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Sleep. It's the one thing we all do and the one thing that few of us are willing to screw around with — if only because a bad night of sleep can ruin an entire day. Still, hundreds of sleep tricks, hacks and dream induction techniques exist that are supposed to give you a better night of sleep, and they've all been ported to your phone. But do any of these really work? If so, are these apps worth using? We'll take a look at the science supporting various sleep apps, and then see how it really feels when your sleep and dreams are tinkered with.
I tested two types of apps when researching this post: sleep tracking and dream induction. Sleep tracking is supposed to help you see how much sleep you're getting, how good it is, and then wake you up at the optimal time. Dream induction, as the name implies, is all about helping you create and remember your dreams. Both types are based on a fairly simple understanding of our sleep cycles, so before we get into the results of my tests, let's take a quick look at the basics of the science they're based on.
The Science Behind Sleep Tracking and Dream Induction
To get a good understanding of what these apps are trying to accomplish, it's helpful to understand the basics of what happens when you sleep, when you're most likely to dream, and when the best time to wake up is.
The Different Stages of Sleep
When you sleep you alternate between two basic sleep states, non-rapid eye movement (NREM) and rapid eye movement (REM). As you begin to fall asleep, you enter NREM, which has four individual stages. About 90 minutes later you enter REM sleep, and that cycle continues throughout the night.
During REM sleep you typically don't move, which is the key detail that a lot of the apps below use to judge where you are in your sleep schedule. It's thought that most dreams occur in the REM period, but it's still not clear why.
The end of an REM cycle is usually the best time to wake up because it's one of the lightest stages of sleep you go through. This is why most of the sleep-tracking apps attempt to wake you up near the end of a REM cycle and why most dream apps start to induce dreams at the beginning of your REM cycle. Image by RazerM.
Controlling Dreams Through External Stimulus
You can control your dreams in a variety of ways. The process is different depending on what type of dreams you're trying to induce, but with a little training and some help from external stimuli, you can induce dreams to solve problems, influence nightmares and even dream about a specific person. In an interview with Scientific American, Dr Deirdre Barrett describes how certain inputs can control a dream:
The auditory seem to work best [to induce dreams], such as water or a voice saying something. Very strong stimuli wake us up. You want it to get in some narrow threshold where it gets detected by the brain and processed but it doesn't wake you up, and then there's a shot at it getting incorporated into the dream.
Alternatively, you can influence your dreams without apps and a bit of mental preparation. Dr Barrett adds:
If you want to problem-solve in a dream, you should first of all think of the problem before bed, and if it lends itself to an image, hold it in your mind and let it be the last thing in your mind before falling asleep. For extra credit assemble something on your bedside table that makes an image of the problem. If it's a personal problem, it might be the person you have the conflict with. If you're an artist, it might be a blank canvas. If you're a scientist, the device you're working on that's half assembled or a mathematical proof you've been writing through versions of.
Barrett also suggests that if you have trouble remembering dreams it's best to wait a few minutes after you wake up to sit and think about how you feel to try pulling the narrative thread together to help you remember the dream.
Now that we know the basics of sleep cycles and that it's possible to influence dreams, let's take a look at the apps that are supposed to help you do both.
Apps that Track and Help You Improve Sleeping and Waking Up
We've talked before about how to achieve better sleep with the help of technology that involves tracking your sleep patterns and comparing it with your daily activity, as well as ways you can reboot your sleep cycles to get better sleep. I don't have a lot of trouble sleeping or waking up, but I was curious to see if I was waking up at the right time every day and if I was doing anything weird in my sleep. To find out I picked two iPhone apps, Sleep Cycle to track my sleep and Sleep Talk to see if I talk in my sleep (and if that's indicative of a certain sleep state).
Tracking Your Sleep Patterns with Sleep Cycle
Since most of the apps that can supposedly induce dreams work on the same basic premise as Sleep Cycle, I used it to get a baseline for what an average night of sleep looks like.
Sleep Cycle is pretty simple: you start up the app, set the phone face-down on your bed, and then fall asleep. The app uses the accelerometer to see when you're moving, and then decides what cycle of sleep you're in based on your movement.
I averaged about seven hours of sleep a night with only about two of those hours dedicated to deep sleep. This seems fairly normal.
Sleep Cycle also features a timed smart alarm that's supposed to wake you up when your body is best suited for it. In my case this worked surprisingly well, and when I woke up to the smart alarm, I typically felt good and refreshed, even though it was about 20 minutes earlier than my alarm was usually set for.
Since Sleep Cycle only uses your phone's accelerometer, it's not perfect and the one caveat is that you have to sleep alone (this is true for all the apps featured here). If you're looking for something with a bit more accuracy, you may want to look into Wakemate, which features an app and a wristband to track your movement accurately. However, for my basic purposes Sleep Cycle works well.
Do You Talk in Your Sleep? Sleep Talk Has the Answer
Sleep Talk is an iOS and Android app that does one simple thing: it listens to you sleep and records when you talk. I ran it throughout the course of these tests to see when or if I talk in my sleep and if dreams had a role when I did.
The results aren't that spectacular in my case. I only spoke once in the course of a week, and according to Sleep Cycle, I was in REM sleep at the time. As best as I can tell, I muttered, "Checkmate". I have no idea what the context of this was, because I don't remember having a dream that evening, but it's a surprisingly action-movie sounding thing to mutter out in my sleep. (Action movie and not chess? I guess we just learned something about Thorin – Oz ed). No other recordings were made during my tests.
Apps that Induce Dreams and Influence Your Sleep
With my sleep control set and my average sleep hours and times logged, it's time to start experimenting with dream apps. Just so we're on the same page, I should mention that I remember my dreams very rarely. If I had to put a number on it, I'd say I remember them as little as 5 per cent of the time. So as a test subject to see if these apps can not only induce dreams but help you remember them, I'm a decent choice. I chose three different apps that are supposed to induce or help you remember dreams.
Influencing Dreams with Dream:ON
Dream:ON is a free app created by Dr Richard Wiseman as a social experiment to track your sleeping habits and induce dreams using music and verbal cues. The app collects your sleep data for a massive study that's supposed to shed some light on how and why dream induction works. It has the same smart alarm feature as Sleep Cycle, but instead of resting quietly while you sleep, Dream:ON starts playing music (or a story) called soundscapes that are designed to create a specific dream. It does this when it thinks you're in REM sleep, which, as we know, is when research suggests you're most likely to dream. I used the app three separate nights with three different results.
The first night I tried Dream:ON I tried the "Into the City" soundscape, because I figured if I was going to let an app induce dreams it should be of familiar sounds. I didn't have any success with it. If it did cause a dream, I don't remember it. That might be because whatever city sounds the app played were too reminiscent of the sounds that are outside my window every night, so I decided to try it again.
This time I set the soundscape to "Peaceful Garden", which, according to the app description, was supposed to sound like "taking a stroll through a garden of tranquility". This time around I actually woke up a little when the music started but fell back asleep to a dream where I was a tiny fish being chased by a giant fish. After the chase I hid in a tiny claustrophobic room and was stuck there until I woke up in a panicked sweat. It was not the type of dream I'd really like to induce.
Undiscouraged, I decided to give it one more chance. This time I went all out and purchased one of the in-app purchases, "Wild West", because I've always wished I was a cowboy. The description describes this one as "a classic Western adventure, as you become embroiled in the heart of a shootout to save the day". I set my phone on the edge of my bed and went to sleep. Then I dreamt of being a cowboy in the west, but for some reason a Fresh Prince of Bel Air-era Will Smith was with me and we were having a shootout with Tommy Lee Jones. We won the shootout and then I woke up about 25 minutes after the alarm had gone off.
Since I was dead asleep when Dream:ON started playing this time around, I can't say for certain what it was doing to initiate this western fantasy, but I can say it worked. I vaguely remember hearing a story being told about cowboys, but I'm not certain how much of that was the app and how much was in the dream.
The two days after I had dreams induced were pretty awful and it was hard to concentrate on anything. That may just be the fact that on both nights I only clocked in six and half hours of sleep as opposed to my average of seven. Still, if you're interested in seeing if specific sounds and (possibly) stories can influence your dreams, Dream:ON is worth checking out at least once. It's a free download, and while one of my experiences was a bit terrifying, the wild west dream made it worth dealing with the other issues. Most importantly, it helped me remember the dreams I had even if it didn't always influence them in the right direction.
Using Brainwave Entrainment with Dream Inducer
Compared to the other apps I tried, the iPhone app Dream Inducer seems a bit primitive. Instead of tracking your movements to decide when you reach specific parts of your sleep cycle, it plays ambient sounds that are supposed to induce different sleep states. It's still unclear what, if any, effect music or tones have on dreams, but if you've ever fallen asleep listening to music you know the brain picks up at least a little of that external stimuli.
Dream Inducer has a large playlist that changes its music and tones as you enter different cycles of your sleep. It is supposed to synchronise tones with a target mental state and then induce one of the sleep states. It uses a practice called brainwave entrainment. To date, studies on the psychological impact of brainwave entrainment are inconclusive and studies on their effects on dreams are even harder to track down.
I used Dream Inducer on two separate nights to see if it had an effect on my sleep. Both nights I slept well, but that's not out of the ordinary for me. Neither night produced memorable dreams. If I had to describe my "feeling" in the morning, I'd say I was a bit more awake, in a good mood and ready to tackle a new day. The big benefit was that Dream Inducer didn't seem to trigger any negative effects, so it's probably worth checking out if you're looking for a lightweight way to possibly influence your dreams and sleep cycle.
Getting Startled Awake Mid-Dream with Dream Alarm
Unlike the other apps on this list that want you to sleep peacefully through the night and possibly influence your dreams a little by playing special sounds, the iPhone app Dream Alarm seeks to wake you up in the middle of REM sleep to help you remember your dreams without any external influence. This is entirely counterproductive to getting a good night's rest, but if waking up in the middle of a dream is one of the easiest ways to remember the dream then I was willing to give it a shot.
I spent one night with Dream Alarm and that was enough. After setting up the app on my bed I fell asleep quickly. Around 3am, Dream Alarm woke me up in the middle of a dream where I was giving a speech to a group of university kids about the benefits of coffee. Not exactly the most exciting dream by any stretch, but the fact I actually remembered it was interesting enough to me.
The problem with Dream Alarm is that it woke me up at 3am, and I couldn't get back to sleep afterwards. The fact I couldn't get back to sleep isn't a fault of the app, but it's a jarring enough experience that I wouldn't recommend repeating it unless remembering your dreams is somehow part of your job.
The final tally on dream apps is about as definitive as the rest of dream research: three dreams in six days, with only one of those dreams clearly influenced by the app. Compared to my regular seven hours of sleep per night, the dream apps did have a small effect on the number of hours I slept and subsequently had a slight effect on my mood throughout the day. More important is the fact the apps did seem to have an impact on the memory of dreams, even if they didn't always have a noticeable influence on them. That might be the direct reason why my mood was altered as well since I'm not used to remembering the weird things my brain comes up with throughout the evening.
Dream science is not an exact science by any means, and I'm not about to even try analysing any of the above dreams. As far as my experiments are concerned, it is possible to improve your sleep and remember dreams better with a some tech tricks, and influencing your dreams works occasionally. It's not exactly Inception-level, but it's probably as close as you can get for now.
That said, I'm still not entirely certain how I feel about induced dreams — it seems that if, as some research suggests, dreams are a way to work out problems and organise your memories — they might be best left alone. I can say for certain that for my own mental health I'll be returning to quiet, tech-free slumber. How about you: have you ever tried to induce dreams or alter your sleep with technology? Share your experiences in the comments.


