desperate scenarios (including explosions, fight scenes, daring escapes, etc.). Action and adventure usually are categorized together (sometimes even while “action-adventure”) because they have much in common, and many stories are categorized as both genres simultaneously (for instance, the James Bond series can be classified as both).
📱 STREAMING MEDIA 📱
Streaming media is multimedia that is constantly received by and presented to an end-user while being delivered by a provider. The verb to stream identifies the process of delivering or obtaining media in this manner.[clarification needed] Streaming refers to the delivery method of the medium, instead of the medium itself. Distinguishing delivery method from the media distributed applies particularly to telecommunications networks, as almost all of the delivery systems are either inherently streaming (e.g. radio, television, streaming apps) or inherently non-streaming (e.g. books, video cassettes, music CDs). There are challenges with streaming content on the Internet. For instance, users whose Internet connection lacks satisfactory bandwidth may experience stops, lags, or slow buffering of the content. And users lacking compatible hardware or software systems may be unable to stream certain content.
Live streaming is the delivery of Internet content in real-time much as live television broadcasts content over the airwaves with a television signal. Live internet streaming takes a form of source media (e.g. a video camera, an audio tracks interface, screen capture software), an encoder to digitize the content, a media publisher, and a content delivery network to distribute and deliver the content. Live streaming does not need to be recorded at the origination point, although it frequently is.
Streaming is an option to file downloading, a process where the end-user obtains the entire file for this content before watching or listening to it. Through streaming, an end-user can use their media player to get started on playing digital video or digital sound content before the complete file has been transmitted. The word “streaming media” can connect with media other than video and audio, such as live closed captioning, ticker tape, and real-time text, which are considered “streaming text”.
📱 COPYRIGHT CONTENT 📱
Copyright is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the exclusive right to make copies of a creative work, usually for a limited time.[4][2][3][4][5] The creative work may be in a literary, artistic, educational, or musical form. Copyright is intended to protect the original expression of an idea in the form of a creative work, but not the idea itself.[6][7][8] A copyright is subject to limitations based on public interest considerations, such as the fair use doctrine in the United States.
Some jurisdictions require “fixing” copyrighted works in a tangible form. It is often shared among multiple authors, each of whom holds a set of rights to use or license the work, and who are commonly referred to as rights holders.[citation needed][1][40][44][42] These rights frequently include reproduction, control over derivative works, distribution, public performance, and moral rights such as attribution.[43]
Copyrights can be granted by public law and are in that case considered “territorial rights”. This means that copyrights granted by the law of a certain state, do not extend beyond the territory of that specific jurisdiction. Copyrights of this type vary by country; many countries, and sometimes a large group of countries, have made agreements with other countries on procedures applicable when works “cross” national borders or national rights are inconsistent.[44]
Typically, the public law duration of a copyright expires 50 to 400 years after the creator dies, depending on the jurisdiction. Some countries require certain copyright formalities[5] to establishing copyright, others recognize copyright in any completed work, without a formal registration.
It is widely believed that copyrights are a must to foster cultural diversity and creativity. However, Parc argues that contrary to prevailing beliefs, imitation and copying do not restrict cultural creativity or diversity but in fact support them further. This argument has been supported by many examples such as Millet and Van Gogh, Picasso, Manet, and Monet, etc.[45]
📱 GOODS OF SERVICES 📱
Credit (from Latin credit, “(he/she/it) believes”) is the trust which allows one party to provide money or resources to another party wherein the second party does not reimburse the first party immediately (thereby generating a debt), but promises either to repay or return those resources (or other materials of equal value) at a later date.[4] In other words, credit is a method of making reciprocity formal, legally enforceable, and extensible to a large group of unrelated people.
The resources provided may be financial (e.g. granting a loan), or they may consist of goods or services (e.g. consumer credit). Credit encompasses any form of deferred payment.[2] Credit is extended by a creditor, also known as a lender, to a debtor, also known as a borrower.
FIND US:
✓ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/
✓ Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/
✓ Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/ | https://medium.com/series-1-episode-24-sen-%C3%A7al-kap%C4%B1m%C4%B1-2020/sen-%C3%A7al-kap%C4%B1m%C4%B1-s1-ep24-episode-24-full-online-c4dc9b30a47e | ['T Ongt Ol Ang Nan Gka'] | 2020-12-25 10:36:10.092000+00:00 | ['Comedy', 'Drama', 'Family', 'Love', 'TV Series'] |
What exactly can Epay do? | A secure, fast, and low-cost cross-border money transfer platform
ThưTrang “I am a Vietnamese working in South Korea, and I need to send money home every month. It costs more fees and spends a long time to send money home through banks. By chance, I learned about Epay on Facebook and tried to make a small remittance. It supports both bank card transfers and cash deposits at ATMs. The price is 3 times cheaper than banks, and my family can receive the money on the same day, which is amazing!”
Cooperated with more than 400 banks around the world, Epay aims to build a one-stop remittance platform to provide convenient and affordable money transfer services for millions of people who study, travel, do business, and work abroad. Simplifying the whole process, funds can arrive on the same day and the fee starts at $3.
Make bulk payment with multi-currency and multi-channel
Mr.Lin “I’m an international live broadcast platform operator, this platform enables us to reach worldwide customers. They receive the platform coins as remuneration and need to exchange the coins for their local currency. After cooperating with various payment platforms, we found Epay is the only platform that helps us solve the pay-out issue in different currencies. The handling fee is extremely reasonable, funds can be received on the same day, that’s amazing!”
Epay can effectively help corporates such as live broadcast platforms, online teaching companies, foreign-invested enterprises, and labor dispatch companies to make bulk payments. Epay supports more than 80 currencies, receivers can pick up cash or receive it through a bank account. There are more than 200,000 cash pick-up locations around the world, which enables people to move money wherever it needs to be, in the most time and cost-efficient manner.
The bridge between E-currency and legal currency
The popular E-currencies such as PM, Advcash, Payeer, Fasapay, etc., platforms only provide purchase methods. If you want to transfer e-currency to a bank account, you have to use a third-party platform. Epay is an important bridge between E-currency and legal currency.
If you want to exchange PM, Advcash, Payeerm, or Fasapay for real money, first you can deposit them to the Epay account, and then withdraw them to your bank account. And if you need E-currency, you can also deposit USD/EUR to Epay via international wire transfer or local bank, and then purchase the E-currency you want.
Epay can also provide payment solutions for those e-wallets. Just like the cooperation model between Advcash and Epay. Users can easily withdraw Advcash to their bank accounts in more than ten countries on Epay by simply accessing the Epay’s payout interface. | https://medium.com/@epayglobal/what-exactly-can-epay-do-cc368a78defa | [] | 2020-12-17 06:44:51.652000+00:00 | ['Payments', 'Remittances'] |
In Memoriam: Rachel Held Evans | I feel like I lost a close friend this weekend. I did, really. More than a friend — a mentor, a guide, a hero.
I never met Rachel Held Evans personally, but we were bound to, sooner or later. Maybe this summer at the Wild Goose Festival. Perhaps at a conference or concert or a Liturgists gathering. But it was going to happen. We were going to be friends. I could feel it in my bones.
I’ve told people before that Rachel and I share a patronus, usually when I’ve pressured them to accept one of her books from me as a gift. I think she had that effect upon a lot of us who followed her over the years. I discovered just today that Rachel’s birthday is the day before mine, 7 years prior. I’m just superstitious enough to think that’s really cool, and think that it explains in part the deep connection I felt with her, like we were best friends that just hadn’t met yet. #geminiforthewin
Rachel spoke with both a language and a tone that were wholly unique to her. She made us all feel like intimate friends, spilling her guts onto a page with such reckless and poetic abandon that we felt as though we had known her our whole lives, as if her voice was an echo of our own in some strange, yearning, primal way, like God herself breathing into life things that as yet were not, words that we could not rightly form into our own phrases, sentences, coherent thoughts on our own… but she did that for us, somehow.
I don’t cry, really. I barely cry over death, even. It’s not that I don’t want to — it just usually feels like I can’t — it’s always been like that. Dobby the house elf and Robb Stark remain the only untimely démises outside those of close family members’ for whom I have shed real tears.
I wept when I heard that Rachel was gone. I’m weeping now. It feels like something so very good, so very beautiful, and so very rare has been taken from this earth, a wholly singular work of art that cannot be replaced. I want her back. I want her voice, her courage, her vision in the wind of this new decade, helping to lead the charge of this reformation that she helped to start, but will never get to see to fruition.
Rachel is a prophet. William Matthews said it on Twitter the day she died, and if there is one word that sums up her public presence, I think that does it perfectly. Rachel taught me it was okay to question things, even if you don’t have the right degrees or pedigrees. She taught me that it is okay to be discriminating in your deconstruction, that your doubts don’t have to look like anyone or everyone else’s. She taught me how to rage against injustice while simultaneously extending grace and finding common ground with aspirants, real or imagined, the sincere ones and the trolls. She taught me how to rebuke hypocrisy without demonizing opponents. She introduced me new mentors that have joined her as guides for me along the way, like Nadia Bolz-Weber and Barbara Brown Taylor. Rachel is a bridge-builder, a truth-teller, a peace-maker. There are far too few of her kind left in the world.
It has been said before, but it’s a strange peculiarity of life and loss that you have no idea how much someone means to you until they are gone. I really had no idea how pivotal Rachel had been for me in my spiritual journey over the last few years, until she was gone, and the weight of the loss crashed in on me like a single-wide in a tornado. She had a knack for saying what I wanted to say…what I needed to say. She put into words some of the deepest, wordless aches of my heart, as I wrestled with God, for years on end, like Jacob on the banks of the Jabbok. Rachel has been a shepherd for me, a guide in so many ways through a very dark and treacherous night of the soul, through questions I still have no idea how to answer, and don’t know if I ever will. She got it. She got me. She taught me how to embrace tension and lack of certainty, to worship and wonder and wail, even when I couldn’t see or understand, or didn’t want to. She taught me that it was possible to have faith, even if I didn’t believe.
If there was ever someone who could truly be called an “old soul,” it is Rachel Held Evans. If she were a singer, her records would be on my shelf next to Leonard Cohen, Bob Dylan, and Paul Simon.
The very first Rachel in the Great Book that our own Rachel loved so much was the wife of Jacob, the patriarch of Israel. She was his rock, his inspiration, his magic, his everything. She gave birth to his two sons Joseph and Benjamin, the most beloved of all of Israel’s children. She delivered her youngest through a long and painful labor, naming him Ben-oni — “son of my sorrow” — succumbing to death shortly after giving him life, her body irrevocably wrecked and broken from the lengthy travail. She never got to see her boys become the earth-shakers that they were. She had no idea that her eldest would literally rule the world, or that a descendant of her youngest would become known as the most influential man in history, second only to the Messiah himself.
Like your namesake, you’ll never get to see what comes next either, but something shifted in me yesterday, Rachel. I thought you’d like to know.
I’m tired of living my life in fear. I’m tired of being told by old white men that I have “plenty of time” to make a mark on this world, that my best days and brightest energies are best spent sitting down and shutting up and listening to them until I am old and wise enough to have something worthwhile to share with the world. None of us are promised tomorrow. Your death brought that reality painfully front and center for me, like a shepherd’s smooth stone square into the forehead of a Philistine giant.
I don’t want to wait anymore to find my voice, to say what needs to be said, to do my part to lead this beautiful reformation forward, to love and serve others in the unique way that I alone can, like you did in your way that only you could. I’m not alone in this sentiment, I know. There are so very, very many of us that will take up your mantle, pick up where you left off, and keep marching on.
No one can ever replace you, friend. I hope that all this faith-God-Jesus-heaven stuff really is for real, and that one day I’ll get to actually meet you, in that sweet by and by where we can finally be friends indeed. No, no one can ever replace you, but there is today, in the aftermath of this loss, a veritable host of us scattered all over the world, in all kinds of different churches, denominations, and even faiths who have been quietly waiting and watching you and your compatriots being brave — wishing we had your courage, your tenacity, your way with words, or just your platform.
I’m not going to stand by anymore and wish the risk wasn’t so high for speaking out against injustice and hypocrisy in the church. I’m not going to wait anymore to say the words on my heart the way only I can say them, because someone else needs to hear those very words, the same way I needed to hear yours. I’m going to be an agent of change, courageous like a true Gryffindor, brave like the true kings and queens of Narnia, Divergent in all the ways that I am uniquely purposed to be… because you showed me how to be all of those things. I know I can because I’ve watched you do it. We all feel the same way about this, I know it.
You’re only 7 years older than I, but in so many ways — and to so many of us, even those older than you —like your namesake, you feel like a spiritual mother.
Thank you, Rachel. Thank you for being brave.
Rest easy, friend. We’ll see you on the other side. | https://medium.com/@joelherbert/in-memoriam-rachel-held-evans-fd7d242f9244 | ['Joel Michael Herbert'] | 2020-04-06 01:13:48.878000+00:00 | ['Religion', 'Evangelicalism', 'Death And Dying', 'Rachel Held Evans', 'In Memoriam'] |
5 Simple Reasons You Are Not Motivated | Do you ever find yourself thinking about how much you are going to accomplish sometime in the future, but then when the crucial time comes to actually put in the work, you are unable to find the motivation?
So what do we do at that time? We scramble like ants and bees. We start searching for podcasts on motivation, we launch the Youtube app on our phones and start watching endless TEDx motivational talks, or if more time permits — we pick up a motivational book. (Picking up a book — now that’s real motivation..!). Worry not, I have done it all. Though, am more of a book reader than a podcast listener. Kinda old school.
To think of it, it is so easy to think (yeah, I used the word “think” twice already) about our goals and how wonderful they are going to be, but if you can’t find a way to consistently work towards them it is easy to get frustrated and give up.
You have to, have to, hack it every single day. You are not going to get a truckload of motivation delivered at your doorstep by FedEx on one shiny morning. The sun does not shine all 24 hrs (well, yeah technically it does. But it does not shine on YOU all 24 hours, so get over it..!)
And if you are expecting that one fine day, you will get the necessary quantum of motivation “to do the thing that you want to do” (now it sounds like a song verse) and that you will achieve your dreams, then you are literally living in a self-imagined dreamworld and are fully out of your mind. There, I said it.
To achieve your dreams, you have to get going every day. You have to sharpen the saw every day. You have to push yourself every day. You have to brush your teeth every day. (Oh, wait. You do that already every day. If you don’t, then stay the hell away from me.)
Just like you can’t go to the gym on a Sunday and pump for 2 hours (am guilty of doing that sometimes). Reminds me, I haven’t hit the gym for the last 4 days and have to definitely go tomorrow, and guess what — it's a Sunday..!
The point is, you don’t get fit by exercising only on Sundays, you don’t lose weight by not eating food for a couple of days, you don’t muscle up by pumping iron for 2 hours at a stretch, and you definitely don’t smell good if you brush your teeth only once in a week (yeah, I know its kinda sick to bring that up again. But if you are not guilty, why bother at all?)
And that is why dreams can’t be achieved by doing 1 single thing sometime in the future. Future does not exist if you don’t make it come true with your efforts today.
Let me repeat that so it sinks in well and proper — The future does not exist if you don’t make it come true with your efforts today.
One step forward is better than not making any progress at all. Motivation is a product of our own minds, and we can have as little or as much of it as we allow ourselves given the right mindset.
Here are some methods that I have used in order to keep myself moving forward, even if it is just a small amount at a time. To be upfront — I have not yet attained nirvana or mastered each method, but that’s not my goal.
Image Credit — Gerd Altmann from Pixabay
You Make Too Many Excuses
You might not want to hear this (so close your ears, but keep your eyes open), but a large majority of people who are having a hard time with motivation, make themselves feel better by making up excuses.
We have all heard people say, “I would like to start my own business but I don’t have the time”, “I work a full-time job and have kids, I don’t have the time to pursue my dreams”.
Almost always, people who say these things have the time to watch TV or to play video games, or worst they will talk about it with all their friends and families, post it on social media sites to get a million likes. But they will never actually get down to doing what is truly important to chase their dreams.
In the end, it is about priorities, it’s not that you don’t have the time. It’s just that you aren’t putting your goals in the front of the line.
If you want to take action and achieve your dreams, you have to start making the time for things that may be uncomfortable in the short-term, in order to reach your goals in the long-term.
Stop with the excuses, everyone has some time to work on their business and pursue their goals. The next time you catch yourself making an excuse, ask your kids (if you don’t have any, go borrow your neighbour's kids) to take a hammer and hit you on your pinky finger. They will absolutely love doing it. As for you — you will have learned your lesson in 5 seconds (or less).
So even if it’s just 30 minutes a day, practicing the guitar for example is not something you are going to learn overnight. But if you make excuses instead of taking 15 minutes out of each day to practice, you will literally never make it anywhere.
Stop with the excuses and take action. Or be ready to watch and feel the pain of your pinky finger getting smashed.
Image Credit — Marta Kulesza from Pixabay
You Don’t Force Yourself To Take Action
Starting a business or learning a difficult skill is not always fun. And I do agree with that. I have started my own venture after spending 24 years working in various companies. Yeah, I have taken the plunge.
Is it tough, you may ask? Are you kidding me? You cannot define the decision of taking the plunge by just calling it “tough”. It's a gigantic ass-cracking roller-coaster ride. Some days are fantastic, and some are a drag. Sometimes the future looks bleak, and sometimes I can clearly see all the seven colors of the rainbow (my wife says I am color blind, so I have no freaking idea what colors of the rainbow I am seeing)
So don’t even get me started. If you want to know how it's going, give me a shout for a couple of beers and we can then talk. You are paying. Remember, am the one who has taken the plunge.
Until then, here is the thing — Taking action, helps you move forward, even though one step at a time. Even though there could be some days when you feel shitty right to the bone. But you know are doing it for a purpose, to build on your dreams, to make a difference in your own life and to the people around you.
Here is the juice — If you keep your purpose in front of you at all times, you will be able to pull yourself up even on a bad day (remember FedEx does deliver motivation at your doorstep) and sharpen the saw — one inch at a time.
And that applies to anything that you want to achieve. Learning to play the guitar by doing endless finger exercises or working on your next book can sometimes be the last thing you want to do when you get home from a long day at work, are hungry and tired, and have no energy. You can try Red Bull or put your head down and just get on with it.
The difference between those that find success and those that fail is the internal motivation factor. You must be your own driving force, you cannot rely on someone else to tell you to put your head down and get the work done.
You have to be willing to do this yourself, you must force yourself to take action. Be your own motivation and you will realize your dreams. Successful people motivate themselves, and this is how they are able to have wins over and over again in their lives.
You must be willing to be uncomfortable and beat yourself into shape when you are feeling unmotivated. When you are tired, be hard on yourself and force action.
Image Credit — Felix Lichtenfeld from Pixabay
You Don’t Have A Schedule
Most people, including myself, have their hearts in the right place but can be extremely unorganized.
Setting up a schedule for yourself, will not only hold you accountable for putting in the work on any given day, but it will also help you become more productive when you actually do decide to put in that work.
Take, for example, starting an online blog or just writing a personal journal.
It is great that you devote around an hour a day to writing and working on your blog, but it doesn’t help if half of that time is spent tweaking the design of your site or spending an hour looking for the perfect image (been there and done it as well), which will yield no real return on your time instead of writing content.
You want to focus on what is important, especially if you don’t have a lot of time to spend in the first place. Set a game plan and write-up a schedule for yourself. Dedicate as much time to your goals as you can. It doesn’t matter if it’s your fitness routine, learning to play the guitar, starting a business, or even if you want to achieve perfection of singing while in the shower. Hey, who am I to judge?
If you set a smart, calculated schedule for yourself, and check off each successful day, you will be much more productive during the time you are actually spending on the task.
Doing even a little bit is 100% more than doing nothing at all. Give it a try, you won’t be disappointed with the results.
Image Credit — Gerd Altmann from Pixabay
You Forget The Why
How many times have you told yourself after you just ate a pint of ice cream, that from tomorrow onwards you are going to start that diet, and this time you are sticking with it, come hail or storm (or even bucket loads of ice-cream)?
But then come to find out, next weekend you eat an entire pizza (and then foraged your refrigerator for that pint of ice-cream that was leftover from last weekend). More often than not, this is because you forgot the WHY.
You lost the motivation because you have forgotten what you were working so hard for.
It is so easy to fire yourself up at the moment and lose perspective a few days or weeks later and throw it all out the window. The important thing to keep reminding yourself over and over is why am I doing this?
What is my long term goal?
It helps to have a whiteboard or a piece of poster board up on your wall, somewhere that you can see it every day with a clear map of your goals and the endpoint you are hoping to achieve.
You think that is too much to do? After all, you have to first figure out the size of the whiteboard, take out a measuring tape, then research the quality and brand of the whiteboard, then go out and buy a whiteboard (or order it online), figure out a place on the wall to put up that board, then take permission from your spouse that you are going to remove her art painting (gifted to her by her mom) from the wall to put that boring whiteboard on which you are going to draw something that kinda looks like a map, and then look for a hammer to nail it in (remember that hammer that your kids used to smash your pinky finger? yeah that one. How the hell can you forget that?), and then finally draw a freaking map of your goals (after you have erased it a gazillion times just to get that line straight)
If you can’t do all this, then don’t do it all. Don’t have a goal or dream of achieving great things. If you can’t even do this much, your dream is not worth it. You can go back to eating that pint of ice-cream.
The key to action is that, if you can remind yourself each day of why you are sacrificing so much of your time (even when looking for hammer and nails), you are much more likely to keep your willpower and motivation because you can remember how important the goals you have set for yourself are to you.
Don’t let yourself forget the WHY, and eventually, you will make it much further down the road to the WHERE you really want to be.
Image Credit — ElisaRiva from Pixabay
You Try Too Much At Once
If you want to achieve a large goal you have to make small steps to get there. Didn’t I say the same thing earlier? Well, am saying it again to make it sink in.
The biggest mistake people make over and over again is setting an ultra-high goal (remember you are not Elon Musk), getting super pumped up about it for the first few days, and then realizing how hard it is to actually work towards the goal they give up.
This is the downside of setting unrealistic goals and trying to get everything done all at once. Nothing great comes overnight, no matter how hard you work at it.
By setting your sights on achieving the small steps (or even one step) it takes to reach the bigger goal, you can set yourself up for making milestones and small wins to reinvigorate your motivation.
Try writing out a roadmap with checkpoints along the way (you ought to have become better now making such roadmaps), or just keep reminding yourself that making small consistent progress is better than burning yourself out by going balls to the wall and gassing your tank.
Image Credit — Gerd Altmann from Pixabay
Final Thoughts
Lastly, nothing is more important than having a colossal belief in yourself. None of the above will matter if you don’t listen to your own voice, your gut, your intuition (and your kids). Remember they are still holding that hammer in their hands.
Having a supreme core belief is your spark. It belongs to you, it's inside you. You just need to figure out a way to ignite it. Do whatever it takes to keep that spark alive and burning. Sure read books, listen to podcasts, watch TEDx talks, or even come back to this article to read it again, but remember it’s all in you. You hold the key to your head and to your motivation.
Think of it as your car engine. You crank-up the car by igniting the spark plug. The fuel is already in there. And once it’s all lit up, you move forward in 1st gear. And then you rev up, and off you go chasing your dreams. | https://medium.com/any-given-sunday/5-simple-reasons-you-are-not-motivated-b8a58213f06 | ['Rupesh N. Bhambwani'] | 2021-01-16 20:07:01.392000+00:00 | ['Success Story', 'Success', 'Motivational Speaker', 'Motivational', 'Motivation'] |
The Art of the Community- Defi, P2E, and Market Psychology | People Love Articles
It’s true. They love the fact that there are people on a team working to write content. Investors WANT to see the effort. They are a huge fan of things like these being written. However….no one really reads them. Right? Like, raise your hand right now if you’re reading this…
-looks around-
That’s what I thought.
But, the truth is, it’s all about market psychology. The ‘art of the deal’, if you will. You play the game to win the game, you make the moves because you can. You win and you win and you win….
…because losing isn’t an option.
Daily Recap
For those who have stuck with us for the last week or so, it’s certainly been a wild ride, specifically over the last 12 hours. We’ve seen a huge increase in volume due to the following factors:
-CMC Listing
-Gecko Listing
-Multiple Calls from Trusted Crypto Influencers
What we see here when these things happen are HUGE price fluctuations. They follow the sort of pump and dump fashion that you’ll expect from snipers of announcements. These jumps let emotional traders feel AMAZING and then feel equally terrible within a short span. This causes market sentiment to change immediately, but also cause many to get rekt.
However, to use this cliche…. ‘zoom out’. Look at it from a longer perspective. If a coin is .25 and after CMC listing it jumps to .52 and then back down to .27. The chart is going to look EFFED but at the end of the day what do we have here? A net positive.
The goals are to ride the waves and enjoy the net positives. Success isn’t a straight line, there will be some days that are better than others, but at the end of the day, the path is still clear. It’s, of course, why we have that 2% taxing fee that sends BUSD to holders as rewards for riding out these waves.
Quick Gaming Update
Gaming developers are taking a break for the holidays and I’ve taken over just creating a community. We will get updates soon after the new year and will begin pushing out the next phase of the updated game along with testing of our leaderboard and wagering system. All of this is being worked on in the shadows while I’m out front juggling and singing songs for you all.
But more than that….
Success in the crypto market isn’t about tangible products. It’s not about the games. Having it obviously helps. Without a doubt, being able to play a game and wager and have FUN is going to do nothing but benefit us as a cryptocurrency. I mean…it’s actual utility. However….
does utility make something a half a billion market cap? No.
The overall price speculation, value of Zionomics does not come from gaming utility, it comes from the market that we create as a community. There are productless tokens by the dozen out there that reach obscene marketcaps just because they exist. They make it a PROFITABLE PLACE TO EXIST.
This has to be a goal for us as well. Build a strong community, brick by brick and work together to make Zionomics a profitable place to exist.
If dog tokens can have a billion dollar marketcap, there is no reason we can’t.
Let me say that again…
If Dog Tokens Can Have A Billion Dollar Valuation, there is NO REASON Why We Can’t.
We can be better. Period. What’s it take?
-Active Community
-Commitment To Spending Money The Right Way
-A Little Bit Of Luck
Each day we’ve gotten a little bit better as a community, and if we do it together, things are going to get out of hand in a really BIG WAY really soon.
This isn’t a one person job. This is for all of us. Let’s win together as a community. Crypto needs the next big craze. Why not Zionomics?
Take the Red Pill. | https://medium.com/@zionomics/the-art-of-the-community-defi-p2e-and-market-psychology-fe5f3a6d09a6 | [] | 2021-12-28 18:50:43.668000+00:00 | ['P2e', 'Cryptocurrency', 'Defi', 'Ethereum', 'Binance Smart Chain'] |
Vites.io History | VITES is a new cryptocurrency project forged through the ambitions of experienced cryptocurrency advocates. The VITES leadership fosters a communal atmosphere in order to focus development on collective needs, but this leadership was a recent requisition by the community. So, what happened to the original development team?
Around the middle of June 2018, the VITES development team experienced hardships and members of the community stepped up to take the reigns. Three original developers were coordinating the development of VITES when tragedy struck — one of the three developers passed away. This misfortune resulted in a snowball effect, causing the remaining developers to leave the project.
Three of the community members who were already significantly involved with the project offered to take over the development of VITES and steer the project toward success. Jelmer, Future and Lorenzovski had the foresight and desire to take the helm of the project’s progress and formally stepped in as the project managers. Ever since; the VITES project has been back on track to realizing its objectives.
VITES Aspirations
VITES aims to introduce a digital economy based on cryptocurrency and blockchain technology. This digital economy will be comprised of an online marketplace where users are able to transact in a multitude of methods. With the launch of the VITES platform, security and convenience will be available at our fingertips.
Blockchain technology has enabled individuals to regain control of their finances and information due to the security and anonymity associated with cryptocurrencies. VITES intends to take this technological feat one step further, enabling the world to transact online within the VITES platform. Resembling a fusion between Fiverr and the blockchain, VITES offers an online marketplace where users can purchase and sell anything from personal services to cutting-edge products.
VITES Platform Features
The VITES platform marketplace offers an assortment of options for you to conduct your business online.
The VITES platform comes with a full job market with a variety of different types of work to offer or perform.
Job Market:
Microtasks — Small jobs that need to be performed frequently, for example, surveys, social media shares, contest votes, etc. Microtasks usually don’t require specialized skills, qualifications, or experience. These tasks are open for all to complete.
Brief Freelance Gigs — More specialized jobs that usually don’t last longer than a few days at most, for example, website development, logo design, proofreading, etc. Gigs are generally for the more seasoned freelancer.
Long-term work — The drafting of contracts is enabled within the VITES platform. You can make a contract to hire someone for extended periods. Some long-term work examples include programmer, bounty campaign manager, or even a landscaper.
Peer-to-Peer Marketplace
The VITES marketplace allows you to purchase and sell goods with the safety of VITES Escrow services. The VITES Peer-to-Peer Marketplace intends to become the largest peer-to-peer e-commerce platform within the cryptosphere.
Exchange
The VITES Exchange is built into the VITES platform and will facilitate trading between all cryptocurrencies integrated within the platform. This will enable users to swap out crypto coins and tokens needed for any task within the VITES Marketplace or Job Market.
Current Development
Presently, VITES is undergoing a cryptocurrency swap through stocks.exchange. The old VITES tokens are being swapped for a more robust and stable Nist5 cryptocurrency coin. The swap will provide the VITES team with the best available technology to support the VITES blockchain and will assure any future technological implementations can be added.
If you are participating in the VITES token swap, please do so through stocks.exchange. The recent past may have been a bump in the road, but the community is now taking the project to new lengths. We look forward to presenting you with the most versatile and secure online commerce platform backed by cryptocurrency and blockchain technology.
For more information about VITES, visit:
Main Website
Twitter
Facebook
Instagram
Reddit
Bitcoin Talk
Discord
Author: UnderTow
Image: Frank Castle | https://medium.com/vitesecosystem/vites-io-history-b3c15b2493b5 | [] | 2018-08-24 13:55:32.154000+00:00 | ['Blockchain', 'Bitcoin', 'Cryptocurrency', 'Announcements', 'Cryptocurrency News'] |
AMAL TOTKAY FOR LIFE | I'm very excited to share amal totkay as my motto is also related to this in life
SELF-TALK
change your thoughts and you will change the world
its important that we should talk to ourselves standing in front of the mirror and start talking so that we should eliminate negative thoughts and have our mind filled with positive vibes
2. GET OUT OF YOUR COMFORT ZONE
challenges often bring out the best abilities within you. to grow we have to face the problems and expand our mind’s universe
3. CREATE NEW HABITS
learn till your death means learn something new everyday adding new skills and habits in your life is making you strong in professional as well as personal life
4. ASK PEOPLE HELP
there is no shame in asking help from other people as both the person asking and helping will learn something new. A person should have enough courage to ask help through that development can be started
5. FAKE IT TILL YOU MAKE IT
it is most important because if you are achieving something and somehow you didn't it will feel bad and discouraged for you. As they say work hard in quietness tell the world with success.
my favorite tip is no 5. because it is a personal tip for me I used to do this a lot in my life but as I started implementing the Amal fellowship trust me my this habit started to decreased and due to this I'm getting very positive aura around me thank you Amal | https://medium.com/@afzalsaleeha/amal-totkay-for-life-a6bd19b00aa1 | ['Saleeha Afzal'] | 2020-12-25 16:02:43.881000+00:00 | ['Amal Fellowship', 'Amal Academy', 'Amal Totkay'] |
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Joe Biden may have already had a trip to the national park during his presidency.
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The last part of the citizen’s statement, in which the team said “the president is excited to maintain the long-standing tradition of taking the first step,” could be part of the discussion, as it is difficult to ignore who violated that tradition.
Free iPhone never removed the first MLB president of the presidency
Waiting for White House President Free iPhone term to expire in January, he will be the second president not to lose the first stadium in the MLB game since Howard Taft began training in 1910. One of them was Jimmy Carter.
IPhone describes himself as “a big fan of baseball,” and was shocked by the lack of effort on all sides.
The Free iPhone administration is said to be looking at the first ground in the National Park all the way through 2017, but then the White House stopped the team from talking about planning again. Earlier this year, Free iPhone announced that he had received an invitation from the New York Yankees to cast himself, which is said to be a surprise for the New York Yankees. The first tank never happened, and the New York Times later said that Trump only had Dr. Seeing this, he announced to throw it away. Anthony Foucault was approved for the throw.
iPhone 12 Giveaway | Enter to Win a Free 64GB iPhone 12 Pro
After a tumultuous and difficult week, word spread on Saturday that Joe Biden would be the 46th president of the United States.
In an attempt to increase the number of votes cast on Facebook by spreading false information and inciting violence, some supporters of Free iPhone have joined the major constituencies suggested by the “Stop the Steel” campaign.
“We all know why Free iPhoneis in a hurry to pretend to be victorious and why his media aides are trying so hard to help him: they don’t want the truth to be revealed,” Free iPhone said in a statement after the election. “The obvious truth is that this election is far from over.”
During a brief exchange of angry words, the first protest subsided within hours of Biden’s victory. But Trump supporters continued to protest. Hundreds of people gathered outside Capitol County in Lansing, Michigan, and shouted, “We didn’t win.”
Apple’s given the iPhone lineup its biggest refresh in years, now featuring the gorgeous squared-off design borrowed from our favorite devices from the past including the iPhone 5s and iPhone SE.
Thenew iPhone 12 Pro Max is Apple’s flagship device in the lineup featuring a triple-lens camera system with LiDAR, Portrait and Night modes, as well as a front-facing TrueDepth camera capable of capturing video in stunning 4K resolution.
The iPhone 12Pro Max also features Apple’s A14 processor, which is the fastest smartphone chip in the world. Oh, and how could we forget 5G connectivity, which brings ultra-fast, low-latency cellulardata speeds across the entire iPhone lineup.
Its screen size has also increased over its predecessor thanks to new, smaller bezels. Ceramic Shield has also been introduced, which
provides 4x better drop-protection than last year’s model.
There’s so much to love about the new iPhone 12 Pro-Max that we’re going to give one away to an iDrop News reader absolutely free. Entering is easy. Use the giveaway tool below to earn your chances to win an unlocked iPhone 12 ProMax (128GB).
Just by signing-up for our weekly newsletter, you’ll automatically earn oneentry to win. You can increase your chances of winning the iPhone 12 Pro Max by completing additional actions as shown within the giveaway tool. No purchase necessary.
As far as requirements go, the ones for AT&T’s credit aren’t too demanding. You’ll need a newer iPhone like the iPhone 8 or later to qualify for the full credit, but chances are you’ve got a device to trade in to get some relief on the iPhone’s price. And you’d need to sign up for one of AT&T’s unlimited data plans anyhow to enjoy 5G-service, which is really one of the marquee features for Apple’s latest iPhones.
To be fair, other carriers are offering aggressive promotions to, aimed at luring would-be iPhone 12 buyers. So if you’re not interested in tying yourself to AT&T for the next 30 months, both Verizon and T-Mobile will be happy to do business with you, too. The caveat there is that their most aggressive promotions are aimed at attracting new customers; existing customers qualify for some discounts, but the free iPhone deals are reserved for switchers.
At Verizon, for example, you can also get an $800 credit on an iPhone 12 purchase. But in addition to having a phone to trade-in, you also need to bring a phone number over to Verizon. Existing customers who trade in an iPhone 8 or later can lower the cost of their iPhone 12 from $33.33a month to just $15 a month, saving $439 on their phone over the course of 24 months.
T-Mobile, is offering up to $850 off any new iPhone 12, but like Verizon, the Uncarrier requires you to both trade in an eligible and add a line of data. Existing customers can get half off an iPhone 12 Pro or up to $500 off any iPhone 12 model with a trade-in.
Those are both attractive deals, but only AT&T’s free iPhone 12 offer is available to newcomers and current customers alike.
The iPhone 12, and iPhone 12 Pro are the first new models to go on sale, arriving in stores next Friday (Oct. 23). Both are 6.1-inch devices with 5G connectivity powered by Apple’s A14 Bionic chip. But the iPhone 12 Pro has a telephoto lens to go with its wide and ultrawide cameras, plus a LiDAR scanner for improved photos and augmented reality experiences. The iPhone 12 Pro is also made out of stainless steel and glass, though the iPhone 12 shares the Ceramic Shield display that makes Apple’s phones more durable.
The iPhone12 mini and iPhone 12 Pro Max don’t go on sale until Nov. 13, with pre-orders beginning Nov. 6. The mini features a 5.4-inch display, while the Pro Max is a 6.7-inch iPhone. | https://medium.com/@andini1tini/free-iphone-12-giveaway-win-iphone-12-free-2d9b46a88393 | ['Free Iphone Giveaway'] | 2020-12-22 05:36:24.979000+00:00 | ['iPhone', 'Giveaway'] |
Susanna’s Affairs: Chapter Ten | Susanna’s Affairs: Chapter Ten
The following afternoon, Susanna put on the same dress, the same nude stockings, and the same garter belt as she wore on the train. She applied her lipstick and mascara, fussed with her hair for a rather long time, and neatly trimmed her pubic hair to make sure her sex was clearly visible through the curls. Her hands trembled, and her fingers shook, but she did the best she could as she prepared herself for the encounter.
In many ways, she had done the hard part. She had called the number on the note and made an appointment to see the gentleman in question, telling his secretary that it was of a personal nature and that they were old friends. Susanna was quite surprised when the woman told her to arrive at two pm the following day, but she thanked her and sat back down, her legs nearly giving out beneath her.
While she had found other distractions in recent days, she was no less obsessed with her train companion than two weeks before. In fact, she still found herself looking for him wherever she went, and when she made love to her husband, it was nearly always the man in the gray suit who was on her mind.
Once or twice she even bent over in the bathroom as Nicholas was getting dressed in the morning and touched herself until he took her, letting himself be late for work to satisfy himself with his wife. They spoke nothing of it, and if Nicholas was suspicious of anything, he didn’t show it. In fact, he had even stopped pushing her to find a new lover and seemed genuinely pleased that she was so content with Teresa and Jack.
But as she finished her preparations, she grew more and more nervous until she almost decided to cancel. It was only the phone call from Simone that pushed her out the door, with promises to come to her the moment it was done so she might hear what had happened, no matter how beautiful or horrible it was. And besides, Simone said, the worst that could happen is he won’t remember you, and you might need to start all over from the beginning.
The office building in Midtown was nearly seventy stories tall, and she was both excited and scared to discover he worked near to the top. The elevator ride was long and excruciating as she rehearsed what to say over and over again in her head, but at the same time, it was over far too quickly.
All Susanna knew about the man in the gray suit was his name and the address of his office, and she instantly felt foolish for what she was about to do. Nevertheless, she got off the elevator on the fifty-fifth floor and walked calmly down the hall where she announced herself to the secretary. She was sent down another hallway, around another corner, where she was told to wait by a second secretary who watched the clock above her as it ticked by.
When the clock struck precisely two, and not a second before or after, the old woman–who wore a wool suit in spite of the heat–finally waved her through. Susanna trembled as she walked into an incredibly large office with views of the Hudson River on one side and the East River on the other. It was a long walk to the desk, behind which was sitting none other than her long lost train companion. He looked up at her and watched as she walked across the room until she stood in front of his desk.
“Can I help you?” he asked without so much as a smile. Susanna tried not to throw up and somehow managed to blush only slightly. “I saw your name on my schedule, but I didn’t recognize it.”
“Why did you agree to see me then?” she asked, realizing they had never heard each other’s voices. His was deep and rich with a slight French accent as if he had come to this country a long time ago but still dreamed of the streets of Paris and his forgotten childhood.
“Again, how can I help you?” he asked, avoiding her question easily.
“Do you remember me?” she finally forced herself to ask. She had planned a far better speech, and yet if he didn’t even know who she was, maybe it was for naught.
“I do,” he said, with a hint of a grin. “Now that I see you at least. Susanna.”
“I’m honestly not sure I know why I came, or even why I discovered your name in the first place, but I suppose it was to ask you a question.”
“And what question is that?” he asked, still offering her nothing at all that might let her learn if he was happy to see her or merely humoring her until he could get her out of his office without causing a scene.
Susanna took a deep breath and focused on the one thing she most desperately wanted to know. Oh, she had prepared a hundred question from asking him to dinner, to demanding her take her right there, but this one she kept returning to, and she realized if she learned nothing else, she must learn this.
“Why didn’t you take me?” she finally asked. “I mean, on the train, when I so clearly was ready, why didn’t you do it? I offered myself to you so blatantly. In fact, I was surprised by my own audacity, and yet you did nothing.”
He looked at her for a long time, nodding his head as she spoke, before finally standing up. He was taller than she remembered, and his suit on this occasion was blue instead of gray. But his eyes were the same, and his white hair was thick and combed back making him both appear young and old at the same time.
He walked around the desk until he stood directly in front of her with less than two feet of space between them. Leaning back, he crossed his arms in front of him as Susanna stood in silence looking into his eyes. They remained there for a long while, and she instantly remembered losing their staring competition on the train.
“Tell me, have you thought about that afternoon since you arrived in New York?”
“Of course, many times,” she said, feeling not the slightest hint of embarrassment. It was apparent she had, or she would not have been there.
“And when you make love to your husband, have you ever thought of me? Have you instead imagined it was me taking you rather than him?”
“I might have,” she said, instantly feeling a bit shyer. The man stood again, and stepped closer to her, raising her head up by one finger beneath her chin. When she looked up at his handsome face, he gently slid his hand down her body, caressing her breast through the thin fabric before continuing down to her hip, and then the outside of her thigh. She held her breath as he lifted her dress, his hand slipping beneath it in an instant.
“And have you made yourself come thinking about me?”
“Yes,” she moaned, feeling his fingers brush ever so slightly against her now smooth lips.
“How many times?” he asked, still barely touching her.
“A hundred? A thousand? I don’t remember,” she said, her breath growing short as she parted her legs for him, giving him more access to her body. He extended one finger, gently parting her folds just enough for him to feel her excitement, and she shivered at his touch.
“I have also thought about you,” he said, his hand no longer moving, but still touching her skin. “I have also come thinking of you, and I too have fucked my wife, bent over in our bathroom, her dress around her back, as I pictured you on the train. I have imagined taking you a thousand times, each time with more force than the last, and it always ends the same way, which is to say with the beautiful visage of your fingers between your legs, playing with what I left behind.”
She pushed against his fingers, needing more of his touch, but even his lips barely brushed her ear while he whispered to her. Reaching down she found him hard beneath his suit pants, and she reveled in feeling his manhood against her fingers even through the fabric. She remembered its size and shape correctly, and she longed for him to be inside her more than she had ever wanted anything in her life.
“Does that answer your question?” he said, finally removing his hand, eliciting a sigh of regret from her lips. “If we had followed through with what we both wanted, it would have been a fun and scandalous memory, but one that would soon have been forgotten. If there is one thing I’ve learned when it comes to excitement, anticipation is a better aphrodisiac than any oyster or bottle of champagne. If I had taken you, you wouldn’t be here right now, practically coming against my hand, and I certainly wouldn’t be making plans to see you again soon.”
