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Jay Cross helps people work and live smarter. Jay is the Johnny Appleseed of informal learning. He wrote the book on it. He was the first person to use the term eLearning on the web. He has challenged conventional wisdom about how adults learn since designing the first business degree program offered by the University of Phoenix.
Remembering is vital. In fact, remembering is as important as learning itself.
There's no point in learning something if you forget it before you can put it to use. Yet research finds that people forget the majority of what they learn in workshops and classrooms. Typically, only 15% of what's covered in a workshop ever shows up on the job!
Many L&D departments act as if their work is (more…)
Effectiveness, Chief Learning Officer magazine, June 2013. This is the article as submitted; the printed version may vary.
Most columnists in CLO magazine advocate something they're sure of. This column is different: it's about an issue I'm not at all sure of but I think it important and would enjoy getting your opinion.
In 1959, British scientist/novelist C.P. Snow wrote an essay describing the "two cultures, whose thesis was that 'the intellectual life of the whole of western society' was split into two cultures — namely the sciences and the humanities — and that this was a major hindrance to solving the world's problems. Snow contended that scientists did not understand the humanities and humanists did not understand science. As the world grew more complex, the two groups grew further apart." (Wikipedia)
Half a century later, the world grows more complex everyday and the two cultures have grow further apart. It's worth a revisit because the growing divide will shake the training industry to its roots. I am going to use the concept to describe two different sorts of knowledge and the different way we learn them. #1 is intuitive knowledge and #2 is logical knowledge. They are different as night and day.
Intuitive knowledge
Intuitive knowledge is what Nobel laureate Daniel Kahneman describes in Thinking Fast and Slow as System 1. It's the province of the emotional brain. Intuitive knowledge works with patterns; it knows no words. In other words, it is tacit. Since the emotional brain is much older and works faster than the logical brain, intuitive knowledge is the first to come to mind; the rational brain uses logic to weigh whether or not an intuitive response is valid or must be tempered. Intuitive knowledge is also known as muscle memory.
Intuitive knowledge is complex and hence unpredictable, inductive, volatile, and emergent. It's the realm of imagination. It deals with people's interpretations. It lives in the minds of the people who pull it together.
Examples of intuitive knowledge: how to dance and to sell. Training departments can't do much with the increasingly important Intuitive skills. Intuitive things are learned by doing: experientially. People "get" the skills of dealing with complexity: critical thinking, prioritizing, working with people, design thinking, and so forth — by doing them.
"I do things I do not know how to do by doing them." Picasso
Experience can be supplemented with stories (someone else's experience), simulations (fake experience), trial and error (the school of hard knocks), and mimicry (copied experience).
Rational knowledge
Rational knowledge is the opposite of Intuitive knowledge. It's the province of the rational brain. It works with logic. It is explicit and can be explained with words.
Rational knowledge is straightforward (or complicated, which is several simples mushed together.) It's Newtonian clockwork, an equal and opposite reaction for every action. It is formulaic, yes or no, and reductionist. It deals with facts. It's true no matter who is looking. Training departments help people learn the Rational. Workshops, programmed instruction, and Kahn Academy can teach Rational Knowledge. Example of rational knowledge: programming PERL, the states and their capitals, multiplication.
The Explicit and the Tacit
As the world becomes more complex, people need to rely more on the interpretive power of Intuitive knowledge. So what does this have to do with a CLO? (The editor here gets on my case if I don't relate topics to the needs of chief learning officers.) Well, here's the punch line: people learn Rational knowledge and absorb Intuitive knowledge by different means.
The basic difference is that you get to know Rational Knowledge. Intuitive Knowledge, on the other hand, transforms your identity. For example, I can know a lot about plumbing but until I have Intuitive Knowledge, I can't call myself a plumber. It's learning to know vs. learning to be.
While different parts of the brain deal with Intuitive and Rational knowledge, these are not the old (and discredited) left/right brain theories. This is more about the conscious and subconscious minds.
Dave Snowden, a oracular figure in interpreting complexity for business ends, says the greatest danger is confusing a complex situation for a merely complicated one.
If you are concerned only with helping people learn rational knowledge, you're abandoning a vital facet of learning. Facts are impotent until coupled with feelings. Feelings without facts are mute. A successful learning organization is bi-cultural; it melds the intuitive with the rational
Bi-culturalism melds two originally distinct cultures into a holistic co-existence.
Ask yourself: is your learning bi-cultural?
Among the prizes I'll be passing out at my webinar on Making Learning Stick on April 30: Cathy Davidson's profound book on attention, Now You See It
The last three minutes of this RSA Animate on using your whole brain rather than favoring one hemisphere is sheer poetry. One inspiration after another, staccato, overloaded by circuits. My mental movie was nodding in agreement. Yes, yes, yes, right, right on, of course, yes, yes, right, yes.
Start here and then go back to the beginning.
I'd been trying to reconcile Dan Pink's bi-cameralism and other's put-downs. The Divided Mind clarifies it.
Now You See It: How Technology and Brain Science Will Transform Schools and Business for the 21st Century by Cathy N. Davison, a polymath professor at Duke. 2011. 292 pages. $11.68 (paperback) (more…)
At Online Educa, I chaired a session on neuroscience and learning, Here's a synopsis from Online Educa's News Portal.
Neuroscientists are progressing rapidly in their research into areas highly relevant to education. Educators are eager to learn about their discoveries. Numerous teachers already use "brain-based" programmes in order to enhance learning. But can neuroscience really help to improve teaching? Experts at OEB 2009 called for caution.
By Andrea Marshall
Hauke Heekeren, Professor of Affective Neuroscience and Psychology of Emotions at the Freie Universität Berlin and Max-Planck-Institute for Human Development, gave a brief summary of the function of the brain and the basic methods of neuroimaging. "We must be very careful interpreting the results of brain imaging," he warned. "What we are measuring might be far removed from what we are actually looking for."
To illustrate this point, Heekeren suggested an analogy: "It is like trying to investigate how a car works – but you examine it with a sensor that is mounted on a geo-satellite."
Quite a few myths have spread from misleading interpretations of neuroscientific data, Heekeren explained. A famous one is "the left side of the brain is responsible for language and the right side for abstract thinking". However, it is far too simplistic to ascribe one specific function to one clearly defined 'centre' in the brain, Heekeren pointed out. "It is a popular myth that there are all these 'centres' in the brain. There is even supposed to be a shopping centre," he smiled.
So how does the human brain work? According to Heekeren, different brain regions form dynamic networks. In other words: Several regions "cooperate" when carrying out certain cognitive tasks. The complexity of the system is one of the reasons that makes it difficult to apply neuroscientific results directly in the classroom. "From a neuroscientific point of view, it is not possible to conclude that – for example – online education works better than other forms of education."
For more information on Hauke Heekeren, please refer to http://www.heekerenlab.org/
Daniel T. Willingham, Cognitive Scientist and Professor of Psychology at the University of Virginia, was connected to the ONLINE EDUCA BERLIN audience via the Internet. He holds a slightly different view. In his book Why Don't Students Like School? he explains the biological and cognitive basis of learning – with clear applications for teachers. However, he also made the point that it is difficult to 'translate' neuroscientific data to behavioural analysis. His main argument: There is often a mismatch in the levels of analysis that neuroscientists and education researchers work with (see below).
Willingham gave a "note of caution" to teachers: "So-called brain experts take ordinary findings, throw in a few 'brain things' and sell it as revolutionary in education," he said, likening the 'experts' to quack doctors selling "snake oil".
The suggestions of these 'experts' are often banal: "They explain how a low glucose level in the brain metabolism affects learning. But everyone knows anyway that children who are hungry don't learn well," Willingham said.
What can neuroscience do for education then? At OEB, both experts pointed out that neuroimaging studies are descriptive but not prescriptive. For example, they can pinpoint the neural systems responsible for reading, writing or arithmetic. But they do not tell teachers "what works" in the classroom. It is not possible, for example, to advise teachers on certain strategies for so-called visual, auditory or kinesthetic learners. Brain research has not found any evidence that these learning styles exist.
Neuroscientists study these cognitive functions in isolation for the sake of simplicity. They do not study the entire nervous system (…).
For educators, the mind of a single child is the lowest level of analysis with any payoff. Higher levels include the classroom, school, neighbourhood and country.
The information that education researchers most often try to import from neuroscience concerns a single cognitive process in isolation, but the interactions with other systems will be part of the educational context. For example, we know that repetition benefits memory, but a teacher cannot ask students to repeat work without considering the impact on motivation.
Neuroscientists usually cannot characterise these interactions."
Daniel T. Willingham (2009)
Related posts:
Brains are Applesauce
Brain Rules
What Do Brains Have to Do With It?
Who's in Charge Here?
The No-One-in-Charge World
Learning Takes Brains
Brain Fitness
Random Learning
Managing with the Brain in Mind
…and finally, from The Onion, Parents of Nasal Learners Demand Odor-Based Curriculum


text: Brown's latest, her first in more than two years, serves up hip-hop with a decidedly dancehall feel. Whether she's following the latest industry trend of sampling reggae or expressing another dimension of her lyrical and hip-hop maturity, she works several songs like a champion. Still, rote cuts like ''I Don't Care,'' which features pedestrian keyboard production and a defensive white MC named Chyna White, keep this effort from shining.

