text:
Mr. Corbijn, you have a long history of photographing musicians. Do you know how to play an instrument yourself?
On two occasions I was able to jump in for the Depeche Mode drummer when he was ill during BBC broadcasts…
I'd say that's pretty good.
But you can't really say something like that about yourself. I don't have anything more to do with music though. I don't want to continue to do what I did when I was 20. I would like to continue to develop myself and not continue to hang around with bands. I've finally become an old guy. When I see U2 today – I was at their last show – I go backstage, which is something I didn't used to do, and now it's nothing more than meeting up with friends. In other words, it's a different kind of hanging around than in the dynamic '80s.
Is that why you recently left London and moved back to the Netherlands?
No, I still had an open return ticket. If I hadn't come back, I would have lost my money! (Laughs) No, after I lost my house in London – a money issue, you know – I bought myself a house in The Hague right next to the sea. Life is calmer; everything moves at a slower pace than in London. In the '90s it was great to be in London where all the action was. The coolest bands, the career… Besides I was on the road 50 weeks a year – I'm still on the road a lot today. But tiny little Holland is a good base from which to travel elsewhere and get out. In reality my life is crazy, but it's also real love.
How can you leave music behind? You must still get tons of proposals, doesn't every new band dream of working with you?
Of course the propositions never stop. But my interests lie elsewhere now. I've gotten used to not looking too far into the future; it's best when you can begin each day anew. At present I am entirely focused on film. It requires the culmination of all your artistic abilities: videos, photography as composition, art directing, design…
You once said, "After I've made three films I'll either quit or become completely absorbed in filmmaking." Your next will be film number three…
We'll just have to see. At this point I remain quite content to simply continue making films.
"A photo doesn't need to be perfect to fascinate."
You've shot famous people for decades now. Is it still possible for fame to impress you?
I am an equal member of the creative class. Celebrity hype doesn't impress me much these days.
Now you're famous in your own right.
I'm not famous; I am simply very well-known to certain people. Famous is something different.
Your first book was called Famouz. Why was it spelled with a "z?"
The title was written with a "z" because everyone thought I was German. I wanted to make myself recognizable as a Dutchman.
What do you look for when searching for your next portrait photo personality?
Depth is important. I can see quite quickly which features of a face are worth photographing. After that I search for the people.
Would you shoot a portrait of the Queen of England?
Ah, such a shooting is only done to satisfy a photographer's curiosity. I know because I've taken several photos of the Dutch queen – a truly wonderful woman. I'm not so interested in the British royalty. On the other hand, I sincerely enjoyed photographing Claus von Amsberg, our queen's husband. He was very impressive.
What about the fathers of the U2 band members imitating the performance poses of their sons?
My thought was: when you get older, you always end up taking on your father's characteristics – it's genetically determined. With U2 I had this wonderful opportunity: fathers and sons, they were all in the same city at the same time. I gave the older men instruments. That's one of my favorite ideas: the past, present, and future all in one photograph.
How were you able to get Mick Jagger in women's clothing for a portrait?
"It depends on how you open the door" – that's a little saying of mine. With Mick I had the luck that he happened to be playing a female role in a film.
You also once partially covered Kate Moss' famous face with a mask…
I don't go to my photo shoots with any grand scheme in mind. That wasn't even during the time in which I still needed to work on a certain person for one or two years just in order to get them to do one portrait. These days I don't wait for everything to be ideal for the portrait. A photo doesn't need to be perfect to fascinate.
It must be nice to be able to get anyone you want in front of your camera.
Yes it is.
Source: The Talk
Leave a Reply Cancel reply
'The Square' Interview with Ruben Östlund, Claes Bang and Elisabeth Moss
Director Ruben Östlund is an adventurer of Swedish film and a hard man to satiate. It is seen in his Oscar-nominated film – The Square that has received much attention. Here is an excerpt from the interview with The Playlist as actors Claes Bang and Elisabeth Moss share their experience with the movie and the director.
Claes Bang: Can I tell you a funny story from Cannes?
Elisabeth Moss: Yeah.
Claes Bang: When we were [at Cannes] there was this Screen International journalist, Wendy Mitchell, and she saw the film, she loved it, and she started [rooting] for me as best actor. She put on her Facebook page she put "The Daily Bang" and posted a new photo of me every day. Invented the hashtag #BangforBond.
Elisabeth Moss: So good!
Claes Bang : At the end of the festival, all these predictions come out, right? My agents were fanning me. "It says in Variety now that you're gonna win. It says in the Daily Telegraph you're gonna win. It says in The Guardian." It said everywhere and I started fucking believing the hype. I did. I started believing the hype, because everybody was saying, "It's an amazing film. It's so fucking good, but you're not gonna win the big thing because it's too funny." So when we got that phone call on Sunday…
The Playlist: And they told Ruben to come, too, it wasn't just…
Claes Bang: No, no. They invite the entire crew that is there. So they said to come and I was like, "Fuck, I'm gonna get [an] award." So when they said, "And the award for Best Actor goes to," I was almost fucking getting my ass out of the seat and then they said, "Joaquin Phoenix." I was like, "Okay, I'll stay put." Then the next prize went, the next prize went, the next prize went and there was just one left. I leaned over to Rupert and I said, "Unless they're really fucking with us, we're gonna get the big one." We got the big one and I was like, really, really so fucking happy about it, and he was, and everything was exploding, and then five minutes later I was like, "Wait a fucking second. What the fuck was that? He stole my award,that fucking Swedish wanker." (Laughs.) So what happened is that all the people that get the awards, they go off to a press conference.
Elisbeth Moss: Yeah.
The Playlist: Yeah, I was at the press conferences.
Claes Bang: There's an amazing party that starts out on the top of the Palais overlooking this harbor with all the boats and everything. Then you go down to the beach where there's a department of a French restaurant that's just the most amazing food, champagne, people in tuxes. I mean, amazing. I started to get a little bit pissed. I got quite drunk and then Ruben came back from the press conference and I saw him over there, and I was like, "I'm fucking gonna hurt him now. I'm fucking gonna go over there and kick his ass."
The Playlist: Really?
Claes Bang: I was so mad. I was really … and I have done really, really stupid stuff when I'm drunk. So, I said to my wife, "We need to leave now." So we left.
Elisabeth Moss: That's the danger of believing the hype! That's why after eight nominations I will never convince me of anything else other than that I'm gonna lose.
Claes Bang: And Ruben texted me something at [1 AM asking] "Where the fuck are you? I mean, we won and everybody's asking for you." I mean, everybody there had seen that film and unless you know Ruben, you don't know that he is the guy, but everybody knew that I was sort of the lead of the film. And I was just…
Elisabeth Moss: Gone.
Claes Bang: I was gone.
The Playlist: But when you woke up the next morning with the hangover were you at least excited?
Claes Bang: I had to get up like, fuck dead early the next morning. That was one of the things. I had a show in Edinburgh that next night.
The Playlist: But when you were going to the airport, on the plane, you must have been thinking "Holy cow!" because when you make a movie you don't necessarily think it's going to win the Palme d'Or at Cannes.
Claes Bang: No, and my wife, she was so fucking mad with me. She said, "We're leaving the party of our lives. There's boom boom boom and they all want to talk to you, and now we're leaving." "Yes," I said, "This is not where I'm gonna kill a director or try and break the Palme d'Or in half to say 'This is mine' or something."
Elisabeth Moss: But how Ruben Ostlund would that have been if the lead actor and the director got into a fight?
Claes Bang: Exactly.
The Playlist: Yes!
Claes Bang: When I told him this story, because I've told him and I've told the press and everything now, he was just like, "This is the best story of the whole shoot."
Elisabeth Moss: Yeah, it's the greatest!
The Playlist: He's gonna put this in a movie now. You realize this, right?
Claes Bang: It's cool. It's fine. It's no problem. Listen, what I actually find quite funny is that when you think about it, it's like, "Oh my God, no. Did I do that?" But when I tell the story people are like, "Finally, someone is coming out and saying I was really, really disappointed not to win."
Elisabeth Moss: Right. Totally, yes.
Claes Bang: It was literally something like five or six places where it said, "He's gonna win it." I fucking believed it.
Elisabeth Moss: Of course. It's dangerous!
The Playlist: By the way, I'm one of those people that do the stuff that say "these people are going to win."
Elisabeth Moss: Right, exactly!
The Playlist: So, I guess I apologize?
Elisabeth Moss: No, by all means. It's your job, but it's like…
Claes Bang: I have this thing also that was like, "Okay, they really invited a rookie to Cannes. Now we're gonna fuck with him."
The Playlist: It's not personal!
Claes Bang: "We're gonna build him up, we're gonna make him believe, and then-"
Elisabeth Moss: "We're gonna take it away. Just to teach him a lesson."
The Playlist: Elisabeth, you weren't at the ceremony. Were you there for the premiere and then you left?
Elisabeth Moss: I went to Antibes which is like 45 minutes, a half an hour away or something. Nobody asked me to go to the Palme d'Or Ceremony.
The Playlist: Oh, they didn't call and tell you? I thought they gave everyone 24 hours notice.
Claes Bang: No. For instance, if you're in Japan and you've gone back to Japan and you're getting an award, they will let you know in time so you can get on a plane.
Disclaimer: Photographs utilized by this page is not the sole property of the page or it administrators; the photos utilized by us come from around the worldwide web and are shared publicly.
Christo, you and your wife Jeanne-Claude were born on the exact same day in 1935, but in completely different countries. Do you believe in destiny?
Jeanne-Claude always said, "There are a million people born on the same day." But it happened that we met, that's all. That is something not unusual. But there are many things that are not destiny. You make your own destiny.
You worked together for nearly 50 years. Would you have become the same artist without her?
It's the same question to ask, "What would happen if I were Chinese?" (Laughs) We cannot discuss these things – if, if, if – there are no ifs. After living for 80 years, there are no ifs. I can only say one if and it was that I was rather lucky to escape in 1957 to the West. I had never been outside of Bulgaria until 1956 and if I didn't go to the West, things would have probably been different.
The Soviets had a very strict policy against modern art so you might have not made art at all.
I was drawing all the time as a little boy, like 5 or 6 years old, and it was at this age that I decided to be an artist. There was never a thought about anything else. But it's true, in the late '40s and early '50s most modern art was not permitted to be seen in the Soviet Bloc countries. There were some very bad reproductions and old books… I desperately tried to go beyond Bulgaria and the Soviet Bloc, but even going to other communist countries was very difficult. Fortunately my aunt and my uncle were living in Prague and finally I succeeded in finding a way to visit them. And I was totally flabbergasted by Prague!
It was the most Western country. Even before the chance to fully escape came into view, I had already decided that I was never going to go back to Bulgaria! I was going to stay in Prague. I was young, like 21 years old, and when you're young and you discover the relatively small freedom of the Western art in Czechoslovakia and Prague in the late '50s, suddenly you dream of going to Paris! And this is how the stage was set for me to go to Paris.
And that made all the difference after all. It was there that you met Jeanne-Claude and you were together until her death in 2009. How has your life changed since she passed away?
We are missing her all the time, you know? You should understand that living with one person for over 50 years, we miss many, many things. Probably one of the greatest things was that she was always very critical of anything we tried to put together. You can see in many of the films the Maysles brothers made about our work how vigorously we argued with each other – almost fighting each other! This is the thing I miss the most because it is so important to the process of what we are doing, to have this critical attitude all the time, not bending, not compromising. But there are many, many things. Many, many things.
Is it true that you always flew in separate planes so that in case one crashed the other could continue the work?
Exactly, because we are always working on two or three projects and at least one should finish the project that was very much advanced. That was the story. I remember often we would take different planes, then on the way to the connecting flight we would kiss each other and take another plane.
Was it natural for you to continue making work alone after her death?
To be a visual artist is not a profession – it is existence. In the Maysles' film The Gates, she is in a car and a journalist is asking, "You're very advanced in age, will you retire?" And Jeanne-Claude says, "Artists do not retire, they simply die." It's not a profession, it's existence, you know? You exist through art. You cannot even compare it to other professions, in the office and things like that.
Source: The Talks
Ms. Roš, what are the main challenges in Slovenian cuisine today?
I think Slovenia is slowly, slowly stepping on the world gastronomic map. But my generation of chefs needs to fight for every single step, and every decision is opening a new door. If you work in Italy or Germany, and you cook well, sooner or later you will get the recognition that you need — there is the Michelin Guide, there is Gault Millau, there is the L'Espresso Guide. While in Slovenia, you can be really good, but up to the moment when the international community acknowledges you, you are actually no one.
You have been the head chef of Hiša Franko in Kobarid for almost 20 years — and it wasn't until this year that you were recognized as the number one female chef by the World's 50 Best Restaurants academy.
Right, it's a very, very slow process. Everybody travels for food to Copenhagen, London, or Paris, but who knows where Kobarid is? So it has been a long, long struggle and fight. It doesn't have only to do with the quality of the restaurant; you have to prove that you are worth certain awards three times more than in developed countries.
"Creativity is something that does not come only from our childhood — it has a lot to do with our own personality."
I guess the former Yugoslavia doesn't necessarily come to mind as a haven for creativity in fine dining. What was it like growing up there in the 1990s?
Well, my mother was actually a brilliant cook. She was a journalist and a very creative person, so our meals at home were very colorful and never repeated. But if I think of the food from my childhood, I think of a simple pasta dish with homemade tomato sauce. It really was a super flavorful meal, with a drop of olive oil on the top and with no cheese. That was the most loved meal when I was a child! That is what they call, "happy food." You know, my children would kill for it.
My parents lived through the communist regime and told me they used to get so excited over simple things like bananas because they were so rare.
Yes but you know, Yugoslavia never had a very strict organization of the country — the borders were open and we could travel. Tito was a "bon vivant" and he was letting his people have a pretty free life. So Yugoslavia had a lot of good things as well. I think Yugoslavia was a place with a lot of creative people; culture was super strong, especially in Zagreb and Belgrade. But I think that creativity is something that either is in a person or is not. Let's say I have two children and they are both raised in the same way. The girl is super creative and totally irrational, while the boy is totally rational and not creative at all. I think it is something that does not come only from our childhood or from our upbringing or from the regime in which we lived in — it has a lot to do with our own personality.
Do you feel more creative and irrational, or the other way around?
Oh, I'm too instinctive sometimes! You see, my problem — and sometimes it is also a good thing — is that I don't question a lot. I actually just jump in the water and swim and I am a kind of personality that is never happy with average results. At Hiša Franko, I never questioned myself about how it is going to be like, especially because I never had any prior experience of seeing how a restaurant really works and I'm completely self-taught so it was like a total experiment and we are still making corrections.
Source: The Talk
About Talk Column
We provide you with the latest talks and interviews from the industry.
Top 10 Quotes From Elon Musk's Genius
Top 5 Takeaways From Tiger Woods's Latest Press Conference
Top 5 Times Oprah Has Lost Her Cool On Her Talk Show
Top 10 Quotes On Leo Messi To Read Today
Top 10 Quotes By Leonardio DiCaprio
News2 years ago
Oprah Talks to Ellen DeGeneres
Popular2 years ago
Interview with the iconic actor Terence Stamp
Popular2 years ago
News2 years ago
'The Square' Interview with Ruben Östlund, Claes Bang and Elisabeth Moss
Updates2 years ago
General2 years ago
Top 10 Quotes From Elon Musk's Genius
Popular2 years ago
The Best 5 Oprah Winfrey Interviews
Updates2 years ago
Matt Ryan Opens Up About Super Bowl LI, the Falcons' Bright Future, and Keeping His Style Game Strong