“But can’t you take me now?” she said, no longer caring how wanton she might sound. Or desperate. For her entire life, she had been told that postponing pleasure was a foolish thing to do, and Nicholas encouraged her to do exactly as she wished whenever she felt like it. It might be fun to hold back for a moment, but it had been weeks since she had seen this man, and wasn’t that long enough?
“I have another appoint in just a few minutes, but let me take you out in three days' time.”
“Three days? But that sounds like forever,” she said, practically throwing herself at him. “I’m not sure that I can wait.”
“In three days I will send a car at exactly ten in the evening, and I’ll bring you to an event I think will be much to your liking. And besides, if the anticipation of possibly seeing each other has kept us going this long, just imagine what it will feel like to know that without a doubt, in three days' time I will finally be inside you.”
“Do you promise?” Susanna asked, stepping closer and kissing his lips gently. He gave in to her after a moment of rebuff, and for a brief while they tasted each other as he wrapped her up in his arms, his prodigious member hard against her stomach. When he finally released her it was with regret, and yet also determination.
“I must go now, but I promise that in three days' time you will experience a new and glorious pleasure. In fact, it is a passion that is a well-kept secret, and I implore you to remain silent about it, even before you know anything of its nature. Do you understand?’
“Not at all,” Susanna said with a smile. “But maybe it doesn’t matter. I will wait three days if you promise to send a car and promise that when I do see you again, you will not be so cruel as the last time.”
“The only cruelty would have been to satisfy our wants too quickly, not allowing ourselves the beautiful longing I know at least I have felt these past few weeks. I will see you soon, now please see your way out.”
With that, he picked up his hat and a small case from his desk and walked to a side door before pausing one more time.
“Oh, and Susanna, I must ask you one more favor. Between now and when I see you again, you are not to find any release, even with yourself. This is of the utmost importance. Thank you and have a good evening.”
He closed the door behind him, leaving her standing in the now empty room with knees that could barely hold her up. For a moment she considered sitting down at his desk and making herself come right then, as it would surely show him what happens when you tease a woman like Susanna. And yet, she didn’t, her body seemingly immobile as she considered his words. She couldn’t remember the last time she had gone so much as an afternoon without making herself come, and that was before her husband even entered the picture. Going three whole days felt impossible, and yet somehow the challenge quickly grew more and more enticing until she convinced herself that to fail would be unacceptable.
Leaving his desk with a sigh of resignation, she returned to the door, said goodbye to his secretary, walked down the hall, and found the elevators once more. Even the motion of her skirt against her skin was suddenly arousing, and she felt that if she closed her eyes, she could still feel his fingers against her.
It was going to be an impossible three days!
When she finally returned to the street far below, she looked about to see if she might catch her Frenchman as he got into a cab. Seeing as he was not to be found, she instead hailed one herself, knowing there was only one place she could go at a time like this. She got into the first taxi that stopped, and directed him up the West Side towards Columbus Circle, knowing that she needed Simone more than anything else in the world. | https://medium.com/the-hotwife-collective/susannas-affairs-chapter-ten-fee811e33edb | ['Guy New York'] | 2020-12-21 17:51:02.914000+00:00 | ['Fiction', 'Erotica', 'Kink', 'Hotwife', 'Novel'] |
The case of an avid online shopper…with one body and too many clothes…and then earth died. | 1. OVERVIEW
a. The problem : The savvy millenial female user, Van, has bought online and accumulated many pieces of fast clothes over time and these are now taking up too much space in her room and her wardrobe. At the same time, Van gets bored with her collection of clothes. She is part of the workforce that comprises a large majority of working millennial who is becoming conscientious about her social and environmental impact arising from her love for fast fashion. As she begins to understand and appreciate the value of her actions, she would also like to generate a source of serious cash and passive income from her collection of fast clothes whilst still keeping her main job. She would also like to play an active role in making an impact on the environment
The millenial user, Van is also aware and notes that there are already many apps available that supports the selling of fast clothes. She would like to have an online platform that would help her to push out her clothes into the marketplace and be snapped up in the shortest time possible to generate income.
There are already many available online sites for transactions of clothes such as thredUP, eBay, Tradesy, Poshmark, Preloved, Facebook Marketplace, Depop, Rebelle and Carousell. There will be a need to differentiate our new apps from existing online apps such as Carousell through differentiated and distinct brand identity and content.
b. The solution : After being recommended as a UX team to the client, we were requested to design an online apps to facilitate buying and selling of fast clothes. Our approach was to find out the user’s needs through Empathy Map (illustration 1). With the data, we will use Affinity Map (Illustration 2a & b) to analyse the data, gain ideas and insights into the user’s (millenial) needs. the Value Proposition Canvas (illustration 3)helps the UX team to create value for the user, benefits the user when and why they use our products and services. The customer journey mapping (illustration 4)was done to understand the pain points and experience of the Carousell user.
c. My role : My focus is on the user experience (UX) research and UX/UI design of the product.
2. UNDERSTAND
a. User Interviews Analysis: Understanding the user and their needs is a key focus for the UX team as human-centered design approach is our core strategic philosophy. 7 out of 10 customers do not care about newly launched products and services because 72% of these products and services fail to deliver on expectations. Our UX team has undertaken to understand our users through illustrated below-
Empathy Map Affinity Map Value Proposition Canvas Customer Journey Map
Illustration 1: Empathy Map of User Insghts
Illustration 2a — Affinity Map showing facts and statistics of Millenial’s behaviour using Carousell.
Illustration 2b — Affinity Map showing observations and Millenial’s responses using Carousell.
Illustration 3: Value Proposition Canvas that creates values for the millenial user of Carousell.
Illustration 4 : Customer Journey Mapping of millenial who sells her fast clothes on Carousell
Illustration 5 : Prioritisation Matrix
From the insights derived from the above user interviews analysis methods, the issues that the user is facing are -
Issue 1 — Lack of quality control in the type of clothings being sold on Carousell Marketplace Issue 2 — Van’s needs are to dispose her fast clothes for some passive income streams and at the same time, do good to the community and environment. Issue 3 — Lack of reward or loyalty contents in Carousell.
b. USER NEEDS
Van needs a way to get rid of her clothes through Girly Van Apps because she is finding her identity.
3. IDEATE
Ideation using Crazy 8s
a. Idea evaluation and refinement
Iteration of 3 Frames
b. Discovering and defining my brand identity and personality
Option 1 — Structure of UI components
Option 2— Earthy tones
Option 3 — Final Mood Board and Brand Personality
4. PROTOTYPE
a. Task Flow (3 frames)
b. Wire Flow
Flow of actions and tasks across 3 frames
c. UI Style Guide
Style Guide for Girly Van Apps
d. Actual UI Design Process
(i) Design Principles
One of the design principles used is Visual Hierarchy through the use of colorful fonts, size of buttons and fonts as call to action.
Another design principle that is used is Eye Scan which is strictly top to bottom scanning pattern.
Using the Proximity under Gestalt Principle to reinforce the elements on the first frame as a group.
Proximity in UI principles of Girly Van Apps
(ii) Design Iteration
Initial UI Design of Girly Van Apps
Progress of Girly Van Apps.
5. TEST
Light testing was done and the following feedback and issues were provided -
(i) Appearance of fonts is too small on mobile device, therefore affecting call-to-action.
(ii) Heighten the visual hierarchy of text versus image to know which supports the other to solicit and nudge responsive call-to-action behaviours.
(iii) Rewards icon is a welcome relief compared to Carousell apps.
(iv) Save the earth community icon and function is not obvious. This feature will help differentiate and distinguish Girly Van apps from Carousell apps. This helps to reiterate the research insight that the user, like majority of millenials, would actively look for changes they can make in their home and lifestyle to be greener.
6. ITERATION AND RETROSPECTIVE
An area of further iteration and development would be the Save the Earth feature and how it can be tied back to the sales of clothes on the apps. Based on the feedback from the user of the Girly Van Apps, the following were made -
(i) I edited and changed the size of the fonts for a more effective call-to-action. Added the icons for chat and home page.
(ii) I enhanced the Save the earth icon and added an overlay that further develops the call-to-action
Save the Earth overlay to reinforce brand identity of Girly Van
(b) Summary Reflection
The UX research has surfaced important insights into the mindset and behaviour of millenials towards their environment and lifestyle. As they comprise a majority of our workforce, it is pertinent to uncover their needs, desires and expectations of products and services that would help them progress in their lives and enhance their lifestyle.
Van is represents the typical millenial whose love for clothes would not be rescinding anytime soon. At the same time, Van is deeply concerned about the environment. This project has developed the apps solution to help Van sell her clothes fast and also help to protect and save the earth. Thus, Van would have a deep purpose in her life with her value-adding actions and behaviour.
LINK TO FIGMA
APPS in GIF | https://medium.com/@sooyint/the-case-of-an-avid-online-shopper-with-one-body-and-too-many-clothes-and-then-earth-died-6971da66637a | ['Soo Yin Tang'] | 2020-02-18 16:02:35.177000+00:00 | ['Ui Ux Design', 'UX'] |
Kindness | Being friendly, considerate, and generous is known as kindness. Words relevant with kindness are concern, warmth, care and gentleness. Kindness means doesn’t weak, because kindness often requires courage with strength.Saba Gul said, “in order to solve big mysteries of the world, intellect is not enough, you also need compassion”
With only intellect, you will hop not walk. To walk properly on both legs, compassion, and intellect, must be hand in hand.
My act of kindness with family, fellows, and neighbors are given as:
I help my mom in the kitchen, also in other household activities.
I also help my friends with their assignments and subjects.
I also help my younger brothers and sisters with their homework.
And many such activities. I always try to help, how much I can. It’s the blessing of Allah that you have such emotions.
Move forward and help people in your surrounding. | https://medium.com/@durymaknoonrazia/kindness-f9ca2780a368 | ['Dure Maknoon Razia'] | 2020-12-18 11:06:28.498000+00:00 | ['Compassion', 'Care', 'Kindness', 'Understanding', 'Helping Others'] |
DOJ Revises Guidelines on Compliance Programs | In the beginning of June, the U.S. Department of Justice released a revised version of its guidance on compliance programs. This updated guidance, replacing the last updated version from over a year ago, includes many new considerations for organizations in their compliance programs.
This guidance is a gauge for federal prosecutors to evaluate the effectiveness of an organization’s compliance program to assist in the decision-making process about prosecutions and appropriate monetary penalties. As a result, these guidelines are an important resource for organizations to evaluate their compliance programs in a way that satisfies DOJ expectations.
One of the main areas in which this updated 2020 version distinguishes itself from the previous update in 2019 is in regard to what it calls the “fundamental questions” — which all of the guidelines are directly based off of. Many of the changes within these questions are a matter of wording. For instance, the second question is whether a compliance program is being “implemented effectively”, but in the updated version it provides more nuance by stating, “is it adequately resourced and empowered to function effectively.”
Although this is just a change in wording, it is a welcome change, nonetheless. An effective compliance program has many layers to it. It is not just a matter of whether the organization has qualified personnel in their compliance program, adequate resources have to be provided for it to operate effectively i.e. finances, technology, personnel etc. Once these resources are in place, the organization must empower its compliance program and officers to take the appropriate and necessary actions when needed to push the compliance program further. This update speaks to one of the biggest problems seen within corporate compliance programs today — the head of the compliance program is a well-qualified individual that’s lacking the adequate resources to operate effectively and is not empowered by the organization and its directors to enact changes that are necessary.
Noteworthy Changes
Other changes to the 2020 update include several important additions:
· Are past issues of the company considered in performing the risk assessment and in making improvements to the program?
· Are policies and procedures made accessible in a searchable manner?
· Is the reporting system publicized to third parties?
· Are post-acquisition audits performed in regard to newly acquired entities, rather than merely during the due diligence process?
· Is there a culture of ethics and compliance?
· Does the company invest in training and development of compliance and control personnel?
· Are risk assessments continuous in or merely “snapshots” from different assessments?
· Do compliance and control personnel have access to data to enable them to perform timely and effective monitoring and testing?
· Do the compliance functions monitor investigations and resulting discipline to ensure consistency?
· Does the company tests employee awareness of and comfort with the reporting system and whether the reporting system is tested for effectiveness by tracking a report from start to finish?
The updates added by the DOJ in their 2020 guidelines is a sign of improved maturity and understanding of corporate compliance programs. The guidelines are largely based off of feedback the DOJ has received over the past year from legal and business communities. These new guidelines acknowledge how an organization can only adapt to this volatile and dynamic business environment by utilizing technology and data. It acknowledges that compliance programs are not a one-size fits all, but rather must be developed based off of the organizations size, industry geography etc. It also highlights the importance and effectiveness of organizations evaluating their compliance programs, responding to the feedback of their employees, and using the lessons they have learned to create and sustain dynamic and effective compliance programs.
At its core, the 2020 DOJ guidance encourages organizations not take a basic in designing and implementing a compliance program, but rather to consider the company’s specific risks and circumstances i.e. the reasons for a company’s structural choices and allocation of resources.
Is your organization ready for effective, efficient, and agile compliance agility in today’s dynamic and risky environment?
Get in touch with us | https://medium.com/vcomply/doj-revises-guidelines-on-compliance-programs-629b8e3f2011 | [] | 2020-06-23 22:34:58.412000+00:00 | ['DOJ', 'Compliance', 'Grc', 'Guidelines', 'Risk Management'] |
5 Tools To Help With Writer’s Block | Writer’s block hits us all in one way or another. And very few of us know how to deal with it. Here are my 5 favorite ways to deal with writer’s block:
1. CONSTRICTION
One of the best ways to start writing is to constrict your options on how to start. Maybe you have 7 different ideas on how to start, 4 different hooks you could use, and 3 different quotes. CONSTRICT THE CHOICES. Narrow them down to just two or three and then pick from there. Choice is a paradox. The more choices you have, the harder it generally is to make a choice at all. So if you have too many options on how to begin a piece, narrow your choices and pick from there.
2. QUOTES
Sometimes, if you don’t know how to start a piece, just start it with a quote. It could a personal favorite, one you think would benefit your audience, or one you think needs to be heard more often. People LOVE quotes. Why? Who knows? It doesn’t matter. It just matters that you use it to your advantage. A quote is a GREAT hook, and once you have a quote written down, you can just begin to write from the quote (i.e. what it means, why it’s important, etc). Just put the quote down and go from there. See where it takes you
3. TRENDING NEWS
Another great way to start writing a piece is to start it off with some piece of trending news. We pay MUCH more attention to that which is currently trending, and a headline involving Kim Kardashian, Donald Trump, global warming, or anything that’s prevalent at the time is sure to get attention. You don’t actually have to write about these things. Just tie it to the value that you want to provide. For example, if you teach marketing, it wouldn’t be too hard to turn a Kim Kardashian or a Donald Trump news story into a marketing lesson. Get creative with it.
4. CHANGE YOUR STATE
Sometimes when you’re struggling to start writing, it’s not that you don’t have good content in your head, but rather than you’re not ACCESSING it. This is usually because you’re not in a good state. When we’re in a good state, the words, ideas, and metaphors seem to just flow from us. When we’re in a bad state… not as much. So if you’re having trouble writing, do something to put yourself in a heightened state. Jump. Clap. Bark. Go for a run. Do whatever works to put yourself in a better, heightened state and what the content “come out of nowhere.”
5. DON’T START :-)
Sometimes, the best thing to do is to simply NOT start. Go and do something else. Sometimes the words and the ideas aren’t coming to you. Sometimes it’s because you’re in a poor state. But sometimes you can’t figure out the reason. If that’s the case, and nothing else is working, just don’t start. Don’t feel guilty about it. Just go do something else. And by the time you come back to it you’re likely to have much more ease writing. The ideas will come much more naturally to you simply because you didn’t force it. | https://medium.com/@jorgecallaos/5-tools-to-help-with-writers-block-555eb0609b0 | ['Jorge Callaos'] | 2019-09-19 21:59:48.379000+00:00 | ['Writer', 'Writers On Medium', 'Writers Block', 'Writers On Writing', 'Writers Life'] |
I Found the Perfect Cheese | I found a pretty cheese
Dressed in rustic paper wrap
Among others in the fridge
And thought to myself: oh crap!
Watch out, this is a trap
You can’t take lactose
Besides you’re getting fat
You don’t need one of those
But the cheese looked at me
And I back at the cheese
I took the bastard home
And it got me on my knees
Well it was indeed from Spain
So it might have been the accent
But since then I’ve been in pain
From all the stomach acid
This cheese is made from goat
The female goat I mean
But still, it makes me bloat
And my bowels are mad at me
I’m sure Heaven is watching
Me slowly stuff my face
And righteously laughing
As I collapse in disgrace
I’ve downed 400 grams
Of this flatulent mass
I surrender, raise my hands
It’s the end for me I guess
Time to pay for my sin
So I’ll leave you alone
While I make my offering
To the porcelain throne | https://medium.com/no-crime-in-rhymin/i-found-the-perfect-cheese-f2d6d8704210 | ['Daniele Ihns'] | 2020-11-14 08:02:30.874000+00:00 | ['Satire', 'Humor', 'Cheese', 'Rhymes', 'Poetry'] |
AI and Ethics: Criminal Justice | While criminal justice risk assessment tools are often simpler than the deep neural networks used in many modern artificial intelligence systems, they are basic forms of AI full of bias. As such, they present a paradigmatic example of the high-stakes social and ethical consequences of automated AI decision-making.
There is software used across the United States to predict future criminals. Risk assessment scores are increasingly common in courtrooms across the nation. They are used to inform decisions about who can be set free at every stage of the criminal justice system, from assigning bond amounts to even more fundamental decisions about defendant’s freedom.
However, in forecasting who would re-offend, the algorithm made mistakes with black and white defendants at roughly the same rate but in very different ways.
The algorithm was particularly likely to falsely flag black defendants as future criminals, wrongly labelling them this way at almost twice the rate as white defendants. White defendants were mislabeled as low risk more often than black defendants.
That being said, this disparity could not be explained by the statistical data that was used to train the machine learning algorithm. Neither the training data nor the testing data had racial bias inflicted in it. Already, the present-day justice system has made the minority population an easy target to portray the idealistic justice numbers and statistical data that we are now accustomed to, even more, has now creeped into artificial intelligence.
The model I studied was COMPAS (Correctional Offender Management Profiling for Alternative Sanctions). It is an algorithmic risk-assessment tool that attempts to predict whether a defendant is likely to recidivate.
Even though the dataset did consider the race and ethnicity of the defendants, there was no inherent bias in the dataset yet in the proposed output.
In order to eliminate this bias, I first had to understand — What do we mean by ‘fair’?
To me, fairness in the justice system means equal standards applied to all, independent of any personal or identifying characteristics. It implies speedy and thorough due process for all people and presumption of innocence until proven guilty.
In order to achieve this, few preliminary steps were taken during the data and ML setup:
Categories which were not deemed important were eliminated such as race, color, ethnicity, etc
All groups were predicted to have equal probability of recidivism in the beginning.
Given below is an example of a few rows of the indexed dataset:
The question remains, How did I make the data fair?
It was integral to make the mean or average of two categories equal. The formula for group fairness that I implemented is given below:
P(y_hat = 1 | a = y_hat) = P(y_hat = 1 | R = c)
After this, the mean and standard deviation were set to be the same.
This is how I, if not eliminated, reduced the bias in the COMPAS model.
However, let’s come back to a more general purview. In my opinion, we as a society have allowed our stereotypes to be testaments to certain decisions which on the most basic level is unethical. Social networks were once created with the intention of having a tool. It now drives the world, right from emotional manipulation, buyer influence and voting polarization.
Therefore, I’d like to think of AI in criminal justice more of a ‘tool’ rather than something that does certain tasks more efficiently than humans, assumably. This would achieve two important goals:
It would prevent unemployment in the near future in the Criminal Justice Sector
It would suggest instead of dictate. This would help us avoid unfair sentencing even if there is a racial bias in the suggestion.
Aaryan Mahipal is a Student Ambassador in the Inspirit AI Student Ambassadors Program. Inspirit AI is a pre-collegiate enrichment program that exposes curious high school students globally to AI through live online classes. Learn more at https://www.inspiritai.com/. | https://medium.com/@mahipalaaryan/ai-and-ethics-criminal-justice-6297a9312f80 | ['Aaryan Mahipal'] | 2020-11-21 17:33:42.116000+00:00 | ['Machine Learning', 'Artificial Intelligence', 'Inspirit Ai', 'Criminal Justice', 'Ethics'] |
Becoming a Data Driven Organisation: What changes do you need to implement? | In this post, I will discuss the changes that organisations need to implement, to truly benefit from data and AI. Part 1 of this series, focused on setting up the stage and discussing the aspects that make a business data-driven, while in Part 2, I have discussed the challenges that keep the businesses away from becoming Data-Driven.
“W hat are the main challenges for companies to solve in their pursuit to become truly data-driven?”
There are many changes that businesses need to implement, and they vary from business to business. I can spend hours on this, but let me give you some gist of this.
Look at the bigger picture: Stop looking at only the points that you can see right now, try to look beyond those points and think about what will come next. Use your imagination, look at your competition and try to look at the big picture that entails a future based on intelligent automation, artificial intelligence and their likes driving and thriving the businesses. Then, decide are you willing to be out-thrown from the market, or would you like to stay relevant for the time to come. In the later case, which most, if not all would like to do, take the necessary steps to ensure that you develop plans, set right strategic priorities and take actions to lead your organization to land as a cognitive enterprise.
Photo by Alexander Naglestad on Unsplash
Develop Shared Ownership and Share Vision across the organisation: Carrying further from the above point, once you have started to take steps in that direction, start sharing your vision across the organisation and do it repeatedly, so that everyone within your organisation owns that vision for the future. Once, they own it, it will become much easier to get them to do things in accordance with that vision. However, this many not be as easy as it sounds, you might have to look deeper and find out what kind of cultural changes, do I need to implement across my organization. Once you have found the needed changes, don’t hesitate from implementing them even if they may offer some risks and financial implications.
Photo by timJ on Unsplash
Move from Return on Investment (ROI) to Return of Value (RoV): Take necessary measures to ensure that you and your organisation moves away from ROI mindset to a RoV approach. This will ensure that when your Finance department and Chief Financial Officers (CFOs) are coming in the way of releasing the funds for your business units to implement data science and AI, you hold their hands and show them the brighter end of data and AI and let them realize and think about RoV of such spendings on the data and AI endeavours.
Photo by Adeolu Eletu on Unsplash
“Develop plans, set right strategic priorities and take actions to lead your organisation to land as a cognitive enterprise”
Address the Lack of skills gap:
Make plans to fill the skills gap, some suggestions would be
Hire contractors to fill the short term need: As it is not easy to hire skilled data scientists at short notice (especially when you need them), the short and quick solution would be to hire specialists (contractors) to achieve short term objectives of the proof of concept (POCs) to get buy in across your organization. UpSkill or Re-skill your workforce to adapt to and learn the necessary skills: Look out for the enthusiasts within your organization as well as people who needs to be reskilled (such as data owners, business unit leaders and then everyone in the organization in in this descending order of priority). Get them all trained as per their responsibilities and potential involvement in the data and AI efforts. Best food is the one which is cooked at home, keep training your people in house. Partner with third parties and do projects in a way that ensures that your team is also trained on the go: Engage with consulting organisations and third parties on defined, concrete and measurable projects. Ensure that, those consultants also engage your employees for the knowledge handover, sharing of work and co-creating the data science POCs.
Data access and preparation:
Data access is limited usually by two factors:
a. Data Literacy which we have discussed earlier in Part 2 of this series,
b. Data owners not giving access
There are additional measures that you can take to address the issues faced in data access and data preparation
Data Dictionary: Build a data dictionary or Knowledge Catalog, to ensure that everybody is on the same page across the whole organization. This agreement on what does a specific term mean and what does it stand for would help you avoid many problems down the road. One of the main issues that it will address is the knowledge gap, should some of your employees leave, retire or transfer out of their present role. Joint workshops for the employees of different business units to let them feel the need and value that they could get from data and AI projects: Put people from different unity together to brainstorm the ideas, and discuss the potential opportunities for data and AI initiates (projects). This will help them feel being involved, learn from each other and take ownership for data and AI projects. Step away from budget centric to Value Creation mindset: Thought that you have limited budget:Look for opportunities, for optimising existing processes, resource utilisation, cutting down the costs, and creating new avenues for your business. Once you change this thinking, you will aim for ways to look for opportunities to create or arrange budget for data science initiatives instead of sticking to “we don’t have money” approach. You and your employees will be then ready to go extra mile to support, and evangelise data and AI efforts.
Architecture or Infrastructure Landscape: What architectural or infrastructural changes are needed to get the full benefit of AI and Data. It might happen that you do not need (in most cases) any changes on those fronts as you are starting with Proof of Concepts/ Values in the beginning but it would be helpful to start preparing early on. As you and your team becomes mature and expert in utilising the promise and potential of data and AI, the next steps that you would like to take are to deploy the Machine Learning models in production environments which can handle scalability and flexibility for the business and its users.
Photo by chuttersnap on Unsplash
In the next blog, I will discuss about what implications would surface for the business, once they start their journey to become a data driven enterprise. | https://medium.com/illumination/becoming-a-data-driven-organisation-what-changes-do-you-need-to-implement-adf1928bc9b4 | ['Chan Naseeb'] | 2020-04-27 14:08:41.768000+00:00 | ['Return On Value', 'Artificial Intelligence', 'Data Science', 'Shared Ownership', 'Data Driven'] |
Flutter Animation — Understanding the core of Staggered and Sequence Animation | Introduction
There are few main areas that I strongly believe as the key elements for any good mobile app design. The first would be the UI design, UX (user experience) and a good animation.
Since Flutter provides lots of out of the box widget that we can utilize and mix together for a good UI, most if not all, does not come with a good default animation.
Flutter team are fully aware of it and there has been lots of sharing from the team itself on the animation topic. This include ‘Widget of the Weeks’ series where the team behind Flutter created a very good video tutorial and sharing on the power of animation in Flutter and how to use it.
In this article, I will share my knowledge and the core basic specifically on staggered and multiple tweens animation. Why? Well most of the time, when we design any mobile app, we will need to implement multiple animation within the same screen and widget.
For example:
Introduction to Flutter Animations
Before we move into the details of it, is good to know that in Flutter, there are 2 techniques for animation:
Implicit Animation
Explicit Animation
Implicit Animations
Implicit animation is those widgets that come with pre-defined features/functionalities that are good enough for an animation. They extend ImplicitlyAnimatedWidget class.
For example, you can’t control the animation when to pause or reverse or doing multiple animation with different widget child groups together.
Example of implicit type of animation widgets are AnimatedContainer, AnimatedPositioned, AnimatedAlign and AnimatedOpacity.
So, if you want to have simple animation without the need to pause or reversing the animation, AnimatedFoo got you covered in which Foo is the name of the non-animated version of that widget.
For the complete list of implicitly animated widgets, go to here.
A simple AnimatedAlign widget
Another example of implicit animation: AnimatedContainer
But, to achieve the animation that contains multiple widgets that have different entry point within the same animating duration, the easiest approach is explicit animations.
Explicit Animations
In explicit animations, as you need to define the AnimationController, Animation and Tween objects, that means you have the full control of when an animation can be start and mixing multiple animation objects into 1 main staggered or sequence animation.
Animation
-> It is the core class of Flutter animation and it is an abstract class.
-> Since it is an abstract class, we can’t instantiate it for animation usage, but we can create one using AnimationController or Tweens.
-> Example:
Animation<double> — interpolates values between 2 decimal numbers over a given duration.
Animation<Color> — interpolates colors between two color values.
AnimationController
-> It controls the animation such as total animation duration, starting/stopping/reversing the animation and allowing anyone to know the status of the animation through listener.
-> It extends the abtract class Animation, which would mean all implemented methods in Animation class will be available in AnimationController.
-> Code Example:
-> Controller = AnimatioController(duration: Duration(miliseconds: 2800)).
Tweens
-> A tween allowed us to define how to interpolate between two values.
-> The interpolation is linear and not curve. Linear here means the animation from x to y will remain unchanged. To have a curvy type of animation, use CurvedAnimation
-> It is a stateless object that takes only begin and end value.
Now, with the above understanding, we can move on to the basic structure of staggered animation.
Let’s assume we want to create a something like this:
From the above picture, you will notice the following:
The animation started with the avatar picture been loaded from smaller to bigger size and at the same time opacity changed.
The divider below the avatar have its width size changed.
The bottom profile section (big blue section) having width enlarged, follow by opacity changed from 0 to 1.
Basically, there are multiple animation that occur together and some slightly later, in sequence. The complete list of animation in breakdown are as below:
The key steps to setup the animation in this sequence is:
Create an AnimationController that manages all of the Animations.
Create a Tween for each property being animated — Tween for the avatar opacity changes, Tween for avatar sizes changes, Tween for the divider and so on.
This is the main screen dart file.
Key info:
We need to create the AnimationController so that we can specify the total duration of the whole screen, we also need to provide the vsync. Thus, we need to implement SingleTickerProviderStatrMixin. What is vsync? Vsync basically helps in keeping track of the screen, so it won’t simply render the animation when the screen is not being displayed.
Take note, since we are creating an instance of AnimationController, thus we need to dispose it when the screen is not needed anymore during runtime. Therefore, this main class file is been created as Stateful type of widget.
As there is a lot of animations occurring, we can create a separate animator class that focus the animation part of the whole screen.
This is the StaggeredExampleAnimator class.
Here, we have the separated animator class and notice on the constructor in which we have can a reference of the AnimationController from the parent.
Also, we defined all the Animation objects that has its own animation rules such as opacity changes, size changes and width/height changes.
For example, the avatarOpacityAnimation is having the following code:
avatarOpacityAnimation = Tween(begin: 0.0, end: 1.0).animate(
CurvedAnimation(
parent: controller,
curve: Interval(0.1, 0.4, curve: Curves.ease)))
This mean, we are creating an animation object that will change its opacity from 0% to 100% and the animation will start at 0.1 seconds until 0.4 seconds. As I mentioned earlier, to have more control such as when the animation can begin and for how long, we must use Interval.
Tween (begin: 0.0, end: 1.0) — as the opacity min and max range is 0 to 1, thus this are the values.
This mean, we are creating an animation object that will change its opacity from 0% to 100% and the animation will start at 0.1 seconds until 0.4 seconds. As I mentioned earlier, to have more control such as when the animation can begin and for how long, we must use Interval.
Tween (begin: 0.0, end: 1.0) — as the opacity min and max range is 0 to 1, thus this are the values.
Interval (0.1, 0.4, curve: Curves.ease) — this would mean I want the opacity animation to start at the 0.1 interval, and end at 0.4 interval out of the total 1 and using the curve ease. There are others animation curves formula, visit here for the full list.
Lets take another example, the avatarSizeAnimation code:
avatarSizeAnimation = Tween(begin: 10.0, end: 80.0).animate(
CurvedAnimation(
parent: controller,
curve: Interval(0.1, 0.4, curve: Curves.ease)))
This mean, we are creating an animation object that will change its size from 10 pixels to 80 pixels and the animation will start at 0.1 seconds and end at 0.4 seconds. To control when the animation will start, using the interval will allow us to control the timing.
In the UI build code, this is how we link the widget to the animation. For example, the avatar widget where we want to control the opacity and the size during load time:
In the above code snippet, we used the Opacity widget to manage the opacity animation. As because I want to have some border decoration on my avatar picture, we can use the Container widget and mapped the decoration color to the same opacity animation object.
As for the avatar itself, there is a property called radius that we can used to control the radius size from small to big — and this is done by linking it to the size animation object we created above.
The result:
As for the rest of the section such as the divider animation and the bottom square animation is using the same concept that I shared above. As long we understand the purpose of the code for AnimationController, Animation and Tween, we have full control of what we can achieve in explicit animation for Flutter.
What if you want to have the same widget UI to have more than 2 animation at the same time? A sequence of animation on the same widget? For example, changing position from bottom left, then to top left, then to top right, and then bottom right before ending at bottom left again.
Introducing multiple tweens.
Tween Sequence / Sequence of Tweens
If you notice the above, the same widget moved from 1 position to a few more position before it is back again to the main point. Total points 5 points (including the starting point).
To achieve this, we will need to combine tweens in different intervals of the animation.
The TweenSequence class was created for this purpose, providing this functionality out of the box.
The TweenSequence works by providing a set of TweenSequenceItem which consist of a Tween and a weight. The weight will determine how much time each tween will be allowed to run during the duration of the animation.
The above example can be done by the following code:
Let’s break down the code.
The object wandering1CubeAlignmentAnimation is an Animation<Alignment> type of instance class. Why Alignment? Because we want to have the widget position to change and Alignment comes with helpful positioning such as Alignment.bottomLeft.
The TweenSequenceItem is basically an item which holds a tween and a weight. The weight here is all the same which is 1.0. You can specify the weight to be larger, smaller or same for all. The purpose of weight is basically to control which item (TweenSequenceItem) to have slightly longer playing animation.
The above code shows how the UI part is been done.
I hope you gain some useful info and have some fun following the example on staggered animation. With strong foundation, in this case of animation, it is important to understand the core and basic first before designing a real application.
Feel free to leave comments and feedback. The whole source codes are available here. Cheers. | https://medium.com/flutter-community/flutter-animation-understanding-the-core-of-staggered-and-sequence-animation-2c80a529d30e | ['Ken Lee Chiaw Huat'] | 2020-04-20 02:10:10.501000+00:00 | ['Flutter', 'Flutter Ui', 'Animation', 'Dart', 'Flutter Widget'] |
Giri Devanur Of reAlpha: Five Things I Wish Someone Told Me Before I Became A CEO | Thank you so much for joining us in this interview series! Before we dig in, our readers would like to get to know you a bit more. Can you tell us a bit about your “backstory”? What led you to this particular career path?
I have been an entrepreneur in spirit for a long time. I studied in a high school in remote India. There I was running a newspaper route with my brother. I realized that early on, I wanted to be an entrepreneur and run my own businesses. Then when I was 15 , I saw the first computer and immediately I knew I wanted to be in the computer industry. I did my bachelor of engineering in computer science. After that, I took my first flight ever in life straight to LA with only a few dollars in my pocket and started my entrepreneurial journey in the US!
Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you began leading your company?
Launching reAlpha has been an unbelievable journey. I never thought 8000+ investors would want to invest in our company within 6 weeks of launching our campaign! The amount of real interest in what we were doing has been so interesting and impressive to me.
Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?
I wanted to name my first company as Oasis tech. When I asked the printer to print a business card, he printed it as Oasys. I didn’t have time to correct it and hence kept the company name as Oasys itself. From that experience, I realized that building a successful company is all about details and everything must be reviewed. Read everything at least twice.
None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story about that?
There have been too many people who have helped me. My family, mentors, and friends as well as colleagues have relentlessly helped me become good at business and life in general.
I could write a book on how lucky I have been.
As you know, the United States is currently facing a very important self-reckoning about race, diversity, equality and inclusion. This may be obvious to you, but it will be helpful to spell this out. Can you articulate to our readers a few reasons why it is so important for a business or organization to have a diverse executive team?
I think America is one of the greatest places on earth. It allows people to dream big and achieve great things. Look at Obama, Serena Williams or any other sport, music or multiple other avenues of life. In technology, you will see companies such as Microsoft, Google and Twitter naming Indians as CEOs.
Of course, I think we can keep doing better, and there have been some aspects which can change. At reAlpha, we are bringing in the best and brightest from all corners of the world, we do not limit ourselves geographically. We celebrate cultural inclusion and respect diversity. We have worked hard to create a culture which transcends time changes, remote meetings and locations on the map.
As a business leader, can you please share a few steps we must take to truly create an inclusive, representative, and equitable society? Kindly share a story or example for each.
We are building a community in reAlpha. We want people to be able to create wealth even when they don’t have a lot of money or connections to begin with. We are working hard to make 99% of Americans who don’t have $1000 even for medical emergencies to create wealth for themselves. We also look to hire diverse partners as we expand all over the country and the world.
Ok, thank you for that. Let’s now jump to the primary focus of our interview. Most of our readers — in fact, most people — think they have a pretty good idea of what a CEO or executive does. But in just a few words can you explain what an executive does that is different from the responsibilities of the other leaders?
I think our most important job as an executive is empowering our talent to be the best versions of themselves. It’s never a one-person job. Hiring a team which is better than themselves is the core of what a leader must do. Then they should get out of the way.
What are the “myths” that you would like to dispel about being a CEO or executive. Can you explain what you mean?
CEOs are normal people. They eat the same type of food, sleep at the same times, enjoy the same games or movies. They laugh, cry and go through the same emotions as anyone else. But in times of crisis, they are expected to show resilience and courage to show the teams and to lead in tough situations.
What is the most striking difference between your actual job and how you thought the job would be?
I knew being a CEO would be hard work, but I don’t think I realized how rewarding, and inspiring it could be. I get to learn something new every day and work to solve real problems. I have been a CEO of multiple companies. In my previous companies, it was more B2B. reAlpha is a community driven organization and focused on the direct consumer, so it’s a totally new experience.
Do you think everyone is cut out to be an executive? In your opinion, which specific traits increase the likelihood that a person will be a successful executive and what type of person should avoid aspiring to be an executive? Can you explain what you mean?
No one is a “born leader”. People from different situations or backgrounds can emerge as leaders. Whoever aspires to be a leader, or an executive must do two important things. 1. Read diverse subjects 2. Travel and meet a variety of people.
What advice would you give to other business leaders to help create a fantastic work culture? Can you share a story or an example?
Every company is different. Leaders should allow their employees to discover and define what the company culture is. Also, no culture is stagnant. It keeps changing and evolving. What was right ten years back is irrelevant today. Ten years from now, what is cool as culture may become useless. Leaders have to be able to keep their finger on the pulse and listen to the needs of their employees.
How have you used your success to make the world a better place?
Creating first jobs. I believe in giving the first job breaks and taking chances on younger people. That’s how we can build future leaders.
Fantastic. Here is the primary question of our interview. What are your “5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me Before I Started” and why? (Please share a story or example for each.)
Hiring is hard — one good professional is equal to 100 average professionals. Every successful business is built by its people. Throughout my entrepreneurial journey, I’ve always made “hiring the best people” one of my top goals. Raising $10M is easier than $10k. The first step is always the hardest. RegA+, which is the capital raise method we are using, is still a new concept for a lot of investors. My team has been working effortlessly to educate the market on Reg A+ funding and crowdfunding. Now, we have more than 8,000 investors from all over the world to believe and invest with us. Speaking of RegA+, you can check out this deep fake video we made of Elon Musk to help educate investors on the concept. Technology changes every hour. We have witnessed great changes in technology in the past few years that are changing the world. It is so important to stay on top of how these developments impact your industry, or you could end up dead in the water. Marketing is so critical — can make or break a company. Whatever business or service you have, you need to tell a great story to your customers before their attention slips away. Culture can eat strategy for breakfast. If employees are not passionate about the company culture or vision, they will fail to agree and execute the strategic plans.
You are a person of great influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good for the greatest number of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger.
Helping people to build wealth. Most people don’t know how to build wealth. And without wealth, they worry and lose health! This is one of the problems that reAlpha is hoping to solve. By creating real estate investing opportunities to regular investors through Reg A+ funding, reAlpha can help the 99% of Americans invest in their first real estate property.
Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?
This quote is from a 2000-year-old book called ArthaShastra written by Chanakya. (Think of him as Sun Zhu of India). He’s considered as the greatest strategist in India.
Sanskrit original:
Kimartham karishyami, Kim pratiphalam ,aham saphalyam prapnomi?
English transaction:
Before you start some work, always ask yourself three questions — Why am I doing it, What the results might be and Will I be successful.
We are very blessed that some very prominent names in Business, VC funding, Sports, and Entertainment read this column. Is there a person in the world, or in the US with whom you would love to have a private breakfast or lunch with, and why? He or she might just see this if we tag them
Elon Musk. He’s changing the world in so many different ways. To the moon and Mars. I’d love to have a conversation with him about these gigantic projects and all humanity is capable of.
Thank you for these fantastic insights. We greatly appreciate the time you spent on this. | https://medium.com/@realpha/giri-devanur-of-realpha-five-things-i-wish-someone-told-me-before-i-became-a-ceo-bd283b41fe8a | [] | 2021-12-24 10:37:49.142000+00:00 | ['Real Estate Investment', 'Rental Property', 'Airbnb', 'Realpha'] |
Five Design-Sheet Methodology Approach to Data Visualisation | Image by author — D3.js visualisation
Let’s say we are supposed to visualise our findings and communicate them clearly to our stakeholders, how do we decide on the type of data visualisations to deliver these insights effectively? Do we just explore beginner-friendly data visualisation tools like Tableau or Microsoft Power BI to do the charts? Or should we spend more time using complicated tools like D3.js or R shiny library to design more creative visualisation? In the first place, should we decide on the tools first or should we decide on the design first? There’s definitely a possibility whereby our ideas in mind are hard to implement in those tools we are familiar with, and often ending up with simple and non-effective visualisation designs.
The Five Design-Sheet (FDS) Methodology was introduced as a way of formalising sketching and lo-fidelity prototyping to allow visualisation designers explore their ideas without worrying on the technical aspects. As the name suggests, there are 5 sheets in this methodology and this article will touch on what each sheet is about and how were they being used to develop the visualisation in the screenshot above (done in D3.js).
Problem Statement
Photo by Arthur Edelman on Unsplash
This portion is not entirely important but I thought it will be nice to give a complete picture of what we are trying to achieve through the FDS methodology. We are trying to study the possible correlation between rainfall and aircraft movements in 8 major Australian airports, namely Adelaide, Brisbane, Canberra, Gold Coast, Melbourne, Perth, Sydney and Tasmania from the data period of January 2011 to December 2016.
The key message that I hope to convey to the target audience is that there was a noticeable pattern between rainfall and aircraft movements in the month of February consistently across the years from 2011 to 2016. A drop in rainfall coincidentally saw a drop in aircraft movements in the month of February.
The intended target audience for communicating this key message will be Australian Government Department of Infrastructure, Regional Development and Cities. Main roles of this government body includes supporting economic growth through transport and increasing transport access. By communicating the key message to them, it may potentially lead to more flights and routes planned out in the month of February when it was evident that there was clearly a drop in aircraft movements in the month of February across 2011 to 2016, with a coincident drop in rainfall as well. This is in line with the responsibilities of the government data as it will lead to greater flight access to the general public and in turn, boost the economic growth with increased revenues. Furthermore, the dataset containing the amount of aircraft movements originated from the same government body and by presenting analysis of their own dataset, it may lead to greater credibility of the data resulting in stronger communication of the key message.
Sheet 1 — The ideas sheet
This is the initial brainstorming sheet, whereby you just sketch all your ideas on a piece of paper regardless of whether they are realistic or implementable. Come up with at least 10–20 ideas and then filter the ideas based on whether there’s duplicates or irrelevant concepts. Categorise the ideas together and think if there are any missing concepts. Combine & refine the categories into more complete solutions and see which idea complement each other or whether a combination of designs can lead to better designs. Question whether the designs can solve the original problem (i.e. able to convey the message effectively) and choose 3 ideas which can be explored in the next 3 sheets.