text: If you've been to AEON Mall Malaysia (or formerly known as JUSCO), then you probably see the stickers that they stick to the price tag. These stickers actually indicates the discount given for that particular item. But sometime it is difficult to know the discount percentage if you don't have the discount colour guide. Below is the chart that I took recently at one of the AEON mall.

subset: commoncrawl


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In the examples I have seen, graph vertices in Mathematica are usually explicit small integers. However, Wolfram documentation says that vertices can be any arbitrary expression (eg., george, x^2, London, 5).
Nevertheless, it seems that vertices are always referred to by number, that is, by the position of the vertex expression in VertexList[gr]
. This can be confusing. For example, if I build a graph like this, using nonconsecutive vertex numbers,
Graph[1<->2, 2<->10, 10<->3, 3<->4]
then I still have to refer to the vertices as if I had made each vertex number equal to its creation order, as if I had built the graph with strictly consecutive vertex numbers:
Graph[1<->2, 2<-3 ,3<->4, 4<->1]
Am I understanding this correctly?


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Figure 1. Correlations between judgments and various sources of information about the mass ratio, for each observer across all sessions (Figure 5 from Jacobs et al, 2000) |
While the perception of relative mass is a slightly odd task, there is a clearly defined and available specifying variable so the task has the right kind of ecological validity (the definable kind!). The fact that people probably don't tend to do this task if left to their own devices makes the necessity of some training unsurprising, however. Of course, this is true of everything, even the things we do get up to on a regular basis; we had to learn how to do all of it. This task is therefore an okay model task for the question at hand.
That said, this is just a judgement task, and while it's a legitimate place to start it's not an action measure of perception and is thus an indirect way to evaluate perception. I've used judgments of relative phase before to measure visual perception of phase information; the results basically work out, but are very noisy and the training without action takes a very, very long time to work (up to 1500 trials, compared to about 40 or 50 for the action learning task). So while these data are relevant to the case Withagen is making, it's far from the kind of data required to topple something like specification and are, at best, a hint of something worth looking at further.
Runeson, S. (1995). Support for the cue-heuristic model is based on suboptimal observer performance: Response to Gilden & Proffitt (1994). Perception & Psychophysics, 57, 1262-1273.
Runeson, S., & Vedeler, D. (1993). The indispensability of precollision kinematics in the visual perception of relative mass. Perception & Psychophysics, 53, 617-632.
Wilson, A. D., & Bingham, G. P. (2001). Dynamics, not kinematics, is an adequate basis for perception – Commentary on Shepard (2001). Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 24(4), 709-710. Download


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WASHINGTON, April 5 (UPI) -- If Russia is a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma then Ukraine must be even more so.
One of the most important lessons we have learned from observing Ukraine is that labels commonly used by Western journalists of a country divided between "pro-Western" and "pro-Russian" political forces don't reflect the far more complicated reality on the ground.
Nowhere is this more so than in the realm of energy.
Presidents Leonid Kuchma and Viktor Yushchenko both talked a lot about Ukraine's energy independence but did very little to move beyond rhetoric. Under Kuchma an oil pipeline was built from Odessa to Brody to import Azerbaijani oil but the project failed to move ahead. Eventually, the oil flow was reversed with Russian oil pumped south to Odessa.
Ukraine's reliance on Russian increased following the 2006 gas contract with the opaque RosUkrEnergo gas intermediary whose golden era was in 2006-08 under the "pro-Western" Yushchenko.
Gas tycoon Dmytro Firtash told the U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, a cable from Kiev reported, that "He described himself as a close friend and confidante of the President -- someone the President can trust totally."
Moving from rhetoric to real work on Ukraine's energy independence only began after Viktor Yanukovych came to power in 2010. With Ukraine paying one of the highest gas prices in Europe, the Yanukovych administration rejected the idea of taking the 2009 gas contract to Stockholm and instead launched four policies to increase the country's energy independence from Russia.
The first is to explore Ukraine's vast shale gas deposits which are reportedly the third largest in Europe at 1.5 trillion cubic meters and 2.5 trillion cubic meters of technically recoverable shale gas. Royal Dutch Shell signed a $10 billion contract to develop the Yuzovsky shale gas deposit and drilling is to begin this year with production beginning in 2015. The Donetsk regional council controlled by the ruling Party of Regions voted to approve the deal.
U.S. company Chevron signed a shale gas exploration PSA to drill in Western Ukraine but the nationalist Svoboda (Freedom) Party which is in power in the region has led opposition to fracking, the term used for shale gas production, on allegedly environmental grounds.
It is indeed ironic that the anti-Russian Svoboda is opposed to energy diversification that will assist Ukraine in becoming independent of Russia.
The second policy is to construct a liquefied natural gas terminal that would satisfy immediate demand by importing gas 20 percent cheaper than currently. Vladyslav Kaskiv, head of the State Agency for Investment and National Projects, who was a parliamentary deputy from Yushchenko's Our Ukraine, has led the project.
Ukraine launched the LNG project on the Black Sea near Odessa in November, beginning construction of a $145 million, 40-mile link from the terminal to the national gas network.
Unfortunately pressure to quickly secure a deal led to imposter Jordi Sarda Bonvehi signing on behalf of Spanish company Gas Natural. The company announced it had no intention to invest in Ukraine's LNG terminal and the search continues for LNG partners. But, it also remains unclear if Ukraine can convince Turkey to permit the passage of large quantities of LNG through the Istanbul Strait.
A third policy is to increase oil production on the Black Sea coast. The Vanco contract will explore the 5,000-square-mile Prykerchenska region of Ukraine's Black Sea shelf that reportedly holds large reserves of oil and gas.
In spring 2008, the Yuliya Tymoshenko government annulled the contract but it has been revived after a positive decision by the Stockholm Arbitration Court. Donetsk oligarch Rinat Akhmetov is searching for joint investors in the Vanco project.
Royal Dutch Shell won a tender in 2012 in a consortium with other international petroleum companies for the exploration of offshore deep-water reserves in the Black Sea's Skifska field. They agreed to pay an upfront premium of $300 million upon signing the PSA and pledged to invest $200 million in the exploration phase.
The fourth policy, probably the most important, is supporting an expansion of gas production
Chairman of Royal Dutch Shell Ukraine Graham Tiley told the Ukrainian edition of Forbes magazine last year that it is entirely feasible for a three-fold increase in gas production from the current 20 billion cubic meters.
In the 1960s and 1970s, Ukraine was the biggest gas producer in the Soviet Union and much of this infra-structure of pipelines, underground storage and expertise remains. From the late 1970s the center of Soviet energy moved to Western Siberia and Central Asia.
One of the companies supporting Ukraine's drive for energy independence is Cub Energy, a relatively small player in Ukraine's energy sector registered in Toronto, a city it chose believing it offered better opportunities than London or Oslo.
Chairman Mikhail Afendikov, who was born in Donetsk, says Cub Energy brings together Albertan and Texan expertise and Western technology. Currently, it has nine gas wells in Transcarpathia and the Dnipro-Donets basin with up to 10 new wells planned this year in the 70,000 gross acres of underdeveloped land purchased this month lying adjacent to existing wells. The purchase of contagious land close to producing gas wells mitigates exploration risks enabling Cub Energy to draw upon existing infrastructure and in place Western technology.
Afendikov has high praise for Ukraine's conditions for foreign investors saying Cub Energy has not experienced problems from local authorities while receiving encouragement from the central government. This is in contrast to earlier experience by Robert Bensh, who is a senior adviser to Cub Energy and Afendikov's partner on day-to-day operations, with the Yushchenko administration. In 2008, after failing to resolve conflicts with oil and banking oligarch Igor Kolomoysky, who was then allied to Yushchenko, Bensh decided to close Cardinal Resources in Ukraine.
It is no coincidence that Ukraine's energy independence is being spearheaded by Cub Energy, a city at the center of the large and active Ukrainian diaspora. It is also no coincidence that the majority of the Western companies that have won tenders in Ukraine's energy sector are North Americans. The Yanukovych administration says that if Ukraine's geopolitical importance grows in Washington's eyes it will be given greater flexibility to pursue domestic policies and will be treated in the same manner as Russia.
Whatever the enigma, on-going steps toward Ukraine's energy independence from Russia and the country again becoming a major European energy player are now on the cards for the first time since 1991. Cub Energy is one of the Western companies assisting in this strategic development.
(Taras Kuzio is a non-resident fellow at the Center for Trans-Atlantic Relations, Johns Hopkins University-SAIS in Washington. He has just completed a "Contemporary History of Ukraine from 1953 to the present."
(United Press International's "Outside View" commentaries are written by outside contributors who specialize in a variety of important issues. The views expressed do not necessarily reflect those of United Press International. In the interests of creating an open forum, original submissions are invited.)


