What is the minimum long run training distance to finish a half-marathon?

Question: As per the title, what is the minimum long run training distance to merely be capable of finishing a half-marathon? I've been trying to research this myself and answers seem to be all over the place ranging from 7 miles all the way up to 14 to 15 although the latter might be for more competitive runners. I'm seeking merely to be able to finish the half-marathon so what is the minimum long run training distance I should be aiming for to be able to finish a half-marathon?
Comment: Some details specific to myself: right now I'm running 5k distances for fitness and between four to five miles each week on a longer run. I've finished a 10k before in the past and the half-marathon I'm thinking about signing up for has a course limit time of three hours.
Answer: There are a very big difference between just completing a certain distance at a modest speed and running competitively for a good finishing time (e.g. with a time-goal). The following is true if you just want to finish, not if you run competitively.
As I learned it many years ago, to finish a race up to and including Marathon, the rule is that you should be be able to run 2/3 of the distance and feel reasonable well afterwards. Then you should be able to complete the full distance at a race at the same speed without feeling completely wasted.
So, to do complete a 15 km race at a modest speed, you must be able to run 10 km at the same speed. And to complete a half-marathon, you should be able to run 14 km (~ 2/3 of 21.1 km). This matches most beginners plans for half-marathons that I can find online. The intermediate and time-goal plans usually have longer distances for the longest runs, but here the plan is not to complete the race, but complete at a specific time - which is something else.
Running longer than 30 km is very hard on your body - especially you joints - and really should be avoided if at all possible. Even if you want to train for a Marathon. Most training plans for Marathon that I have looked at also stops at 30 km for the longest run.
If you want to run longer distances than this - like Ultras and Extreme Running - there are no way to train for it at a beginners level! The usual recommendation is to try first with a couple of Marathons, and then run 10-30 seconds slower per km depending on the target distance.
Answer: When I ran my first 20km (almost HM, which is ~21.1 km), I had previously run 5-10km, and twice 12km and once 17km, with about 1-2 runs per week over 1,5 months. Plus I trained acrobatics 3 times a week. I managed to finish, in just under 2h (so roughly 10km/h), but could barely walk up stairs the two days after.
Half a year later, my first HM, I had completed a training plan with 4x Running per week over 3 months, including 4 runs of 20, 22, 22, 24km respectively. I ran the HM with a friend who was an avid tennis player, but only ran 2 times a week for the past month with max distance 10km. We finished both around 1h45 (roughly 11,5 km/h). I was very happy at having improved my time, and a bit vexed, that even though I ran much more, my friend seemed to manage just as well. He fell sick that day, and only went back to work 3 days later.
I think the moral of my experience, is that amount of specific running training directly correlates to your wellbeing after having run a HM. If you are generally fit, and have run 10km, you should be able to finish, while being quite exhausted the days after. If you want to finish with a smile - you should run the half-marathon distance once or twice in a very slow speed (3h), although it is best to work your way up to that distance in successive runs and not straight away.


What is the aperture efficiency of an antenna?

Question: For reflector antennas, I see a number called aperture efficiency. What does it mean?
Answer: The aperture efficiency of a horn or reflector antenna is the ratio of the effective aperture to the physical aperture.  The formula usually looks like:
$$
\epsilon_{ap} = \frac{A_e}{A_p}
$$
The aperture efficiency is a dimensionless number usually reported as a percentage and $A_e$ is the effective aperture and $A_p$ is the physical aperture.
For horn and reflector antennas, the aperture efficiency is typically in the range of 50 to 80 percent.
I assume the OP understands antenna aperture.  The effective aperture is usually less than the physical aperture because the $E$-field is not uniform across the physical aperture.  The effective aperture and physical aperture are specific to each kind (with size dimensions) of horn and reflector antennas.
Answer: The aperture efficiency tells you what percentage of the power incident upon the antenna is available at the feedpoint.
The concept of "power incident upon the antenna" is a bit weird. So let's take a step back, and consider something more visible, like a sheet of paper. At any time there's some amount of light hitting this sheet of paper. We can increase the light hitting the paper by making the paper bigger, or by shining brighter lights at it. More specifically, all the light hitting the sheet of paper is called luminous intensity measured in candelas. The brightness of the light at the paper is called luminance, which is luminous intensity per unit area, measured in candelas per square meter.
The candela is a photometric unit: it takes into account only visible (by humans) electromagnetic radiation. The analogous unit which takes into account all electromagnetic radiation is familiar: it's the watt.
So now consider a receiving reflector or horn antenna. Depending on the transmitter's power, gain, and distance, there will be some irradiance at the receiving antenna, measured in watts per square meter. This irradiance, multiplied by the area of the reflector (assuming it's pointed in the right direction) gives you a power in watts, the theoretical power intercepted by the antenna. The ratio of the actual power at the feedpoint to this theoretical power is the aperture efficiency.
There is another number, the "effective aperture", which is the area we come up with if we run this calculation in reverse: start with the actual power at the feedpoint, and then calculate the area required to intercept that much power from the transmitter. The effective aperture is another way of expressing gain:
$$ A_\text{eff} = {G \lambda^2 \over 4\pi} \tag{1} $$
Where:

$A_\text{eff}$ is the effective aperture,
$G$ is the gain (as a unitless ratio, not in dB), and
$\lambda$ is the wavelength.

If $A_\text{phys}$ is the physical aperture, for example the area of the reflector, then aperture efficiency is simply the ratio:
$$ e_a = {A_\text{eff} \over A_\text{phys}} \tag{2} $$
Which we can combine with equation 1 to be expressed in terms of gain rather than effective aperture:
$$ e_a = {G \lambda^2 \over 4 \pi A_\text{phys}} \tag{3} $$
Or if your gain is expressed in decibels and you have frequency, not wavelength:
$$ e_a = {10^{G_\text{dB}/10}\: c^2 \over 4 \pi \: A_\text{phys} \: f^2} \tag{4} $$
As an example, let's find an arbitrary antenna on the internet with specifications:

2.4 GHz
24 inch diameter (0.2235 square meters area)
21 dBi

Thus by equation 4, the aperture efficiency of this antenna is:
$$ e_a = {
  10^{21\mathrm{dBi}/10}\: c^2
\over
  4 \pi \: 0.2235\:\mathrm{m}^2 \:
  (2.4\:\mathrm{GHz})^2
} = 70\% $$
That is, 70% of the power hitting that 24 inch reflector is available at the feedpoint, while the other 30% is lost. The losses could be due to:

the feedhorn and its support structure shadowing the dish
diffraction around the edges of the dish
less than perfect focus and reflectivity of the dish
inefficiencies of the feedhorn itself
Comment: This is a great reference answer.  Thank you, Phil for presenting the math.


about filing and making of prototype

Question: For a design patent (medical clothing item) is it better to file provisional patent first? then regular one? Also can we use other items out there to  construct our product (as in pieces of it used differently and not in the same type application?)
Comment: Are you sure you want a design patent which just covers ornamental design? Just because the item is clothing doesn't mean it won't merit a utility patent.
Answer: If you are looking for a design patent, you should not file a provisional application. A provisional application cannot be used for priority for a design patent.
For example, MPEP § 1504.10 provides:

Design applications may not make a claim for priority of a provisional application under 35 U.S.C. 119(e).

Moreover, the Convention period for a design patent is 6 months, not 12 months. You could in principle file a nonprovisional utility patent application, then 6 months later file a design patent claiming priority to the nonprovisional utility patent. But that would likely be an expensive six month extension of term.
Alternatively, you could file a nonprovisional utility patent application, then subsequently file a design patent application as a divisional before the utility patent application grants. This would likely be even more expensive, since you'd likely need to draft a full utility patent application and prosecute it. But it would extend the term by a few years.
Answer: I would say to both yes. Filing a provisional has the advantage that you have time to craft the claims while getting the priority day. Since the change of the law of priority day recognition the provisional filing is almost a must, even if you have outlined claims.
Using off the shelf components for demonstration does not violate other patents. The violation starts when you sell and use as a commercial mean.
Comment: The questioner was asking about a design patent. A provisional has no value to a design patent.
Answer: A provisional patent application is always a great idea because it sets your priority date at that earlier time, as a non provisional application (NPA) often takes longer to draft. It is meant as a placeholder only though while you draft the "real" application (your NPA). So while your NPA can benefit from the priority date of the provisional application, the provisional by itself does not offer any protection, I.e. in the case you fail to file an NPA within a year of your provisional, the provisional is abandoned. So be sure to follow within a year! In fact some inventors might prefer to work in secret rather than starting that one-year clock after the provisional is filed.
So while filing a provisional is a great idea, it is not required. It is neither necessary nor sufficient for full-on patent protection, which is the right to exclude. And of course it is an added expense, so shoe-string budgeted inventors sometimes forego filing a provisional.
Regarding prototyping material, you can use different material than that described in the application. No problem. What will be protected is the invention as laid out by the claims. Nothing has to exist yet in the real physical world.
Comment: The questioner was asking about a design patent. A provisional has no value to a design patent.
Comment: And why not? The idea is that you can have safe discussions while seeking funding or initial sales which could  contribute to the final design - so you could file provisional as you go and benefit from "safe" discussions.
Answer: I am shocked at the answers. There are only certain instances when a provisional is a good idea. Design patents are inexpensive, and can not claim priority to a provisional so you would be wasting money if you file a provisional patent application.
Comment: Quote from Maca's answer: "If you are looking for a design patent, you should not file a provisional application. A provisional application cannot be used for priority for a design patent."
Comment: While agree the answers other than Maca's are misguided, Maca's answer is correct. A better use of your efforts would be to comment and if possible down vote the bad answers. Perhaps your new status keeps you from doing so.

about filing and making of prototype


Adding users to Sharepoint when they are not in the same domain

Question: Bear with me as I explain this, I'm working my way through Sharepoint access as I go, but I'll clarify my question as I go along.
The Problem
We have about 10,000 users who need access to our Sharepoint 2005 based reporting. Because our organization is migrating from one domain to another, we need to add each user twice, once for each domain. For the current domain, this is no problem, we've got a powershell script that I tweaked to add all the users in a given CSV file, this takes about 5 minutes to run.
The big problem we're having is with users who are NOT in our currently active domain. Because the sharepoint server cannot authenticate the new users, we can't add them directly. What we're doing is creating a temp user, then using STSADM.EXE to migrate that test user to the proper domain/user_name for each of our 10,000 users. The creation and migration takes about 5 seconds per user, or well over 12 hours to run.
The Question
Has anyone encountered this before?
Is there a way to add users without requiring AD authentication?
Why is STSADM.EXE running so slow?
Comment: This seems to be more of a sysadmin type question, you may have better luck at serverfault (http://serverfault.com/)
Comment: right you are. I flagged for migration.
Answer: Wouldn't it be a lot easier to create a trust between the two domains?
Comment: This seems like the right way to go. You create a domain trust between the domains, and make sure sharepoint can see both. Then you add the users in fully qualified e.g. olddomain\username or username@olddomain


Difference between Pancakes and "Kaiserschmarrn"?