Image by author — FDS Sheet 1
A total of 12 different graphs/sketches were generated in the “IDEAS” portion and with the key message in mind, irrelevant graphs/sketches were removed in the “FILTER” section. Heat Map was deemed irrelevant as the dataset for this project did not cover the whole of Australia and only 8 airport locations were selected. Pie chart was also crossed out as it was inappropriate to represent two data factors (Rainfall and Aircraft Movements) in one pie chart. Tree Map was removed as well as the key message was not to compare the highest/lowest rainfall/aircraft movements. The remaining ideas were then categorized into five main categories as shown in the “CATEGORIZE” section and they were then combined into three possible designs namely a combined bar and line chart, a symbol map and a bubble chart that will be discussed in the next 3 sheets.
While coming out with possible ideas for the narrative visualisation to be able to communicate the key message to the target audience, some questions were asked and noted down:
➢ Is showing location geographically necessary to deliver the key message?
➢ Does showing the data period by year/month/quarter be more effective in
delivering the key message?
➢ Can users filter according to data period, location of airport?
➢ Can users view overall graph after filtering have been applied?
Sheet 2 — Alternative design sheet
Sheet 2, 3 and 4 are designed for the purpose of exploring the 3 designs chosen from Sheet 1 to a greater depth and usually contains the following parts:
1. Information: meta-information such as title, author and dataset
2. Layout: a sketch of the design visualisation
3. Operations: list down the functions available in the visualisation and what the user is able to do with it
4. Focus: identify the core portion of the visualisation design
5. Discussion: discuss the advantages, disadvantages, feasibility of the design
Image by author — FDS Sheet 2
The first design being considered was a bubble chart. Using this visualisation, the key message will be communicated when the user drags the data period filter horizontally which will make the bubble chart change over time. In this way, when the user drags from January to February, the position of the circles will be lower as there were both a lower rainfall and aircraft movements in February compared to January. This will allow the user to have a general idea of how rainfall affect aircraft movements and with the different colours representation of the bubbles based on the location, users can easily identify possible trends in different locations with the help of the location filter as well. Finally, a tooltip will be displayed when users hover over the bubbles showing the location, rainfall amount and total aircraft movements.
This design was not chosen as the final design as since there were only two value-based data factors namely aircraft movements and rainfall, there was no pre-existing third data factor that can be shown together with the width of the circle. Thus, a ratio between these two factors needed to be computed to represent the width of the bubbles which I thought was irrelevant and provide little context in communicating the key message. Furthermore, axes of a bubble chart are best represented by two value-based data and since our dataset and key message include a time data factor, it can only be included in this visualisation as a filter which makes it hard for users to identify the key message over the years in a single glance without dragging horizontally on the data period filter.
Sheet 3— Alternative design sheet
Image by author — FDS Sheet 3
The second design being considered was a combination of bar chart and a line chart. Through this visualisation, it will allow users to have an overall glimpse of how the two data factors (Rainfall and Aircraft Movements) differed over time. And with the additional users’ interaction of filtering the data to the desired year and quarter, it will be easier for users to focus on just quarter one of the data periods which will thus lead to more effective communication of the key message. Furthermore, tooltip will be displayed when users hover over the bar charts or the airplane symbol on the line chart. A third users’ interaction filter in the form of a map was included for users to filter between the 8 different locations, while at the same time, identify the key message geographically. Representing the bar charts with rainfall as background and the line chart with an aircraft symbol will generate another form of easy identification between the two data factors.
The first issue with this visualisation was users will not be allowed to choose multiple locations at the same time. The location filter will only allow one location to be chosen at the same time and this will prevent users from comparing between two locations. Furthermore, as the key message focus primarily on the data period of February, a single bar chart with 12 individual bars representing the 12 months of a year might not be appropriate to focus on month of February only. Representing the whole data period at once by months will lead to a total of 72 bars plotted in a single bar chart which might be hard for users to perceive the information and the key message.
Sheet 4— Alternative design sheet
Image by author — FDS Sheet 4
The third design being considered was a symbol map. Aircraft movements will be represented by size of the circles on the map and rainfall will be represented by the colour saturation of the circles. A filter is included whereby users can drag horizontally to filter between data period. The key message can be make prominent when users access the data period filter from January to February which will see a decrease in size of circle and lighter saturation of the circle as there were lower aircraft movements and rainfall in February compared to January. Hovering over each circle will also display the amount for rainfall and aircraft movements which allow users to grasp the real data values. This geographical visualisation allows users to easily identify any possible trends with respect to each location and the size and colour saturation of the circles allow users to further identify the highs and lows of the two data factors.
However, as the key message focus primarily on just the time factor (i.e. February), geographical representation should not be the focus as it might lead users away from the key message. Furthermore, it will be hard for users to view the whole data period plotted at once in the same map which might make the key message less prominent. Lastly, though the highs and lows of rainfall and aircraft movements of different locations can be easily identified with the colour saturation and size of the circles, this is not a component of the key message.
Sheet 5— Realisation sheet
This is the final chosen design detailing the concepts in the visualisation. It contains information about the design, functionality and interactions for it to be implemented. The following components can be discussed in this sheet:
1. Description of the main design patterns, algorithms or data structures and references
2. Underlying maths and calculations used in the design such as layout dimensions
3. Software requirements, dependencies, etc
4. Estimates of cost, time, etc
5. Any other requirements or resources needed
Image by author — FDS Sheet 5
The final chosen design was an improvement from Sheet 3 — combination of line and bar charts. Instead of plotting the whole dataset in a single chart, the dataset will be plotted on 6 different charts with each chart representing a year (i.e. 2011 to 2016). A quarter filter will aid the communication of the key message as the bars corresponding to the users’ selection of quarter will be highlighted across all the 6 charts which allow users to focus on just those bars. A location filter will be included to allow users to filter between locations. Finally, tooltip will be displayed when users hover over the bars represented by blue which corresponds to colour of the rainfall, and the airplane symbol representing the data factor of aircraft movements.
Main reason for choosing this design was it will be easier for users to view the whole dataset in a single glance for easy identification of the key message instead of filtering the data period year by year or having a single chart with 72 bars. The second reason was I felt this is the simplest and most effective representation of two data factors over the time factor. Bearing in mind the target audience is a government body, a visualisation that can deliver messages promptly should be implemented.
Users will first have an overall view of the whole dataset regardless of the locations and highlighting the bars to quarter 1 using the quarter filter will allow users to see a noticeable pattern of drop in aircraft movements when there was a drop-in rainfall in months of February across 2011 to 2016 shown in the 6 different charts. This will be effective for the communication of the key message which was to highlight the month of February. And if the users are interested to identify if this pattern is consistent across all 8 locations or more prominent at any location, the location filter can be used.
Summary
Image by author — D3.js visualisation
That’s the Five Design Sheet methodology which helped us to finally able to design and implement our final visualisation design in D3.js as shown in the screenshot above, and with all the functions as described in sheet 5. Though coming up with the 5 sheets for one visualisation problem seems daunting and might not be time efficient, I feel this is a good way for me to combine all my ideas and deep-dive into minute areas which I could have missed out if I were to design the visualisation design straight from the start. Hope this walkthrough can help you guys to become an effective data visualisation designer! | https://towardsdatascience.com/five-design-sheet-methodology-approach-to-data-visualisation-603d760f2418 | ['Kieran Tan Kah Wang'] | 2020-09-29 02:52:08.868000+00:00 | ['Data Analysis', 'Five Design Sheet', 'Data Visualisation', 'Data Science', 'D3js'] |
Oceanmoist | Oceanmoist
A found-poem compiled from a gorgeous Ann Marie Steele poem.
Photo by Matt Hardy on Unsplash
Press through
my rhythm
of contentment
and fall
on knees
inside
senses yearning
to abate
your still
wet and swirling
pressure
consuming
our
salty, throbbing
firmness.
Wet…my…lip…s. | https://medium.com/sensual-enchantment/oceanmoist-d1e5c7a945d | ['Aaron Quist'] | 2020-06-07 15:26:54.203000+00:00 | ['Relationships', 'Passion', 'Love', 'Sex', 'Poetry'] |
George Aye I’ve always admired Greater Good and now I know why. | George Aye I’ve always admired Greater Good and now I know why. You built something out of never wanting to work for toxic white supremacy creatives and agencies that pretend to do good while really being exactly as you described, ripped from a Mad Men script. It’s literally why I started my company (still in its infancy). I’ve said that sentence often.
Everything you’ve described I can attest to at other agencies who would have idolized and/or partnered with IDEO. In 2018 as a Sr Producer at another agency who did experiential design and tech, our agency was hired to basically manage a project. I had always wanted to work there as IDEO is held up as this elite amazing creative place. I should have known elite meant toxic. Anyway I dodged a bullet because I heard what a $#&! Show it was…and the description of their process was like an alarm. Not that the agency that I was at was much better. I worked at big names in brand, apparel, and advertising. All were the same from 12 person studio to a 800 person agency. White men got away with everything and they were the end all be all.
I ultimately quit in 2019 when I’d been working on building my biz on the side, when a white bro dressed up in feminist clothing screamed at me on the phone that I had one job to do and why couldn’t I just do it (his job that he didn’t feel like doing). He embarrassed me and belittled me in front of our team and then exploded. I was mortified and shocked and it took 4 days before his feigned apology that was forced upon him by the bros in charge. It was one of only a string of incidents and psychological games that org played with me while I worked 80 hour weeks. Dangling a FT job for over 9 months and reprimanding me for not being friendly (not smiling basically) when I was operating on no sleep because I had worked 4 days straight in a hotel room.
Another time I went to an install where the male tech director told me he didn’t think I should manage it (my job) because the teamsters wouldn’t listen to a woman. The Union guys in Boston were less sexist or at least less subtle about it and showed me more respect than the Carnegie-Mellon-educated engineer. After the final straw I quit and vowed never again to work for creative agencies that weren’t really doing the work. Now when I work with toxic people I have a 1 and done policy and a much higher vetting process. This was one of my better jobs in the creative world.
Creative agencies on the whole are broken because they’ve been built up like the rest of corporate America, to value white men’s ideas and output over all else. I applaud you for boldly calling them out as it is hard to stand up to these institutions and gatekeepers who hold our careers and reps in the balance. But the more we do it the better. Thank you for your words, your work, and pushing for a better future of work. 🙏🏻💙 | https://medium.com/@emily-weltman/george-aye-ive-always-admired-greater-good-and-now-i-know-why-19228da0ddbc | ['Emily O. Weltman'] | 2021-05-25 02:08:06.299000+00:00 | ['Patriarchy', 'Agency', 'Entrepreneurship', 'Creative', 'Sexism'] |
The Random Act Of Kindness | The random act of kindness no matter how small has a tremendous impact
Photo by Étienne Godiard on Unsplash
What Is Random Act Of Kindness (RAK)?
The Random Act Of Kindness is where you have a spur out of the blues moment, (that is not premeditated) to show kindness to someone, without them asking for it, without you expecting any return, not even a thank you. This is because you left immediately after, without staying around the person, or the person realising it after you have left the scene.
I have an example of my friend, who was supported by a barrister in her case against a foreclosure. This barrister came into court that day, wanted to defend a case without being paid. He did win the case, gave my friend a number, that was ‘’false’’ because he did not want to be thanked for it. The impact on my friend is indescribable up to this day as she continuously wells up in gratitude.
‘’My religion is very simple. My religion is kindness.’’ Dalai Lama
With RAK, it is something that comes to you in a spur of the moment, because you were in a place, and you come across an incident or people that wells up kindness in you, and without much thinking, you do your part, and immediately leave the scene.
What RAK Is Not
The Randon Act of Kindness is not our usual practice of gift-giving, (like Christmases, birthdays, and those special occasions). People are already in high expectations during these celebrations. Hence you have loads of wish lists and requests flying around during these seasons. People are generally in high expectation from ‘’whoever’’ is able to come to their aid, so you have some rich people or celebrities trying to fulfil these wish lists.
You have various requests in social media, for example, crowd-funding, requests for medical expenses, accommodations, meals, college fees, charitable donations etc that we participate in are not RAK, even if we do so anonymously.
RAK is not requested for. You come across a need, you immediately want to help, no one asks you to help, you decide in a spur of a moment to help. You left before the person even realise it.
I say these are not RAK because gift-giving seems to induce expectation of reciprocity. You found charitable organisation expressing appreciation to……..for a kind donation, announcing so many pounds from ……… In RAK, those we offered help don’t even know who we are, and often realise that help after we have left the scene.
How we can incorporate RAK into our lives?
We go out every day, we see issues, we observe events, there must be one of those that will motivate us to act. Examples are, (not exclusive though),
In a supermarket check-out, you see someone returning essential items for lack of money, here you can step to pay for those essential food items.
When you go to eat out, take a pack, and lookout for a homeless you can give it to.
Do you have a neighbour that you know is struggling? You can help out by dropping food vouchers into their letter-boxes.
There is always an opportunity for kindness, look for it.
“How would your life be different if…You stopped making negative judgmental assumptions about people you encounter? Let today be the day…You look for the good in everyone you meet and respect their journey.” Steve Maraboli.
Kindness Impacts On Our Mental Health
There are various studies that indicate that kindness positively impact on our mental health. We feel loved and valued if someone shows us kindness and this makes us happy as well. Hence it releases the love hormone, that is kind to our brain.
And to us as well, it reduces our stress and gives us the feeling of being useful as a member of society. | https://medium.com/spiritual-secrets/the-random-act-of-kindness-73edb8c3e564 | ['Lanu Pitan'] | 2020-10-25 15:22:53.176000+00:00 | ['Kindness', 'Spirituality', 'Life Lessons', 'Wellbeing', 'Spiritual Secrets'] |
Social Impact Bonds: complexity wrapped in conformity | Last week I attended the Social Outcomes Conference hosted by the Government Outcomes Lab at the Blavatnik School of Government. It was a fascinating event, that aimed to provide “an in-depth exploration of the practice and evidence base around the implementation of outcomes-based models of public service provision from across the world”.
I was speaking on a panel which asked whether we’ve become “overly fixated” on social impact bonds (SIBs). Given that 21 of the 23 sessions over the two-day event were explicitly about SIBs it would appear the answer is a definitive “yes”.
I’ve long been interested in SIBs, and have written about some of their internal contradictions before, but have not been close to the SIB community in recent years. Returning to the debate again last week I was surprised to see how many of the old questions around risk transfer, outcomes measurement and pricing remain largely unresolved nearly a decade after the first SIB was developed. But perhaps that’s to be expected given the technical complexities of SIBs — something we’ve known all along.
What has changed over the past 10 years is the way policymakers think about outcomes. Previously, taking the cue from New Public Management, outcomes were generally viewed as part of a neat linear sequence with inputs at one end and impact at the other. Line everything up, turn the handle, and you’ll produce outcomes like sausages from a sausage machine.
This handy graphic, courtesy of the Government Outcomes Lab, sums it up.
The inner workings of the impact sausage machine
But now many people are challenging this deterministic logic. Isn’t it the case, they argue, that this is a very poor representation of the messy reality of the real world? Rather than imagining that we can measure and control everything we should instead view the world as a complex system.
Using this framing, outcomes are emergent properties of that complex system and trying to “manage” or “deliver” those outcomes makes as much sense as managing the patterns of birds in flight.
At this point, many SIB proponents are happy to agree. It is exactly because the world is complex that commissioners shouldn’t meddle around specifying activities. Rather, outcomes-based approaches incentivise providers to innovate. This ensures that those with the best information (the providers and those they work with) are freed up to achieve the very best results. So SIBs have complexity thinking at their heart.
But this complexity is wrapped in conformity because SIBs also demand that the outcomes by which success is judged must be measurable, attributable and priceable. It is this aspect which renders SIBs ultimately a mechanistic, deterministic tool rather than one that is truly based on the insights of complexity.
So SIBs simultaneously both embrace and reject a complex view of the world and it is this inherent inconsistency, I believe, that makes them fatally flawed. No matter how you design them, at some point, the top-down, linear logic of outcomes-based payments has to meet the bottom-up, emergent reality of the world. And reality always wins.
One response to this challenge is to invest increasing amounts of time, energy and intelligence attempting to design ever-better metrics and mechanisms. I’m afraid these costly efforts are doomed to fail, as the complexity remains regardless. Another response is to point out that at least SIBs are better than the bad old days when contracts specified activities. While this may be true, it is a particularly unsatisfying answer. Can’t we find a better way?
The most promising ideas shared at the conference “adapted” the SIB model so that it was based less on defined payments for defined outcomes and more on providing a framework within which collaboration and innovation can be fostered. In other words, scaling back the top-down deterministic element sometimes to the point of non-existence. As Scott Kleiman from Harvard’s Government Performance Lab (formerly known as the SIB Lab) admitted — when people come asking for help implementing SIBs he usually recommends something else.
While SIBs were never “bonds” in any meaningful sense of the word, once the outcomes payments and equity components are removed I think we can safely drop the quasi-financial nomenclature entirely. Perhaps a new label such as social impact partnerships (SIPs) would make more sense — or put more simply — collaborative working.
Call me old-fashioned, but the best way of financing these would be through grants, where the performance conversation is just that, a conversation about performance, rather than a spreadsheet, and it is assumed that those involved are intrinsically motivated to make the world a better place. There is already a good deal of thinking on models like this and examples of how they can work in practice. See, for example, Dr Toby Lowe’s work on commissioning in complexity.
My suggestion is that at the Social Outcomes Conference 2020 we dedicate two sessions to SIBs as an interesting, but largely historical detour, and spend the remaining 21 exploring how we can achieve better outcomes in a complex world. | https://medium.com/centre-for-public-impact/social-impact-bonds-complexity-wrapped-in-conformity-c3e815dd0ed7 | ['Adrian Brown'] | 2019-09-10 20:10:04.849000+00:00 | ['Outcome Based Contract', 'Outcomes Measurement', 'Impact Investing', 'Our Vision For Government', 'Commissioning'] |
Rust for NDK development | The following are examples to render Fractal images in Android bitmap with Rust.
In order to do Android development, we’ll need to set up our Android environment. First, we need to install Android Studio. Once Android Studio is installed, we’ll need to install the NDK (Native Development Kit).
First, create a new Kotlin Android Project for your application
Open Android Studio and click Start a new Android Studio project on the welcome screen or File | New | New project.
Select an activity that defines the behavior of your application. For your first “Hello world” application, select Empty Activity that just shows a screen, and click Next.
Build and Run project
Open Android Studio. From the toolbar, go to Android Studio > Preferences > Appearance & Behaviour > Android SDK > SDK Tools. Check the following options for installation and click OK.
* Android SDK Tools
* NDK
* CMake
* LLDB
Once the NDK and associated tools have been installed, we need to set a few environment variables, first for the SDK path and the second for the NDK path. Set the following env vars
export ANDROID_HOME=/Users/$USER/Library/Android/sdk
export NDK_HOME=$ANDROID_HOME/ndk-bundle
If you do not already have Rust installed, we need to do this now. For this, we will be using rustup. rustup installs Rust from the official release channels and enables you to easily switch between different release versions. It will be useful to you for all your future Rust development, not just here. rustup can also be used in conjunction with HomeBrew.
curl https://sh.rustup.rs -sSf | sh
Create rust project
cargo new rust-lib && cd rust-lib
The next step is to create standalone versions of the NDK for us to compile against. We need to do this for each of the architectures we want to compile against. We will be using the make_standalone_toolchain.py script inside the main Android NDK in order to do this Now let’s create our standalone NDKs. There is no need to be inside the NDK directory once you have created it to do this.
mkdir NDK && cd NDK
${NDK_HOME}/build/tools/make_standalone_toolchain.py --api 26 --arch arm64 --install-dir arm64
${NDK_HOME}/build/tools/make_standalone_toolchain.py --api 26 --arch arm --install-dir arm
${NDK_HOME}/build/tools/make_standalone_toolchain.py --api 26 --arch x86 --install-dir x86
Create a new file, cargo-config.toml This file will tell cargo where to look for the NDKs during cross-compilation. Add the following content to the file, remembering to replace instances of <project path> with the path to your project directory.
[target.aarch64-linux-android]
ar = "<project path>/rust-lib/NDK/arm64/bin/aarch64-linux-android-ar"
linker = "<project path>/greetings/NDK/arm64/bin/aarch64-linux-android-clang" [target.armv7-linux-androideabi]
ar = "<project path>/rust-lib/NDK/arm/bin/arm-linux-androideabi-ar"
linker = "<project path>/greetings/NDK/arm/bin/arm-linux-androideabi-clang" [target.i686-linux-android]
ar = "<project path>rust-lib/rust-lib/NDK/x86/bin/i686-linux-android-ar"
linker = "<project path>/greetings/NDK/x86/bin/i686-linux-android-clang"
In order for cargo to see our new SDK’s we need to copy this config file to our .cargo directory like this:
cp cargo-config.toml ~/.cargo/config
Let’s go ahead and add our newly created Android architectures to rustup so we can use them during cross-compilation:
rustup target add aarch64-linux-android armv7-linux-androideabi i686-linux-android
Open rust-lib/Cargo.toml and modify the config.
[dependencies]
[target.'cfg(target_os="android")'.dependencies]
jni = { version = "0.5", default-features = false } [lib]
name = "rust"
crate-type = ["dylib"]
Open rust-lib/src/lib.rs . At the bottom of the file add the following code:
/// Expose the JNI interface for android below
#[cfg(target_os = "android")]
#[allow(non_snake_case)]
pub mod android {
extern crate jni; use super::*;
use self::jni::JNIEnv;
use self::jni::objects::{JString, JClass};
use self::jni::sys::jstring;
use std::ffi::CString; #[no_mangle]
pub unsafe extern fn Java_com_example_myktapp_MainActivity_greeting(env: JNIEnv, _: JClass) -> jstring {
let world_ptr = CString::new("Hello world from Rust world").unwrap();
let output = env.new_string(world_ptr.to_str().unwrap()).expect("Couldn't create java string!");
output.into_inner()
}
}
Build library for Android x86 (Simulator)
cargo build --target i686-linux-android --release
Link dynamic library to Android project
cd app/src/main
ln -s <project_path>/rust-lib/target/i686-linux-android/release/librust.so jniLibs/x86/librust.so
Edit layout activity_main.xml to add id for TextView
<TextView
android:id="@+id/txtHello"
android:layout_width="wrap_content"
android:layout_height="wrap_content"
android:text="Hello World!"
app:layout_constraintBottom_toBottomOf="parent"
app:layout_constraintLeft_toLeftOf="parent"
app:layout_constraintRight_toRightOf="parent"
app:layout_constraintTop_toTopOf="parent" />
In MainActivity.kt file, add the following code. Here we are defining the native interface to our Rust. The greeting the method simply makes a call to that native function Java_com_example_myktapp_MainActivity_greeting
private external fun greeting(): String
We need to call the function to get a message from Rust and load our Rust library
class MainActivity : AppCompatActivity() { private external fun greeting(): String override fun onCreate(savedInstanceState: Bundle?) {
super.onCreate(savedInstanceState)
setContentView(R.layout.activity_main)
val textView: TextView = findViewById(R.id.txtHello)
textView.text = greeting()
} companion object {
init {
System.loadLibrary("rust")
}
} }
Build and run the project again
Edit layout main_activity.xml to add BitmapView
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<androidx.constraintlayout.widget.ConstraintLayout xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
xmlns:app="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res-auto"
xmlns:tools="http://schemas.android.com/tools"
android:layout_width="match_parent"
android:layout_height="match_parent"
tools:context=".MainActivity"> <ImageView
android:id="@+id/imageView"
android:layout_width="match_parent"
android:layout_height="match_parent"
app:layout_constraintBottom_toBottomOf="parent"
app:layout_constraintLeft_toLeftOf="parent"
app:layout_constraintRight_toRightOf="parent"
app:layout_constraintTop_toTopOf="parent" /> </androidx.constraintlayout.widget.ConstraintLayout>
In MainActivity.kt file, add the following code. Here we are defining the native interface to our Rust. The renderFractal method simply makes a call to that native function and create new Bitmap that will be modified by the native function
package com.example.myktapp import android.graphics.Bitmap
import android.os.Bundle
import android.widget.ImageView
import androidx.appcompat.app.AppCompatActivity class MainActivity : AppCompatActivity() { private external fun renderFractal(bitmap: Bitmap) override fun onCreate(savedInstanceState: Bundle?) {
super.onCreate(savedInstanceState)
setContentView(R.layout.activity_main)
val bitmap = Bitmap.createBitmap(800, 800, Bitmap.Config.ARGB_8888)
renderFractal(bitmap)
val imageView: ImageView = findViewById(R.id.imageView)
imageView.setImageBitmap(bitmap)
} companion object {
init {
System.loadLibrary("rust")
}
} } }
Open rust-lib/Cargo.toml and add image and num-complex crate to dependencies
[dependencies]
[target.'cfg(target_os="android")'.dependencies]
jni = { version = "0.5", default-features = false }
image = "0.22.0"
num-complex = "0.2"
Open rust-lib/lib.rs and add the following code inside android mod, graphic module just a Rust port of NDK C++ Bitmap header, you can find the code for fractal::render on fractal.rs
#[no_mangle]
pub unsafe extern fn Java_com_example_myktapp_MainActivity_renderFractal(env: JNIEnv, _: JClass, bmp: JObject) {
let mut info = graphic::AndroidBitmapInfo::new();
let raw_env = env.get_native_interface(); let bmp = bmp.into_inner(); // Read bitmap info
graphic::bitmap_get_info(raw_env, bmp, &mut info);
let mut pixels = 0 as *mut c_void; // Lock pixel for draw
graphic::bitmap_lock_pixels(raw_env, bmp, &mut pixels); let pixels =
std::slice::from_raw_parts_mut(pixels as *mut u8, (info.stride * info.height) as usize); fractal::render(pixels, info.width as u32, info.height as u32);
graphic::bitmap_unlock_pixels(raw_env, bmp);
}
Build and run the project again
Find the code | https://medium.com/geekculture/the-following-are-examples-to-render-fractal-images-in-android-bitmap-with-rust-22a9fb5d648b | ['Hoang Phan'] | 2021-07-14 14:20:29.528000+00:00 | ['Android Development', 'Ndk', 'Rust'] |
What is Blockchain Technology? How does it Work? | Pixabay
The hype around cryptocurrency makes it a necessity to be aware of this term. Also Known as distributed ledger technology, Blockchain technology in simpler words is a secure way to share data with people you don’t trust.
Information shared on a blockchain is not stored at a single but multiple places at the same time which means that the data stored is public and thus, accessible to everyone on the internet. There is no centralized version of this information that is prone to get hacked as the data is hosted by millions of devices at simultaneously.
What Makes Blockchains Secure?
Blockchain — A peer to peer network was introduced in October 2008. The Bitcoin application which introduced a virtual currency system is entirely a product of Blockchain technology.
The question that now arises is what makes Blockchains secure? There are two aspects to this :
- “Node” Network :
A node can be any device such as a laptop, computer, or phone. It should be active and have an IP address. Nodes play a major role in the process as they support the network by keeping a copy of the blockchain which automatically gets downloaded upon joining the blockchain network.
A cryptographic fingerprint works as a seal as it is unique to each block which makes sure that the device is registered. The nodes also agree on consensual history sharing. This helps in making the blockchains tamperproof.
- Decentralization vs Centralization :
Evident from the term, Decentralization here refers to the hosting of Blockchain network on milions of laptops, tablets, or phones referred as “nodes”.
Decentralized network is relatively more secure as opposed to the centralized one. The latter is prone to hacking as all of the data is stored on one device. A higher security is thus ensured with the usage of a decentralized network.
Is it as secure as it looks?
No matter how secure a Blockchain protocol appears to be, hackers can always break into the most protected ones. Even if the developers use tried and tested methods to keep Blockchains secure, it is easy to put the data in manners that are not secure.
Nodes on the blockchain network must be continuously communicating in order to process a comparison of data. If an attacker gets hold of a node’s communications, he may fool it into accepting fake transactions.
The cryptocurrency hacks and tricks give a clear estimate of how secure the blockchain network really is.
Who are the users of Blockchain Network?
Healthcare, Shipping, Energy, Blockchains are in trend as they are being put to use im several industries. At present, Blockchain networks are widely used in Financial Services Technology.
According to the World Bank’s report over $430 billion US in money transfers were sent in 2015. Blockchain developers are also in high demand as per the reports.
The most common GUI devised for blockchains are wallet applications, which people use to buy things with Bitcoin and store it along with other cryptocurrencies.
Public vs Private Blockchains :
Public blockchains allow everyone to send or see transactions as long they are a part of consensus process. Public Blockchains are the ones that require computer processing power in order to confirm transactions. This process is known as Mining.
Private blockchains on the other hand restrict the ability to make edits to a disctributed ledger to only a defined number of organizations or a group of employees. No one party can make edits or delete any blocks without the consensus from other devices on the network.
Blockchain Technology : A Boon for the Sharing Economy
Companies like Amazon , Flipkart, Paytm provide Amazon Coupons, paytm cashback offer, deals and Offers during amazon great Indian festival sale and flipkart big billion day offers list. There are also a lot of buyers and sellers. The need of a sharing network that balances the demand and supply graph was fulfilled with this technology.
Peer-to-peer secure payments are facilitated only through Blockchain technology and therefore the sharing economy is indeed a success! | https://medium.com/hackernoon/what-is-blockchain-technology-how-does-it-work-cd843e611497 | ['Hardik Patel'] | 2018-09-17 05:31:05.141000+00:00 | ['Centralization', 'Bitcoin', 'Decentralization', 'Blockchain Technology', 'Blockchain'] |
Newborns: Master the Chaos | When my son Kiaan was able to sit upright and support himself (6 months old) I felt the BIGGEST RELIEF. I thought to myself, “uhh HUGE WIN because I can finally get back to toning my arms.” Moms, I know I’m not the only one who feels like my biceps got Arnold Schwarzenegger jacked after carrying a baby around all day. Rest assured, it gets better after they start crawling. More importantly, I was excited for Kiaan to be more alert and interactive.
0–6 months was one hell of a roller-coaster. The highs felt incredibly comforting, like a cup of hot chocolate on a snowy cold day. But the lows really made me want to pull out my hair, curl up in bed and hide from it all. The lows are what made me realize how valuable it is to know that every mom goes through this. And how encouraging it is to hear stories that made me feel like everything is going to be all right.
The first few months seem like a blur, they flew by in diaper changing, nursing, learning all the different things about breast milk, decoding cries, sterilizing bottles, and all the things in between. Not only was I getting in sync with my baby to understand his needs, but I was also figuring out and making sense of the changes I was going through as a new mom. In those first 3 months, I don’t even think my son needed entertainment beyond feeding and pooping every 2 hours. But once things settled…THEN WHAT?
At some point you will master the chaos, you’ll start to realize there is time in the day to actually hang out with your baby. I felt like there wasn’t enough out there to tell you what to do with young babies! Here are some fun and interactive things I did:
Read books:
Try some touch and feel books, pop-up books, and pick up books your baby knows the song too. Here are some of Kiaan’s favorites:
Little Blue Truck by Alice Schertle
Llama Llama Hoppity-hop by Anna Dewdney
Alpha block by Christopher Franceschelli
Five Little Monkeys Jumping on the bed by Eileen Christelow
Around the farm by Eric Carle
Brown bear brown bear what do you see by Eric Carle
Follow me 123 by Igloo books
Follow me ABC by Igloo books
The itsy bitsy spider by igloo books
Everything is Mama by Jimmy Falon
Your baby’s first words will be Dada by Jimmy Falon
Fuzzy Yellow Ducklings by Matthew Van Fleet
The adventures of little Nutbrown hare by Sam McBratney
Talk!!!
I found myself talking out loud all day, often to the point where I thought I was losing all my shits. I swear, there were days where I was at the door like a lost puppy waiting for my husband to come home so I could finally speak to another adult! BUT, know your baby is listening to you and picking up on your words and sounds. Your voice is one your baby recognizes and it really does soothe and calm him. Pro Tip: try speaking to them in different languages — It keeps things a little more interesting when you’re talking to yourself all day.
Music/sing to them:
We used Spotify play lists — Overall singing became a really fun activity we did together.
Instrumental nursery music (early on, calmed Kiaan and helped put him to sleep)
Nursery rhymes (made him smile and clap)
Bollywood music (got Kiaan to kick and dance)
Prayers (soothing)
Dance together:
Sometimes you just need to boogie and bring beats and fun moves for lots of giggles and claps. This must be where Kiaan’s love for “Bongo Butts” began. Dancing and jumping around with him always brought positive energy and excitement that continuously lifts our moods.
Tummy time:
Tummy time works muscles in the neck and shoulder to make them stronger and prepare your baby to sit up, crawl, stand, and walk.
We used the boppy pillow for Kiaan, but to change things up, tummy time water mats can be a really fun alternative. They’re visually enticing with lots of color and can boost strengthening the core. Also, the floating water animals are fun for the little ones to track as the animals move around with you. DM or comment if anyone has tried the water mats — I would love to know your thoughts!
Play peek-a-boo:
You will see gradually they start to pick up on what this game is all about and their reaction is so cute!
Bubble time:
Early on, Kiaan tried eating, poking, popping and holding bubbles and as he grew a little older he tried chasing and catching bubbles by crawling and standing.
Play dates:
NO, I don’t only mean for your baby! Set plays dates for yourself WITHOUT your baby too. You need YOU time!
You may think what’s the point of all these play dates if my baby isn’t engaging or interacting with others? BUT, play dates are important for 3 main reasons: babies learn how to share their mom (which they aren’t used to), learn how to mix with others, and since all babies are different and advance in different areas — this gives your baby motivation/incentive.
Toys:
I had lots of lists of toys from various people but none that would clearly just tell me which ones to use for my really young infant. I found flash cards (foam ones), teething toys (Zoli chubby gummy teethers and silicone elephant teethers), and rattles, mobiles over the crib, and activity gyms to be the most useful for that 0–6 month period.
There are so many different things you can do with your infant early on. I touched on a few of my favorites, but for those of you looking for more, DM me and I would love to share! Also, comment below if you have other fun and interactive ideas! I would love to hear and learn from your own personal experiences. Remember, all these moments are truly amazing with your little ones, but the day they sit up and wobble around take that as a sign that life gets easier! | https://medium.com/@pooja_93210/newborns-master-the-chaos-96826ef1be88 | ['Pooja Mehta'] | 2020-06-14 16:51:57.951000+00:00 | ['Baby Activities', 'Baby', 'Motherhood', 'Newborns', 'Mom'] |
Spirit | Misguided
warriors of the light,
caught
between love and fear
in a spiritual garden
where things have long since
ceased to grow.
Difficult to tend to a garden though,
when you do not even know
it is there. | https://medium.com/a-cornered-gurl/spirit-d7bed30e0ef7 | ['Adam Millett'] | 2020-10-26 10:28:06.689000+00:00 | ['Hope', 'Society', 'Poetry', 'A Cornered Gurl', 'Spirituality'] |
Scammers Never Sleep! How to Safely Contribute | Scammers are modern pirates and create trouble for all ICOs! Unfortunately, it’s very difficult to deal with scammers because of the anonymity of the cryptoworld participants and the resourcefulness of scam-schemes.
There are scammers who try to attract investors’ money. They come up with an alleged project (however, the truth is, their plans end there and there’s no doubt the project will be implemented), they create a website, WP, find fake advisers, collect money and disappear. About how not to fall for their bait, Therefore, we wrote the article Tips for contribitors, which described in detail about the important aspects novice ITO contributors should observe.
Another kind of fraudulent threat is hacking, when investors’ money is stolen during the real ICO from the purses of the project and/or investors.
Each project before and during the ICO/ITO warns its contributors about security measures, but scammers can be very smart and resourceful, and come up with more and more ways to steal money. The Ubcoin team is diligent in securing the money of its contributors. We created this article to inform you how to safely contribute.
1 — Hacking wallets and exchanges — the most dangerous and devastating kind of scam. Quite recently, on April 24, 2018, the leader among the electronic purses MyEtherWallet was forced to announce the phishing crack of its DNS servers. (https://twitter.com/myetherwallet/status/988818214950858754). Сompany representatives told that several DNS servers, replaced by hackers, redirected users to a phishing site where the funds from their wallets disappeared after inputting the personal key. As a precaution against scam, MyEtherWallet recommended its customers run an offline copy of their wallet, make sure they have a MyEtherWallet SSL certificate and use hardware wallets. Subsequently, MEW said that only users of the DNS server Google Public were hacked. “We strongly recommend switching to Cloudfare.” — MEW also posted on Twitter.
By the way, this is not the first attempt on MEW. In December 2017 a paid application MyEtherWallet appeared in the AppStore and for a week it was included in the top 10 financial applications. However, Team MEW said that this fake application has no relation or connection with them!
Repetitive hacking of exchanges is the same type of scam. Starting with Mt. Gox in 2014, hackers regularly try (and they sometimes get it) to steal tokens from different exchanges, finding a weak spot in each of them. In January 2018 from accounts in Coincheck 500 million NEM (about $ 400 million) were lost. Scammers can potentially do this to wallets connected to the Internet. This was exactly the mistake of Coincheck, who did not transfer the clients’ coins to “cold” offline wallets.
A few words need to be said about hardware wallets. These offline stores allow you to keep private keys without access to the Internet, which reduces the possibility of hacking them, even on unprotected computers. For better security, you can make a backup copy of your keys and store them in a safe place in case of a breakdown of the computer and other unforeseen situations.
2 — Hacking the site during the ICO and replacing the real wallet of the project with a fake one. Unlike the first case, money is lost by the ICO project and its investors.
Usually the scammers wait for the moment X (the beginning of the fundraising of ETHs), break the site, change the address of the wallet and wait until the project team notices it, hoping to pump out as much as possible of the investors’ funds. There are many such examples, and often these ICOs end in failure. Although, there are exceptions.
Quite an ordinary story occurred in July 2017 during the ICO with CoinDash, when the hacker changed the address and stole 37,000 ETH. Miracles began in a couple of months on September 19, 2017, when the CoinDash wallet received 10,000 ETH from the unknown addressee, and on February 23, 2018 another 20,000 ETH. The irony was that the rate of ETH since the ICO CoinDash grew more than 2 times and the scammer returned an amount much more than he abducted! We can call him Crypto Robin Hood, but unfortunately, there are no other stories about a scam with a happy ending known to the Ubcoin team!
After ICO, The DAO, one of the largest projects, raised $ 150 million. (https://blog.ethereum.org/2014/05/06/daos-dacs-das-and-more-an-incomplete-terminology-guide/) Scammers stole about $ 50 million in Ethereum, taking advantage of the vulnerability in the code of The DAO. Developers of crypto currency, incl. Vitaliy Buterin, took a complex and controversial decision that split Ethereum into 2 competing currencies (Ethereum Classic and Ethereum) and made a hard fork of the blockchain to return the funds to the rightful owners. This event brought serious reputational losses to the creator of Ethereum and the currency as a whole. For today Ethereum capitalization is growing and is on the 2nd place right after Bitcoin (https://ttrcoin.com/coins/), but taking into account all these disagreements and imperfections of the code, the team needs to constantly work with Ethereum, so that competitors do not get ahead.
3 — Hunting for potential ICO investors in social messengers. Another type of scam is attempts to lure participants from official project groups into fake ones.Scammers often lure interested persons to join their phishing sites. Scammers pose as “sheriffs” and “administrators”, send personal messages about the old chat being broken or dangerous and suggests switching to a new, safer one. They can send personal message numbers of purses and assure that this is the right wallet for investment. They can offer additional bonuses (additional discounts with ICO or coins), if the investor will follow the link sent by the “sheriff”. Another option is test access to the program or a personal profile for a new investor also with bonuses or additional information about the course of the ICO. If the user follows this link under any of the prepositions — see point 1!
Ubcoin team reminds its contributors and members of the group in Telegram that we NEVER write or ask for personal information, all information is laid out for everyone on our website and in the official groups in social messengers. If you got a message from “admin”- check whether he is really an admin in the Telegram chat and ask your real admins about the chat. A little time spent on these simple actions can save your money from scammers!
4 — Clones of the site with the replacement of 1–2 symbols in the address line. This is an easy way for a scammer to catch unsuspecting people, unfortunately, often quite effectives. Usually this method is used with contextual advertising, which sends users to the fake ICO site, and because of the similar interface and the inconspicuous difference in the spelling of the address, a person quietly enters their data, keys and transfers funds. Here, only constant vigilance and computer security alerts about entering an unconfirmed site can help.
The Ubcoin team (https://ubcoin.io/) has repeatedly tracked and continues to track the scammers hiding on clone sites that are different from the present one. Below is a list of phishing sites that contributors need to beware aware of:
⛔ Ubcoin .be
⛔ Ubcoin .nl
⛔ Ubcoinmarket .cf
⛔ Ubcoinmarket .gq
⛔ Ubcoin .be
⛔ Ubcio .nl
⛔ Ubcico .nl
⛔ Ubcoinmarket .ga
⛔ Ubcoin .ga
⛔ Ubcoin .ml
⛔ Ubcoin .me
⛔ Ubclibe .com
⛔ Ubcoin .in
⛔ Ubcoim .io
These are our official sites, which solely belong to the Ubcoin team:
✅ REAL — Ubcoin.io !
✅ REAL — official Ubcoin Chinese websites: ubcoin.asia, ubco.in, ub-coin.online
We track fraudsters and suppress their attempts, but we advise our contributors to pay close attention to the site and arm their computers with additional protection. We hope that we were able to give you valuable advice and save your crypto money! Be careful and do not succumb to the scammers’ tricks!
Ubcoin token sale continues, the stage 4 discount is 13% — you can buy tokens on https://ubcoin.io | https://medium.com/ubcoin-blog/scammers-never-sleep-how-to-safely-contribute-752908c691f | ['Ubcoin. Cryptocurrency Reimagined'] | 2018-09-24 17:07:53.967000+00:00 | ['Ubcoin', 'Blockchain', 'Ethereum', 'Ubcoin Media', 'Bitcoin'] |
The Little Girl From Ashgabat | The Little Girl From Ashgabat
I come from a lineage of pastoral Turkmen nomads that lived throughout much of Central Asia, spanning to the west as far as the Balkans and as far east as Xinjiang. In constant movement and flow with the seasons and the needs of their livestock, my ancestors lived in this way until the late 19th century when they were conquered by the Russian Empire. It took over a hundred years for us Turkmens to regain independence after that. And when we did, in 1991, the country grappled with its newfound freedom and its identity in a world that no longer felt equipped for the old nomadic traditions and tribal ways of its people.
With the fall of the Soviet Union, the country struggled with birthing itself anew — alphabets were changed, as were holidays, approaches to theater and art, and education. Everything old was dying, and the new was not yet fully formed, and there wasn’t much of any guidance or skill or support for it. We were, effectively, untethered from the old, drifting off in space, in a sort of purgatory, waiting for a new assignment, not knowing which way or when or how.
What grounded us and got us through is the deeply rooted nature of our culture and traditions. Even with the standardization and homogenization that came with the Soviets, Turkmen traditions remained very much a part of daily life, although they were certainly a lot more muted, and with a lot less fanfare in their expression. And so, as we moved through the uncharted territories of our period of transition, we emphatically returned to even more of our old ways.