subset: commoncrawl


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It's funky Friday, which means we rapped the entire podcast. Also, that's not true, and it was just a normal show. We discussed:
* The Rangers clinching playoffs (with help from Dan Ellis)
* The Jets being eliminated from the post-season
* Erik Karlsson and the Senators
* The ball is in the Minnesota Wild's court
* Detroit could be a scary round one opponent
* And so much more
You can listen to it here:


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Need a reason to complete an Ironman? How about this: you'll have to eat like you did as a skinny teenager just to survive the training. If so inclined, it's actually possible to tick the 2.4-mile swim, 112-mile ride, and full marathon race off your list after just a year of training, says renowned triathlon coach Matt Dixon, founder of Purplepatch Fitness. The key: using shorter-distance triathlons like sprint triathlons (500-meter swim, 20-km bike, 5-km run) and half-Ironmans (1.2-mile swim, 56-mile ride, 13.1-mile run) as part of your training regime. "Triathlons are not swim, then bike, then run—they're swim, bike, run," says Dixon. "Completing all three disciplines successively is a skill and you have to practice it." The skill comes in learning how to be efficient in the transitions, of course, but more overlooked are the nutritional aspects of getting enough calories into your system before and during the 140-mile race just to survive it. "Nutrition is the fourth discipline," says Dixon. "What works for a neighbor might be very different than what works for you. Some foods or gels might not sit well on your stomach or give you gastrointestinal issues and the only way to find out is by trying them out in races." Dixon suggests tackling your first sprint triathlon after three months of training, during which time you should be focused more on swimming and a little less on running, which is more taxing on the body. Schedule your first half-Ironman six months before your full Ironman race, and make sure to have fun. Complete a second half-Ironman three months later, this time focusing on improving your performance. In between, mix in other sprint-triathlons, a 10k, or some half-marathons. Just don't compete in a full marathon, says Dixon, which requires too much recovery time to be useful. Lastly, schedule a final sprint triathlon three weeks before the big race, and feel free to go all out. "If you finish feeling strong, you are ready to go," says Dixon.
To get ready for your first sprint triathlon, use Dixon's three month interactive training plan.
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Jeff McGill was diagnosed with stomach cancer in August. On Saturday, his fellow firefighters held a barbecue lunch to raise money for his medical bills.
The group became civil rights heroes after their 1961 sit-in at an all white lunch counter in Rock Hill, choosing to go to jail instead of paying the fine for their charges. Earlier this week, after 54 years, the group had their convictions vacated.
The Allied Pilots Association, representing 15,000 pilots at American Airlines, announced that members approved a new five-year contract providing an immediate 23 percent pay raise. 08:50 AM
Republican Gov. Pat McCrory and potential Democratic 2016 election rival Roy Cooper were about even with campaign cash entering 2015. Their campaign committees disclosed fundraising totals for the final six months of 2014 on Friday, the deadline for candidates not on last year's ballot. 08:11 AM
Police arrested two men who they say may be responsible for more than a dozen robberies in the past eight months. 01:49 PM
Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools and the United Way are partnering to help get kids who are chronically absent from school back into the classroom for good. 01/30/2015 08:26 PM
There are 10,000 apartments under construction right now in Charlotte and thousands more in the works. Analysts say rent costs have been rising between 3 and 5 percent each year for the past couple of years. 09:05 AM
Watching TWC News on the go is easy with the Time Warner Cable News app, featuring a live stream of the news channel and on-demand weather and video content from TWCNews.com.
2015 North American International Auto Show
There was a time when four doors meant family car, not performance car. Our Ed Keiner has more on how automakers are blurring that distinction.
More News
One of the drivers inducted into the NASCAR Hall of Fame on Friday was Wendell Scott. He may not have won as many races as the other inductees but his determination as the first African-American driver in NASCAR earned him a rightful spot. 01/30/2015 09:24 PM
A big push is underway to save a tax credit to save historic buildings. The Republican-led legislature ended the historic tax credit at the beginning of the year, and now another group of Republicans, including Gov. Pat McCrory, is traveling around the state to bring it back. 01/30/2015 07:33 PM
A chilling, first-of-its-kind PSA is set to air during the Super Bowl Sunday night, raising awareness of domestic violence. The NFL teamed up with the No More campaign to make the minute-long spot. 01/30/2015 04:29 PM
Carlton Richardson and five other members of a Johnson C. Smith University's Omega Psi Phi fraternity are accused of striking a pledge during hazing. According to a statement from the university, the fraternity was suspended and the students will be punished pending the outcome of an internal investigation. 01/30/2015 07:00 PM
The National Retail Federation expects total spending to top $14 billion nationwide. 01/30/2015 02:44 PM


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Kadner: Letter threatens to 'out' non-voters
By Phil Kadner firstname.lastname@example.com April 8, 2013 11:10PM
Nancy Schultz Voots, Will County Clerk. | Joseph P. Meier~Sun-Times Media
Updated: May 10, 2013 6:29AM
A letter threatening to publish the names of people who don't vote in Tuesday's local elections was mailed to residents of Frankfort Township over the weekend.
"What if your neighbors knew whether you voted?" reads the ominous opening sentence. "Why do so many people fail to vote? We've been talking about the problem for years, but it only seems to get worse.
"This year we're taking a new approach. We're sending this mailing to you and your neighbors to publicize who does and does not vote."
The letter includes the person's voting history (i.e., "vote" in November 2008; "no vote" in November 2012), but not the party or candidates supported by the recipient. An additional page contains the alleged voting records of about 60 "neighbors" who are named,
Will County Clerk Nancy Schultz Voots, the chief election official for the county, was so upset by the mailing that she asked the state's attorney's office to investigate whether any violation of voters' rights had occurred.
Mary Tatroe, chief of the state's attorney's civil division, responded that political committees "have the right to receive a copy of the poll list, (but) there is nothing in the statute prohibiting the redistribution of these lists by the committees that receive them."
A spokesman for the Illinois State Board of Elections said the list of people who voted is available to registered political committees and government agencies.
Political committees and candidates often turn that information over to marketing research firms so they can target voters with campaign literature and robocalls.
Mary Farmer, who lives in an unincorporated area of Frankfort Township near Mokena, received a letter and was outraged.
"How dare they threaten to release my name publicly and publish the names of my neighbors," Farmer said. "I don't understand how they obtained this information. I'm so upset I'm tempted never to vote again."
William Birk, of Tinley Park, was almost as angry as Farmer.
"I was suspicious when I received the letter because there was no return address on the envelope or the letter itself," Birk said.
The outside of the stamped envelope was marked by a red-ink stamp and reads "Audit," which Birk interpreted "as an obvious ploy to deceive people to get them to open the envelope."
At the bottom of the front page of the letters sent to Birk and Farmer is their voting history in the November 2008, April 2009 and November 2012 elections.
"Who you vote for is secret, but who votes is public record," the letter states. "Do your civic duty! Vote on Tuesday!"
At the top of the letter is the name of a group, Citizens for Effective Local Government, that is not registered with the state board of elections as a political committee. The organization threatens to publish the list of voters and nonvoters on a website, www.frankforttownshipvotes.com, that does not appear to exist.
All of the recipients of the letter who contacted the SouthtownStar and Will County officials appear to be residents of Frankfort Township and registered Democrats, although Farmer contends that she sometimes has voted Republican.
Birk said his wife votes Republican and did not receive a letter, although she lives at the same address. He said he didn't realize voter polling lists were public information,
And they're not, really.
It might seem strange that an ordinary person can't get a copy of such a list from election officials, but political parties and committees can. But the political parties run the Illinois General Assembly. They want voter lists that identify who voted Republican or Democrat in primary elections so they can target their messages and limit campaign costs.
Lists of likely voters also help political parties and pollsters when they're trying to identify important issues and attract those most likely to vote.
"I think it's dirty politics plain and simple," Birk said about the letter that arrived at his home Friday.
Frankfort Township Assessor Joseph Kral, a Republican, said he was contacted about the letters by angry neighbors on Sunday.
"From what I can determine, the letters were sent to people who were Democrats, and the list on the second page seems to be people who have voted in Democratic primaries in the past," Kral said. "But when they list the elections and whether people voted or didn't vote, some of that information seems to be wrong.
"I just think this is awful. This is the worst thing I've seen in politics in my three years in office. ... I know nothing about who did this, except that it was costly because the stamps cost 48 cents each, but that makes these mailings virtually untraceable."
Will County Democratic chairman Scott Pyles said he knew nothing about the letters until a candidate told him about seeing "something on the SouthtownStar website.
"We didn't do this, I can tell you that," Pyles said. "We don't have the money. We put a total of $250 into backing the entire Democratic slate in Frankfort Township.
"I don't know how anyone could determine what the impact of such a mailing would be, but I would guess the Republicans were behind it because it would likely upset the people who received the letters. And Republicans outnumber Democrats in Frankfort Township about 2 to 1."
Edward Ronkowski, the county Republican chairman, had an opposite view.
"These letters are being sent out by Democrats," he said. "Why would Republicans threaten any Democrat who fails to vote in this election? These letters were targeted primarily at Democratic voters who do not vote in (local) elections."
The lists of people who voted, or didn't vote, should either be made available to everyone or restricted only to election officials. Giving political committees access to that information is giving them authority to harass people.
"I believe it's a civic duty to vote," Birk said. "But people shouldn't be coerced or intimidated into voting. This is about freedom to do what you want to do, the very essence of democracy."
Yes, but because political parties make the laws, I doubt anything will change.