Question: Is there a difference between pancakes and Kaiserschmarrn from Austria?
Answer: There is a wide range of pancake variants.
Kaiserschmarrn are an egg-white leavened pancake often served with fruit and nuts, with the pancake itself being shredded for presentation.
This is different than the most typical pancakes served in the US, which are not egg-white leavened, but baking powder leavened, but it is still a type of pancake.
Comment: @mien Well this is big and puffy and fluffy, not thin and unleavened like the prototypical crepe.
Comment: To complete this question and answer, is there a difference between Kaiserschmarn and crepes?
Answer: A couple of years ago, I used 'pancake' to explain the problems of polysemy (words having more than one meaning, but due to divergence over time and not a case of being homonyms).
Kaisersharrn was one of the items used in my display, as I intended it to represent a pancake that was :

egg white foam leavened
not a breakfast item

... but those weren't the problems that people called out.  My sample size wasn't statistically significant, and my methodolgy was pretty sloppy (it was intended more as performance art), but, when we look at why people though kaiserschmarrn was not a pancake:

8 responses : isn't flat
2 responses : wasn't a breakfast item.
1 response : wasn't chemically leavened.

5 people said pancakes had to be fuffy, but didn't specifically call out the type of leavening.
For those that called kaiserscharrn for not being flat, I followed up and asked if they had even cut up pancakes for someone, and if the items that were cut up was still a pancake, but I don't recall any good responses to that line of questioning. (and I didn't record their response yes or no)
I really didn't think this would've been one of the items called out ... people were more accepting of corn tortillas being a pancake (due to shape) than kaiserschmarrn.
Comment: IMO, kaiserschmarrn are related to pancakes the same way scrambled eggs are related to omelets: same ingredients, same tools, and there ends the similarity.


Importing CQWP second time changed the Field name to a Guid

Question: I have a publishing site in 2013, pretty much OOTB.  It has a news section as well which is where I created a bunch of news articles and everything is published.
I then went to create a CQWP on the Home Page of the Site Collection.  I added the CQWP, left it at its defaults and have Pictures and Images.
Then I exported the part to get the .webpart and changed it to point at custom item and main xsl files in the style library.
I altered the Main to output all XML so I can add my custom fields and see what they look like. This is the bit of xml that does it
      <xsl:template match="/">
        <xmp><xsl:copy-of select="*" /></xmp>
      </xsl:template>

It returns this
 <dsQueryResponse>
        <Rows>
          <Row ListId="FBE9959B-E067-4641-A723-B97BAF4C9330" WebId="0DB3F73A-F288-4BA6-BB88-0BFA34A1A13C" ID="22" _x007B_fa564e0f_x002D_0c70_x002D_4ab9_x002D_b863_x002D_0177e6ddd247_x007D_="Video Test Article" _x007B_94f89715_x002D_e097_x002D_4e8b_x002D_ba79_x002D_ea02aa8b7adb_x007D_="News/Pages/Video-Test-Article.aspx" _x007B_1d22ea11_x002D_1e32_x002D_424e_x002D_89ab_x002D_9fedbadb6ce1_x007D_="22" _x007B_28cf69c5_x002D_fa48_x002D_462a_x002D_b5cd_x002D_27b6f9d2bd5f_x007D_="2015-01-20 15:04:24" _x007B_1df5e554_x002D_ec7e_x002D_46a6_x002D_901d_x002D_d85a3881cb18_x007D_="Danny" _x007B_d31655d1_x002D_1d5b_x002D_4511_x002D_95a1_x002D_7a09e9b75bf2_x007D_="Simon" _x007B_8c06beca_x002D_0777_x002D_48f7_x002D_91c7_x002D_6da68bc07b69_x007D_="2015-01-19 14:21:29" _x007B_30bb605f_x002D_5bae_x002D_48fe_x002D_b4e3_x002D_1f81d9772af9_x007D_="0" _x007B_ba3c27ee_x002D_4791_x002D_4867_x002D_8821_x002D_ff99000bac98_x007D_="0x400000300c231061" _x007B_c5c4b81c_x002D_f1d9_x002D_4b43_x002D_a6a2_x002D_090df32ebb68_x007D_="" _x007B_8fca95c0_x002D_9b7d_x002D_456f_x002D_8dae_x002D_b41ee2728b85_x007D_="4493" _x007B_39360f11_x002D_34cf_x002D_4356_x002D_9945_x002D_25c44e68dade_x007D_="aspx" _x007B_543bc2cf_x002D_1f30_x002D_488e_x002D_8f25_x002D_6fe3b689d9ac_x007D_="<img alt="" src="/News/PublishingImages/Pictures_Rosie%20smalljpg.jpg?RenditionID=2" style="BORDER&#58;0px solid;" />" _x007B_43bdd51b_x002D_3c5b_x002D_4e78_x002D_90a8_x002D_fb2087f71e70_x007D_="1" _x007B_9da97a8a_x002D_1da5_x002D_4a77_x002D_98d3_x002D_4bc10456e700_x007D_="" _x007B_b9e6f3ae_x002D_5632_x002D_4b13_x002D_b636_x002D_9d1a2bd67120_x007D_="" _x007B_691b9a4b_x002D_512e_x002D_4341_x002D_b3f1_x002D_68914130d5b2_x007D_="" PubDate="Tue, 20 Jan 2015 15:04:24 GMT" FileExtension="aspx" FileSize="4493" DocumentIconImageUrl="/_layouts/15/IMAGES/ichtm.gif" ImageUrl="/News/PublishingImages/Pictures_Rosie%20smalljpg.jpg?RenditionID=2" ImageUrlAltText="" Title="Video Test Article" LinkUrl="http://sp2013.ecm.development.int/News/Pages/Video-Test-Article.aspx" Style="Default" GroupStyle="DefaultHeader" __begincolumn="True" __begingroup="False" />
        </Rows>
      </dsQueryResponse>

I deleted the webpart off the page and then went to add a new site column.  I did this at the SPSite level, called it "TeaserHome" *note no space no special chars, its a text field.
I then added this Site Column to the "Article Page" Content Type, which all my articles are based on.
I then went and set some of these values in the articles so there is some data.
I edited my .webpart and added
<property name="CommonViewFields" type="string" >TeaserHome, Text;</property>

Then I Imported the .webpart on the homepage again, and there in the XML was the TeaserHome attribute on one of the rows.
<Row TeaserHome="This is teaser home text" />

GREAT.
Saved the page, publish etc.
Then I re-edited the page, deleted the .webpart.
I then re-imported the webpart and re-added it.
Now the XML does not contain the attribute TeaserText, it changed to to an encoded Guid.
<Row _x007B_e605c9b0_x002D_b7a3_x002D_4d3a_x002D_884c_x002D_4879742a0c47_x007D_="This is teaser home text" />

**I cut out most the attribs this time but you get the idea.*
Every subsequent import and re-add now has a GUID for a field name, which is no good, it should be its Internal Name.  Adding a DataColumnRename makes no difference.
The Column did not change I can go and query the list, site columns etc, I never touched it or renamed it or nothing.
I repeated these steps and it happened again, with a brand new site column first time round it works, delete and re-add the part and the field names some stupid encoded guid, which then of course I can't reference in my XSLT (maybe I could try and reference the Guid but that would be a stupid thing to do, the name should work).
I have to be able to delete and add web parts without worrying about some key functionality breaking.
Does anyone have a solution to this.
Answer: I've had the same issues as you're describing. There is no fix for this without customization. The best way to go is to write your own SharePoint Hosted App Part that does the same as the CQWP does.
Within the browser there is no solution.


Linux hard drive speed test

Question: I would like a lhard drive
speed test software.  I have tried black magic but it doesn't appear to support Linux.
What are my options?
Comment: Try [enter link description here](https://askubuntu.com/questions/87035/how-to-check-hard-disk-performance) - works well and on SSDs/M.2 drives
Answer: The Phoronix Test Suite is the most comprehensive testing and benchmarking platform available for the Linux operating system. The process from the benchmark installation, to the actual benchmarking, to the parsing of important hardware and software components is heavily automated and completely repeatable, asking users only for confirmation of actions. It is possible to log in real-time various system sensors like the CPU temperature, the battery power consumption, disk read/write speeds, and numerous other sensors. This can be done while any test profile is running and the recorded results are then provided within the results viewer.
The Phoronix Test Suite is licensed under the GNU GPLv3 free software license.
Supported platforms are Linux, Windows, OS X, GNU Hurd, Solaris and BSD operating systems. Phoronix Test Suite can be downloaded as a .deb package or .tar.gz package from the official Phoronix Test Suite website. Phoronix Test Suite is in the default repositories of all currently supported versions of Ubuntu, and can be installed using the command:
sudo apt install phoronix-test-suite

Comment: I'm using Debian/ubuntu so when I get a chance to test this question I think this should work.
Answer: Use the built-in time in front of some DD commands, read from /dev/zero or a CD/DVD iso and output to drive, read from drive and output to /dev/null
user@darkstar ~ $ time  dd if=/dev/zero of=testfile bs=1024 count=1024000
1024000+0 records in
1024000+0 records out
1048576000 bytes (1.0 GB, 1000 MiB) copied, 9.9741 s, 105 MB/s

real    0m10.093s
user    0m0.064s
sys 0m2.096s

Comment: Could you post a complete command you would use with time for completion sake?