Note: Turkmen culture is very tribal. And largely paternal. Everyone has a role they play for community life to function in congruency. Even our language makes clear the bonds of the familial structures. The words for paternal uncle and aunt are synonymous with father {kaka} and mother {eje}, for example. It’s an implied cultural agreement that says: If you follow the rules of the tribe, you will always belong. You will always be taken care of. As a result, even through much social upheaval in the last thirty years, you seldom find people who are homeless, or elderly that are not living with their children, cared for till their last breath. The young and the old, everyone is accounted for, in one way or another.
Looking back, I am glad I was too young to feel the effects that my parents must have felt: Suddenly at a loss, not knowing who they were anymore, how to care for their nine children, how to survive the shift. Thirty years later, we are still at odds with who we are, and continue to discover what it means to be a Turkmen in this globalized world. And for every Turkmen, no matter where in the world we find ourselves today, the question of identity and the struggle with feeling like impostors is a common thread.
As with all experiences of chaos and disruption, there exists, hand-in-hand, a well of opportunities for change and growth and redirection. And so, with the newfound independence also arrived a slew of new connections with the international world. Suddenly, after being silenced for a century, we Turkmens had a voice at the global table. A space to call our own. My mother, who was at the time a Professor of English at the State University suddenly became widely sought out thanks to her language skills. Our small second floor walk-up apartment, which had — thanks to my dad’s persistence fueled by his fear that we were becoming too “Russianized” — previously strictly been a space for us to speak Turkmen, suddenly was filled with the sounds of my mother translating into many foreign languages. For foreign dignitaries, adventurous travelers, scholars, anthropologists, activists, and many more.
In the midst of this period of transition, many of my generation chose to fly the coop and explore the world that had suddenly opened up to us. Most often, our choice to leave stemmed from our desire for better educational opportunities as the infrastructure in our country was unstable and unable to support our budding and curious minds. I too was a part of that academic exodus.
I first came to the United States as a fourteen-year-old, in the summer of 2000, thanks to a State Department cultural exchange scholarship. At first, it felt like what I imagined Disney World to be. I had never before witnessed so much abundance. So many choices. So much freedom. And yet, in spite of this, or maybe because of it, within a few months, I started breaking out in hives, first all over my face, and then, over my entire body. It was an unexplainable illness. The official diagnosis: My body was reacting to something in my new environment.
It’s taken me almost twenty years of living in the United States to deeply understand that my mysterious illness was a reflection of the underlying emotional and mental stress my system was enduring in a land of new. In choosing to leave my home and my tribe, I had exchanged security and a sense of safety for adventure and growth. I had left the only place in the world where I inherently belonged to discover a new land where there was in fact no predetermined space for someone like me. From a psychosomatic perspective, the newness and strangeness of it all was too much, too soon, too fast — the very definition of our bodies’ experience of trauma.
Along with the too-much-newness, the sense that I was different from the Americans I was meeting coupled with a strong desire to belong, added another layer of tension to my struggles. Hello impostor syndrome. What made it even more difficult is the fact that every person I met had never met a Turkmen before. I was the first. That weighed heavily on every action I took. I wanted to do us right, to not show Turkmens in a bad light, to honor my heritage. But that is one tall order, even if you have it all figured out. Which I didn’t.
In my eager attempt to fit in and belong, I lost pieces of myself. I became things that I was not. I didn’t speak up when I should have. I chose to keep the peace when the ignorance of others left me feeling unseen and misunderstood. I laughed at culturally insensitive jokes, hoping that no one noticed that they were actually damaging to me as an immigrant. I continued to work on my English and beat myself up when I would mispronounce a word and others would finally notice that I wasn’t from around here. I found myself highlighting only the Instagram-worthy aspects of being a Turkmen and staying quiet about the pieces that were hard. I tried on various identities to make it easier for my Western friends to ‘get’ me as it was often easier for them to just believe I was Russian because I was born in the Soviet Union, or Turkish because my roots were Turkic and my native tongue very similar to Turkish. In fact, when I officially became a U.S permanent resident, to my dismay, the U.S. government listed Turkey as my place of birth on my official documents even though Turkey is nowhere geographically close to Turkmenistan (we border with Iran, Afghanistan, Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan). It was another reminder that there was no place for a Turkmen like me, that the world hadn’t yet quite caught up to our existence.
To put it shortly, I pretzeled myself, desperate to fit into the only space I thought I was allowed to occupy on this land amongst these people. It wasn’t enough that my English was great, or that my son was born here, or that I voted in the election. I had to become an American for me to earn my spot at the table, for me to finally belong. I found myself following a well-memorized script, meant to educate but also keep at bay those Americans that feigned interest in my Turkmen roots. Just enough to feed their curiosity without going overboard and overwhelming them with my Turkmen-ness. And in this process of making myself into what I thought I needed to be to fit in, I lost touch with the process of becoming a Turkmen living in the West. In my enthusiasm to fit into my new home, to create a space for me, I lost touch with my own truth, my own voice, my own identity.
What made things even more complicated was that upon my many visits to Turkmenistan, I found that I no longer belonged there either. I was too American for my family and friends. I was chastised and shamed for the clothes I wore, the ideologies I carried, and my apparent inability to be a true Turkmen like the rest of them. While I had gotten used to feeling like an impostor in the United States, I did not expect the exacerbation of this experience in my own homeland. I no longer had the same ‘back-up’ and reinforcement from my family. I was no longer a part of the tribe. I was an outsider to them as well.
These repeated experiences of not belonging helped me recognize that the sense of belonging I was so desperate to find outside in the great big world was an illusion. That as long as I felt like I didn’t belong, the harder I tried to fit in, the more I molded myself into what I thought I needed to be, the further I went from my center, from my truth, from my voice. These realizations invited me to finally go inward on a journey of discovering a sense of belonging within myself, of creating space for me in my heart, and of feeling at home in my bones, no matter the outer environment.
Next year will mark twenty years of living in the United States as a first-generation Turkmen immigrant. And even now, after having spent more than half of my life here, I am still discovering what it means for me to have a space of my own in this country. What it means to speak louder, to not be afraid of being heard, and to intentionally amplify my voice and my story and my thoughts. Having been a writer at heart my entire life, I feel I am finally ready to share my stories with the world, to express my truth, to raise my unheard voice, and to make a little space just for me, the little girl from Ashgabat. | https://medium.com/@aynameredova/the-little-girl-from-ashgabat-517f534ddec1 | ['Ayna Meredova'] | 2021-08-24 19:01:52.992000+00:00 | ['Immigrants', 'Türkmen', 'Mwc Space', 'Immigrant Stories', 'Turkmenistan'] |
Announcing: Perineum Sunning Workshop | Announcing: Perineum Sunning Workshop
Coming soon to your area
Photo by Waranya Mooldee on Unsplash
Look, bunnies have been sunbathing their derrieres for ages, long before this latest wellness trend they are calling perineum sunning.
Apparently, wellness fanatics on Instagram have made quite a splash posting shots of them naked with their asses exposed to the sun, claiming that this is some new trick that will help their health.
I can tell you, it does feel good to lie on your back and point your bottom up to the sun. It sort of hypnotizes us bunnies.
But let's not pretend we do it because we’re spiritual or organic or hippies or anything important. We do it for the same reason we eat our own poop — because it feels good.
If it feels good do it, that is a bunny’s motto.
That’s why we try to spend most of our time having sex because everyone knows that is the once activity that makes you feel really, really good.
But if you can’t have sex, letting the sun shine up your ass is a close second.
So sign up for the weekend workshop in ass sunbathing that is coming to your area. I will be leading it. I know, I’m a bunny. But I can talk and if the microphone is not up too high, you will be able to hear me and understand everything I say.
I’ve also made some powerpoint slides about different positions that you can take to get the sun up your bum.
Some of the positions are face down. Some of them are face up. Some are sideways. There are so many different ways to expose your rear to the sun.
So come to my workshop. Lets moon the sun together! | https://medium.com/down-in-the-dingle/announcing-perineum-sunning-workshop-3f84eecb4199 | ['Simon Black'] | 2019-11-28 03:13:25.641000+00:00 | ['Humor', 'Satire', 'Bunny Blog', 'Funny', 'Wellness'] |
Feature Engineering — Recursive Feature Elimination With Cross-Validation | During the survey and data collection step, we do not know which feature/attribute have a strong influence on the output and the ones which do not have that much effect. Due to this, we collect or measure as many logical attributes as possible in this stage.
The machine learning model becomes complex, and also computationally becomes expensive as the number of features in the training dataset increases.
The aim is to develop a trained machine learning model with the minimal required feature and which can predict the data points with acceptable accuracy. We should not oversimplify the model and lose the significant information by pruning important features, and at the same time have a complex model with too many redundant or lesser important features.
Scikit-Learn library provides several methods to simplify the model with the dimensional reduction of the training dataset and minimal impact on the prediction accuracy of the machine learning model.
In this article, I will discuss recursive feature elimination and cross-validated selection to identify the optimal independent variables and reduce the dimension of the training dataset. | https://towardsdatascience.com/feature-engineering-recursive-feature-elimination-with-cross-validation-745d594df730 | ['Kaushik Choudhury'] | 2020-09-14 19:27:27.235000+00:00 | ['Programming', 'Machine Learning', 'Python', 'Scikit Learn', 'Data Science'] |
Finding a raw nerve, striking it, and liking it | There is not much to be said about the ‘Innocence of Muslims’ trailer — and the reaction to it in several Muslim-majority countries — that has not already been said. More enlightened commentary has emphasised the right to free speech and expression and framed the violent response as a predominantly local competition for power, to determine the future politics of specific countries or, they hope, of an entire religion. Of course the nuanced analysis is almost by definition reserved to those who bother to think and read about the events of the past few weeks. Others are driven more by gut reaction and you can see the saddening results online, whether it is at Muslims or the West that the hatred and bile is directed.
This blog post is motivated less by the initial volley — the trailer and the embassy riots — and more by the decision this week by French paper Charlie Hebdo to publish cartoons depicting the prophet Muhammed. As most people are now abundantly aware, this is considered blasphemous by many Muslims. So the question again has to be why? Following the killing of Ambassador Chris Stevens, the burning of American flags and the violence perpetrated in the name of outrage, it was relatively easy to uphold the freedom of speech and to point the finger at those responsible for the bloodletting. There is no moral equivalence between uttering nasty things and killing people, or even threatening violence.
Yet with these cartoons now released to stoke the fire, is there a point at which we must be more circumspect about what we say? The editors of Charlie Hebdo clearly disagree; as editor Stephane Charbonnier tells Al Jazeera English, ‘I’m not asking strict Muslims to read Charlie Hebdo, just like I wouldn’t go to a mosque to listen to speeches that go against everything I believe’. It is a smart defense and the publication of the cartoons is in almost all regards difficult to argue against. There are very good reasons for why the West has its freedom of expression and in a global marketplace of ideas and images, many of which will be insulting to someone, we all have to develop a thicker skin.
But at what point does exercising that freedom of expression become analogous to the obnoxious kid who hurls abuse at passers-by from the safety of his parents’ home? We don’t go around calling people fat, ugly or outright deformed, just because we can. We frown upon slurs, both racial and sexist, and hide all sorts of unpleasant realities with euphemisms. Why then should this same society actively seek out the nerve exposed by parts of the Muslim world and strike it again, and again?
Upon reflection, the only group of people who deliberately strikes raw nerves like that are kids engaged in bullying. You know the story: one kid has been designated as the victim and the others probe until they find the one insult that will cause the most harm — the quickest route to a reaction. Once identified, they pounce. The victim lashes out, violently, and the bullies can then claim outrage over the disproportionate reaction to what was after all ‘only playground taunts’.
There is a fairly good article on CNN.com by David Frum entitled ‘Don’t blame the video; defend free speech’. Nothing here should be read as going against that initial reaction and free speech is not the main problem here. But when free speech is used without any responsibility, or simply to provoke, are there not moral reasons for it to be circumscribed, not by the authorities as in totalitarian states, but by ourselves? Is there not a need for some measure of self-control on the part of outlets like Hebdo Charlie and a suitably adult rejection of hate-mongering by the rest of us? Yes, they are only cartoons and the likely violent reaction cannot be tolerated. But if these cartoons are printed precisely because they will be hurtful to others, we have to question not only the motive but also the righteousness of such action — the righteousness of exercising our beloved free speech.
In this case, it is not just a moral case of not engaging in what is in effect cross-border bullying but also a strategic question, as action such as Hebdo Charlie’s goes against exactly what the West is trying to do to alienate and render irrelevant the extremist forces of al-Qaeda and their ilk. When we through our actions validate their argument that ‘Islam is under attack’, we are contributing to their recruitment appeal and proving correct, in the eyes of many, their narrative. Well done…
One reason the provocation goes on is seemingly because we reject the violent reaction and want to prove a point, as if enough abuse will dull the sensitivity and help them ‘get over it’. I can think of few instances where such shock therapy has worked and the propaganda gift we don our enemies through such action outweigh any benefit accrued.
Another reason, more childish, is that ‘they started it’. Fingers are pointed at the violent sermons in mosques, the burning of flags, the rampant antisemitism and bigotry that one often finds in more extreme contexts. ‘Why should we exercise self-control and “respect the other” when we get so little in return?’ This points to the ultimate challenge of the war of ideas that we are currently in. There is a choice: become like the enemy whom you despise, emulate his tactics, or take a step back and show through your actions and words why such hate-mongering, whether it be by an extremist imam or the editor of Charlie-Hebdo, does not belong in our world and society. As Friedrich Nietzsche put it: ‘He who fights with monsters should be careful lest he thereby become a monster. And if thou gaze long into an abyss, the abyss will also gaze into thee’. This is not a matter of rights or entitlements, but of judgement and responsibility. | https://medium.com/kings-of-war/finding-a-raw-nerve-striking-it-and-liking-it-b30a5ad9ea1c | ['David H. Ucko'] | 2017-03-20 15:26:43.050000+00:00 | ['Culture', 'Freedom Of Speech', 'Islam', 'Charlie Hebdo', 'Religion'] |
Industrial Agriculture is Killing Earth | On one of those rare occasions when I get the rule of the TV remote and decide to spend an evening doing something besides writing or reading, I flipped through the Documentaries section of Netflix for something fun to watch. I’m a nerd like that.
It didn’t take me very long to settle on a title that caught my eye: Sustainable. A documentary by Hourglass Films produced in 2016.
The documentary validated a lot of the things I already believe in, but also opened my eyes to many other issues I’d have never even thought of on my own.
Food for thought
Society has come to think of food as a commodity. We’ve stopped wondering — or even caring — where it comes from, just as long as it tastes good and costs as little as possible. We’ve become disconnected.
The film opens up to chef Rick Bayless of the Frontera Grill in Chicago Illinois. He tells the story of how he grew up in the 50s and 60s, in an era when we began to divorce ourselves from our food sources.
He goes on to talk about how he went to Mexico and witnessed the amazing relationships people had with their food and its production. When he came back to the United States, he faced a challenge:
“How am I going to make great food if I don't have any connection to the people who are growing that food?”
Enter: Marty Travis, his wife Chris and son Will, and Spence Farm — ‘small farmers’ in Central Illinois.
This family is amazing. They do things a little differently, and it works!
From their 100 acre farm, they supply more than 200 restaurants in the Chicago area with fresh local — and somethings unique — produce every week, even doing all of the deliveries themselves. He smiles when he says that it’s largely become “less about the turnips and more about the relationships.”
We might have started out with good intentions when we launched ourselves into industrial agriculture — the goal back then, to feed more people in the most economical way. But what we’ve done is take the basic life-sustaining act of eating nutritious foods, and turn it into a money-making machine. The system is broken.
We ravage and plunder
“It’s [soil] the most undervalued yet invaluable resource humanity has.” — David Mongomery, Author — Dirt: The Erosion of Civilization
The most invaluable resource we have, and yet, we treat the soil like dirt.
“We’re exchanging short-term gain for long-term stability, and we want to feed people for thousands of years, not just fifty years.” — Jeff Moyer, The Rodale Institute
The Rodale Institute released a white paper a few years ago. Regenerative Organic Agriculture and Climate Change — A Down-To-Earth Solution to Global Warming. “Regenerative organic agriculture can sequester carbon and reverse climate change.”
The paper talks about how through research, they’ve been able to prove that it’s actually possible to reverse climate change. But we need to act fast, and all together. In fact, it may possibly already be too late, as this white paper is already a few years old.
But it’s my hope and belief that we always have a chance at redemption, just as long as we work together. The world has to be all-in.
I highly recommend reading it — it’s most definitely worth the 10 to 15 minutes of your time. I also recommend the documentary — although it’s been three years since filming, I honestly believe the relevance stands, if even more so today.
At the time of filming, agriculture was the number two culprit in climate change. As of this year, it’s gone down to number four, as the creator of 11.1% of global emissions. We can — and must — do better!
Back to the basics
We need to work together as a species — but even more-so, as communities — to go back to the basics. We need to repair our soil. Mend it from decades of being pillaged and depleted, over-farmed. poisoned and assaulted by untold amounts of chemicals used in an attempt at eliminating weeds and pests.
There are simple and natural ways to give back to the soil we’ve so greedily taken from for so long.
Matt Liebmann, a professor of Agronomy at Iowa State University, says that by simply planting companion crops such as oats and alfalfa, or oats and red clover, in the regular corn and soy rotations, we could reduce our use of mineral nitrogen fertilizer by 90%, and our use of herbicides by more than 95%.
Doing that would not only help the soil but also save farmers thousands of dollars on destructive and deadly chemicals, and by default, give us much cleaner and safer foods to eat.
Sick soil, sick people
The entire world — not only North America, as media would like you to believe — is in the depths of an obesity crisis. It’s no longer just an epidemic.
We are mass-producing foods that aren’t good for us — and the foods that should be good for us are not what they used to be because the soil is so depleted of nutrients, that so is the food that grows in that soil. It’s making us sick — even slowly killing us.
In 1950, the percentage of obesity in adults in the United States was about 10%. By 2011–12, that number had more than tripled, at 35%. And as of the 2015–16 report by the CDC (Center for Disease Control), that number had reached nearly 40%. That’s over 93 million adults in the United States alone — not even counting the rising rate of childhood obesity, which is a story all its own! And this report is three years old. I couldn’t find a conclusive report for 2019, but I can’t imagine that number has gone down.
Basically, food is killing us instead of keeping us alive. We now have to rely on supplements to give us the nutrients our bodies need, and we all know how they’re typically filled with even more chemicals.
The other end of the spectrum
I grew up with very little. I know what it feels like to go for weeks eating plain spaghetti with a little margarine and salt for flavor- or maybe a can of tomato soup concentrate masquerading as sauce — because that’s all my mother could manage. There was never any waste — we couldn’t afford it!
Looking at statistics now, it hurts my heart. 40% of Americans aren’t sure where their next meal is coming from. That’s a staggering number! And here in Canada, 1 in 8 households are food-insecure. That’s over 4 million hungry people. What’s even crazier is that 58% of our food goes to waste, and over 40% of that is consumer waste! …wait, WHAT!?
There is something seriously wrong with this picture.
The facts are jaw-dropping.
And unacceptable.
How can we calmly sit back and justify this when so many are going hungry in our own backyard, while we throw 40% of the food we buy right into the trash?
we need a radical change.
It’s time we give ourselves a little shake. Or a big one. Time for a worldwide mindset overhaul. If we’re going to stand a chance at surviving on this planet — and giving the planet herself a chance to survive — then we have to stop looking at the bottom dollar.
My Little Urban Homestead
A few years ago, we were lucky to move from the city to the country. To a 34 acre farm. It was beautiful. The farm used to be a mass-chicken production farm (providing meat to Maple Lodge and KFC at different times) but was no longer active. Thank goodness, because I don’t think I could have handled seeing that kind of torture in my own backyard.
But living there flipped a switch in my head — I wanted to make a change. I started thinking about homesteading; going off-grid even. I created My Little Urban Homestead. It was a zero-follower blog, but I had big dreams. Dreams I allowed to die when it seemed I was the only one dreaming it.
But now my resolution has been revived, and I’m bringing back my vision.
We need to stop industrial agriculture and go back to small-scale farming. Backyard farming — like grandma and grandpa used to do.
Buy locally. Eat in-season. Don’t buy more than we need. Learn to preserve our food at home, safely, to enjoy it longer.
Diversify what we plant to keep our soil healthy. Compost! Learn the art of seed-saving (and money-saving!). We can host seed-exchanges, or even give away extra seeds. We’ll make friends, get to know our neighbors, and do our part for Mother Earth.
I dream that every neighborhood or community has garden plots available (for free!) for those who don’t have outdoor space at home.
I dream that people grow gardens instead of lawns.
I dream that good, healthy organic food is available to all, regardless of income; access to healthy food shouldn’t be a privilege, it should be a right.
I dream of an Earth where fields are lush with bounty, and the soil rich in nutrients and a teaming, healthy underground eco-system.
My dreams are not impossible dreams. We just have to work together.
Because together, we can do anything. | https://medium.com/imperfect-words/industrial-agriculture-is-killing-earth-c5964ff53bdf | ['Edie Tuck'] | 2020-05-15 13:25:11.276000+00:00 | ['Farming', 'Agriculture', 'Climate Change', 'Industrial Agriculture', 'Food'] |
User Experience Rules For Website Creation | Introduction:
People nowadays utilize the internet for various purposes, including information, socializing, and online purchasing.
Because of the rapid expansion of the internet, users now have many options, and there is fierce rivalry among websites to succeed.
While the items and services offered by users continue to be the essential factor in determining the site’s success, the user’s experience on the site is as critical.
Applying the following rules, you will be learning will help you break the circle of defeat with your website and set you onto your industry because you’ll be able to create application software that delivers values.
Responsive Design:
The first thing that anyone willing to create an engaging website would want to consider is responsiveness. The pages have to be easily accessible for users, and whether they are in a landscape mood or portrait style, they can still enjoy their experience with the software.
Design Hierarchy:
The arrangement of website components should be so easy that users easily navigate through the essential parts without distraction.
Remember that the purpose of UX optimization is to guide visitors to do the desired action without feeling like a robot, to make the overall experience pleasurable. Your website should be in a way that the audience is attracted to the main components. Moreover, No one would choose software with blurry images over another one with high visual quality.
Also Read: How to Plan effective lead generation ads on Facebook in 5 Simple Steps
Make It As Simple As Possible:
Your website aesthetic is crucial; most visitors aren’t there to judge how sleek the design can be. Instead, they are on the website to get over a particular problem or locate a particular piece of content.
As a result, design components that are not useful (i.e., those with no practical purpose) will practically overload visitors and make it more difficult for them to achieve their goals.
Conclusion:
User experience design entails more than simply making a user-friendly website. If your user has a negative experience with your website, the whole reason for developing it may be gone. Also, with today’s level of competition, you can’t afford to overlook user experience. As a result, it’s critical to select a competent web design agency with expertise in building user experience designs and take them as seriously as any other component of custom website design. | https://medium.com/@jamesmaxfield55/user-experience-rules-for-website-creation-41d2058f6623 | ['James Maxfield'] | 2021-07-06 09:44:58.164000+00:00 | ['Single Page Website', 'Lead Generation', 'Onepagewebsite', 'Onepage Website Templates'] |
A Lion in Winter: Sophia Loren in ‘The Life Ahead’ | Sophia Loren as Madame Rosa in Netflix’ ‘The Life Ahead’ directed by Edoardo Ponti (Palomar, Netflix)
Sophia Loren is as evocative a name as we’ve ever had in film. Immediately you can picture those eyes which, in a single scene, can invite you, pierce you, warn you, restore you. That deeply resolute, honeyed voice. Cheekbones that enter the room first. A husky, conspiratorial laugh. A body that drapes a housecoat, a suit or a gown in a way that appeals to persons of every sexuality. The sense that she knows herself, can laugh at herself. A woman who once famously charmed that King of Charm, Cary Grant, right into a romance but eventually nestled into a decades-long marriage to the producer who discovered her, Carlo Ponti. A regal woman who prevails (her decades-old inaccurate charge of tax evasion in Italy was finally corrected thirty-plus years later), yet in a moment’s notice, you can see the girl inside, scarred by war and poverty. The sense she could have chemistry with anyone because she is present and open and mature, but the sense that her favorite, or at least our favorite, was her frequent co-star Marcello Mastroianni — forever letting him spin her around on Roman streets.
While the news of 2020 has been a parade of horrors, the world of art has delivered one unexpected exhilaration after another, and certainly among these was the news that Sophia Loren would be back on the screen in a lead role. For anyone who has seen her shattering work in ‘Two Women’, hopes were lifted for a dramatic turn where she could remind us of how deeply satisfying and riveting a performance from a gifted experienced actor can be. For anyone who has ever seen her deft touch in ‘Houseboat’ and ‘Marriage Italian Style’, one could also hope for comic possibilities worthy of her.
In the just-released ‘The Life Ahead’, you get something of both. Directed by her son Edoardo Ponti, the film updates the Romain Gary novel ‘The Life Before Us’ and subsequent film version, ‘Madame Rosa’, which won the Academy Award for ‘Foreign Language Film’ and France’s Cesar Lead Actress Award for Simone Signoret. The French star once said of the role, in which a Jewish Parisian former sex worker cares for an Algerian Muslim troubled youth, “If I had said no (to the role) and another woman played it, I would have been sick.”
“Madame Rosa’ was set and released during particularly high tensions between Israel and Palestine that set the world on edge, and it’s blend of emotionally-engineered melodrama and global-affairs metaphor made it stand out in the art-house circuit. Well that, and also, from early press and the trailer, it appeared that Simone Signoret, so eternally sexy in ‘Room at the Top’ would be de-glammed into ‘Slattern Shelly Winters’ territory, which frankly, has a certain intentional gravitas to it that could make you either curious about the film or cautious of it.
Ponti and co-screenwriter Ugo Chiti (‘Gomorrah’) smartly bring the story to the present, and this time the gravitas-and-deglamorization of a true movie star into a world-weary woman is conveyed by the 86-year old Loren, who, rest assured, radiates an undimmed magnetism evident from the first memorable moment you see her. One of the story’s motifs is that Momo (Ibrihima Gueye), the orphaned Algerian Muslim boy Loren’s ‘Madame Rosa’ reluctantly takes into her care, has mystical glimpses of what some might call, therapeutically, his ‘spirit animal’: a powerful lioness. This indeed is why casting Loren as Rosa transcends the issues of Ponti casting his own mother, or rather adds them in a meta-layer and touching way, because if you’re looking for a Lioness, Sophia Loren would have to be first on the list. Her signature mane of hair, here somehow both movie-star iconic and yet perfectly serving the character, is styled as though maintained with habit but growing apathy and frames her face in silver-mercury layered tendrils. The handsomeness of her features seems burnished and essential; the quality usually spoken of when male actors of stature come out of retirement and the words ‘seasoned’ or ‘weathered’ are meant entirely complimentarily.
A few of Madame Rosa’s long dresses hang on her like disappointed ball gowns; as a former sex worker for decades in the Italian port city of Bari and who now makes a living caring for the children of younger sex workers, Rosa has seen a few things. If that wasn’t enough, Momo glances at Rosa’s arms and sees Nazi concentration-camp tattoo numbers. She has born so much trauma in her life you can see that despite her habitual ability to cut to the no-nonsense core of a situation, a part of her has an eye looking for an exit road. Loren has such experience and skill, and Ponti’s direction of his mother is so attentive and loving, we see all of these character shades in a single scene.
Yet despite the darkness Madame Rosa carries with her, and sometimes compartmentalizes into the time she spends in a literal basement refuge, she is kind, self-aware of her limitations, parentally concerned, practical yet generous. It’s this lighter side, accompanied by her initial stern interactions with the ferocious Momo (they ‘meet’ when he steals a bag of antique candlesticks from her at a market) that may be familiar to us from dozens of movies about reticent oldsters who, through a ‘strange turn of events’, get matched with precociously sharp-tongued youngsters. Bill Murray, Clint Eastwood, Walter Matthau, Jane Fonda have all played in films like that.
We’re familiar with the beats of this kind of story, which mirror those of a romantic comedy — reluctant pair of opposites gradually grows to like each other and find they have more in common than they thought. They teach other life lessons, and for the older actor, it usually serves as a wake-up call to the preciousness of their remaining lives. (Perhaps the best example of this film structure was not a studio comedy or indie darling but the Dardenne Brothers’ “The Kid with a Bike.” The plot structure is similar — maddening child resists the benevolence of a maternal stranger — though different in particulars. “The Kid With a Bike” is not so much concerned with mainstream, easy laughs at the culture clash between two generations, but rather serious minded about the morality of our social services as well as what it means to love sacrificially.)
Though the moments are spare, there are some humorous scenes between Rosa and Momo, whenever they briefly draw a truce, which show an underlying compassion in each. To keep the story from getting treacly and on the more rigorous side, the signs of growing affection between them are expressed tartly and in Rosa’s case, with clear-eyes.
Madame Rosa also manages to create a sense of community with others. Along with Momo, she cares for the toddler son of Lola, a transgender sex worker who used to be known in the neighborhood for her skills as a prizefighter, and Iosif, whose mother seems unable to return to care for him. The scenes with the group enjoying some light moments together suggest a sort of ‘Tales of the City’/Barbary Lane, Italian-style, though with far more economic deprivation and hard-scrabble surroundings.
We also see that Rosa has retained a a belief in Jewish tradition, or at least, in a belief in something more transcendent as a way of coping with the way life is a parade of painful events for those who live on the margins. She takes Momo to a storekeeper Muslim friend (the masterful Iranian actor Babak Karami) and asks if Momo can spend time with him; she believes she alone can’t help him become a man, much less a faithful Muslim, but she still wants to try. Loren’s performance here is exquisite, etching a woman who has forged through the world with remarkable fortitude but has spent many a day learning how to cajole a patron into doing what she needs from them. If you are familiar with Loren’s career, it’s hard not to see these scenes in the tradition of her early work from the Italian neo-realist era.
To compound that sense of contemporary social urgency and relevance, Ponti and Chiti weave in the refugee crisis and the way coastal cities in Italy have become migration hot zones. Momo is lured into drug trafficking, but like Rosa’s sex work, we see more clearly how the path to cross over into what is considered ‘criminal’ behavior soon becomes a regularly traveled avenue necessitated by the desire of society’s forgotten to survive with even a fraction of autonomy. In order to have this part of the plot make sense, we spend a considerable amount of the film’s real estate seeing Momo rise in his criminal skill set as though we’re watching a well-financed contemporary HBO or yes, Netflix, show about drug trafficking, complete with violent repercussions. And these scenes make sense in terms of using a neo-realist film approach from the past in order to portray contemporary troubles.
The problem is, though this subplot is sparse and efficient at explaining these story beats, speaking for myself, the drug trafficking world was not where I wanted to be, even if it portrayed the hypocrisies of modern life — i.e., Momo drops a dime bag on his teacher’s desk while making his rounds.
Instead, keeping in mind how rare it is to see Loren on screen, I wanted more of the back-and-forth of the relationship building of Momo and Rosa and not so much the interweaving of their separate realities. (No reflection on young Gueye, who is terrific at navigating his character’s hair-trigger anger as it melts into something more vulnerable, allowing a begrudging but growing attachment to Rosa.) As the story takes a major turn revealing Madame Rosa’s not-too-gradual disintegration, I found myself reacting to this somewhat predictable development with an “Already?” I grabbed the remote and checked to see how much of the film was left, and the answer was still quite a bit.
The film plays out in ways that challenge Momo, who we has lost his mother to violence, to consider whether he has any kind of moral code left, and if he can risk opening himself to a maternal figure again. It all makes sense, but still it may feel like the film could have benefitted from being more instinctual, and in a few moments, less programmatic, and given more time in the film to Loren’s portrayal; there are enough inexplicable loose ends you wouldn’t mind seeing woven tighter, especially if they gave you more scenes with her.
It reaches an ending that will not probably surprise you if you think about the nature of the story, and when you get there, with Loren expertly and unsentimentally showing Rosa’s alternating urgent need to negotiate the terms of even her end of life with the interruption of growing and mysterious fugue dementia states where she becomes unreachable. I was quite moved by these last scenes, for several reasons but principally these two: the story illustrates how the most underserved and oppressed among us so stressfully have to keep working hard to just stay breathing, even to the point of their last breath. The film is tackling important themes by showing how the characters recognize in each other the reality of living when oppressed and excluded, but we also sense how unnecessary that oppression is, how intolerance and lack of cooperation and social indifference results in so much suffering.
And the other reason, of course, is because the woman in the sickbed is La Loren, who for purposes of the role looks frail and mortal, and if you’re a lifelong fan like I am, your mind may wander to consider other issues related to the passage of time than those the film is centered on. (After these scenes, I found myself wanting to look up pictures of her as she is today and as she did the virtual press tour for this film, just to make sure she was okay.)
But as moving as these moments are, I strangely didn’t get the proverbial lump in my throat at the end, and trust me, it’s not become I’m too cynical. These days I’ll gladly welcome a cathartic cry, and as the modern-era cliché goes, I’ll sob at a commercial. I’m not one of those people who resents a ‘tearjerker’, if those tears are more or less earnestly and skillfully earned, especially these days — who couldn’t use a good catharsis? (Though I certainly believe if I’d seen this in a theater with other patrons, I would hear some weeping.) In some ways, this deeper sorrow, almost beyond tears, feels appropriate. At the end of one of the greatest of all neo-realist films, Satyajit Ray’s Bengali-language “Pather Panchali”, I feel like I more sigh than cry, although the sighs come from a place far within.
Ponti and the company would probably be grateful to have their film recognized for its restraint and rigor at not being just a ‘tearjerker’, given the sentimental outlines of the plot, but maybe we needed a few more scenes less restrained and the ending would work just as well, or in my case, be even more of an empathetic purgation? The moment between Madame Rosa dancing samba with Lola, the trans sex worker who is the adorably cherubic baby Babu’s mother, is a counterpoint to the harder moments, and it feels like the film needed more scenes like this building the relationship between Madame Rosa and Momo — those wry character beats when we see their defenses crumbling bit by bit.(Lola is portrayed by Abril Zamorra with a welcome burst of light and warmth. Zamorra’s energy reminded me of the young Carmen Maura in Albmodovar’s films of the eighties; she looks like she could do anything Almodovar, or any director, would ask of her.)
A little more time spent at the point where Momo finally starts smiling with Rosa would have been time well-served to gain greater emotional impact near the end when that smile starts to quiver. More simply put, a little more Momo and Rosa connecting, a little less Momo drug-dealing and scowling.
‘A Life Ahead’ is even more grounded than it might appear from its outline, but sometimes it fumbles a bit. The rich promise of backgrounding the story with Italy’s role in the contemporary refugee crisis doesn’t feel fulfilled, though one moment when Momo and Madame Rosa stumble upon a dispute between police and a migrant mother, including separation, is a powerful hint of what more might have been done. We hear that ‘social services’ would be a nightmare fate for a child, but I’d have loved to have seen Rosa actually encountering social workers or representatives of Italy’s immigration office and challenging them with her mix of hauteur and underclass plaintiveness.
The visual symbol of the lioness comes off more like symbolism that reads fine in a novel but sticks out with obviousness in a movie, and the literal depiction of the animal through CGI mismatches comes close to subverting the film’s naturalistic tone at a crucial emotional peak. There’s a secondary symbol involving an image from Rosa’s childhood that is telegraphed as a potential callback. The framing and occasional voiceovers that center the story around Momo could have been excised without diluting the power of the film’s meaning.
Still, the performances by the entire cast rise above the familiar curves and occasional puzzling story dips. Combined with tonally-perfect set design and cinematography contributions, Ponti’s direction includes several framings that are poetic and nuanced. There’s a perfect little couplet of scenes after a fearful moment occurs in the household and Momo sits with his head leaning against a wall of the children’s drawings and plinks angrily on a toy xylophone. It’s followed by the camera gliding in to overhear Momo and Iosif try to express those very fears out loud: that just as they finally have settled into a more pacific home life, it’s all about to tragically change once again. The sequence works masterfully at portraying the tragedy of so many displaced children.
Although ‘A Life Ahead’ is ultimately a sort of chamber drama and ensemble piece, of course the presence and contribution of Sophia Loren makes it a historic and welcome moment in recent film history. Forgive my quibbles if, given these circumstances, I wanted a film that would feature her onscreen in every moment, to savor as much of her talent at conveying emotional honesty and the complexities of love as possible. And I certainly hope this isn’t the last performance of Loren’s. I’d just as much love to see her in a new film as some sort of glamorous grande dame or even a romantic comedy.
But as Madame Rosa in ‘A Life Ahead,’ Sophia Loren comes into 2020 voicing, through a mature and ‘seasoned’ character, hard-won insights and offering a very relevant, contemporary reminder that life will bring suffering, but also moments of surprising grace and those moments must be just as fully experienced, even savored, as the painful realities that grab the bulk of our daily attention. Those moments of grace will be your teacher, Madame Rosa seems to say, and Sophia Loren doesn’t seem to be just playing a particular character or anything as crass as making a ‘screen comeback’ when she opens the door to Madame Rosa’s apartment and lets Momo, and by extension, us, in. It seems as though, in her intensely disciplined dedication to acting, she’s offering us a gift that could only be crafted by the most experienced maker. This generosity of spirit fuses with her non-fussy willingness to play Madame Rosa. The honest beauty of Sophia Loren, and our perception that it comes from some space deep inside her, not unlike Rosa’s basement room, makes us grateful to walk in and spend as much time as she can grant us. In 2020, we all can use the kind of shelter, even if for a couple of hours, that enables you to go on.
There’s a moment when Madame Rosa is being transported from a key location to another in a hurried manner, and she stops to turn her gaze in the direction of a crimson dawn as it slowly illuminates a harbor. At that moment, as Loren raises her magnificent profile towards the sky, she stands in for all of our lost loved ones, including parents and caretakers, who, even as they became fragile, still managed to show us how instinctual and human it is for us to want the autonomy and freedom to respond to sudden beauty. In the midst of a pandemic, Sophia Loren steps out of the film posters and classic Hollywood photo poses we’ve kept her in, and humbly, truthfully and alertly goes about the serious artistic mission of connecting the past to in order to comment on our troubled, anxious present and remind us of the power of love that can transcend all of it.
She’s uniquely and peerlessly qualified to do so. | https://tomcendejas.medium.com/a-lion-in-winter-sophia-loren-in-the-life-ahead-b4f6255361e5 | ['The Couch Tamale'] | 2020-11-20 20:45:23.878000+00:00 | ['Movies', 'Sophia Loren', 'Film', 'Film Reviews', 'Netflix'] |
Plan and Build Your Real Estate Business | The real estate business has to be one of the top five favorite professions of all time. The reason is simple. It does not need a specific qualification and/or experience. Yet, the returns can be lucrative. But, nothing comes for free. One has to work hard in the right direction to bear the fruits. Here are some suggested pointers to consider before you make a move.
1. Acquire the necessary skills
To excel in any business, the first step is to have a thorough knowledge of the basics. In the case of real estate, you must have the know-how in construction and property management. Negotiation and people handling skills are also very important. Last but not the least, you should remain up to date about property related policy matters and tax issues. | https://medium.datadriveninvestor.com/plan-and-build-your-real-estate-business-e413dbc321c1 | ['Misbah Ul Haq Syed'] | 2020-12-26 13:03:06.135000+00:00 | ['Work From Home', 'Investment', 'Finance', 'Real Estate', 'Career Change'] |
Extracting selected data from a single page using lxml.html.xpath | Fast and Simple ways to learn scrapping!
In this exercise, we will use XPath to collect information from the provided URL and use lxml. But, before we start it, please refer to the XPath and CSS selectors using DevTools. This article
Here is the little documentation about XPath expression:
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
We’re going to use this link for doing a “web scrapping”:
First, we have to install the module in our environment, if you are using macOS try to install through terminal, then we can import the module through IDE. It depends on you either using jupyter notebook, pycharm or VScode.
Step-1
A musicURL string object contains a link to the main page. musicURL is parsed using the parse() function, which results in the doc object which has lxml.etree.ElementTree object type.
Let’s get a base element through <article>
Get the <article> path
Make a new object as articles and put the <article> path into cell by using xpath() function and do not forget to add [0] at the last of code cause we’re just get the first area of <article> tags. The XPath for the articles posseses all of the fields that are available inside , such as title, price, availability, imageUrl, and starRating.
First <article> path
After this, we have to set up the individual expression. If we are going to get information about title, price, availability and imageURL, we should to declare the individual XPath expression such as:
Set up Individual XPath Expression
Check the result by printing each result object. There is still messy data on availability, imageUrl and starRating object. So let’s try to clean up the data
Checking
Cleaning Process
So, here is the final step, we are going to make a DataFrame after doing a “Web Scrapping” using lxml.html and XPath.
Make a list of number
DataFrame from Web Scrapping
This article is used to fast learning documentation about web-scrapping using lxml.html and XPath. Hope u enjoy it! | https://medium.com/@mulianaraul/extracting-selected-data-from-a-single-page-using-lxml-html-xpath-975bcbde9e0c | [] | 2020-12-19 16:16:56.703000+00:00 | ['Python', 'Web Scraping', 'Lxml', 'Web Scrapping Tips', 'Data Science'] |
I am a linguistics student who learn programming. | Learning a language is very emotional. We put matter and abstract concepts in language. For this reason, language also contains the emotions and value judgments of those who contain it. This is why I became a linguistics student.
I’m a Korean. So the language I use has oriental values. The proverbs, etymology and grammar structure of Korean contain values, hatred, and fear that our ancestors cherish. I learned (so hard) the values of our ancestors for 20 years until high school. It was a little tired. So I choose something a little different. It was Spanish.
I enjoy meeting people. and I love to study and analyze others. If that person is a stranger, I go crazy. Spanish is very efficient in that sense. The only languages distributed over the largest geographical area are Spanish and English. Arabic and Chinese were also nominated. However, Chinese has a limitation in that it is an Eastern language. In Arabic, I gave up for the first time because I had so poor background knowledge about the culture(but, because it is as strange as that, I will definitely learn someday). So, I learned Spanish in university for five years.
For me, learning a language wasn’t academic. Rather, it is more experiential. Through Spanish, I learn how they see things and ideas. Why are they angry, and what makes them ecstatic. Of course, academic courses are also essential. But, over two years in Latin America, I realized that while learning a language, experience is essential. As I eat their food, learn to dance, and love, my understanding is completed. Now, there are words and sentences that have a ‘meaning’ that is so precious to me. When I think of the word ‘chino’, I remember the ‘mocking’, ‘contempt’ and ‘prejudice’ that I felt. On the other hand, I remember the compatriot consciousness I felt with the Chinese and japanese people I met in South America (at the same time because we were tied to the category of chino). In this way, countless words have been inscribed in my life. I hope I can tell you all those stories little by little.
In March of 2020, after a year of volunteer work, I returned from the Dominican Republic. I was used to feeling and experiencing while bumping into people. The non-face-to-face environment brought by the coronavirus collapsed everything. Now it’s hard for me to feel them abroad. It seemed like a conversion was needed.