text:
When it comes to peak tennis shoe performance, comfort, and fashion, nothing beats the adidas Barricade. Here you'll find Midwest Sports' selection of Barricade women's tennis shoes in a variety of styles, colors, and designs. Merging sleek styles with flexible and durable on-court performance, Barricade tennis shoes offer players of all skill levels the perfect foundation for their game. Whether you're just starting out or you're an experienced pro, adidas women's tennis shoes will help you get your game up and running. Shop today!
30% Off
$149.95 $104.94
30% Off
$149.95 $104.94
40% Off
$150.00 $89.94

subset: commoncrawl


text:
- Overview
Quick OverviewS75981 Olive Cargo,Core White,Ray Pink Casual Shoes Adidas ZX Flux Adv Verve Mesh Womens
- Description
DetailsZX FLUX predecessor was launched in 1989, ZX8000. 2014, adidas Originals to this pair of legendary ZX 8000 as a blueprint, into a more modern aesthetic concepts and innovative technology, to create a new generation of ZX FLUX. ZX FLUX to full of thoughtful design, to create a more diverse style. Printing and the use of knitted and mesh fabrics, presented on the ZX Flux's minimalist shoe body, which burst out of the diversity of content. Adidas ZX FLUX combines modern sports with stylish leisure. The modern sports technology shoes and fashion casual footwear boundaries fuzzy, easy to create a comfortable but yet bright spot of sports modeling.
- Adidas ZX Flux Adv Verve
- Mesh
- Womens
- Olive Cargo/Core White/Ray Pink
- Reviews
Customer Reviews
Review "S75981 Olive Cargo,Core White,Ray Pink Casual Shoes Adidas ZX Flux Adv Verve Mesh Womens"


text:
Doc Turns to Heat in Heat
Memorial Day wasn't a vintage Doc performance but he came through with a gritty performance when it really counted on a hot and humid afternoon.
Touched for a season-high three homers, Doc was in hot water when the Nationals had runners on first and third with no out in the seventh. Dripping wet and over 100 pitches, he turned to fast balls to get out of the jam unscored. He fanned Werth on a high heater to end the inning. That's the sign of a great pitcher.
The Phillies wound up with their third win on this trip, all come-from-behind efforts (7th inning or later).
Doc has won 11 straight decisions against the Nationals/Expos. He is also riding a 10-game winning streak against the Orioles.
The back-to-back homers by Ryan and Raul came in the Daily News Home Run Payoff inning. Up until that time, there was only one $1,000 winner, back in April, a sign of the Phillies power shortage. A grand slam means $10,000 and LA has volunteered to add $10.00. Kind gentleman, he is.
One-Third Point
Monday was the 54th game, one-third of the season. They are 34-20.
Only better record is 38-16, first done in 1976 and matched in 1993.
Since Chase has returned, the Phillies have 35 extra-base hits. Don't know how to explain that one . . . Phillies are 24-5 when hitting at least one home run . . . Night game Tuesday, followed by a day game Wednesday and a day off on Thursday, the first after 20 consecutive games.
Draft Prep
While many were enjoying Memorial Day, scouting director Marti Wolever and his troops began preparation for the First-Year Player Draft that starts next Monday.
Joining Marti are Mike Ledna – National Coordinator, Bill Moore – National Coordinator, Darrell Conner – West Regional Supervisor, Brian Kohlscheen – Central Regional Supervisor, Gene Schall – East Regional Supervisor, Sal Agostinelli – International Supervisor and Steve Cohen – Texas Area Supervisor/Pacific Rim Coordinator.
Ruben, his assistants Scott, Benny and Chuck, pluss Pat Gillick, Dallas Green, assistant scouting director Rob Holiday and baseball information analyst Jay McLaughlin will be in the daily meetings in the Draft Room, which is located on the Hall of Fame Club level, just around the corner from Ruben's office.