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Hey, hey, it's the Monkees and more than 1,000 other faux rock groups from movies and TV compiled in T. Mike Childs' The Rocklopedia Fakebandica. The project was born when Childs needed something for his sketch comedy troupe's Web update: ''I couldn't think of anything funny, so I came up with this instead.'' But can you recall the names of the following fictitious rockers?
The up-and-coming '70s rock group fronted by Billy Crudup in Cameron
Crowe's 2000 autobiographical film Almost Famous. (Crowe is married to Nancy Wilson, who sings in Heart, which is not a fake band.)
Mediocre grunge band in Crowe's 1992 film Singles consisting of Eddie Vedder, Jeff Ament, Stone Gossard...and Matt Dillon. Luckily, Eddie,
Jeff, and Stone had a little group known as Pearl Jam to fall back on.
Mediocre grunge band in 1994's Reality Bites consisting of Nathan
December, Christopher Wagner, Jack Irons...and Ethan Hawke. (Oddly, Dave
Pirner and Evan Dando had cameos in the film but weren't in the band.)
In a 1993 episode of The Simpsons, this barbershop quartet overcomes
Homer and the unpronounceable last name of dell man Apu (their manager
changes it to ''D'Beaumarchais'') to win a Grammy.
This all-female trio, which included two real-life Playboy Playmates,
changes its name from the Kelly Affair and gets sucked down the drain of
sex, drugs, and...sex in 1970's classic Beyond the Valley of the Dolls.
In 1989's Heathers, this band's hit, ''Teenage Suicide (Don't Do It),''
motivates one zaftig fan's attempt to off herself, mostly because she
isn't cool enough to be murdered by Christian Slater and Winona Ryder.
Jamie Lee Curtis actually learned to play a guitar solo for this band's
performance in the 2003 update of Freaky Friday. Because, you see,
Lindsay Lohan was in her body, and vice versa, and...oh, it's
Michael J. Fox's band in 1985's Back to the Future, which judge Huey
Lewis calls ''just too darn loud'' to play Hill Valley High School's prom.
Happily, Fox travels to the '50s and helps invent rock & roll, so it all
works out.
Citizen Dick
Big Fun
The Pinheads
Hey, That's My Bike
Pink Slip
The Be Sharps
The Carrie Nations
Answers: A-5; B-1; C-4; D-7; E-8; F-2; G-6; H-3


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Fun baseball things are fun. Fun like homer-laden comebacks, illicit substance-coated baseball gloves and swaggering Tigers. Then we make fun of the Rockies, which isn't even fun for us.
Do yourself a favor and hold the audio-only version of the show tight to your chest via this MP3 link or stream it below. You can also subscribe to The Getting Blanked Podcast on iTunes, to have the podcast, live stream MP3s and other life-changing materials delivered straight to your computer each week via the RSS feed here.