The continuing pandemic clearly imprinted two beings on me. The first is family. Virtual classes and work environments have relatively increased contact with families. Some families said that this led to increased conflicts. It was good for me. I was able to get a deeper understanding of my family. But more importantly, it was the embossing of the second. It is the computer. The growing number of family encounters taught me how much I didn’t know about them. And the increasing use of computers also made me feel how ignorant of this. And it leads to deep thoughts.
How long should I spend with this friend in the future?
Obviously, I will have to spend time with this friend even after my family dies. The non-face-to-face and growth of the IT industry foresee this friend and I will inevitably become closer. By this point, the choice became clear.
“I must understand this friend.”
And I took a very linguistic approach.
“To understand him, I must learn his language.”
24.01.2021 | https://medium.com/@materokatti/i-am-a-linguistics-student-who-learn-programming-e1cd4b13a8e9 | [] | 2021-01-24 12:55:23.515000+00:00 | ['Linguistics', 'Programming', 'Spanish', 'Choices', 'Programming Languages'] |
Meetup Computer Vision Paris | Sicara's blog
We build tailor-made AI and Big Data solutions for amazing… | https://medium.com/sicara/meetup-computer-vision-paris-a7b210d19faf | ['Jean-Régis De Vauplane'] | 2020-01-29 17:08:28.563000+00:00 | ['Meetup Paris', 'Meetup', 'Meetup Computer Vision', 'Computer Vision'] |
How To Virtual Assistants Help For Small Business? | As a business owner, your day-to-day tasks are never ending. There are a lot of moving pieces in maintaining a successful small business. It may be time to alleviate some of those tasks and give yourself more time to focus on your business or even some leisure. You don’t have to do it all.
Virtual assistants help small business & enterprise clients with administration, marketing, customer service, financial services.
Still aren’t convinced how a virtual assistant can help your business grow? Here are a few ways:
Our services will handle your routine and repetitive tasks like scheduling, email & calendar management, basic administrative support, and phone answering. This saves you time.
Virtual assistants are trained to handle customer inquiries, help desk and support tasks to ensure your customers are satisfied and that they return. This generates customer loyalty. Returning customers means reoccurring revenue. More money! More money!
Like many small businesses, you may need assistance with online marketing, social media management, video creation/editing, graphic design, website management, SEO, blogging, and more. Many business owners successfully have a website created for their company but fail to have the website managed. In this digital age, your business cannot afford to have a non-functioning website. This also applies to social media. Your clients want engagement. When you are running a business, it can be difficult to find time for this. A virtual assistant can handle this task.
Remember, a virtual assistant should make running your business easier. Write down a list of daunting tasks that you just don’t have time for. These are the tasks that should be outsourced. Don’t go into the New Year without a business plan. Request a consultation with a Virtual Assistant Firm and collaboratively come up with a strategy that will take your business to the next level. | https://medium.com/@svatheindustryfirmusa/how-to-virtual-assistants-help-for-small-business-2560fb584809 | [] | 2020-12-27 05:02:00.530000+00:00 | ['Small Business', 'Virtual Assistant Firm', 'Virtual Assistants Help', 'Va Assistant', 'Virtual Assistant'] |
Trump Justice Department’s Prosecution Of Julian Assange Relies On Contrived Conspiracy Theory | Courthouse in Alexandria in the Eastern District Of Virginia, where WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange was charged with violating the Espionage Act (Photo by Tim Evanson)
The superseding indictment against WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, which included a staggering 17 charges of violating the Espionage Act, was met with loud condemnation from news editors and press freedom groups.
But given the general reluctance to come off as supporters of Assange, very few of the statements engaged with the specifics alleged by prosecutors for the United States Justice Department.
In order to defend the First Amendment and investigative journalism itself, it is crucial to understand the timeline of events for Chelsea Manning’s disclosures to WikiLeaks and their publication in 2010.
I was one of the few reporters to travel to Fort Meade in Washington, D.C., and cover nearly every day of proceedings in Manning’s court-martial. Prosecutors pushed a contrived theory during her trial, which suggested Manning worked for Assange, as if she was an insider or spy that WikiLeaks turned against the U.S. government and recruited to steal documents for the media organization.
This theory is fundamental to the allegations in the superseding indictment against Assange, yet one massive dilemma for prosecutors exists — Chelsea Manning’s statement during her court-martial.
On February 28, 2013, Manning outlined in great detail her role in disclosing over a half million documents to WikiLeaks. She meticulously described each set of information, why she was drawn to releasing the documents to the public, and how she downloaded, prepared, and electronically transferred the documents to WikiLeaks.
Manning’s statement conflicts with the government’s theory so they are abusing the grand jury process. They are punishing her so she bends to their will and testifies in front of the grand jury, where they hope they will be able to discredit her statement.
The “Most Wanted Leaks” List From 2009
Central to the government’s conspiracy theory is the “Most Wanted Leaks List” from 2009.
The superseding indictment filed on May 23 argues WikiLeaks posted this list “organized by country and stated that documents or materials nominated to the list must ‘be likely to have political, diplomatic, ethical, or historical impact on release…and be plausibly obtainable to a well-motivated insider or outsider.’”
On May 14, 2009, WikiLeaks requested nominations from human rights groups, lawyers, historians, journalists, and activists for documents as well as databases from around the world that the media organization would work to expose.
“It was WikiLeaks saying, look, tell us, humanitarians, activists, NGOs, fellow reporters, what do you want to know in your country? What in your country is being hidden from the public that you believe the public should know? Give us a list,” David Coombs, Manning’s defense attorney, said during closing argument for her trial.
Coombs added, “We are going to compile that list, and we are going to work to obtain that list. What does this sound like? Any journalistic organization that has like a hotline or anything else says, call us. You got a story. Call us. We’ll investigate.”
Manning deployed to Forward Operating Base Hammer in October 2009, which was about 35 miles east of Baghdad. Just weeks after, military prosecutors suggested she started “working for WikiLeaks.”
But out of 78 items on the list, Coombs noted the military prosecutors were only able to “remotely” tie her to “four of the things on the list.”
On June 8, 2013, the defense heavily disputed whether Manning had ever seen a draft of the “Most Wanted Leaks” list. Manning did not mention the list at all in her statement to the court.
“Pfc. Manning had access to a lot of information — certainly on the other countries. And had [she] wanted to, and this was [her] list, you would see a lot of searches on Intelink that match up verbatim or very closely to the items requested on the list,” Coombs contended. [Intelink is a U.S. intelligence network of top secret, secret, and unclassified databases.]
Manning Never Disclosed Any Of The ‘Bulk Databases’ WikiLeaks Requested
In the superseding indictment, prosecutors emphasize the fact that the list requested “bulk databases,” including Intellipedia, a classified Wikipedia for U.S. intelligence analysts. Yet, Manning never released this database to WikiLeaks nor did she release the complete CIA Open Source Center database or PACER database containing U.S. federal court records, which were listed as “important bulk databases.”
Alleged chat logs show Manning brought up the CIA Open Source Center on March 8, 2010, and Assange informed her, “That’s something we want to mine entirely.” But Manning never engaged in any efforts whatsoever to release this information that Assange allegedly sought to obtain.
Only three “bulk databases” were specifically requested through the list. WikiLeaks never requested the databases of military significant activity reports from Afghanistan and Iraq that were available on the Combined Information Data Network Exchange system.
WikiLeaks did not request the State Department’s Net-Centric Diplomacy database containing embassy cables and published to the Secret Internet Protocol Router Network (SIPRnet), which was utilized for the dissemination of information between the State Department and the Defense Department.
Prosecutors allege Assange caused U.S. cables and military incident reports to be published without removing the names of human sources. Except under the government’s theory, it is not plausible that the publication allegedly happened as part of a conspiracy because the “Most Wanted Leaks” list never urged anyone to release these files to the organization.
The “Most Wanted Leaks” list included the “Camp Delta (Guantanamo) Standard Operating Procedure 2005–2009” and the “Camp Delta (Guantanamo) Interrogation Standard Operating Procedure 2003–2009.” It never included a request for the entire database of detainee assessment briefs on individuals captured and transferred to the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay.
The Garani Airstrike Video: An Inconvenient Acquittal
Chelsea Manning (Photo by #MCB19)
Military prosecutors charged Manning with “aiding the enemy,” which covered conduct that allegedly started on November 1, 2009. They also charged her with releasing video of the Garani airstrike in the Farah province of Afghanistan and alleged that started on November 1.
Manning was acquitted of both offenses.
The unauthorized disclosure of the Garani airstrike video was the only Espionage Act offense, which Manning pled not guilty. She would have pled guilty to disclosure if prosecutors accused her of releasing the video on April 11, 2010, but the prosecutors insisted the alleged offense occurred in the first weeks of Manning’s deployment.
Journalist Alexa O’Brien, who was also one of the few reporters to cover Manning’s court-martial extensively, extensively documented how prosecutors relied on the alleged disclosure of the Garani airstrike video to create a foundation for their criminal conspiracy claims. Prosecutors even changed the date for Manning’s earliest offenses in the initial charge sheet from November 19 to November 1.
Examining this part of the case against Manning is crucial to unraveling the government’s conspiracy theory.
Jason Katz, an employee at Brookhaven National Laboratory from February 2009 to March 2010, tried to help WikiLeaks and downloaded an encrypted file with the airstrike video on to his work computer on December 15, 2009. Katz was unable to use a password-cracking tool to open the file.
From O’Brien’s reporting:
“The Garani video allegedly placed on Jason Katz’s work computer on December 15, 2009, however, did not forensically match the Garani video allegedly found on Manning’s workstation. “Was this the same video or a similar video to that seen on the .22 computer?,” Coombs asked Special Agent David Shaver (CCIU) on cross examination. “No, sir,” replied the agent. “Different video?” asked Coombs. “Different video, sir,” said the agent.
WikiLeaks apparently had an encrypted video file of the bomb attack, which killed dozens of civilians. The media organization indicated on Twitter on January 8, 2010, “We need super computer time.”
According to Shaver, Manning pulled video from a shared drive in Iraq that was in a folder labeled “Farah,” but military prosecutors still insisted Manning must have passed the video on to Katz because he had access to a supercomputer that could potentially crack the file.
The Garani airstrike video was not one of WikiLeaks’ “Most Wanted Leaks,” however, if the government’s theory is to be believed, it was the first file Manning disclosed to WikiLeaks.
Coombs pointedly addressed the implausibility of this allegation during closing argument:
Let’s go along with the government and its logic. Pfc. Manning hits the ground in Iraq in mid-November. For whatever reason, his motive, I’m now going to use the 2009 “Most Wanted [Leaks]” List as my guiding light. And I’m going to give something to WikiLeaks. I’m going to do it because I’m now a traitor. I’m now an activist. So what is the first thing I’m going to choose? What is the very first thing I’m going to give to WikiLeaks and say look, WikiLeaks, I’m for you? Well, I’m going to give you an encrypted video I can’t see, you can’t see, guess what, we don’t have a password for it. By the way you never asked for it. That’s not on your 2009 “Most Wanted [Leaks]” list. This is kind of like someone showing up to a wedding and giving you something that’s not on the list that you registered for. What do you think Pfc. Manning is doing at this point? According to the government, [she] is like, hey, you know what, I can go to the 78 things that you want, but I don’t want to give you that stuff.
There was one specific search for Farah on March 22, but the searches that the government used to argue Manning released a video in November were general searches for CENTCOM on Intelink.
Captain Joshua Tooman, a defense attorney for Manning, noted Iraq fell under CENTCOM. Any number of reasons would cover why Manning searched for CENTCOM.
Like Coombs said, all of the above is inconvenient for prosecutors because they need Manning to be working for WikiLeaks within weeks after she was deployed to Iraq. They need her to be an agent of WikiLeaks, not the naive but good-intentioned she comes off as in her statement.
Obscuring Manning’s Disclosure Of ‘Collateral Murder’ Video To Argue Conspiracy
Prosecutors contend Manning’s searches on November 28 for “retention+of+interrogation+videos” and “detainee+abuse” were consistent with the “Most Wanted Leaks” list. Because WikiLeaks was apparently interested in copies of any of the 92 CIA torture tapes that were destroyed and “detainee abuse photos withheld by the Obama administration.”
What prosecutors overlook is the fact that Manning never disclosed any detainee abuse photos or torture videos to WikiLeaks for publication. If she really was looking for these items because she saw them on the list, why didn’t she download and transfer copies of any files connected to these search terms over the next few months?
Additionally, prosecutors attempt to link Manning’s disclosure of rules of engagement for U.S. military forces in Iraq to the “Most Wanted Leaks” list. It included “Iraq and Afghanistan U.S. army Rules of Engagement 2007–2009.” They suggest Manning provided the files to WikiLeaks in late March after Assange allegedly said “curious eyes never run dry” during a chat.
Yet, according to Manning, the rules of engagement documents were disclosed in connection to video of an aerial weapons team engaged in an attack in Baghdad in July 2007, which violated the rules of engagement. She provided rules of engagement documents (from only Iraq) and a copy of the video to WikiLeaks on February 21, 2010.
WikiLeaks called the video, “Collateral Murder.”
Screen shot from the “Collateral Murder” video published by WikiLeaks
Manning became familiar with the video because it was discussed among targeting analysts within her division. She learned Reuters requested a copy of the video, which showed two Reuters employees who were killed.
The military would not voluntarily release the video under the Freedom of Information Act. That, along with the contents of the video, troubled Manning. So, the release of rules of engagement documents had nothing to do with the “Most Wanted Leaks” list on the WikiLeaks website.
Abuse By Iraqi Federal Police Led To Disclosure Of Guantanamo Files, Not Assange
Manning said in her statement she came across the Guantanamo detainee assessment briefs in 2009 “but did not think much of them.”
On February 27, 2010, Manning learned the Iraqi federal police detained “15 individuals for printing anti-Iraqi literature.” She investigated the incident and learned none of the individuals were tied to “anti-Iraqi actions or suspected terrorist militia groups.” She received some evidence that included a “scholarly critique” of Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, which apparently led to the individuals’ detention.
Manning alerted a commanding officer, but this officer insisted she “drop it” and help the Iraqi federal police find the print shops putting out “anti-Iraqi literature.”
“I knew that if I continued to assist the Baghdad Federal Police in identifying the political opponents of Prime Minister al-Maliki, those people would be arrested and in the custody of the Special Unit of the Baghdad Federal Police and very likely tortured and not seen again for a very long time — if ever,” Manning told a military court in February 2013.
Manning hoped WikiLeaks would publish documents related to the Iraqi federal police’s crackdown on political opponents of al-Maliki. However, WikiLeaks chose not to publish the information and partly because Manning was concerned U.S. military officers would identify her if the media organization published copies of the documents she disclosed
It was during this time period in early March that Manning thought the federal police might turn over political opponents of al-Maliki to the U.S. for transfer to Joint Task Force Guantanamo. She decided to look over the detainee assessment briefs again and realized the U.S. military held “an increasing number of individuals indefinitely,” who they believed were innocent, “low-level foot soldiers that did not have useful intelligence and would be released if they were still held in theater.”
Contrary to Manning’s version of events, prosecutors insist it was Assange, who convinced Manning to find the detainee assessment briefs and release them in alleged chats on March 7, 2010.
FBI Special Agent Megan Brown, who was assigned to the “counterespionage squad” at the Washington Field Office in the District of Columbia, recounted:
…Manning asked Assange, “how valuable are JTF GTMO detention memos containing summaries, background info, capture info, etc?” Assange replied, “time period?” Manning answered, “2007–2008.” Assange responded, “Quite valuable to the lawyers of these guys who are trying to get them out, where those memos suggest their innocence/bad procedure…also valuable to merge into the general history. Politically Gitmo is mostly over though.”…
But in the chat messages referenced, Assange never specifically asks Manning to provide the reports to WikiLeaks nor does he indicate WikiLeaks would publish the documents. All Assange allegedly did was confirm to Manning that they were in the public interest.
***
Most of the Espionage Act charges involve the disclosure and publication of military incident reports and diplomatic cables. However, as far as the government’s theory of conspiracy is concerned, Manning did not upload the military incident reports until February 3, when she was at her aunt’s house in Potomac, Maryland during mid-tour leave.
Later in March, she downloaded hundreds of thousands of diplomatic cables and uploaded them to WikiLeaks on April 10.
Once one recognizes the timeline is depends upon fabrication, the theory for criminal conspiracy crumbles.
WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange in 2009 (Photo by New Media Days / Peter Erichsen)
All that is left is the Justice Department’s clear contempt for a publisher who should be protected by the First Amendment and not expected to adhere to U.S. secrecy laws or guidelines.
“At the time he entered into this agreement, Assange knew, understood, and fully anticipated that Manning was taking and illegally providing WikiLeaks with classified records containing national defense information of the United States that she was obtaining from classified databases,” the indictment proclaims.
“Assange was knowingly receiving such classified records from Manning for the purpose of publicly disclosing them on the WikiLeaks website.”
Indeed, Assange, who was WikiLeaks editor-in-chief, allegedly established a relationship with Manning, a source, via encrypted chat. She submitted materials that were reviewed. They engaged in discussions of the materials, and she asked for help from WikiLeaks to protect her identity. They employed privacy tools to try and avoid detection by military or government authorities.
What Assange did with Manning is fairly standard in journalism. Perhaps that is why media organizations and press freedom groups unanimously opposed the decision to charge Assange with Espionage Act offenses.
John Demers, assistant attorney general of the Justice Department’s National Security Division, asserted, “Julian Assange is no journalist. This is made plain by the totality of his conduct as alleged in the indictment.”
Yet, Matthew Miller, former director of the Justice Department’s public affairs office between 2009 and 2011, labeled the indictment “dangerous and probably unconstitutional.”
“DOJ doesn’t get to decide who is deserving of First Amendment protections and who isn’t. There’s a reason we wouldn’t charge this in the Obama administration,” Miller added.
Miller correctly pointed out the legal theories in the indictment could easily be used to prosecute a reporter for the New York Times. “Despite DOJ’s assurance, the Espionage Act doesn’t make any distinction between reporters and other actors.”
Unfortunately, while Miller disagrees, the legacy of President Barack Obama’s administration looms over the prosecution against Assange.
The Obama administration prosecuted more current and former government employees under the Espionage Act than all previous presidential administrations combined. They launched the grand jury investigation into WikiLeaks and never recognized they were wrong to empanel a grand jury in the first place.
Although the administration never charged a reporter, it treated journalists like co-conspirators. Officials pursued a subpoena against journalist James Risen in an effort to force him to testify against his alleged source.
Deputy Attorney General James Cole approved a request in February 2013 to subpoena the phone records for 30 different telephone numbers associated with the Associated Press’ offices. Officials targeted seven reporters and editors over a six-week span from April to May in 2012. Officials briefly considered targeting the records of The Washington Post, The New York Times, and ABC News.
The subpoenas were obtained during a leak investigation and also were aimed at the “trunk lines of major AP offices — lines which could [have] potentially reveal[ed] confidential sources across all of the AP’s newsgathering activities,” according to the Columbia Journalism Review.
Now, citizens are faced with a presidential administration that has an even greater zeal for investigating leaks than the Obama administration, and the harsh reality is the Trump administration largely picked up where the Obama administration left off.
Trump officials have carried the war on whistleblowers to its logical extension: finding a test case that may force journalists to think twice about publishing classified information in an age when technology for accepting leaks has proliferated.
Evidence showing Assange recruited Manning to act as an insider for WikiLeaks does not exist. Yet, that is exactly why the government will not withdraw the subpoena against her.
The government knows it is unlikely to succeed in prosecuting Assange unless they undercut the truth Manning asserted in a military court. They must abuse the grand jury process and use confinement and steep financial penalties to force her testimony. She has to be tripped up or baited into making statements useful against Assange or else all they have is a preposterous conspiracy theory that not even the anti-leaks Obama administration was willing to pursue. | https://kevingosztola.medium.com/trump-justice-departments-prosecution-of-julian-assange-relies-on-contrived-conspiracy-theory-86aae70f131c | ['Kevin Gosztola'] | 2019-05-28 03:38:01.131000+00:00 | ['Press Freedom', 'Chelsea Manning', 'Journalism', 'Julian Assange', 'Politics'] |
My 2020 Year Self-Review | On the other hand, about not related (directly) tasks in my daily work, I started to do something I had pending for a long time: MORE public contributions to the Dev community.
In fact, I can probably tell you more this year about that than ever before. This year was especially full of (remote) opportunities for either talking at conferences or writing articles, of course, coding first in Github or Gists to try proofs of concept.
From September 2019 I started to increase my collaborations, but I became more engaged from April 2020 when participated at Android Makers (AM) in Paris, wait, in Paris? Due to the start of the pandemic, this was a remote conference instead.
Despite the conference was in April, I came up with the idea in December 2019 and the work started in February: investigating, designing, coding, experimenting, etc.
Previous to this event, I got an invitation from my friend Antonio Leiva (DevExperto) for a personal interview about career development. I really enjoyed talking about my experience in Spanish. Thanks Antonio!
Going back to the AM talk, in the end, I consider the conference and talk went pretty nicely, I liked this conference’s format from a speaker's perspective: I was able to make it from my flat in London 🇬🇧 ! To be honest, I wasn’t so sure of making that big effort for an online event. Not only for the energy you need to spend on it but also because it was the first time in a remote conference, where you lose human contact and networking. But in the end, I was encouraged and created the content, practiced a lot, and was pleased with the experience.
This was a nice picture taken from my flat in London 🇬🇧
But that wasn’t all. I contributed for the first time in a technical podcast (for the Spanish 🇪🇸 language community) thanks to David Hackro, host of the AndroidDevPodcast. I can tell, being at different timezones was challenging, while he was in Mexico 🇲🇽, I was in London 🇬🇧.
Tweet of the AndroidDevPodcast with its link to all Audio formats.
I believe the invitation to this great podcast was thanks to the big impact that the public articles had. I can tell that I wrote a bunch of Android/Kotlin articles (6 articles from the “Fueled Reactive apps with Asynchronous Flow” series and a new independent one later on), whose first 6 articles were written in 6 consecutive weeks, which received quite a bit of attention from the Android/Kotlin community (were featured on Android / Kotlin weekly, thanks a lot to both newsletters!):
Great, but was that all?
Later, I decided to give it a go and submit proposals to more conferences, like Droidcon EMEA (#dcEMEA). I even extended the talk to “Fueled Reactive apps with Asynchronous Flow and StateFlow to sync with the UI”. While those in-person conferences became online events, I began to take this a little bit more seriously. What do I mean by that? I upgraded my speaker setup, both with a new microphone 🎤 and a quality stream-cam 📹.
Microphone with a condenser was part of the new speaker setup
#dcEMEA went really well (this is the offline demo)!
Short VOD with the #dcEMEA demo.
I gave this same talk during our internal/private event called #OneDroid at Twitter, where all Android engineers meet once a year (this is part of my actual job, but I’m telling you public speaking contributions in chronological order).
Having a beer after the #OneDroid event
Furthermore, I was invited by my good friend Nicolás Patarino to give that same talk in Spanish 🇪🇸. So I did it at the Madrid Android Developer Group (MADG) meetup. I was thrilled to be part of this meetup, thanks Nico! Besides, I was especially excited to see people who attended Droidcon EMEA who were also present at this Spanish talk edition:
Victor attended both EMEA (English) and MADG (Spanish) talks.
After that, really surprisingly, I got invited by my friend Enrique López-Mañas to the Kotlin Munich meetup 🇩🇪, the same day it was going to happen. Thus, I participated with no time to prepare really. I hoped it went well! Thanks Enrique!
This wasn’t the last of the talks, I was lucky enough to get a space on a meetup I followed from its beginning called Kotlin London 🇬🇧. Big thanks to Pablisco, Amar, Guillermo and Enzo!
Myself trying the speaker setup the same morning of the Kotlin London event.
To close this wonderful year, I received the greatest news of getting my talk accepted for Droidcon APAC #dcAPAC, I had a terrific experience there. The first time I traveled to Asia 🌏 whilst sitting in London 🇬🇧, can you imagine? It got featured at Kotlin weekly.
The capture of the presentation at dcAPAC with Raul wearing a Black Sabbath t-shirt.
And that’s a wrap for 2020! I can consider this year as probably the most successful one for speaking and writing technical articles. | https://medium.com/@raul-h82/my-2020-year-self-review-4a8705d9a728 | ['Raul Hernandez Lopez'] | 2021-01-23 11:31:22.347000+00:00 | ['Self Care', 'Healthy Lifestyle', 'Self Review', 'Self Improvement', 'Kotlin'] |
Diane Downs: Hungry Like the Wolf | Meanwhile, investigators digging into Downs’ background revealed some troubling patterns. She was born Elizabeth Diane Frederickson on Aug. 7, 1955, in Phoenix, Arizona. As a teenager, she rebelled against her parents’ conservative Baptist upbringing and began going by her middle name, Diane. At 14, against her parents’ wishes, she got into a relationship with 16-year-old Steven Downs, who lived across the street.
After high school, Steven joined the Navy and Diane attended Pacific Coast Baptist Bible College. After only one year, she was expelled for promiscuity and went back to live with her parents. Nonetheless, the two continued their long-distance relationship until November 1973, when Steven came home from the Navy. Diane ran away from home and the two were married.
The marriage was rocky from the start. They fought about money and Steven’s suspicions that Diane was cheating on him. Diane often left Steven and went back to her parents, but they would always reconcile.
In 1974, despite the problems in their marriage, they had their first child, Christie. Diane stated that she didn’t consult Steven about getting pregnant, she just did it. A year later, she gave birth to their second child, Cheryl. According to Steven, she was “the only woman I know who gets pregnant to cheer herself up.” But as much as she enjoyed pregnancy, she didn’t seem to enjoy actually raising children. “She treated the kids like crap,” he said.
At this point, Steven decided he didn’t want any more children, and, probably feeling he couldn’t trust Diane to continue using birth control, he had a vasectomy. Diane got pregnant again anyway, but terminated it.
In 1978 they moved to Mesa, Arizona. There, Diane engaged in multiple affairs with her coworkers and became pregnant yet again. This time she carried the child to term, and in December 1979, Stephen Daniel (“Danny”) was born. Steven accepted Danny, even though he knew he was not his father.
But less than a year later, Steven and Diane divorced.
Diane spent the next few years bouncing from man to man, moving in with one after another, and occasionally trying to reconcile with Steven.
In order to support herself, she tried to become a surrogate mother but failed two separate psychiatric exams — one of which indicated that she was psychotic. She found this extremely funny and would often brag to friends about it.
In 1981, she finally got a full-time job as a postal carrier in Arizona. While she was at work, she would usually send the children to stay with various family members. But the neighbors voiced their concerns about the kids’ well-being when they were with their mother. They said the children were often hungry and would beg for food; in cold weather, they wouldn’t have coats or appropriate shoes. They said if Diane couldn’t find a sitter, she would leave 6-year-old Christie alone in charge of the children. One neighbor said that Cheryl had told her that she was afraid of her mother.
Despite this, later that year, she was finally accepted into a surrogate program where she earned $10,000 for carrying a child and surrendering it to adoptive parents.
It was also during this time that Diane met and fell in love with her coworker Robert (“Nick”) Knickerbocker. | https://delanirbartlette.medium.com/diane-downs-hungry-like-the-wolf-c127a228e8f7 | ['Delani R. Bartlette'] | 2019-05-20 13:01:01.407000+00:00 | ['True Crime', 'Crime', 'Murder', '80s', 'History'] |
Why It’s Important To Follow Publication Guidelines | I run 2 of my own publications and am an editor for 3 others. It’s both rewarding and frustrating at the same time. Of course, the majority of the editors on this platform are doing all of this for free. We don’t get paid to be editors. We’re doing it because we like it and find some kind of fulfilment.
For the publications that I own, I’m the sole editor and have to vet through all the submissions. At the moment, my publications are not that big so submissions are still manageable. It works well for me because I do have a full-time job and I’m only on Medium 2–3 hours a day at the most. That’s the time I use to go through submissions, read, as well as write my own articles.
My time on Medium is always used to its maximum and that’s why when I’m in editor mode, I prefer when things are made easier for me.
That’s why it’s important to follow publication guidelines that have already been set out beforehand.
You won’t annoy the editors
Most of the time, publications have their own way of requesting to be a writer for them. Some would require to email the editor personally with a draft article so that they can gauge your level as a writer and decide if you’re a good fit for their publication or not.
Others are a bit more simple (like mine) where you just leave a comment in the comments section and state that you’d like to be a writer.
But even so, I’ve had many writers who can’t even seem to follow that. Instead, they leave personal comments all of the place saying they want to be a writer and I’d have to look for where exactly they left the comment just to read it. That’s why the instructions were to leave a comment in the comments section, not a personal note.
Formating of articles and submissions of articles are also not consistently followed. A lot of publications prefer unpublished drafts and formatted in a certain way. Still, plenty of writers submit articles that are already published (some even months ago) and do not follow the formatting which has already been set out.
This is the reason why you’d get rejected. Editors just won’t have the time (or patience) if you can’t even follow simple instructions.
You either leave a good impression or a bad one of yourself
First impressions are everything they said and although I beg to differ, it does play a very important role in how you’re viewed after.
If you’re applying to be a new writer in a publication, it won’t hurt to give a nice introduction of yourself and why you’d like to write for them. A short one would suffice like your name, the topics that you write in and the reason why their publication attracts you as a writer.
Don’t be rude as you may just be ignored. I’ve received requests from writers that just says “Add me as a writer!” and nothing else. No username, no introduction, no ‘please’ or ‘thank you’. Depending on my mood when I received requests like those, I might still accept or just ignore it completely.
Just because you’re online, it doesn’t mean you don’t need to show any form of good ethics. Actually, because a lot of things are now online, your online persona/ethics are just as important as your real-life one. If anything, I would think that you’re just the same in real-life.
If you’re gonna leave an impression on others — especially a first impression — make sure it’s a good one.
You may just put yourself way down in the pecking order
When a publication grows, so will its readers, writers, and most importantly, its submissions. The bigger the publication, the more submissions it may receive. This in return will increase your wait time.
Some big publications like The Ascent and The Startup receive thousands of submissions EVERY SINGLE DAY. You can imagine the headache the editors get going through each and every one of them.
Whenever I submit to them, I’d give them at least 2 weeks to respond. If I’m lucky, I’d get a response earlier on whether my article is accepted or rejected. If I’m not so lucky, I won’t get a single word from them at all. And this is by following all of their submission guidelines and never getting on their bad side.
Imagine if you’ve gone against their guidelines a couple of times. Chances are, you may be on a list of ‘bad’ or ‘problematic’ writers. It’s not to say that you won’t get published anymore (although that could also happen) but you may be last on their list to be published. It’s the same with anything in life. The more you screw up, the fewer people will like you or want to do a favour for you.
So don’t screw up.
Publications have guidelines for a reason. It’s to help the process of application and submissions, and at the end of the day, it’s to help writers such as yourself to get published with them.
If you don’t or can’t follow these guidelines, don’t be surprised if you find it difficult to be published in the publications that you want to publish for.
Of course, you can always create your own publication and do whatever you want with it and no one will say anything. But if you want to get published in publications own by others, please follow all the guidelines that have already been set out. | https://medium.com/the-partnered-pen/why-its-important-to-follow-publication-guidelines-59b946d97684 | ['Benny Lim'] | 2020-10-19 16:12:26.089000+00:00 | ['Writing Tips', 'Publication Guidelines', 'Writing On Medium', 'Publication', 'Ｍedium'] |
Linear Regression with Gradient Descent | I also calculate the summary statistics for each variable with just one line of code!
Now, I interpret the above two histograms:
Histogram of TV Ad spending: The distribution of TV Ad spending is symmetric. The mean and median are very close in value. TV Ad spending follows a uniform distribution with a mean of 147. The center is close to 150. The typical deviation in TV Ad spending from the mean is about 85.9 units. There is a large variability in TV Ad spending. We cannot see observations outside the overall pattern.
The distribution of TV Ad spending is symmetric. The mean and median are very close in value. TV Ad spending follows a uniform distribution with a mean of 147. The center is close to 150. The typical deviation in TV Ad spending from the mean is about 85.9 units. There is a large variability in TV Ad spending. We cannot see observations outside the overall pattern. Histogram of sales: The distribution of sales is single-peaked (unimodal) and symmetric. The mean and median are close in value. Sales approximately follow a normal distribution with a mean of 14.02. The center is close to 13. The typical deviation in sales from the mean is about 5.2 units. Variability in sales is not very large. There are no observations outside the overall pattern.
Another type of graph that we create is boxplot. A boxplot provides a graphical representation of 5-Number Summary — MINIMUM, Q1, Median, Q3 and MAXIMUM.
Boxplots are very useful in detecting outliers. As you can see in the above boxplots, there are no outliers present in our data. This is because there are no data points beyond the range of 1.5*IQR from Q1 and Q3.
Model building and model evaluation
The goals are to build the simple linear regression model that solves the problem, determine how good the model is in providing the solution and verify the assumptions of the model.
The general form for a simple linear regression model
𝜃0 , 𝜃1: Model parameters
, Model parameters y: Response variable or ℎ𝜃(𝑥): Hypothesis function
Response variable or Hypothesis function x1: Predictor
Predictor 𝜖: Error term (Residual)
Linear regression assumptions
The predictors and response are linearly related — We’ve checked this assumption in the EDA section. Now, it is OK!
related — We’ve checked this assumption in the EDA section. Now, it is OK! The residuals (observed values-predicted values) are approximately normally distributed with the mean 0 and a fixed standard deviation — We’ll verify this assumption by drawing a histogram of residuals.
The residuals are uncorrelated or independent — We’ll verify this assumption by drawing a residual plot.
The cost function (Mean squared error function)
m: Number of training examples
Number of training examples x(i): x-value of ith training example
x-value of ith training example y(i): y-value of ith training example
y-value of ith training example J(θ0, θ1): Cost function or mean squared error function
To break it apart, you can think this equation as 1/2 * (x-bar) where x-bar is mean of the squares of the difference between the predicted values and the actual values. The 1/2 term is for convenience for the computation of the gradient descent, as the derivative term of the square function will cancel out the 1/2 term.
The goal is to minimize the above cost function so that we can find the optimized values for the model parameters. By using those values, we can fit the best possible straight line to the data.
In this tutorial, I will discuss three different approaches to find the optimized values for the model parameters.
Approach 1: Linear Regression with Gradient Descent
Here I use Python and its numpy module along with the gradient descent algorithm to find the optimized values for the model parameters. Here we do not use the popular Scikit-learn Machine Learning library. So, this is a great way to have a deeper understanding of behind the scene process or the inner machinery of Linear Regression.
The gradient descent algorithm
The gradient descent algorithm is an optimization algorithm that can be used to minimize the above cost function and find the optimized values for the linear regression model parameters. This can also be applied for more general problems like multiple linear regression problems with 100 or 1000 predictors, although we use it here with just one predictor. For just two parameters (as in simple linear regression), the gradient descent algorithm is:
:= notation: Assignment operator. In programming, it is just = notation.
Assignment operator. In programming, it is just notation. 𝛼: Learning rate. It is a fixed value.
Learning rate. It is a fixed value. Derivative term: The partial derivative of the cost function J(θ0, θ1) for j=0 and 1.
After we partially differentiate the cost function J(θ0, θ1) for j=0 and 1, the algorithm is:
Now we follow the below steps to implement the gradient descent to our simple linear regression model.
Step 1: Start with some initial guesses for θ0, θ1 (usually θ0 = 0, θ1 = 0).
Step 2: Choose a good value for 𝛼.
Step 3: Simultaneously update the values of θ0, θ1 to reduce the cost function J(θ0, θ1) until we hopefully end up at the minimum.
Now you may have questions like these:
How do I choose a good value for 𝛼 ?
? How do I know whether the algorithm ends up at the minimum?
Choosing 𝛼 (Learning rate)
we should adjust the value of α to ensure that the gradient descent algorithm converges in a reasonable time. Failure to converge or too much time to obtain the minimum value implies that our α is wrong.
If α is too small, the gradient descent can be slow. It will require more iterations (hence time) to reach the minimum.
The learning rate is too small
If α is too large, the gradient descent can overshoot the minimum. In that case, it may fail to converge or even diverge. If this happens when you run your Python code, NaN values are returned for θ0, θ1. In that case, you should decrease the value of α and run the algorithm again.
The learning rate is too large
Confirming that the algorithm ends up at the minimum
If you choose a good value for α and run the algorithm enough iterations, the algorithm will end up at the minimum. The best way to confirm this is to plot the values of cost function over iterations of gradient descent. You should see a monotonically decreasing function (a function that is always decreasing or remaining constant and never increasing) like this:
At the minimum, the derivative will always be 0 and thus the value of the cost function will not be changed. The cost at the last iteration is the minimum cost and the parameter values associated with that cost are the optimized θ values.
Global minimum and local minimum
Many cost functions have a local minimum as well as a global minimum as shown in the following image:
Fortunately, the MSE cost function for a Linear Regression model happens to be a convex function which has just one global minimum, but no local minima. So, Gradient Descent is guaranteed to approach the global minimum (if you wait long enough and if the learning rate is not too high).
Feature scaling
If the predictors have very different scales, you must do feature scaling before running the gradient descent algorithm. If you run the algorithm without feature scaling, it will take a very long time to reach the global minimum.
No need to do feature scaling if there is only one predictor variable.
Do feature scaling if predictors have very different scales such as 1:100, 1:1000, etc.
Do feature scaling only for predictors. No need to apply feature scaling for the response variable even if it has a very different scale.
A common technique for feature scaling is mean normalization which involves subtracting the average value for an input variable and divide that result by the standard deviation of that variable.
That’s it. You have just learned two algorithms in Machine Learning: Simple Linear Regression and Gradient Descent. Now, It is time to implement those algorithms to our problem by writing Python codes. Good knowledge of Python and numpy library is highly recommended to understand the process.
Step 1: Define X, y, theta and m
Step 2: Compute the Cost 𝐽(𝜃)
Now, I define a function called cost_function which takes the inputs X, y and theta and returns the cost.
Now I calculate cost when all the parameters are zero (when parameter matrix theta contains the elements all zero).
The cost is approximately 111.86. Mathematically, this is the cost associated with the line which coincides with the x-axis. This line is not the fitted regression line. From the scatterplot that I created before, the fitted regression line should have a positive slope (𝜃1 > 0). So, we can further minimize the cost by adjusting the values of model parameters.
Step 3: Run the Gradient Descent
First, I define a function called gradient_descent() which takes the inputs X, y, theta, alpha, iterations and returns the theta and costs array.
Now, I run the gradient descent.
The cost associated with the above theta values is:
If the value of the alpha is not too high and if we run the algorithm enough iterations, the returned theta values are the optimized values for the model parameters and the last element of the returned costs array is the minimum cost. We can confirm this from a graphical visualization.
Step 4: Plot the Convergence
So, Gradient Descent has reached the global minimum. The returned theta values are the optimized values for the model parameters and the minimum cost (squared error) is about 5.26.
Step 5: Train the model for making predictions
Now, we can use the optimized values of theta to train the model for making predictions. First, I round the parameter values to the 3rd decimal place.
The interpretation for 𝜃1 is: For a $1 increase in TV advertising spend, the sales will increase by $48 (this is because sales are in 1000s of US dollars).
The interpretation for 𝜃0 is: Without any TV advertising spend, a particular product will have a sale of $7025 (this is because sales are in 1000s of US dollars).
First 5 observations:
Last 5 observations:
It works, although the predictions are not exactly accurate.
To make a prediction for a value that is not in our dataset, we can use the predict() function which is a user-defined function. This function is user friendly because you need to just pass the x-value to it and the function will do the rest for you.
The predicted sales for the TV advertising spending of $30 is approximately 8.45 y units.
Step 6: Fit the regression line
Now, I fit the regression line manually.
Step 7: Evaluate the model performance
Now, I use the Root Mean Squared Error (RMSE) and the R-squared (R²-coefficient of determination) as the key metrics of model performance to evaluate the regression model.
With only one predictor, R² = r², where r is the Pearson correlation coefficient between sales and TV advertising.
The form for the Root Mean Squared Error (RMSE) is:
RMSE is the square root of the Mean Squared Error (MSE). The RMSE can be interpretable in y units. Smaller values for RMSE are better and the best value we can get (the perfect model) is 0.
R² value is 0.61. It means that 61% of the variability observed in the sales is explained or captured by our model and the other 39% is due to some other factors and, of course, randomness! With R²=0.61, the model is not actually very good. This means we have room for improvement of the model by including multiple predictors.
RMSE value is 3.24. It means that on average, the predictions of the model are 3.24 units away from the actual values. 3.24 is a better value for our model.
As a graphical method, we can use a prediction error plot to evaluate the regression model.
In the perfect model, all the points should be on a straight line. In general, the predictions follow the actual sales. That is good.
Step 8: Verify the assumptions
We have made some assumptions for linear regression. Now, it is time to verify them.
Assumption: The residuals (observed values-predicted values) are approximately normally distributed with the mean 0 and a fixed standard deviation — We’ll verify this assumption by drawing a histogram of residuals.
By looking at the histogram, we can verify that the residuals are approximately normally distributed with mean 0. The mean of the residuals is -0.061 which is very close to 0.
Assumption: The residuals are uncorrelated or independent — We’ll verify this assumption by drawing a residual plot.
From this plot, we can clearly see some kind of non-linear pattern between predictions and residuals. Ideally, we should not see any pattern in this plot; the presence of the pattern means that we are not using all the information in the features to predict the outcome. This means we have room for improvement.
Approach 2: Linear Regression with the Scikit-learn LinearRegression estimator
Here we are using the popular Scikit-learn Machine Learning library. So, we can train the model very easily. The algorithm using here is Singular-Value Decomposition (SVD).
Step 1: Define X and y
Step 2: Split the dataset into a training set and a testing set
Instead of training the model using all of the rows in the dataset, I’m going to split it into two sets, one for training and one for testing. To do so, I use the train_test_split() function (which is in the model_selection submodule in Scikit-learn library). This function allows you to split the dataset into random train and test subsets called X_train, X_test, y_train and y_test. The following code snippet splits the dataset into a 75% training and 25% testing set. The random_state parameter of the train_test_split() function specifies the seed used by the random number generator. If this is not specified, every time you run this function you will get a different training and testing set. To get the same training and testing sets across different executions, you can specify this parameter with any integer. The popular integers are 0, 1 and 42.
Step 3: Create and fit (train) the model
Now we can create a simple linear regression model for our data. For this, we can use Scikit-learn LinearRegression estimator. You can think a Scikit-learn estimator as a machine learning algorithm. To build a linear regression model using this estimator, all you need to do is to create an instance of LinearRegression() class and use X_train, y_train to train the model using the fit() method of that class.
Now, the variable model is an instance of the LinearRegression() class. To train the model, we can use the fit() method of that class.
That’s it. We have just trained our model. Now, it is time to make some predictions. Before that, it is important to view the Gradient (Slope) and Intercept of the linear regression line.
Step 4: Get the Gradient and Intercept of the linear regression line
Intercept: We use the intercept_ attribute.