text:
Al Gore's Climate Reality Project held its second annual 24 Hours of Reality broadcast today, with live online presentations about climate change from all 24 time zones. The event started at 8 p.m. EST on Nov. 14 and had attracted 3.2 million online viewers as of its halfway point on Thursday morning.
At the same time, the climate-change doubting site Watt's Up with That held its own online event, featuring 24 hours of live broadcasts intended as a "counterpoint" to Gore's event. As of 10 a.m. the morning of Nov. 15, the event had attracted about 9,000 viewers. (Update 11/15/12, 8 p.m.: As the 24-hour events concluded, the Climate Reality Project broadcast had exceeded 15.7 million views. The Watts Up with That broadcast totaled just over 16,000.)
In an op-ed for Forbes, James Taylor, senior fellow for environmental policy at the Heartland Institute, which has a long history of denying the effects of climate change, called the Watt's Up broadcast "the televised debate Al Gore has been avoiding for years."
Much of the Climate Reality Project's broadcast has focused on the theme of "dirty energy = dirty weather." It has been positioned by the organization as a "24-hour trip to examine how humans are warming the planet and 'dirtying' the weather. The day-long event comes as climate change emerges as a more serious political topic in the aftermath of Superstorm Sandy."
"2012 was an extraordinary year for extreme weather event," Gore said in a press statement. "This year has seen consistent worldwide record-breaking temperatures, historic droughts in the Midwest, and of course Superstorm Sandy, which alone affected millions of people and caused an estimated $50 billion in damages... In addition, the North Polar Ice Cap reached a record-low summer ice cover — less than half of what existed just 30 years ago. It becomes more and more obvious every day that Dirty Energy is changing our climate and causing Dirty Weather. We are already paying the price for inaction, and that must change before we cause much worse damage."
In his own press release, Watts Up founder Anthony Watts called Climate Reality's broadcast "yet another example of what has been called 'Tabloid Climatology' trying to use the once forbidden 'weather is not climate' meme. Now almost any weather event seems to be used as 'proof' of a global warming influence where just a few years ago the idea was laughed at by climate activists."
The hashtag #DirtyWeather is trending today on Twitter. Last year's 24 Hours of Reality event attracted a total of 8 million online views and 90 million tweets.
More climate change stories on MNN:
- Climate change threatens your morning cup of coffee
- Watch: How to prepare for climate change
- How to discuss climate change with your uncle during the holidays


text:
BAY80-6946 Open Label, Phase I Study in Patients With Advanced Cancer
|The safety and scientific validity of this study is the responsibility of the study sponsor and investigators. Listing a study does not mean it has been evaluated by the U.S. Federal Government. Read our disclaimer for details.
|ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT00962611
Recruitment Status : Completed
First Posted : August 20, 2009
Last Update Posted : October 6, 2017
- Study Details
- Tabular View
- No Results Posted
- Disclaimer
- How to Read a Study Record
|Condition or disease
|Drug: Copanlisib (Aliqopa, BAY80-6946)
|Phase 1
|Study Type :
|Interventional (Clinical Trial)
|Actual Enrollment :
|57 participants
|Intervention Model:
|Single Group Assignment
|None (Open Label)
|Primary Purpose:
|Official Title:
|An Open Label Phase I Dose Escalation Study to Evaluate the Safety, Tolerability, Pharmacokinetics, Maximum Tolerated Dose and Biomarker Response After Intravenous Administration of Weekly BAY80-6946 to Patients With Advanced Cancer
|Actual Study Start Date :
|November 19, 2009
|Actual Primary Completion Date :
|February 23, 2016
|Actual Study Completion Date :
|February 23, 2016
|Experimental: Copanlisib
Drug: Copanlisib (Aliqopa, BAY80-6946)
BAY80-6946 given IV over 1 hour every week for three weeks with a one week break until progression or unacceptable toxicities develop.
- Characterize safety, tolerability + pharmacokinetics, to determine the maximum tolerated dose of BAY80-6946 administered 1x weekly for 3 weeks, every 4weeks, as a 1h-intravenous infusion. Evaluate biomarkers that may be predictive of tumor response. [ Time Frame: 2 years ]
- Determine the effects of BAY80-6946 on blood glucose and insulin, and its safety in patients with type I or II diabetes. [ Time Frame: 2 years ]
- Evaluate for early signs of efficacy in expansion cohorts [ Time Frame: 2 years ]
Choosing to participate in a study is an important personal decision. Talk with your doctor and family members or friends about deciding to join a study. To learn more about this study, you or your doctor may contact the study research staff using the contacts provided below. For general information, Learn About Clinical Studies.
|Ages Eligible for Study:
|18 Years and older (Adult, Older Adult)
|Sexes Eligible for Study:
|Accepts Healthy Volunteers:
Inclusion Criteria:
- Age >/= 18 years.
- Histological or cytological documentation of non-hematologic, malignant solid tumor, excluding primary brain or spinal tumors, or history of central nervous system metastases
- At least one measurable lesion or evaluable disease
- Life expectancy of at least 12 weeks
- ECOG Performance Status of 0, 1 or 2
- PT-INR/PTT < 1.5 x upper limit of normal [Patients who are being therapeutically anticoagulated with an agent such as coumadin or heparin will be allowed to participate provided that no prior evidence of underlying abnormality in these parameters exists]. Low-dose aspirin is permitted (</= 100 mg daily).
- Adequate bone marrow, liver and renal function
- Ability to understand and to sign an informed consent form; a signed informed consent must be obtained prior to any study specific procedures
Exclusion Criteria:
- History of cardiac disease congestive heart failure (CHF) > NYHA Class II; active coronary artery disease, myocardial infarction within 6 months prior to study entry; new onset angina within 3 months prior to study entry or unstable angina or cardiac arrhythmias requiring anti-arrhythmic therapy (beta-blockers or Digoxin are permitted).
- Current diagnosis of type I or II diabetes mellitus or fasting blood glucose level >125 mg/dL at screening, or HbA1c 7%
- Active clinically serious infections > Grade 2 (NCI-CTCAE Version 3.0)
- History of having received allogeneic organ transplant
- Uncontrolled seizure disorder. Use of cytochrome P450 enzyme-inducing antiepileptic drugs (phenytoin, carbamazepine or phenobarbital) is not allowed throughout the entire study.
- Uncontrolled hypertension defined as systolic blood pressure > 150 mmHg or diastolic pressure > 90 mmHg, despite optimal medical management
To learn more about this study, you or your doctor may contact the study research staff using the contact information provided by the sponsor.
Please refer to this study by its ClinicalTrials.gov identifier (NCT number): NCT00962611
|United States, Arizona
|Scottsdale, Arizona, United States, 85258
|United States, Pennsylvania
|Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States, 15213
|United States, Texas
|San Antonio, Texas, United States, 78229-3307
|Study Director:
|Bayer Study Director
Publications of Results:
Other Publications:
Publications automatically indexed to this study by ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier (NCT Number):
|Responsible Party:
|ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier:
|Other Study ID Numbers:
|First Posted:
|August 20, 2009 Key Record Dates
|Last Update Posted:
|October 6, 2017
|Last Verified:
|October 2017
Solid tumors
Advanced cancer


text:
jkbaird necesitaba un nuevo diseño de fondo de Twitter y lanzó un concurso de diseño en 99designs.
Un ganador ha sido elegido entre 20 diseños de 8 diseñadores freelance.
BringZing hopes to become a premier gift-buying destination and social community online. Our specialty is romantic gifts, but we also have a focus on birthdays. An important aspect of our brand is giveaways, which we conduct at least weekly through social networks such as Twitter and Facebook (or whatever comes along next). We give away significant prizes, such as trips to Hawaii, dream honeymoons, etc... A few keywords that represent us well are: gifts, giveaways, elegance, romance, giving, connecting, bonding, loyalty, trust, anniversary, commitment, love
Primarily couples. We hope to appeal to women. We want a background that Women are attracted to, but is gender-neutral enough that men will like it as well. We hope to attract men who want to purchase gifts and giveaways for the women in their lives.
We need a simple, elegant background that looks good on a variety of screen resolutions. Look at the examples here for inspiration: http://inspiredology.com/42-twitter-backgrounds/
I would like to see our logo glyph (brand mark) large on the left side - use up to 190 pixels of width for the logo.
Use colors that work in harmony with the logo design.
Work in the text "gifts & giveaways", and "Follow for a chance to win great prizes. Not lame stuff like soap or neckties. Cool stuff like vacations."
Show what your design will look like on Twitter at 1280x1024. Remember that Twitter uses a 750 px center column to display tweets and profile information. Anything in that space will be hidden from view.


text:
- CA UMASC Mss 346, Pc 302, El 28 (A.11-26)
- Fonds
- 1932-1996
The fonds is divided into five series. They include diaries, personal, drawings, sketchbooks and oversize drawings. The fonds consists of letters, personal records, postcards, photocopies of Bruce's published artwork, 9 notebooks, 7 photographs,...
Bruce, Robert, 1911-1980


text:
OTTAWA — The royal couple will "giddy up" to one of the most popular events in the country this week, a new survey shows.
The Calgary Stampede — the annual 10-day event that celebrates everything cowboy with rodeo shows and chuckwagons, was ranked the fourth-most-popular Canadian event in a new study by BMO Financial Group.
The top-ranked Canadian event was the Grey Cup, receiving 13 per cent of the vote. The Canadian National Exhibition came in second at 12 per cent, followed by the Toronto International Film Festival at 11 per cent and the Calgary Stampede at 10 per cent. The survey pool of 1,576 Canadians over the age of 18 participated in the study to gauge how much interest was in the Stampede.
The survey also found that 27 per cent of Albertans surveyed said the Stampede is the most popular event to attend.
"The Stampede really does embody western traditions and family values and is recognized throughout the world as being an iconic Canadian event; this continues to be a source of pride to many Canadians," said Robert Hayes, BMO senior vice-president Prairies Division, in a statement.
The last time a member of the monarchy attended the Stampede was in 1973, when Queen Elizabeth made an appearance.
In March, the federal government pledged $5 million for the 100th anniversary of the Stampede in 2012.
Last year, more than one million visitors from 60 countries attended the event.
The BMO survey, using Leger Marketing's online panel, was completed online from June 27 to 30.
An equivalent telephone survey would have a margin of error of 2.5 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.