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I've heard (and used) YAGNI (You Ain't Gonna Need It) quite often in my software development career. It's a battle cry for shipping a minimum viable product and letting the real-world usage dictate what new features and improvements are really needed. Generally speaking I think that this ruthless minimalism is a good thing. I think we've all fallen into the "pie in the sky" thinking about adding lots of bells and whistles to whatever feature we're working on. I for one also know the feeling of spending a lot of time on one aspect of a new feature only to later discover that no one really uses it. I like to think that, over time, I've begun to develop some sense of when a given feature is likely to be useful and when I should YAGNI it out of my task list, but then again I also feel like the more I know the less I know. Lately I'm finding that when I'm in doubt it's best to err on the side of doing less and keeping things as simple as possible.
That said, there is a certain classification of feature that I sometimes regret omitting in the name of YAGNI. I recently read a fantastic post on Oren Eini's blog titled, "On Professional Code". I think this quote from that post sums it up quite nicely:
…a professional system is one that can be supported in production easily. About the most unprofessional thing you can say is: "I have no idea what is going on".
This post really hit home for me because I've recently transitioned into a support role (or devops, if you like) at work. One of the things that I'm now responsible for is assisting our support team with troubleshooting difficult issues and figuring out what's going on when the phone is ringing off the hook with end-users complaining that the "system is slow" and they can't get their work done. While it's a relatively rare occurrence, I absolutely hate having to say, "I don't know what's going on". When there's an odd error being thrown at a user who is trying to do something in our system it's terribly frustrating to have to crack open the source code of the system to figure out why it's being thrown. The error messages that are logged are often loaded with developer-speak or things like, "this shouldn't happen". I'm one of the more tenured developers on our team so I know that if I have difficulty understanding why a given error is being raised our support staff has almost zero chance of being able to figure it out on their own. When they can't figure it out, they have to ask for help and when they have to ask for help me or one of my co-workers has to stop working on something else (usually some improvement to our infrastructure, an internal tool that will make our lives easier, or some performance profiling/tuning) to help them and make sure our customers can get their work done. I feel very comfortable in saying that these kinds of poorly documented and understood error conditions can be tremendously costly to any company. If you have to read the source code of your application to fix an issue that doesn't require changing the source code (i.e. it's a bug in the system), then you're failing to write "professional code" as Oren defines it in that post.
As a developer I know that I'm as guilty as anyone of writing sub-par error handling code and leaving cryptic error messages in the log. I can't speak for anyone but myself, but I think that this happens for one of two different reasons:
As long as software is written by human beings we'll always make mistakes. I'm not interested in exploring the mitigation of damage caused by human error in this post because that's a topic that's been explored in-depth by folks much smarter and more experienced than I am. Instead I'd like to focus on issue #2: that application of YAGNI to error-handling features. I've come to the realization lately that there is no such thing as 'YAGNI' when it comes to exposing information about what's going on in a live production application. In fact, I've started using another five-letter acronym to describe the development of features like this: YCNHE or "You Can Never Have Enough".
In my opinion, the cost-benefit ratio for adding useful information to error handling code is such that you can almost never have enough. Any time I add a message to some code that will end up being logged I ask myself the following question: "Who will read this message and what action will they need to take?". Almost no one can see a message like, "Unexpected value for parameter InputType" and know what needs to happen to fix it. This is just an informative statement with no imperative command or pointer to additional information. Granted there's probably a ton of contextual information that was captured along with the message like the timestamp from the server, a stack trace showing what routine or line of code was being executed, and the username of the person that was running the application when the error occurred. That type of contextual information can be very useful to a developer trying to reproduce or fix a defect but it's nearly useless to a non-developer trying to resolve an issue.
So what can you do to help alleviate this issue? Here are a few thoughts I've been formulating and will be experimenting with in the coming months:
I think it's pretty commonly accepted in the software development community that "good" code is easily readable and maintainable by other developers, but I think that this notion needs to be expanded. Good code should also be easily supportable by people who aren't developers. Next time you write a new feature take some time to think about how that feature might need to be supported in production. Are there things that would be relatively easy to add that might pay big dividends down the road in terms of improving the supportability of the system in production?
This post is a collection of my findings from a recent effort to eliminate memory leaks in a .NET Compact Framework (CF .NET) application. All of the information in this post is available elsewhere on the web but after spending a lot of time pulling it all together for my own purposes I thought I might write up my findings and maybe save someone else a few hours of time down the road. The majority of this post will focus on the initial setup needed to even get to the point that you can start to profile memory usage and find leaks in a running CF .NET application as I found that to be the most confusing and frustrating part of the entire process.
I've found that the .NET Compact Framework Remote Performance Monitor tool is the most memory profiling tool available for the purposes of finding memory leaks. Here are a couple of very informative blog posts by Steven Pratschner describing how this tool can be used:
Analyzing Device Application Performance With The .ENT Compact Framework Remote Performance Monitor
Finding Memory Leaks using the .NET CF Remote Performance Monitor
If you already use a Windows Mobile emulator image for doing CF .NET development then you should be able to just use that same image to profile memory usage and find leaks. If you don't currently use an emulator image you'll need to set one up and get to the point that you can deploy and run your app on the emulator. You might at this point ask why you can't do this on a physical device. You can do it on a physical device but I've opted to use an emulator for a few reasons:
If you need to setup an emulator image to work with, start out by grabbing some from here: Windows Mobile 6.1.4 Emulator Images. Download the 'Professional Images' package from that site and install it. Once installed you should be able to start, cradle, and deploy your application to a running emulator image.
Once you have an emulator that can run the application you want to profile, you'll need to install a hotfix to the Compact Framework in order to let the Remote Performance Monitor take snapshots of the garbage collected heap while the application is running. These snapshots are what ultimately let you see what objects are leaking as the application runs. You can request and download this hotfix here: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2436709
Once downloaded, cradle the emulator and copy the .cab file over to the emulator and run it on the device to install over the existing .NET Compact Framework on the device.
The Remote Performance Monitor tool comes with the Power Toys for .NET Compact Framework 3.5 package. You can download this package here: http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=13442
It's worth nothing here that I also took a look at the CLR Profiler tool which also ships with the Power Toys package. This tool was easier to get setup than the Remote Performance Monitor, but I found it really hard to parse the resulting output for an app as large and complicated as the one I was profiling. Also, taking snapshots with this tool was painfully slow to the point that it wasn't really practical for me to use. As always, your mileage may vary.
Once you have an emulator image that can run your application and has the properly hot-fixed version of the .NET Compact Framework installed you're ready to start profiling your application with the remote performance monitor. The blog posts that I linked to at the top of this article have a lot of detailed and helpful information about this, but I'll summarize it here as well.
First, make sure that your emulator is cradled and that the application you want to profile is available on the emulator. Also be sure that no applications are currently running on the emulator.
Next, start the Remote Performance Monitor and click the green 'Play' icon to start and profile an application. This brings up the 'Launch Application' dialog:
From this dialog you'll select the device that you want to profile the application on. If you've setup an emulator for this you should have an option like "Pocket_PC (ActiveSync)" in this list. You'll also need to specifiy the path to the application that you want to profile on the device. If your app lives under the "Program Files" path in a sub folder called "Myapp" you would enter: "\Program Files\MyApp\MyApp.exe". You can optionally specify a path on the desktop from which to copy the application, but I've always found it easier to just have the application already deployed and available on the emulator. Finally, enter any startup arguments that your application might need and then click 'OK' to launch and start profiling the app.
Once your app is running and being profiled the main Performance Monitor Window will start being constantly updated with a wide variety of metrics. There are a lot of interesting metrics here and most of them line up with counters that you can setup and monitor in PerfMon for Windows applications on a desktop or server. For the purposes of finding memory leaks, however, we're primarily concerned with the 'GC Heap' button that will become available in the main toolbar of the Performance Monitor.
Clicking the 'GC Heap' button will force a garbage collection on the running application and then take a snapshot of the garbage collected heap. This snapshot lets you see all objects that the garbage collector wasn't able to clean up. As you use your application and keep taking snapshots you can start to see if certain types of objects keep getting higher and higher instance counts which is a pretty good indication that you have a leak somewhere. The Finding Memory Leaks using the .NET CF Remote Performance Monitor blog post that I linked to at the start of this post has a lot more information and a good example of how to do this.
In my last post I discussed the approach we used at my job to convert an ASP .NET web forms application written in VB .NET to C#. In that post I alluded to some of the issues that we encountered during the conversion but didn't delve into any of the technical details. I decided to take the technical specifics of some of the more interesting conversion issues and make a separate post of them. If you ever embark on a conversion project like ours these might be of use to you.
This isn't a conversion issue per se, but if you want to convert a VB .NET project to C# you definitely want to have these compiler settings turned on in your VB .NET project prior to doing so. Turning these compiler flags on forces you to both explicitly declare all variables before using them (Option Explicit) and disallows some of the implicit data type conversions that VB .NET will do for you (Option Strict). Having both of these flags turned on will make the VB .NET code behave more like its C# equivalent with respect to variable declaration and type conversion. That said, if you've been developing in VB .NET without these settings on you might not be the type of person that would really want to convert that code to C# anyway.
Even with Option Strict turned on VB .NET is more permissive with implicit data type conversions than C#. For example, in VB .NET the following code will compile with Option Strict turned on:
2: 'Enumeration for defining columns in a grid
3: Public Enum OrderGridColumn
4: OrderDate
5: OrderedBy
6: ShipDate
7: End Enum
9: 'When binding data to the grid:
10: gridRow.Columns(OrderGridColumn.OrderDate).Text = data.OrderDate.ToString("g", CultureInfo.CurrentCulture)
Here we're using an enumeration to name the indexes of the columns in a grid for displaying order data. At runtime we're using these values to access the grid's columns and do special formatting for the OrderDate field. This is a somewhat trivial example, but we had lots of code like this scattered throughout our VB .NET project. The C# conversion tool converted line 10 of the above snippet to:
gridRow.Columns[OrderGridColumn.OrderDate].Text = data.OrderDate.ToString("g", CultureInfo.CurrentCulture);
gridRow.Columns[(int)OrderGridColumn.OrderDate].Text = data.OrderDate.ToString("g", CultureInfo.CurrentCulture);
For the record, there isn't much that I like about VB .NET, but being able to implicitly cast enum values to integers is one thing that I miss.
VB .NET supports query-style LINQ expressions just like C# but with slightly different syntax. The automated conversion tool completely whiffed on converting these queries from VB .NET to C#. I ended up re-writing them to use the LINQ extension methods and the converter did better with those but still got choked up on some of the more complicated lambdas. If I had it to over again I would probably have hunted down these bits of VB .NET code with query expressions/heavy lambda use and re-written them to use simple loops prior to the conversion. After the conversion I could have then just let ReSharper do the LINQ refactoring for me.
In VB .NET you can return a value from a function or property getter by assigning the return value to the name of the property or method, like this:
1: Public Function Add(ByVal firstNumber As Integer, ByVal secondNumber As Integer) As Integer
2: Dim result as Integer = firstNumber + secondNumber