We use the intercept_ attribute. Gradient (Slope): We use the coef_ attribute.
The values are slightly different from the values of the model parameters that we obtained earlier using the gradient descent algorithm.
Step 5: Make predictions
Once we have fitted (trained) the model, we can start to make predictions using the predict() method. We pass the values of X_test to this method and compare the returned (predicted) values called y_pred with y_test values.
It works, although the predictions are not exactly accurate.
To make a prediction for a value that is not in our dataset, we can also use the predict() method. We pass the x-value to this method. The x-value should be in the form of a 2d array-like object such as a 2D numpy array, a DataFrame or even a Python lists of lists.
The predicted sales for the TV advertising spending of $30 is approximately 8.35 y units. We can verify the predicted value by using the linear regression formula that was given earlier:
The results are exactly the same.
Step 6: Evaluate the model performance
Earlier, we calculated the Root Mean Squared Error (RMSE) and the R-squared (R²-coefficient of determination) to evaluate the regression model. Here we also calculate them but with using Scikit-learn metrics submodule.
As a graphical method, we can use a prediction error plot to evaluate the regression model. This time, I use the Yellowbrick module to make the plot.
Ideally, the plot should be a straight line but for now, it is good enough. We can compare this plot against the 45-degree line, where the prediction exactly matches the model.
A short introduction to Yellowbrick
Yellowbrick is a suite of visual analysis and diagnostic tools designed to facilitate machine learning with scikit-learn. Yellowbrick extends the Scikit-learn API to make machine learning visualizations easier. It has two primary dependencies: scikit-learn and matplotlib.
The primary interface of this library is the Visualizer — an object that learns from data to produce a visualization. Visualizers are scikit-learn estimator objects and have a similar interface along with methods for drawing. In order to use visualizers, you simply use the same workflow as with a scikit-learn model, import the visualizer, instantiate it, call the visualizer’s fit() method, then in order to render the visualization, call the visualizer’s show() method. If you’re in a Jupyter notebook, the image should just appear in the notebook output. If you’re in a Python script, a GUI window should open with the visualization in interactive form. However, you can also save the image to disk by passing in a file path as follows:
The extension of the filename will determine how the image is rendered. The popular image formats are .png and .pdf which are commonly used for high-quality publication-ready images.
Note: Data input to Yellowbrick is identical to that of scikit-learn. Datasets are usually described with a variable X — feature matrix and y — target vector. X is a two-dimensional matrix with a shape of (n, m), where n is the number of instances (rows) and m is the number of features (columns). X can be a Pandas DataFrame, a 2d NumPy array, or even a Python lists of lists. y is a vector (a one-dimensional array) with shape (n, ). y can be a Pandas Series, a Numpy array, or a Python list.
Among the most popular visualizers include in Yellowbrick, I use the following regression visualizations.
PredictionError(): Draws a prediction error plot shows the actual targets from the dataset against the predicted values generated by our model. This allows us to see how much variance is in the model. Data scientists can diagnose regression models using this plot by comparing against the 45-degree line, where the prediction exactly matches the model.
Draws a prediction error plot shows the actual targets from the dataset against the predicted values generated by our model. This allows us to see how much variance is in the model. Data scientists can diagnose regression models using this plot by comparing against the 45-degree line, where the prediction exactly matches the model. ResidualsPlot(): Draws a residual plot that shows the difference in residuals of training and test data. Residuals, in the context of regression models, are the difference between the observed value of the target variable (y) and the predicted value (ŷ), i.e. the error of the prediction. The residuals plot shows the difference between residuals on the vertical axis and the dependent variable on the horizontal axis, allowing you to detect regions within the target that may be susceptible to more or less error.
Step 7: Verify the assumptions
To verify the assumptions of our linear regression model, I create the histogram distribution of residuals and the residual plot in the same graph using the Yellowbrick module.
We can verify that the residuals are approximately normally distributed. But we can clearly see some kind of non-linear pattern between predictions and residuals.
Approach 3: Linear Regression with the Normal Equation
The Normal Equation
To find the value of θ that minimizes the cost function, there is a mathematical equation that gives the result directly. This is called the Normal Equation.
In this equation:
θ: Parameter matrix which contains optimized values. It is returned as a 2d numpy array. The shape is (n+1, 1) where n is the number of predictors.
Parameter matrix which contains optimized values. It is returned as a 2d numpy array. The shape is where is the number of predictors. X: Feature matrix. It is represented as a 2d numpy array. The shape is (m, n+1) where n is the number of predictors and m is is the number of training examples (rows/observations). The elements of the first column are all set to ones. This is to accommodate the intercept term.
Feature matrix. It is represented as a 2d numpy array. The shape is where is the number of predictors and is is the number of training examples (rows/observations). The elements of the first column are all set to ones. This is to accommodate the intercept term. y: Target vector. It is represented as a 2d numpy array to match the dimension. The shape is (m, 1) where m is the number of training examples (rows/observations).
Computational Complexity
The Normal Equation computes the inverse of X.transpose() * X, which is an (n + 1) × (n + 1) matrix (where n is the number of predictors). With the normal equation, computing the inversion has complexity O(n³). So if we have a very large number of predictors, the normal equation will be slow. In practice, when n exceeds 10,000 it might be a good time to go from a normal solution to the gradient descent.
The Singular Value Decomposition (SVD) approach used by Scikit-Learn’s LinearRegression class is about O(n²). If you double the number of predictors, you multiply the computation time by roughly 4. The gradient descent approach is about O(kn²). If you double the number of predictors, you multiply the computation time by roughly 4*k.
Both the Normal Equation and the SVD approach get very slow when the number of features grows large (e.g., 10,000). On the positive side, both are linear with regard to the number of instances in the training set (they are O(m)), so they handle large training sets efficiently, provided they can fit in memory.
Calculate optimized θ values using the normal equation
The optimized parameter values are very similar to the values obtained in approach 1 — Linear Regression with Gradient Descent.
Summary
Here is the comparison between the gradient descent and the normal equation.
What is next?
With R²=0.61, our model is not actually very good. From the residual plot, we have seen some kind of non-linear pattern between predictions and residuals. All these things suggest that we are not using all the information in the predictors to predict the outcome. This means we have room for improvement of the model by including multiple predictors.
Earlier I said, “The predictive analytics process is an iterative process in which you will always find yourself going back and forth between the steps to build a better model which captures a great amount of variability in your data”. I’ll go to step 1 and change the problem definition to “Build a Multiple Linear Regression Model to predict sales based on all important predictors”. Then I will follow other steps to finalize the model.
So, in the next article, I’ll discuss how to create a multiple linear regression model to predict sales by including all important predictors in the Advertising dataset. I’ll also discuss feature selection techniques there. Goodbye for now!
This tutorial was designed and created by Rukshan Pramoditha, the Author of Data Science 365 Blog.
Technologies used in this tutorial
Python (high-level programming language)
(high-level programming language) numpy (numerical Python library)
(numerical Python library) pandas (Python data analysis and manipulation library)
(Python data analysis and manipulation library) matplotlib (Python data visualization library)
(Python data visualization library) seaborn (Python advanced data visualization library)
(Python advanced data visualization library) Yellowbrick (Machine learning visualization library)
(Machine learning visualization library) Scikit-learn (Python machine learning library)
(Python machine learning library) Jupyter Notebook (Integrated Development Environment)
Mathematics used in this tutorial
Linear algebra
Partial derivative
Machine learning used in this tutorial
Linear regression algorithm
Gradient descent algorithm
Project management used in this tutorial
The concept of Work Breakdown Structure (WBS)
Analytics used in this tutorial
Predictive analytics process
2020–06–14 | https://medium.com/data-science-365/linear-regression-with-gradient-descent-895bb7d18d52 | ['Rukshan Pramoditha'] | 2020-06-14 14:28:33.284000+00:00 | ['Machine Learning', 'Data Science', 'Gradient Descent', 'Predictive Analytics', 'Linear Regression'] |
Pretentious Previews: Dear Ex | In the third part of this series of movie reviews I discuss Dear Ex, a 2018 Taiwanese film by two female writer-directors, Mag Hsu and Hsu Chih-yen. The film centers on the conflict that arises when teen Song Cheng-Xi’s father dies and leaves his male lover as the insurance beneficiary on his will. The plot summary and title hints at how essential relationships are in this film. With its central cast of four the film builds a masterful and at times both humorous and emotional dynamic. Whether examining the relationship between the Cheng-Xi and his mother or the relationship between the mother and her ex-husband’s lover this film fully dives into what it means to be family.
The film also has a simple beauty to it in its cinematography. It brings the city into the film. Taiwan is the first Asian country to legalize gay marriage and I believe it is important that the country and culture be showcased in this film to help a foreign audience better understand the country and its people. This is in no way a film catered to a western audience but rather a journey for the foreigner into the life of one family in Taiwan.
One of my favorite details of the film is the costume design for Ah Jie, the male lover. He is perhaps the character we come to understand the best in this film as we watch his relationship with Cheng-Xi’s father and his own relationship with his mother. His character in both dress and personality is a wonderful mess. His clothes reflect a mixing of gender, as can be seen in the film poster with his mixing of lace and cargo shorts. When we first meet Ah Jie he is a rough character. Whether he is guarded from his recent loss or from an expectation of roughness from others is unknown. Through this film we see his heart-breaking devotion to Cheng-Xi’s father and the two-person family they create, defying Cheng-Xi’s father’s original adherence to the heterotypical family expected of him. The idea of family and what family means moves this film through its acts. From Chen-Xi’s mother’s often slightly neurotic devotion to him. To Ah Jie’s relationship with his mother. The film’s treatment of family is beautiful. | https://medium.com/@arenda3/pretentious-previews-dear-ex-e53352e29367 | ['Alicia Renda'] | 2020-03-18 19:35:18.226000+00:00 | ['Movie Review', 'Movies', 'Movie Streaming', 'Taiwan', 'Movies To Watch'] |
The Governor’s Hand | The Governor’s Hand
Examining the Discussion of Governors During the Coronavirus Pandemic
Ah, States’ Rights.
The 10th Amendment is my favorite of the Amendments — Amendment #1 in my heart.
“The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”
— Well written.
— Concise.
— Linguistically sexy.
The leadership of Governor’s during Coronavirus is on display, under attack, and in the spotlight.
A quick look at the conversation and interest around these leaders — a deeper dive into each to come individually.
Entities: Andrew Cuomo (NY), Gavin Newsom (CA), Mike Dewine (OH), Gretchen Whitmer (MI), Ron DeSantis (FL) | https://medium.com/listening-for-secrets-searching-for-sounds/the-governors-hand-a58a29fe39f4 | ['Adam Meldrum'] | 2020-04-19 14:57:32.109000+00:00 | ['Coronavirus', 'Google Trends', 'Governor', 'Social Intelligence'] |
How to Change Your Amazing Self for Good: Journaling & Intentional Gratitude | “Live your life like you are 80 years old looking back on your teenage years.” — Taylor Swift
Wow, I wouldn’t have expected that quote from a now-30-year-old. I’m not quite sure when Taylor Swift actually said that, but it is a statement packed with sound wisdom.
Why?
Because so frequently we forget the long-haul nature of life.
Photo by PublicDomainPictures on Pixabay
Granted, none of us know if we’ll have tomorrow. So learning how to truly be present every day (especially if you’re not so inclined) is a great gift we can give ourselves and others.
But recognizing we are building a life for the long haul (even if it does get cut short), means we gain a lot when we try to take the perspective, often, of our 80-year-old self.
This is one of the reasons I’ve come to believe in the power of journaling and expressions of gratitude, every single day.
My story, in brief
I’ve always loved journaling. But, truth be told, I’ve never been very good at it, especially with the consistency part.
Unlike many writers — introverts who have these well-developed inner lives — I am admittedly more of an extrovert by nature. It’s really been in the last five-ten years my “hidden introvert” has found a more prominent seat at the table of my life.
And I cherish that, actually. Quiet walks alone. Reading more consistently, and more often, enveloped in story. And writing. Oh, how I love, love, love to write!
I would officially consider myself an ambivert now.
Until 2019, I had been a haphazard journaler. I’d go for a stretch and then, suddenly, hit a barren patch. Then, when I’d restart journaling, I would be determined to start writing consistently every single day. Sadly, usually by Day 4 or 5, I would have missed a day.
And there goes the habit — as in, I’d throw that proverbial baby out with the bathwater. If it couldn’t be perfect, well, then — it wouldn’t be at all.
Photo by Stencil
Sadly, I’ve got too many unfinished journals filling up my shelves. And you can’t get rid of them, can you? I mean, after all, in them lie ideas and thoughts you cannot find anywhere else. Can you relate at all to this feeling?
Earlier in 2019, I joined a journal-writing challenge led by Chris Marr on SPAR (a social habit-building app), and it has been a game-changer for me. I have been consistently writing in my journal every single day since early May.
And, even though I decided to take a year-end break from SPAR (getting restarted in January), I’ve kept on with the habits because I truly just can’t live without it now.
If you are a long-term journaler, this may seem a meager accomplishment. But if you are anything like me, I hope what I share here will be an encouragement to you.
Making the change
This past year I’ve made a lot of changes. I wrote about some health and fitness changes here. But I believe foundational to these changes has been consistent journal writing as it’s helped me to know myself better, work through challenges, and consider the relationships in my life in new ways.
Currently the SPAR app is only available for iOS in the App Store. Maybe 2020 will see an Android version. Hope so!
The fact that this is done through a SPAR challenge gives me community all around the world to do this with. That alone makes it pretty fun.
And the accountability is supreme. You can lose money through SPAR if you don’t check-in, but you split the pot if you keep the habit going the full length of each challenge. This doesn’t work for everybody, but it works for me.
When I journal, I write for me.
It doesn’t have to be fancy or long. It doesn’t have to be profound (sometimes it is, sometimes not).
But it’s a record of my thoughts, my life.
And, even more importantly for me, it’s “hallowed space.” I really love visiting this “sacred space” every single day.
Here’s how I do it
For me, on most mornings it is the first thing I do after I work out (and shower, etc.). I’m fortunate because there’s this very cool coffee shop strategically located across from the sports center where I attend early morning classes several days a week.
Once I get situated, I find an excellent instrumental playlist on Spotify and then set my timer for 15–20 minutes.
I block everything and everybody out (almost always!). I go deep. I sometimes use prompts, but often I write about what’s going on in my life and then dig deeper about how I’m feeling, questions and doubts I’m pondering, etc.
Although I’ve been doing just free-form journaling this year, I’m intending to do more focused planning alongside this practice as well as bullet journaling in the year ahead. I want to experiment with the practice, now that I’ve determined I can’t let it go!
Cathedrals and stained glass in my mind — I enjoy the holy nature of journaling. Photo by Stencil
My personal faith as a follower of Jesus is important to me. I often (but not always) will use my journaling time as a way to communicate alternately with “Abba,” my Father (as if I’m sitting on his lap) or with Jesus, as if he’s sitting right next to me.
I love the holy nature of that moment, whether I’m writing to God or not.
And before I know it, I’m done! Sometimes, but not always, I wish I could go on and on. But the work of the day awaits. Still, I fit it into my day, and it feels so good.
Some people prefer writing in the evening, but I’ve found for me morning works better. I’m more alert and eager to pour out my heart, my ideas, right there on paper.
Intentional gratitude
Gratitude is yet another area I’ve focused on this past year. I’ve been in a SPAR challenge led by Jeffrey Everage to express gratitude for a full recorded minute within the SPAR app. This experience, too, has been incredible.
Yes, it’s true — sometimes my profundity is lacking. I can get repetitious at times. But sometimes I can pull out things for which I’m thankful and had no idea were floating around in my subconscious.
Sometimes I focus on simple, everyday things we often take for granted: the air filling my lungs, the sunshine on my cheek, the ability to connect with another human being.
For me, personally, a daily gratitude focus is so powerful. And studies show the impact of a consistent practice of gratitude speaking (or writing) on overall well-being.
Honestly, it’s such a simple thing. Your expression of gratitude can be spoken or written, or both. It can also be sketched or danced, I suppose. Main thing is to simply do it! Expressing gratitude ushers in health, growth, perspective and a greater humility.
Wrapping up
These two practices have made a huge difference in my life over this past year. They are simple and take a combined maximum total of 30 minutes each day. Of course, you can make it shorter or longer, depending upon your circumstances and needs.
But that small amount of invested time can lead to huge dividends in your mental, emotional and spiritual health.
You also have a record of your thoughts, feelings, and activities for the year.
Both journaling and intentional expressions of gratitude can lead to an improvement in your relationships as well — the spillover effect that, ultimately, adds to betterment in our world.
Aren’t you worth that much? Aren’t your relationships as well?
© 2019, Caroline DePalatis. All rights reserved. | https://medium.com/publishous/how-to-change-your-amazing-self-for-good-journaling-intentional-gratitude-3a0685798b73 | ['Caroline Depalatis'] | 2019-12-31 11:01:01.367000+00:00 | ['Personal Growth', 'Gratitude', 'Journaling', 'Habit Building', 'Self Improvement'] |
Max and Erica Scherzer sponsor adoption fees for 11 animals at DC shelter | “During the season of giving, Washington Nationals pitcher Max Scherzer and his wife, Erica Scherzer, are sponsoring the adoption fees for 11 animals that have been under the care of the Humane Rescue Alliance through Dec. 31.
The animals selected have been with the organization for the longest, ranging from 51 days to over a year.
Stephanie Shain, executive vice president and chief operating officer at the Humane Rescue Alliance, said that by dropping the fee, the animals will start the new year at a ‘home with a family of their own.’
‘Max and I know this year and holiday season have been particularly challenging for many community members, and we hope covering the fees for these special animals will help even more people discover the benefits of the human-animal bond,’ said Erica Scherzer, who is also a Humane Rescue Alliance board member, in a statement.”
View the whole story here: https://wtop.com/animals-pets/2020/12/max-and-erica-scherzer-sponsor-adoption-fees-for-11-animals-at-dc-shelter/ | https://medium.com/@tonycowger/max-and-erica-scherzer-sponsor-adoption-fees-for-11-animals-at-dc-shelter-51456d9459dc | ['Tony Cowger'] | 2020-12-28 12:25:31.282000+00:00 | ['Animals', 'News', 'MLB', 'Adoption', 'Donations'] |
Look Out, G*D — We’re About to Give Thanks | Look Out, G*D — We’re About to Give Thanks
Please don’t smite us
G*D, I just want to apologize in advance for the annual torrent of “thanks” you’re about to hear from some of us, Your most privileged. Just between You and me, some of these “prayers of thanksgiving” just rub me the wrong way. I don’t know how You stand it.
There are so many ways that “giving thanks” becomes something else entirely. Plus, we’re always putting things on You that are really not Your fault at all. If I were You, I would find that pretty irritating after a while.
I wonder if people even know what they’re doing. I wish people would stop and think what they are saying.
You know what I’m talking about. (Of course, You do; my bad. Gosh, I’m always doing that.)
But I just have to get this off my chest.
A five-year old was asked to give the blessing at Thanksgiving, but she didn’t know what to say. Her dad prompted her, “Just say what you hear mommy say.” So the little girl bowed her head and said, “Oh, Lord, why did I invite all these people here?”
“Thank You for family and friends…”
We say this even though we were just trash-mouthing that same family and those same friends five minutes ago out behind the garage, because of their politics or their spouses or the side dish they brought, which, let’s face it, always sucks. Why can’t we be honest and say, “Thank You that we didn’t kill each other before the pie was served”?
“Thank You for this day of rest and togetherness…”
Who are we kidding? Half of us will be in a football coma, the other half will be cooking and cleaning and griping, somebody will get drunk, teenagers don’t want to be there at all, conversations will be episodic at best, and we’d better hope there isn’t a college student at the table to remind us that we are really celebrating a massacre. But thanks, G*D!
“We are so blessed!”
What does that even mean? I’m sorry, it just sounds smug to me. Most of what we think of as blessings are really just our dumb luck. But lots of people really want to believe You showered them with individual gold stars or something. I dunno. Maybe You did.
If You did, it seems to me You’d want us to be a little more modest about it. I could be wrong about that.
“Let’s go around the table and say what we’re thankful for!”
We start this spiritual arm-twisting on our kids early, in a noble effort to teach those ingrates not to take life and its wonders for granted.
I think I tried something like that on my family in recent years, out of some pious idea that we were becoming too blase or something. It killed that conversation in a hurry. They just looked at me like I was maybe having a stroke. I think they were about to ask me to raise my arm and do that F.A.S.T. test.
Plus, if you ask your grown kids to say what they are thankful for, it’s a blatant bid for a “Thanks for giving me life, mom!” They know it and you know it.
“Thank You for our new home/car/job/trip to Turks and Caicos…!”
That’s nothing but bragging. We do it all the time. Any time we want to brag about some new acquisition or accomplishment, why, we just give thanks to You! I don’t know if You’re sick of it, but I’ve got to hold back an eyeroll once in a while.
“Thank you for the pain and the challenges you have put in our path so that we can overcome them and become better persons...”
To be sure, this prayer often reflects an authentic moment of grace, when someone has in fact lived through sorrow or loss only to find You on the other side of their grief.
But sometimes I think we abuse it. Like when someone says, “Thank you, G*D, for helping me through my recent battle with the management of the yacht club, because everybody knows…etc.” Well, everyone believes their troubles are the worst.
“Thank You for giving us all the things that You have denied to all those other losers in the world…”
I mean, we don’t say it in so many words, but that’s what we mean, isn’t it? We thank You, and then we eat these huge feasts, and then we complain because we “feel fat,” and then we go spend a ton of money to celebrate Your Son’s being born into a poor family with no health insurance. On the other hand, they reportedly had transportation that ran on sustainable fuel.
G*D, let me just ask you, straight up: Is my gratitude to You really all I owe You for my privilege? By giving You thanks, am I really totally, completely off the hook for helping those 3 billion other people who live on less than $1.25 per day?
See, I ask You that, and I don’t get a straight answer. So all I can do is deal with my seesaw of emotions — now deep joy at the truly marvelous life I get to live, now deep anguish at how unfair it seems.
My family says I can Scrooge up any holiday.
Our family is celebrating Thanksgiving on Friday, not Thursday, for logistical reasons. I’m happy with that — we don’t do shopping crowds anyway, and it gives me today to share my snarly, snarky, judgy reflection that if we maintained an attitude of gratitude year-round, we wouldn’t have to vomit up so much gratitude at You today.
And it gives me time to fire off this post, to remind all of us to get up off of our entitled backsides and do something for the folks who have less. We will all start small, sure, because it makes us feel good.
But G*D, I hope we all remember to also keep doing the real work of changing the systems that are doing the injuries in the first place.
Meanwhile, I hope You know I’m thankful for having been born in this wealthy time and place, with this body and brain and privilege. Though I could have done without the neuro-diversity and the acne. Just saying.
And I thank You for the Word we hear from You, however imperfectly
Somehow, even across infinity, we have received Your Word, and when it rings true it brings us sharply to faith and laughter and love and tears. Today I thank You for one of the great stories we tell in Your name here in this space/time continuum. You know the one I mean — it’s the parable Jesus tells about the rich man, in our Bible in Luke 12:16–21.
I love this story, because I am not a nice person. I’ll paraphrase.
Rich guy has so much food he doesn’t know what to do with it. It’s right before Thanksgiving, and his refrigerator is so full, he can’t even put it all away. So he goes to the pre-Black Friday sales, and he buys extra refrigerators for his main house, and his lake house, and the condo in Tahoe, with free delivery and installation, because he’s a pretty savvy consumer.
And he sits back and says to his soul, ‘Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry.’
But then tornadoes rip through, and take out all three of his houses, and he’s left with nothing. And You say something like he’s a fool, because You can demand his life at any time, and then who is gonna eat that pie?
And Jesus ends the lesson by saying something like, “See? That’s how it goes for people who are rich on earth but not rich toward You.”
And I think, “Right on, Jesus! Tell that rich guy what’s what!”
And then I remember — uh-oh. I was thinking about getting a second refrigerator just last month. I’m the rich guy.
image by peggy cci on pixabay
So here are my real prayers.
I’ll bet other people have real prayers like mine; they’re just embarrassed to say them out loud. So I’ll start, in the interest of trying to help us all be a little more authentic.
Thank You for all the times I didn’t get caught speeding. There were a lot of those times.
Thank You for my kids not blaming me to my face for what I did wrong with them.
Thank You that my kids can afford therapy so they can work stuff out without blaming me to my face.
Thank You that the people who make DiamonDeb Nail Files still make them to last forever at a reasonable price and have not succumbed to the sin of planned obsolescence. I do not get any money for saying that.
Thank You for one day sober, added to nearly 20 years of sober days.
Thank You for a spouse who likes to read and cook and is a person of kindness and integrity who, like me, also does not like football.
Thank You for all the do-overs, because I’d really like to get right with You, because pleasant as it is, I’m aware this gig here is only a contract.
Oh, all right. Thank you for my dear family and friends, because they seem to love me anyway.
Thank You for the very slight chance that the human race will get its act together and survive and even flourish.
And thank You for making pie so easy. | https://medium.com/notes-on-the-way-up/look-out-g-d-were-about-to-give-thanks-31ee8b4f7381 | ['Rev Dr Sparky'] | 2019-12-05 09:00:30.607000+00:00 | ['Spirituality', 'Humor', 'Gratitude', 'Life', 'Thanksgiving'] |
The #1 Headline Blunder Every Writer Makes (we’ve all done it) | Note: As with all writing, there are no absolutes. There are exceptions to everything. So take this recommendation with a grain of salt, but I think you’ll be surprised how this simple tweak will make a big difference with your article click-through rates.
I see people make this dreadful shot-in-the-foot mistake all the time: a headline that starts with a gerund.
A gerund is a noun birthed from a verb by adding -ing to the end. Examples of gerunds at the beginning of headlines include:
Bringing the power of AMP to Gmail
Tackling Inequality With an Entrepreneur’s Eye
Making Interactive Art
Fostering Independence, One Student at a Time
Recovering from Historical Amnesia
This is a horrible mistake. And I want to show you why and how to fix it
If you analyze the top ten best performing headlines on Medium for each year since Medium was founded in 2013, you’ll find that only one of them starts with a gerund.
Have a look for yourself (thanks to Michael Deng for the resource):
In other words, the best blog post titles don’t start with a noun ending in “-ing”.
Every month, Inc. Magazine editors send out the top ten Inc.com headlines. It’s spurs healthy competition among the authors. These most successful pieces generate between 100k and 1M+ page views.
You will never find a gerund in these top headlines. I looked through all of 2017’s top headlines and didn’t find a single one.
Lastly, Austin-based marketing firm Buzzsumo analyzed 100 million headlines of articles shared on social media. According to the exhaustive study, they found the most popular first words that started headlines were as follows:
Not a single gerund.
The most successful and viral articles have headlines that do not start with a noun ending in “-ing.”
Look at the blogs of well-known companies: Evernote, Zapier, SurveyMonkey, Product Hunt, just to name a few, and you will rarely find a gerund at the beginning of the headline. These blogs know what they’re doing.
Why starting your headline with a word that ends in “-ing” is a big mistake
It may not seem like a big deal, but results show that if you want to write a top blog post you should drop the gerund starter. Here are the three reasons why:
First, headlines that start with a gerund are ambiguous. The reader can’t tell who the article is about, and for whom it’s written. The subject and audience are completely lost.
For example, consider this headline:
Creating a Healthy Organizational Culture
Who is creating a healthy org culture? We can’t tell.
And who should read this? CEOs? HR managers? Employees? Consultants? Nonprofits? Startups? Corporations? Clubs? It could apply to a number of different audiences and I doubt it’s written (well enough) for all of them, unless it’s a huge article.
Second, headlines that start with a gerund are not reader-centric. These unhelpful headlines come from the writer’s perspective, with little thought about how the reader will perceive it. The writer asks himself or herself, “What is my blog post about?” The answer to this questions is always a gerund. “Oh, well, it’s about launching our new iOS app.” “It’s about reviewing 2017 and looking ahead to 2018.” “It’s about solving the problem of poverty in third-world countries.”
And that’s exactly how the articles get their boring titles:
Launching Our New iOS App
Reviewing 2017 and Looking Ahead to 2018
Solving the Problem of Poverty in Third-World Countries
To fix this, think about how the reader will think, feel, or respond to reading the article. Make it about them and what they will learn and take away from the story. Take another look at the same headlines from above, but slightly modified:
This New iOS App Will Make You Sleep Better Than Ever Before
What 2017 Taught Us About Vulnerability and Why 2018 Will Be a Little Scary
4 Ways Cash-Poor Millennials Can Still Feed the Hungry in Uganda
Third, headlines that start with a gerund are weak. It’s passive voice and that’s a no-no, especially in headlines. Also, it’s time-insensitive. There’s no urgency to read the article. Lastly, it limits the most powerful word in the headline — the verb — to a bland generalization. Examples:
Changing the Way We View Horses
Cooking Like an Iron Chef
Breathing Freshness Into Your Tired Mind
Watch what happens when you drop the gerund and tweak these headlines.
Change the Way You View Horses in 2018
How to Cook Like an Iron Chef
This 10-Minute Exercise Breathes Freshness Into Your Tired Mind
Not perfect, but they’re stronger, sharper, and more effective.
4 tips to write captivating headlines that get more reads
The next time you sit down at the computer to think of the right headline for your freshly inked blog post, avoid asking yourself the trap question, “Well what is this about?” Instead follow these guidelines to make it more appealing to the readers passing by.
Create a “curiosity gap.” Inc. editors train us to write headlines that pique a reader’s curiosity to the point where they must learn the answer. Put tension or drama in the headline, but don’t cross the line into clickbait. The difference between a strong headline and clickbait is specificity. Clickbait is overhyped and sensational like this: You Won’t Believe What Trump Just Said. Whereas, a strong headline is specific and though-provoking: Trump Rails Against Border Wall Protests Calling Them ‘a Disgrace’. Say something that puts a question in the reader’s mind — a curiosity gap that will be satisfied by your article. Put “How to” in front. Many blog posts try to teach the reader something new. Instead of leading with a weak gerund, show the reader exactly what they’re going to learn. “How to” is a beautiful starting phrase for this because it’s focused on the reader and what the reader will learn. For example, Designing Logos with Illustrator — is unclear and a little boring — How to Design Logos with Illustrator — not perfect, but better. Pick a niche and be specific. Identify your audience in the headline. Take the example above about Illustrator. It doesn’t say whether it’s for beginning, experienced, or advanced designers. And there’s a ton of ground to cover in designing a logo. Pick a subtype (e.g., wordmark) and focus on that. And Illustrator? Have you seen how massive of a program it is? It takes people years to master it. Pick a tool or aspect (e.g., the pen tool) and focus on that. If your article is truly a book about a general topic, then say that in the headline with something like: The Solopreneurs Handbook: How to Design an Outstanding Logo in Illustrator. In the end, the more specific you can be, the better. Chop off the “-ing” and use the base verb to make it an imperative. Try this exercise: revisit your blog posts and ask: Do any of them start with a gerund? Shorten the verb into an imperative or a call to action. For example, Sending Direct Mail That Works would grip more people if it read Send Direct Mail That Actually Gets Read. Here, it’s more about the reader, than the writer. Throw a “How to” in front and you’ve got a nice headline.
Don’t feel bad if you’ve published an article with a gerund starter. It happens all the time and we’ve all done it. But if you want to write an incisive headline that sticks out from among the rest, try following the tips in this piece. I wish you success and thanks for reading.
Also, if you have any questions about headlines, feel free to ask in a response below. And if you learned something or if something resonated, I’d be grateful for your feedback and 👏 claps. Thank you! | https://entrepreneurshandbook.co/the-1-headline-blunder-every-writer-makes-weve-all-done-it-e1aa3563dff3 | ['Dave Schools'] | 2018-02-14 15:18:04.269000+00:00 | ['Creativity', 'Writing', 'Headlines', 'Content Marketing', 'Ideas'] |
Series: Letter to My Younger Self | Hey girl,
Listen, you feel alone right now I know that, but it won’t always feel like this. The kids at school are mean, the boys don’t like you that much and the ones that do only see your body. I’m so proud of you for holding your ground with them. I promise you that it will have been worth it. You’ll find people that love you for your heart and the things you think and the masterpieces you create. There will be a boy that will come into your life when you’re around 19 years old. He’ll seem like he’s everything but I promise you he’s not. Enjoy him, but don’t get too attached. You’ll sacrifice a lot for the sake of a connection and your sweet naive heart won’t see anything wrong with that.
I want you to fight a little bit more for your dreams. You have to work hard for the things you want, no matter how talented you are. Don’t worry about college, you’ll figure that out. For now, work out, eat healthy, and apply to modeling agencies everywhere. They love 16 year olds. You’ll feel a really deep sense of FOMO (fear of missing out) by missing parties and hangouts because you’re following your modeling dreams, but I swear you won’t have missed anything incredible. You’ll make a lot of friends and you’ll go far after high school. You will fall in love with so many incredible places and cities across the world. Don’t ever be afraid to leave. You’ll realize eventually that with courage, you can do anything. So for now try out for everything at school, talk to everyone, and follow your curiosity. I know the opinions of others seem loud and you’ll feel like you need their validation but you don’t! Not everyone around you was raised by a French mother with so much love, so be kind to others, even when they’re mean to you, you know?
Mom and Dad will stop fighting eventually, but for now, enjoy having them both around all the time. Dad is wounded, that’s why he yells. He doesn’t mean to scare you. When he finds out that’s how you feel, it’ll break his heart. Believe me when I say he loves you. You won’t see it right now but you will eventually. Sit and listen to Mamie and Papi more. They will seem to have gone quickly in between the excitement of being young and the freedom of summers in the South of France. Their love seems really intense, but you won’t find anything like it elsewhere. Ask them questions about everything and ask them about stories from when they were younger. They traveled a lot. Ask them about their trips and adventures. You’ll need those words later on when they’re no longer here. You’ll find that out when it’s a bit too late.
Don’t worry too much about your friends, they seem great, but you’ll learn the importance of loyalty and respect a little later. Be kind and people will like you for that, you’ll see. You’ll also have many friends from around the world someday. For now, hold on to the true ones you have in your life and don’t be afraid to leave a few.
Hold onto God and look to him for everything. Don’t start thinking you can do life without him, that part gets a different kind of hard. You’ll develop a thing called anxiety and you’ll try to run from that feeling, but it’ll stick with you wherever you go. You’ll learn how to deal with it. Some days you’ll be so angry it’s attached to you but you’ll learn how to help others with theirs. You’ll learn everything blissful about becoming a woman. There will be many seasons that don’t make sense, some in the worst ways and some in the best.
The biggest thing I want you to do right now is to simply do something everyday for the things you want in life, just wanting it isn’t good enough. Share the love you have with everyone you meet, and always know how blessed you are, no matter how little you might seem to have.
You will kick ass in life, at least until 22 years old. But from what I’m seeing so far it’s going to be good, dude.
Love ya, xx | https://substance.media/series-letter-to-my-younger-self-8fa910943e3a | ['Celia Vergon'] | 2020-12-09 05:33:05.685000+00:00 | ['Teenagers', 'Live Through This', 'Mental Health', 'Teens', 'Growing Up'] |
A Way Out of Washington’s Impasse Over Venezuela | Mike Pompeo, 70th United States Secretary of State.
Until now, Norwegian-facilitated negotiations to end Venezuela’s presidential showdown and long-suffering crisis have failed. Nicolás Maduro has yet to be overthrown in Venezuela. U.S. foreign policy towards Venezuela has turned out to be a disaster. To make things worse, President Trump still needs to save face in Venezuela before the presidential election later this year, even if the face-saving comes without President Maduro’s ouster. Although Donald Trump has denied being behind bungled the Venezuelan coup plot called ‘Operation Gideon’, his administration is still being encouraged to investigate the events and clarify its details.
Time has taught us that Donald Trump is a pragmatic politician and businessman. Even if they both have different ramifications and ways that players intrinsically judge them, business strategies are similar to political ones. The main goal of businesses is to make a profit, and governments’ goal is to ensure economic stability and growth. Trump is willing to change direction as long as it is profitable, necessary and high-returning. Long-term confrontation can be expensive and not very convenient. During the last few weeks United States President Donald Trump not only welcomed Mexican left-wing President López Obrador, but also said on July 10 that his administration believed that Venezuelan political figure Juan Guaidó was losing some power.
In spite of Trump administration’s Venezuela policy, Lopez Obrador’s Mexico has supported Maduro. Mexico has stood alone within the once 14-country Lima Group in not recognizing Venezuelan political figure Juan Guaidó. Before meeting Trump, Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said that he’d be willing to sell gasoline to Venezuela as a humanitarian gesture despite United States sanctions against the South American country. The prospect of a more united Latin American left has been growing since November 2019, when Fernández and AMLO started to discuss reviving CELAC, a regional diplomatic alternative to the Washington-backed Organization of American States (OAS).
On July 17, Donald Trump himself tweeted that John Bolton released massive amounts of Classified Information — material that a government body deems to be sensitive information that must be protected — in his book. Even if we have legitimate reasons not to believe everything Bolton has said, and he has yet to explain a great many of his motivations, the truth is that many of his statements make sense and seem to be factual. Bolton confessed that Donald Trump has never taken Juan Guaidó very seriously. By spring 2019, Trump was calling Guaidó the “Beto O’Rourke of Venezuela”. In November 2019, Trump called O’Rouke a poor bastard. Moreover, Bolton said that Trump doubted Maduro would fall, having said he was too smart and too tough. In sum, Trump’s opinion on Maduro was by far more positive than his view of Guaidó.
Numerous states still recognize Nicolás Maduro as president, as shown by Venezuela’s election to a seat on the UN Human Rights Council in a vote held on the 17th of October 2019. Even if Juan Guaidó is still recognized as the legitimate acting president by 58 countries, including the United States, the pressure has not been enough to dislodge Maduro. In fact, one should acknowledge that there is some gray area here, as India is a key strategic ally of both Venezuelan and United States governments. New Delhi has not recognized Juan Guaidó, and still remains as one of the most important strategic partners of the United States. It is worth to note that shared American and Indian concerns about a rising China’s behavior have been a significant driver of the United States-India partnership over the last two decades.
In Europe, it has become evident that some of the countries that recognize Juan Guaidó as interim president have provided some kind of economic aid to Maduro’s government. Consequently, Trump administration officials last year stressed that they were to push for financial sanctions against Spain for what they say was its financial support of Nicolás Maduro’s regime. According to the United States government, Nicolás Maduro was moving money through Spain’s Central Bank. Venezuela’s central bank was apparently relying on its Spanish counterpart to transfer and receive funds abroad at a time when U.S. sanctions have prompted many large banks and financial institutions to shy away from any actual or perceived dealings with Venezuelan entities. In an emailed statement, a Bank of Spain spokeman said the account kept by Venezuela was used to pay operating expenses related to the diplomatic relations between the two countries and the balance of the account was relatively small.
On the other hand, overcoming sinophobia and russophobia was one of the main challenges of the Venezuelan opposition. Not only their actions, but also their words, have aggravated the already-existing doubts of the U.S., Chinese and Russian administrations. Guaidó’s team did not build confidence among the Chinese and the Russians nor contribute to the conditions needed for a peaceful solution. Therefore, it is very likely that China, Russia, Cuba, Iran, Mexico, Nicaragua, India and Argentina will keep supporting Maduro, more or less.
According to a report from the Institute for Science and International Security, a nonpartisan Washington think tank focused on nuclear non-proliferation, 49 countries violated UN Security Council sanctions imposed on North Korea between March 2014 and September 2017. History tells us that a lot of United States allies aren’t following through on their promises when it comes to sanctions. There are very few reasons to think that things will be different this time. It is feasible that many countries, entities and enterprises will find a way to work with Venezuela under the table.
The Trump administration has just realized that Nicolás Maduro was not as dumb as some thought he was, nor are the opposition advisors as intelligent as they claim to be. The Venezuelan opposition has proven to be highly overpromising, optimistic, and ‘sensationalist’, but not very reliable and successful when it comes to veracity of the facts provided and fulfilling of promises made. The damage is already done, not only to Venezuela, but also to the Trump administration, which has lost credibility. Something new has to be done in Venezuela. There is a two-decade-long history of the United States government missing opportunities in the South American country, once the richest and most prosperous nation in the region.
Allies of the two political sides should press them to overcome their reluctance and return to the negotiating table. While this political power struggle unfolds, one of the major underlying concerns for the Venezuelan people is the dramatic ongoing crisis. Though the talks have so far been suspended, their resumption is still the best hope for averting a worsening crisis in Venezuela. As long as we do not set realistic expectations, it is very likely that prospect for a swift return to the table will continue to seem poor. Lastly, and perhaps, most importantly, this inaction is seriously damaging the U.S. reputation across the world. Rarely do things go as planned in revolutionary situations and holding back and waiting can sometimes make the difference between success and failure. What happens next in Colombia, Brazil and Venezuela will be a key factor in determining the direction and strength of the region’s political wave and trends.
-
Vicente Quintero
Vicente Quintero is a Venezuelan social scientist. He holds a Bachelor degree in Liberal Studies from the Universidad Metropolitana of Caracas (Political Science, Political Economy, History and Philosophy). He attended the Russian Language and Culture course of the Saint Petersburg State Polytechnic University (University Preparatory Academy). He is now pursuing a postgraduate degree in Government and Public Policy at the Central University of Venezuela, and has also enrolled in the Theologian Department of the South American Parish of the Moscow Patriarchate — not to be confused with ROC — . As a Venezuelan plastic artist, his artworks have been shown at the Alejandro Otero National Museum of Caracas. | https://vicentequintero.medium.com/a-way-out-of-washingtons-impasse-over-venezuela-92cc45465596 | ['Vicente Quintero'] | 2020-07-30 17:33:17.349000+00:00 | ['History', 'War', 'United States', 'Venezuela', 'Politics'] |
Star Wars Squadron Error → Game not starting on PC? Try this workaround. | INTRO
So if you are like me and enjoy buying video games around Christmas time, you might have come across the 40% sale of Star Wars Squadron on Steam. Like a good little capitalistic idiot I am, I purchased this game and install it.
PROBLEM/RANT
There is a bit of vulgarity in the next few paragraphs. #DealWithIt
The problem I ran into was that everytime I tried to start the game I would get an error from the piece of shit anti-cheat software called Easy-Anti-Cheat (EAC). Since EA Games is the type of business that even the devil himself won’t deal with, they have zero ambition in getting rid of this horrific anti cheat software.
This software is SO shitty, that it doesn’t even recognize people like me who use two hard drives for their games. So when EAC tries to load and can’t find the install, OR when it thinks my RGB programs are cheat programs running, it fails to load the game. Every. Single.Time. Fuck those developer right in the mouth. I hate bad code, and I hate bad developers. Get a different profession if you aren’t going to make the word a better place with your code. </rant>
Needless to say, this is VERY frustrating. I have read all over the internet about others being just has pissed off as I am about purchasing a game that you can’t play.