text:
Get immediate access to your FREE class when you sign up!
- Daniel P.Dad to Ivan, age 2
I felt like I was failing as a dad. Erin's classes have saved my life! The tools have totally changed the way I approach parenting and therefore my son's behavior and our relationship.
- MelissaMom to 2 girls, 1 1/2 & 3
I randomly found your website in a moment of desperation! I watched my first class and shared with EVERYONE I know! The tips and techniques make so much sense. My sanity and child thank you!
- KelseyMom to 2 yo son
You have saved me. A few days ago my 23 month old son was about to break me. Horrible nights. Constant "NOs". Throwing everything. In a desperate attempt, we found your classes. Everything you say makes so much sense. We are on night 3 of a solid consistent bed time routine and I didn't hear a peep from my son for 9 hours straight- which is HUGE!!
- Daniellemom of 2
You are amazing at what you do and I'm so grateful I found you. Your-informational/ educational videos have really helped me and my family. Thank you for everything you do!
- Margeaux MARGEAUX Mom of 4 yo son and 5 yo daughter
Thank you so much for having such a wonderful way to learn and grow as a parent with out feeling judged.
- AshleyMom to 4 yo Chelsea
I stumbled upon your classes in recent months and feel as though I have found a hidden treasure in the world of parenting.


text:
HHD_FUN with Aaajiao – Xu Wenkai | Embedded Project
This temporary, interactive installation was based on the concept of 'complex systems' which can observe, perceive and research our living world, society and biology. Virtual architecture is embedded into various cities and regions within Google earth projected onto the floor, within the internal space of the installation. Motion sensors track the movement of the audience within the internal space, and the projectors respond according to these inputs. By using this interactive technology, members of the audience can trigger and control the projected scene by changing the displacement of their own body or altering the distance between each other within the projective regions. The audiences are provided with unusual perspectives to view the globe, our city, open fields, as well as the algorithmic architectures embedded into the Google Earth projection.
This system establishes an evident but uncertain logical relationship between the movement of people, visual experience and "urban messages". The audience can observe the process of urban change within the projection.
Design: The faces of the box were designed using a recursion algorithm, based upon a triangular fractal pattern. Each triangle is sub-divided or 'cracked' again and again to create smaller and smaller triangles and a denser pattern. At each stage, two out of the three segments are cracked, so that one large segment remains intact to create variation in scale across the surface. At each cracking, the new triangles are raised, perpendicularly by 12cm to create the three-dimensional, surface pattern on the faces of the installation.
Abandoning traditional architectural design methodology and using this computational algorithm, the artists(architects) seek to challenge the traditional top-down design method. Connecting the logic of the algorithm and its execution process with physical architecture can generate unexpected results. To visualize these results, the generated digital data (the three-dimensional architectural models) are embedded into the Google Earth projections. Hence the installation design is virtually-embedded within its own physical, architectural manifestation.
Architect: HHD_FUN with Aaajiao – Xu Wenkai


text:
For the moment, it appears that Proposition 29 has lost.
Yes, there are votes left to be counted, and we may not have final results for another week or two. But for now, the initiative -- which would add $1 per pack to the cost of cigarettes -- doesn't have the votes.
Until recently, Proposition 29 was cruising to victory. Three months ago, proponents enjoyed a commanding two-to-one bulge in the polls. Even 10 days ago, the "yes" side had a 10-point lead. So what happened?
U.S. & World
Critics will surely point to the evil of money as the root cause for the voters' about-face. After all, what do you expect when one side almost exclusively funded by powerful Big Tobacco outspends the underfunded health/environmentalist coalition by a four-to-one margin?
Surely, money played a role in Proposition 29, but it wasn't the primary factor. All you need to do is look back just two years ago when two equally powerful interests -- PG&E and Liberty Insurance -- badly outspent opponents on self-beneficial ballot propositions, only to see both go down to defeat.
So what made the difference?
In all likelihood: voter turnout.
Prior to the election, the Secretary of State's office predicted a participation rate of 35 percent, down precipitously from the 57 percent who voted in the June 2008 presidential primary, but close to the 33 percent who voted in June 2010.
But when all is said and done, it may be that the turnout will be pegged at 25 percent, according to the views of some election experts.
Voting turnouts foretell a lot about voting outcomes. Historically, the "base" is found in political conservatives who loyally participate on a regular basis. In California, like elsewhere, political conservatives generally believe in small government run by few taxes.
Liberals tend not to vote as much in low-turnout elections. These are the same folks who tend to expect more from government and support taxes to fund its activities.
Which takes us back to Proposition 29.
Even though it was a "user" tax, that is a tax only on those who buy tobacco, Proposition 29 was a tax nonetheless. For political conservatives voting disproportionately in comparison to political liberals, that was enough pure and simple.
In the end, Proposition 29 may somehow squeeze through. But if it fails as the current results indicate, it won't be because of tobacco ads as much as the 75 percent of the electorate who decided to pass on their voting opportunities.
That's how participatory democracy "works" in California.
Larry Gerston teaches political science at San Jose State University and is the political analyst for NBC Bay Area.
Send us your thoughts via Twitter @PropZero or add your comment to our Facebook page.


text:
» Download the Arkansas Children's Hospital Patient Guide
Within the hospital, there are overhead signs and signs on walls to direct you to different areas. Inside each entrance, there is also a large diagram of the hospital.
If you are confused, just approach any hospital employee (you'll know they're an employee because they'll be wearing an identification badge!) and ask for assistance.
View Maps & Directions or Download the Arkansas Children's app.
Children are assigned to rooms based on their diagnosis, needs, and room availability. Every effort is made to make the patient and family comfortable; some rooms are private and some are shared with one or more others. Each room has a phone, television, VCR, patient bed. Rooms in the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit (PICU) also have DVD players. Remember that if your child needs a crib, the side rails need to be up at all times.
Your contact with your child is important to maintain the parental bond, increase a sense of security and well-being, and to ensure that care in the hospital will be continued at home. As a result, ACH attempts to accommodate two parents per child in either the child's room or in the waiting room. There are many different types of patient rooms; in some, there is one sleeper chair while others are large enough for two sleeper chairs. In most intensive care areas provision for two parents per child is provided in the waiting area. The PICU has provision for one parent to sleep next to the child. Unfortunately, space does not permit sleeping arrangements for additional family members; children under 18 years are not permitted to stay overnight at the hospital. Of course, any family member, adult or child may not visit or stay overnight if they are sick.
The Ronald McDonald House (RMH) is across the street from the hospital and can accommodate some parents on a referral basis. There are application forms for the RMH at the desk in each waiting area: families are assigned to a room as they become available. Eligible parents are at least 18 years of age and live more than 50 miles from ACH. Mothers with c-section delivery of children younger than one month in one of the intensive care areas are given first priority; other new mothers of children in the intensive care areas are given second priority. Families of children older than 30 days are then placed by order on the waiting list. If you have questions or need help with the application, contact the Family Support Assistant in the waiting rooms. There are a limited number of out-patient rooms which can be used for one to two nights; contact the Social Work department for a referral.
There is a small, free RV lot at the hospital which has hook-ups, but no waste disposal. You may call ahead to the Security Department, 501-364-4353; space is on a first come, first serve basis. There are also RV lots in the central Arkansas area through Arkansas State Parks and Recreation and other national organizations. There are also some local RV campgrounds and several nearby hotels/motels which give a reduced rate, nightly and weekly, to our parents. (This is an incomplete listing of sites which are not endorsed by ACH)
Some children are placed in various forms of isolation because they have a contagious illness or are immunosuppressed; during that time, visitors may be limited and family members may be asked to use a different bathroom or wear a glove/mask/gown. Please remember that any limitation of this nature is for the well-being and safety of you, your child, other children, and staff.
There are bathrooms located in almost every patient room which the families may use (the exceptions are isolation areas e.g. Bone Marrow Transplant Unit, some areas of the PICU, NICU, and CVICU). There are public restrooms and showers on each floor of the hospital. Of course, courtesy and tidiness are encouraged for each family using the facilities.
Free laundry areas are available in several locations throughout the hospital. The Family Support Assistant in the intensive care waiting rooms can provide small packages of laundry detergent at no cost.
Children who eat regular food may order their choices from menus provided daily; within doctor's orders, they may also receive a meal ticket from the Unit Secretary to go to the cafeteria and choose from many food types. The hospital has an extremely limited meal assistance program; primarily each family is responsible for buying or bringing their own food. For exceptions contact the Family Support Assistant. A variety of foods at varying costs are available in the cafeteria, and there are many nearby restaurants and restaurants which will deliver food to our hospital. Vending machines are also located at several sites within the hospital.
View all onsite Dining Options
ACH has limited cable access selected primarily for the enjoyment of children and families; there is also an in-house channel with health information and live presentations of special "happenings" within the hospital.
Free telephones and televisions are provided in each room. Local calls may be made by dialing 9 + the local number. Long distance calls may be made using a long-distance calling card or by calling collect. For long distance calls dial 9+ 1 + area code + phone number. There are also pay phones located at several places in the hospital. In intensive care waiting rooms, there are areas designated for each family's phone messages. Some children's rooms may be direct dialed; check with your nurse to see if this service is available in your child's room.
Some clinics and departments have toll-free numbers for calling into the hospital; there is no general toll-free number. Check with your clinic or departmental staff. The main hospital number is 501-364-1100.
Looking for something special for you or your child? Visit the Playaway Gift Shop just off the main lobby on the first floor at the front of the hospital. The gift shop has a variety of toys, stickers, stuffed animals, balloons, candy, cards, magazines, postal stamps, clothing, and seasonal gifts for both children and family members. They may even have your child's favorite cartoon character.
There is a post office collection box in the breezeway close to the Emergency Room for out-going mail. Our Child Life Department sorts and delivers patient mail daily to the bedside. Mail for family members will be brought to the child's room or the respective waiting area whichever is appropriate. Computers are available in the Family Library located on the first floor of the Sturgis Building where e-mail may be checked and sent. Local newspapers are available in newspaper racks outside the South Entrance of the hospital and in the Playaway Gift Shop.
Arkansas Children's Hospital is now a tobacco and smoke-free environment. That means smoking and tobacco use will not be allowed on Children's property, including buildings, grounds, and parking area for the health of the kids.
ACH has two ATM machines located outside the cafeteria exit. The closest places to claim a money order are the Harvest Foods grocery store locations on South Main and 12th Streets. Remember that identification is required to claim a money order.
Lost and Found
Contact the ACH Security department at extension 44353.
Safe-keeping for Valuables
We strongly recommend that you do not bring valuables and/or items which can't be replaced to ACH; however, if you have a large amount of cash or other expensive items you may ask your nurse or Social Worker to assist you in having the item(s) placed in the safe of the Security Department. Small lockers are available in the waiting rooms of the intensive care areas; the Family Support Assistant will assign a locker and combination lock to you on a space available basis.
We know that visitors are important for both you and your child's support and encouragement. Visits may also help your child feel better more quickly. Generally, parents are welcome to visit their child for as long as they wish; however, each unit determines their visiting policy. Your child's health will determine the number of visitors and length of visits permitted.
In the interest of your child's safety, parents are given "Parent Badges" at the Admissions desk in the lobby at the front of the hospital; wear this badge at all times to help hospital staff identify you.
Parents not spending the night at the hospital and any other visitors may visit between 8:00 a.m. and 9:00 p.m. daily.
Healthy children of any age may visit with their parents in the waiting rooms and in some patient rooms. They may only visit in intensive care areas with the attending doctor's permission. Children (under 18) do not spend the night in the hospital and need to always be in the care and supervision of an adult. Toys may be available from one of the playrooms or by notifying the Child Life representative if needed; however, when visits by little ones are planned, it is a good idea to bring two or three of their favorite, quiet toys or games to keep their interest.
We make every effort to provide a calm and orderly environment for our patient's health and recovery from illness. If there are unfriendly relationships with various family members or ex-family members, please settle those before coming into the hospital since no verbal or physical abuse will be tolerated on site. It is possible for the parents or legal guardians of a child to restrict certain individuals without legal rights from visitation at ACH. Please be aware that you may be asked to provide a copy of custody and visitation court papers when such requests are made. We ask that adults behave as adults because we are all here for the well-being, safety, and treatment of children. Your Social Worker may assist you with these issues, if necessary.