Linux hard drive speed test


Can bricking my GT - I9100 damage my antennas?

Question: I'm running a cf-root, SG SII with KL1 kernel and cyanogenmod 7. Before getting it done the way it is now, I went through several failed attempts. I'm afraid the first few times I installed the wrong kernel because the blue progressbar didn't appear, the phone rebooted and then the screen gradually lit up, showing pixels of different colours scattered all over, like a sort of gradient. It was very frightening, therefore I ask: has the "pixels" thing done any damage to my phone, in any way? Have the wireless/gsm antennas been affected by this incident? (I've read, although I didn't really understand, that installing the wrong kernel can affect I a way -- again, didn't get in which way-- your wireless antenna's performance) Is this the truth? I've experienced difficulties when connecting to some wifi networks. Also, a firend's Galaxy Note showed more wifi bars than mine, of the same hotspot. Does that mean I have a problem? Would be "flasing a new radio" the solution? Thank you!
Comment: As Matthew said, although it's not impossible, it's quite unlikely. Also you can't really compare the signal bars on different devices models. It's difficult to compare signal quality, instead check for the network speed characteristic, running a speedtest and checking your ping time should tell you if you have any signal issues.
Answer: You shouldn't be able to damage your hardware through software.  It's obviously not impossible, there are things that control voltages and so on, but in general it's not even worth considering.
The Note and the SGS II have different hardware and software; there's no reason to believe that the difference in bars you see is anything other than normal.  If your connection has a problem, you'll notice when you try to use it.  Don't rely on the bars.


Is there an english translation of Ibn al Jawzi's Minhaj al qaṣidin

Question: Is there an English translation of Ibn al-Jawzi's Minhaj al-Qaṣidin? I know of ibn Qudamah's mukhtasar of the book but I'm looking for a translation of the original.
Answer: There is no English translation of Minhaj al-Qasidin wa Mufid al-Sadiqin (Arabic: منهاج القاصدين ومفيد الصادقين) as the Arabic version is not available in the first place. This book was lost long time ago, but I have heard that, for the first time, a Syrian publisher has distributed the book in Arabic, based on an old version found in Turkey. I have not seen this version. The manuscript in Arabic can be found here.
In the introduction of Ibn Qudamah's book of Mukhtasar Minhaj al-Qasidin, he mentioned that the book was an abridged version of Minhaj al-Qasidin by Ibn al-Qayyim, which is in itself an abridged version of Ihya' 'Ulum al-Deen by al-Ghazali.


manually installung Grub2 after Windows8.1 update 1

Question: After boot-repair failed to install (both with secure boot disabled and enabled), I decided to try running grub-install manually using the following command.
sudo grub-install --root-directory=/mnt/root/ --efi-directory=/boot --uefi-secure-boot /dev/sda7
Where /dev/sda7 is the root for the Ubuntu install. however, this prints Installing for i386-pc platform., and I'm on a 64 bit machine.  It fails, saying:
grub-install: warning: File system `ext2' doesn't support embedding.
grub-install: warning: Embedding is not possible.  GRUB can only be installed in this setup by using blocklists.  However, blocklists are UNRELIABLE and their use is discouraged.
grub install: error: will not proceed with blocklists.

I tried adding --target=x86_64-efi, but that prompted grub-install: error: /usr/lib/grub/x86_64-efi/modinfo.sh doesn't exist. Please specify --target or --directory.
An ls showed that, indeed, this file didn't exist.
ubuntu@ubuntu:/$ ls /usr/lib/grub
grub-mkconfig_lib  i386-pc

I don't really know what to do now.  I'm currently running Ubuntu 14.04 on a live USB.  The machine is a Toshiba Sattellite P55t with an i5.
Comment: can I retract this quiestion? I just reinstalled.
Answer: You have to install the package grub-efi-amd64-bin on your running live-system.
You can do this by using the following command:

sudo apt-get install grub-efi-amd64-bin


The clutch keeps going out in my truck

Question: my 94 ford ranger was fine then all the sudden the clutch went out. It wont go into gear and when you try and put it in reverse it grinds really loud. i have replaced the master cylinder three times and the slave cylinder twice. The fluid was gone and i put fluid back in it and it started working fine but today the gears are out but the resavoir is still full of fluid. What can be causing this issue? why does the clutch keep going out?
Comment: Does it go into gear when the engine is off? Did you bench bleed the master or slave cylinders?
Answer: You say the clutch is out. But have you replaced the clutch, pressure plate, throw out bearing and pilot bearing ? If you lost the fluid its gotta have a leak or  had one bad air bubble. Make sure it's bled correctly.

The clutch keeps going out in my truck


If an ATM is stolen, how easy can the personal information of the users be recovered?

Question: ATMs get occasionally stolen. How easy would be for the thiefs to retieve the PINs and other information of the users that have previously used the ATM? Is there a periodic wipe of all records/logs/traces on the machine within the ATM enclosure?
Comment: There is no reason for storing any user data on ATM, and all security guidelines clearly recommend against doing so. Do you have reliable information that ATMs actually **do** store such information?
Answer: There is no way to no for sure what happens inside the ATM, but most ATMs handle transactions by connecting to a server.  There is no reason that it should have to keep any record of transactions internally.
Answer: My sense is that ATM transactions processing is done mostly on the server side:

An ATM is basically a safe with a PC, an LCD monitor and some
  additional devices. ATMs are not on the Internet...

To clarify, they are not internet-accessible in the sense that installing cracking software on an ATM would require physical access to internals of the ATM, in advance of harvesting users' data.
Typically only an encrypted version of the PIN is stored and transmitted. There are few, if any, reported incidents of customers' personal information being retrieved from stolen ATMs. Instead, card skimming (copying data from ATM cards' magnetic strip) is the primary method used for ATM fraud.
The ATM is often severely traumatized by being pulled from its concrete foundation by a truck, with a chain wrapped around it. Even if it were not irreparably damaged, the modus operandi of ATM thieves is to open the ATM with a blow torch, which would likely impair function of anything that remained. Harvesting customer PINs, after stealing the ATM, would be unlikely. Thieves empty the cash, and abandon the ATM. ATMs are typically recovered by authorities after being incinerated, buried, submerged in lakes etc.
Answer: PINS are not stored within the ATM machines. When you type in your PIN in the keypad an offset is calculated (essentially a hash) and that is what is sent to the back end host. The hashes are not stored in the ATM either.
Comment: "When you type in your PIN in the keypad an offset is calculated" -- can you provide any source for this?
Comment: It's called an "Encrypted Pin Pad", or EPP for short. Source: http://www.diebold.com/Diebold%20Asset%20Library/dbd_eppremotekey_whitepaper.pdf
Answer: There is no way to retrieve the PIN and other information of the user through ATM.
At max EJ (Log journal inside ATMs) logs transaction details which contain information like account number/PAN (masked)/ amount. But PIN is not logged anywhere.
Moreover, PIN is never transferred anywhere unencrypted neither it is saved anywhere in that way. As soon as you enter the PIN over the ATM keypad, the entered value gets encrypted and then passed on for transmission.
Even the Server doesn't keep PIN records. Original PINs are stored in HSMs which is a hardware device kept with Bank's server.


Changing Iranian currency into Euros - cheaper in Europe or in Iran?

Question: Let's assume I have 100 million Iranian rials in cash. This is very roughly equivalent to something like 1000 Euros. I am in Iran and am traveling to Europe soon. Am I likely to get a better deal if I change my rials into euros in Iran or in Europe?
Comment: Have you checked that you can take such an amount out of Iran? This five-years-old post  suggests the maximum allowed is 500,000 rials or the equivalent of about five dollars based on the rate you refer to above.
Comment: Do you mean the best place in Iran? I doubt it's possible to exchange them once you arrive in Europe
Comment: @Traveller: in Iran or Europe.
Answer:
Large Iranian banks, like Bank-e Melli-ye Iran (BMI), Bank -e- Sepah, Bank Mellat, Bank-e Saaderaat-e Iran (BSI), Bank-e Paasaargad and Bank-e Saamaan (Saamaan Bank), and Beank-e Paarsiaan all have branches outside the country that can be found at their websites.
  Source: https://en.m.wikivoyage.org/wiki/Iran

You could check with some of the above banks and see whether their rates can compete with those of private exchange offices in Iran.
That said, it's definitely easier to exchange Rial in Iran (not many foreign banks will accept them) and probably you'll get better rates too.
I suggest you contact some banks and exchange offices in Europe and compare their rates (and fees) with the ones on the ground while you're still in Iran.
Answer: This post is relatively old and probably you've already exchanged your money but anyway, I'll add more points to what Martin already said, for future travellers:
Where to exchange:
I recommend to exchange your money inside Iran, but in certified exchange offices and not in the banks.
Currency in Iran has been always complicated, and lately, it's got even worse with all the sanctions, and its value being so unstable! As a result, there are plenty of exchange rates (official, merchant, traveller, free market, etc). Banks, usually work with the official rate which is currently around one-third of the free market. They might buy your Euros based on a different rate which is close to that in free market but still less.
Airport regulations for currencies:
You can take up to 10 thousand Dollars (or equivalent) to Iran without any need for declarations [source].
The limit for going abroad is around 5 thousand Euros (or equivalent) and/or 5M IRR (right now equivalent to ~40 Euros)  [source].