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Serving Clovis, Portales and the Surrounding Communities
Information on critical business thinking, making kaleidoscope quilts and insertion lace machine embroidery will be the featured topics on "Creative Living" at 9:30 p.m. Tuesday and noon Thursday.
Author Kivi Bernhard talks about the hunt for profit in a tough global economy. His book is titled "Leopardology," and he compares critical business thinking with the hunt for the African leopard. Bernhard lives in Atlanta, Ga.
Jean Gilles Dean is a quilting expert, and she's going to show how to create kaleidoscopes using large-print fabrics. She also has samples of finished quilts and quilt tops using square and/or diamond blocks. She's from Midland, Texas.
Designer and digitizer Laura Waterfield is the owner of Laura's Sewing Studio, and she's going to demonstrate insertion lace machine embroidery, which creates an heirloom design that can be done on most fabrics. The secret to this technique is to use a wing needle, which she 'll show. Waterfield lives in Tomball, Texas.
Information on shisha and quilting will be the featured topics on "Creative Living" at noon Tuesday and 2 p.m. Saturday.
Becky Hanson will demonstrate a technique called shisha, which involves tiny mirrors sandwiched into fabric, and will also show how to make twisted cords on the sewing machine. She's with Singer Sewing Co. in Lavergne, Tenn.
Quilting expert and author Maggie Ball will talk about how to share the joy of quilting with the next generation. Her company is Dragon Fly Quilts, and she's from Bainbridge Island, Wash.


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There are, on SO, more and more users with names such as user220755, user281482, user198729, ...
This is better than the "unknown (google)" kind of stuff we had before, but it's becoming quite confusing, with so many names that all look quite the same.
And some users with such names have already been on SO for quite some time -- for instance, the third one I linked to currently has more than 3k reputation, and has been a member for 3 months.
Would it be possible to suggest to those users that they should choose a better display name, pointing them to the edit-profile page?
This might not be necessary for users who come, ask a couple of questions, and never come again; but maybe this could be suggested to users with more than, say, 200 reputation?
(i.e. users who have been on SO for a while, and might stay longer)
By "suggest", I'm thinking about the orange bar that's displayed when we get a badge, or have new comments.


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Today's entry is a hidden gem not only in the catalogue of Netflix, but also in that of beloved director Martin Scorsese, one of several underrated masterpieces so often overshadowed by more well-known ones like Goodfellas and Raging Bull. Along with films like The King of Comedy and After Hours, Scorsese's 1999 film Bringing Out the Dead has been unjustly overlooked for the most part, and deserves more recognition than it has gotten. Sure, you could dismiss it as simply "Ambulance Driver" for its similarity to Scorsese's breakthrough masterpiece, Taxi Driver, as well as the fact that both films were written by frequent collaborator Paul Schrader, but there is more to it than that. I'm certainly not saying it's better than Taxi Driver, but it's certainly different enough to warrant appraisal on its own merits.
The film follows three days in the life of constantly working New York City paramedic Frank Pierce (Nicolas Cage), who is so exhausted and depressed that he has begun to hallucinate. His most frequently recurring vision is of a young woman named Rose (Cynthia Roman), who he failed to save from a fatal overdose. Throughout the three days in which we witness his life, Frank is teamed with three different partners, each of whom seem to reflect different aspects of his personality and his viewpoint toward his job. Larry (John Goodman) does his best to not take his work home with him, looking at his work as simply a job by which he refuses to let himself be haunted. Marcus (Ving Rhames) is the polar opposite of Larry, a Christian who views his job as working the miracles of the lord, bringing the dead back to life. Tom Wolls (Tom Sizemore) represents pure, unchained id, a man who encourages Frank to release his own demons through naked aggression aimed at the patients he is meant to be helping.
Along the way, Frank saves an old man named Mr. Burke (Cullen Oliver Johnson), who is ultimately so far gone that he spends his recovery in an intensive care unit, repeatedly flatlining and being revived again. His former junkie daughter, Mary (Patricia Arquette), forms a tenuous bond with Frank, and the two of them find some hope for redemption in each other, though without the expected romantic subplot that would have undoubtedly been exploited in a lesser film. Though Arquette's performance feels oddly flat and this is not Scorsese's best film, it is also far from his worst, which makes it vastly superior to the average movie. Bringing Out the Dead is a fascinating look at a profession that is oddly underrepresented in the movies, and the depths of the human soul that profession must regularly plumb.
Hidden Netflix Gems is a new feature designed to help readers answer that burning question, "What should I watch tonight?" It will be updated every Saturday before the sun goes down.


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Jump to navigation
Jump to search
dvbyell is a streaming solution for DVB(-S/-S2/-C/-T). It will read streams from the device nodes (/dev/dvb/*) associated with a DVB device and send them to the network using UDP multicast. This kind of software is often referred to as "DVB to IP gateway" or "IPTV server". Other solutions that provide similar support already exist, so in helping you to decide whether dvbyell suits your needs, some of its features are listed below.
- Modest hardware requirements (I'm running a 800 MHz Pentium III with 256 MB RAM which is streaming 4 satellite transponders simultaneously at a total of > 100 MBit/s)
- Configuration doesn't require specifying the audio/video PIDs of the programs, it's sufficient to specify the programs' names which are transmitted in the SDT (the PIDs will then be discovered by examining SDT, PAT and PMT)
- The programs on one transponder which are sent in a MPTS (multi program transport stream) are split into SPTSs (single program transport streams) so only one program gets transmitted per multicast address (together with a correct PAT/PMT)
- The EPG (electronic program guide) is read and rewritten into easily parsable XML chunks
- SAP packets are sent into the network so that streaming clients (e.g. vlc when started with the "-S sap" option) will automatically show the available programs
- A command line interface which is accessible with telnet allows to retrieve the service information (PAT, PMT etc.) received and various other information
- Stations which dynamically switch to different audio/video PIDs (e.g. the German "Regionalsender") are handled properly; changes of other PIDs (e.g. of the PMTs) are also correctly handled
Please note that dvbyell does not do on-demand channel switching. It is designed to stream a fixed set of programs. This is usually what's required in a larger network where people expect a certain number of programs and don't care if Japanese bible TV isn't available.


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A key element of your SIGGRAPH 2015 presentation is your electronic slide preparation. The audience will base its evaluation of you and your subject matter partly on the appearance of your images. An attractive, legible, and organized presentation will reflect positively on the content, and therefore on you. Please review these basic guidelines to ensure that your SIGGRAPH 2015 presentation is the best it can possibly be:
SIGGRAPH 2015 Slide Templates
Find out how much time is allowed for your presentation. Plan your talk and the number of slides to allow for a relaxed pace. Think of what you would change if the presentation had to be shortened or lengthened. Practice your talk before the conference. Time yourself. Force yourself to slow down a little. A rushed presentation will create more stress for you and won't be compelling. Come to the Speaker Preparation Room to upload your presentation and practice your timing.
The technical session rooms at SIGGRAPH 2015 are large, and your presentation must be legible from the back row. If you can stand two meters away from your computer's monitor and easily read your slides, your text is large enough. To achieve this, limit each slide to eight lines of text or less and limit each line of text to 30 characters or less. Use a bold typeface, no smaller than 28 points, with generous line spacing.
Use key words, so that your slides will be quick and easy to read. You want the audience to hear your presentation, while the slides accentuate the points to remember. Use standard fonts. That way your presentation will be truly portable. Incorporate only the essential parts of a diagram and simplify whenever possible. While it is tempting to include detail for the sake of accuracy, too much will make the slide difficult to read and become a distraction. Break up complex diagrams into sections if you can, so that each section can be made larger and therefore more legible.
Avoid the use of ALL CAPITAL letters. Words written in ALL CAPS are harder to read and take up more space on the screen. Use bold face and italics for emphasis, or use a bright color such as yellow text when normal body text is white. Underlined text is not recommended.
Color and Contrast
Make good use of color and contrast. Dark backgrounds tend to be easier to view, especially with light text and graphics. Good background color choices are black, blue, maroon, or gradient dark colors. Good text colors are white or yellow. If you use a light background, use black or very dark text and graphics.
Maintain consistency throughout your slides. Using the same background color, text size, text color, and uniform fonts throughout all the slides makes it easier for the audience to follow the flow of your ideas.