text:
The Anita Hill-Clarence Thomas showdown in the 1991 Supreme Court confirmation hearings served as an education on sexual harassment for the nation. Looking back, it's amazing to see the news clips in which mostly male anchors and reporters attempt to explain the charges to the TV audience; it's intriguing to hear dialog from those playing Senators and Congressmen who were clueless about women's rights and what might be offensive to female employees.
At a time when President Obama's SCOTUS nomination is being politicized, the drama "Confirmation," Saturday at 9-11 p.m. on HBO, is ripe for controversy.
Ironically, we hear more from Thomas (portrayed by Wendell Pierce) in HBO's "Confirmation" than we've heard from the real Thomas in his 25 years on the Supreme Court. (You'll recall he was narrowly confirmed, by a 52-48 vote.)


text:
Men are obsessed with size. So it came as no surprise when a new report from a task force of distinguished men declared that California's debt is larger than we think.
The State Budget Task Force, which is co-chaired by former Federal Reserve chairman Paul Volcker, issued not an exact number but a big (naturally) range for California's debt.
The task force pegged it at somewhere between $167 billion and $335 billion.
U.S. & World
For those who need context for those numbers, the Los Angeles Dodgers sold for $2 billion earlier this year, so the upper range would be like buying the Dodgers every single day of a 162-game baseball season.
What is California's debt? The task force report is good at laying out well-known state obligations (such as pensions and health care for retirees) and lesser known obligations (including the billions needed to improve drinking water).
These are big, scary numbers, and that's the point. The task force was formed in part because its founders worried about the depth of fiscal problems in many states, including California.
But, in one sense, the debt number doesn't matter. Other estimates of state debt have been all over the map. (A Stanford study has estimated pension debt at half a trillion dollars.)
There are two significant problems with the debt -- and neither is about the overall number.
The first debt problem is the uncertainty of the debt. No one really knows what the obligations will be.
That's because California government is complicated and multi-layered with many debts scattered among many governments. And it's also because pension debt estimates depend heavily on how the investment markets do; the worse the market performs, the worse pension funds do, and the higher the obligations of taxpayers to make up the difference.
The second debt problem has to do with governance. California's budget and governance systems are so broken that it doesn't much matter what we know about the debt problem -- because we don't have democratic means to do much about it.
Dealing with debt requires giving real authority to those who govern us to make difficult choices. But the California system is all about limiting the authority of those who would govern us. That means no one in California has the juice to get much done on this subject.
So let's hope this new report is the last one that focuses on the size of the debt. Instead, we need more task forces and more work to redesign the governing system -- so that our leaders can tackle the debt, and other problems.


text:
You may not believe a trip to the chiropractor helps anything, but we all generally think of it as a relatively harmless treatment. Well, that may not be quite so true — a new study from the University of Exeter found that many of the randomized trials conducted on chiropractic treatments failed to report any adverse effects. Not only is this wildly unethical, but it paints a falsely rosy picture of how safe the treatments are. Edzard Ernst, the professor of complementary medicine who led this review of the trials, says that despite the fact that many of the trials showed there weren't any dangers associated with treatment, hunderds of case studies say otherwise. He said, "About 50% of patients seeing a chiropractor have adverse effects, which is staggering." Usually it's just something like mild pain, but in rare cases severe complications can occur. For instance, one thing that can happen when the neck is manipulated is that "an artery can disintegrate and lead to a stroke." Ah, not exactly what you want to hear when someone has your spine in their hands.
Dangers of chiropractic treatments under-reported, study finds [Guardian]
wavebreakmedia ltd