If you are curious and want to know more, I suggest watching this video by Nick (Indigo Traveller). In his video, he explains the complexity of the Iranian currency and some of the best practices on how to manage that as a foreigner.


How to stop biting my nails?

Question: I've tried a lot of things to stop biting my nails but with no success.
If there's something you have tried and worked, please share your advice and good practices.
Answer: Dab hot sauce on your nails and let it dry out, this should cause you to stop very fast. This is a very easy method but can be painful. If you find out that you actually enjoy the pain, there are some nail polishes with denatonium benzoate (a very bitter substance).
Comment: I tried this when I was a child but was unsuccesfull. You get used to the bad taste...
Answer: Get in the habit of carrying nail clippers in your pocket. Bring them with you everywhere you go. Rather than biting your nails, clip them instead.

There's a good chance you'll develop a new compulsion – clipping your fingernails – but that's a big improvement over biting them.
Comment: Some compulsive nail biters usually have almost nothing to clip. Have seen them bite on nails right down to the middle and keep going. There is nothing much that a clipper can get at that point.
Comment: @planetregin - The idea is to switch the habit from biting to clipping. The person might have to let some growth happen first. Anyhow, I know this can work, because I know a few folks who successfully used this approach.
Answer: One needs to control himself on this.
Best way to control - keep your mind focused on "I don't bite my nails"
Keep reminding yourself this statement.
You can even post it on your bedroom wall, desk, washroom mirror or any place where you have your visual focus more.
Hope this helps.
Comment: This indeed helps me a lot to control myself, thanks for the advice, bro ;)
Comment: Yes. Glad it helped you solve your problem.
Answer: Wear a rubber band around your wrist. Every time you find your hand near your mouth, snap the rubber band(hard!) on your wrist.
Also, keep a file handy for whenever you feel that a nail is out of shape.
Good luck!
Answer: I have just almost finished dealing with this for my 5 year old son. So here is a technique that worked.
"Mavala Stop" is a clear nail coat. Believe me when I say the taste is so yucky that there is no way but to stop putting your nails into the mouth. It took my son couple of weeks to get rid of a habit that was destroying his nails and also bothering us quite a bit. The coat wears off in about 3 days, so replenish it until the habit stops or resurfaces. The customer reviews describe more and no doubt it is the number one product on Amazon for 'Nail growth'. My son's nails are growing back healthily once again. Good luck.
http://www.amazon.com/Mavala-Stop-Biting-Sucking-0-3-Fluid/dp/B0000YUXI0
Answer: Biting your nails is likely be just a symptom of something else that is eating at you.
My parents have always wanted me to stop it, gave me nail coat (which were not strong enough I guess), tried punishing me, etc. - none of those worked.
20 years later I am still doing it, but at least now I know the background reason (which is not going to be fixed easily, but that's for another site).
Answer: I found a very good solution. I work in front of a PC, so I fixed in the screen a paper written "STOP BITING NAILS". So I look to it every time and I don't bite my nails accidentaly as I used to do.
Answer: Tried many of the suggestions here and the only thing that worked long term was taking supplemental vitamin D3. Your doctor can check your D levels. I take 2000 IU per day. Nails got stronger and the urge to pick at them went away. It was a totally unexpected benefit.
Answer: When I was a kid, I had a friend whose mum used to spread the gel from the aloe vera plant (really bitter) on his fingers to stop him from biting. It's edible from what I've read. Try that maybe? Hopefully you don't get used to the taste.
Answer: I bit my fingernails for about 30 years.  I didn't enjoy it but seemed powerless to stop.  I would do it without conscious thought.
Finally, two years ago after seeing my kids play with fidget spinners I realized that if my fingers were always busy then I couldn't bite my nails subconsciously.  I bought a fidget cube and for two months it was either in my hands or in my pocket.
After getting the fidget cube I never bothered my nails again.  After two months I no longer needed the fidget cube and gave it to my kids.
Good luck!
Comment: This sounds great, I bought exactly this one but...now I have a broken cube, annoyed collegues at the office and still, biten nails
Answer: just look at the contents of your fingernails under a microscope, the sight of it should stop you pretty fast.
link from womens' health listing things commonly found there
Answer: Don't just clip them, but file them as well. The nicer your nails are, the more of a reason you will have not to bite them. Increase your care for them until you no longer bite them.
Answer: I had this habit throughout pretty-much my entire childhood, into the adolescence. It went away naturally (I was not even aware of it happening) during a 1-week camping trip in the mountains. Because my hands were quite dirty most of the time because of the activities done, the biting just vanished.
While you might not have that luxury, here is some things you can try:

ask people around you to give a heads-up when they see you biting your nails. It worked with a colleague in the past, to get rid of saying some words very often, unnecessarily (something like "you know...", but every 20 words or so);
attach something to the fingers which you bite first or most often; can be a bit of adhesive paper, medical adhesive band... You can apply it directly on the nail. You will see it stop. It would actually prevent you from biting, even if you were determined (unless you willingly remove it).
as an alternative, apply brightly colored nail paint on the nail; while you can still bite the nail, you will still have the heads-up.

If people ask you about it, just tell the truth. There is no shame in it.

When I need to remember something, I write a short word on one of my fingers. When people ask me why I write things on myself, I just tell the truth. It is their problem if they do not agree.

How to stop biting my nails?


What should TAs do if students disrespect them?