3: Add = result
4: Exit Function 'You don't technically need the explicit Exit Function in this case
5: End Function
Obviously C# doesn't use this convention and requires an explicit return statement for all possible execution paths of a method or property getter. The automated conversion tool we used didn't always properly convert to explicit return statements so I ended up changing places in VB .NET where we were using this convention to use explicit return statements instead.
VB .NET allows the use of 'When' clauses when catching exceptions to define multiple catch blocks that are used only when the condition in the When clause is true. C# doesn't really have an equivalent way of doing this, so you have to pay some special attention to any Catch…When blocks when converting VB .NET to C#. In most cases the same run-time behavior can be achieved in C# by catching the desired exception types and then using switch or if/else statements to branch the handling logic.
For example, if you had the following VB .NET code:
1: Try
2: 'Some code that might throw an exception
3: Catch ex As SqlException When ex.ErrorCode = SomeErrorCode
4: 'handle this error code
5: Catch ex As SqlException When ex.ErrorCode = SomeOtherCode
6: 'handle the other error code
7: End Try
The equivalent C# would be:
1: try
2: {
3: //some code that might throw an exception
4: }
5: catch (SqlException ex)
6: {
7: if(ex.ErrorCode == SomeErrorCode)
8: //handle this error code
9: else if (ex.ErrorCode == SomeOtherCode)
10: //handle the other error code
11: else
12: throw;
13: }
Note that we need to re-throw the exception in the 'else' condition to completely mirror the VB .NET catch blocks, as the exception would not have been caught at all if it didn't meet one of the error code conditions.
The last issue I want to discuss in this post was by far the strangest and least expected of all of the issues that we encountered while reviewing and testing the converted code.
Consider the following snippet of VB .NET code:
1: Dim dividend As Integer = 1
2: Dim divisor As Integer = 0
3: Dim quotient As Double = dividend / divisor
4: Console.WriteLine(quotient)
This code will print 'Infinity' to the console. Now consider the following equivalent C# code:
1: int dividend = 1;
2: int divisor = 0;
3: double quotient = dividend/divisor;
4: Console.WriteLine(quotient);
This code will throw a System.DivideByZeroException. The reason this happens is because of the difference in the way that VB .NET and C# interpret the "/" mathematical operator. In C# the "/" operator performs division that is consistent with the types of the dividend and divisor. In the C# snippet above the dividend and divisor are both typed as integers so the "/" operator is performing integer division and therefore throwing an exception. In VB .NET on the other hand the "/" operator always does division that will return the full quotient including any remainder value in the fractional portion (see http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/25bswc76(v=vs.80).aspx). When the division operation returns a floating point number it has the flexibility to indicate that the value approaches infinity (even if that's not technically what the result of that division is).
To help deal with this VB .NET also exposes a "\" operator that will always return an integer result. If we were to re-write the VB .NET snippet above to use the the "\" operator for division instead it would also through a DivideByZeroException. Similarly if we were to tweak the C# code to type the dividend and/or divisor as a 'double' it would write 'Infinity' to the console. Note that the the 'Infinity' value is actually the PositiveInfinity constant exposed by the double data type.
If you're interested there are a couple of questions on Stackoverflow and the Programmers Stack Exchange site that explore different behaviors for dividing by zero in programming languages:
For the past few years I've been working with a fairly large ASP .NET web application. The app began its life as Classic ASP and was later ported to ASP .NET web forms written in VB .NET. Over the years the language preference of the development team shifted and we started finding ways to leverage C# alongside the existing VB .NET web forms project. This shift lead to a collection of class libraries, Windows services, and assorted utilities written in C# that were built up around the aging VB .NET code base. We found ways to push a lot of code out of the VB .NET web forms project, but still found ourselves having to add or edit code in the VB .NET project often enough to make it painful. In addition, building our main solution containing the VB .NET web forms project and our various C# class libraries took forever, apparently because Visual Studio didn't like our mixed-language projects. During our first annual DevCon (a yearly week-long meeting of our distributed team) in early 2011 we identified the presence of VB .NET as our primary source of pain on the development team and committed ourselves to eliminating it.
While the majority of this post will be focused on how the conversion was done I think it's important to briefly talk about why we did it. Taking a large and stable codebase and changing the language it's written in might seem foolhardy. At a past job I had explicitly decided against converting a much newer and smaller VB .NET application to C# based solely on the fact that it didn't add any value for our users. I was working as a contractor at the time and couldn't tell our client that we wanted to spend 2-3 weeks doing a "re-write" that wasn't going to add any of the new features that were needed. At my current job, however, we strive to devote a portion of our development time each sprint toward eliminating developer pain. We understand that alleviating this pain may not immediately add value to our product, but it will increase productivity and reduce attrition in the future. Some teams use the term "technical debt" when referring to the painful areas of their codebase and recognize that, just like any debt, it's most cost effective to pay it off quickly.
You could probably make the argument that programming language choice is not really technical debt, but technical debt or not we knew one thing: everyone hated working with VB .NET and that alone was reason enough to get rid of it.
Our VB .NET web forms project consisted of roughly 300,000 lines of code spread over about 600 different pages (.aspx files). Due to the sheer size of the project we opted to use an automated conversion tool to do the brunt of the work for us. There are a number of VB .NET –> C# converters out there, but we ultimately decided to use the VBConversions VB .NET to C# Converter because it offered the fastest, easiest, and highest quality conversion of any of the tools that we evaluated. That said, no automated conversion tool will produce 100% perfect results for all conversions and no one on the team was comfortable blindly trusting an automated tool, so we also had to manually review every converted file to clean up compiler errors and other incorrectly converted code that we found. The code review was followed by a regression test of the application before finally releasing it to the wild.
While we we identified the elimination of VB .NET as a top technical debt priority at our DevCon in early 2011 we didn't actually complete the C# conversion project until our DevCon in early 2012. While the project spanned roughly 1 year, it certainly didn't take a year's worth of developer hours to complete. Any time spent on the project in the months between the 2011 and 2012 DevCon meetings was spent in small increments (i.e. a few hours here and there) doing preparation work.
The preparation work for this project consisted mostly of identifying potential issues with the VB .NET code that would trip up the converter. The VBConversions tool will generate list of suggested changes for the source VB .NET code that help it perform a more accurate conversion. In this way it encourages you to run a conversion, fix potential issues, and run the conversion again to see the updated results. Our initial pass at converting the VB .NET code yielded a C# project with well over 5,000 compiler errors. By the time we were ready to make the final conversion and begin our manual review process we were down to several hundred compiler errors. If we had taken more time with this step we likely would have ended up with an even cleaner conversion, but I don't think that we would have ever had a 100% perfect result.
Prior to conversion we froze all other development efforts because we knew that we need to focus solely on the conversion until it was completely finished before trying to pick up any new work. Trying to balance new development work with the conversion and the potential bug fixes that would be needed following the conversion would be too difficult, so we had to get buy-in from our product management to let us tackle this conversion effort while putting other work on-hold for awhile. Once the conversion process began the only changes going into source control were related to the conversion itself.
Because the entire development team would be in the same conference room at the same time for a week during our 2012 DevCon meeting we decided to finally pull the trigger and get the conversion done during that week. Over the weekend prior to the meeting I ran the final conversion and committed the converted C# project to source control alongside the VB .NET project. At this point we had code in source control that was known to be broken. This is normally a big no-no, but having everything in source control was going to make collaboration much easier. Also, we left all of the existing VB .NET code and build scripts untouched meaning that all of our CI builds and QA deployment scripts continued to work even though we had a big pile of broken code in source control. We started the week with two Visual Studio solutions that were under the same top level folder in source control:
Having both the original VB .NET and converted C# exist side-by-side in source control allowed us to open both projects for side-by-side comparison during the review process. We were also able to make commits of the cleaned up C# code after each file was reviewed. We used a shared Google Docs spreadsheet during the conversion to help keep track of our progress. This spreadsheet had the following columns:
We used the following general approach while reviewing each converted file:
Our DevCon meetings take a Monday-Friday schedule and we began the conversion review and cleanup on Monday morning. By Wednesday night we had the project compiling successfully and were able to update our build scripts to start pushing the newly converted code out to our QA machines for regression testing.
The regression testing effort turned into an all-company affair as we ended up enlisting members of the support and product management team in addition to developers and QA analysts to get it all done. Even with the added resources, however, it wasn't feasible to fully regression test all 600 pages in the application. We did some quick brainstorming and came up with a prioritized list of the pages and services exposed by the web application that would need the most rigorous regression testing. We used the two pretty simple criteria to determine what areas of the application needed the most attention:
Areas of the application that both alter data and/or are used a lot got the most attention from our QA team while those that only read data but are also used frequently were the second highest priority. For areas of the site that were not used very frequently and had low risk for data corruption were only "smoke-tested" to ensure that they executed without throwing any errors. We added a couple of columns to the shared Google Docs spreadsheet that we used to review each file to keep track of files that had been tested and whether or not any issues had been found. One nice side effect of this exercise was the identification of a few pages in our website that were not being used anymore and could be deleted.
One of the biggest challenges we had during the test effort was figuring out how to test certain areas of the code that are not easily accessible. For example, code-behind files for shared user controls (.ascx) had to be converted and reviewed, but our QA team didn't necessarily know what pages those controls were used on or how to exercise their code. In some cases a user control might only appear when a certain configuration is enabled and that required that a developer work with them to figure out whether or not each bit of shared code had been exercised adequately.
The regression testing effort ended up spilling over into the week following the DevCon meeting, but we were ready to deploy the converted code by the middle of the week following.
We knew that we hadn't been able to fully regression test every bit of the converted code and were certain that issues would crop up once the code was out and being used in our production environment. We maintain a production environment that many of our customers use in a SaaS model and several of our customers self-host our application on their own hardware. Our production environment has a load-balanced web farm which we decided to use to our advantage for the initial rollout of the converted code.
Once our regression testing was finished we created a release branch of the converted code just like we would for any other normal deployment. We then took some of the servers in the farm out of the load balancer rotation and modified our deployment scripts to push the converted code from the release branch to those now offline web servers. Once the deployment was done, we swapped them back into the load-balancer rotation and removed the ones with the older VB .NET code.
When issues were found and reported, we were able to quickly swap out the servers and get the older reliable VB .NET code running in production again while we patched the code in the release branch, re-deployed to the offline servers and swapped them back in. I don't recall the exact numbers, but I don't' think we had to do this more than 5-6 times. Because we had created a release branch we were able to let most of the development team get back to new development work against trunk while a portion of the team focused on fixing any issues that cropped up with the conversion in the release branch. Any fixes that were made in the release branch were merged back to trunk. By the end of the week following our DevCon the conversion project was officially finished and the entire team returned to our normal flow of development work. I think we still fielded a few minor bugs related to the conversion here and there over the next couple of weeks, but most of the issues shook out within the first week.
I have a few key takeaways from this effort:


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Kernel for DBF repair software is an expedient tool to restore the corrupt or unstable database files back. Moreover, it provides accurate recovery of the lost tables, triggers, unique keys and indexes from the database files that are created on FoxBASE, Dbase or other DBMS applications. This expedient utility scans the hard disk or other storage media intensively to extract and restore the corrupt DBF files. Once the files are recovered they are saved in new DBF files.
Furthermore, the software is equipped with a unique Livepreview technology that provides a preview of all reinstated DBF files and folders to the user that exist on their computers. It handles the corruption issues like hard disk crash, virus attack, etc. quite effortlessly since an advanced scanning engine is equipped within the software that provide swift and precise retrieval of the database files.
Kernel for DBF repair software is available in - Licensed as well as Unlicensed Free Evaluation version. Licensed version needs to be purchased by doing online transaction. But a free evaluation version can also be downloaded for analysis of the software before purchasing the full version. Both versions work exactly in the same way except that the unlicensed DBF recovery program does not allow the users to save the recovered databases on their systems.
Versions Supported
All versions of DBMS applications such as DBASE III, IV, V, VI and VII
Also supports FoxBASE, Foxpro and Sybase
Important Note
Recovery of DBF databases depends on the intensity of damage caused to the database.


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Virtual Villagers: The Secret City
On the heels of Virtual Villagers 2, comes the sequel. Grow your little people in real-time as you embark on a journey to re-populate the city ruins of Isola. Along the northern island shores, find new sources of food to nourish your villagers and make a variety of unique potions from hidden herbs. Discover real-time weather with clouds, fog, and sudden rain storms in Virtual Villagers 3, The Secret City.
- Real-time weather & game-play
- Rebuild city ruins
- Unravel the mystery of Isola!
- Go back to where it all began in
Virtual Villagers: A New Home
Game System Requirements:
- OS: 10.4, 10.5 (recommended)
- CPU: 1.83GHz
Game Manager System Requirements:
- Browser: Safari 4.0 or later
The Big Fish Guarantee:
- Quality tested and virus free.
- No ads, no adware, no spyware.
Recently Viewed Games
Reviews at a Glance
Virtual Villagers: The Secret City
Customer Reviews
The Windows logo is a trademark of Microsoft, Inc.


text:
Welcome International Customers
We're excited to share our jewelry collection with you!
Just choose your country and currency to personalize your shopping experience.
We're excited to share our jewelry collection with you!
Just choose your country and currency to personalize your shopping experience.
Item#: 029630
This dainty diamond accent solitaire necklace is perfect for a child. Round diamond drops from a 13" rope chain with a springring clasp. 14kt yellow gold necklace.
Our 100%
Length: | 13 inches |
Metal: | 14kt 14KT: Karat (abbreviated kt or K) is a unit that indicates the purity of gold in the metal. 14kt is 58.33% gold. In the United States, 14K yellow gold is most favored and used in jewelry. Yellow Gold YELLOW GOLD: Gold is a precious metal with a natural yellow color. It is quite soft and often alloyed with other metals to increase its strength. The purity of the metal is indicated by a unit called a "karat," with 24kt having the highest percentage of natural gold. |
Finish: | Polished POLISHED: A buffed-out finish used to produce a mirror-like shine. |
Clasp: | Springring SPRINGRING CLASP: Invented in the early 1900s this diminutive device is highly effective. It's a hollow circular metal fastener with a spring opening. This keeps the clasp closed. |
Center Stone: | Diamond Diamond: The hardest and most brilliant of all gemstones, a diamond can make the heart race with its pure and fiery spark. An ancient symbol of love, a diamond is the preferred gemstone for tokens of affection, such as rings, earrings, necklaces and bracelets. Diamond is the birthstone for April. (Color: White, Quantity: 1, Shape & Cutting Style: Round, Color Grade: H, Clarity: I1, Weight: 0.07 carats) |
All weights and measures are approximate.
You May Also Like
Learn More About: Diamond Buying Guide Yellow Gold Polished Finish Springring Clasp Diamond


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Most Recent Articles In People
Latest People Articles
- Carroll Petrie Dies at 90
- Sundance's Up and Comers
- Richard Kilroy Launches 'Menswear Illustration' Book
More Articles By
The rhinestone-studded gown she wore to sing "Happy Birthday" to President Kennedy, her pleated white halter dress from "The Seven Year Itch" and the jeans-and-shirt combo from "The Misfits" — these are Marilyn Monroe's most iconic outfits, but there's another that is getting play: the dress she was buried in.
"Marilyn Monroe Wanted to Be Buried in Pucci," which opened on Friday at the Moore College of Art & Design in Philadelphia, is a mixed-media showcase by artist Devon Dikeou partly inspired by the actress' fondness for Emilio Pucci's dresses — Monroe's wardrobe was filled with the designer's punchy kaleidoscopic frocks. "Marilyn is so overwhelming and flamboyant, kind of like a Pucci," Dikeou, 46, says. "What lots of artists and people find compelling about her is the way she captivated the American consciousness and still remains of interest." Dikeou's fascination with Monroe is rooted as well in the actress' relationship with Joe DiMaggio, to whom she was married for nine months in 1954. The resulting work is a rather poetic take on the two icons and the way their worlds overlapped.
The most poignant example is the rose-filled urn on display. DiMaggio, who planned Monroe's funeral, had flowers delivered to her grave for 20 years after she died. Dikeou located the florist, Parisian in Hollywood — still in business today — and ordered bouquets to be sent to the Moore College gallery until the show ends March 14: a half-dozen red roses, three times a week (Monday, Wednesday and Friday), as per DiMaggio's original request. "I really don't know why it was 20 years. He gave me no reason," says Parisian's Louis Alhanati, 81, noting he never once raised the price for DiMaggio during that period. Alhanati, who doesn't remember the exact figure he initially charged, is donating the arrangements to Dikeou.
At the opening reception on Thursday, Tiffany & Co. lent the artist a diamond ring, a look-alike of the eternity band DiMaggio gave Monroe. Dikeou displayed it on a pedestal for guests to try on themselves. "It's like stepping into somebody else's footsteps at Grauman's Chinese Theatre," says Dikeou, who is the founder and publisher of the art journal Zingmagazine and owns a gallery in her hometown of Denver. Also featured are five (because DiMaggio wore number 5 for the New York Yankees) photographs of the half-mast flag at New York's Union Square, taken by Dikeou on March 8, 1999 — the day DiMaggio died.


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Replay Analytics for Manufacturing
In manufacturing, business leaders often look at daily, weekly, or monthly performance numbers, and when they see a "bad day" they ask, "What happened?"
A new concept called Replay Analytics® can answer that question. Replay Analytics creates an animated dimension of time for past, present and future state analytics. Many business intelligence applications are designed to test hypotheses by exposing the relationships between datasets and teasing out insights. Once you've answered those questions, however, you need an application to monitor those important metrics in one place and to know if something is off-track without running custom reports or spending lots of time on a deep-dive. Replay Analytics delivers that insight in real-time with minimal fuss, so you spend less time collecting data and more time managing your business.
Factory Media Center
Our Goal: Creating a new environment for reviewing and interacting with data on the plant floor
The Vision: Collaboration taken to a new level…
An environment on the factory floor which :
- Immerses the operators in plant performance data
- Integrates operators engineers, 3rd party vendors with the root cause problem solving process
- Guarantees the use of common templates, 5 why, fishbone, etc.
- Ensures continuous improvement activity is immediately shared, not waiting on being typed up and circulated
- Creates total visibility, connectivity and accountability for performance across the entire business
Advanced Andon System
"Andon" – The definition
Andon (アンドン, あんどん, 行灯) is a manufacturing term referring to a system to notify management, maintenance, and other workers of a quality or process problem. The centrepiece is a signboard incorporating signal lights to indicate which workstation has the problem. The alert can be activated manually by a worker using a pullcord or button, or may be activated automatically by the production equipment itself. The system may include a means to stop production so the issue can be corrected. Some modern alert systems incorporate audio alarms, text, or other displays.
An Andon system is one of the principal elements of the Jidoka quality-control method pioneered by Toyota as part of the Toyota Production System and therefore now part of the Lean approach. It gives the worker the ability to stop production when a defect is found, and immediately call for assistance. Common reasons for manual activation of the Andon are part shortage, defect created or found, tool malfunction, or the existence of a safety problem. Work is stopped until a solution has been found. The alerts may be logged to a database so that they can be studied as part of a continuous-improvement program.
The system typically indicates where the alert was generated, and may also provide a description of the trouble. Modern Andon systems can include text, graphics, or audio elements. Audio alerts may be done with coded tones, music with different tunes corresponding to the various alerts, or pre-recorded verbal messages. Usage of the word originated within Japanese manufacturing companies, and in English is a loanword from a Japanese word for a paper lantern.
The Next Generation Andon System…
A combination of:
- Large overhead plant floor displays
- Utilization of existing Operator HMIs and plant floor terminals
- Alerting technology using emails and SMS type messaging