text:
It's not a single payer health care system (yet), but the United States enters the 20th century finding some way to cover citizens with affordable health care. This formerly fat doctor says, "Yeah, baby!"
Going Off The Grid
Our weekend in Vegas was tremendous fun, as you can see in this dignified photo of my sisters and me.
Now I'm off to the infrequently visited North Rim of the Grand Canyon with Sue and the pups in our trusty camping van. I
expect hope that we will be unable to connect via our numerous i-devices and enjoy amazing scenery and cooler weather.
Staying on my primal-ish eating with ease right now.
One Word Weekend
What I Love About Tucson
"Like" might be a better word to describe my view of Tucson (The Old Pueblo) because it has taken every second of our 6+ years here to appreciate this part of Southern Arizona. In keeping with my current sunny outlook (me, sunny – snort), I am focusing on the positive aspects of living in a
red-neck, gun-toting more conservative state. Actually Tucson is known for being fairly progressive as befitting a university town. That is one of the positives – The U of A.
Some folks would tout the men's basketball team (NCAA champs 1997). I like the women's softball history with 8 NCAA championships and 21 appearance in the Women's College World Series. More important than sports are the cultural events, museums, and jobs that the UA brings to the decent sized community (~1,000,000 in the county).
The environment was what brought us here from the glorious Gulf Coast of Texas (not being sarcastic). The combination of mountains and warmth and amazing biodiversity within short distances is hard to top. We live at 2700′. Behind us are the Catalina mountains at over 9,000′.
Traveling from our green Sonoran desert to the top of Mount Lemmon in 1.5 hours is equivalent to traveling to a Canadian climate zone. We do have the most southern ski area in the U.S., assuming there is snowfall. What about that heat? It is hotter than hell. Despite our average June temp of 101º, step into the shade, add some mist and breeze – ahhh. It really is not that big of deal unless one plans to do heavy outdoor activity May-September. Intense hydration and acclimation are a must. Two healthy adults died in May while hiking this year already. The trade-offs for the heat are the views; the desert critters that surround us (bobcat, coyote, quails, birds, bats, snakes! mountain lions!); amazing greenery year round; eating out doors at Thanksgiving; wearing sandals all year; moaning because 60º feels cold; running in the rain storms; watching lightning dash through the clouds. Our budget has to include bird food and extra water for the irrigation system that keeps our native trees going when nature falls behind.
Along with environmental factors I must include the low pollution (excepting dust storms) because of the emphasis on tech, tourism, and the university. There is little light pollution. The number of observatories on surrounding mountains has resulted in regulation of night lighting. I had forgotten that one could see the Milky Way! Hiking – wanna hike, just go find a canyon or mountain. Trails galore exist for all levels of hikers. Biking – Tucson is one of the top cities for bikers.
El Tour de Tucson is one of the best organized perimeter races in the U.S. – just ask our tourist promoters. Come next November and ride with 9,000 others along a variety of routes. Oh my, how could I forget golfing! There are so many resorts, but the best deals are found at the public courses that are as nice as many resorts in other states.
The population is diverse though the city is very segregated. Over 35% of Tucsonans are Mexican-American, which accounts for our great food! I had to become accustomed to Sonoran style Mexican food after a life of Tex-Mex.
(We just found a wonderful place where I can eat my "primal-ish" method and top off fajita meat with an outstanding salsa bar assortment.) I thought there would be many Native Americans here – nope. Only 3% of the Tucson population is Native American. The Tohono O'odham Nation and Pascua Yaqui Tribe have the closest reservations, and they do have casinos in town.
Lots of festivals to attend from the largest Gem and Mineral show, semi-annual street fairs that close down half the city (exaggeration), Tucson Meet (Eat) Yourself, Festival of Books, Mariachi Conference – oh, go see the tourist site.
Lastly, we are close to many wonderful places, for instance, the Grand Canyon, Sedona, the White Mountains, Flagstaff. And, yes, there are rivers and lakes in the desert state. Just don't ask me to discuss regional politics.
Finally, it's a pretty quiet town. I hadn't realized what a big city gal I was until we moved here. A few bars are hopping all night, and I'm certain life nearer the university is more active, but there are not 5,000 restaurants or grocery stores open 24 hours. For this reformed fatty, that's a really good thing.
Where The Hell Have I Been?
Subtitle: I f'ed up.
Over the last 6 months, I have made 8 posts. 8 ÷ 6, carry the…
While I don't need to explain this pitiful output and have ruminated about disclosure for the paucity of posts, I decided finally to out myself. Not that kind of outing. Anyone who reads more than one post knows I am out.
Also, everyone knows that I am a yo-yo'er. I have, however, maintained or lost weight consistently over the past 2+ years. Not this winter. My bingeing returned with a vengeance as my SAD ( Seasonal Affective Disorder) burst into major depression. So here comes the "outing" part. I have recurrent episodes of depression that are more significant than regular readers might have thought. The occasional mention of "my therapist" refers to the amazing woman who has been treating me for over 12 years with a myriad of meds and analysis. (Hey, she is the only one allowed to say that I have a form of bipolar illness. I don't even get to say it.) No, I do not get manic – too bad because I could use a creative flair now and then. I have had episodes of hypomania that usually manifest as irritability (OK, more than usual), insomnia, and anxiety. One could call it Bipolar II – but we aren't using the "B" word 🙂 I could provide history of my disorder and the amazing family history that snakes up both sides of the family tree. (It's in the blood as the Amish say.) But that is boring and not the intent here.
Life had been smooth sailing until the end of December when I hit one of my lowest episodes in recent memory. No matter the cause – I like to blame it on my trials as a breast
cancer surgery survivor – I tried to sooth myself with food. Even though it didn't work, I kept trying and not writing and not weighing and gained almost 20 pounds.
Why should you care? Folks with depression and other forms of "more common and less severe" mental illness receive less support, acceptance, and tolerance from family and friends. My own wonderful partner called my lazy during this episode. I was suicidal. People do not get treatment because of societal judgment of these common mental conditions that can lead to major bad outcomes.
Moral of the story: If you are depressed, get help. It is a major illness. Treatment is effective. Most of us are highly functioning members of society, even. If you know someone who is depressed, please be understanding, ask what you can do to support them. For god's sake, don't call them lazy.
With some tweaking of meds, support of my partner (who finally saw my distress), and other changes, I managed to stop bingeing and get back to monitoring. In one month, I lost 13 pounds eating on plan. Now it's time to write again. Honestly, part of the reason for this post is to remind me that the next time I feel like bingeing, I need to check in with my brain AND my body.
Memorial Day – Observe or Mourn?
Monday we observe, honor, celebrate (?), our military dead. I wrote last fall a little about my struggle with aspects of armed service given my leanings to non-violence. I am moved to tears each time I see the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, the somber USS Arizona where 1,102 men are entombed, and the vastness of Arlington National Cemetery. Clearly we need a strong defense. I would take up arms to protect my family and community from invasion.
So many wars and "conflicts", however, are not about defending anything. Over 700,000 troops died during the civil war. Slavery was just one factor – economics and states' rights (sound familiar ?) also were important causes. WWII was seen as a "good war" because we were attacked, and the U.S. was instrumental in liberating Europe from Hitler. Over 400,000 American troops died. Yet the number of dead soldiers does not begin to count the costs of war. Perhaps they are just they easiest to identify and quantify. This quote from former President Eisenhower, who was the Supreme Allied Commander of Allied Forces in Europe in WWII, has resonated with me for years: "I hate war as only a soldier who has lived it can, only as one who has seen its brutality, its futility, its stupidity."
Peace to those who have lost loved ones fighting in armed conflict for our government. Strength to all who struggle for peace among nations.
Monday is not meant to be about barbeque, shopping, or outdoor fun. Take a little time to observe Memorial day in your own manner.
When I Was A Kid…
There are many posts half written; some discussing my absence from blogging – kinda; one describing our adventures in the new camping van trekking to Texas and San Diego; another on friendship; and one begging forgiveness from being absent on so many of your blogs as a commenter. Since it seems very hard to complete anything original now, I have
stolen borrowed an idea from Karen@Waisting Time who got the inspiration from Roni's Weigh.
When I was a kid:
1. My parents told me…"you can be anything you want."
2. I wanted to grow up to be a… an astronaut. Since women weren't accepted back in the dark ages, I settled for being a physician.
3. I refused to eat… brussel sprouts, which I now really enjoy.
4. My favorite thing to do outside was… play ball, any kind of ball. Softball, baseball, catch, football until the boys outgrew me.
5. I broke my… nose flying across my grandparents king size bed.
6. I liked to wear… OK, I was a tomboy and we mainly lived in warm climates, so shorts and tennies and whatever comfortable shirt I could get away with.
7. My parents always… made us go to church on Sundays. Remember, Dad was a minister so it was twice on Sundays, Wednesday night, and Thursday night choir practice. Usually some other events were thrown in to keep the family scrambling.
8. I thought that Santa was… my Grandfather. I watched my Grandpa get dressed one year and thought I had discovered who Santa really was.
9. My favorite cartoon was… Mighty Mouse. I have a Native American version (Black Lodge Singers) of the infamous song. Pretty cool. "Is it a bird? NO!"
10. I was the… the perfect child who rarely caused her parents any grief. It was really difficult thinking you are perfect in the eyes of your parents but knowing that you are just a normal kid. Tough to live with.
11. I got in trouble when… the few times I did get in trouble I was very young and don't like to talk about the consequences. What, you think I'm going to reveal everything on this blog?
12. My bedroom was… never shared even though I had 3 siblings. They were much younger (by 8, 11, and 14 years).
13. My favorite food was… my mom's Sunday pot roast, just because it made the house smell so comforting as well as tasting great.
14. My parents always made me… say ma'am and sir to all adults. It still slips out and people think I am being sarcastic. At my age, I probably am!
15. My first crush was… she knows who she is but I won't embarrass her by using a name. We were both horrified at age 17.
16. My favorite toy was… a ball, any ball that I could play catch with someone.
17. I thought school was… at times boring, often challenging, frequently anxiety provoking as I kept striving to be my parents' perfect child.
18. My biggest fear was… disappointing my parents. Needless to say, coming out to them was a lengthy process because of my fears, not their reaction.
19. My favorite story was… I found my Mother's old Nancy Drew books one summer at her mother's house. I spent hours reading them. I think that was what hooked me on mystery and detective novels.
20. My favorite memories… summers at the beach with my family, Grandparents, and my cousins.


text:
What's On
Please meet outside the museum for Fossil and Mary Anning Walks.
Fossil Walks provided by Paddy Howe of the Fossil Workshop.
Mary Anning Walks provided by Natalie Manifold.
Lyme Regis History Walks provided by Chris Lovejoy.
- This event has passed.
Fossil Walk Monday 13th January 10.30am
13 January @ 10:30 am - 1:30 pm
Explore the beach with our expert Fossil Hunters Paddy Howe and Chris Andrew and collect your own fossils to take home. Walk in the footsteps of Mary Anning, hear about the amazing fossils discovered in Lyme Regis and the fascinating geology of the Jurassic Coast.
Walks start from outside the front of Lyme Regis Museum and last approx. 3 hours. Booking is recommended, especially during school holidays.
Tickets are not available as this event has passed.


text:
My name is Alias Cummins, and I'm a freelance creative professional based in north London, England.
For work and hiring information, check out my linkedin profile here.
I'm originally from Dublin, Ireland, and enjoy making art, writing comedy, boxing, rollerblading, and making software.
These days I mostly work with Cinder and various random technologies such as the Kinect, Leap Motion and the Intel Perceptual Computing SDK. However I can pick up new tech pretty fast, and have been learning a lot of new stuff lately, notably in video processing, 3d sensing, graphics (the various kinds of OpenGL, mainly) and gesture recognition.
You can follow me on twitter here: @no_other_alias
This is a picture of me and my cat, Freyja:
And yes, Alias really is my real name, really. Yes, it really is.


text:
I have always been interested in table ideas that I can pull out for a dinner party, but have tucked away when it is just me. I usually will eat my meals watching a TV show (the only time I watch TV) if I'm alone, go out with friends, or go to my families house for dinner. I like having people over for meals, but in the end it may happen one-two times a month. Though that is the life of a bachelor I guess.
so this table breaks down to a smaller size. While its a coffee table I like the concept and it could be done on a larger scale.