Question: TAs are responsible for answering students' questions. But sometimes there are bad-mannered students who don't treat the TA with respect during the interaction. Should TAs just take it and still answer students with patience? Otherwise, they may be complained about by students. Or do TAs have a right to ask students to behave politely before answering them, or to just simply refuse to meet them?
Comment: Just to make sure: what do you *exactly* mean by bad-mannered? You know,I have seen TAs which tell something obviously wrong and when I (we, a couple of students noticed it) intervened, he told that I am wrong. Some students may leave it like that, but some may discuss further. If you, for example, classify this as bad-mannered (or questions in general?), it is a completely different story than "really" bad manners. So can you may elaborate on this, if possible with examples?
Comment: @Davor: of course students need to respect TAs the same is they need to respect any other human. Regardless whether it is a TA, technician, cleaning staff or the director.
Comment: Could you add some context? Where are you (what country), and what kinds of disrespectful actions have you observed?
Comment: You are not owed *respect*, any more than you're owed any other feeling. If they are breaking a rule, than deal with that. If they are not breaking a rule, just shut up and do your job.
Comment: @cbeleites "students need to respect TAs (or any other human being)" is just an opinion, so in this context, it is meaningless, I think. Plus, I actually agree with Davor, regardless of whether the that person is TA or a Professor, as long as the student is not breaking any rules, you should continue to your job because there is no reason for not to do it.
Comment: @Davor: we may have misunderstanding what "respecting" means. To me the basic level of respect that is due to everyone it is closely linked to the human rights (dignity), and respect to me is not a feeling but a property of your treatment of the person in question or your interaction with them.  IMHO, anyone (including students :-P) is welcome to have whatever opinion, feelings and thoughts of anyone else (including TAs) - they are their very own. But interactions nevertheless need to meet the standard for professional manners. I do consider not meeting such a standard as breaking rules....
Comment: @cbeleites - that's the thing, I don't *need* to respect anyone. Fortunately we still don't live in a complete dystopia where wrongthink is literally a crime.
Comment: ... This is my mental image triggered by the question: (Personally, I never had trouble with students treating me disrespectfully, btw) students leaving heaps of rubbish (chocolate papers, ...) in a lecture hall. I consider this very rude and disrespectful against the cleaning staff - and very unprofessional. It is clearly unacceptable behaviour in my culture. So is not greeting/not replying the greeting to receptionists or cleaning staff (or TAs or professors, ...). These 2 symptoms of lack of respect are the most common I've seen - and this is the level of (dis)respect I'm talking about.
Comment: @cbeleites - you are now also smushing professionalism into this all encompassing 'respect" that you have defined. To me, this word means nothing anymore, as it can mean everything. There are laws, there are rules, there are regulations. Bringing in abstract emotional concept like respect into it only makes the issues worse. Is leaving heaps of rubbish behind against the rules or your organisation? If yes, than enforce the rule. If not, either do nothing or complain to your superiors that you want such a rule. But no one cares about your private emotions about such matters.
Answer: The TAs in question should speak with the director of the course first and foremost - it will be important to have that person "on their side", and they likely have a better idea of what actions are available to the TA.
In a more general sense, my opinion is that you try to treat those students with a sort of detached professionalism, but you are under no obligation to go the extra mile to help them. And you are absolutely within your rights to ask them to behave politely.
Answer: As a TA, you have been granted a degree of authority from the instructor or professor that you are assisting, and in turn, the educational institution that employs you.  Your mentality should reflect this responsibility that you have undertaken.
One of the things that I learned from teaching is that your own attitude and professionalism (or lack thereof) is continuously signaled to your students.  That's not to say you have to rule with an iron fist in order to have your students' respect, especially in higher education.  But if you act like a student that just happens to have teaching responsibilities, you could be setting up a learning environment that opens you up to being disrespected.
When I was a TA, there was only one incident where I had to explicitly establish my authority.  During my recitation section, two undergraduates sitting at the back of the classroom were gossiping loudly, to the point where they were clearly disrupting the other students.  I stopped mid-sentence, stopped writing on the board, turned around, and simply waited.  The other students of course immediately noticed, but it took about 5 seconds for them to realize I had stopped because they were busy listening to each other.  Once they had shut up and turned to look at me, I said, quite firmly but calmly, "Nobody is forcing you to be here.  If you'd like to continue your conversation, feel free to do it elsewhere, but don't disrupt your classmates who are here to learn."  And then I went right back to teaching.
My point is that you have power, and you should not feel shy about using it, so long as you remember that your purpose is to facilitate the education of your students.  To the extent that lack of respect or disruptive behavior interferes with that goal, not only are you within your rights to exercise corrective action, I would say you have a duty to do so.  However, the nature of your interactions with your students must always be professional.  If there is disagreement about course topics, that's fine as long as it stays in the bounds of the concepts being taught.  It's not fine if it becomes personal (e.g., "What you said was so obviously wrong!  How can you be the TA for this class?" or "You're just an undergrad, and I'm doing my PhD in this stuff so I'm pretty sure I know what I'm talking about here").
Comment: To be clear, it's not the TA's problem if, as part of doing their job--and it **IS** a job--some students think that they're power tripping.  As long as the TA is behaving professionally and making good faith efforts to help their students, they're fulfilling their role.  If students don't like being held accountable for their conduct, that's their problem and their loss, not the TA's.
Comment: I loved your description of the technique right up to the sentence that began "Once they had shut up and turned to look at me".  At that point, all you'd have to do, 99% of the time, would be to continue with what you were writing, drawing, explaining, asking, etc.  In fact, the technique you described will often be more effective without the heavy handed scolding.
Comment: A similar strategy is to ask their names, and make a point of writing their names down. This is a subtle reminder that you have power over their grades - but never ever mention this.
Comment: @Davor I don't think it's out of line for a TA to get to know each student, and that could be accomplished by taking names (although in my opinion it is preferable to do it in a more organic way; e.g., through one-on-one interactions).  Again, I subscribe to the philosophy that the TAs are there to facilitate learning by providing more personalized instruction in a large class than what the professor can do.  They are not there to make the students "feel good" or be their shoulder to cry on.  It's a university, not kindergarten.
Comment: @heropup - of course, I agree. I was merely disputing axsvl77's advice that a TA should publicly threaten a student, whether explicitly or implicitly. I've seen that in action, it did not end well for the TA.
Answer: Some schools have a policy that disruptive students can be asked to leave the class by the instructor. You might check to see if the situation you describe rises to such a level.
Certainly consider discussing the situation with the supervising professor and/or the department chairperson.
Answer: First: The TA should try the best to find out the reason(s) behind such behaviour of the students. For example, (1) if the TA is very friendly with the students and has maintained a small distance with the fellow students, then the students might be thinking him as their friend in which case the formality would not come in the class; (2) if TA is not able to do proper teaching or problem solving, then students might take him as granted.
It also depends on the class size.
Second: What can be done?
As @Fomite points out, the TA should speak with the course in-charge to plan out the things to get the students in line. But, be ready with your points to discuss with the Professor as (s)he would definitely ask questions related to my 'First' point.
Answer: This is a difficult question to answer, we have to first consider the problem of "what level of respect should the students give the TA ?"
I am a docent in Europe and I have to teach undergrads in tutorials, and there are some things which I just let pass and somethings which I have zero tolerance for. Some things are so extreme that I would not tolerate them for a moment but thank goodness they have never occured.
Consider what you think is reasonable, do you want to expect the students to treat you like a god and even ignore you when you make an error ? If you expect that then sadly you will be very disappointed.
At the other end of the spectrum if a student made a comment about the appearance of a TA and made a sexual remark about them. Then I would strongly hold the view that this is totally unacceptable, as an academic if a TA came to my office and told me such a thing had happened then I would be deeply troubled and the next thing I would be doing would be contacting the HR officer for advice. I have never had a student come on to me in class, I hold a view that sexual relationships between the academic and the undergrad are an exceptionally bad idea.
I would lump racist, sexist or other bigoted abuse into the same bin of horrors which I would blow my lid at. If a student came to me and told me they did not want a white / black / asian / female / gay / muslim / jewish / christain / green / purple / whatever TA,
I would say "tough you are not able to choose the colour (gender / sexuaility / religion) of your TA. Chemistry is the same chemistry regardless of who the TA is. You need to grow up and become less bigoted"
In the middle you have a wide range of behaviours, I have had the class clown who kept on asking very odd questions such as "how long will be DVD player battery last" during a lesson on elctrochemistry (nerst equation). My advice with such people is never lose your cool, stay calm you need at least one adult in the room. One of those adults has to be you ! As long as the class clown does not disrupt the teaching you will just have to tolerate them.
The disruptive student who is chatting away on their phone or otherwise disrupting the lesson. My advice is to tell them to be quiet, and point out that they need to respect the right of others to learn. Also point out that if they want to discuss some sporting event from last night, their social lives or otherthings which are unreleated to the lesson then they can wait until they are not in the class before doing so.
I had a very offensive student who was being exceptionally rude to me and he kept saying "you do not know my name, you can not do anything about me". By chance I found out his name, the way I then dealed with the student was to walk up to him the next time I had to teach in the undergrad lab. I greeted him by name and told him I was glad to see him, I also told him that I hoped that he was going to have a productive and enjoyable day in the lab. This changed him from a horrible pest into a rather likeable little lamb.
Sometimes a good sense of humor is needed for improving the behaviour of students and making them keep their minds on the subject. I was once teaching basic nuclear chemistry to some undergrads. I had one who was swearing a lot and using the "s word". I turned to the class and in a totally deadpan way, I told them that the classic bioassay for determining exposure to airbourne plutonium is to get a feces sample, ash it and then measure the plutonium content in it. Suddenly using the s word was not quite so funny for the student. Human waste was no longer a swear word it was now something else. Sadly there are limited times when you can pull a stunt like that one to get them to focus and stop swearing.
It is important that you lead by example, if you for example want to your classroom to a cuss free zone, then do not litter your speech with colourful language which would make a factory labourer blush (I used to be a factory labourer in my youth).
You need to keep in mind that as a TA you are not there to be their friend, you are there to teach. Be friendly but try to keep a distance from the students. Never use your time as a TA to try to chat up students (ask for date) or arrange your social life with the students. I have seen some people break this rule, it results in a loss of respect from both the students and other people in the university.
One of the other people commented about make sure that they know you know their names as you have power over their grades. I would advise you to divorce in your mind their conduct in the classroom from their homework. If you grade problem sheets or homework, then ignore the name on written work. You should grade merely what is in front of you on the paper, do not care who the person is. Grade the written work in a totally fair way. One thing that this avoids, is if some horrible student who was "mouthing off" at you, conducting their social life in the classroom and calling you every dirty name under the sun spots that you marked them down becuase their were an arse in your lesson, then they have a tool to make your life harder. They now have a means of complaining to your boss.
If you grade them fairly and the student you flunk (one which did poor work) goes moaning to the head of department, the prof or whoever. If this person has a backbone they will tell the student to stop moaning when they see how you have marked their homework fairly.
You may sometimes have to accept that you might get a very gifted but lazy student. Occasionally you might encoutner a genius with a attitude problem who is lazy, unless you are in a subject such as medicine or the nuclear sector where a standard of behaviour (having the right attitude) is required for work then you will have to just put up with the lazy student who makes lifestyle choices which you disapprove of. I hold the view that the genius should use their time in a productive way rather than merely doing what is required of them in 5 minutes when most students need a whole hour to do it before doing no further productive work. But not everyone sees it the same way as me.
Answer: From the first moment you start to feel uncomfortable, you should inform either the professor teaching the course (if you are a grader), or your supervising administrator (if you are the instructor of the course, section, recitation section, or lab).
You are part of a system -- you are a cog in a complex machinery system.  Each part of the machine plays its role.  Part of your job as a TA is to inform your superior when a problem arises.  This is exactly one of the problems that can easily arise on campus.
The way the department will deal with the problem will depend on the context in which the uncomfortable interaction occurred -- in the classroom, in your office, in a computer lab, in the library, etc.
To help you visualize yourself as part of a complex system, with support from your department, I'll mention a few possible ways the problem might be addressed:

A veteran TA might be asked to work quietly at another desk in your office.
You might be asked to move your office hours to a larger group office.
You might be advised to refer the student to the professor him or herself, who is better equipped to answer their question(s).
The professor might email the student to request a visit to his or her office hours, where the professor might listen to the student's point of view, and then perhaps explain the basic ground rules of respectful interaction on campus.
The student might be transferred to a different section (if the behavior was serious, or repeated).
If the behavior was egregious, the student might face serious consequences with the university.

I think you will find that over time, as you find that you are consistently supported by your department, your self-confidence will grow, and you'll become more comfortable asserting yourself with minor incidents.  But to get from Point A (fear and uncertainty) to Point B (confident assertiveness), you must allow your department to support you.  Your department can't support you if you don't report incidents that make you feel uncomfortable.
Now, sometimes there's a gray area and you're not sure whether something is worth reporting.  As a new TA, your motto should be: if in doubt, report.  Just a simple email or stopping by a supervisor's office to make a mention of what happened.


Does Islam consider Jesus to be a prophet and of virgin birth?

Question: Does Islam consider Jesus to be a prophet and of virgin birth? Like Moses and Abraham and other prophets Jesus was a prophet. Was Jesus of virgin birth?
Comment: Even the most basic Google search would give you Islam's perspective of Jesus. Given that, and given your argumentative behaviour in comments (now deleted), this doesn't look like a real question and I am closing it as off-topic: **This is not an honest question and we are not a site for argument and debate.**
Comment: When did Jesus say he would die on a cross for mankind's sins?
Comment: A Google search doesn't not necessarily give truth nor does one side determine if a question is real.  The subjects of the question are real, the events are real. The question is focused on what it true. Now: Quran 2:136 ""We believe in Allah, and the revelation given to us, and to Abraham, Isma'il, Isaac, Jacob, and the Tribes, and that given to Moses and Jesus, and that given to (all) prophets from their Lord: We make no difference between one and another of them""
Injil, So Jesus said he would die on a cross for mankind's sins. He was decreed a prophets, so He spoke the truth.
Answer: Yes.

