Meetings in agile project

Question: we are into Agile project development. Our onsite PM wants us to attend every possible meeting happening for everybody in the whole team.
This consumes daily 5 hours on average.
I dont want to make onsite PM feel bad about my suggestion that I want to cut down on meetings, atleast for developers.
Is there anyway I can put my point across about reducing the meeting timings/better management to onsite PM without hurting her ego?
I am an offshore PM.
Comment: Please enlighten us what is the purpose of those meetings? 5 hours per day seems a bit much. I know some culture like to talk a lot, but this is extreme. I always vote to timebox meetings and stop meetings when there is no agenda, to prevent endless talking about non important topics.
Comment: Do you mean 5 hours in total, accumulated across all of the team members, or 5 hours duration of meetings (which would be, for example, 25 hours of time for a team of 5 people)?
Comment: This includes clarification of requirements, status updates on inprogress items(multiple times) or just be there to get more information on any available topics, Even if you are not involved with that topic in particular.
Comment: How in the world can anyone get ANYTHING done meeting five hours a day?
Comment: meetings are evil, in agile projects, see: http://www.yegor256.com/2015/07/13/meetings-are-legalized-robbery.html
Answer: Too many meetings is a symptom - of lack of confidence
Too many meetings is a symptom, not the disease. Looks like the Scrum Master (or PM) does not have confidence in the dev team's ability to deliver at the end of the Sprint. Based on my experience working with multiple offshore teams, here is what the dev team can do to give them this confidence:
Requirements:

Ask for all requirements clarifications at the time of the Sprint Planning meeting. And write them down as Acceptance Criteria in the story. This will make sure that the Dev team is on the same page as the Product Owner.
If requirements are not clear or complete, refuse to take that story into that sprint.
If as an exception, one or two clarifications are promised in a day or two after the sprint starts, keep reporting that as an impediment in every Scrum call.

Sprint workload: One of the main reasons why Scrum Masters (or PMs) keep asking for status is because some dev teams make a habit of leaving stories incomplete at the end of the sprint and offering various excuses.

Commit to only stories that you are very confident of completing within the Sprint.
Once committed, the Scrum Master should be able to have confidence that the dev team will make every effort to complete them.

Status reporting:

Ask the dev team to update status of stories, at the least, every day prior to the Scrum call. How many hours of work is remaining to complete each task should be readily visible.

Once you develop a track record of delivering on your promises, the need for meetings will go down drastically. If not, you can confidently ask to cut down on them.
Answer: Agile-scrum?  XP?  Kanban?  If you are using a particular methodology you may want to first focus in on which meetings (if any) are proscribed by the specific methodology and point out whether or not her meetings fall within the methodology.
It's always best if recommendations come from a number of people on the team or if you have quantitative information to back up your request.  "I feel we have too many/too long meetings" isn't that compelling and can make it feel personal.  You are trying to influence a peer.
Instead approach it more impartially.  Something like, "Dear PM, x of y members of the team have stated that meetings take up too much time.  I'd like to discuss the validity of their concerns.  Why are we having so many meetings?  Are there other ways we could achieve the desired outcomes of all these meetings?  Why do we invite everyone to every meeting?"  Could be a more effective foray into starting a productive conversation about the problem.
Answer: In my current environment, people usually tend to have lots of meetings, to the point that, during a meeting, a discussion is opened and "ok, let's schedule a meeting to discuss this". Come on, we are already in a meeting, for Saturn's sake.
As a PM, I started to ringfence my team from attending meetings whenever possible (and logical). The rationale was fairly simple - and might work for you as well: Every meeting's attendee should answer a simple question:

What's the value this meeting has added to my current work?

Depending on the project phase, meetings are a must because requirements are unknown. These meetings are needed (assuming there's no other way to clarify requirements), so we just go ahead with them... as they clearly add value.
On the other hand, having a 1h meeting with 10+ people for status reporting is obviously a waste of resource.
With that in mind, you can

assess if the meetings are required / useful / valuable and then, based on the results of this assessment,
you'll be able to approach your PM with evidences (instead of feelings).

In your quesiton it's not clear (for me) if the dev team is also offshore with you (I'd assume so). Assuming that's being true, your onshore PM is probably trying to have more visibility on overall progress. If that's the case, instead of entering into task-detail meetings with PMs and dev team, you should be gathering status with dev team and then reporting back to the onshore PM. As long as the communication is clear and objective, your PM will be comfortable with your status, releasing dev team to actual work.
Success!

Meetings in agile project


Which data is correct Google Trends or Google Keyword Planner Tool?

Question: I have searched for a keyword "MLM" in Google Trends (location - Benin) which shows me there is some rising searches about this term but when I search this keyword in Google Keyword Planner Tools with the same location (Benin), I didn't get any result. What is the reasons can anyone tell me? Which data is correct Google Trends or Google Keyword Planner Tool for keyword analysis?
Comment: I'm not sure that data from either is all that trustworthy at this point.   I used to trust the AdWords keyword planner data more than Google Trends, but these days Google has been combining keywords and estimating traffic in the AdWords planner more.
Comment: It seems to me that the keyword planner and trends is like looking into the rear view mirror. Neither can predict the future. In fact, this, for me, is the problem with the whole keyword chase. It seems to me to be hyper-focused in the wrong direction - the past. I have found that a thoroughly written, well covered, and excellent and compelling content on a topic of interest that is consistent over a long period of time actually performs best overall. Add to this forward focused content for things coming down the pike. Combine the two, and you may do really well. Look forward and not backward.
Answer: Both are correct. Those are different data.
Keyword Planner shows absolute numbers, while Google Trends shows normalized data of user behavior. Normalized means here in general in proportion to time and location
Answer: Google keyword planner now shows approximations of search volume for keywords unless you are a paying member of the keyword planner platform in which case the search volume should be more exact.
If keyword planner is showing a search term to have for example, 200-2k searches per month, and the search volume jumps from 300 to 1500, keyword planner will still likely show the search volume as being 200-2k searches per month, whereas Google trends will show the search volume as going up 5x from 300 to 1500.
It's also possible that you didn't get any result in Keyword Planner simply because there is not enough search volume for Google to be reporting on it while Google Trends will still show it.
Also, Google Trends search volume data updates hourly, whereas Keyword Planner may take much longer to update and show search volume changes. As a result, if a keyword goes from 100 monthly searches to 2,000, keyword planner may take a while to react to the search volume change whereas Google trends will display it immediately.


Is the increased weight of the ipad 4 worth the retina screen, in comparison to the ipad mini?

Question: I'm trying to decide between purchasing a iPad mini or an iPad 4--this will be my first tablet.  I went to the Apple Store and was struck by how heavy the iPad 4 feels in comparison to the iPad mini, but also by how gorgeous the iPad 4 screen is.  The main question is if the weight and heft of the large iPad is worth the retina screen in comparison to the smaller, lighter, but not so crisp iPad mini.  My primary uses of the device will be ebooks, rss reading, document viewing, social networking, streaming video, light emailing, occasional gaming.
Comment: "Worth it" is a difficult question — what's "worth it" to one person is not for another.
Answer: No. Unless you are showing clients pictures or using a remote desktop access to control a computer and do work, the mini is so much lighter than the retina iPad that it's not even fair to compare them in terms of ease of use.
Yes, you can tell the difference between something drawn with retina versus the mini screen - especially for foreign texts and line art, but in practice it doesn't matter much.
I have and use both and easily, my use slants 10 to 1 in favor of the lighter mini - especially for short bursts and casual reading and gaming. For several apps, I do increase the font size one notch from what I prefer on the retina display, but I don't find any critical failure in not having a retina display despite using the device heavily for work and pleasure.
At half the weight and almost all the power, the mini is the device to get except for some very specialized situations. You can also put the money you save into AppleCare plus or a wireless keyboard or just apps and have a better all around solution.
Answer: It's really a personal thing, but I can offer my experiences.
I love my retina iPad, I waited to get an iPad until the retina one came out and I'm glad I did. In comparison to the iPad 2 (which I got to use fairly extensively for a week or two), it's night and day for me, particularly for reading.
That said, the iPad Minis I've tested in stores have been very impressive — the form factor and especially the casing are great. If I hadn't been spoiled by the retina screen and was buying my first iPad, it would be a close call. However I think I would still go for the big iPad, for two reasons. Firstly, most of my use is either lounging on the couch or sitting with the iPad resting on a table, so the weight isn't as much of a concern for me. Secondly, so much of my use is for reading that the retina screen really makes a difference to me.
My best advice is to consider what your likely use is, and how much of a difference the weight will really make.


Is it okay to publish a fan-fiction book from a TV series?