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Creating and Modifying Distributed Tables (DDL)¶
Creating And Distributing Tables¶
To create a distributed table, you need to first define the table schema. To do so, you can define a table using the CREATE TABLE statement in the same way as you would do with a regular PostgreSQL table.
CREATE TABLE github_events
event_id bigint,
event_type text,
event_public boolean,
repo_id bigint,
payload jsonb,
repo jsonb,
actor jsonb,
org jsonb,
created_at timestamp
Next, you can use the create_distributed_table() function to specify the table distribution column and create the worker shards.
SELECT create_distributed_table('github_events', 'repo_id');
This function informs Citus that the github_events table should be distributed on the repo_id column (by hashing the column value). The function also creates shards on the worker nodes using the citus.shard_count and citus.shard_replication_factor configuration values.
This example would create a total of citus.shard_count number of shards where each shard owns a portion of a hash token space and gets replicated based on the default citus.shard_replication_factor configuration value. The shard replicas created on the worker have the same table schema, index, and constraint definitions as the table on the coordinator. Once the replicas are created, this function saves all distributed metadata on the coordinator.
Each created shard is assigned a unique shard id and all its replicas have the same shard id. Each shard is represented on the worker node as a regular PostgreSQL table with name 'tablename_shardid' where tablename is the name of the distributed table and shardid is the unique id assigned to that shard. You can connect to the worker postgres instances to view or run commands on individual shards.
You are now ready to insert data into the distributed table and run queries on it. You can also learn more about the UDF used in this section in the Citus Utility Functions of our documentation.
Reference Tables¶
The above method distributes tables into multiple horizontal shards, but another possibility is distributing tables into a single shard and replicating the shard to every worker node. Tables distributed this way are called reference tables. They are used to store data that needs to be frequently accessed by multiple nodes in a cluster.
Common candidates for reference tables include:
- Smaller tables which need to join with larger distributed tables.
- Tables in multi-tenant apps which lack a tenant id column or which aren't associated with a tenant. (In some cases, to reduce migration effort, users might even choose to make reference tables out of tables associated with a tenant but which currently lack a tenant id.)
- Tables which need unique constraints across multiple columns and are small enough.
For instance suppose a multi-tenant eCommerce site needs to calculate sales tax for transactions in any of its stores. Tax information isn't specific to any tenant. It makes sense to consolidate it in a shared table. A US-centric reference table might look like this:
-- a reference table
CREATE TABLE states (
code char(2) PRIMARY KEY,
full_name text NOT NULL,
general_sales_tax numeric(4,3)
-- distribute it to all workers
SELECT create_reference_table('states');
Now queries such as one calculating tax for a shopping cart can join on the states
table with no network overhead, and can add a foreign key to the state code for better validation.
In addition to distributing a table as a single replicated shard, the create_reference_table
UDF marks it as a reference table in the Citus metadata tables. Citus automatically performs two-phase commits (2PC) for modifications to tables marked this way, which provides strong consistency guarantees.
If you have an existing distributed table which has a shard count of one, you can upgrade it to be a recognized reference table by running
SELECT upgrade_to_reference_table('table_name');
For another example of using reference tables in a multi-tenant application, see Sharing Data Between Tenants.
Distributing Coordinator Data¶
If an existing PostgreSQL database is converted into the coordinator node for a Citus cluster, the data in its tables can be distributed efficiently and with minimal interruption to an application.
The create_distributed_table
function described earlier works on both empty and non-empty tables, and for the latter it automatically distributes table rows throughout the cluster. You will know if it does this by the presence of the message, "NOTICE: Copying data from local table..." For example:
CREATE TABLE series AS SELECT i FROM generate_series(1,1000000) i;
SELECT create_distributed_table('series', 'i');
NOTICE: Copying data from local table...
(1 row)
Writes on the table are blocked while the data is migrated, and pending writes are handled as distributed queries once the function commits. (If the function fails then the queries become local again.) Reads can continue as normal and will become distributed queries once the function commits.
When distributing a number of tables with foreign keys between them, it's best to drop the foreign keys before running create_distributed_table
and recreating them after distributing the tables. Foreign keys cannot always be enforced when one table is distributed and the other is not. However foreign keys are supported between distributed tables and reference tables.
When migrating data from an external database, such as from Amazon RDS to Citus Cloud, first create the Citus distributed tables via create_distributed_table
, then copy the data into the table.
Co-Locating Tables¶
Co-location is the practice of dividing data tactically, keeping related information on the same machines to enable efficient relational operations, while taking advantage of the horizontal scalability for the whole dataset. For more information and examples see Table Co-Location.
Tables are co-located in groups. To manually control a table's co-location group assignment use the optional colocate_with
parameter of create_distributed_table
. If you don't care about a table's co-location then omit this parameter. It defaults to the value 'default'
, which groups the table with any other default co-location table having the same distribution column type, shard count, and replication factor.
-- these tables are implicitly co-located by using the same
-- distribution column type and shard count with the default
-- co-location group
SELECT create_distributed_table('A', 'some_int_col');
SELECT create_distributed_table('B', 'other_int_col');
When a new table is not related to others in its would-be implicit co-location group, specify colocated_with => 'none'
-- not co-located with other tables
SELECT create_distributed_table('A', 'foo', colocate_with => 'none');
Splitting unrelated tables into their own co-location groups will improve shard rebalancing performance, because shards in the same group have to be moved together.
When tables are indeed related (for instance when they will be joined), it can make sense to explicitly co-locate them. The gains of appropriate co-location are more important than any rebalancing overhead.
To explicitly co-locate multiple tables, distribute one and then put the others into its co-location group. For example:
-- distribute stores
SELECT create_distributed_table('stores', 'store_id');
-- add to the same group as stores
SELECT create_distributed_table('orders', 'store_id', colocate_with => 'stores');
SELECT create_distributed_table('products', 'store_id', colocate_with => 'stores');
Information about co-location groups is stored in the pg_dist_colocation table, while pg_dist_partition reveals which tables are assigned to which groups.
Upgrading from Citus 5.x¶
Starting with Citus 6.0, we made co-location a first-class concept, and started tracking tables' assignment to co-location groups in pg_dist_colocation. Since Citus 5.x didn't have this concept, tables created with Citus 5 were not explicitly marked as co-located in metadata, even when the tables were physically co-located.
Since Citus uses co-location metadata information for query optimization and pushdown, it becomes critical to inform Citus of this co-location for previously created tables. To fix the metadata, simply mark the tables as co-located using mark_tables_colocated:
-- Assume that stores, products and line_items were created in a Citus 5.x database.
-- Put products and line_items into store's co-location group
SELECT mark_tables_colocated('stores', ARRAY['products', 'line_items']);
This function requires the tables to be distributed with the same method, column type, number of shards, and replication method. It doesn't re-shard or physically move data, it merely updates Citus metadata.
Dropping Tables¶
You can use the standard PostgreSQL DROP TABLE command to remove your distributed tables. As with regular tables, DROP TABLE removes any indexes, rules, triggers, and constraints that exist for the target table. In addition, it also drops the shards on the worker nodes and cleans up their metadata.
DROP TABLE github_events;
Modifying Tables¶
Citus automatically propagates many kinds of DDL statements, which means that modifying a distributed table on the coordinator node will update shards on the workers too. Other DDL statements require manual propagation, and certain others are prohibited such as those which would modify a distribution column. Attempting to run DDL that is ineligible for automatic propagation will raise an error and leave tables on the coordinator node unchanged.
Here is a reference of the categories of DDL statements which propagate. Note that automatic propagation can be enabled or disabled with a configuration parameter.
Adding/Modifying Columns¶
Citus propagates most ALTER TABLE commands automatically. Adding columns or changing their default values work as they would in a single-machine PostgreSQL database:
-- Adding a column
ALTER TABLE products ADD COLUMN description text;
-- Changing default value
ALTER TABLE products ALTER COLUMN price SET DEFAULT 7.77;
Significant changes to an existing column like renaming it or changing its data type are fine too. However the data type of the distribution column cannot be altered. This column determines how table data distributes through the Citus cluster, and modifying its data type would require moving the data.
Attempting to do so causes an error:
-- assumining store_id is the distribution column
-- for products, and that it has type integer
ALTER TABLE products
ALTER COLUMN store_id TYPE text;
ERROR: XX000: cannot execute ALTER TABLE command involving partition column
LOCATION: ErrorIfUnsupportedAlterTableStmt, multi_utility.c:2150
Adding/Removing Constraints¶
Using Citus allows you to continue to enjoy the safety of a relational database, including database constraints (see the PostgreSQL docs). Due to the nature of distributed systems, Citus will not cross-reference uniqueness constraints or referential integrity between worker nodes.
Foreign keys must always be declared between either
- Two local (non-distributed) tables,
- Two colocated distributed tables, or
- A distributed table and a reference table
To set up a foreign key between colocated distributed tables, always include the distribution column in the key. This may involve making the key compound.
Primary keys and uniqueness constraints must include the distribution column. Adding them to a non-distribution column will generate an error (see Cannot create uniqueness constraint).
This example shows how to create primary and foreign keys on distributed tables:
-- Adding a primary key
-- --------------------
-- We'll distribute these tables on the account_id. The ads and clicks
-- tables must use compound keys that include account_id.
ALTER TABLE accounts ADD PRIMARY KEY (id);
ALTER TABLE ads ADD PRIMARY KEY (account_id, id);
ALTER TABLE clicks ADD PRIMARY KEY (account_id, id);
-- Next distribute the tables
SELECT create_distributed_table('accounts', 'id');
SELECT create_distributed_table('ads', 'account_id');
SELECT create_distributed_table('clicks', 'account_id');
-- Adding foreign keys
-- -------------------
-- Note that this can happen before or after distribution, as long as
-- there exists a uniqueness constraint on the target column(s) which
-- can only be enforced before distribution.
ALTER TABLE ads ADD CONSTRAINT ads_account_fk
FOREIGN KEY (account_id) REFERENCES accounts (id);
ALTER TABLE clicks ADD CONSTRAINT clicks_ad_fk
FOREIGN KEY (account_id, ad_id) REFERENCES ads (account_id, id);
Similarly, include the distribution column in uniqueness constraints:
-- Suppose we want every ad to use a unique image. Notice we can
-- enforce it only per account when we distribute by account id.
ALTER TABLE ads ADD CONSTRAINT ads_unique_image
UNIQUE (account_id, image_url);
Not-null constraints can be applied to any column (distribution or not) because they require no lookups between workers.
ALTER TABLE ads ALTER COLUMN image_url SET NOT NULL;
Adding/Removing Indices¶
Citus supports adding and removing indices:
-- Adding an index
CREATE INDEX clicked_at_idx ON clicks USING BRIN (clicked_at);
-- Removing an index
DROP INDEX clicked_at_idx;
Adding an index takes a write lock, which can be undesirable in a multi-tenant "system-of-record." To minimize application downtime, create the index concurrently instead. This method requires more total work than a standard index build and takes significantly longer to complete. However, since it allows normal operations to continue while the index is built, this method is useful for adding new indexes in a production environment.
-- Adding an index without locking table writes
CREATE INDEX CONCURRENTLY clicked_at_idx ON clicks USING BRIN (clicked_at);
Manual Modification¶
Currently other DDL commands are not auto-propagated, however you can propagate the changes manually. See Manual Query Propagation.