قالت رب أنى يكون لي ولد ولم يمسسني بشر قال كذلك الله يخلق ما يشاء إذا
قضى أمرا فإنما يقول له كن فيكون
She said, "My Lord, how will I have a child when no man has touched
me?" [The angel] said, "Such is Allah; He creates what He wills. When
He decrees a matter, He only says to it, 'Be,' and it is.
— Quran 3:47

قالت أنى يكون لي غلام ولم يمسسني بشر ولم أك بغيا
قال كذلك قال ربك هو علي هين ولنجعله آية للناس ورحمة منا وكان أمرا مقضيا
She said, "How can I have a boy while no man has touched me and I have
not been unchaste?" He said, "Thus [it will be]; your Lord says, 'It is easy for Me, and We will make him a sign to the people and a mercy from Us. And it is a matter [already] decreed.' "
— Quran 19:20-21


Can I dictate if an attachment is included in the text or as a thumbnail?

Question: Occasionally I wish to send a photo or file to open with the message text and at times I wish to send as an attachment that needs to be opened by the receiver. How can I determine this?
Answer: One way of dictating the choice is to choose what format you send the mail in. If you send mail as plain text then the attachment will need to be opened by the receiver (although the receiver's mail client may choose to provide a preview with the message, much like Mail.app does for some images and PDF documents). If you send the message as rich text (Format -> Make Rich Text) you can choose to place images etc. in the message and they will be visible in place to the receiver (depending on the capabilities of the receiver's client).


Can a raging barbarian carry live rabbits to kill them, in order to keep his rage going?

Question: One of my players, a human barbarian, came up with the idea of carrying captured rabbits, feeding them and treating them nicely, so that he can rip them apart mid-battle if he knows he will be unable to attack during the round. Does this sound balanced or does this sound like breaking the rules?
Comment: Somewhat duplicate of the famous [bag-of-rats](https://rpg.stackexchange.com/a/124888/10383) ?
Comment: Related to enemies and hostile creatures: [What is considered an enemy for an Orc's Aggressive trait?](https://rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/109951/what-is-considered-an-enemy-for-an-orcs-aggressive-trait)
Comment: [Also related.](https://rpg.stackexchange.com/q/50974/15469)
Answer: No, that's not how rage works.
Murdering random rabbits does not fuel rage. A barbarian's rage works as follows:

It ends early if you are knocked unconscious or if your turn ends and you haven't attacked a hostile creature since your last turn or taken damage since then.

First of all, if you're carrying rabbits around and treating them nicely, then the rabbit presumably is not hostile. It may become hostile if the barbarian suddenly attacks it, but by then it will be dead.
Second, this will require the serial killing of many, many rabbits. Eventually you will run out.
By comparison, it would be more efficient for the barbarian to maintain the rage by damaging themselves. This would fulfill the "or taken damage since then" clause. On rounds where they can't attack an enemy, they smack themselves with an unarmed attack, or use the hilt of their weapon as an improvised weapon. They have resistance to physical damage during a rage, so this probably won't hurt them very much.
Recommendation: Make attack rolls anyway.
In general, the barbarian should be attacking every round in a rage. If you really need to keep the rage going, then make attack rolls. They don't have to hit.
For example, the barbarian could carry some spare throwing weapons or some ranged weapon. That way, if your enemies are out of your movement and melee range, then the barbarian can make a thrown or ranged attack each round while moving toward the enemies. Even if these attacks miss the enemy, they will keep the rage going until the barbarian has closed in.
Answer: It's up to your DM
The only stipulations that end your rage are not taking damage and not attacking hostile creatures.

It ends early if you are knocked unconscious or if your turn ends and you haven't attacked a hostile creature since your last turn or taken damage since then.

So yes, conceivably, if your DM allows you to consider these hostile, they're hostile. But can you really consider them hostile?
Hostility is something that isn't clearly defined. But at the end of the day, you decide who your foes are and who your friends are. This is necessarily undefined because relationships are difficult to describe. The word hostile is used to differentiate your targets from your allies, disallowing you from punching allies to keep raging.
However, saying something is hostile and it actually being hostile to your character are two different things. You need to remember that you are playing a character, not a video game.You can claim your character considers these rabbits hostile enough to keep raging, but I don't think your DM will buy it. Rules like these are left wide open for your DM to make judgement calls on the intent and the language of the rules. We can no easier flip a switch from friend to foe than we can jump to the moon. You can say your character does it, but your DM decides "reality".
So, convince your DM that you can carry rabbits (or something) that you actually hate enough to consider hostile, and you can attack them to keep raging. Maybe you believe the rabbits to be demons, or you had a bad experience with them as a child. Convince your DM and the rules allow this.
Although, it's much easier to just take damage instead. Here is a great question about how to keep raging with many good answers.
Comment: [I've got a theory, it could be bunnies!](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YLMaSII_URU).  Precedent if *you* are an ex-demon.
Answer: While I can't find an equivalent rule in 5e, in 4e this "bag of rats" exploit was explicitly disallowed.
From the 4e DMG:

Legitimate Targets
When a power has an effect that occurs upon hitting a target—or reducing a target to 0 hit points—the power functions only when the target in question is a meaningful threat. Characters can gain no benefit from carrying a sack of rats in hopes of healing their allies by hitting the rats.

If I can find the equivalent 5e wording I'll add it but I think it's fair to say this type of strategy is not allowed.
Answer: Honestly, your player is not really role-playing anymore they are just trying to min-max around the rules. If this question came up I'd point out to him straight up - "Rage isn't something that he understands - it's a reaction to a combat situation. When he goes through multiple turns doing damage in a row, that's him 'losing control of himself' and rampaging. Why would he stop rampaging, kill a rabbit 10 feet from an enemy, then continue rampaging? Why would he carry rabbits in to combat in the first place?"
Can he do it? Sure (though this is up to the DM's discretion). Does it make sense in a role-playing sense? Not unless you're trying to justify it to someone else :).


Battery and current confusion?

Question: How exactly does a battery produce a current in the circuit connected across its ends? I dont want to know the chemical reactions in the battery core, but just the essence of it. I believe it doesn't do this by creating an excess of electrons at the -ve terminal and a deficit at the positive terminal. Moreover, how is the voltage and the EMF different in their definitions and value. Electric field being a conservative field, can the work done in motion of electrons in the conducting wire and all the components be compared to the work done in any other path across the terminals of the battery? And on a side note, how can we theoretically derive an relation between the potential difference and the electric current?
Answer: The technical name for the structure in a battery is known as the "electrochemical cell". It consists of an electrolyte (or more of them), a liquid with ions that carry the electric charge. The asymmetry in the battery, the main reason why it works, is that these two types of carriers like to participate in chemical reactions in two different containers, near the two electrodes.
Positively charged ions – imagine $Na^+$ from salt, although it's not the most realistic example – like to to get "attached" to one electrode while the negatively charged ions – imagine $Cl^-$ ions from salt – like to get "attached" to the other one. These two types of reactions are called reduction and oxidation, respectively, according to the sign of the charge that the ion is gaining or losing. I don't want to get lost in sign errors so I haven't assigned them to the first sentence of this paragraph. As these chemical reactions are running, they are producing a charge asymmetry, and therefore a discrepancy between the potentials of the two electrodes, and this asymmetry is compensated by the flow of electrons through the wires of the circuits (outside the battery). In the long run, one is converting chemical energy (sort of an electrostatic potential energy of ions – they're "higher", using a gravitational analogy, before they react with the electrodes) to a hopefully useful energy done by the circuit. The total energy is conserved. The energy deposited to a charged particle moving across voltage $V$ is $E=VQ$.
EMF, the electromotive force, is a special type of voltage, so its SI unit is 1 volt, just like for any other voltage. I say it is a special kind of voltage because it is used for the "energy generating" parts of the circuits only, namely for batteries or parts that produce electricity by electromagnetic induction (following Faraday's law) like coils in a variable magnetic field. There's also voltage on resistors and capacitors but it's "passive", or "consuming" the power created elsewhere, so we don't count it as EMF. EMF is meant to be the "ultimate source of life" in electrical circuits.
Concerning the derivation of the relation between current and voltage, I suppose you mean Ohm's law $V=IR$. Its microscopic form is $\vec j = \sigma \vec E$, i.e. the current is proportional to the electric field where the coefficient $\sigma$ is known as conductivity. This formula holds for metals rather well because the electric field accelerates electrons up to an average speed dictated by the trade-off between the electric field acting on the electrons; and the decelerating speed from the collisions. This trade-off leads to a velocity that is proportional to $\vec E$ as well, and $\vec j$ is the product of the electron density and the average velocity of these carriers.
Answer: Whether EMF is a kind of voltage or not depends on terminological conventions. EMF certainly has the same dimension as the voltage (a.k.a. electric tension) has. They are customarily added or subtracted in formulae related to voltage sources such as $U = {\mathcal E} - I\cdot R_{\rm int}$. But these ${\mathcal E}$ and $U$ are no more the same quantity as energy density and pressure are (that also have the same dimension).
Electric tension is the difference in electric potential (it is much like gauge pressure that is the difference in absolute pressure). On the fundamental level, electric potential is a foggy concept, you can read at Ambiguity on the notion of potential in electrical circuits? about this, but for most electric circuits you can assume that potentials inside conductors are well-defined. What is the EMF, indeed? In some sense it is a quantitative expression of a force experienced by the charge carriers other than electrostatic force. As one can read in Wikipedia, it may have electrodynamic origin (Lorentz force), but not necessarily. Original poster was more interested in chemical sources, although doesn't want to know the chemical reactions. No: without knowledge of chemical reactions (that often create, annihilate, and convert charge carriers) one can't understand which force pulls carriers in an electrochemical cell against the $-q {\mathbf E}$ force. Without lengthy excursion in this matter and complexities of the solid-state physics I can only say that such forces act at the atomic scale.