Question: I'm 13 years old and I'm writing a story called 'Destiny'. This book is a fanfiction of the TV-Show "Merlin" (the TV series 2008) and I've added a character into it. There currently is no book of Merlin, so would it be okay to publish this book or would I have to get permission from the directors and creators of Merlin? It's not complete yet, but I really want to publish a book on it one day.
Comment: Welcome to Writing.SE *Frosty*! There has been a question in one of the answers: are you talking about the legendary character or about a TV show? I have heard of one show at least, but could you [edit] your question to say which medium you are writing a fanfiction for? If you have a moment please take the [tour] and visit the [help] to learn more about the site. Have fun!
Comment: I've rolled back your edit. Firstly, if you have a new question, please ask a new question instead of changing an existing one. Secondly, it's considered bad practice to edit a question in such a way that it invalidates the existing answers, so please don't do that.
Comment: I'm sorry I dont really know how to use this, please do excuse me, I hope I didn't offend you or anything but I just don't reallly know how to work this thin which is not helpful at all, sorry for the late reply I've been dealing with school work
Answer: Fan fiction is a legal gray area, but in general these days, most shows will ignore it UNLESS you are trying to make money from it in some way --in which case they will definitely come after you (lawyers always follow the money!).  That means publication as an actual novel is out.  It's also 100% sure you would be denied permission if you did ask, not because you're a kid, but because when they get ready to publish a book, they will hire an established author.
On the other hand, however, most popular shows have active communities of fan-fiction writers and readers.  Some shows actually even encourage those communities.  If you can find a community like that, you'll have a place to post your work, get feedback, and maybe even build a fan base of your own.  You might even have more people reading your work than if it was a book.
I don't personally enjoy fan fiction, but millions of people do, and some very big and famous writers got their start that way.  So keep on writing, share your work with other Merlin fans, and you'll be well on your way to writing an original novel with your own all-new characters and setting one day.
Answer: Of course you would need the permission of the creators. A fanfiction is always based on something existing and you are not allowed to earn money with it. Only if the creators allow that.
And allow me to say that: With 13 most of my stories were underdeveloped and hadn't shown any sign of something, that could suck the readers in and hold them.
As hard it is to say (but you wouldn't ask if you wanted to be sugarcoated), but why should an million dollar producer, pay a 13 year old to write a story, if he could get Stephen King for example. As long as you didn't make a name as writer, have connections into the field of work or are related to some famous writer, the chances are very near to 0 to publish a fanfiction to an existing story.
There is a writer, who got famous with a fanfiction (E. L. James), but even she changed the characters, places and names as she published the story as book.
Comment: Not all 13 yr olds are the same. Some are geniuses,and Frosty might be one of them. As to publishing a fan fiction, as said above you need permission from the creators of Merlin and I doubt they'd give you the go ahead so easily. You're not the only one writing Merlin fan fiction. Still, you could ask if you really want to publish the story. Otherwise do what 50 shades of grey has done. Change everything- the places names, the characters names, the plot, etc. And it will end as your original story.
Comment: *Why pay a 12 year old millions ...* Because no adult (not even a little person) can successfully pull off being a 12 year old. In acting, physical appearance counts, and it is actually difficult to find a 12 year old with the right "look" for the part when on camera, that can **also** act: Pretend the cameras and 30 crew members aren't there, and the half built sets and plastic props and fake food are all real, and still take direction (from the director) and at "Action!" cry on cue, or laugh, or be angry or frightened. Studios  would pay less if they could! But the talent is extremely rare.
Comment: But isn't the same for actors? Why pay a 12 year old millions of dollars to act?
Comment: Yeah you could argue with that ... but it's mostly uncommon that anyone could be actor. You have to go through auditions, interviews, make promotional videos and then there is a slight chance you can get the permission to participate in a show. I didn't say you could never publish the book for the series. I just noted that it would be very unlikely that you would get the permission for it.
Answer: What do you mean by Merlin? The legendary character of Arthurian legend who is in the public domain and anyone can write and publish story about him:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fiction_featuring_Merlin
Or specifically from a TV show or story featured on the list? That might be more complicated...you might have to read up on copyright law from your country.
Whether your fiction is good enough to be published is another matter.
Edit: If you do indeed mean the 2008 series, then what might help you determine if you need permission is actually reading up on the stories of Merlin that the show is based on(start with the Wikipedia article and go from there). That way you can determine what aspects of your story belong to the TV writers and which ones are fair game and are just part of the Merlin myth which is in the public domain.
Comment: Welcome to Writing.SE! I am pretty sure this is about a TV show (maybe [this one](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merlin_(2008_TV_series))?), judging by the fact that "There currently is no book of Merlin". Could you elaborate on what problems the OP might encounter with the copyright law? Is there something else that "might be more complicated"? Currently this is a bit short and doesn't really answer the question of whether the OP needs to get permission or not. If you think the OP should clarify some things that should be asked in comments, which you can write once you have 50 reputation.
Comment: You might want to read [How can one link / merge / combine / associate two accounts / users? (Anonymous / unregistered / cookie, or OpenID / registered)](https://meta.stackexchange.com/questions/18232/how-can-one-link-merge-combine-associate-two-accounts-users-anonymous) This answer was originally posted by an unregistered user, but judgning by your (quite unique) username I take it that you registered. Combining the accounts will allow you to collect the rep you may get from this answer and collecting rep will unlock privileges, such as voting or commenting.
Answer: The short answer is NO, you don't have to ask for permission.  Merlin, and the characters associated with him, were created in around the 1680's according to this site (a very interesting read - with video included):
https://firemark.com/2016/02/18/can-name-characters-famous-characters-old-book-entertainment-law-asked-answered/
If you are taking from a series, for example using Thor and Loki directly from the Marvel Universe, then maybe need check.  Characters can be trademarked, but the names themselves cannot be trademarked because they've appeared in much older works.  Another example is Tolkien's characters names, taken directly from mythology (although the characters are different).
Comment: The question seems to be about a TV show, judging by "There currently is no book of Merlin" and "I've added a character into it" looks to me like the OP is taking the TV show as a basis and then writing a story in that specific universe. The question is not about the name Merlin. If you think the question needs to clarify whether or not the OP is talking about the original characters or a TV show you should write a comment, which you can do once you have 50 reputation.
Comment: @Secespitus Good to know and thank you for clarifying, and will do that in the future.  Yes, I realized that too late after reading your initial comment.  I had never heard of the series, didn't occur to me thats what was meant by fan-fiction of a name of a legendary folkloric character.


Should questions about programming Bitcoin applications be on topic?

Question: One Area51 example prohibits qusetions such as "Should I use urllib, urllib2, or something else to communicate with bitcoind from Python?". Still, I think more specific question such as this one should be on topic. What do you think?
Answer: The Area51 example seems like kind of a gray area to me.  The questioner wants to interface with bitcoind, but the question itself could apply to any JSON-RPC interface.  It's unclear whether those who voted it off-topic meant "all questions involving programming are off-topic" or "this question is off-topic because it's only tangentially related to Bitcoin".
I think actual Bitcoin-specific programming questions (such as the Scala one that you linked) should be allowed.  We should still disallow general programming questions that are merely masquerading as Bitcoin questions.
Comment: I think the main distinction is whether the question is about Bitcoin either as a piece of software and protocol, or if it is an actual implementation detail that would be better off on one of the numerous programming flavoured Stackexchange sites. Protocol questions are central to the understanding and evolution of what bitcoin is as a whole.
Comment: I agree, this was a *very* Bitcoin-specific question. Just like questions about Bitcoin-specific crypto belong here and not on crypto, questions about Bitcoin-specific programming belong here, and not on programmers.
Answer: Bitcoin SE is an end-user site (much like Apple and Android SE). It should not become a support forum for developers.
There may be an edge case where a developer can ask about particular use case of Bitcoin to implement a client, but  technical support questions will need to go to one of our technical forums (such as Stack Overflow).
It will become harmful to this community if you try to combine end-user questions about  Bitcoin with the technical, programmer-y jargon of a technical support site for programmers. If there is a big call for such content, they will have to establish their presence on a site like Stack Overflow or Cryptography.


Oldsmobile Alero squeaking when started

Question: I just bought a 2000 Oldsmobile Alero 2 days ago, and when I start it there is a loud squeak that lasts maybe 15 seconds. Unfortunately I bought the car 'as is'. Will it most likely be a belt, and if so, how much would it cost me for the belt itself and how much work is involved? This totally sucks but I guess that's the reality of buying a car 'as is'. Then yesterday, the car would not start - it took 4 tries and I had to press on the gas. Its been fine since.
Answer: A squeak like that is almost certainly a slipping belt. The easiest fix would be to pick up some "belt conditioner" spray from an auto parts store and spray it on the inside of all your belts, and see if the problem goes away. If not you can try tightening the belt that's causing the squeak; this is not too difficult, and just involves loosening a couple bolts so you can adjust the component with the pulley (alternator, compressor, power steering pump, etc.) then tightening them back down while putting tension on the belt. If the problem persists you'll need to replace the belt.
Comment: Ease of replacement depends a lot on if there are other belts you also need to take off to get to the bad one, and whether the engine compartment has enough space to let you get them off without taking too many other parts off.
Comment: On most vehicles replacing a belt isn't very difficult. Take a picture of how it is routed before removing though.
Comment: I agree, but some are very easy. So that may be a valid option.
Comment: Yes, I don't disagree. I was just elaborating on what issues might complicate the job to give OP some more information.

Oldsmobile Alero squeaking when started


How do you set which window an mg is initially set up in when you garrison a building?

Question: I realise they move about as required but how do you set which window an mg is initially set up in when you garrison a building or bunker?
Answer: It's been a while since I've played CoH, but I seem to remember that when MGs are garrisoned, you force them to fire in the direction you want, and they'll set up that way. This isn't perfect/ideal, since you have to wait for them to garrison and then issue the command, but it's better than waiting for the enemy to arrive.
Come to think of it, I may be thinking of a different game though. Apologies in advance if this is completely incorrect.
Answer: I've never found a way to get them to start in any direction, and am not sure it's possible.
The intuitive way to do this, were it possible, to me would be to hold the mouse button after clicking to garrison, and try dragging out in the direction to cover like you normally do.


What are some possible causes for failure for server manager/eventvwr/iis manager?