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Ten Blogging Mistakes I Learned in Year One
A few weeks ago, this little bloggie turned one. In a medium where "old school" is five years, turning one sorta makes you a teenager. Armed with my new "know it all," brooding, moody attitude, I'm putting on my skinny jeans and flannel, shuffling the iPod on EMO and getting ready for year two. The last year has been an incredible adventure of success, stumbles, and relationships. I don't claim to know it all or be an expert on blogging, in fact I've made a whole mess of mistakes in year one. A wise man learns from the mistakes of others (and a fool is destined to repeat them), so here are 10 blogging mistakes I made in the first year. I hope you avoid these.
10. Don't post your new post after 6PM – As a general rule you're better off waiting until the next morning. I've been guilty of this a few times and without fail, the post in question gets very little traction in viewership and response. Twitter and Facebook (great traffic drivers) get very conversational after 6PM and promotional pushes seem to fall on deaf ears. One time, in order to keep my 7 month streak alive, I did post at 11:58PM on a Friday night. That post saw as much traffic as the path between Pelosi and Obama's house since the 2010 elections. In a similar vein, don't come out of the gate with your best stuff on Saturday afternoon on a sunny summer day. Just because you're sitting at your PC still in your tightie whities doesn't mean many other readers are.
9. Don't spell people's name wrong when you highlight them in a post – Blogs often quote others as reference points, additional information, or for cross promoting. Linkbacks are great for SEO optimization. When writing a post on social media, I reached out to Rick Bakas, (then the Director of Social Media Marketing for St. Supery winery) for a quote on the subject. Armed with several great quotes, I drafted my post and then sent it out for the whole world to see (by whole world, I mean the 327 people who followed my stuff at the time). The problem was I spelled Rick's name Backas. Rick was gracious and kindly pointed out my flaw. The real embarrassment was when I did it AGAIN in another social media post, this time calling him the Directory of Social Media Marketing. What a tool I am.
8. Don't forget proper SEO tagging – Many months went by before I realized that I was missing out on better search engine optimization. It may take a few extra minutes but I've noticed a dramatic difference in traffic and ranking by focusing on three simple things.
- Make sure that the title contains the key words of the topic
- Make sure the images are tagged appropriately (spkwine1.jpg is not as good as Barrister Winery Spokane 1.jpg)
- Use the SEO portion of your blog platform. WordPress has a great built in tool that lets you optimize your page and your post with key words and a brief synopsis.
7. Don't pick fights with people – I only partially did this once (okay maybe it was three times, but who is counting) but have seen it done on many occasions. The times when I didn't hold my tongue have always come back to bite me on the ass and have hindered my brand and my reputation. Online communities are like small towns and it seems that at some point everyone will know your business. If you have a beef with someone, take it to them directly. If you feel like calling someone out on your blog, you may generate a lot of comments and traffic, but be ready to retract any emotional statements. In one of my more popular posts (and a fun one to write), I talked about this very subject – In My Opinion, Your Opinion Sucks
6. Don't be a recluse – One of the most fun parts about blogging is being a part of the community. When I first started, I commented on hundreds of blogs. It was a great way to get to know the writing styles of the blogging leaders, lean more about wine, and also introduce myself to a bunch of really cool people. Writing top notch stuff is great and all, and it might get read at some point, but developing relationships, sharing other people's content, recognizing other's hard work, and adding to the conversation will build your community quickly.
5. Don't be everywhere – Focus. I don't do LinkedIn, Google Wave, Friendster, My Space or many other social networks out there. When I first started in this wine community I joined a few Ning sites that seemed to have quite a few members. Keeping current on all the sites proved to be a challenge. Many of these sites still exist but don't seem to have much influence on traffic and the community seems less engaged. I learned early on that Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and local networking site, LaunchPadINW were the places to be. Find your niche and excel there.
4. Don't be hit and miss with your content– If you want to be successful in blogging, you've got to have daily content (or near daily). Google likes fresh content and people on social platforms are slutty tramps with ADD (I mean that in the nicest way, so let me explain). There is always a shiny new widget on Twitter and Facebook. Your fans, followers and likers, will quickly find something else to fulfill their reading desires. Staying current on content keeps them coming back and faithful. While I let my streak lapse without any fanfare a few weeks back, I'm convinced that my commitment to content is one of the main reasons for the continued increase in traffic and recognition. If you can't do daily content, make a goal of 3 times per week or every Tuesday, and stick with it. The same can be said with updating Facebook and Twitter. Develop a strategy and stick with it. Your consistency will pay off.
3. Don't be elusive – This one is important for folks that are blogging and getting into social media with an agenda. I've always been honest about my intentions. When I began, I always informed the wineries, wine bars, and coffee shops I reviewed that I wanted to eventually open a wine and coffee bar. When that goal morphed into a tasting room, I made sure I shared that. While not everyone has embraced those goals, and some still look at me with a skeptical eye, they can't accuse me of being sneaky or underhanded (well, they can – but would be wrong).
2. Don't be a conformist – Find your voice and stick with it. I'm not always the greatest writer but I know my strengths and I avoid my weaknesses. You won't find me producing some technical wizardry like you find on Palate Press from time to time. I am not as quick witted as 1WineDude or connected to the industry as Steve Heimoff. I'll never give in depth winery analysis like Washington Wine Report. I'll be me. There are times I've posted some serious expose and had to deal with the consequence of people not liking it. I used Twitter to get the media interested in my plight against city hall. Some say, I should have played nice. When I wrote about one wineries unsuccessful attempt to open in the area, I wrote about the irony of the opposition. I was vilified. When I wrote something very sexy about Champagne recently, one person told me I needed to be more careful now that I was a business owner. For me, I think it's important to stay true to who you are. Keep being you and the people who like you will keep liking you.
1. Don't have an unorganized brand approach – This is a lesson that I'm continuing to learn and struggle with. When I came out of the gate I wanted to be Nectar Coffee and Wine. I bought that URL and I also bought Drink Nectar. Drink Nectar was unavailable on Twitter, so I did @nectarwine. Over the course of the year, I've become the "Drink Nectar guy" locally. My Facebook page is Facebook.com/DrinkNectar. My YouTube channel is Youtube.com/DrinkNectar. Almost daily on twitter, I'm mistakenly referenced as @drinknectar (that account is a dead account with zero tweets). When I went to open a business, I didn't want it to be called DrinkNectar. This was a huge FAIL on my part that is becoming difficult to correct. I recently decided to RE-BRAND to accommodate the opening of Nectar Tasting Room. Hopefully, after a year of successful re-branding, I'll have solidified myself as Nectar Wine Blog, Nectar Tasting Room, Nectar Media, and Spokane Wine Magazine. So, in order to avoid the same confusion that I have, I strongly encourage you to think through the aspects of your approach before you get started.
There you have it, 10 blogging mistakes that I've made this year. I hope they help you avoid making the same mistakes in your blogging adventure. Now I think I'm going to post this, even though it's getting close to 6pm.
21 comments on "Ten Blogging Mistakes I Learned in Year One"
MatthewLiberty Great post Josh, funny how so many of us simply learn from doing (for the most part). We've definitely made some of these mistakes but the nice thing about blogs is that they should always be a work in progress. I 've watched you evolve over time and it seems the fine tuning never ends.
Cheers man, Happy Thanksgiving.
Tamara Belgard I love it that you can laugh at yourself It takes a big man to admit his mistakes and even bigger one to admit them again. Good for you. You've always shown consistency and integrity, while you may have made a few small mistakes along the way, you've always been way more correct than most.
Martin Redmond Great post. I started a wine blog back in July with very humble intentions. Now I'm feeling more ambitious. Your advice is helpful. Look forward to following you. Thanks!
Steve Raye Congratulations…it's a real accomplishment, and those of us who dabble in the art recognize the dedication it takes. You've created a real voice, and we enjoy hearing it. Keep it up!
Thomas Hansen Beautiful advice Josh. I'll take up #6 immediately and comment here to prove it … 😉
Antoine Pin Josh,
Being as new as I am and I'd say forward thinking being that I've got an almost entire video VLOG/BLOG. I've made SOOO many mistakes this year. But I've been listening on Twitter and reading many blogs. You, Shawn, Taryn, Jen K, Bean and many more to name have all inspired me to figure my stuff out. I'm guilty of Rules: #2, #5, #10 and I'm sure plenty of others. But I'm proud to be part of this very creative, intense and passionate bunch we all call bloggers. Thank you Josh.
Sally - My Custard Pie Succinct, accesible and wise advice. Point 1 is the easiest to get wrong at the start and the most difficult to rectify. When you are impatient to get started mistakes can be made that you are then lumbered with.
Elizabeth MInchilli Great post! Thanks for all the tips. I guess I like them so much since I share your views!
Sarah Commerford Thanks very much for posting. I'm guilty of several of these blogging no-no's on a regular basis – namely posting after 6 pm, since that's when my meals are cooked, photographed and written up. Btw – I love your blog even more than your great advice. Bravo!
Mama J I'm one month into this 'new to me' world of blogging. Thanks for the fabulous advice!
David Honig Good post. Let me add, when you mention another website, make it a hot link. ; )
Sasha @ Global Table Adventure I almost had a similar problem with my brand… a classic story of desired domain unavailable… so I had to come up with something else. At first I hated it, but now I think it is better than what I originally wanted. Enjoyed the rest of the list, too.
Rachel Very practical tips, thanks. I've always wondered about what time of day to post, mornings it is!
Veronique Deblois Great post. Funny how so many of us have made the same errors and have learned from each other.
Refugia Piechocki I do not even know how I ended up here, but I thought this post was great. I do not know who you are but definitely you are going to a famous digg if you aren't already 😉 Cheers!
blue wedding flowers The background image of my website is labeled for commercial reuse. However, I need to copyright all other content (since I do not own the image), how do I go about doing so? Just to label my website as copyrighted… I am not concerned with the entire copyrighting process… All help is greatly appreciated..