text:
Brighton Rocks: UA Europe 2011
by ultan o'broin
on Oracle Blogs
See other posts from Oracle Blogs
or by ultan o'broin
Published on Wed, 22 Jun 2011 11:00:00 -0700 Indexed on 2011/06/23 0:28 UTC
Read the original article Hit count: 355
/user assistance
User Assistance Europe 2011 was held in Brighton, UK. Having seen Quadrophenia a dozen times, I just had to go along (OK, I wanted to talk about messages in enterprise applications). Sadly, it rained a lot, though that was still eminently more tolerable than being stuck home in Dublin during Bloomsday. So, here are my somewhat selective highlights and observations from the conference, massively skewed towards my own interests, as usual.
Enjoyed Leah Guren's (Cow TC) great start 'keynote' on the Cultural Dimensions of Software Help Usage. Starting out by revisiting Hofstede's and Hall's work on culture (how many times I have done this for Multilingual magazine?) and then Neilsen's findings on age as an indicator of performance, Leah showed how it is the expertise of the user that user assistance (UA) needs to be designed for (especially for high-end users), with some considerations made for age, while the gender and culture of users are not major factors. Help also needs to be contextual and concise, embedded close to the action. That users are saying things like "If I want help on Office, I go to Google " isn't all that profound at this stage, but it is always worth reiterating how search can be optimized to return better results for users. Interestingly, regardless of user education level, the issue of information quality--hinging on the lynchpin of terminology reflecting that of the user--is critical. Major takeaway for me there.
Matthew Ellison's sessions on embedded help and demos were also impressive. Embedded help that is concise and contextual is definitely a powerful UX enabler, and I'm pleased to say that in Oracle Fusion Applications we have embraced the concept fully.
Matthew also mentioned in his session about successful software demos that the principle of modality with demos is a must. Look no further than Oracle User Productivity Kit demos See It!, Try It!, Know It, and Do It! modes, for example.
I also found some key takeaways in the presentation by Marie-Louise Flacke on notes and warnings. Here, legal considerations seemed to take precedence over providing any real information to users. I was delighted when Marie-Louise called out the Oracle JDeveloper documentation as an exemplar of how to use notes and instructions instead of trying to scare the bejaysus out of people and not providing them with any real information they'd find useful instead.
My own session on designing messages for enterprise applications was well attended. Knowing your user profiles (remember user expertise is the king maker for UA so write for each audience involved), how users really work, the required application business and UI rules, what your application technology supports, and how messages integrate with the enterprise help desk and support policies and you will go much further than relying solely on the guideline of "writing messages in plain language".
And, remember the value in warnings and confirmation messages too, and how you can use them smartly.
I hope y'all got something from my presentation and from my answers to questions afterwards.
Ellis Pratt stole the show with his presentation on applying game theory to software UA, using plenty of colorful, relevant examples (check out the Atlassian and DropBox approaches, for example), and striking just the right balance between theory and practice. Completely agree that the approach to take here is not to make UA itself a game, but to invoke UA as part of a bigger game dynamic (time-to-task completion, personal and communal goals, personal achievement and status, and so on). Sure there are gotchas and limitations to gamification, and we need to do more research. However, we'll hear a lot more about this subject in coming years, particularly in the enterprise space. I hope.
I also heard good things about the different sessions about DITA usage (including one by Sonja Fuga that clearly opens the door for major innovation in the community content space using WordPress), the progressive disclosure of information (Cerys Willoughby), an overview of controlled language (or "information quality", as I like to position it) solutions and rationale by Dave Gash, and others.
I also spent time chatting with Mike Hamilton of MadCap Software, who showed me a cool demo of their Flare product, and the Lingo translation solution. I liked the idea of their licensing model for workers-on-the-go; that's smart UX-awareness in itself. Also chatted with Julian Murfitt of Mekon about uptake of DITA in the enterprise space.
In all, it's worth attending UA Europe. I was surprised, however, not to see conference topics about mobile UA, community conversation and content, and search in its own right. These are unstoppable forces now, and the latter is pretty central to providing assistance now to all but the most irredentist of hard-copy fetishists or advanced technical or functional users working away on the back end of applications and systems. Only saw one iPad too (says the guy who carries three laptops). Tweeting during the conference was pretty much nonexistent during the event, so no community energy there. Perhaps all this can be addressed next year. I would love to see the next UA Europe event come to Dublin (despite Bloomsday, it's not a bad place place, really) now that hotels are so cheap and all.
So, what is my overall impression of the state of user assistance in Europe? Clearly, there are still many people in the industry who feel there is something broken with the traditional forms of user assistance (particularly printed doc) and something needs to be done about it. I would suggest they move on and try and embrace change, instead.
Many others see new possibilities, offered by UX and technology, as well as the reality of online user behavior in an increasingly connected world and that is encouraging. Such thought leaders need to be listened to. As Ellis Pratt says in his great book, Trends in Technical Communication - Rethinking Help: "To stay relevant means taking a new perspective on the role (of technical writer), and delivering "products" over and above the traditional manual and online Help file... there are a number of new trends in this field - some complementary, some conflicting. Whatever trends emerge as the norm, it's likely the status quo will change." It already has, IMO.
I hear similar debates in the professional translation world about the onset of translation crowd sourcing (the Facebook model) and machine translation (trust me, that battle is over). Neither of these initiatives has put anyone out of a job and probably won't, though the nature of the work might change. If anything, such innovations have increased the overall need for professional translators as user expectations rise, new audiences emerge, and organizations need to collate and curate user-generated content, combining it with their own. Perhaps user assistance professionals can learn from other professions and grow accordingly.
© Oracle Blogs or respective owner


text:
Bet you didn't know that Rohnert Park has roots (yes, pun intended) as a seed cultivating farm.
We like to play! We have 19 public playgrounds featuring a variety of amenities sure to delight and entertain your entire family.
Our Public Safety Officers have multitasking down. They are highly trained to serve you in both police work and firefighting.
We love animals! There are over 4,100 dogs and 1,200 cats currently licensed in Rohnert Park.
On July 1, 2019 building, planning and engineering fees will be increased. Check out the new pay schedule.
The Parks and Recreation Commission is a group of five community volunteers appointed by the City Council to advise them on matters relating to city parks, cultural arts and recreation facilities and services. Following the course of annual Commission goals, Commissioners work in committees to discuss regular topics such as the Aquatics Program, Dog Park, Sports and Fitness Center, Youth Sports, Parks and Facilities, or any other special issues, and bring recommendations to the entire Commission for consideration.
The annual capital improvement program for parks and recreation projects is reviewed and prioritized by the Commission. The Recreation Services Manager is the city staff liaison to the Commission, with staff support and information provided for the Community Services and the Public Works Department, which is responsible for maintenance of city facilities. Lastly, the Parks and Recreation Commission conducts meetings open to the public to resolve issues and formulate recommendations for the City Council's consideration. Accomplishments include the design of the new Roberts Lake Dog Park, the establishment of an Adopt-A-Park Program, revision of the Parks and Recreation Facilities Master Plan and review of the design of playground renovation projects at four local parks.
Meetings: *First Monday of each month at 5:30 p.m. in the City Hall Council Chamber. (Regular meetings are televised live on Channel 26.)
Staff Liaison: Renee Eger, Administrative Assistant, (707) 588-3303
Current Vacancies
Current vacancies are listed on the Notices and Public Hearings page. To apply, submit a completed Fact Sheet Application form to the City Clerk's Office at City Hall, 130 Avram Avenue, Rohnert Park, or fax to (707) 794-9248.
For more information, please call the City Clerk's Office at (707) 588-2227.
Please visit our Meeting Central page to view agendas and videos for the Parks and Recreation Commission.
City of Rohnert Park | All Rights Reserved | Powered by CivicLive | © 2020 Intrado Corporation. | Sitemap


text:
Your car is collecting a lot of information, much of it about you. What's being done with that information isn't exactly clear. That's more unsettling, even if it's great if your car is finally able to recognize your voice when programming the navigation system.
In today's TMS, the question posed was whether you care about automakers collecting data about you and your car, or even if you care where it goes? I think we should care where it goes, but I'm not rushing out to stop them from collecting it. Some of you felt differently.
timateo81, I hope you're not wrapping up your neighbors' cars:
And don't be like The Dummy Gummy:
Thank you for the next idea of bad things to do to my friends car. Last time I filled his car with packing peanuts while he was away on his honeymoon.
I was an extra dick and locked the back doors (where there were less peanuts) so he had to open one of the front doors, only to be greeted by a sea of ever flowing packing peanuts.
The packing peanuts would probably draw more attention to your car, not less.
Photo: Getty Images


text:
Orange Transparent - Clone material
Original OT is very hard to come by. So some enterprising souls with more brains than brawn set out to make their own. It was theoretically possible to manufacture OT since the original supply was man made. They devised a plan to scour ancient legendary battlefields for microscopic bits of OT that may have been knocked loose in the OTC vs OTC battles. After thousands of years of searching, they found it, a single atom of OT.
Now with an original OT sample they could begin the scientific process of cloning it into a larger usable supply. It took over 100 million years to discover the best mixture of chemicals, power levels and environments that would grow more OT. They eventually got the process down to 1 million years to make enough clone OT to make 1 chainsaw. The trick was that each mass of clone OT needed 1 atom of original OT at its core. The self repair properties of OT took care of the rest. The atom of OT would scavenge the adjacent materials to clone itself, this is a slow process. The resulting clone OT is inferior to the original, but anyone who actually knows the difference first hand isn't talking.
Ancient Battlefields are now a source of conflict among those factions who wish to clone OT. Each atom of OT an explorer finds and sells at auction or to a private buyer could buy him a planet. Although a minifig could spend his entire life searching and still find nothing.
Of course there are still mad scientists on isolated moonbases that are running experiments to recreate the conditions that produced the original OT. None have been successful. We suppose that's what makes them so mad.


text:
Ophirah necesitaba un nuevo diseño de logotipo y lanzó un concurso de diseño en 99designs.
Un ganador ha sido elegido entre 135 diseños de 19 diseñadores freelance.
I am an entrepreneur and always thinking about how sales and marketing processes can be more efficient and effective with the use of software.
Now I have developed a piece of software that enables Wholesale and B2B online shops to create and manage Quotations (besides the standard "add to Cart" functionality)
So what I need is a logo for this software product with the name: Cart2Quote
The software is an extension of the populair eCommerce software: Magento
Function of the software
This software extension enables visitors of Magento based shops to create a Request for Quote and enables shopowners to easily propose a price for the requested products and send the Proposal back to the customer. (a complete roundtrip)
Mainly B2B (Business to Business), Wholesale and enterprise eCommerce shopowners will use this software extension.
But I expect a great deal of website developers to visit my site, from all over the world. They will probably be the ones that recommend this product to the shopowners.
Logo look and feel
Check the website layout:
(Choose Lightgreen as color, see attachment)
Keep it simple and clean. Viewers of the logo should understand through the visual that our software can Switch the Normal "Add to Cart" function to a "Add to Quote" function and back again. = "Cart to Quote"
Title "Cart2Quote" easily readable at different sizes of the logo.
Balance between icon and text in logo: icon needs to be clear / crisp, but the name is what needs to stick. So relatively high visual importance of text.
Keep the target group in mind!
The product title: Cart2Quote
Tagline: The complete Magento Quotation manager
(the logo needs to stand alone form the tagline, giving us the option to show logo with or without logo)
Extra points for creating icons in the same style for:
(characteristics of this software product)
vector ESP
Finally: Create impact, be bold, be unique....may the best logo win!
Descubre cómo funciona un concurso de diseño u obtén más información sobre nuestros servicios de diseño de logo.


text:
What are cookies?
Heidelberger Druckmaschinen AG uses cookies to follow the preferences of our visitors and optimize our websites accordingly. A cookie is a small text file, which is placed with your permission on your computer's hard drive. You can activate or deactivate the use of cookies at any time. However, we have made every possible effort to ensure that our website will work just the same, even when you do not use cookies. Not all cookies are the same. There are two kinds of cookies: temporary and log cookies. Temporary cookies are used to maintain the user's session and to tell the server which page to call up next. Log cookies tell us which pages are being used. Cookies help us to improve our website to better meet your needs. However, a cookie holds only technical data; it does not tell us your e-mail address or who you are. Any personal data will only be passed on with your explicit consent.