Question: Coming into the office this morning, I was told that our web server was down. After remoting in, I noticed Server Manager failed to start with an error saying "MMC could not create the snap-in". I tried opening eventvwr and got the exact same error. Then, trying to connect to localhost in IIS Manager, I receive the error "The request is not supported." I'm a developer with little system administration experience, so I've been searching for hours. I've made sure Windows Event Log and Task Scheduler are running in services.msc, I ran sfc which had no errors. I was told there were updates installed last night. Any possible/usual causes for these issues come to mind? Thanks in advance.
Answer: You haven't specified whether this is a production or development server so I'm operating under the assumption that it is a production server.
If I'm incorrect please say!
Updates were installed? How were these updates installed, are you rocking automatic updates for a production server? If you are I suggest you change that setting to download and install manually, many of the headaches I've suffered ahve been caused by unmanaged changes to systems caused by automatic updates.
If you're updating your production boxes at the very least someone should be on a VPN Connection to check that everything comes back following the updates, ideally you should have someone who can touch the box whilst carrying out the patching.
Have you rebooted the server since finding it this morning? If not I would suggest you do that to see if the issue persists or is resolved.
If it persists working on the assumption that the updates are the only changes to your server, your next step should be to uninstall the recently applied updates one at a time until the issue dissappears.
Sometimes patches just apply wonky and other times things that have been done to a server cause patches to break things, once you find the patch that is causing the issue you can decide what course of action to take. Ignore that patch or try to re-apply it.
If you have the ability to do so I would advise setting up a second server to test patches on before they get applied to your web server (You may already have this, but if not its worth saying).
Comment: Yes it is a production server. Automatic updates are on. I tried rebooting first thing to no avail. I uninstalled every update installed today and restarted, still nothing. Thanks for all the advice so far.
Comment: Has anything else changed on the server recently? New sites deployed, new software? - any other suspect messages in the Application or System Event Logs?


Curvature and torsion changes related to Frenet frame choice

Question: Let $\gamma(s)$ be a unit-speed curve in $\mathbb{R}^3$. Let $t = \dot{\gamma}(s)$, $n = \frac{\dot{t}}{\left \| \dot{t} \right \|}$ and $b= t \times n$. The vectors $(t,n,b)$ form what is called a Frenet frame in a point $s$. Define the curvature as $k = \dot{t} \cdot n$ and the torsion as $\tau = - \dot{b} \cdot n$.
We can change the sign of $t$ and $n$ arbitrarily, obtaining (for example) the new frame $(t^\ast=-t,n^\ast=-n,b^\ast=b)$. My teacher said that curvature's sign depends on the choice of $t$ but torsion's sign remains unchanged after arbitrary sign switching on $t$ and $n$... but that seems not to be true. In fact we have
$$\tau= - \dot{b} \cdot n$$
realted to the first frame and
$$\tau^\ast = - \dot{b^\ast} \cdot n^\ast = -\dot{b} \cdot (-n) = -\tau \quad$$
for the second I wrote.
So, where is my mistake?
Answer: First of all, curvature's sign is always positive (unless one is dealing with a plane curve, in which case the signed definition of curvature is different from the general one you've given here).
I'm slightly confused about your reference to a "choice of $t$"; you just defined $t$ to be the tangent vector to $\gamma,$ which involves no choice. Neither is there a choice involved in your definitions of $n$ or $b,$ so one cannot willy-nilly change the signs of $t,$ $n,$ or $b.$
However, if we change the direction of $\gamma$ to get a curve $\Gamma$ that
covers the same range as $\gamma,$ but backwards (so $\Gamma(s) = \gamma(c-s)$ for some constant $c$), then we have $\dot{\Gamma}(s) = -\dot{\gamma}(c-s).$ That is, at any given point of the curves' common image, the tangent vectors of $\gamma$ and $\Gamma$ point in opposite directions.
Then the Frenet frame of $\Gamma$ would be, as you have written, $(t^\ast(s),n^\ast(s),b^\ast(s)) = (-t(s),-n(s),b(s)).$ So the Frenet equations for $\gamma$ are $$\dot{t}(s) = k(s) n(s)$$ $$\dot{n}(s) = -k(s) t(s) + \tau(s) b(s)$$ $$\dot{b}(s) = -\tau(s) n(s).$$ The Frenet equations for $\Gamma$ are, of course,
$$\dot{t^\ast}(s) = k^\ast(s) n^\ast(s),$$
$$\dot{n^\ast}(s) = -k^\ast(s) t^\ast(s) + \tau^\ast(s) b^\ast(s),$$
$$\dot{b^\ast}(s) = -\tau^\ast(s) b^\ast(s).$$
In what follows, for convenience I will write $S = c-s,$ and all derivatives are taken with respect to $s.$ In particular, $\dot{S} = -1.$ Now, $\dot{t^\ast}(s) = -\dot{t}(S),$ so $k^\ast(s) = k(S)$ and $n^\ast(s) = -n(S).$ On the other hand,
$b^\ast(s) = t^\ast(s) \times n^\ast(s) = -t(S) \times -n(S) = b(S).$
Furthermore, $\tau^\ast(s) = -\dot{b^\ast}(s) = -b^\ast(s) \cdot n^\ast(s) = b(S) \cdot n(S) = -\tau(S).$
So $$\dot{t^\ast}(s) = - k(S) n(S),$$
$$\dot{n^\ast}(s) = k(S) t(S) - \tau(S) b(S),$$
$$\dot{b^\ast}(s) = \tau(S) n(S).$$
I hope this sufficiently answers your question.


What gives 'Winter Song' by Nico a medieval sound?

Question: The song below seems to have a definite medieval flavour to it, but what causes this?  Is it the guitar or vocal melodies?  What scale/mode aspects give this feel?
Comment: That piece simply holds qualities associated with music written for medieval-themed films. Music written in the medieval ages would sound more like this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Ex_organum.ogg. That piece is definitely not medieval music.
Comment: Yes, that's what I meant.
Answer: I'll give this a shot.  Some elements contributing to a Medieval sound are

Minor-key, modal melody (I think it is Dorian)
Melody is catchy and song-like and follows a resolution pattern that resembles old drinking songs or sailor songs.
The 6/8 rhythm also contributes to a drinking-song feel.
Harmonic voice-leading features prominent parallel motion (parallel fifths jump out)
The strummed instrument is troubadour-like
Comment: *This comment comes from an anonymous visitor who posted it as an "edit" comment:* the song is in the key of G. the mode is not aeolian but dorian (aka harmonic minor) which means you will flat the 3rd and 7th note in the key you are in. Since this song is in G, you will have G,A,B flat, C,D,E and F ( F=your flatted 7th)
Answer: I agree. In particular, it reminds me of the Nibelungenlied (as sung by Knud Seckel).
I hear three clear similarities:

the melody, which uses the same incomplete scale and is actually quite similar
the harmonization, which stresses fifths and does not use the fuller chords we're accustomed to from later European music
the instrumentation, which is sparse and improvised


Should I upvote *and* vote to close?

Question: I sometimes find questions that are not suited for the site (usually because they are list questions), but I find interesting. Often times I upvote the question, and then cast a close vote. Does anyone else do this? Does anyone else think this is a bad practice?
Comment: I've done this a few times and usually the OP leaves me a comment telling me I suck for doing so. Nevertheless, I think sometimes it's appropriate and it's certainly not against the site's guidelines; I agree with **BESW** that it ought to be a rare occurrence. But, yes, there are times when it's appropriate.
Answer: I must disagree with @Pearson's answer.

Closing means that you think that the question violates the site's "willing/able to answer this in SE format" rules, some/many established by community.
Voting means you like the question.

Therefore, if you are a genuinely honest person with integrity, and do NOT like and disagree a specific closing rules, it is perfectly reasonable to:

Follow the "law" and VTC despite disling the law.
Upvote to express your personal approval.