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We knew as far back as February that the Miami Dolphins were giving Reggie Bush the cold shoulder because they believe 2012 fourth-round draft pick Lamar Miller can be a bigger, faster, better version in this year's backfield.
Although Dolphins coach Joe Philbin recently described the running back competition as "wide open," those close to the team understand that Miller is the runaway leader.
Appearing on NFL Network's "NFL Total Access" on Monday, Dolphins quarterback Ryan Tannehill stated without equivocation that Miller is well ahead of 2011 second-rounder Daniel Thomas and rookie Mike Gillislee.
Asked who the Dolphins' starting running back is, Tannehill replied without hesitation: "Lamar Miller right now. He's doing a great job this offseason, really has a great handle on the offense and he's doing a great job protecting. ... They can (all) run the ball but being able to understand the pass game, understand the checkdowns and where they're protecting really makes a big difference and makes me more comfortable."
Fantasy leaguers take note: With deep-threat option Mike Wallace on the scene to keep extra defenders out of the box, there isn't a better breakout candidate than Miller this season.
Follow Chris Wesseling on Twitter @ChrisWesseling.


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Centrelink is an sub-agency of Satan, the Department for Continuing Degradation, Humiliation and Subjugation of Human Kind. Based in Darwin, Australia, the central Aboriginal district, Centrelink occupies the largest building in Alice Springs - a 15-storey fortress. Centrelink has ties as far back as the 1800s and is believed to be one of the first agencies to promote slavery. As time moved on and racism was considered bad, Centrelink shifted its corporate vision from promoting white superiority to promoting class superiority. This change in values meant Centrelink focused exclusively on degrading classes of sub-human, known as The Scum Of The Earth. This includes unemployed, the mentally ill, single parents, people with debilitating illnesses, the elderly, students and generally anyone who is from the low socio-economic classes.
Centrelink has origins in slavery reaching far back into history's arse. Centrelink's current practices are embedded deeply within its dreary, depressing and completely heartless history. In any country where slavery has been legal, there has been Centrelink. Wherever slaves were held under involuntary control, with their balls firmly grasped in the palm of a crushing overlord, there has been Centrelink. And whenever slaves have been forced by the state to undertake gruelling labour under disgusting conditions, without the right to refuse or leave there has been Centrelink.
Centrelink has most been involved in high profile slavery promotion, doing the African, Arabian and Asian circuit for years. All countries beginning with A actually, like America and Australia. Like the devil, Centrelink has changed its form and focus, from its involvement in the trans-Saharan slave trade to current interests in the Asian sex trade, smuggling Mexican slaves in to the United States as well as its current and very successful program in conjunction with the Australian government to force The Scum Of The Earth into crap jobs with no rights. This is crucial as people might think that you are a total douchebag who is ready to sell his/her ass to the devil to get their souls back!
Centrelink's Mission Statement[edit]
The mission statement goes beyond the fact that they don't want to give money to The Scum Of The Earth who should starve to death (the gypsies), and is not limited merely to denying much needed services, it is about serving the majority of Australian tax payers in the upper bracket by forcing the blood sucking parasites of human society to become self sufficient through crime, drug addition and unwanted pregnancy in a supportive ghetto environment.
What Centrelink Does[edit]
Centrelink destroys souls, and promotes Kitten Huffing. Centrelink has spent billions of dollars on secret research labs to optimize the process of crushing the will to live. Unfortunately, due to lawyers, Centrelink couldn't do this research on rich people, it was too expensive getting sued all the time. So they did the experiments on the socio-economically disadvantaged. Criticism was avoided for these studies by branding members of the low socio economic classes as The Scum Of The Earth, through economic policy, the erosion of basic working rights and welfare reforms.
Early studies were conducted into slavery, with the creation of the welfare state in the year named "liberal hell" the research began to focus on those with no money or rights. A considerable amount of money was funnelled into this research project as Centrelink realised it could apply principles of confusion, frustration and desperation to save the Australian government millions!
This method has been employed since and perhaps even before the liberalisation of Australia, and Centrelink is working on many problems to cure hard working, "Battlers" from having to cough up their hard earned dough to jobless dole bludgers, otherwise known as The Scum Of The Earth.
A major issue with the current Australian government system is that The Scum Of The Earth are allowed to vote. Centrelink is investigating methods to deter The Scum Of The Earth from voting or taking an interest in politics. This ensures they don't register to vote and hence the government can be better suit itself to the needs business, free trade agreements and widening the gap between the rich and the poor.
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The second idea, which has yet to be implemented, is to start a voting system similar to the US system. Make voting non-compulsory and on working days so that only those in financially secure jobs (and therefore wealthier people) can take the day off to vote.
Aside from long ranging projects, Centrelink in its day to day business provides many services to other people you've never met and don't know. For the rest of us, Centrelink tries its utmost to ensure continuous frustration and pain. Indeed their new filing system requires all of your forms to be stored anally - by you - to forever remind you of their slogan: "Centrelink, screwing the people who can't do anything about it."
The De Facto Wars[edit]
In the 1970s when people didn't have to get married, Centrelink realised they were losing out in the pay game. The Australian government was probably spending zillions of dollars paying individuals when they could be paying them less as a de facto couple. It is well known that couples, especially de facto ones eat less, pay less rent and have cheaper bills, thereby warranting a cut to their payments.
There exist legal definitions of de facto, but Centrelink are a law unto themselves. They define the term "de facto" to mean:
"Person(s), who upon entering the property of the Centrelink beneficiary, engage in sexual intercourse of some form, which is defined as the penetration of any orifice by a protruding member from the other person, for more than 6 nanoseconds."
After penetration by the 'protruding member' which can include fingers, tongues (kissing) and more, the couple are considered de facto and the Centrelink beneficiary must declare this relationship immediately or have their benefits cut off. The alternative is to declare the relationship and have their benefits cut off.
The unfortunate definition, which has a little '(s)' after Person, means if an individual Centrelink beneficiary bites their fingernails for more than 6 nanoseconds they are officially having a relationship with their finger. Unfortunately this means the beneficiary now has to support their finger, themselves and maintain a relationship on lower benefits.
This definition has enraged female right groups, because under this definition female masturbation immediately results in a self finger/hand relationship. However men, with their hands merely grasping the penis, penetrate none of their own orifices during masturbation. Additionally it takes women ages to climax, meaning they are practically married to their own hands in the eyes of Centrelink.
Sub-Departments of Centrelink[edit]
The Queuing Department[edit]
The Queuing department promotes patience in The Scum Of The Earth. Scum Of The Earth are encouraged to queue for at least 10 hours a week, hopefully with crying baby Scums Of The Earth in tow. Understaffed and at times inept, Centrelink slave direction officers ensure the the maximum amount of time is spent on the smallest problems. Additionally the added bonus of a frustrated and overworked staff members will always be ready to greet you.
The Queuing department is inconveniently located at the end of several sets of queues. Scum Of The Earth have to survive the gauntlet of queues before being able to claim true queue mastery, which is rewarded by cutting their benefits cut-off because the slave direction officer accidentally listed their marital status as "dead". This can only be rectified by completing the gauntlet once more, followed by a long and lengthy argument with a staff member about their dead/ not dead/ undead status. If The Scum Of The Earth have forgotten to get signed proof from the Department of Births, Deaths and Marriages they will have to queue again.
The ingenious set up of the Queuing Department instills a true sense of helplessness in all benefit seekers (A.K.A. The Scum Of The Earth). It is set up like a giant monopoly game. To begin a die weighted in favour of 'zero' is rolled and The Scum Of The Earth must advance the number of desks indicated by the die. Desks have names such as "Go back 3 desks", "Start again", "Intent to queue form lodgement desk", "Mystery desk" and so on. The Mystery desk allows The Scum Of The Earth to select a card at random which can help or hinder the process, they say things such as "You have just been given form '34a: Form to advance 2 desks', please complete this form, advance two desks and lodge with Centrelink staff" or "You have been suspected of fraud, please fill out form '265.36B: proof your child is not a dog', go home and get child/dog and queue again" or "your rent assistance payments can not be justified, please bring in copy of your lease initialed by the prime minister for authentication". The purely random nature of advancement serves to mystify and confuse sub human scum which is further exacerbated by the random nature of form lodgement, at any stage in the queuing game, if previous forms are lost, The Scum Of The Earth must go back to the desk where the lost form was allegedly handed in and re-queue to submit the form once more! Situations that result in returning to the start include: going to the bathroom, being rude, wearing thongs, breathing loudly, breathing, having blue eyes, sighing and existing.
The Truth Department[edit]
The Truth Department is the TrueLies department, where the truth lies as in rests as well as where the truth lies. Sub humans are told the truth, which is actually a misinterpretation of the truth and is therefore a lie, but from Centrelink it is the truth until the next truth is told. It means understanding that the truth in the truth department is a truth as the confusing liars tell it, a lie of truth and a contradiction of the facts. Applied to sub human scum it means an instilled helplessness ingrained so deeply in their soul that they are unable to muster the will to believe in what was perceived truth when presented with the contrary. This demands a continuous erosion of one's will, and more to know that the truth is a lie and the lies are the truth and to forget you ever had self respect. It is, which is known as CentreThink expressed through CentreSpeak.
The Propaganda Department[edit]
The Propaganda Department produces propaganda to make The Scum Of The Earth believe that big brother is watching you and you will get caught. If you really are going to get caught, then why aren't Centrelink spending their money busting your balls instead of making advertisements that try to psyche you out?
Ask yourself: Is this scam your lucky scam?
Fraud and Centrelink[edit]
Centrelink is committed to fraud. By underpaying Australians and forcing them to live off meagre allowances, Centrelink encourages The Scum Of The Earth to commit fraud, and thus start a successful career in crime. They offer soft penalties which you can chose from which include facial maiming, working at a Centrelink for a day or having Chinese paper torture (This is when they send you so much paperwork and forms to fill out that your weakened wrist is crushed under the weight of your pen). Most members of the criminal classes have really appreciated the start Centrelink has given them in their life of crime. One customer was so happy and excited that he assaulted a slave direction officer and then ripped out their still beating heart and ate it. Naturally Centrelink was absolutely thrilled to promote the excited Scum Of The Earth to jail where they won a lifetime supply of unrequited anal penetrations. Thanks to Centrelink's 'Human Humiliation Program' which encourages low self esteem in their Scum, most Scum who get promoted to jail successfully complete their final badge: social deviance.
Centrelink has also released a new slogan: "Screw the People that Screw You", which fits in nicely with the concept of 'natural justice'. Additionally, despite extensive advertising people still commit fraud against Centrelink, which is excellent, RESPECT!
It is of utmost importance, that if you know ANYONE who is making a legitimate Centrelink claim to report them to the anonymous fraudster tip off line, this will ensure weeks of useless bureaucracy and no payments for them! Centrelink's core values revolve around denying legitimate claims which make up to 95% of their costs, thus it is of the utmost importance to to crush the honest and those down on their luck.
The investigations department[edit]
All Scum Of The Earth who receive Centrelink benefits are investigated because they are lying scum. Anyone with half a brain, half a stomach and who lives under a rock will obviously cheat Centrelink because the maintenance of their rock will take away at least 95% of their Centrelink "benefits", leaving only 5% to feed their half stomach, which feeds their half brain to come up with great scams to somehow marginally improve their standard of living.
It is believed by reducing payments by 5% and thus denying food to Scum Of The Earth will mean they won't be able to come up with ways to scam money of Centrelink. There are some "human rights" issues to be overcome if this policy is to be introduced, however Scum Of The Earth aren't human, so QED on that one.
Investigations into Scums Of The Earth, by Centrelink are often very lengthy processes. Firstly The Scum Of The Earth would have been referred to the investigations unit of Centrelink because their forms would have been lost so many times that the blame has to be passed to someone else: The recipient. Once the investigation begins, The Scum Of The Earth is assigned an investigations officer who bombards them with paperwork until the process is terminated by the recipient writing an abusive letter containing the terms "I know your full name", "accountability" and "who is your supervisor".
Most investigations end with payments being reduced or cut, broken photocopiers, the use of many pens and the desire to screw the people that screw you!
How to Claim[edit]
Simply fill out the following simple form to receive your benefits.
The great thing about Centrelink forms is that if you not speel good they are especially taylored for you needs. This bad speeling works two ways: confusion and frustration! Happy writting!
How to really make a claim[edit]
The Encyclopedia team fully endorse the tolerance of Australians as welfare recipients. If you really are in need of welfare assistance, please contact the official Centrelink office below.
The other good thing about Centrelink also is you can walk in, hold a blood filled syringe to their face and they won't really appear that surprised.