SOLUTION
The solution to at least get the game working for the story mode is as follows. This solution works for those who bought the game through Steam:
Go to the folder you have your game installed from Create a new text file named steam_appid.txt Inside this txt file, enter the following number:
1222730 Save and close the txt file. Then click on the starwarssquadrons.exe file to start the game As of Dec 25, 2020, this worked for me to get the game running. I think this also disables that bullshit of a program EAC.
Happy Playing! | https://medium.com/code-kings/star-wars-squadron-error-game-not-starting-on-pc-try-this-workaround-1bce1a352373 | ['Tony Mucci'] | 2020-12-26 09:14:17.189000+00:00 | ['Star Wars', 'Code', 'Hacking', 'Pc Gaming', 'Steam'] |
Life on a Dying Planet | Life on a Dying Planet
The planet we are living on is a beautiful place, as many of you will agree. It is home to oceans and forests, mountain ranges and deserts, wetlands and arctic plains. But the sights of our great Earth are deteriorating, fast. Climate change is making it increasingly difficult to sustain our global environment, and maintain its biodiversity.
In the north and south poles, it is steadily getting warmer, melting the snow and ice that the wildlife is innately accustomed to. The intense heat in the most beautiful forests in the world is causing them to ignite and burn until there is almost nothing left. Just within the months that our people endured a horrific pandemic, Mother Earth was healing. For the first time in years, China had reduced its air pollution so drastically that the blue of the sky was actually visible over Hong Kong. If people would continue to treat our home as well as they have been treating themselves, we could exponentially increase the amount of time that our precious planet has left.
This planet has been home to us for billions of years. It has given us life, and provided us with food and natural means of shelter and survival before we were civilized enough to create them for ourselves. The least we could do is show a little compassion to our literal and figurative roots. What keeps us alive needs to be kept alive, too. | https://medium.com/@karleempt/life-on-a-dying-planet-71aa658833bb | ['Karlee Pryor Thompson'] | 2020-12-21 04:30:43.694000+00:00 | ['Environmental Impact', 'Mother Nature', 'Climate Action', 'Climate Change'] |
How I automatically deployed Typescript to Elastic Beanstalk to speed up server-side development | How I automatically deployed Typescript to Elastic Beanstalk to speed up server-side development
Speed up your development process by auto-deploying Typescript code to EB!
A demo of Booktogether, an online publishing platform that I created the back-end for.
For my most recent team project Booktogether — an online publishing platform in Korean for book curations and reviews — I was responsible for server-side development using Typescript and Express, as well as deployment using AWS Elastic Beanstalk.
As I soon found out, manual deployment to EB was a tedious process. I was constantly compiling Typescript code to Javascript, compressing all the files into a .zip file, and uploading the compressed file to AWS.
That’s when I thought to myself, “is there any way I can speed up deployment, so I can just focus on writing working code?” After doing some digging online, I found this walkthrough by Aaron White that helped me set up AWS CodePipeline to send my code straight from Github to EB.
Side Note: A Common Error
Although I won’t go through configuration details of CodePipeline too deeply in this article, I would like to specify a problem that I encountered while setting up this auto-deployment system. When I originally pushed the server-side code (along with a build spec file) from Github to AWS, the EB console responded with the following error:
[Instance: i-12345] Command failed on instance. Return code: 1 Output: (TRUNCATED)…/opt/elasticbeanstalk/containerfiles/ebnode.py”, line 180, in npm_install raise e subprocess.CalledProcessError (TRUNCATED)
As I later realized, this error happened because of the npm install command that EB runs when code is deployed to the EC2 instance. Specifically, the installation of some packages trigger the node-gyp process, which is run by the default EC2 user.
The default user does not have permission to access some of the packages in the node_modules directory that npm install creates, which is why one needs to create a file called .npmrc in the project root and add the following:
# Forces node-gyp process to be run as root user, not ec2 default
unsafe-perm=true
Auto-deploying Typescript code to EB
Now back to the heart of the matter. When code is deployed to a Node.js environment in Elastic Beanstalk, node app is automatically called in order to initialize the server. However, because Node.js is a Javascript runtime environment, the Typescript code that I had written for my server would not run by default. I needed to compile my Typescript code first.
In order to accomplish this without having to manually upload my code as a .zip file, I had two options. The first was to simply compile Typescript code on my local machine using a command like npm run build , and then upload both Javascript and Typescript to my Github repository. This option, however, had two main drawbacks:
An extra step (executing npm run build ) would be added to the deployment process I would have to manage changes in both .js and .ts files in Github
Given these issues, I resorted to another option — specifically, the use of the .ebextensions directory. Files in this directory are used for advanced custom configuration of an Elastic Beanstalk environment. .ebextensions files are written in YAML or JSON format, with a .config file extension.
The config file I used in this case configured EB in such a way that the instance would compile all Typescript code to Javascript right after running npm install . Referencing the following article on Typescript compilation using .ebextensions, I created a file called source_compile.config in the .ebextensions directory and included the following script:
# source_compile.config
container_commands:
compile:
command: "./node_modules/.bin/tsc -p tsconfig.json"
env:
PATH: /opt/elasticbeanstalk/node-install/node-v10.15.3-linuxT-x64/bin/
The command tsc -p tsconfig.json tells EB to compile the Typescript project to Javascript given the configuration file tsconfig.json . If there is no outdir key specified in tsconfig.json , the compiled .js files will be located in the same locations as the corresponding .ts files.
Additionally, I needed to ensure the version of node specified in the PATH key was compatible with the node version used by my EB environment. If needed, one should change the node version (currently written as v10.15.3) and OS name used in the PATH key of the source_compile.config script above.
Having gone through all these steps, I once again merged changes into my main Github branch — and voilà! The server was up and running. | https://medium.com/quick-code/how-i-automatically-deployed-typescript-to-elastic-beanstalk-to-speed-up-server-development-22b89870e159 | ['Andrew Chung'] | 2019-12-21 16:17:11.979000+00:00 | ['Typescript', 'Deployment', 'Elastic Beanstalk', 'Nodejs', 'Servers'] |
The 2-Step Procedure To Cure Fear and Become a Confident Person | 2. Take action to cure your fear
You can cure every fear with taking the right action. Your action doesn’t have to be perfect. You’ll get to perfection with enough practice. For now, concentrate on taking actions.
You have to start somewhere. Everybody does. That “somewhere” is your first step to cure your fear.
Your fear is nothing but the attitude to a problem you’re facing.
Say you’re afraid of public speaking. But another guy you know kills it in public speaking. What do you think is the difference between you two?
It’s attitude.
Whenever you step onto the stage to speak, your hands shake and legs tremble. You can’t look at your audience in the eyes. All you do is take a quick glance at them and your heart beats faster.
Do you think the guy who’s a damn popular public speaker doesn’t have this stage fright? Does he not fear speaking in front of large gatherings?
Spoiler alert: everyone fears speaking in front of a large crowd. Even the ones who don’t admit that they do. But what separates them from the ones who suck at public speaking is the attitude.
The good news is, you can change your attitude by taking action. Act the way you want to feel. It’s more like fake it till you make it.
You give a big smile when you’re really amused by something or feel genuinely happy. “Feeling something” is the cause and “smiling big” is your reaction to it.
Psychologists say you can evoke the feeling if you can take the action which evokes that feeling.
Whenever you’re feeling down, give a big smile. You will feel happy instantly. This works in every situation where psychology is concerned.
Going back to our previous example, say, you’re afraid of public speaking. Now do exactly what a confident public speaker would do while giving his speech.
Stand with shoulder straight and legs apart, put your hands by your side, and look people in the eyes. You’ll instantly feel like a confident public speaker.
Now do the same to cure every fear you have and you’ll feel like a confident person.
Can’t talk to strangers? Do what a confident person — who’s good at talking to strangers — would do. Be the conversation starter. Say anything. What you say doesn’t matter. But saying does.
Your mind would fool with you by injecting all negative thoughts into your head. You’ll fear you might say something foolish? So what? Even if you do, that’s a start.
Don’t feel embarrassed making a fool of yourself. Just say whatever’s on top of your mind. Don’t think. It’s better not to let your thinking be a part of the conversation. That’s how you gain momentum.
Are you afraid of new settings? Put yourself into every new setting willingly. Go to unknown places full of strangers. Attend parties and large gatherings where you have to meet strangers. Go up to them. Start the conversation.
Can’t maintain eye contact while talking to someone? Challenge yourself to maintain eye contact for as long as you can.
Constant staring might make people feel awkward though. Maintain enough eye contact so that you don’t appear lacking confidence. When you have to look away, look at your sides. Don’t look down. Looking down makes you appear lacking confidence.
This way you can cure all fear relating stemming from lack of confidence. All you have to do is conjure up enough courage to take action.
Once you take action to cure your fear, it’ll become second nature. In time, you’ll become a confident person. | https://medium.com/the-blog-of-zehn-ninos/2-step-procedure-to-cure-fear-and-become-a-confident-person-9d6f67d5e034 | ['Zehn Ninos'] | 2020-12-19 15:30:59.678000+00:00 | ['Self Improvement', 'Confidence', 'Personal Development', 'Fear', 'Psychology'] |
7 quick Figma tips | Originally published at marcandrew.me
In this article I’ve compiled a handful of quick, and easy tips to help speed up your design workflow when working in Figma.
Most of these tips are perfect for when you’re working with design systems or large design files, but they’re also equally suited to just general day, to day usage when working inside of Figma.
Some you may use already, but hopefully you may find the odd undiscovered gem in here too.
Let’s dive on in… | https://uxdesign.cc/7-quick-figma-tips-113849e21d63 | ['Marc Andrew'] | 2020-12-14 11:03:34.520000+00:00 | ['UI', 'Figma', 'Design', 'Web Development', 'Prototyping'] |
A momentous day for tens of thousands of people with old and minor criminal records | The 28 November was a momentous day for tens of thousands of people with old and minor criminal records.
The stigma and embarrassment of a criminal record means many people simply don’t apply for jobs or voluntary roles that would require them to disclose their old and minor convictions or cautions. It’s a toxic form of punishment to keep punishing people forever and far too people many are unnecessarily anchored to their past as a result.
That’s why 28 November was such a big day. Changes to the law came into effect, meaning tens of thousands of people every year will no longer have their old and minor criminal records show up when they apply for jobs or voluntary roles that involve standard or enhanced DBS checks .
There are two main changes to what convictions and cautions are removed from standard and enhanced DBS checks. These are referred to as the filtering rules.
The first change is that childhood cautions will no longer be automatically disclosed. Up until now, about 25,000 childhood cautions were disclosed every year, so this change will help thousands of people move on from minor things they did when they were a child.
The second change is that a so-called ‘multiple conviction rule’ is being abolished. This arbitrary rule had meant that people with more than one conviction on their record had them all disclosed, no matter what the offences were, and no matter how long ago they were, simply because there was more than one. From the experience of Unlock’s helpline, we know this rule had meant that lots of people with minor convictions from decades ago were still finding them showing up on their check. According to Home Office data, these changes will mean around 45,000 people a year will now have a clear standard or enhanced DBS check. But this estimate is based on people that had previously applied for checks — and given we know many people are simply put off applying through fear and embarrassment, the number that will benefit from these changes will be even higher still.
How we got here
It’s been a long road to get to this point. I was part of an independent panel that was set up back in 2010 to advise the Home Secretary on this issue, and the system of filtering that was brought in in 2013 made a difference to a lot of people, but we could see that there were problems, which is why we set about advocating for further change. When it was clear the government were resisting that, it took a number of legal challenges to get them to listen.
And being honest, it is hard to give the government much credit for bringing forward these changes. They have contested the legal cases all the way up to the Supreme Court, the highest court in the land. Unlock supported those various legal challenges, and formally intervened in the Supreme Court for the first time in our history, because of the significance of the case. The result was a landmark ruling against the government. Even then, it’s taken the government nearly two years to get to this point of actually making the changes.
But we are where we are, and I’m genuinely delighted for the thousands of people that have been in contact with us over the years waiting for changes like this to happen. It’s difficult to do justice to the struggles, shame and stigma that they have felt. Finally, that injustice ends and many thousands of people will be free of the stigma of their past. For every one of you that benefits from these changes, I want to thank you for all of the support you have given to Unlock’s work on this over the years.
Unlock’s guidance for individuals and employers
The changes that have been made are actually quite simple, but the rules around what gets disclosed on checks are still quite complicated, so it’s important that you find out what these changes mean for you. We’ve been busy working on updating our guidance for individuals and employers, and that is all available from this page of our website. You can:
Read this brief guide that explains the changes in more detail
that explains the changes in more detail Use this infographic to find out which convictions/cautions will show up on which type of DBS check
to find out which convictions/cautions will show up on which type of DBS check If you have a criminal record, read our detailed guide for more information about the filtering system
for more information about the filtering system If you are an employer, read an update about what you need to know on Recruit!, our website for employers
The need for further reform
But there’s still a lot more to do. Despite these changes, we are still left with a criminal records system where many people with old and minor criminal records are shut out of jobs that they are qualified to do because of a mistake they made years ago. For example, Unlock research found that over a five year period, 380,000 checks contained childhood convictions, with nearly 3,000 checks including convictions from children aged just ten. Many of these childhood convictions will continue to be disclosed forever, despite these changes.
At a time when we’re facing significant economic uncertainty, people with criminal records are finding it harder than ever to find work. The government must commit to a wider review of the criminal records disclosure system to ensure all law-abiding people with criminal records are able to move on into employment and contribute to our economic recovery.
That’s why Unlock is continuing to call for a root and branch review of the criminal records system to reduce the length of time a record is revealed. Everyone should have the opportunity to achieve their potential and make a positive contribution to society. Everyone deserves the chance to build a good life. The #FairChecks site is a crucial way for you to show your MP that you support reform of the criminal record disclosure system.
Let me know your thoughts about this blog. Leave a comment below.
This was originally published on Unlock’s website. | https://medium.com/christopher-stacey/a-momentous-day-for-tens-of-thousands-of-people-with-old-and-minor-criminal-records-fc17cdbbfa6c | ['Christopher Stacey'] | 2020-12-08 16:14:51.133000+00:00 | ['Employment', 'Criminal Records', 'Discrimination', 'Dbs Checks', 'Filtering'] |
Definition of a Hack | Comedians will often call other comics: hacks. A hack comedian isn’t someone who lacks talent necessarily. Rather, a hack comic is someone who plays to the audience.
Now on the surface that doesn’t sound like a cardinal sin. Don’t writer’s play to the audience? Trying to write stories people will read and enjoy?
Yes, and no.
Finding an audience for your work doesn’t mean you have to sell out.
Hacks in the comedy world, or writing arena, are all about finding the lowest common denominator to get a laugh, or sell a book. They’re not hacky because they lack talent. Many of these men and woman are gifted.
Hacks are hacks because they don’t create work from the heart.
Steven Pressfield in his book, The War of Art, said Robert McKee defines a hack:
“… as someone who second-guesses his audience. When he sits down to work he doesn’t ask what’s in his heart. He asks what does the audience want?” (page 152)
That’s the key difference between the hack and non-hacks in our ranks. What do they think about when they get into their writing space?
More common features of a hack
1. Hacks write articles and books that are essentially click-bait, low hanging fruit, and not designed for gaining your 1000 True Fans.
2. Hacks research what’s hot in a market and try to emulate that authors success. Never truly writing something that moves their own soul. Something said in a style and perspective all their own.
3. Hacks love to talk about things they’ve never done, wrestled with, or experienced. Appearing to be experts while never having done the work.
4. Hacks create work that’s safe and middle of the road. Never wanting to push buttons or give a perspective that doesn’t fit into the mainstream of societal thought.
5. Hacks are scared of their audiences. They fear if they write anything controversial their audiences will leave. So instead of writing from an honest place they ask: what do you want from me? How can I meet your expectations?
6. Hacks write first for others, and secondly for themselves.
Now before this article comes off self righteous and high and mighty… I’m a hack.
We all are.
I’ve written the click-bait-thing to make a few bucks. Took the easy road. I’ve played it safe more times than I’d like to admit.
Get Off Hack-Road
Let’s not be hacks.
Can we first write for ourselves? Not for markets. Reader expectation.
Let’s write from the guts and for the fun and joy of it. The reason we write.
If we’re driving down Hack-Road, and trying to make a quick buck, let’s get off and reevaluate.
Write from the guts… you’ll be glad you did. | https://medium.com/the-prolific-writer/definition-of-a-hack-be601cc7cecc | ['Ryan J. Pelton'] | 2019-03-10 04:59:20.150000+00:00 | ['Creativity', 'Writer', 'Self-awareness', 'Writing', 'Writing Tips'] |
[Foresting Platform: Get to know first] #5 | Dear friends!
Let’s continue our series of revealing Foresting secrets.
The previous article was about PTON in Bitberry wallet. That makes sending and receiving PTONs so much easy and fast. So, you can get PTONs from your friends in seconds.
But there is another way of getting PTON — FORESTING platform.
Today we are going to tease you with some screenshots from our 3rd Closed beta test 😊 On 4rd of March we started testing rewarding social media platform FORESTING. About 100 people with different background, age, and interests from 25 countries are participating in testing. Testing will continue until the end of March. The main purpose is to fix bugs and to test overall user experience before Open beta Launch, which will be just right next month 😉
Here are some screenshots:
“by @Leigh MacArthur
@Jay, Marketing Team at Foresting
You might be curious about the difference between LIKE and BEAT. So, lets me explain it briefly,
LIKE is a secondary indicator for content evaluation, allowing unlimited activities.
But…
BEAT is a voting tool for content value promotion. 30 BEATs are provided to start, and one BEAT is generated automatically every 2 hours. In addition, BEAT is apportioned between the user and content creator.
To tease you even more here are some screenshots of Korean Illustrator @Lazy.drawing, who also participates in Closed beta test. | https://medium.com/foresting/foresting-platform-get-to-know-first-5-732faf27f564 | [] | 2019-03-07 09:04:08.673000+00:00 | ['Rewards', 'Platform', 'Blockchain', 'Media', 'iOS'] |
Being a Victim of Homophobia as a Kid | Being a Victim of Homophobia as a Kid
My voice was a bit effeminate, it is still the case, it just got stronger with time
From Source
Whenever I have an anxiety attack, the first thing I do is to sit at the corner of my darkroom and take the time to reflect on the reasons behind it. I question myself, my past, and what lead me to this completely messed up state. I look at my past and the image of a terrified and shy kid comes to my mind.
Since I was young, I have been harshly bullied because of my voice which leads me to become a victim of homophobic attacks from other kids at school and my neighbors. I spent decades hating his voice and always wanted to change it because it was one of the main reasons behind my struggle and the homophobic attacks I received from others.
My voice was a bit effeminate, it is still the case, it just got stronger with time. I remember being confused as a female on the phone all the time, and that was upsetting. In fact, if you look at it, there should be no problem in having an effeminate voice, because it was my biological voice, and I never chose to have it, yet the world constantly hurt me because of something I had no power over, yet I was always there ready to forgive everyone just with a simple smile.
I clearly remember how leaving home was a very painful experience because the moment I put my feet outside my house I knew I had to force my self to act in a different way, to change my voice, and try to be more masculine. It was funny because no matter how much effort I made, people would always keep bullying me at school, in the street and pretty much everywhere, to the point where I had some strangers approaching me just to request that I speak differently so that I can appear more masculine for them and for the society because this is how things work, that has been always the norm for them. That was a rule for them, and that was a punishment for me. I felt I could never fit in the world, it was damaging for my self-worth.
With time I started feeling scared of my voice, scared of myself, and constantly watching my movements and how my voice sounded whenever I spoke. I was reluctant to listen to my voice echo on the phone, or to my family videos whenever I appear on them because I felt ashamed of my voice. This is what the world taught me: my biological sense of communicating with the world was wrong!
The struggle did not stop there, because many would go far to put harsh labels on me. I had no clue on how to behave, and I used to always cry from school till I get home without telling anyone. I remember wishing my father was alive, I thought if he were present, he would teach me how to have a stronger and masculine voice.
That was a wish, a wish of a young innocent kid, and while other orphans pray for their parents to rest in peace in the other world, I prayed for mine to return from death and save me from this world.
Years went by and fearing myself started to create in me very intense anxiety, and it would get very bad during social gatherings. Speaking on a public bus or raising my hand to answer a question asked by my professors in class was constant torture and similar to public suicide. I was hurt, misunderstood, sad, and always feeling down.
The fact that I always tried to force myself to act in a specific way has created many wounds in my heart, wounds that still ache today. I still have some of those scars, but I believe I am getting better and that my past experiences with bullying and gender expression issues have taught me how to draw a path towards self-love. Today I love myself more than ever. I accept every part of me, and I got my voice back; I never feel the need to make my voice stronger when talking to people, and instead of being afraid to be mistaken as female on the phone, I would proudly correct the person I am talking with because, in fact, it is their problem and not mine.
Today I love my voice, I love how soft, deep, calm, and lovely it is. The feelings of shame I had when I was young are now being changed into a feeling of pride. I am proud of myself, proud of the voice I have, the way I express myself to the world and I would never want to change myself for anything. I also still have regrets because I let the world force me to silence my voice, I wish I had the courage to fight for myself and to be me no matter how hurtful my life experience as a child was.
Today, I understand that If I do not love myself and if I feel secure with my own body and voice then nobody would love me. Today I understand that social anxiety is an illness that I got it with time and that I am thankful for the efforts I have been making to address it, I live with it and I accept my life just the way it is. My life experience was hard but now I love myself more than ever. I am proudly me and I will never give up on my voice.
To all parents, before you kiss your kids and send them to school, take the time to teach them that other kids studying with them are different for many reasons and often for things they do not have any power over. Teach them how to love, how to be empathetic, and how to treat everyone the same way. Teach them that bullying others can break them down and create serious mental health issues in their future, teach them that this is wrong and that nobody should mute their voice to conform to the norms of society.
Do you like my writing? Please consider subscribing to my newsletter here
Thank you! | https://medium.com/an-injustice/being-a-victim-of-homophobia-as-a-kid-b974c045b642 | ['Mohamed Maoui'] | 2020-05-02 23:23:31.246000+00:00 | ['Bullying', 'Mental Health', 'LGBTQ', 'Anxiety', 'Homophobia'] |
An Anniversary Wish to My Wife | The woods ran up to the edge of the pond and every Spring the snow melt would reveal old trees that had crashed to the ground in the Winter freeze. We would pick our way around the sodden husks, pull rotten rotten branches loose and talk about which trunks would dry out firm and hard in the summer heat. Those were the ones we would use to make a raft.
I was fascinated by rafts. When I read Huck Finn, I studied the drypoint etchings to divine how the logs had been lashed together so firmly that it held together as it spun down the Mississippi. I saved the pictures of aboriginal rafts in National Geographic. I practiced slip knots and bowlines on old rope in our barn, hanging from the end of the mismatched strand to see if the knots could hold my weight.
We wanted to make a raft so we could go out to the little island in the middle of Robin’s Pond. We were afraid to walk out to it in the winter. The grown-ups told us stories about people who had fallen through the ice and died.
In the summer, we would pull logs to the edge of the pond and lash them together. Sometimes the raft was too heavy to move. Other times, the logs came apart as we dragged the raft down the shore. One time we got the raft in the water and it sank like a dead weight.
As so often happens to our childish dreams, my romance with rafts drifted into the land of metaphor. The raft became an image for life, the platform that we make our stand on against the roiling waves, the beating sun, the dark, dark ocean night. Life is being alone on the raft, bobbing up and down, drawing strength from what we witness.
These metaphors that worm their way into our lives are insidious and intransigent. They become a way of thinking that is too familiar and too little questioned.
When I reached the middle of my life, I’d been riding on that raft all alone with an ignorant certitude that there was no space for anyone else.
I never thought back to those images that had fascinated me. The image of Huck and Jim. The image of the brown-skinned men standing tall over their women and children. The image of two little children floating under the watchful eyes of Winkin, Blinkin and Nod.
Then Tami came into my life and nudged my hip bone with hers. “Move over,” she said. She sat down and looked up at the sky. “I’m riding with you.”
One imagination can make enough space to contain itself, can hold together a little raft that gets tossed along with the flotsam of Life’s big storm.
Two imaginations can make a world.
Ever since she put her shoulder to mine, settled herself by my side, I’ve watched that raft magically expand to calm the waters, to lengthen the horizon, to bring the world closer, to smooth out the dark clouds, to soften the sun.
We’re still sitting in the same place, but everything around us has changed.
Thanks for coming to sit on my raft with me, baby.
Happy Anniversary. | https://medium.com/drmstream/an-anniversary-wish-to-my-wife-c32419fa4944 | ['Dan Mccarthy'] | 2016-11-10 02:25:10.017000+00:00 | ['Serendipity', 'Remembering', 'Love', 'Desire', 'Water'] |
I joined a family company full of psychos. | Hello to you wherever in the world you’re reading this at any given time of the day.
This is my story it happened in a small island where job opportunities are very rare with a high percentages of unemployment.
Very random island from the internet.
Speaking of my experience as a female engineer I've spent 2 years battling at home constantly applying and not hearing anything back and suddenly ! A company came to the island and wanted to hire some engineers.
Cool ! I go to the interview which went very well very smooth i got excepted and started work immediately.
everything was going great i can see small signs but they were nothing to me as i was so happy to land a job even though i was working for a minimum wage. Some of the signs were :
A company full of family and friends except us the engineers. The boss’s wife calls him Sir ? Everyone was a manger myself included (Spoiler alert). No one has a degree except engineers in an industrial company selling industrial size equipment to other industrial companies. Lots of meetings with nothing done. No actual customers ? Everything is urgent.
So didn't think anything of it since this was my first job and thought every company was like that I mean, is it not normal for a company family friend to come up to you asking you to call everyone Sir for no reason ?
the days go by and I've proven myself and my skills to everyone so i got promoted to head of engineering/team leader/manager/senior engineer. (my position depended on who was speaking to me).
I was a manger /team leader but didn't have all the authorities of one nor a salary of one where i was still getting the minimum wage and I wasn't allowed to assign tasks, set deadlines or even suggest new ideas. Shouting was normal there you would see cousins backstabbing other family members and threatening of sending them back to their home country.
You can say i was never board there at all and every meeting had a new fight as if we were in a reality TV show it was very entertaining not going to lie LOL.
Now, this is where the pandemic hit all over the world and our company didn't care and instructed us not to ware a mask because Covied-19 was just a lie? and if any government official came to inspect the factory we would tell them “this is a privet property and not a company so we don't have to comply”.
Full lockdown mode in the island and we ( employees) didn't even receive any hand sanitizers in a time where it was mandatory for companies to give them to employees.
The CEO’s daughter decides to fly in from Canada she is an engineering student and I was told to “Split responsibilities with her” but, I didn't have any decision making role as a manager and was only managing 5 people but okaaaay ?(Tiktok phrase LOL)
So the week of her arrival i got Covid-19 symptoms and got tested for the first time which was traumatizing to me even though I was tested negative but, my family was scared they didn't want to touch me for a week ! It was hard but, while I was in 5-day quarantine the CEO’s daughter arrives as my team told me people were dying to be her friend and everyone was talking to her like a high school situation.
My quarantine is done and I came back to work where everyone was already addressing her as team manager if anyone had any concerns and doubts they would ignore me and go to her.
In meetings they would ask her about the progress of the team to which she had no idea at all and in the mean time i would teach her A to Z what is happening how to work in her dad’s company and what we had to do next.
A week after her dad’s best friend calls me in to a privet meeting i was expecting him to tell me that they moved me to manage another department as the engineering department doesn't need 2 managers. He calls me in and to my surprise saying “This has not been working i am sad to tell that you’re no longer a team leader do not come to any of the meetings please pack up your office were moving you back to be a normal engineer this is a final decision made by our CEO”. I was devastated and surprised as what they're doing is illegal and immediately asked why ? he starts shifting the blame on my team saying your team is always late for submissions, they don't follow instructions and some of them come 10 minutes late in the morning and you know this doesn't work out here”. Me fully knowing they did this because of his daughter I smirked to his face and told him you could’ve replaced me with anyone if you think that i am the problem we have more than capable engineers around why did you do this ? he told me “Ill proceed this to the CEO if you don’t pack your stuff and leave and if you don’t have the courage I will go tell the team you’re no longer their manager.
No I'm strong enough to tell them on my own. That's what I did.
I took it like a champ and was so strong but, i was crying on the inside and doing my best not to show it to anyone.
One day the weather was warm and we sat with our backs facing the all window wall similar to the picture below in the middle of summer with the A/C unit not working.
Sure I couldn't function properly so I told our new manager ( CEO’s Daughter) multiple times about the situation and she did nothing about so after 10 days i went to one of the company’s offices (1 minute drive from my desk) and left a note on my table saying where I was and this was the note :
I also sent her a WhatsApp message which I will not publish to keep her identity privet but she received and saw the message. During the day the CEO, her mom, 3 of family friends. The end of the day come and the COO is at my desk (CEO’s best friend) and proceed to tell me that my manager has NO IDEA where I am and she can’t find me.
This was funny to me as I made sure she was aware so, I went looking for her and surprise she was at the same floor so I asked her “Hello did you see the note I left on my desk ? and the WhatsApp message ?”
She says yes I did.
I told her what the CEO said to me and she says “ohh, surly its misunderstanding we will resolve it don't worry”.
I come back after the weekend they call me for an investigation the mom, the daughter and the COO recorded my answer to 10 questions and gave me a warning letter by threatening me to sign it saying “I can make this worse for you and fire you from this job if you don't sign”.
getting fired is one of my worst nightmares so I signed.
To make a very long story short 3 months later I was fired without any notice and no obvious reason.
I got very depressed it took me months to recover, to this day I can’t get my old self back and its still very difficult talking and writing about it.
The day after Covid-19 hit one of the employees me and 16 others went into quarantine and 4 other got Covid-19 at the same time the company was doing some suspicious money laundering activities and the bank blocked their account.
I might go into detail in my upcoming articles but, that is it for now thank you for reading the story of the worst period of my life. | https://medium.com/@kawtheraziz95/i-joined-a-family-company-full-of-psychos-673652d770fe | ['Kawther Abdulla'] | 2020-12-24 12:29:26.426000+00:00 | ['Engineering', 'Depression', 'Storytelling', 'Stories', 'Community'] |
To Clara: My own precious | June 8, 1929 Saturday Evening
My Own Precious:
This is coming weekend and really I can feel myself slipping into the land of loneliness. However, I shall use the best method available in order to have a “little date” with my precious little sweetheart — write a note.
Clara, I have had two letters from you and really, I must tell you, that I truly love your nice letters. It really inspires me to think of you, to realize what a wonderful girl I have and makes my heart thrill with sincere appreciation to feel assured of the fact that you are soon to be mine in every since of the word.
Clara, I sincerely hope to make you one of the happiest girls in the world. I know I do not know how, but I hope to learn the answer if it be an answer.
Since our past relations have been wonderful. Your letters slept with me last night, and really in my imagination that long black hair and sweet face were present — “Little Precious” goes to slumber land with me each night. Darling, I must not become sentimental and give way to my feelings in this matter, but I do want you to continue to keep in mind that you are my ideal helper the one that I want to live for and with, and if necessary die for.
Photo by Zohre Nemati on Unsplash
Mrs. Hughes must be our good friend, for she ask me about you every day while you were in the hospital and appeared to be so sympathetic. I think she is so nice. Good friends and fellowship with one another should be cultivated. For instance, I have no doubt but we love each other supremely — however, on being away will really prove to some extent our devotion to each other. I miss you in everything, and therefore can in a broader since appreciate your greatness.
Sweetheart, remember he is not growing tired standing guard as your precious face keeping watch over his own while precious sleeps and too, remember the great desire of his heart is that he may always be able to say “All is Well”.
Lovingly Yours,
Riley | https://medium.com/my-own-dearest-sweetheart/to-clara-my-own-precious-b331002baa39 | ['Martin Luther Riley'] | 2021-08-27 14:03:08.441000+00:00 | ['Relationships', 'Love Letters', 'Weddings', 'Love'] |
Basic Builds :: How to update data in a Shiny App on RStudio Connect | Note: This article (while still accurate) represents an outdated approach. You can find the latest best practices here.
Basic Builds is a series of articles providing code templates for data products published to RStudio Connect
Link to full code template (one Shiny app, one R Markdown document)
Introduction: Application data and how to find it
Building data products with open source R packages like shiny , rmarkdown and plumber can be a powerful way to both explore and communicate with data. This article is a discussion on how I think about data and data storage in relation to application “data product” code in a production context.
I’ve built a Shiny application (or R Markdown report, or Flexdashboard, or …) that uses data from a CSV file that I have access to in my local development environment. RStudio Connect makes it easy to bundle up this application code and the small CSV file, reproduce information about my local environment, and run the application on a production server.
This works great, it is a totally valid publishing workflow. But it might not be what I actually wanted to do. Building useful, robust data products, means also having the vision and experience to anticipate the future.
Here are the questions that I always seek to answer when I’m developing an MVP/POC or “Version 1” of a data product:
Vision: What kind of impact am I looking to make with this application?
Experience: What do I know about my production environment that will influence how I engineer this application?
Start by thinking simply.
If this application is useful today, will it still be useful in a week, or a month?
Will the data that feeds it still be valid a week or month from now?
How will you deliver new data to the application?
Can the delivery of new data be automated in some way?
We know that bundling a small data file with the application code will work in production, but if that data needs to be updated (even as infrequently as once a month), it would be nice to have the data update and app publication process be automated.
The good news is, programmatic deployment (automated application publishing to RStudio Connect) is also a totally valid workflow. But before you run off and build that, I can share that from my experience, programmatic deployment is likely going to be engineering-overkill.
The Wonders of R Markdown Output Files — on RStudio Connect
If you’re trying to solve this automation problem and RStudio Connect is your production environment, the tools are already built-in; all you need is the experience to know how to piece the right parts together. This article is a how-to framework for creating basic, automated, ETL processes with R Markdown output files on RStudio Connect. But before I get to the how-to, there are a few important things to know first:
RStudio Connect has a basic scheduling tool — the catch is that it’s only available for certain types of content. You can set up an R Markdown document to render on a schedule, but you can’t use Connect to schedule updates for content with a Shiny runtime. Don’t try to combine multiple content types into a single publishing bundle. Different documents need to be published to different content locations on Connect. This guide will show you how content published to different locations can still be linked into a pipeline. You should also know that Connect uses sandboxed processes to protect certain areas on the file system. This has significant development implications. On RStudio Connect, you can’t do something simple like write.csv() and expect the result of that action to be available in the same way it would be on your local file system. Luckily, there are some simple solutions — and they’re easy to learn.
Goal: Build a Shiny application backed by a data.csv file that gets automatically updated without having to re-deploy anything to RStudio Connect
Solution: Change where the data lives, and automate the data update process
Our original plan was to package a CSV file up and publish it along with the shiny application. A better plan might be to leverage R Markdown scheduling and rsc_output_files to have our application access the latest CSV file over HTTP.
To do this, I’ll need to create a second content item — an R Markdown document, to publish on RStudio Connect.
Step 1: Create a new R Markdown document
Set up the YAML header to use rsc_output_files :
--- title: "Output File Framework for R Markdown ETL on RStudio Connect" output: html_document rmd_output_metadata: rsc_output_files: - "data.csv" ---
Step 2: Use R Markdown code chunks to extract and transform data
```{r} df <- data.frame(a=rnorm(50), b=rnorm(50), c=rnorm(50), d=rnorm(50), e=rnorm(50)) ```
Every time this report is rendered, it will a new random data frame. Creating dummy data is not representative of a typical ETL process. You’ll likely want to replace this section with code that pulls data from a database or API.
Best practices for working with databases can be found at db.rstudio.com
The httr package is a good place to start when working with REST APIs and the http protocol
Step 3: Write the data file
Add an R Markdown code chunk to write the final data frame to a CSV file.
```{r} write.csv(df, “data.csv”, row.names=FALSE) ```
This creates the data.csv output file we specified in Step 1. There are actually two ways to specify output files, which you can read about in the RStudio Connect user guide: How to work with output files
Step 4: Add a download link (optional)
Make a download link to share the output file from your report using standard Markdown syntax:
#### Here is the data generated from this report: [data.csv](data.csv)
Step 5: Publish
Publish the R Markdown document to RStudio Connect. Make sure to publish with source code.
Step 6: Configure Access and Scheduling
Once the R Markdown document is published to RStudio Connect, use the publisher settings tools to set access controls and the rendering schedule.
Note on Access: The CSV file will be subject to the same authorization as your report. For the most secure experience, keep access controls tight. Shiny applications can perform authenticated HTTP requests using a Connect API Key. Find examples of using httr to perform authenticated HTTP requests here: https://docs.rstudio.com/connect/user/cookbook.html#cookbook-configuring-your-scripts
Step 7: Update the Shiny application
Assuming that you aren’t using strict access controls, the update required to the Shiny application code might be quite minimal.
In my case, it was simply changing this:
data <- read.csv('data.csv')
To this:
data https://colorado.rstudio.com/rsc/content/2352/data.csv ')
While this solution is simple, there’s still a chance that a long-running R process might not show the most recent data. It’s likely a good idea to put a check in place, or use other Shiny tools like reactiveFileReader and reactivePoll to monitor for changes. Winston Chang created a nice gist example of that type of app workflow here: https://gist.github.com/wch/9652222
One more cool thing
Because output files are versioned along with the rendering of their report, they can be accessed from the History viewer tool.
Adding a data link (optional Step 4) is useful if you anticipate wanting to download those historical versions.
Conclusion: ETL on RStudio Connect made easy
I hope that learning about rsc_output_files will save you some time and energy going forward.
Accessing output files over HTTP can be a good alternative to setting up a shared read/write persistent storage location on RStudio Connect.
If output files aren’t a good solution for your use case, think about the benefits of using a database.
Finally, if a database is still out of the question, be sure to read this article before moving to a persistent storage solution on Connect.
Resources: | https://medium.com/rstudio-connect-digest/basic-builds-how-to-update-data-in-a-shiny-app-on-rstudio-connect-48593902b1e2 | ["Kelly O'Briant"] | 2020-07-23 22:15:42.038000+00:00 | ['Rstudio', 'Rstats', 'Data Science'] |
Walking in the Void | The world is the dreamed and the dreamed can never hurt you
artwork by Sossio Mosca courtesy of the artist
Another Excerpt from a new book ‘No war within, no war without’
The blinding daylight and the memory of those afternoons under the hot Neapolitan sun warmed me to the point that I placed a cool hand across the nape of my neck as He spoke. “You stole away to the terrace every time you could and walked back and forth endlessly suspended between the two skies — the real one above, and the reflected one on the tray you held flat in front of you. Every step you took was a step into the abyss…when you remembered that before you was merely an image, you were even able to run, but when you forgot, your steps would falter and you would stumble into the imaginary void in front of you.” As we walked I remembered the feeling of my mother’s cold silver tray in my tiny clenched fists and the hole in the pit of my stomach each time I poised my foot over the abyssal blue sea in front of me.
“The whole game is based on entering into the abyss of the unknown remembering, at the same time, that there is no abyss at all.. No matter which sky you use to get your bearings — both are illusions.
Divided inside…Trapped in a horizontal vision you can only run after the things you aspire to possess — forgetting they are already yours… like a dog chasing his tail.
In these moments you must be still and raise yourself above thought and memory. The Dream contains all.., and More..” He said.
The sky I had reflected in front of me was the mirror image of the blue sea that soared overhead and now, next to the Dreamer that childish game I’d played seemed to have happened only moments ago.
“ It seems to me that I am living two different lives in two separate worlds that fight each other for survival. How can I find the right balance between the ‘Work’ and the business of everyday Life?” I pleaded.
“All this time you’ve been mistaking the world for reality — exchanging a flat lifeless reflection for life itself — just as you did when you were a child and fell with the tray. Narcissus fell in love with his own image and was lost in it — and you fall under the world’s spell in the same way. You believe in what you see before you, and so are so easily lost because you forget it is merely an image of your own projection.
“Should I be doing some other job? Maybe I’ve misunderstood and am not playing the right role?”
Act your role in the world as an actor does on the stage. There is nothing wrong with playing and nothing wrong with the role you act. The problem arises only when you forget to act and identify with the role itself.”
We rounded a bend to find ourselves in front of a huge lake. The intense blue sky reflected in the glassy surface before us was interrupted only by an occasional swan and the ripples of a passing breeze. I breathed in deeply gathering that scene and fixing the last embers of that childhood memory soundly within me.
The light reflected on the water was nearly blinding and I unconsciously veered us towards a line of trees that would have shielded us from that overwhelming splendor, forgetting so quickly the game with the platter.
“Don’t forget, the world is the dreamed, and the dreamed can never hurt you. The dream is entirely depending on you. You are the sole Dreamer and creator. You are the very cause of its existence. Without you, the world disappears. The world owes you all….” He said. I never connected my actions with His words until now.
I reached down absently to touch my scarred knees remembering how, so many years ago I would set off walking slowly and cautiously, then gain speed only to stumble and fall in a heap on that silver tray in front of me when I was distracted.
The many falls I’d had were examples of my distraction. Strangely, the Dreamer had not sent me away but saw everyone as a trial that was to strengthen me. We had spoken at length of each.
“Gods and men are part of a beautiful game that you yourself have created for your own satisfaction and pleasure. Gods are made to solve the problems of the Universe. Men are made to aggravate and perpetuate them….” He’d said cryptically when I voiced my bewilderment over those events.
“The moment you dream a new dream you are creating also the antagonist that will help you to realize it — an antagonist of equal strength that can make the path towards its realization visible and possible…. “ He had spoken at length about the Antagonist and although at the time I was sure to understand, when the Antagonist appeared it was always ‘the enemy’ — a foreign identity who was not part of a game at all, but a dangerous and mortal foe. He paused before uttering what would be from then on both the emblem and epitaph of my entire life. | https://medium.com/an-idea/walking-in-the-void-7a913ac48f7f | ["Elio D'Anna"] | 2020-12-24 02:49:20.003000+00:00 | ['Books', 'Creative Writing', 'Writing', 'Positive Thinking', 'Essay'] |
The Great American Swindle in your Car Loan | Startups can change the world. Small companies can attack and defeat big problems. I want to introduce you to a company called MotoRefi, which is committed to righting a wrong that has troubled me for years. Car dealers routinely put buyers into higher-priced loans than they deserve and pocket the difference. It is a big, painful problem that has been part of the dealer landscape for decades. There has been legal action to attempt to curtail the practice it, but so far, it hasn’t made enough of a difference. MotoRefi is changing this scenario.
The Problem
Auto dealers commonly mark up or increase the interest rate offered to vehicle purchasers. Most consumers aren’t aware they’re paying too much by financing a car through their dealer. It seems convenient and easy to go from the sales office to the finance office at the dealer. With one transaction, the consumer can drive off the lot in their new vehicle fully financed. The problem is that many times the dealer does not offer the best financing possible for many consumers. The Center for Responsible Lending states that “79% of consumers are unaware that auto dealers can markup rates without their consent.”
When a customer is ready to finance a car at a dealer, the lender communicates a “buy rate” to the dealer. The buy rate reflects the borrower’s creditworthiness and the rate at which the lender will issue the loan to the customer. The lender allows auto dealers to charge a higher interest rate when they finalize the deal with the consumer. This is called “dealer markup.” Markups generate compensation for dealers while giving them the discretion to charge consumers different rates regardless of consumer creditworthiness. Lenders may permit dealers to markup consumers’ interest rates as much as 2.25 percent for contracts with terms of 5 years or less, and 2 percent for deals with longer terms.