This is what I do with any "Does there exist" or "Any" questions that are otherwise good interesting questions - yes, they are VTCable according to moderator-imposed rules, no, I deeply disagree with those rules despite agreeing to abide by them; and therefore will upvote questions of that type if they are interesting and contribute good content to the Internet which is the main mission of Stack Exchange.
A real life analogy would be a cop arresting someone for violating an unjust law, and giving them a calling card of the best lawyer in town or money for their defense fund.
Comment: They're community-imposed, not moderator-imposed.  Mods enforce the rules that the community developed and agreed upon.
Comment: @Keen - the list rules are moderator imposed.
Comment: You're saying that all 9 downvotes on [this (deleted) answer](http://meta.scifi.stackexchange.com/a/351/1027) were mods?  That all 16 upvotes on [this answer](http://meta.scifi.stackexchange.com/a/17/1027) were mods?  The community didn't make these posts and vote on them?
Comment: @Keen - I'm talking about significantly more recent edge cases, where the only determination that the question will result in endless list of answers was because a mod said so.
Comment: So make a meta post and argue your case!
Answer: Though it should probably be a rare occurrence, I don't see a major problem with this, because it's what we do anyway: we vote for what we like. If this practice is a problem, we have a BIGGER problem.
In more objective SE sites, upvoting means "you feel [it] is especially useful." This is the wording in our help, too, but only because it's a copy-paste. In more subjective SEs like ours, "useful" isn't a very... useful... term; questions about Star Trek aren't seeking solutions to a problem or in other ways looking for answers that are demonstrably "useful" to anyone except the original poster, so we can't use that criterion to gauge if it's appropriate to vote up or down.
So what does an upvote mean? PearsonArtPhoto says it means "you think it's a great question for this site," and that'd be swell... but we don't use upvotes to mean that, and if we should then we need to do a pretty strong education campaign about what makes questions great. (And I can't really think what downvoting would mean then: "This is an awful question for the site"? That's vote-to-close.)
No, we use votes as an indication of popularity: "I like this post" is much closer to what voting behavior means on scifi.se. We vote for the franchises we like, and the posts with lots of pictures, and we often don't even vote then (here's a post from a popular franchise with contemporary media saturation that got 13 14 votes out of over 1k views). If that's the accepted practice then I see no reason that just because the answer should be migrated we should make an exception to popularity-based voting for it. Heck, given the sickly state of our voting community, if somebody wants to vote on something at all I think it should be encouraged.
(And we shouldn't confuse up/downvotes with accepting an answer or voting to close; accepting an answer is the original poster's way of saying that one answer was more useful than the others to the original poster. If it were like voting, either upvoting would be one-per-thread or we could accept multiple answers. They're three different kinds of input about three distinct pieces of information.)
Comment: "No, we use votes as an indication of popularity:" Is this really true? *I* use the up/down votes as the hover-titles describe them. If it's a good question showing research and effort and it's clearly stated, it gets an upvote. If it's unclear, not useful or generally a bad question, it gets a downvote. I don't upvote every Star Wars question just because I like Star Wars.
Comment: @phantom42 I'm generalizing, of course, but I call the trends like I see them. We don't click through to posts we don't think we're interested in, so *naturally* we don't vote based on actual merit. But beyond that, the criteria don't apply to scifi.se: we don't expect posters to read the source material, so what's "well-researched"? Most questions aren't asking for solutions to a problem, so what's "useful"? These are terrifyingly subjective in our SE, and that's why I don't see a problem with another subjective use of voting: it's a drop in the pool.
Answer: I say "yes".
I posted thoughts on this on another SE site a short while ago, but they're probably worth repeating in this context, so here we go.
Way I see it, a vote to close is not necessarily always saying "this is a bad question".  There are plenty of other reasons to vote to close, and I'm going to home in on one to illustrate this - close as duplicate.
Close as duplicate is not saying "this is a bad question".  It's not saying "this is a good question" either; what it's actually saying is "the answer to your question is over here". So close as duplicate is not a slap-down for a question - it's actually the exact opposite; it's a valid way of answering a question.
So given that close reason, is it appropriate to vote up and also vote to close?  Hell, yeah.  Somebody might ask a damn good question, very well written, but which despite that is answered by a duplicate.  They deserve rep for asking a good question.  But they also deserve a vote to close for being a duplicate, but a vote to close in that context is not slapping-down the question.  It's answering it by saying: "the answer is over here".
Answer: Generally speaking, this is bad practice. Upvoting says that you think it's a great question for this site, while voting to close says that it isn't on topic.
Comment: I agree with BESW on this one : the description you make is right for the objective SE sites, not really SFF.
Answer: The main purposes of question voting are to promote questions that others may find helpful, largely based on how helpful you found it, and to reward people that ask good questions for the site.
If a question is closed, it can't be answered and therefore won't help people. Bigger still, you shouldn't be rewarding people for asking bad questions. Reputation is largely a gauge of how much the community trusts you and shows that you understand how the site works. Asking off-topic questions clearly does not demonstrate that you know how the site works though and hints that you do not understand it that well.
The exception to this would be not-so-obvious duplicates though, where having some variety in wording helps more people find answers that they're looking for. If a duplicate isn't that easily found, shows research effort, and is still a helpful question, then I would probably upvote and vote to close, but not for questions closed for other reasons.
Comment: Thing is, it's entirely possible for someone to ask a really nifty, interesting question (which I may like), but it's in an inappropriate format for SFF.SE (for example, a list question). A user might want to say, Hey, I like your question, but it's not a fit for the site.

Should I upvote *and* vote to close?


What would happen to stars and planets if the gravitational constant was 34 times weaker?

Question: What would happen if the gravitational constant of our universe were 34 times weaker? What effect would it have on the stars and planets?
Comment: *what would happen* (in the whole universe!) is the very exemplar of a **too broad** question.  You should look over **previous questions** on this issue, and also get a feeling for what is "too broad".
Comment: Exactly 34 times?  That's rather specific.
Comment: What I remember from watching too many science shows, is our universe is in a precise balance.  A change of that magnitude, and you might not have any planets, just dust clouds.  A few of the most dense materials **might** form a very small number of planets.
Comment: I'm voting to close this question as off-topic because it is pure what-if question
Comment: Possible duplicate of [What would the Universe be like if gravity was slightly stronger?](https://worldbuilding.stackexchange.com/questions/2870/what-would-the-universe-be-like-if-gravity-was-slightly-stronger)
Comment: @Shalvenay This looks like a "much weaker" question to me.
Comment: Welcome to WorldBuilding! If you have a moment please [take the tour](https://worldbuilding.stackexchange.com/tour) and [visit the help center](https://worldbuilding.stackexchange.com/help) to learn more about the site. Have fun!
Comment: VTC - This question is overly broad and isn't a good fit for the site.
Answer: You're probably looking at a significantly less interesting universe for a number of reasons.
Cloud Collapse
I suspect that stars wouldn't form. The current leading explanation for the formation of the universe holds that after the Big Bang, the universe contained only thin hydrogen gas. Over time the gravitational attraction between the hydrogen atoms caused it to collapse into clouds that would form stars.
In order for a gas cloud to collapse under gravity, it must be subject to Jeans Instability. The calculation involves a lot of factors, but for our purposes the important thing to note is that the critical mass is inversely proportional to $G^{3/2}$. A gravitational force 34 times weaker would require a cloud to be about 200 times more massive in order to collapse.
Another fact to consider is that the universe is expanding at an ever-increasing rate, due to forces we don't yet fully understand. This expansion would increase the distance between the hydrogen atoms, counteracting the gravity that is trying to pull them together.
Solar Ignition
Assuming that the clouds still come together, the change could still disrupt star formation. Each star is a delicate balance between gravity trying to smash all of that mass together into a single point and the outward pressure produced by nuclear fusion trying to blast it apart. With a lower gravitational constant, it would take a much greater mass of hydrogen coming together to produce enough inward pressure to trigger the fusion reaction. Stars would be much rarer, and star formation might even be entirely impossible.
Any clouds of hydrogen that came together without sufficient mass to form a star in the new universe would form gas giant planets like Jupiter and Saturn.
Lack of Heavy Elements
Fewer stars means less nuclear fusion, which means that elements other than hydrogen make up a much smaller portion of this universe than they do in ours (and hydrogen is already by far the most common element in our universe). Those elements would also have a harder time spreading throughout the universe, because even if star formation is possible, supernovae might not be.
Stars die in one of two ways depending on their mass. Small stars like our sun (and most other stars in the known universe) will fuse up to the point of generating carbon, but don't burn hot enough to fuse carbon into higher elements - at a certain point, the core will collapse into a white dwarf and the outer layers will fly apart to form a nebula. Larger stars will continue fusing elements up to iron but will eventually hit a similar point of collapse; however, their greater mass produces so much pressure on collapse that it triggers a supernovae, a massive explosion believed to be the only way that elements higher than iron are ever created in nature. The explosion distributes those elements across space until gravity eventually pulls them together to create new stars and planets. Changing the gravitational constant would increase how big a star would have to be to trigger a supernovae on collapse, which could prevent elements higher than iron from ever being formed.
So this universe would contain much less carbon and silicon, the two most common elements with the greatest potential for forming chemical bonds, which most biologists believe is an important part of the creation of life. Combined with the fewer number of stars in the universe, this would make life much rarer or quite possibly non-existent. It would also contain little to no copper, silver, gold, lead, nickel, tin, uranium, or any of the other elements higher than iron on the periodic table (depending on whether supernovae are impossible or merely very rare).
Comment: @Kilisi The relative strength of magnetism could be another issue, I'm not sure - part of the reason fusion is so difficult is that before the hydrogen atoms are moving fast enough to fuse on impact, the intense heat ionizes them, and as a result they have to be moving even faster to overcome the electrical repulsion between the ions. I think it's simply a question of adding more mass -> more pressure -> more heat -> moving faster, but it could be more complicated than that.
Comment: This is interesting. Can you mathematically demonstrate if stellar ignition is possible with this reduced gravity?
Comment: Unfortunately, while I'm pretty confident about the physics of star formation in general terms, I'm not a professional astrophysicist and don't know the right equations. I can try to find them, but I figured I'd wait to see if this was enough of an answer for the OP first.
Comment: Well, I like math, so let me encourage you to take a stab at it, if you find the time.
Comment: Makes perfect sense to me, I wonder if you could even have solar systems with stars that big assuming stars could even get started. Systems with rocky planets in the life zone I mean. Plus reducing gravity doesn't mean you're reducing the other forces to match so magnetism etc would be way out of kilter
Comment: @kingledion I haven't figured out the star ignition details yet, but I think I've got the math for whether the clouds of hydrogen would collapse at all.


Coffee stain in coffee cups

Question: I've noticed that my coffee cups are getting stained.  Neither myself nor the dishwasher can get the stains out.  Any suggestions? (Other than buying new cups ;)
Comment: Can you clarify a bit? What types of cups are these? Obviously not glass. Plastic and enameled cups can obviously become stained. Looks like you found your answer, but more info could help find a better one.
Comment: @brendo234 It is porcelain coffee mugs
Answer: Baking soda. I use a standard dish sponge/scrubbie with baking soda and a little water and it comes completely out. I've actually tried it with just a damp paper towel and baking soda and it's almost as easy.
Baking soda has natural whitening properties and is a very gentle abrasive. I actually started using it elsewhere (sinks, counter tops, greasy pans) before discovering its use in coffee cups.
I've also tried baking soda + salt on counter tops and pans with great success. Salt has similar whitening properties (surprisingly to me) and is a stronger abrasive. Haven't tried it in coffee cups, but you might consider trying that if you need a little extra cleaning power. (Also: Aside from being cheap, baking soda / salt are food-grade and non-toxic!)
Comment: This seems to work some what, enough to make a difference.  And it is cheap ;)  Thank you.
Answer: Another possibility for residual stains: Try soaking in powdered dishwasher detergent (i.e., stuff for automatic dish machines, not dish soap) and boiling water.
The process: put a small amount (~ 1 tsp / 5 mL) of powdered dishwasher detergent in the cup. Fill cup with boiling water (very hot tap water might also be okay). Stir to dissolve detergent. Let sit for at least 1 hour or overnight. Empty, rinse, wash with sponge or scrub brush and conventional dish soap as usual.
I did this to clean my heavily tea-stained equipment, and it worked great, as I noted in another question and answer of mine from Seasoned Advice.
Answer: Puro Caff
This stuff cleans stains from all my presses, thermoses, and cups...makes all like new again.
Comment: Thank you for the tip but it is very expensive and not readily available outside the USA, it seems.
Answer: All the tips above are good and might help, but in my opinion a good coffee cup shouldn't get any stains what so ever, in case it does I suggest you to throw it away and buy a new one.
Why not using a regular espresso glass cup similar to:

These cups will never get stains :)
Comment: Those borosilicate cups sure are pretty but often times I really enjoy seeing the contrast of the dark coffee against a clean white interior. I do notice that some ceramic mugs stain easier than others. After reading your post it comes to mind that I should pay more attention to the quality of the glazing. Thanks!
Answer: Use some thick household bleach with the option of adding a bit of warm water.
Leave this to stand in the cup making sure the stains are coated with bleach. After leaving these for several hours the stain will eventually be removed! Works on the toughest stains.
Remember: wash this out thoroughly under a tap before using it!
Answer: I nice clean cup or mug certainly adds to coffee drinking enjoyment in my opinion. Since coffee stains are somewhat oil based, I suggest you put in a dollop of coconut oil, sprinkle in some baking soda, salt, and a few drops of water, scrub with a toothbrush or nail brush. Follow with some vinegar, then a hot water rinse. Since your cup is warm it is a perfect time for another cup of coffee :-)
Answer: For ceramic mugs just use toothpaste and toothbrush.

Coffee stain in coffee cups


How to install Ubuntu Touch with a Windows computer?

Question: Can I install Ubuntu Touch on my phone via a Windows 8 laptop? I think I'm only seeing instructions from a Unix-ish environment?
Answer: As for OS X, you should install Virtualbox, and then install Saucy Salamander, and then, you can start your install of ubuntu touch from this virtualized Unix-ish environment.


How to cut an image from text in Adobe Illustrator?

Question: Learning to use Illustrator for the first time. I would like to cut out a the lightning bolt shape from the text behind it, leaving a transparent outline of the shape. I see many tips for cropping text from images but not the opposite. I have created this effect using photoshop but I am struggling to replicate it on Illustrator. Any help here is much appreciated.
Answer: Convert the text to outline (Command+Shift+O), select all elements, use the Shape Builder Tool (Shift+M) to cut out all the elements you don't want.
This only works if all elements are shapes.
Comment: This crops all the text and not the shape on top of it
Comment: There is no text if you convert it to outlines. So everything should be good. Don't try it with text ;)
Answer:
Select the text
Convert the text to outlines pressing Cmd + Shift + O Mac or Ctrl + Shift + O Win
Convert it to a compound shape pressing Cmd + 8 Mac or Ctrl + 8 Win
Fill it with a color
Select the compound shape and the shape to cut
Pathfinder panel > Minus Front

Tip: when clicking Minus Front hold the Alt key to make a compound shape and keep both shapes.
Comment: Is it possible that since the lightning bolt is a .png file, that is what is causing me the issue? I keep getting an error when pressing Minus Front.
Comment: Yes, Pathfinder works with shapes, not with images. You should trace the image and expand It. But this is another process and another different answer.
Answer: Since I see that you have the text and bolt in different layers, you can simply do the following:

If not already, outline the text. You can select the text and press CMD+Shift+O or right click > Outline.

Select both shapes and go to the Pathfinder (If not visible go to Window > Pathfinder) and while holding the option key, click Minus front option.

Horray! You've just created a compound shape out of your original logo.
Comment: This usually shows when you're using a raster image. Are the shapes in your layers actual shapes or are they an image?
Comment: I got an error saying "Images, gradients, meshes, graphs, placed objects and text paths cannot be used as compound shape elements."
Comment: I read your other comment, for the bolt, you can easily redraw it using the pen tool (p) and then do the above.


Is there a maximum that someone could charge for licencing a patented technology?

Question: Also, can a patent holder decide to not let someone use their patented technology altogether?
Answer: Once you own a patent, you own the right to stop whomever you'd like from practicing what it describes. It's yours as much as your car or computer is, for its term.
As such, no, there's no real maximum that someone could charge. Of course, as is the case with capitalism, there may be limits on what people will pay, but that's the biggest consideration.
As for stopping others altogether, that's many patent holders' goals, and it's definitely allowed as well. Of course, you can only stop others from practicing what you claim in the patent, and only once it's actually granted (as compared to being in the application phase), and depending on how broad your patent is, it may be feasible for others to get around what you claim. But barring all that, you do have the right to stop others from practicing it.
You haven't explicitly asked this, but I think it's a reasonable extension: a lot of people who are new to patents get a little confused about what right it exactly gives you. It's very important to remember that a patent does not necessarily grant you the right to perform your invention, but rather, it grants you the right to stop others from doing it. This is relevant in a few situations, but primarily when performing your invention may violate laws, or more subtly, when someone else holds a patent on a necessary step to performing your invention. In those cases, cross-licensing deals can be useful in lieu of (or in addition to) money.


Which scenarios are better shot with a prime lens versus zoom lens or macro lens?

Question: What scenarios are better shot with a prime lens? A zoom lens? A macro lens?
Answer: My definitions follow...
Prime: fixed-length lens. Shorter ones are good for portraits, while longer primes are better distance shooters than the zoom varieties. You have to use your feet to get the right setup.
Zoom: lens can zoom in and out. Can be versatile, depending on the lens. Tends to have lower performance than prime lenses.
Macro: for closeups of small objects, and sometimes portraits. Not for distance shooting.
Answer: Whether to use primes or zooms is largely a matter of personal preference.  That said, zooms are usually considered to be more versatile and better suited for fast-moving environments--i.e., photojournalism, sports, etc--since you can probably achieve your desired framing more quickly by zooming than by running or changing lenses.  When speed is not an issue--say, when making art--primes are great, usually having advantages in size, maximum aperture, and price/performance ratio.  Fast primes are a huge asset in low-light situations where flash is not allowed (e.g., performing arts), and/or when small depth-of-field is desirable (e.g., portraiture).
As for macro lenses, well, most true macro lenses are primes.  Macro lenses are best for macro  (i.e., close-up) photography, but there are macro lenses that also happen to be great walk-around lenses, such as the highly-regarded Pentax DA 35 f2.8.
Answer: Prime lenses are better suited to specific environments - a 50mm f/1.8 is great for food photography, a 100mm macro is quite flattering for portraiture, but neither work well as a general purpose "carry-round" lens. I use Canon's 28-135 IS lens as a carry round, and can't sing its praises higher, even performing well doing some music photography the other week.
Comment: what I'm trying to say is that's a very subjective aspect of the question, and I think you dismiss too quickly.  Primes are still a good choice for a lot of people as everyday lenses.  Also, the "not versatile" aspect could apply equally to many fairly common zooms; an 80-200 or 14-24 can't switch from wide to narrow either – I think the distinction you're making isn't properly zoom vs. prime, but "wide-to-mild-telephoto zoom" vs. everything else.
Comment: 100mm lenses may not be a walking-around lens, but 50mm certainly is, 28mm and 35mm as well. All of those are used with regularity in street photography.
Comment: Another point — a normal prime with a fast aperture is arguably _more_ versatile than a slower zoom, especially if you don't have total control over the light.
Comment: @matt a prime is not versatile for use as a walk-around lens, you cannot easily flip between a wide angle landscape, or an abstract detail by the side of the way. - i.e. the point I was trying to get across is that primes are not general purpose.
Answer: I use prime lenses for portraits (e.g. Canon 50mm 1.8), zoom lenses for traveling/holidays and my 100mm macro for well... macro shots :).
I use a Sigma 17-70mm F2.8-F4.5 DC most as it is most versatile. But prime lenses are usually sharper and allow a shorter DOF which is preferrable for portraits.
Answer: Macro = any time you need a close-up shot, typically for detail of small objects. Macro refers to the minimum focus distance. Macro lenses are typically prime, though could be zoom.
Comment: Actually I should clarify this: "Macro" really refers to the relationship between the size of the object and the size of the object's image on the sensor; they should be about the same. In practical terms though it's used to refer to the ability for close-up focusting.
Comment: re: clarification: suggest editing your answer rather than commenting.
Answer: The correct prime lens will always give the better photos, however owning and transporting 101 prime lenses is not an option for most people, hence a zoom lens is more practical as a main lens.
The other partial problem with prime lenses is that every time you change a lens you risk letting dust in.
The first step to getting a great photo, is to be there with your kit, so ask yourself:

If I use a lot of prime lenses will I
  be likely to take less photos?
Comment: I think 101 is overstating it a bit. Two or three are usually sufficient, and a lot of accomplished photographers predominantly used only one or two focal lengths.
Answer: A reason to select a prime lens, is that for the money, one normally gets a bigger aperture, which lets in more light, or has a more limited depth of field. A second reason prime lenses are used is that for the cost, mass and size they product better image quality with mid-apertures.
More light is helpful in limited lighting, like in a church, where flash will not be used.
Limited depth of field is often desired for outdoor portraits, and other shots where the background or possibly the foreground (and possible also the background) is softly out of focus.  Different lenses have different patterning and characteristics and this is sometimes classified under the term bokeh.
The limited depth of field is more pronounced with lenses with f-stops of 1.2 or 1.4, and much more limited with zoom lenses which may have a lower f-stop of 3.5.
In each of these instances, it is necessary to use the lens more wide open, as opposed to a mid-aperture such as 5.6, 8, or 11.  However prime lenses used in this range have other advantages.  Because the optics has fewer system trades (like being able to run with a focal length of 18, and 300, all in the same lens, it is easier to design and build a higher quality lens.  So the MTF of a given prime will normally be better than a comparable priced zoom or varifocal lens.  The advantage here is that one gets crisp images, and the lens is smaller and lighter and may have less secondary artifacts such as lens flare, than a comparable zoom lens.
A macro lens is one which permits close focus. Historically it meant a lens where the image area to capture sensor (including film) was 1:1, but that is much more liberally construed these days. Normally a macro lens will not focus to infinity.  Before the days of autofocus lenses, VR, metering and the like, we used to unscrew the lens, reverse it, and hand hold it between the camera and the scene for a macro shot.  Some shorter (focal length) lenses may have near macro ability to close focus.
Also, for some macro lens applications, it may be viable to use filter like lenses with typical diopter values of +1, +2, +4, and +10.  They can be stacked, and they change the focal length of the lens and are handy to take pictures of bugs, flowers and things a macro lens might be used for.  Usually they are not coated, and are primitive lenses, with chromatic aberrations, lower MTF, and other adverse artifacts. A set is very inexpensive.  Other devices and strategies exist for macro photography,


Problems adding Contribution form to a WP page

Question: I just created a new contribution page in Civi and made sure it was active. When I go to create a new wordpress page and try to insert it I have no options to choose from when I click on the CiviCRM button. The only thing it shows is the dashboard options. How do I get my Civi Contribution form into a wordpress page? Is there some sort of a setting I am missing to get active contribution pages to show up as an option to choose from?
Answer:
Disable all of your plugins (except CiviCRM) and try it again. If you can now see the Civi options, you have a couple of options: a. Set up your page, reactivate your plugins and go on with life, b. Reactivate the plugins one by one to see which is the issue.

If that does not work:

Switch to a WP basic theme like Twenty Seventeen or Twenty Sixteen and try the page create again. If you can see the Civi options, I would setup the page, switch back to your theme of choice. Just switch to a basic theme when you need to see the options and then back to your theme for usage.

If you do not want to mess with either above,

Under Contributions > Manage Contribution Pages > Select the page you want > Links > Live. This will give you a link that ends in id=#  Below is an example of Civi shortcode. Replace the 2 in the shortcode below with the id# from your live link and paste it to your WP page.
[civicrm component="contribution" id="2" mode="live" hijack="0"]
Answer: Drag the Pop up window over. Usually the drop down is rendered on a lower Z axis than the pop up.
The Select2 is being broken by a plugin or the theme. Usually it is a Fusion theme or a page building plugin.


Is there Scrum ceremony for planning Technical Details on an Agile Project?

Question: Specifically, if we assume that the team spend a day on Sprint Planning using the 4-8 hours of planning for each week of our sprint formula then that doesn't really seem like enough time for the team to flesh out implementation details. And should the entire delivery team really be involved in that discussion? At a sprint planning meeting we will have the Product Owner, Scrum Master, Developers and Testers (Maybe even a Business Analyst or 2). Do we really want to go deep on Dev with all of these other team members burning hours? Or should this be discussed in a separate developers only meeting? It just doesn't appear that Scrum provides for this? Am I missing something? How is your team dealing with this?
Answer: TL;DR: Scrum doesn't provide for a lot of things, you need to figure out a way that works for your team and project.

During the planning meeting (from the Scrum guide)

The Development Team usually starts by designing the system and the
  work needed to convert the Product Backlog into a working product
  Increment.

What designing the system means could be open for discussion. Personally I think the planning meeting should result in an achievable Sprint backlog. This means that each story should be clear enough to be estimated and the team pickups only so much stories that they can complete in the cycle. To let the team estimate they should have a short discussion about how to technically implement it, but not 100% of the details have to be clear at that moment, just enough to estimate it. We try to minimise waste for non-technical roles, but still discuss enough so they have an idea how to team will try to tackle the task. The goal is knowledge sharing and shared focus, not a 100% detailed Sprint plan.
So to answer your first question: Yes, everyone should be involved in the discussion. Everyone who will do a part of the work should estimate the whole story.
More details during the Sprint:
During the Sprint our teams starts each story with an "architecture and design" task, this is a session which results in a design and technical sub-tasks. Including design, coding, but also testing tasks. This is the moment the actual detailed design becomes clear based on the higher-level acceptance criteria noted down in the Sprint planning. After this session we swarm to complete the user story as quick as possible. The sessions length depend on complexity of the story at hand. I would say this is a dev-team group session, but sometimes if the complexity is low a single person could prepare everything with a short introduction to the rest of the team.
Now it is possible that during the Sprint in such a design session the team notices that they under-estimated. Challenge the team to build only what is really necessary, apply the YAGNI principle and prevent over-engineering. If this happens often, inspect and adapt, maybe you need to take more time during the Sprint planning meeting. Discuss this in a retrospective and let the team decide how to experiment with improving this.
More information:
One of the major Dutch web-shops with around 20 Scrum teams (in 2013) did experiments with the length of Sprint planning meetings to get and idea what level of detail is good enough. They told me that doing Sprint planning meetings in 15 minutes (yes just 15 minutes) lead to relative the same average estimations as 4 hours would. Now I think this will lead to a bit of more discussion during the Sprint, but it highlights that details are not the most important thing of a Sprint planning.
The reason Scrum does not detail everything for you is that there is not a single truth for process in Software development. It is different per product, team, company or industry. What the Scrum framework does is to help you inspect and adapt to find your fit the quickest.
Comment: Also reflect on the 10% of the Teams time that you have for Refinement. Refinement should include breaking down and understanding all of the things coming up on the backlog. Good refinement means a well understood backlog which makes for an easyer Sprint Planning.
Answer: TL;DR
The first half of Sprint Planning consists of selection of items from the Product Backlog that will fit within the current Sprint. Ideally, the backlog items meet INVEST criteria and are suitable for selection without a great deal of fine-grained planning during this portion of the meeting.
The second half of Sprint Planning is decomposition of Product Backlog Items into tasks for the Sprint Backlog. This is where the team is expected to do "just enough" planning to build a roadmap for the current Sprint.
Task-Oriented Planning
Let's work an example. For instance, let's imagine a story that says:

As a web site user
  I want to be able to maintain a user profile between visits
  so that I don't have to re-enter preferences each time I log in.

When this story is selected from the Product Backlog, the team then needs to identify the dependencies and agree on a general implementation that can be broken down into tasks. These tasks should typically be no more than ½ to two days in length to make it easier to coordinate tasks and track them as done or not-done rather than as percent-complete.
In this example, the team should probably agree on a few things, like:

Where will the user profile be stored?
What preferences will be stored in the profile?
How will the team test that the functionality meets the Definition of Done?

The team does not have to over-constrain the technical implementation during Sprint Planning. Instead, Sprint Backlog items are created, and can be discussed and refined further by the development team during the course of the Sprint itself. The goal is to do just enough planning to set a direction for the team, so that the work increment can begin in a coordinated and collaborative fashion.
Iterative development is an emergent-design process. The goal is not to produce detailed up-front specifications, but rather to generate consensus on a "good enough" approach that the team can then collaborate on throughout the iteration. To that end, Sprint Planning (and the Sprint Backlog in particular) are about defining what is to be worked on, not how it will be implemented.
By definition, any working increment that:

supports the Sprint Goal,
meets the what and why of the Product Backlog Item, and
fulfills the Definition of Done

is sufficient for a Sprint. Over-specification, over-engineering, and over-planning are agile process smells. Obviously some planning is needed, but the goal is always to do just enough planning to deliver a working increment.
Always remember INVEST, YAGNI, and working software and collaboration. Detailed specifications and "plan the plan; work the plan" are your kryptonite in iterative development.
Support Just Enough Planning
I like lists. Maybe you do, too. Some ways to support this type of planning include:

Ensure the Product Backlog is well-maintained, and that the top of the backlog is filled with items ready for selection into a Sprint.
Ensure the entire team participates in Backlog Refinement so that the what and why of the items are at least implicit in each selectable backlog item.
Ensure the team only selects actionable stories that fit within a single Sprint during Sprint Planning. Decompose stories or swap out items that won't fit during the Sprint Planning process.
Ensure that the team creates a Sprint Backlog with tasks during Sprint Planning. Some very mature teams don't always do this when the Product Backlog items are small and well-defined enough, but in general skipping this step is where teams miss out on just-in-time planning.
Focus on what and why in Sprint Planning. Leave specific implementation details (the how) up to the team members doing the work during the Sprint.
Leave plenty of slack in your Sprint to allow for collaboration, exploration (e.g. micro story spikes), and small meetings focused on "just enough" planning to coordinate the current day's work increment.

If you find yourself in need of complex, detailed planning exercises, chances are your Product Backlog or Sprint Backlog items aren't decomposed well enough, or don't meet the INVEST criteria. It may also mean that you're over-constraining the team by limiting their opportunities to collectively collaborate on implementations. Back up, fix the process issues, and then turn the team loose to implement the functionality in the simplest way that can possibly work.


Multi-color printing with desktop 3D printer?

Question: My MakerBot printer supports only two filaments at the same time.
What are techniques to print objects with more than two colors for one object?
Answer: The most obvious solution is to pause the print and swap filament for another color.
Another option is to splice pieces of filament together, though this does not allow very precise control of when the switch happens. There is also a device that can automatically slice filament this way.
Finally, another option that uses very little external equipment is to use (permanent) markers to colorize light-colored filament.
Other options include upgrading to a printer with more hotends, or installing a hotend with multiple filament inputs and one outputs, but these options would involve significantly changing your printer setup.
Answer: I've seen where certain slicers and/or firmware installations will allow you to set pauses mid-print so you can insert a different filament and resume. Such firmware that I'm aware of is Sailfish. I haven't personally used this, but I've heard many great things for people who enjoy tinkering with their machine(s). Alternatively, there are 3D-printable attachments for your extruder that allow you setup markers to color your filament (mentioned by Tom in another answer).
Answer: Another approach is Mosaic Manufacturing's Palette – it appears to a single extruder 3D printer as a filament reel, but it is creating a custom filament on-the-fly by

pulling information from a multi-extruder .gcode file to determine the length, and the order, each color segment needs to be.