text: This Ultra-High Shear Mixer from Charles Ross & Son Company is designed for homogenizing dispersions and disintegrating large solid particles or droplets suspended in liquid in submicron emulsions and dispersions, as well as formulations that degrade upon exposure to excessive shear. With an inline rotor/stator design, the mixing head turns at tip speeds well over 11,000 ft/min and generates complex flow patterns without sacrificing throughput. This subjects the product to intense mechanical and hydraulic shear, rapidly resulting in a very fine particle size distribution. In a typical process set-up, raw materials are combined in an agitated vessel and the resulting slurry, paste or emulsion is introduced to the mixer, which behaves like a centrifugal pumping device. Materials are fed by gravity or pumped to the mixer. When an auxiliary pump is used, the mixer can handle viscosities up to around 200,000 cP or higher.


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Announcements, Azure Cosmos DB, Databases
Azure Cosmos DB: The industry's first globally-distributed, multi-model database service
By Dharma Shukla Technical Fellow
Posted on
3 min read
Today, we're excited to announce the general availability of Azure Cosmos DB. Azure Cosmos DB is the first globally-distributed data service that lets you to elastically scale throughput and storage across any number of geographical regions while guaranteeing low latency, high availability and consistency – backed by the most comprehensive SLAs in the industry. Azure Cosmos DB is built to power today's IoT and mobile apps, and tomorrow's AI-hungry future.
It is the first cloud database to natively support a multitude of data models and popular query APIs, is built on a novel database engine capable of ingesting sustained volumes of data and provides blazing-fast queries – all without having to deal with schema or index management. And it is the first cloud database to offer five well-defined consistency models so you can choose just the right one for your app.
To create these five consistency levels, and build many of the capabilities within Azure Cosmos DB, we married decades-worth of distributed systems and database research with world-class engineering rigor. You can learn more about the research we implemented in Azure Cosmos DB by watching this video from Turing Award-winning, Microsoft Researcher, distributed systems giant and our inspiration, Dr. Leslie Lamport.
Azure Cosmos DB – Transforming Cloud-based App Development
We believe that Azure Cosmos DB fundamentally transforms the way developers will build cloud-based apps:
1. Build globally distributed apps, more easily
Azure Cosmos DB makes global distribution, turnkey. With a single click, you can add/remove any number of Azure regions to your Azure Cosmos DB database, anytime. Azure Cosmos DB will seamlessly replicate your data wherever your users are.
2. Elastically scale throughput and storage, at any time, on demand, around the globe
Azure Cosmos DB allows your application to elastically scale throughput and storage on demand, worldwide. You can elastically scale up from 1000s to 100s of millions of requests/sec around the globe, with a single API call and pay only for the throughput (and storage) you need. Azure Cosmos DB is the only cloud database which allows you to scale throughput at both second and minute granularities. This in turn helps you to predictably deal with any unexpected spikes in your workloads without having to over-provision for the peak.
"We are using Azure Cosmos DB for our transaction processing systems because it is capable of handling an extremely high volume of writes per second with predictable consistency, which gives our systems the high performance and reliability our customers demand. Our ability to scale throughput for each collection gives us the control we need to fine tune performance and cost to provide the highest value to our customers."
– Andrew Hochstetler, Senior Director Application Architecture, Blackboard.
3. Build highly responsive apps
Azure Cosmos DB guarantees single-digit millisecond latencies at the 99th percentile to your app, anywhere in the world. The write-optimized, log structured and latch-free database engine, which is at the core of Azure Cosmos DB, enables sustained ingestions of data and blazing-fast queries. Users will love how responsive your app is!
4. Build always "on" apps
Azure Cosmos DB makes sure your app is always "on," automatically. We guarantee high availability of your data in every region as well as, across all regions. Its multi-homing capabilities allow both your application and your data to remain highly available even in a case of regional disasters, without requiring complex redeployment of your app.
"The Xpander team within Microsoft develops one of the key services that powers a number of critical flows across Windows and Xbox, as such they have extremely high availability goals, strict latency requirements, distributed in key data centers across the world. Since the migration from our previous storage solution to Azure Cosmos DB we have seen a drastic increase in overall reliability, significantly improved performance characteristics and a drastic reduction in something previously called "Micro-outage timeouts" that would affect 0.001% of transactions for <1 minute throughout any given day."
– Cary Mitchell, Principal Software Engineering Lead, Xpander
5. Choose the consistency model that works best for your app
With Azure Cosmos DB, developers do not have to settle for extreme consistency choices (strong vs. eventual consistency). It offers 5 well-defined consistency choices – strong, bounded-staleness, session, consistent-prefix and eventual – so you can select the consistency model that is just right for your app.
"Johnson Controls is a global company, with a presence on all seven continents. Having a global database like Azure Cosmos DB available makes it dramatically easier to build applications to support our customers and equipment wherever they may be. Azure Cosmos DB gives us the low latency we need, and with fine-grained control over consistency we can make the right choices for our application for performance. Microsoft's got some of the best folks in the world on their team, and we know that we can count on them to meet their very aggressive SLAs."
– Erik Paulson, Data Engineer, JCI Connected Offerings
6. Iterate your app quickly without worrying of schemas or indexes
Keeping database schema and indexes in-sync with an application's schema is especially painful for globally distributed apps. With Azure Cosmos DB, you no longer need to deal with schemas or indexes. The database engine is fully schema-agnostic. Since no schema and index management is required you also don't have to worry about application downtime while migrating schemas. We automatically index all the data – no schema, no indexes required – and serve blazing-fast queries.
"Citrix switched to Azure Cosmos DB to support the Citrix Identity Platform which enables single sign-on for more than 400,000 organizations and 100 million individuals globally. Azure Cosmos DB helped Citrix remove a primary issue faced by the development team, where a previous NoSQL database required indexing and constant code modifications. Azure Cosmos DB now automatically indexes all the properties of every record it ingests, by default."
– Tom Kludy, Principal Architect, Citrix
7. Use the right data model for your app
The database engine of Azure Cosmos DB is designed to natively support nearly any data model. With today's launch, we are enabling; key-value, document, and graph, but the engine is designed to be extensible and efficiently support newer types of data models. Stay tuned.
8. Use the APIs of your choice
Our goal is to help you to write globally distributed apps, more easily, using the tools and APIs you are already familiar with. Azure Cosmos DB's database engine natively supports DocumentDB's SQL dialect, Azure Cosmos DB for MongoDB API, Gremlin (graph) API, and Azure Table Storage APIs. In the future, we will support other popular data access APIs natively, giving you even more choice and flexibility.
9. Industry-leading, comprehensive SLAs
Azure Cosmos DB is the first and only globally distributed database service in the industry to offer financially-backed comprehensive SLAs. They cover: high-availability, low latency at the 99th percentile, consistency and throughput.
"When ASOS evaluated the market for our future NoSQL platform, we looked at multiple options, however we selected Azure Cosmos DB because we were impressed with it on many levels. Firstly, it's a managed database-as-a-service which was extremely appealing – we don't think as a retailer there's value in running databases, the value is in the propositions you build using them! Obviously this only plays out if the availability and the SLA's around that service are enterprise grade. Secondly, our customers were global so the ability to simply replicate the data globally for performance as well as for resiliency was key. Finally, ASOS is running a micro-service architecture and naturally each service has different workload and performance characteristics, so the ability to vary the consistency levels without having to move to a different technology gives us a lot of benefits. Azure Cosmos DB is already an important part of the ASOS architecture, and looks increasingly to be core to our proposition."
– Dave Green, Enterprise Application Architect, ASOS
A Brief History of Cosmos
Azure Cosmos DB started as "Project Florence" in 2010 to address developer the pain-points faced by large scale applications inside Microsoft. Observing that the challenges of building globally distributed apps are not a problem unique to Microsoft, in 2015 we made the first generation of this technology available to Azure developers in the form of Azure DocumentDB. Since that time, we've added new features and introduced significant new capabilities. Azure Cosmos DB is the result. It is the next big leap in globally distributed, at scale, cloud databases. As a part of this release of Azure Cosmos DB, DocumentDB customers, with their data, are automatically Azure Cosmos DB customers. The transition is seamless and they now have access to the new breakthrough system and capabilities offered by Azure Cosmos DB.
For a technical overview, please check out the first of a series of blog posts you can expect from me and my team here. This post also includes a longer version of the interview with Dr. Leslie Lamport titled Foundations of Azure Cosmos DB.
With Azure Cosmos DB, our mission was to enable the world's developers to build amazingly powerful, cosmos-scale apps, more easily. Today marks the Big Bang moment for us in the Azure Cosmos DB team and we're excited to share it with all of you—our developers and customers around the world.
Please try out #AzureCosmosDB and let us know what you think! We are excited to see what you build.
— Your friends at Azure Cosmos DB (@AzureCosmosDB)