text:
Since earlier this summer I have been working on a book chapter for the Architecture of Open Source Applications text book. It is a pretty cool project because there are a lot of great contributors, and all of the profit made from text book sales goes to Amnesty International.
My chapter assignment was Distributed Systems, which was pretty broad, so I focused my writing on the architecture of large scale internet applications. Like most writing though, it is always best to cut down things, and so part of my chapter that was cut was all about handling failures particularly my sections on monitoring and fault tolerance. Since I think that these are pretty important, I posted the cut parts here and plan to link to them from my chapter. So here is a preview of my chapter (well the part that didn't make it in) below 🙂
Handling Failures
When it comes to failures, most fall into one of two buckets: hardware or software related.
- Hardware failures used to be more common, but with all of the recent innovations in hardware design and manufacturing they tend to be fewer and far between with most of these physical failures tending to be network or drive related.
- Software failures, on the other hand, come in many more varieties. And software bugs in distributed systems can be difficult to replicate and, consequently, fix.
In small, self-contained systems it is much easier to simulate the conditions required to replicate and debug issues, with most of these issues classified as being a Bohrbug, that is a bug "that manifests itself consistently under a well-defined (but possibly unknown) set of conditions" [3]. However, in more complex systems or production environments having many servers, it can be extremely difficult to find and diagnose more unusual bugs; like the Heisenbug "that disappears or alters its characteristics when an attempt is made to study it" [3].
With more hardware the probability goes up that there will be a failure somewhere. Add more software and the complex interactions between different programs creates greater chance for more bugs, including the unusual ones. As a result, any distributed design will carefully consider failure and diagnostic scenarios.
When designing distributed systems it is said that the following (perhaps normal) assumptions should be considered false (and these are so well known that they commonly referred to as the Fallacies of Distributed Computing):
- The network is reliable.
- Latency is zero.
- Bandwidth is infinite.
- The network is secure.
- Topology doesn't change.
- There is one administrator.
- Transport cost is zero.
- The network is homogeneous. [4]
By challenging each of these assumptions and looking at the system design within that context it can help identify potential risk areas. Systems that exhibit the key principles, like reliability and availability, have designs that take each of these fallacies into consideration. Handling failures in these areas can be done in an automated way, or other times the design may simply involve a plan or reaction for when they occur. And, there many different techniques that come in handy guarding against failure, redundancy was covered above, but two other important techniques are fault tolerance and monitoring.
Fault Tolerance:
Another important part of service based architectures is to set up each service to be fault tolerant, such that in the event one of its dependencies are unavailable or return an error, it is able to handle those cases and degrade gracefully. There are many methods for achieving fault tolerance in a distributed system, for example: redundancy (as described above), standbys, feature flags, and asynchrony.
Standbys – a standby is exactly that, a redundant set of functionality or data waiting on standby that may be swapped to replace another failing instance. Replication can be utilized to maintain real time copies of the master database so that data may be replaced without loss or disruption.
Feature flags – a feature flag is used to enable or disable functionality in a production system. In the event of a failure for a particular system, features that depend on that system can be turned off and made unavailable until that system comes back online.
Asynchrony – this is probably one of the more important design considerations in any distributed application. It essentially means that each service, or functional piece of the system, communicates with each of its external dependencies asynchronously, so that slow or unavailable services do not directly impact the primary functioning of the application. This also typically implies that operations aren't tightly coupled, requiring the success of one operation for another to succeed, like a transaction, and don't require services to be available to handle requests. For example, writing an image could return success to the client, even if all the copies of the file haven't been created and written to the file store. Some of the pieces of the "file write" are asynchronous – there will be a file upload, converting the file to the desired format/size, writing the converted file to disk, and then replicating it to its redundant copy. While all of those are required for the file write to be considered a success, each of those eventually have to occur, meaning that the client can receive "success" once the file is uploaded and the rest of the operations can happen asynchronously afterward. This means that if one of the down stream services was unavailable or congested, the other parts of the write could continue operating as expected (in this case, accepting files from clients).
Extensive monitoring and logging is essential to any complex distributed system. Having many services each with a different purpose, yet still interacting with one another, can lead to highly unusual bugs when they occur. It can be hard to tell where the problem lies and where the issue needs to be resolved. One of the best ways to mitigate this confusion and help diagnose problems quickly is to be sure that all system interfaces and APIs are monitored.
However, monitoring in large-scale web systems can be challenging.
Separation and services adds complexity.
As noted earlier, a key part of scaling systems is to break up the pieces of the system into services, but because each of these services is independent of one another it can make problems harder to diagnose. There are many different points of control and they don't necessarily operate in sync with one another, making traditional sequential monitoring, or tracing the pattern of execution (like a debugger would with breakpoints in a program) much more complicated.
Furthermore, with most of these systems the communication between them can be delayed and complicated through mechanisms like retries (which is what happens when one service makes a request, like fetching an image, and the other responds with an error, such as being too busy to serve the request, and the requesting service retries the request at a later time), which only compounds the problem of tracing sequential events.
Monitoring can have an impact.
Another challenge with these large-scale systems is adding the monitoring to the system. Too much monitoring or logging can cause delays, take up space, and potentially interfere with normal operations. This is one of the reasons why many software systems have a debug (or noisy) mode and a production mode with less logging and information. Monitoring may or may not live on the same physical hardware, and in the event that it doesn't, there is additional communication required for the monitoring systems to track and record metrics. This extra step is another layer of interaction, which can add more complexity in understanding these systems.
Despite all the obstacles with monitoring though, extensive metrics are a key part to understanding and diagnosing problems. Here are some best practices in distributed system monitoring:
Monitor end-to-end functionality. End-to-end monitoring typically consists of an operation, or path from start to finish within the system. So for the image hosting example, this would be uploading an image, and ensuring that the image is written as expected and can be retrieved from its storage location by the client. It is the complete use case for the web system. Of times there are more than one of these cases and each one should be monitored independently.
Monitor each service independently of one another. Since each service has its own focus of control, making sure that each one is monitored is a key part to recognizing or diagnosing problems within that service. The monitoring for each service may not be the same, but often there is some overlap in monitored metrics (like standard system metrics, i.e. CPU usage, memory usage, disk and network i/o etc.). In the image hosting example, some of the service specific monitoring would be: the speed of reads, how many concurrent reads were happening for the Image Retrieval Service, whereas the Image Write Service would watch the write queue, number of connections.
Monitor "to the glass" metrics – look at things from the end users perspective. An important part of any large web system is to really understand what the end user's experience is with the web site. It is not enough to understand the internal workings, but it is important to also monitor and track the overall experience from the client. Typically this is done using an external service that will in its simplest form ping the site to ensure that it is up, and in more complex cases actually execute end-to-end use cases. This sort of metric can help diagnose problems that occur somewhere between the client and the website, and can be one of the fastest ways to uncover network problems. For global user bases, this sort of monitoring may be geographically distributed such that it will take into account the different networks.
Monitor at a frequency to detect issues before they impact customers (this also means having enough time to address the issue, so also understanding the rate of change and next steps to address it). Another key part of any sort of monitoring is ensuring that the data is sampled frequently enough to detect problems, and raise alerts before it becomes an issue. For example, if there are too many requests to upload images simultaneously but throughput is only logged every few minutes, it may not be frequent enough to detect these peak usage periods that are causing problems.
Establish a baseline on historical performance. In order to really make the most of the metrics, one must understand what is "normal" for the system. Without a baseline or clear history it is really difficult to determine if something is wrong and should be investigated. For example, problems caused from too much load or traffic on the system would be very hard to diagnose if there was not an easy way to understand what type of load or throughput was typical. Therefore it is not just enough to track metrics, but to also look at trends over time.
Monitor the monitoring systems. In addition to having monitoring systems keeping track of events within the system, it is also key to make sure that the monitoring is up and reporting as expected (otherwise there is no way to know that there is even a problem!). Most of the time it is sufficient to have something as simple as an external ping to ensure the monitoring software is responsive (and most have web front ends that make this easy.
While extensive monitoring is not necessarily required, thinking about these things ahead of time will certainly help ensure more resiliency and faster recovery in the event of failure. Monitoring is a central theme for any large scale website, and the bigger more complicated the architecture, the more important it is to have monitoring on all the pieces. When it comes to designing the system, choosing which type of monitoring and how it works is a very important decision, since having lots of discoverable information is key to solving and diagnosing problems quickly. Most types of metrics being monitored fit into three categories: network, system and application. In general, application specific metrics are the most important, but can also be the hardest to measure since they are specific to the business or application and will almost always require some customization.
In most of these websites, there will be a separate system (that could be one or more hosts) that is tasked with collecting and aggregating data across multiple machines. This can be done by installing agents or instrumenting each of the machines "being monitored" and one interesting facet of these distributed systems (particularly ones in the cloud) where machines are often in flux (going up and down or becoming unavailable) is to setup a bootstrapping process that includes adding the monitoring to those new hosts; and of course doing this in an automated way.
Another challenge is choosing what data to collect and at what frequency and sampling rate makes sense for the architecture, because it is very easy to collect too much data and miss the forest through the trees (or in some cases, simply overwhelm the server). Some big websites, such as Wikipedia and Twitter [7], use software like Ganglia that will automatically aggregate data storing it in decreasing resolution as it ages; so for recent events there will be more data at a higher granularity than events in the past.
There are many great open source options for monitoring, logging and tracking events in web systems, Nagios, Zabbix, Flume, and Munin are all popular choices; and it is not uncommon to use more than one for the same system.
Having covered some of the core considerations in designing distributed systems, let's now talk about the hard part – scaling access to the data. {the rest is available in the chapter!}
[3] Unusual software bug, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unusual_software_bug
[4] Fallacies of Distributed Computing Explained, http://www.rgoarchitects.com/Files/fallacies.pdf
[7] Ganglia documentation and users, http://ganglia.sourceforge.net/