The device was a successful Kickstarter campaign and as far as I can tell it isn't shipping yet (as of January 2016), but they are taking orders and promising an April 2016 ship date.
Answer: Answering this question fully depends on the type of printer you have. Some printers have a pause capability, while others do not. Some have multiple extruders, while most do not. Some have a tube leading to the extruder and others do not. You specifically are asking about dealing with more than two colors when you have a dual-extruder, but the question generalizes to how to get more colors than you have extruders.
Markers probably offer the easiest solution. You could have different markers on the feeds for each extruder.
For printers with no pause ability, you might have to snip one filament and hand feed the second color after the first one until it can be caught by the feeder gear.
There are rigs that are available, or that you can make, that will let you connect two strands together lengthwise. You can then make up a single piece of filament that has multiple colors. Thus, one extruder head will be generating multiple colors.
The Kickstarter mentioned elsewhere essentially does this automatically for several strands whose lengths are calculated precisely by special software. The result is a single strand of filament that goes into one of your extruders - the other extruder would be unused with this solution.
Comment: The question specifies they have a dual-extruder makerbot. Perhaps you could specialize your answer for that situation?
Comment: Disagree somewhat - the original question is about providing ***more*** than the two colors that their printer already supports. This generalizes into a question about dealing with more desired colors than their printer supports, for any number of extruders. I'll modify my answer to be more explicit in that fashion.
Answer: The standard option is to change out filaments at certain times during the print. Software to add these pauses to your print automatically are around, with one (ColorPrint). This method works if you only want to change at a certain Z height, and not intermix colors on the same levels.
The other newer development that works for many printers (this works for single nozzle printers as well) are getting Y type adapters that allow more than 1 filament to be fed into a single extruder, and use a rapid retraction to pull the filament back out past the Y connector to allow the next color to be fed into the nozzle. Several companies are putting products like this out on the market at this time. An example of this can be seen at this page.
As mentioned in other answers, Mosaic Pallette is an option to drive more complicated multi-color prints, but is a rather expensive option at $999.
The E3d Kraken might be a possible hotend upgrade to a Makerbot, although it would involve a fair amount of work.


How does Ring Confidential Transactions work?

Question: Can someone explain to me how RingCT works and how the recipient gets the actual amount from the encrypted amount in a RingCT transaction?
Comment: Possible duplicate of [ELI5: How does RingCT work?](https://monero.stackexchange.com/questions/880/eli5-how-does-ringct-work)
Answer: All outputs on the Monero blockchain have encrypted amounts, with the exception of outputs created in a 'coinbase' transaction. A coinbase transaction is a transaction that creates new Monero out of thin air according to Monero's emission schedule. Here is an example coinbase transaction: https://xmrchain.net/tx/c0b6b35c1a9c580aaa5ba04db6477cb255b33abb6492f9b5d6e02d7768aefcee
The amount of each output is encrypted and written into the transaction in two different ways. Once, as part of the 'ecdhInfo' in a way that allows only the recipient to decode the actual value, and  a second time as a 'Pedersen commitment'.
Only the recipient of an output is able to decode the actual amount. This amount is encrypted by the sender using the transaction shared secret, and is transmitted to the recipient in the 'ecdhInfo' section of the transaction. The transaction shared secret is computed by combining the recipient's private view key with the transaction public key (the latter is transmitted as part of the transaction).
Third party observers will not be able to decrypt that amount, and will need to use the Pedersen commitments to verify that other than the allowed creation of new Monero as part of the emission schedule, no Monero has been created out of thin air.
RingCT achieves this by doing two things:

Proving that all of a transaction's outputs are greater than zero. This prevents the sender from starting with 1 XMR, and then creating two outputs where one has a value of -99 XMR and the other has a value of 100 XMR. This is achieved with a 'range proof'. A range proof proves that the encrypted amount must have been created out of the addition of a series of positive powers of 2, without disclosing what the actual powers of 2 are. For more information, see https://people.xiph.org/~greg/confidential_values.txt
As you probably know, there are real inputs and fake inputs referenced in each transaction. No third party can tell which are real and which are fake. RingCT proves that in at least one combination of the possible inputs and the outputs, that Pedersen commitments of the inputs - Pedersen commitment of the transaction fee - Pedersen commitments of the outputs = a zero Perdersen commitment.
This is possible because input and output amounts are encrypted using 'homomorphic' Pedersen commitments, meaning that although you can't tell the values, you can verify that they sum to zero. Proving that they sum to zero is achieved by proving that you know the private key of the 'zero' Pedersen commitment for at least one of the combinations of possible inputs and outputs.
Therefore, for a transaction of ring size 5, as an outside observer you'll come up with 5 different possible 'zero Pedersen commitments', where only one of those possibilities really will be a commitment to zero. Since the Pedersen commitments are all technically public keys, and since the sender of the transaction needs to prove that they know the private key for at least one of those combinations (thus proving one of the combinations really does sum to zero), this is an ideal task for a ring signature. This is because ring signatures are a device to prove that out of a set of public keys, you know the private key for at least one of them.
The full math is here: https://lab.getmonero.org/pubs/MRL-0005.pdf

To sum up, RingCT is a mechanism that allows an outside observer to check that in at least one combination of inputs and outputs, no Monero has been created out of thin air. This mechanism is impossible to cheat.
Comment: Thank for your replying. Can you please explain me the step by step process of Monero. I meant let says Alice want to pay 12XMR to Bob and she input transaction is 14XMR. Please explain me step by step how does this works. (according to the Alice and Bob, how Alice send it and how Bob receives it)
Comment: Your question would require dozens of pages to answer. The summary is that Alice starts with a 14XMR output that she owns. She then creates a transaction to pay Bob, which spends the existing 14XMR output and creates two new outputs. One is a change output of 2XMR that goes back to herself, and the other is a 12XMR output that is destined for Bob. Alice signs the transaction with RingCT to prove she has the right to spend an output. Bob scans the blockchain and sees that there is an output destined for him. For more, see the Cryptonote White Paper https://cryptonote.org/whitepaper.pdf
Comment: Thanks knaccc. Addition for this can you suggest me some research areas that possible to do with Monero?
Comment: I'm not sure I understand what you mean by "research areas". If you're interested in researching more about Monero, the Cryptonote White Paper and the MRL documents at https://lab.getmonero.org/ are the place to go. If you're talking about researching future directions for Monero, then an upcoming replacement for the "range proofs" mentioned above are something called "bulletproofs", which you can read about here https://eprint.iacr.org/2017/1066.pdf


Does the idea of Moshiach ben Yosef negate the anti missionary argument against the second coming?

Question: As found in writings of Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan, one of the arguments used by Anti missionaries to explain why we don't believe Jesus was the messiah, was his epic failure to bring world peace and universal belief in God. To which the missionaries point to their beleif of the second coming, when messiah comes back to finish the job. This idea is dismissed as a sorry excuse for his failure, as the Jewish. prophets only mentioned a single arrival of the Moshiach.
If we take for granted that there will be a twofold arrival of Moshiach, namely Moshiach ben Yosef and afterwards the Moshiach ben Dovid, does this ruin the argument? Does the fact that they are presumably two different people make a difference?
Comment: Related: http://judaism.stackexchange.com/questions/13359/who-is-moshiach-ben-joseph-and-what-does-did-he-do
Comment: "Does the fact that they are presumably two different people make a difference?" That would indeed seem to be pretty relevant at excluding the possibility that it will be one person...
Comment: @Double good. so now take our view of two Moshiachs. Does that fit in the psukim any better?
Answer: First, there is the question of "taking for granted" that there will be a MB"Y -- on this...

Quite significantly, R. Saadiah Gaon (one of the few to elaborate on the role of Mashiach ben Yossef) notes that this sequence is not definite but contingent! Mashiach ben Yossef will not have to appear before Mashiach ben David, nor will the activities attributed to him or his death have to occur. All depends on the spiritual condition of the Jewish people at the time the redemption is to take place:
The essential function of Mashiach ben Yossef is to prepare Israel for the final redemption, to put them into the proper condition in order to clear the way for Mashiach ben David to come. Of that ultimate redemption it is said, that if Israel repent (return to G‑d) they shall be redeemed immediately (even before the predetermined date for Mashiach's coming). If they will not repent and thus become dependent on the final date, "the Holy One, blessed be He, will set up a ruler over them, whose decrees shall be as cruel as Haman's, thus causing Israel to repent, and thereby bringing them back to the right path."14 In other words, if Israel shall return to G‑d on their own and make themselves worthy of the redemption, there is no need for the trials and tribulations associated with the above account of events related to Mashiach ben Yossef. Mashiach ben David will come directly and redeem us.

from http://www.chabad.org/library/moshiach/article_cdo/aid/101747/jewish/Appendix-II.htm which footnotes to Emunot Vede'ot VIII:6; see there at length. Cf. Or Hachayim on Numbers 24:17.
But if one sees that the MB"Y will come, two factors are required -- 1, that he dies in a war as a military leader and 2, that the events which follow to usher in the MB"D happen soon thereafter.