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(250) 692-3499
819 Centre Street
PO Box 879
Burns Lake, BC V0J 1E0
Margaret Patrick Memorial Centre provides catering services and hall rental for weddings, social gatherings, conference settings, annual general assemblies, or business meetings. Located in Burns Lake on the Woyenne Reserve, this facility is central to all amenities in Burns Lake in terms of its location and accessibility. This facility also operates weekly bingos on scheduled for Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays.
(250) 692-4882
837 Lower Lorne Street
PO Box 879
Burns Lake, BC V0J 1E0
Lake Babine Nation Public Works Yard is owned and operated by Lake Babine Nation. LBN Members provide services such as appliance repairs, plumbing, and house repairs. Appliances that can be repaired are cookstoves, washers, and dryers. Plumbing services include leak repairs, toilet or sink replacements, and plugged sewer lines. House repairs include drywall and minor renovations. All workers are Lake Babine Nation members. Services are available to Fort Babine, Tachet, Donalds Landing, and Old Fort communities.
(250) 692-7611
827 Williams Drive
PO Box 879
Burns Lake, BC V0J 1E0
Recently received full certification to operate as a BC equivalent standard preschool. This facility is operated by LBN Members with a unique curriculum that includes the Babine Carrier Language as the first language. Preschoolers are picked up at there home with a school bus. Preschoolers are prepared to enter into the public educational system with an adage of early intervention programs.
Learning Centre (Adult Ed): (250) 692-2329
Kay Skak (High School): (250) 692-2355
142 Sus Ave
PO Box 879
Burns Lake, BC V0J 1E0
This facility is operated by LBN Members and has advanced into blending today's technological advances in all Adult Learning programs. The Babine Carrier Language is currently being introduced as part of the curriculum with the students being reintroduced into the balhats system.
(250) 692-3901
819D Centre Street
PO Box 879
Burns Lake, BC V0J 1E0
The dream of LBN owning a gas and convenience store became a reality on June of 2009. The store is located on the Woyenne Reserve, 819 D Centre Street. The store operation hours are from 6 am to 10 pm from Monday to Thursday; on Friday 6am to 11pm; Saturday 7am to 10pm and closed on holidays.
The store services the members of LBN and other first nation members who come onto our reserve for business or personal reasons. The Sne Cal Yegh Gas and Convenience Store sells regular and diesel gas to status members and non-status members. We sell status tobacco; convenience items and lotto tickets.
Our convenience store has on staff a store manager, Angela Napp; and four store clerks, namely, Patricia West, Carla Michell (on Maternity Leave), Julian Lowley and Brook Abraham.
We welcome you to come and visit the store where you will be approached by a friendly face.
You will find us, when you come from Prince George Highway 16 west, you turn right just before the Husky Gas Station and follow the H (hospital) sign or from Smithers, Highway 16, east, just before the Husky Gas Station, again follow the H sign and as you reach the hospital, just keep driving straight up on Centre street and you will reach the Woyenne Reserve, you will see the LBN community hall and the store is right across from it.


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For all Napoleonic enthusiasts, I have set up this site in such a way that it can easily be used as the startpage of your browser, in order to allow you to surf the Napoleonic Webworld as soon as you get on the Internet.
NEWS FROM THE FRONT Oregon, USA - Here you'll find articles from newspapers written in the year 1815. They have been transcribed out of the original newspapers by Beryl Bernardi. Read more...
NAPOLEON AND THE FRENCH REVOLUTION Illinois, USA - (Article, by Tom Holmberg) "We have finished the romance of the Revolution, we must now begin its history, only seeking for what is real and practicable in the application of its principles, and not what is speculative and hypothetical.." Read more... Link Guide Deventer, The Netherlands- With these sections I try to guide you to as many Napoleonic sites as possible. Here I have added all sites I could find about Napoleon on the web, along with those brought to my attention by visitors. See right red column for further details, or read more at this page... Funeral of Napoleon in 1840 Oregon, USA- In the NEWS FROM THE FRONT section of this website you'll find this article about the reburial of Napoleon in Paris in the year 1840.
A digital walk through Pere-Lachaise Oregon, USA Here you will find the pictures that Beryl Bernardi took when she visited the graves linked to the Bonapartic era at the cemetery of Pere-Lachaise in Paris.
Founded november 9, 1997
-Napoleon Bonaparte Internet Guide- optimized for browsers 4+ (600x800)


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Welcome to Farmers EasyPay® Online Billing! We are glad you have elected to use our electronic billing service. Before you begin setting up your account and using our service, please take a moment to review these Terms of Use ("Terms"). These Terms are an agreement ("Agreement") between you and the Prematic Service Corporation, a wholly owned subsidiary of Farmers Group, Inc. ("Prematic"). It is important that you understand both the benefits of Online Billing as well as restrictions in using Farmers EasyPay® Online Billing to make your insurance premium payments.
Acceptance of Terms.
If you agree, click "Agree" to begin setup. By doing so, you agree to the Terms, as set out below, for our providing you with our Online Billing services. If you disagree click "Disagree" and you will exit from this screen. By agreeing to these Terms you will receive email billing for payment of your insurance premiums until you elect to discontinue this service, you are no longer insured by one of the Farmers® companies, or this Agreement is terminated by Prematic. You will also receive one hardcopy confirming statement after setting up your Farmers EasyPay® Online Billing account by regular mail, after which no further paper statements will be sent to you. You can print a copy of your Online Billing statement from our system at any time.
Changes in Terms.
These Terms may be updated from time to time. Upon any change, Prematic will notify you by a link to such new or different terms and conditions. If you continue to use the Farmers EasyPay® Online Billing service thereafter, your continued use of the services is your acceptance of the changes and agreement to be bound by this Agreement and Terms, as amended. If you do not agree to the changes, you agree to discontinue your use of the Farmers EasyPay® Online Billing service.
Farmers EasyPay® Online Billing Services.
A. Service Limitations: Our goal is to make your experience with Farmers EasyPay® Online Billing a pleasant and productive one. However, we cannot always foresee or anticipate technical or other difficulties. These difficulties may result in loss of data, personalization settings or other service interruptions. For this reason, you agree that Farmers EasyPay® Online Billing Services are provided "AS-IS," without warranties of any kind. Prematic cannot assume responsibility for the timeliness, deletion, misdelivery or failure to store any user data, communications or personalization settings.
B. Service Changes and Discontinuation: Prematic reserves the right to change or discontinue, temporarily or permanently, the service at any time without notice. You agree that Prematic or any member Farmers® company with which you have insurance will not be liable to you or any third party for any modification or discontinuance of the service.C. Privacy Policy: Prematic respects your privacy. In a nutshell, we do not share information about you with unaffiliated third parties, except or unless authorized under the various federal and state privacy statutes. The information you provide enables us to provide services to you. It also enables us to give you updates about our service. The complete terms of our Privacy Policy are part of this your agreement with us and so you should read it. Click here to view the Privacy Policy.
D. Cancellation: You may cancel your enrollment in our service at any time by sending a request for cancellation via our "Contact Us" form.
"Rules of the Road": For your benefit and security, and to comply with applicable laws, we have a few mandatory guidelines that we call "Rules of the Road". Any conduct that violates the Rules of the Road is the basis for termination of your enrollment. For this reason, we ask that you carefully read and follow them.
A. Provide Accurate Information: You agree to provide true, accurate, current and complete information about yourself as requested in the Farmers Easy Pay® Online Billing registration form and account set up forms, and you agree not to misrepresent your identity. Accurate records enable us to provide you services. You agree to keep your registration and account information up to date and accurate.
B. Guard Your Password: You will choose a password when registering. You are responsible for the confidentiality of your password and account. You are fully responsible for all activities that occur using your password or account. Prematic will not be liable for any loss that you may incur as a result of someone else using your password or account, either with or without your knowledge. Please notify Prematic immediately of any unauthorized use of your password or account or any other breach of security. Also, you may not use anyone else's password at any time.
C. Obey the Law: You agree not to use the Farmers EasyPay® Online Billing service and system for illegal purposes or for the transmission of material that is unlawful, harassing, libelous (untrue and damaging to others), invasive of another's privacy, abusive, threatening, or obscene, or that infringes the rights of others.
D. Proprietary Rights: You acknowledge and agree that Prematic and its licensor own all rights to this Web Site and the content displayed on the site. You are only permitted to use this content as expressly authorized by Prematic. You may not copy, reproduce, distribute, or create derivative works from this content. Further, you agree not to reverse engineer or reverse compile any of the Prematic technology.
Rights You Grant to Prematic Service Corporation:
A. Advertising: You agree that Prematic, Farmers Group, Inc. or their affiliates may display advertisements and promotions of all kinds in and with the services and Online Billing system.
B. Online Billing Account Access: To ensure that Prematic is able to provide high quality services that are responsive to members' needs, you agree that Prematic employees may have access to your Online Billing account and records as reasonably needed to investigate complaints, and to conduct the business of Prematic in providing billing services for you and the companies insuring you.
C. Third Party Accounts. By using this Web Site and service, you authorize Prematic to access third party sites designated by you, on your behalf, to retrieve information requested by you and you hereby appoint Prematic as your agent for this limited purpose. You hereby permit Prematic to use information submitted by you to the Web Site, system and service to accomplish the foregoing.
Other Legal Matters:
A. Disclaimer of Warranties: You expressly understand and agree that: Your use of the service is at your sole risk. The service is provided on an "as is" and "as available" basis. Prematic expressly disclaims all warranties of any kind, whether express or implied, including, but not limited to the implied warranties of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose and non-infringement. Prematic makes no warranty that (i) the service will meet your requirements, (ii) the service will be uninterrupted, timely, secure, or error-free, (iii) the results that may be obtained from the use of the service will be accurate or reliable, (iv) the quality of any products, services, information, or other material purchased or obtained by you through the service will meet your expectations, and (v) any errors in the technology will be corrected. Any material downloaded or otherwise obtained through the use of the service is done at your own discretion and risk and you are solely responsible for any damage to your computer system or loss of data that results from the download of any such material. No advice or information, whether oral or written, obtained by you from Prematic or through or from the service will create any warranty not expressly stated in these terms. Some jurisdictions do not allow the exclusion of certain warranties. Accordingly, some of the above limitations may not apply to you. To the extent that any part of this section is not consistent with any other part of these terms, then this section will control.
B. Limitation of Liability: You agree that Prematic will not be liable for any harms, which lawyers and courts often call direct, indirect, incidental, special, consequential or exemplary damages, including, but not limited to, damages for loss of profits, goodwill, use, data or other intangible losses, even if Prematic has been advised of the possibility of such damages, resulting from: (i) the use or the inability to use the service; (ii) the cost of getting substitute goods and services resulting from any products, data, information or services purchased or obtained or messages received or transactions entered into through or from the service; (iii) unauthorized access to or alteration of your transmissions or data; (iv) statements or conduct of anyone on the service; or (v) any other matterrelating to the service. Some jurisdictions do not allow the limitation or exclusion of liability for incidental or consequential damages. Accordingly, some of the above limitations may not apply to you.
C. Indemnification: You agree to protect and fully compensate Prematic and its affiliates, and service providers from any and all third party claims, liability, damages, expenses and costs (including, but not limited to, reasonable attorneys fees) caused by or arising from your use of the services, your violation of the Terms or your infringement, or infringement by any other user of your account, of any intellectual property or other right of anyone.
D. Other: This Agreement cannot be changed or any of the Prematic rights waived unless Prematic agrees in writing or you continue using the service following receipt of notice of any changes proposed by Prematic. This Agreement is personal to you and you may not assign it to anyone. All notices to you shall be in writing and shall be made either via email or conventional mail, at the discretion of Prematic. Prematic may broadcast notices or messages through the service to inform you of changes to the terms, the service, or other matters of importance; such broadcasts shall constitute notice to you. All notices to Prematic must be made in writing at our address below. If any provision of these terms is held to be unenforceable, then such provision shall be construed, as nearly as possible, to reflect the intentions of the parties with the other provisions remaining in full force and effect. The laws of the state of
E. Notices: Prematic Service Corporation
Attn: Online Billing Manager