Battery and current confusion?


Personal Facebook usage statistics

Question: Is it possible to see personal Facebook usage statistics from facebook.com or some other web service? By statistics, I mean, for example, the total number of likes, posts, logins, etc. (maybe detailed in periods).
Answer: Klout.com offers, as part of its measurement of how "influential" you are online, some Facebook stats such as # of likes and comments (total / per post).
Disclaimer: Klout is quite limited with regards to Facebook (being more Twitter-oriented), and it seems a Twitter account is required to be able to use it at all.
(But at least Klout proves that some such statistics are indeed available through Facebook's APIs, so quite possibly there are other services that provide what you ask for...)
Answer: I think that the best option is Wolfram Alpha.
Check it out at http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=facebook%20report
:)
Answer: As all of those apps no longer work but here is a new Facebook app: "Facebook Analytics"
It will give you all those answers and more in a very user friendly way. It also works for pages. Here is the description from the page:

A free tool for analysing your Facebook data. Use Analytics to know:

The total number of likes, comments and shares
Who comments and likes the most
Which users get the most likes and comments
Who the most influential users are
Which content generates the most interest
Who are the most influential users outside of your social circle

Personal Facebook usage statistics


Disk space visualizer with delete function

Question: Is there a tool that let me (recursively) visualize how much diskspace space directories and files (!) consume on my disk and that lets me delete directories and files (!) which would result in a on the fly update of the visualization. Something like HDGraph only that it also shows the size of the files separately and that it has a delete function.
Answer: SpaceSniffer brings up the standard Windows context menu on a right-click, so yes, it can delete.
It updates instantly as well (even from things outside the application, which is awesome to watch!)
Comment: This is the best answer because SpaceSniffer ist fast (you don't have to wait until the whole disk is scanned, it updated automatically when something changes (even through external applications) plus it has the best search, filter and tagging functionality of all suggested apps. Also the UI is comparably sleek and modern.
Answer: I found WinDirStat a while back and found it to be awesome. You can delete files from within the application. You can also do it outside and then right-click any part of the directory tree and have it refresh it quickly.
http://windirstat.info/
Answer: TreeSize does it very well, and the pro version has a nice pie chart and bar chart - if the starburst chart of the alternate tools is not your taste.
Answer: I mostly use the excellent freeware Folder Scanner.


How does Wikipedia prevent spamming?

Question: Anybody can alter wiki contents, and I am wondering "How does Wikipedia prevent spamming?", when even not registered members edit the contents. What you think about it?
Answer: Crowdsourcing
Wikipedia has many editors, each editor is usually subscribed to change notifications of the article they created/edited during their Wikipedia activity life span. When you make an edit, one of the editors reviews it and if it's spam he will revert the change to the article previous state.
Wikipedia relies on people to filter out the spam, you can do this too by going to the history tab.
Comment: You can't block all the spammers in the world with just crowdsourcing. Software plays a much bigger role. See my answer to this question.
Answer: From their About page on abuse:

Handling disputes and abuse
Wikipedia has a rich set of methods to handle most abuses that commonly arise. These methods are well-tested and should be relied upon.

Intentional vandalism can be reported and corrected by anyone.
Unresolved disputes between editors, whether based upon behavior, editorial approach, or validity of content, can be addressed through the talk page of an article, through requesting comments from other editors or through Wikipedia's comprehensive dispute resolution process.
Abuse of user accounts, such as the creation of "Internet sock puppets" or solicitation of friends and other parties to enforce a non-neutral viewpoint or inappropriate consensus within a discussion, or to disrupt other Wikipedia processes in an annoying manner, are addressed through the sock puppet policy.

In addition, brand new users (until they have established themselves a bit) may at the start find that their votes are given less weight by editors in some informal polls, in order to prevent abuse of single-purpose accounts.
Answer: Users can also create programs called bots that help automate dealing with spam and vandalism.
Here is a list of bots and what they do. Some users publish the code for their bots.
Answer: While crowdsourcing is definitely part of the way Wikipedia handles spam it's only a very minor part. Wikipedia is using several anti-spam extensions, without these it would be a big spamfest that no army of humans could stop. Around November 2014 these are set up:

Abuse Filter - Applies automatic heuristics to edits
AntiSpoof   – Blocks the creation of accounts with mixed-script, confusing and similar usernames
AntiSpoof for CentralAuth   –   Adds AntiSpoof technology to CentralAuth
ConfirmEdit -   Provides CAPTCHA techniques to protect against spam and password-guessing
SpamBlacklist   –       Regex-based anti-spam tool allowing to blacklist URLs in pages and email addresses for registered users
Title Blacklist -   Allows administrators to forbid creation of pages and user accounts per a blacklist and whitelist
TorBlock - Allows tor exit nodes to be blocked from editing a wiki

How does Wikipedia prevent spamming?


What law requires payment of a termination fee as outlined in a contract?

Question: My employer canceled on me (I am a contract worker) and didn't pay the termination fee we discussed. I want to show him the actual law so that he may understand that he should pay me because I have a legal right. The fee was written in the actual contract.
Comment: In which state? Generally there is not likely to be *any* statute saying "contracts are legally binding" (this is something that is normally based on court precedent), but depending on your state it might be.
Answer: It isn't ordinarily written in law.  The only law directly pointing this out would likely be if you can show a court case with similar facts where an employer was made to pay.
Parties have obligations under contracts, which in most cases are established by the contract itself rather than the law.  Those obligations are enforced by bringing a lawsuit in court for "breach of contract."  (Or, if the contract specifies, going to arbitration).
If a party refuses to honor their contract, the typical next step is to have a lawyer to write the party a sternly worded "demand letter" on law firm letterhead that makes the party realize he, she, or it has a legal obligation and it will be cheaper to pay than to fight.
Comment: Small claims court may be a better option if the amount in dispute falls within their jurisdiction.  The cost of having the lawyer write the letter is not recoverable by default in the United States, where the "American Rule" requires that each party pay its own costs.  However, the contract may specify that the substantially prevailing party can recover its costs under the contract in the event of a dispute.  If the contract does, the cost to write the letter is technically recoverable.
Comment: Would the cost of having the lawyer write the letter be recoverable?  Would small claims court be a better option?
Answer: Contract law is common law, not statute law, that is, there is no piece of legislation that you can point to and say "there's the law".
What you need to do is find cases, preferably decided in your state that support the enforcement of such a clause and quote the cases to the principal.
Comment: This is true in most states. It is not, however, true in Louisiana (whose legal system has *heavy* French influence, meaning it has lots of aspects of civil law, particularly for contracts and torts).


Why is Greninja Ash's only bonded Pokémon?

Question: If Ash bonded with his Greninja that he had for one generation, but he won't use it anymore, why haven't Pokémon like Pikachu or Tauros bond with Ash instead?
Answer: In the same way that not every pokemon has a Mega Evolution the only pokemon known to have the bond ability so far is the Greninja.
True that by now we can believe that Pikachu and Ash have maximum trust, one of the requirements for the Bond phenomena to happen.
But that might not be the only requirement, or Pikachu species does not have this bond ability.
It remains to be shown further if other pokemon than Greninja have that ability or not.
Comment: If you were talking in game terms, then it's not just an ability, it's an Ability - i.e. something specific to an individual Pokemon, and only one particular Greninja (the one that appears in the Sun Moon demo) has the "Battle Bond" Ability.
Comment: @ConMan yes. And the TCG card specifically states Ash's Greninja


Should I link my research in my SOP?

Question: I have done some independent research that I wish to mention in my SOP. The full account of what I have done till has been published as an e-print on arxiv.org. Can I give a hyperlink to this e-print in my SOP?
Answer: I would differ a bit from both of the previous two responses.
The SOP and the CV serve different purposes. The SOP is the high-level summary (some would say sales pitch) for why your work is interesting and why you should be hired. This needs to be tightly written and compelling, and part of being compelling is highlighting particularly unique, interesting, or high-profile publications. Importantly, I've been told by several hiring committee members that more people will read your SOP than your CV - so if something's important, don't bury it only in the CV. The CV is more of a "data dump" in which you list everything that you've done that may be of interest. You don't necessarily want all of this detail clouding up your SOP, although you want the hiring committee to have access to it if necessary. Think of your SOP like a glossy brochure and the CV like a dictionary - the former is intended to be read while the latter is intended to be referenced.
So, that said, I think it's both a mistake to leave your publication out of your SOP entirely and also to list all of your publications there (if you have many). Reference only the key ones that support the rest of your story and include a hyperlink in a footnote if you think that a reader might actually follow it. I would suspect that this will be a rare event, though, and I would encourage you to put enough detail from this publication in the SOP itself that a reader won't have to follow the link to get the gist of what you did.
Comment: *Think of your SOP like a glossy brochure and the CV like a dictionary - the former is intended to be read while the latter is intended to be referenced.* -- I really like this part.
Answer: Yes, you should absolutely list it in your statement, in the bibliography, with a hyperlink, along with all the other papers you cite in your statement.
Comment: I don't understand what you're suggesting.  Your CV should list all your publications and preprints.  Your research statement (aka "statement of purpose") should describe your research interests and accomplishments with citations to the relevant literature, most likely including your own papers.  If your statement _only_ cites your own work, then you may as well use your CV as your bibliography, but what kind of scholar only cites their own work?
Comment: What I think I should do is mention all the citations in my resume, what do you think?
Answer: No, you shouldn't list it on your Statement of Purpose. You should cite it properly in your CV / Resume, or in a separate list of publications.
You can certainly discuss the research that led to the paper in your statement, but if the statement-readers would like to read the paper itself, they can find the reference in your other material.
Comment: Why shouldn't it be listed in the statement of purpose?  Certainly it should also be listed in the other places you mention (including it just in the statement of purpose would be a bad idea).  However, it's common for statements of purposes to cite references, in which case it should be listed in the bibliography there too if it is cited.