The immediate results of this war11 will be disastrous: Mashiach ben Yossef will be killed. This is described in the prophecy of Zechariah, who says of this tragedy that "they shall mourn him as one mourns for an only child." (Zechariah 12:10).12 His death will be followed by a period of great calamities. These new tribulations shall be the final test for Israel, and shortly thereafter Mashiach ben David shall come, avenge his death, resurrect him, and inaugurate the Messianic era of everlasting peace and bliss.13

  Targum Yehonathan on Exodus 40:11, and on Zechariah 12:10 (manuscript-version in ed. A. Sperber); Agadat Mashiach; Pirkei Heichalot Rabaty (in version cited by Ramban, Sefer Hage'ulah, sha'ar IV; ed. Chavel, p. 291); and Rashi on Sukah 52a; identify the battle of Mashiach ben Yossef with the war of Gog and Magog.

  Sukah 52a, and parallel passages.

  Pirkei Heichalot Rabaty, ch. 39 (cited in Sefer Hage'ulah, sha'ar IV); Sefer Zerubavel; Agadat Mashiach (cited in Lekach Tov, ibid.). See R. Saadiah Gaon, Emunot Vede'ot VIII:ch. 5, adding Scriptural "prooftexts" or allusions for all details; and the lengthy responsum of R. Hai Gaon on the redemption, published in Otzar Hageonim on Sukah 52a, and in Midreshei Ge'ulah, ed. Y. Ibn Shemuel, p. 135ff. Cf. Rashi and Ibn Ezra on Zechariah 12:10; Ibn Ezra and Redak on Zechariah 13:7.
Answer: The traditional concept of Moshiach ben Ephraim (also known as Moshiach ben Yosef) does not undermine the criticism that Nazarene has not fulfilled significant Messianic prophecies.
Even if we could concede hypothetically that the tradition of Moshiach ben Ephraim gave some legitimacy to the belief that the Nazarene would "continue" or "complete" his purported Messianic mission even after he died, such a concession would have rapidly become irrelevant when the "fulfillment" of the messianic mission proper wasn't subsequently realized.  The events associated with Moshiach ben Ephraim take place, at any rate, at the time of the redemption so the delay of the Messianic redemption until long after the life of those involved in its alleged commencement is inconsistent with the picture we see in the Scripture or in tradition. In other words, the real or perceived similarities between Christian belief about the Nazarene and these aspects of the redemption doesn't diminish the difficulty posed by the unfulfilled prophecies.
Furthermore the fact that Moshiach ben Ephraim is a distinct individual from the Moshiach is significant (see Zechariah 2:4 and Obadiah 1:21, traditional verses from which the notion of MBE is sourced).  It is difficult to argue that the Messiah's mission will be interrupted for an extended period based on the difficulties of an entirely other player in the events.
The notion of Moshiach ben Yosef not withstanding, the prophecies remain unfulfilled and an assertion that they will be fulfilled later isn't a fulfillment....
Comment: http://judaism.stackexchange.com/a/12785/899


desktop effects could not be enabled on Ubuntu

Question: I would like to enable the "extra" visual effects on Ubuntu. When I choose the option for "extra," it searches for drivers and then says, "Desktop effects could not be enabled." Why doesn't this work on my computer?
Answer: The problem might be that restricted drivers necessary for your graphics card are not enabled.
Go to System -> Administration -> Hardware Drivers and see if there are any restricted drivers available for your graphics card.  If so, enable them, reboot, and you should be able to use desktop effects.
Answer: I got the same message when I was running an Ubuntu virtual machine inside Virtualbox.  I got it to work by enabling 2D and 3D hardware support within Virtualbox.  That may be the same thing that's accomplished by switching drivers when you're running Ubuntu, straight, not inside a VM.  Or maybe there's a setting for 2D and/or 3D acceleration that you need to set inside xorg.conf or via a graphic dialog before desktop effects will work.  Just a guess. . .   .


Exporting from SVG to PNG with AI

Question: When exporting an SVG icon to PNG, I am attempting to retain the quality of the image while not loosing the size (16px x 16px).  I have made the attempt numerous times but have yet to produce a icon image that retains a good quality.  Each attempt produces a very blurry image at a screen resolution of 72 ppi.  When I increase the resolution to 300 ppi, the image is clear but the dimensions of the icon are now 67px x 67px.  Is there anyway to lock the dimensions while applying a higher screen resolution.  I have attempted this through the normal export as well as tried to set the values within the artboard as well.
Comment: Are you reducing the SVG *before* trying to save as PNG? -- that's your best bet.
Comment: The SVG is already at the size of 16px x 16x before I export it to a PNG.
Answer: No, you have misunderstood things. There is no difference between as a 16x16 pixels image at 300 DPI and 16 x 16 pixels image at 72 DPI. The DPI value simply does not change the image clarity in any way! 16 pixels is 16 pixels, a pixel is a sample the sample is the same irrespective . There is no such thing as higher screen resolution in this sense. Doing what you ask would accomplish absolutely nothing.
Only devices have a resolution property images do not. For images the DPI value is a piece of metadata. It is like putting a post it note on the image saying that this is the size I would wish to output on your hard copy device i.e. a printer. It is universally understood that displays do not even begin to try to heed this.
This does not mean that your question is broken, the only reason I brought the previous up is that very many people make your mistake and quite frankly you should not even go there. If you have a hard time understanding DPI just ignore it, you will know when you need it and it basically only applies for printing anyway.
As you have discovered having a vector file vectors does not mean infinitely scalable content. Particularly small icon sizes require you to manually tweak the content to hit the pixel grid. You could try to enable pixel snapping for your art the tweak the points*.
Alternatively, more closely to what you think is going on, you could try a different filtering technique. It is possible that switching over to, type optimized rendering or  a windowed Sinc filter (Lanczos), see this post. However, Because your image is extremely small i doubt this helps you in any practical way. This is the reason fonts are hinted, as there is really no way around the fact that tweaking points is the best strategy.
* Or scale up enable pixel snapping and scale down for quick and dirty approach. Alternatively you can set the grid to pixel/ half pixel sized and use the jooSnapToDocumentGrid.jsx on points you deem most problematic.
Comment: Thanks for the reply joojaa.  I am only input what I have performed in Adobe Illustrator. I have perform all of the manual tweaking of my icons at a snapped 16px x 16px grid already.  Nothing is just being scaled down.  I have created all of my SVG's to the grid size that the will be utilized as.  As to the exported and then viewed png's at the size exported 16px x 16px at either 72 PPI or 300 PPI.  They are significantly different.  however when looking at the dimensions of the file in File Explorer the dimensions have changed with the resolution size.
Comment: @Bgreen offcourse bigger images look different a 16x16 pixel image at 300 dpi is same as 16x16 pixel image in 72 dpi but tht is not what you have. What i am saying is true even if its hard to accept.
Comment: It is not hard to accept.  However if I insert the png images of each which are both showing the same dimensions of 16px x 16px into Word, PowerPoint, Visio, even in Illustrator, etc. The quality of each is apparent.  png file size has grown beyond the 16 x 16 now to about 67 x 67.  In order for me to use the file within certain applications, the icon needs to be no bigger than 16 x 16.  I just need the quality to be good as a PNG.
Comment: @Bgreen yes but you have less samples so the quality **can not** be as good unless your graphics align with the samples better. You can try different fiters but its still not going to make a huge difference, If you are below the nyquist limit, then you are, and there is no way around it.
Comment: @Bgreen and how often do you view images at 1:1 size in illustrator or word or powerpoint? Default powerpooint and word is zoomed beyond one pixel is one unit. Theres no way to chek that. In illustrator you can see the size right if you hit 100% zoom
Comment: My point being is that the quality is apparent enough to anyone viewing the icon at a zoom level 100% (not zoomed in). The quality of the icon is bad enough to warrant some level of corrective actions to clean up the 16 x 16 icon to make it more appealing to the user of the application.
Comment: Ok so if you in illustrator view a n acceptable image at 300 dpi inserten in illustrator AND (very important) you zoom is at 100% and your image indeed is 16 pixels wide on the canvas. Then you can improve situation by changing filtering slightly if not then no dice. If you do this in word then your lying for yourself. But then your vector image should look like crap at that 100% zoom also before export. IF not ry changing antialiasing to type optimized.
Comment: @Bgreen it still has nothing to do with DPI just fitering behaviour.
Answer: PPI doesn't matter
As Joojaa says, the PPI doesn't matter. The PPI value itself makes no difference at all, all that matters is the pixel dimensions. a 16 × 16 pixel image at 300 PPI and 72 PPI are exactly the same thing. If you're working in Illustrator and exporting for screen always export at 72 PPI (assuming your document is at the intended size), but this actually has nothing to do with the PPI value assigned to the output file, it's just a shortcut to output it at the correct size.
The problem is that your SVG wasn't designed to be shown at 16 × 16 pixels. Vectors have no inherent size so most of the time it doesn't matter, you can scale as much as you like. The problem appears when your vector is no longer a vector—i.e. made up of pixels.

An example...
Take this boom box SVG icon. The original vector on the left looks great. View the same thing at 16 × 16 pixels and it looks terrible. You can see this is because the paths don't align with the pixels. There is too much information to be seen in the number of pixels available.

Image 1: Original vector (left), 16×16 pixel preview (right)

The solution is to design the icon specifically for the size it will be viewed at. Take the same icon again and redraw the paths so that they align with the pixel grid and you have a nice clean icon (cleaner at least, the speaker/circle could probably do with some more adjusting):

Image 2: 16×16 pixel preview original vector (left), adjusted paths to fit pixel grid (right)

This means in a lot of cases you should have different versions of the same icon for different sizes. Or at the very least design with the smallest size in mind.

Related reading:

What is meant by 'designing an icon at 100% scale'?
PPI in the Wild: implications of setting or providing a PPI flag in an image file
DPI Vs. PPI Vs. Image dimension, what should be taken to consideration?
Why are the terms DPI and PPI so misunderstood?

Exporting from SVG to PNG with AI