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I have 2 Newbie pack for SASBE. You MUST be a new member with a sign up date of May 2013 to present. I know this sounds specific but I have done newbie packs in the past and found that there are a couple of members who sign up for all the newbie posts and have been members for a few years. These packs are meant for new comers just starting out. Please make sure your email link is up and running so I can contact you. There are a lot of seeds for both the packs so make sure you have at least 5.00 in stamps sent to me. Whatever I don't use I will return to you with the seeds. When you post if you could put a little blurb about yourself and how you got into gardening I would love to hear about you!!!! Nina (Beautifulreddahlias) |
Follow-Up Postings:
Hi, I am wondering if you would be willing to trade some of your Echinachea Big Sky for some dark burgundy hollyhocks. I have tons and I also have tons of sunflower seeds from huge sunflowers. I would be fine with just a sase. Thanks, |
Hi, Thank you for your generosity to new gardeners! I might be interested in a seed packet, but i was wondering what seeds were included. I wanted to know if the seeds would grow in my zone. I live in zone 9b southern california, I got started in gardening by my grandma, and then really into my own garden when i made a life style change and wanted to make green smoothies packed with all kinds of amazing nutrients. Its much cheaper to grow the food organically in my own yard than to by organic from the stores. I would love to take a look at what kinds of seeds you have. |
Sent you a pm :) |
Hi Nina. I would be greatly interested in the newbie packs. We just moved to a new house and I'm thinking of planting my first garden this spring. I have done some minor planting in pots last year at our old house as we had no room for an actual garden with my two girls (we grew tomatoes and strawberries) and we absolutely loved it. The girls (2 & 4) would check the plants each day and ate ripe fruit right off the plants (including the tomatoes) and I'm looking forward to doing it with them this year. I joined today to get ideas on what to plant and how to start the seeds etc. and would love any seeds that you have to share. |
- Posted by NewbiePaFarmer 6a/6b (My Page) on Sat, Dec 28, 13 at 21:13
Hello My name is Shane, And I live in Westmoreland country of PA, A rich farmland county and I have been thinking of getting into the farming business. I do not have much money to start with, and am looking to use this season as a chance to test my market by growing out multiple crops and taken surveys at the farmer markets. My operating cost is very low to enter, and I have been looking at way to expand my seed collections from the store bought ones I have from my 5 years of gardening. Thats how I found this site, and really hope if I invest in some stamps you would be willing to help a future farmer out! I would be also willing to pay for the stamps for the 2nd package to be sent to another newbie who might not have the funds, as a way to help pay it forward! Please let me know. Shane |
Do you have any newbie packs still available? |
- Posted by EricaBraun 9 (My Page) on Sun, Dec 29, 13 at 6:16
Hi, I just discovered and joined the site tonight, maybe an hour ago. I guess that probably qualifies me as a newb! I'm so excited to discover that something like this exists. I almost feel at a loss for words, my excitement is so overwhelming. I recently got back into gardening. I was obsessed with it when I was younger, and this last year, that obsession has flared to life again. For years, I've been interested in herbalism and now, also, in the movement towards non-GMO food. Thanks so much for all your efforts in seed saving, and contributing to us newbs. Hope to hear from you. :) |
I just found this site tonight as well...very excited about it! I have done a few small gardening projects and some container gardening but have recently moved to a place where I can plant a larger garden. I am very excited about being able to feed my family some healthier food! Thank you for the work you do collecting these seeds for us newbies! |
- Posted by beautifulreddahlias 6a (My Page) on Tue, Jan 7, 14 at 23:51
I have given both packs away. Thanks to all who responded |
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ESN with the support of the Council of Europe launched in 2009 a special campaign for sharing intercultural experiences, thus aiming to reduce xenophobia and racism in this world. Five different postcards, a poster and a booklet have been produced for that reason.
The 5 different postcard designs depict a moment or a feeling that ESNers saw or experienced while being in a different country. Something from their time spent as Erasmus, studying, volunteering or travelling abroad. The designs are a photo or a graphic illustration. The designs have been inserted in the guidebook.
The name of the winners has been mentioned on the backside of the postcard. On the front of the postcard there has been placed the logo of ESN and in some of them also the Give20 one in small format.
During the summer period ESNers from all over Europe were sending postcards to the ESN headquarters of ESN International in Brussels. On the postcards they were writing short stories about how their experience abroad, may that be student or youth exchange, working, volunteering or holidays, opened their eyes to understand, accept and respect people from different backgrounds.
The guidebook has been distributed to people all over Europe (ESN sections and international institutions) to raise awareness towards how beneficial inter-cultural dialogue and understanding are to each individual and society as a whole.
Why did ESNers took part in this project?
Because every day, ESN volunteers are in contact with different cultures and because they want to share their experiences with young people all over Europe. The vision of our organization is to enrich the society through international students. Our mission is to provide opportunities for cultural understanding and self-development under the principle of Students Helping Students. Our main values are unity in diversity, diversity in the unity, we are all from different backgrounds, but share one common aim and goal; openness with tolerance, we understand and accept others and learn from them; cooperation in the integration, we share a holistic view towards internationality.
In the booklet there can be found articles from organizations active in the field of fighting racism and xenophobia, from ESN members and other international students and even some postcards. They have been divided into 4 major parts: definition of racism and xenophobia, facts and figures from organizations active in the field of racism and xenophobia and from students and the last part about mobility programs, and at the end other organizations working in the educational field. Initially we wanted to present a clear and, as much as possible, objective idea about the subject that we are dealing with. Passing through some particular cases and experiences, mainly from students or our members, and ending with some information about mobility opportunities and other organizations like us. Most of the articles are divided by the postcards international students sent us during the year with a short story about their experiences in the inter-cultural dialogue.
This guide would not have been possible without the support from the European Youth Foundation of the Council of Europe and without the contribution of many organizations active in the field of racism and xenophobia all over Europe, as well as all the ESN members and international students.
Attachments |
NORACISM_postcard.pdf (1.12 MB) |
poster_postcard_def.pdf (5.29 MB) |
6.pdf (1.22 MB) |
7.pdf (846.82 KB) |
8.pdf (710.98 KB) |
9.pdf (811.02 KB) |
10.pdf (406.87 KB) |
Keep up with ESN International :


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Enter your email address so that we can email you the password
Acclaimed documentary maker Nick Broomfield (BATTLE FOR HADITHA) heads to Wasilla, Alaska in pursuit of Sarah Palin, interviewing her family and friends for a decidedly unauthorised perspective on this growing force in American politics.
In much the same vein as his previous films about controversial political figures, namely Eugene Terreblanche and Margaret Thatcher, Broomfield paints a portrait of the woman who came scarily close to White House power. Whilst visiting her hometown where she has held both the offices of beauty queen and mayor, he speaks to family, supporters and former aides to unveil the woman behind the campaign.


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What is Hosted Exchange?
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