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The Lakers knew this when they traded for Dwight Howard last summer — under the terms of the new CBA it makes financial sense for a max player to play out his current deal and become a free agent then re-sign with the same team than it does to sign an extension to a deal and never hit the open market. Said player can get one more guaranteed year and larger raises if he becomes a free agent and re-signs than if he signs an extension.
But that means players have to become free agents for a stretch and other teams can approach them.
Howard will become a free agent this summer and is going to talk to other teams besides the Lakers, reports Dave McMenamin of ESPNLosAngeles.com.
I'd throw the Houston Rockets in that mix, as well. Atlanta will want to be in the mix but word out of Howard's camp consistently has been he doesn't want to go back home. Of course, the Lakers will call him at midnight July 1 with a max offer as well.
Let's talk money first, because it's always about the money.
Howard is a lock for a max deal. The difference in money is the Lakers can offer an expected five years, $118 million, other teams coming in could offer four years, $87.6 million. (Those numbers could move a little once the new salary cap levels are set for next season, but said cap is expected to be in the $60 million range). That's about a $30 million difference, for those of you scoring at home. You can say for a player who has made more than $100 million in his career (and likely will get one more max deal after this one) that the money isn't the biggest issue, but would you leave $30 million guaranteed on the table? In a year after you felt your basketball mortality after struggling to return from back surgery?
Now the big question: Would Dwight Howard leave the Lakers?
I doubt it. Clearly his first year in Los Angeles didn't go as smoothly as he hoped — he rushed back from back surgery and didn't play up to his standards, and he heard about it from the demanding Lakers fan base. He and Kobe Bryant had to adjust to each other, the Lakers switched coaches this season, Howard fought through a torn labrum, injuries ravaged the team, and the Lakers will be bounced from the NBA playoffs in the first round, likely on Sunday.
You can look at all that, say Howard didn't have fun and that he could go to Houston with James Harden or Dallas with Dirk Nowitzki or Cleveland with Kyrie Irving and win. And maybe be happier. For Howard basketball has to be fun for him to play his best and he might think he will have more fun in another market with another star.
Here is why I think he doesn't leave — image.
Howard is still trying to rehabilitate a public image that took a hit after the ugly way he left Orlando. To move again away from one of the NBA's premiere franchises to go to a lesser light will not help that — he's be painted as the guy who could not fill the shoes of Miken, Wilt, Kareem and Shaq. Go to Dallas or Houston and you go from a place where the Lakers are kings of the market to a place where football is king and basketball gets a lesser spotlight. Leave and his reputation as indecisive continues.
Winning is how Howard fixes that image. Howard knows the Lakers would have everybody but himself and Steve Nash off the books in the summer of 2014 — they can reshape the roster to win with him as the focus. The Lakers have said they want him to take the reins of the franchise from Kobe Bryant in the coming years (ideally Kobe would cede a little of that power next season to a healthy Howard). Most of all, you know the Lakers can draw free agents and spend in a way few other teams can to win. He's not leaving to go somewhere else and have a better chance at a ring.
But we all want to be wanted. So Howard is going to flirt with other teams besides the Lakers this summer.


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Yaskawa Remote IO Modules
Available Services
Field Service
Along with Yaskawa Field Service Engineers, we are also able to provide local service through our wide network of Authorized Service Providers.
Full details about field service program available in the support area.
Technical Support
Yaskawa provides support for all of its products on a global basis.
Full contact information available in the support area.
Node: lr2


text:
- Home
- Government
- Departments L - Q
- Municipal Court
- Entering a Plea
Entering a Plea
Please be advised all court ordered fines, fees and penalties must be paid in full on the day of court. This includes defensive driving, deferral, and dismissal fees. Failure to pay on the day of court may result in a warrant for your arrest.
Your decision on what plea to enter is the most important decision you will have to make. The named defendant on the citation must sign his/her name and enter a plea to each charge; either in person or by mail. Failure to enter a plea for each charge in person or by mail within 12 days may result in a warrant being issued and could result in the denial of driver's license renewal, with additional fees assessed. We suggest you read the following explanations of the different types of pleas prior to making your decision.
You must decide upon and enter a plea to the charge against you on or before the appearance date on your citation. If you signed a citation in front of an officer, you did not plead guilty, but only signed a promise to appear in court. There are three possible pleas to a complaint:
- Guilty
- Nolo Contendere (No Contest)
- Not Guilty
Adults (17 and over)
Guilty states you are waiving your right to a jury trial and are guilty of the charges as filed. The fine and costs on a plea of guilty are the same as a plea of no contest. A guilty plea may adversely affect you in the event a civil action is brought against you (example: an accident; assault, etc.).
Nolo Contendere (No Contest) states you are waiving your right to a jury trial and are not contesting the charges filed. If you plead no contest, a finding of guilty will be entered by the Court and your fine will be assessed. A No Contest plea is not an admission of guilt.
Not Guilty states you are not guilty of the charge as filed. If you plead not guilty, after a pre-trial hearing, your case will be set for a trial. Should you be found not guilty, you would be released at that time from the charge against you. Should you be found guilty, your fine would be in an amount not to exceed the legal limits provided by law plus Court costs per violation.
Juveniles (16 and under)
You are required to appear for a trial along with a parent or guardian, even if you are represented by an attorney.
A court date will be mailed to the parents or legal guardian. If you do not receive a court date from the court within 30 days, contact the court. Failure to appear may result in a revoked driver's license or denial of driver's license reinstatement or renewal. The juvenile and parent must notify the court in writing of a change in the juvenile's residence address within 7 days of the change. A violation is a Class C misdemeanor. This obligation does not end when the juvenile reaches age 17. The obligation terminates only upon discharge and satisfaction of the judgment.