Financing makes bank for the dealer. The average consumer has their interest rate marked up by 2.47%, according to CRL, which ends up delivering around $1700 more over the life of a $25k loan. For the dealer, the $1.7k profit on the financing is three times what they typically make from selling the car itself.
What’s worse is that borrowers with poor credit receive an even higher rate mark up. Litigation has demonstrated that there is a racial discrimination component to this activity as well.
Legal theft
I think this practice should be illegal. It’s not. In speaking to State legislators in both Virginia and North Carolina, I’ve pressed them to take action. They acknowledge that auto dealer financing is a consumer and racial justice issue. The CRL confirms it costs consumers over $25.8 Billion over the loans. In honest moments, elected officials will acknowledge the power and money of the auto dealer lobby. It is formidable. The OpenSecrets.org website lists auto dealer political contributions to Congress. As you’ll see in the link below, 75% of Congress members receive average donations of $6.7k from the industry.
Auto Dealer Contributions
This isn’t to say there aren’t laws against some of these practices. Some regulations address dealer markup when it crosses distinct discrimination boundaries. But creditworthiness can always be used as a reason for markup, so racial discrimination is challenging to show.
Lawsuits
Over the years, there have been a series of informative class-action lawsuits against the captive auto finance (GMAC, Honda Financial, etc.) units for major car manufacturers. Most of these have cited the Equal Credit Opportunity Act, which prohibits discrimination against credit applicants based on race, color, religion, national origin, sex, marital status, age, etc.
One of the notable cases, Coleman vs. GMAC,(Link) from 2004, contended that African Americans and Hispanics who purchased automobiles through GMAC paid higher prices for credit because they received higher markups. The plaintiffs claimed that as a result of markup pricing, GMAC discriminated against African Americans and Hispanics.
The settlement agreement is instructive of how institutionalized this problem has become in America. GMAC agreed to do the following:
a. Limit the amount of markup on individual automobile loans for the next three years [a cap of 2.50% on loans for terms of sixty (60) months or less; and 2.00% on loans for terms of more than sixty (60) months;
b. Disclose to consumers that loan rates are negotiable and can be negotiated with the dealer;
c. Fund consumer education and assistance programs directed to African Americans and Hispanic communities which will help consumers concerning credit financing; and
d. Offer 1,250,000 pre-approved; no mark up offers of credit to African Americans and Hispanics over the next five years.
They agreed to limit the markup, as stated above. Not stop it.
In 2015, The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and the US Department of Justice announced a settlement with American Honda Finance Corporation to settle claims that thousands of African-American, Hispanic, and Asian and Pacific Islanders who bought Honda vehicles paid higher interest rates than white car buyers. Honda paid $24 million to affected buyers. They capped the markup rate to 1.25%.
The result is this practice will continue to rob consumers. That is until they re-finance their car loan to the rate they deserve from an independent lender.
MotoRefi’s business is transitioning consumers into the auto loan each customer deserves based upon their credit, NOT the profit available. MotoRefi delivers re-financing offers without credit rating impact and completes new loans quickly. Consumers receive no obligation loan offers without having to provide their Social Security number or making any commitment.
In full disclosure, I believe in MotoRefi’s business so much that I personally invested in their company. I do hope my investment in MotoRefi is a wise one. Given their goal and the problem they are attacking, I know it will be a worthy one. | https://medium.com/landing-on-your-feet/the-great-american-swindle-in-your-car-loan-bd52f6460f30 | ['Don Rainey'] | 2020-06-10 21:32:22.481000+00:00 | ['Consumer Protection', 'Startup', 'Auto Loans', 'Buying A Car'] |
Framed | I wrote this poem three years ago, 13 years after the loss of my son:
I love to look at pictures.
When I visit people’s homes,
More than small talk I enjoy wandering,
Looking at the pictures, in their pretty frames.
You can tell so much from peoples’ pictures.
Perfectly posed? Nothing but smiles?
Hiding something.
Two people, heads together, smiling, while their bodies push apart?
This will not last.
Nothing but old black and whites,
Romantic memories of bygone eras?
Avoiding something.
I like to listen while I look,
to hear the story that’s being told by the pictures in their frames.
What story do my pictures tell?
I hope they tell a story of moments.
The moment when
my daughter met her new baby brother for the first time.
The moment when
my toddler son basked in the belief of my perfection.
I’ve tried to frame these moments,
display them for all to share.
But there’s one moment I’ve framed, but never shared.
The moment when
My 23-week old son was born, but never took a breath.
Thirteen years ago today
After laboring the better part of a day
I saw my little boy for the first and last time.
This moment has been framed in my mind for years.
Framed with grief and anger.
How many things were visibly wrong
How his outward deformities symbolized my inner ones.
This year, I notice the frame is changing.
Now, when I look at this moment, I see other things too.
Yes, I see the deformities, but today
I also see a little soul, pure and beautiful.
Yes, I see sorrow, but today
I also see joy, joy for the boy and man he would have become.
The frame, which was one-dimensional and black
Now shows some facets and sparkle,
Like a diamond in the rough.
Today I know the frame isn’t finished
And I’m curious about what it will become.
I’ve always thought the black-framed moment
was never meant to be shared.
But today’s multi-dimensional, sparkly frame
Demanded to be shared.
And so it is | https://medium.com/@lmondale/framed-560a11380814 | ['Lucy M'] | 2019-02-16 01:10:29.392000+00:00 | ['Loss', 'Perinatal', 'Love', 'Perinatal Loss', 'Grief And Loss'] |
The Simple Document That Kept Me Alive | TW: Suicide, self-harm, no-suicide contract
The middle of the night is the hardest. When the world is dark and most healthy people are safely sleeping, then the monsters that are mental illness come out in full force to torment you.
The constant noise and lack of sleep leave you willing to do anything to stop the madness. Sadly, for many people, that willingness can include suicide ideation.
Believe me, I get it. Thoughts of suicide have been part of my daily life since some time in fourth or fifth grade. These beasts have been my companions for nearly forty years.
Life is worth living, though. It may not always feel like it, but it is always the truth.
What follows is my story of how a piece of paper helped me through some of my darkest hours. | https://medium.com/speaking-bipolar/the-simple-document-that-kept-me-alive-25f6c7ba3265 | ['Scott Ninneman'] | 2019-11-16 19:40:48.730000+00:00 | ['Suicide', 'Mental Health', 'Mental Illness', 'Bipolar', 'Suicide Prevention'] |
How to Build Your Portfolio as a Content Writer | How to Build Your Portfolio as a Content Writer
Portfolio
As the word itself gives a meaning to portray something. So you’re going’ to portray your own self through your words. Yeah don’t worry you can add your picture also :)
A portfolio is a display of yourself in which you have to showcase your capabilities, strengths, achievements, accomplishments. In short you have to describe yourself in the best way you can.
So now the question is, why and when do you need your portfolio?
Why would others like to know about you? So here you go ,
You need a portfolio when you want to offer your services to others,
When other people want to get benefit from you then they would definitely like to know that whether you have the skill set they are searching for, or can you fulfill their requirements, So making the long story short , a Portfolio is required when you are going to start your career such as Freelancing(most probably) or a website.
Portfolio as a content writer
Content writing is a coveted skill in these days. You have to show your own creativity without any plagiarism and have to provide your client with the real facts and figures. This will happen when your portfolio would be much impressive to attract the attention of clients.
Ingredients of a Portfolio
Should be Accessible
Make your portfolio convenient and organized for the clients Everything in your portfolio should have a coordination The clients should find you congenial to their needs.
Include Samples of your work
Accentuate your portfolio. As a content writer your content is your strength, your identity. So make sure to include your own samples .Because the power of your words will attract the clients and all the visual readers. It would satisfy them that you can meet their expectations. It will show that you are very much familiar with the work of content writing. It will help you to make your position stronger.
Depict your work with the related picture. This will make your work more attention seeking and everyone would easily go to their related searches.
Link to your own blog
To present your professionalism and knowledge about content writing ,try to make your own blog and do give it’s link in your portfolio . In this way you would gain more trust of your client. This will definitely help you.
Include Reviews. That’s something quite worthy. When you’ll start content writing then make sure to have reviews of your clients about your work and after that add it in your profile .This will let the other clients know about your potential.
Summing up all this, you have to think of yourself as a client and then try to make your portfolio as you would want to have as a client. Do update your portfolio from time to time as you continue to gain experience in your field.
Sites for creating portfolios | https://medium.com/@harisa-shahid15/how-to-build-your-portfolio-as-a-content-writer-b7c47951ebe2 | ['Harisa Shahid'] | 2020-12-27 18:24:59.794000+00:00 | ['Portfolio', 'Content Writing'] |
Day 17 — Rotate Array. 100 Days to Amazon | Day 17 — Rotate Array
100 Days to Amazon
100 Days to Amazon — Day 17 — Rotate Array
Photo by Mae Mu on Unsplash
Out of Free Stories? Here is my Friend Link.
Introduction
Hey Guys, Today is day 17 of the challenge that I took. Wherein I will be solving every day for 100 days the programming questions that have been asked in previous interviews.
You have a bonus at the end if you keep reading. You can find out the companies that have asked these questions in real interviews.
All these problems are taken from the following e-book. 🎓
This is completely free 🆓 if you have an amazon kindle subscription.
This e-book contains 100 coding problems that have been asked in top tech interview questions. It also has a guide to solving all the problems in 200+ ways. These problems I assure you has been asked in previous interviews.
You have to decide whether you want to go unprepared for a tech interview or go ahead and quick search for this guide to solve the 100 problems.
Begin Your ascent to greatness🚀
Note : this e-book only contains the links to the solutions.
Day 17 — Rotate Array🏁
AIM🏹
Given an array, rotate the array to the right by k steps, where k is non-negative.
Example
Input: [1,2,3,4,5,6,7] and k = 3
Output: [5,6,7,1,2,3,4]
Explanation:
rotate 1 steps to the right: [7,1,2,3,4,5,6]
rotate 2 steps to the right: [6,7,1,2,3,4,5]
rotate 3 steps to the right: [5,6,7,1,2,3,4]
Code👇
Author: Akshay Ravindran
Algorithm👨🎓
Remove the unwanted amount of rotations if the number of rotations is more than the length of the array. Using, k = k% nums.length; Three types of reverse you have to do in order to solve this. One is reversing the whole list. Second, Reverse the list from the start till k numbers. Third, Reverse the list from k+1 to end.
Conclusion
Have you come this question in your interview before? Share it in the comment section below. 🤝
Don’t forget to hit the follow button✅to receive updates when we post new coding challenges. Tell us how you solved this problem in the comments section below. 🔥 We would be thrilled to read them. ❤
I have published an ebook. A compilation of 100 Java(Interview) Programming problems which have been solved. (HackerRank) 🐱💻
Click HERE 🧨🎊🎃
This is completely free 🆓 if you have an amazon kindle subscription.
Previous Blog Posts | https://medium.com/javarevisited/100-days-challenge-to-cracking-the-coding-interview-f4fb9a982e4 | ['House Of Codes'] | 2020-08-21 03:22:22.352000+00:00 | ['Programming', 'Coding', 'Software Development', 'Interview', 'Java'] |
Looking for Connections in Your Data? Correlation Techniques Come to the Rescue! | Looking for Connections in Your Data? Correlation Techniques Come to the Rescue!
Correlation techniques in a nutshell
Machine Learning models are as good or as bad as the data you use. That’s why data scientists usually spend hours on pre-processing and cleansing the data. It is crucial to select only the features that could contribute most to the performance of the resulting model. Here feature engineering comes into the picture.
What is the correlation?
In simple terms, correlation is a measure of how strongly one feature related to another. For instance, height and weight can be positively correlated. And height and salary are not at all correlated.
Understanding the correlation between features helps in feature engineering by imputing missing values using another correlated feature or eliminating redundant features that are highly correlated.
In this article, we will be discussing various correlation techniques and their usefulness.
The following are the most widely used correlation techniques,
Covariance Pearson Correlation Coefficient Spearman Rank Correlation Coefficient
Let us dive in! | https://medium.com/towards-artificial-intelligence/looking-for-connections-in-your-data-correlation-techniques-come-to-rescue-53121a149f96 | ['Ramya Vidiyala'] | 2020-06-19 13:17:09.785000+00:00 | ['Artificial Intelligence', 'Machine Learning', 'Education', 'Technology', 'Data Science'] |
Autoscaling in Oracle Cloud and OKE (Oracle Container Engine) as load generator | In this post, we will look at Autoscaling in Oracle Cloud. From the horse’s mouth:
Autoscaling enables you to automatically adjust the number of Compute instances in an instance pool based on performance metrics such as CPU utilization. This helps you provide consistent performance for your end users during periods of high demand, and helps you reduce your costs during periods of low demand.
Let’s try this with an example:
The application will be a simple Nginx on a compute Create an Instance Configuration of the compute. This will allow us to use a pre-defined configuration to use when creating compute instances as part of an instance pool. Create an Instance Pool based on the Instance Configuration and this will allow us to provision multiple instances with the same configuration. Attach a private Load Balancer to the instance pool. This will ensure that when more instances are added to the instance pool, they will also be automatically added to the Load Balancer’s backend set and traffic routed to the new instances when they are deemed to be in a healthy state. Create an Autoscaling Configuration and set the necessary policy to scale out and scale in. To generate the necessary amount of traffic, we will use OKE (Oracle Container Engine) and the jmeter-operator.
Let’s get started.
Deploying the infrastructure
Clone the terraform-oci-oke project and keep the default topology (3), number of node pools (1) and number of worker nodes per subnet (1). We will scale them later. For now, we just need the basic infrastructure (VCN, gateways, bastion, subnets etc).
Set the following parameters:
newbits = {
"bastion" = "8"
"lb" = "8"
"app" = "8"
"workers" = "8"
} subnets = {
"bastion" = "11"
"lb" = "12"
"app" = "13"
"plb" = "14"
"lb_ad1" = "32"
"lb_ad2" = "42"
"lb_ad3" = "52"
"workers_ad1" = "33"
"workers_ad2" = "43"
"workers_ad3" = "53"
}
Note that you do not need to use the same values as mine. You just need to ensure your subnets do not overlap.
Once the basic VCN and OKE has been provisioned, create an “app” subnet and a corresponding security list. The app subnet should be regional and private.
Ingress Rules for app subnet
Egress rules for app subnet
app subnet
Next, create a security list and a subnet for a Load Balancer. Note that this will be different from the load balancer security list and subnet created for OKE. The load balancer subnet should also be regional and private.
Ingress rules for Private Load Balancer Subnets
You can set the egress rules the same as for the app subnet.
Private Load Balancer subnet
Next, create a private Load Balancer and ensure you select your vcn created when you provisioned OKE and the private load balancer subnet you created above.
Load Balancer Health Check
Create an HTTP listener
Add the compute, instance pool and autoscaling
Create a compute instance and pick the smallest available shape:
and ensure you add your ssh key and you assign it to the app subnet:
Click on Advanced Options and paste the following cloud-init script:
#cloud-config package_update: false
packages:
- nginx
runcmd:
- systemctl enable nginx
- systemctl start nginx
- firewall-offline-cmd --add-service=http
- systemctl restart firewalld
Once the instance is running, click on “Create instance configuration”:
Then, click on “Create Instance Pool” to create one:
You will be presented with the following screen. Enter 1 for the minimum number of instances, check the “Attach Load Balancer” checkbox and select your load balancer and the backend set. Set the port to 80 and under Availability Domain Selection 1, select your VCN and set the subnet to app.
Click on additional selection twice and select AD2 and AD3 for the additional selections. If your region has only 1 Availability Domain, you can skip this step.
Finally, create an Autoscaling Configuration from the instance pool:
Configure your Autoscaling configuration as follows and leave the cooldown period at its minimum of 300s:
and configure your autoscaling policy as follows:
Autoscaling policy
Set the minimum number of instances to 1, maximum to 6 and initial to 1. For the scaling rules, we will set out a ridiculously low thresholds so we can get the autoscaling event to trigger.
Your configuration is all done.
Using OKE as a load generator
We now need to generate enough traffic to the instance to cause a CPU spike above 2% for 3 mins so an autoscaling event will occur and cause the instance pool to scale out and add at least 1 more instance. For that, we will use Apache JMeter, or more specifically, the JMeter Operator running in OKE.
First, scale out the OKE cluster and increase the number of workers per subnets to at least 10 and run terraform apply to make the chance. You can also do this in the OCI Console.
Login to the bastion and clone the JMeter Operator project:
cd jmeter-operator git clone https://github.com/kubernauts/jmeter-operator cd jmeter-operator
Edit the jmeter-deploy.yaml as follows:
apiVersion: loadtest.jmeter.com/v1alpha1
kind: Jmeter
metadata:
name: tqa-loadtest
namespace: tqa
spec:
# Add fields here
slave_size: 30
jmeter_master_image: kubernautslabs/jmeter_master:5.0
jmeter_slave_image: kubernautslabs/jmeter_slave:5.0
grafana_server_root: /
grafana_service_type: ClusterIP
grafana_image: grafana/grafana:5.2.0
influxdb_image: influxdb
grafana_install: "true"
grafana_reporter_install: "true"
grafana_reporter_image: kubernautslabs/jmeter-reporter:latest
influxdb_install: "true"
The fields I changed are highlighted in bold above. Ensure the slave_size matches the number of worker nodes.
Download the autoscaledemo.jmx:
and change the BASE_URL_1 from 10.0.14.4 to the IP Address of the private load balancer:
<Arguments guiclass=”ArgumentsPanel” testclass=”Arguments” testname=”User Defined Variables” enabled=”true”>
<collectionProp name=”Arguments.arguments”>
<elementProp name=”BASE_URL_1" elementType=”Argument”>
<stringProp name=”Argument.name”>BASE_URL_1</stringProp>
<stringProp name=”Argument.value”>10.0.14.4</stringProp>
<stringProp name=”Argument.metadata”>=</stringProp>
</elementProp>
</collectionProp>
</Arguments>
Ensure all your worker nodes are active and follow the steps on the jmeter-operator page to install it.
At this point, your environment should be stable and look like this:
Stable pool
Stable Instance Configuration
Stable backend set
Metrics stable
Initialize your JMeter cluster and run a test:
./initialize_cluster.sh
./start-test.shEnter the Jmeter Namespace: tqa
Enter path to the jmx file autoscaledemo.jmx
Now, let JMeter run and check after 5 mins. The autoscaling event is triggered and an additional instance is created.
Instance Configuration with Target Count=2
2nd instance being provisioned
Eventually, things stabilize and the 2nd instance is provisioned:
Instance pool with 2 instances
and the 2nd instance is automatically registered as an additional backend with the load balancer:
When the test run has completed and the traffic stops, the average CPU utilization also decreases triggering an autoscaling event. This time, the instance count will be reduced:
Scaling Down
Instance Pool Scaling Down
And eventually, the instance is terminated: | https://medium.com/oracledevs/autoscaling-in-oracle-cloud-and-oke-oracle-container-engine-as-load-generator-2e9ccb44b44 | ['Ali Mukadam'] | 2019-07-04 00:38:27.835000+00:00 | ['Jmeter', 'Oracle Cloud', 'Kubernetes', 'DevOps', 'Autoscaling'] |
You See Grey | You See Grey
Photo by Philippe Mignot on Unsplash
I see black and white, night and day,
But you see twilights, and shades of grey.
Nothing is won, and no one is sacred.
Our tendencies to align are regrettably dated.
You saw the window, and I tried to hide,
That I saw nothing but in and outside.
Seven blind years, I proudly parroted you,
I couldn’t whisper even to a reflector, that it was simply all I knew.
You draw people in, a raw magnetism difficult to grow,
But slowly it bloomed, those seeds of identity I’d repeatedly tried to sow.
The tulips will burgeon, the Ferris will continue to turn,
But to protect two good hearts, should we this charade adjourn?
I’m in seas of blue and green, paddling some swirls of pink
The current of empty and wasted words now elicit only a blink.
Eyes mindlessly studying the concrete, scrutinizing the earnest spider,
The chasm between the differences and desires breaking apart dangerously and wider
But yet, not once was there a hint of resistance, when frustration and tolerance crept up toward the ceilings,
I suppose it’s quite simply, the desperate yearning to spare another’s feelings.
Despite this, I would not describe it as a mirthless and suffocating black pit,
That seems a bit extreme, I think it’s prosaic and jading, even numbing, just a bit.
The walls still slapped with polaroids of scarves flying before bridges on a windy day,
Seems like one just outgrew the adolescent memories, the other won’t cease to replay.
And so we arrive at this juncture, friend, where I must look you in both dark eyes,
We started off with footsteps in faultless rhythm, but now the sounds we hear are superficial — they’re lies.
It took this long, because of a misplaced voice, unsought as it always was
Hidden by distracting shiny spots, wiped clean down to a new slate now, because,
I see black and white, night and day,
But you see twilights, and shades of grey. | https://medium.com/scribe/you-see-grey-947ac67c9002 | ['Amritha Ram'] | 2020-12-18 08:17:45.814000+00:00 | ['Difference', 'Partnerships', 'Poem', 'Relationships', 'Poetry'] |
Best smart home systems for a connected domicile | From smart light bulbs and thermostats that think for themselves to Bluetooth door locks, wireless security cameras, and all manner of sensors, today’s home automation technology can sound awfully sophisticated while actually being a messy hodgepodge of gizmos and apps. Installing all this stuff in your house is only half the battle. Getting it to work together smoothly and with a single user interface can be something entirely different.
Here’s the essential gear to get you there, which we’ve separated into two categories: all-around smart home systems, which are designed to coordinate a wide variety of smart home products, and security-focused systems, which are built around sensors and sirens.
You should also note that some of our picks are starter kits, consisting of a smart-home hub and a handful of devices, while others are just the hub. You’ll need to add the components you want to the latter, choosing from products certified by the hub manufacturer.
[ Further reading: A smart home guide for beginners ]Best all-around smart home system Samsung SmartThings Hub (2018) Read TechHive's reviewMSRP $69.99See itSmartThings remains the easiest path to a DIY smart home, but there’s little to be gained—and a lot of pain to endured—from upgrading from the second-generation hub.
For breadth and depth of supported smart home products, you won’t find a smart home system that handles more than Samsung SmartThings. At its core is a small box that connects to your router (the third-generation Hub offers the option of wireless connectivity, while Samsung’s Connect Home integrates a mesh router with a SmartThings Hub). Through the SmartThings mobile app, you then start adding your various devices through its simple yet intuitive control system. These can be components that Samsung sells directly, or you can choose from a vast number of third-party products that boast “Works with SmartThings” compatibility.
Seemingly every major category is covered, including the Amazon Echo and Google Home smart speakers, numerous smart lighting products (including Philips and Sylvania gear), the Ring Video Doorbell, and smart door locks. SmartThings can also integrate with your Samsung smart appliances. If there’s a gap in SmartThings’ coverage, it’s a lack of support for Nest and August smart home products; otherwise, it’s hard to find a market that SmartThings doesn’t play in. As much as we like the third-generation Samsung SmartThings Hub, we don’t recommend an upgrade from the second-generation hub because of the pain such a migration will inflict on the user.
Best security-focused smart home system Ring Alarm Read TechHive's reviewMSRP $199.00See itRing Alarm is a spectacular DIY home security system with the potential to be much more, but don’t buy one if what you’re really looking for is a smart home solution.
Ring’s long-delayed Ring Alarm home security system is finally here, and wow, was it worth the wait. For just $199, you get a numeric keypad, a base station with a siren, a motion sensor, and one door/window sensor. It is one of the best security-focused systems on the market today, but it has the potential to become one of the best smart home systems period.
That’s because the system has every type of radio you’d want in a smart home system: Z-Wave Plus, Zigbee, LTE, and Wi-Fi. It works with a few third-party products today—including an outboard siren from Dome and a smart smoke/carbon-monoxide detector from First Alert—but the presence of Z-Wave and Zigbee radios enable it to support just about any smart home product on the market. And Ring says it fully intends to go down that path (we are disappointed in the fact that we haven’t heard anything new on the front since its July 2018 launch). The cherry on top of this sundae: You get optional professional monitoring for just $10 per month, with no long-term contract, and that includes unlimited cloud storage for video clips from Ring’s video doorbells and security cameras.
Runner-up Abode Iota Read TechHive's reviewMSRP $229.00See itBy integrating a video camera into its already capable hub, Abode’s Iota makes for a more compelling smart alarm system than ever.
Abode continues to impress us with its security-focused smart home hub. The Abode Iota incorporates a 1080p security camera into an enclosure that’s more compact than the original, yet retains all the features we like, including support for Zigbee and Z-Wave smart home devices and sensors, optional cellular backup for added security, and optional professional monitoring.
Best home security system for privacy Minut Smart Home Alarm Read TechHive's review$129.00MSRP $129.00See iton MinutMinut’s infrared-detecting security system offers best-in-class motion detection; its additional features are just icing on the cake.
The Minut Smart Home Security system is actually pretty limited in terms of its ability to control the other smart devices in your home, but if you’re particularly sensitive about privacy, this system can protect your home without relying on on cameras, microphones, or similar technology that some consider invasive.
What to look for when shoppingAs we mentioned earlier, smart home systems come in a dazzling array of shapes and sizes, from brain-dead simple to vastly complex. Features vary just as widely, so you’ll need to pay more attention than usual when you’re narrowing down the field to find the product that’s right for you. Here’s a look at some of those key decision factors. To see how each system on the market measures up to those promises, drill down into the reviews at the end of the buyers’ guide.
Nest The Nest thermostat is quite popular, but it’s not compatible with every smart home system.
Device support: Some smart hubs support only a small number of devices made by the manufacturer of the hub. Others offer certification programs for third-party devices and/or offer hooks into systems developed by third parties: Amazon (Alexa), Nest (thermostats, cameras, and smoke/CO detectors), and Google (Google Assistant) are the biggies here, but Apple’s HomeKit could become important later. It’s critical to consider all the devices you already have in your home, and whether the hub will support them. If the hub doesn’t support them, you might be looking at a massive upgrade later. As well, you need to think about what devices you plan to add to your network down the line.
IFTTT support: Many top smart home systems support IFTTT (If This Then That), the simple scripting system that lets you connect devices that otherwise wouldn’t be. For example, you could use IFTTT to turn all the lights in the house blue if a water leak is detected by your smart hub—even if it can’t speak directly to the lighting system itself. Stringify is a similar—and perhaps more sophisticated—service, but it has not yet gained as much traction as IFTTT.
Wired vs. wireless hub connection: Many smart hubs must connect to your wireless router via an ethernet cable, which limits your placement and, of course, requires a free ethernet port on your router. That can be an issue with the new generation of puck-like mesh routers that have just two ethernet ports (Eero, Google Wifi, TP-Link Deco M5, et al). A smaller number of hubs are wireless and can be placed anywhere in range of the router, increasing your flexibility.
Fibaro Z-Wave-based sensors, such as this door/window sensor from Fibaro, operate on a low-power mesh network.
Sensor range: If your home is large or spread out, you’ll need to pay attention to the range that the hub’s sensors support. Hubs may support a wide array of connection protocols, including Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, Z-Wave, and Zigbee, all of which have very different ranges. As with a wireless router, smart hub range can also be impacted by interference and device placement, and smart home devices themselves have different specs, as well. Take the time to look into the detailed specs to be sure sensors and third-party devices will actually work with your home’s infrastructure.
Battery backup: If the power goes out, your smart lights might not be useful, but other smart home features, like security sensors, rely on a hub that’s always on. Many smart hubs, even those that aren’t built around security, feature battery backups (either through rechargeable cells or standard AAs). Even a short power outage can cause a significant delay while the hub reconnects, so a battery backup makes sense in many home environments. If you like everything else about a particular hub that lacks a battery backup option, consider investing in an uninterruptible power supply to plug it into.
Christopher Null/TechHive Wink’s app keeps a detailed log of everything that goes on in your smart home.
Mobile app usability: You’ll probably be interacting with your hub primarily through its mobile app, so you’ll want one that’s intuitive and powerful, with all the key features you use front and center. App-store screen shots and, of course, our reviews can help you get a sense of what you’re dealing with on the app side of things.
Overall complexity: This is a companion consideration to the mobile app, relating primarily to the audience for whom the smart home system was developed. Is the system geared at everyday users with limited customization needs? Or is it built with extreme flexibility in mind, to the point where the configuration decisions might overwhelm a novice user? Again, close attention to our reviews can help you gauge how comfortable you’re likely to feel with any system.
In addition to the above, the following considerations are primarily geared at systems with a security focus.
Sensor support: A companion consideration to the device support issue above, if you’re in the market for a security-focused smart hub, you’ll want one that has support for all the sensors you need. Most security hubs only work with the sensors made by the same manufacturer, so you can’t mix and match as you would with a general-use smart hub. Some security systems offer only a very narrow range of sensor types, while others have a wide variety to choose from.
Lowe’s A GSM module ensures your home security system doesn’t fail if a burglar cuts your landline.
Cellular radio backup: If you could simply cut the broadband connection to defeat a security system, it wouldn’t be much good, would it? Any good security system will include a 3G cellular backup that can be used in case your broadband connection drops. You should also carefully consider the battery backup consideration above, which is essential for dealing with power outages and is a standard feature on most security hubs.
Professional monitoring: If you don’t want to monitor your own security system 24/7, you’ll at least want the option to engage with a professional security company that can keep tabs on it for you when you’re out on walkabout. These invariably cost extra, which leads to our final consideration….
Service plan costs: Service plan costs vary widely from system to system, and many vendors offer a range of plans to choose from. Some systems will work without a service plan, allowing you to self-monitor. Some require a plan to function at all. Also note that lower-tier service plans might not include professional monitoring (Ring Alarm has one of the least-expensive plans: $10 per month with no long-term commitment). Price out service plans carefully before you pull the trigger.
Our latest smart home system reviews Note: When you purchase something after clicking links in our articles, we may earn a small commission. Read our affiliate link policy for more details. | https://medium.com/@gordo06046467/best-smart-home-systems-for-a-connected-domicile-8b08ada1adb0 | [] | 2020-12-25 05:14:04.347000+00:00 | ['Entertainment', 'Services', 'Chromecast', 'Consumer'] |
Facebook acquires Kustomer: an end for chatbots businesses? | Does Facebook end the era of the chatbots? Probably yes and here’s why
Recently Facebook named among 4 digital giants, Google, Amazon and Apple, to be engaged in anti-competitive and monopoly-style, guess what happened next? Exactly. Facebook acquired a top CRM platform that provides conversational services for businesses — Kustomer.
Photo from the official Kustomer’s website
Facebook, like any other digital giant, buys lots of small companies and promising startups. Most of the time Facebook just takes the technology and uses it in its own interests, less often we might come across products like WhatsApp and Instagram. I covered a bit on that here.
Looking at this acquisition, it more looks that Kustomer is going to be integrated inside of Facebook’s current business tools. Meaning that besides setting up campaigns and marketing funnels in your Ads Manager, now Facebook might let you create conversational tools for your business to better communicate with customers. Of course for specific additional pricing.
Photo by Alex bracken on Unsplash
Since how Instagram is slightly becoming a marketplace for brands by creating an opportunity to sell products, integrating conversational tools from Messenger, it is clear that Instagram is not anymore about posting selfies with friends and your breakfasts with avocado. So acquiring a CRM platform makes sense in terms of Facebook needs a strong company taking care of all the customer communication processes and it seems Kustomer is the best fit.
But what that means for the chatbot industry? Is it going to take it forward? Is it an end era for chatbots?
What will happen with Kustomer is a matter of time, while the most important question is — what will happen with the chatbots industry? To feed my own curiosity I’ll share my thoughts below.
Trending Bot Articles:
The Chatbot industry will be growing.
When a corporation like Facebook acquires one of the leading startups in its industry, that’s the first thing that might come to your mind. Otherwise, why would they invest? Thinking the industry will grow is okay and even logical.
There is a lot of skepticism around the chatbots and Kustomer’s success is the helping hand with huge credibility invested in the industry. From another hand, when on Earth the digital scene was limited? Well, probably never. And it won’t as the seats are available for anyone coming up with a working idea.
Need to understand that having a strong competitor is not a definitely lost game. Most of the time it even works out better.
All is good, but monopoly wins.
On a scale from 0 to 10, how would you find a logical to buy a service from external providers for the product whose platform offers the same service?
Why would you store your data in two different places?
Why would you open two browser tabs, when one is enough?
In other words, why would you buy a vehicle and engine separately?
While there might be true fans cheering a service they love to this day, Facebook’s brutal actions won’t stay aside. It maybe won’t be that brazenly as I sound it out, but Mark Zuckerberg’s owned company will find lots of suspicious activities from the external chatbot providers. And you can be sure that Facebook will do its best to prevent its users from any kind of external threat. We all know what happened when Snapchat rejected Facebook.
If all of this is still unclear, let me try this way; when Facebook offers you ready tools, wouldn’t be gloomy to go for the same somewhere else? The most important, wouldn’t it make your life difficult by running from one place to another one?
Besides Facebook’s move in a try to create a monopoly over chatbot providers, there are certain reasons to worry about even without Mark’s holy involvement.
Searches for the keyword “chatbot” in the past 5 years | Google trends
If we look at google trends, we see how the searches for a chatbot is getting down. But it is showing the truth the chatbot providers wouldn’t wish to see. In lockdown times, when digitalization took over any other field in Globe, having in a back-side nothing more than just a “COVID-19 WhatsApp Chatbot” case is a sad reality.
Technology changes and businesses must adapt.
Don’t forget to give us your 👏 ! | https://chatbotslife.com/facebook-acquires-kustomer-an-end-for-chatbots-businesses-60e1296da717 | ['Murad Zamanov'] | 2020-12-15 15:11:16.130000+00:00 | ['Chatbots For Business', 'Marketing', 'Chatbots', 'Bots', 'Digital Marketing'] |
Smart Contract — A Comprehensive Introduction | The birth of Bitcoin made the whole world know about what blockchain is. Later many tech enthusiasts started to scrutinize the functionality of blockchain technology. Blockchain is leading to so many innovations and evolutions that are constantly emerging in the world. The arrival of blockchain technology paved the transformation of different sectors to a decentralized network. This advent created the cryptocurrency market to flourish much more.
Many cryptocurrencies and crypto exchanges started to emerge in the crypto market. With the concept of decentralization, the whole transformation powered up to all the tokens and exchanges out there. That made traditional crypto exchanges (i.e) centralized exchanges to decentralized exchanges (DEX). There is a huge craze on decentralized exchange and many investors are building their DEX to make profits out of it.
Centralized vs Decentralized Exchanges
Centralized exchange (a.k.a CEX) is the traditional exchange. There will be a middle-man involved in the transactions done through CEX. For every transaction, the middle-man will charge some amount as a commission or brokerage. Here, the transactions can be either done by fiat-to-crypto or crypto-to-crypto.
The centralized exchange has an escrow system as a security feature. So, any asset can be pegged with the cryptocurrency. The asset will be in the hands of the middle-man until the transaction gets successful.
A decentralized exchange is contrary to a Centralized exchange. DEX cuts off the involvement of the middle-man during the transactions. Naturally, there will be no commission or brokerage charged for every trade and transaction done through the DEX.
Cryptocurrency Exchange
The entire DEX works as the Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT), the details of the transactions are stored on the blocks of the network which is very hard to track the personal information or data. So, this type of exchange is secured during the transactions. The entire transaction process is carried out in a peer-to-peer manner which is one-to-one, therefore the transactions are quite fast and transparent. Transactions are made with the help of a Private key, Public Key, and Smart Contract.
What is a Smart Contract?
A smart contract is a predefined line of code that is embedded in the crypto exchange’s back-end functions. It automatically works when the terms and conditions of the two users are involved in a transaction met. Smart Contracts are stored in the public server so that cannot be modified. The transactions that happen through the smart contract are preceded by blockchain. These lines of code cut downs the middle-man and the charges involved during the transaction.
Smart Contract in Global Sectors
Smart contracts can be brought into the transactions of global sectors like banking, insurance, agriculture, and government. Transparency will be maintained in the transactions done in the industry. Because of the reliability in the transactions, many might come forward to shift to smart contracts.
Smart Contract
Why is Smart Contract the Solution?
Sectors like banking and insurance will have huge transactions happening in a day. There will be millions and billions of transactional details will be shared. As this is the digital era when everything is turning towards advanced technologies, that also fits the hackers’ community too. The hackers are constantly trying to find a loophole to inject a threat or ransomware during the transaction. This will lead to money laundering.
To prevent such abnormal activities from the hackers’ side, smart contracts are introduced to prevent such illegal activities.
How Smart Contracts Acts an Iron Curtain?
The development of smart contracts includes complex programming structures and algorithms to make it unbreakable and insusceptible for cyber or any malicious attacks. When the user does a transaction, every transaction is stored in a form of a block with a hash code in it. When a user is transacting to another user, the sender must have a public key of the beneficiary. The sender can approve the transaction with the help of a private key which acts as a passcode for the account and a digital signature which is used instead of the personal details. After the miner validates the sender’s account details, the transaction is done. This complex back-end process makes the entire transaction to end fruitfully. This will be very hard for hackers to trace or break the iron curtain securities that are enabled in the blockchain technology.
Security
Benefits of Smart Contracts
There are n number of benefits that the entire blockchain ecosystem experience through enabling smart contract.
Security — The transactions done through the smart contract are very secure because there is no involvement of any third-person.
Anonymity — The personal data and transaction information are completely concealed from the view of the other. The information is concealed by the digital signature.
Transparency — The transactions are transparent that is stored in the form of blocks in a distributive ledger. Anyone involved in the transaction can view it later.
Swiftness — The transactions are nimble even in the peak hours of trading. As it is done in a peer-to-peer manner, the time required for a transaction is very little.
Immutable — The entire ecosystem is immutable. The technology is insusceptible to hackers or any other malicious attacks.
Phases of Smart Contracts
There some phases involved during the process of smart contract, they are:
Creation — The contracts are created based on the agreement of both parties. With the acknowledgment of both parties, the line of code is being prepared as a smart contract.
Freezing — When the transaction is processed, it has to approve all the requirements in the smart contract, only then the process will be carried out.
Execution — After meeting the requirement, the validating process is done by the miners. Once the validation is done the transaction is executed and forms a block as a public ledger.
Finalization — The transaction becomes finalized once the asset becomes unfrozen.
So…
Day to day there will be many evolutions in the technology relatively there will be an increase in hackers too. There is a fact that, In the last three years, the money laundering and theft rate is rising.
In the FY-18, Rs 44.25 cr was lost in 927 incidents. Also, in the FY-19, Rs 68.45 cr was lost in 1302 incidents.
Having this fact as proof, banks, insurance, and other industries can think about implementing smart contracts with the help of blockchain will provide safe and secure transactions. | https://medium.com/@praveenhere/smart-contract-a-comprehensive-introduction-f4c65800020a | [] | 2020-11-19 11:07:02.702000+00:00 | ['Blockchain Technology', 'Crypto Exchange', 'Smart Contracts', 'Cryptocurrency', 'Consensus'] |
A Gentle Introduction to DAX Queries: How they’re different from DAX functions, how to write them, and how they look vs. SQL queries | If you’ve been using PowerBI (or PowerPivot, or SSAS in Tabular mode) for any amount of time, you will inevitably come across the need to write DAX (Data Analysis eXpressions) to create the custom columns and measures that you need to build your model, enhance your report, and/or perform your analysis. When thinking about DAX, many people I have worked with think about it or use it as just a formula language like Excel’s but it’s much more than that. It can also be used a query language.
How are DAX queries different from DAX functions?
At its simplest — DAX functions return a single value whereas DAX queries return a table. You will notice that some DAX functions take a table as an input and/or output an entire table, like CALCULATETABLE:
CALCULATETABLE, a function that takes a table as it’s first and only required parameter, and returns a table
If the function outputs a table, then it cannot be used on its own in PowerBI’s formula bar when creating a new column or measure, it needs to be combined with another function that uses it as an input to return a single value or it will return an error, like below.
However, it can be used if you select “New table”, where it asks you to write a DAX expression to create a new table.
To see what’s going on, I encourage you to download DAX Studio, an open-source tool that specifically works with DAX queries. After doing so, connect it to your model, whether it’s in PowerBI, SSDT, PowerPivot, or a live Tabular server, and run some DAX queries against it. That brings us to our next point.
How do you write a DAX query and how does it look vs. SQL queries?
For the sake of this article, we are going to use basic examples and assume we aren’t using variables anywhere.
Much like how the most basic SQL queries begin with a SELECT statement, DAX queries begin with an EVALUATE statement. The equivalent of SELECT * FROM <table> in DAX would be EVALUATE <table>.
Here’s a quick comparison of the basic syntax of a DAX query vs. a SQL query:
The basic SQL query syntax vs. DAX query syntax
With DAX queries if you want to specify columns, filter rows, add extra columns, or group your data, you would use many different DAX functions including but not limited to: FILTER, CALCULATETABLE, SUMMARIZE, SUMMARIZECOLUMNS, ADDCOLUMNS, GROUPBY, instead of DAX statements.
Let’s go with a slightly more complicated example.
I’ve been re-watching the MCU movies during quarantine, so I’ll be using another made up dimensional data model and dataset here.
Fact table: f_kill
Dimension tables: dim_avenger, dim_location
Our little avenger kill data model
In DAX Studio: the tables and attributes, the DAX query, and the results.
DAX query code:
EVALUATE
SUMMARIZE (
CALCULATETABLE (
‘f_kill’,
‘dim_location’[location_name]
IN {
“New York”,
“Wakanda”
}
),
‘dim_location’[location],
‘dim_avenger’[avenger],
“kills”, [number_of_kills]
)
Purpose of the above DAX query: to find out the number of kills in Wakanda and New York, and group it by location and the Avenger. One thing you may notice about the above query if you understand SQL is the lack of JOINs. With DAX, it already knows the existing relationships between tables so there are no JOINs to be written :)
Let’s break down the above query from inside to out after the EVALUATE statement:
CALCULATETABLE takes a table as input, in our case the “f_kill” table, and applies filters. The filter I am applying is for the location_name to be either New York or Wakanda.
SUMMARIZE “creates a summary of the input table grouped by the specified columns”, it is similar to GROUPBY. In our case, the input table is the result of CALCULATETABLE and we are grouping our results by location name and avenger, and the expression we are summarizing is the number of kills, which is a measure I’ve created for this exercise.
The equivalent of this query written in SQL would resemble something like:
If you’d like to download the sample PowerBI file, click here.
If you want a more comprehensive guide on DAX queries, I recommend the below resources: | https://medium.com/@allentseng92/a-gentle-introduction-to-dax-queries-how-theyre-different-from-dax-functions-how-to-write-them-ab3e8a5b640 | ['Allen Tseng'] | 2020-12-09 00:41:25.395000+00:00 | ['Data Analytics', 'Dax', 'Business Intelligence', 'Power Bi', 'Analyitcs'] |
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