Should I link my research in my SOP?


Show a name of the current application on wingpanel like in OS X

Question: Is there a way to see a name of the current application on wingpanel? I know that is possible to launch applications on Freya and see "global menu" on wingpanel, but I didn't found any wingpanel's fork that shows name of the application.
Answer: No, there isn't any version of wingpanel available that suits your request. In fact, there is no active fork of wingpanel anymore. You can find a bit more information here. Both popular wingpanel forks are abandoned.


WordPress blog to Blogger for auto post through IFTTT

Question: I have connected my WordPress blog to Blogger for auto post through IFTTT. Now I want to connect my another WordPress blog to my Blogger blog for auto post. How can I add my second WordPress blog in IFTTT?
Answer: Unfortunately, no, because you can only configure one WordPress blog in the WordPress channel.
An alternative is to use a different channel, such as the Feed channel to pick up new posts from your other blog to send to your Blogger channel.
You might be able to do what you want with another IFTTT account.


Hostname problem

Question: my hostname is newton ...when I set  "127.0.0.1  Newton" in /etc/hosts .. parallels stops working.. when I set "127.0.0.1 localhost" in /etc/hosts  apache installed via ports stops working..  when I add both '"127.0.0.1 localhost", and "127.0.0.1 newton" to hosts file.. parallels network doesnt work
Answer: I'd say, this is not generally wrong. You definitely should leave the first few lines in your /etc/hosts file:

127.0.0.1       localhost
255.255.255.255 broadcasthost
::1             localhost
fe80::1%lo0     localhost
# Add additional host names below:
127.0.0.1 newton
127.0.0.1 testhost
127.0.0.1 something

I've got such a configuration myself on Mac OS 10.6 (Snow Leopard) and had this on 10.5 (Leopard) as well, with Parallels Desktop and Apache still working.
But this configuration does not mean your additional hostnames are working on your virtual machines in Parallels as well. Edit the host files on each VM separately.
Answer: Don't play with "/etc/hosts"! The original file is as follows, don't change it:

##
# Host Database
#
# localhost is used to configure the loopback interface
# when the system is booting.  Do not change this entry.
##
127.0.0.1   localhost
255.255.255.255 broadcasthost
::1             localhost
fe80::1%lo0 localhost

Most likely, you need to change the name and/or address on which you bind in your Apache configuration.
Answer: is there any reason you could not have it as
<code>127.0.0.1       localhost newton testhost something
255.255.255.255 broadcasthost
::1             localhost
fe80::1%lo0     localhost
</code>
instead.
And in some cases you want to specify hosts.
Especially on internal networks like I have where you do not have a DNS host setup. (House Lans and clusters that do not see outside world)
so I define the ipaddress and names in the host files so that computers can talk to each other without the hassle of setting up a DNS server.

Hostname problem


Conky dropping shadow when invoked at startup

Question: I read this thread but it doesn't really address my issue. The problem that I have is that whenever I log in, conky starts up, as set up in Startup Applications, but the instance it runs is dropping shadow and is above every other window, showing the wallpaper beneath it. This can be easily fixed by relaunching conky, but that defeats the purpose of having it start up at login. Also, running conky at any point manually after logging does not cause this. Any suggestions? I rewrote the script and played about with Compiz, but it still keeps happening.
Answer: Have you tried using "conky -p 50" in Startup Applications?
It means there will be a lag of 50 seconds before Conky is actually started and gives all other programs the opportunity to start smoothly before conky is run.
Solved a lot of issues for me.
Might be worth to try...
Answer: I had the same problem. It's caused by conky starting up before the window manager. Most solutions will have you set conky to start 30s after boot. I found a very nifty little script that works like a charm:
<code>#!/bin/bash
until ps -A | grep "gtk-window-deco"> test -n
do
    sleep 1
done
/usr/bin/conky --quiet --config=.conkyrc &
</code>
Simply copy that into a text editor and save it as 'conkystartup.sh' (without quotes) into whatever directory suites you.
Then, add the path to the .sh file in 'Startup Applications'.
It works perfectly for me, and shows up right when you log in.
Source: http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1707947
Comment: FYI: I use Ubuntu 12.04 with the "GNOME Classic" desktop. There is no process `gtk-window-deco`, so I use the static delay.


Does Italian have a demonstrative pronoun for 2nd person?

Question: Demonstrative pronouns in Italian are "questo," corresponding to "this" and "quello," corresponding to "that" in English, which also have their plural counterparts, "these" and "those."
In my language, which is Georgian, there are 3 types of demonstrative pronouns according to the number:
1st person: რა არის ეს? What is this (that I am holding)?
2nd person: რა არის ეგ? What is that (that you are holding)?
3rd person: რა არის ის? What is that (that he/she is holding)?
So English uses "that" for 2nd and 3rd person while the Georgian language has different demonstratives for 2nd and 3rd persons.
My question is this: Does the Italian language have a specific demonstrative pronoun apart from "quello" to indicate the thing the person being spoken to is holding, or does it use "quello" for both 2nd and third person pronoun like English does?
Comment: Welcome to Italian.SE, @zaliko1963! Very interesting question!
Comment: @zaliko1963 Since there seem to be some disagreement about the interpretation of your question, could you clarify better how these "2nd person" pronoun are used? Are they based on closeness to the listener or to some other characteristic?
Comment: If I get you right, the distinction that your language makes is based on the grammatical category of person and not on the distance between the speaker and the addressee with regard to a certain object. If so, Italian behaves differently. I would be very grateful if you could confirm or correct this.
Answer: Sounds like you are looking for codesto, nowadays rarely used outside of Tuscany:

codésto (o cotésto) agg. e pron. dimostr. [lat. eccu(m) tibi iste]. – Indica persona o cosa vicina a chi ascolta, o a lui relativa, o nominata subito prima.

That is, codesto is an adjective or a pronoun that indicates a person or an object close to the listener, or related to him, or something that has been mentioned (by the listener) immediately before.
Outside of Tuscany, usually the role of codesto is played by questo or quello, depending on whether the object referred is close to or distant from the speaker (so that the position relative to the listener is irrelevant).
For instance (these examples are taken from the book Italiano by Luca Serianni), in Tuscany one can say

Sono nuovi codesti guanti?

referring to some gloves worn by the listener. But in the rest of Italy one would say questi guanti (assuming that the interlocutor is close to the speaker in a real or ideal way) or, if there is the possibility of some misunderstanding, questi tuoi guanti or simply i tuoi guanti.
Comment: Comments are not for extended discussion; this conversation has been [moved to chat](https://chat.stackexchange.com/rooms/105582/discussion-on-answer-by-federico-poloni-does-italian-have-a-demonstrative-pronou).
Answer: No, Italian does not have different demonstrative pronouns according to the grammatical category of person, but only along the parameter of proximity of the referent to the utterer and the addressee ("questo": close to the utterer, "quello": far from the utterer (and also in some cases from the addressee").
Comment: Comments are not for extended discussion; this conversation has been [moved to chat](https://chat.stackexchange.com/rooms/105571/discussion-on-answer-by-nico-does-italian-have-a-demonstrative-pronoun-for-2nd-p).


Drupal anonymous post linked to users

Question: I have a situation where anonymous users can fill an application using entityforms and send without registering on a site. Later on the anonymous user is expected to register for an account.
Now the anonymous user will in the entity form submit a field called email address.
Now I want to use that field to compare with current users email address and if a match is found, create a link between previous submissions and the user.
The two options, I have tried are views, creating a relationship between user and entity form through email field but that is not working
Also tried rules where data comparison is made between entity form email field and current user email field, I am aware the commerce guys have done the same thing on their commerce module to allow anonymous shoppers to submit carts.
The other solution could be populating hidden fields with cookies data and then creating a relationship between says session Id on post and user session Id.
Could someone shed light on the best approach and if possible some sample solution..
Answer: I would do it through rules

Add Email to then entityform type
create a VBO Viewthat find entityform submissions.  It should have contextual filter for the email field
add a reaction rule for user being created
Add an action to Rule to load list from VBO using the user email to send the View
Loop through list and set uid property for Entityforms to user->uid

btw entityforms is my module.  Thanks for using it.

Drupal anonymous post linked to users


Duration of lexical directives like "dolce," "espress.," and "marcato?"

Question: What is the duration of lexical directives like "dolce," "espress.," (espressivo) and "marcato" when they appear in a written score beneath a bar?
Is it until the end of the bar, for the remainder of the movement, or until a change of something like the time signature or the dynamics?
Comment: Your examples do not have the same quality. Anybody can judge, whether you play something *marcato*, but the other are more addressing the spirit to to play with, where you are supposed to decide yourself (in absence of explicit different directives.)
Answer: Good question, and the answer is one of those annoying "You'll know when you're more experienced" put-offs. The duration of such directives is not regulated unless you write explicit dashes to mark the extent (but that is common only for tempo alterations, presumably because it's particularly important for keeping multiple players co-ordinated).
So how do people know the extent of an instruction? It's only possible because we approach bits of music with knowledge of previous, similar bits. A dolce will usually appear right next to a prominent melody, phrase or figure that we can well imagine to be played "dolce", and it will apply either to the entirety of that melody or until it's cancelled by an opposing instruction or the end of the movement.
Position is also important; an instruction right over the first bar of a movement can be understood as applying to the mood of the entire movement. (To emphasize this, hints like pp sempre or sin al fin can be added.)
Comment: Well said.  Mood markings are always subject to interpretation by the performer (or the conductor), at least so far as how "strongly" they are applied.