Project owner is asking for refundable deposit

Question: I am new to freelancing and recently placed a bid for one project. Project owner is asking for me to pay the deposit before work is started. They said it is refundable amount.
Is it safe to do so?
Answer: If you are performing the work and they are hiring you, there's no reason on Earth you should be paying them anything for any reason.
Answer: Without knowing the customs in all countries, on the face of it - this sounds fishy. What is their argument for wanting you to deposit money before working? I cannot even make up a legitimate reason. YOU are the freelancer, so the cash should generally flow from the client to you.
It should actually be the other way around; you perform or deliver no work before some payment has been secured.
Do not be appeased by the term 'refundable'; once you have paid money, it can be impossible to get back. Non-payment is a very common weapon used against (inexperienced) freelancers; do everything you can to prevent this from happening to yourself.
If there is a legitimate reason and you decide to go along, you must ensure that the deposit is placed at a verifiably independant third party - and that a contract states when money is refunded.
Answer: It's absolutely the converse, they should make the deposit!
Most of the freelancing sites propose an escrow policy such that you are guaranteed to be paid if you've done the work. In case of problems, the litigation is between the customer and the site, not you.
Answer: First of all, ask this question from yourself. why they need money?
you are doing something for them so they have to pay the money. in the worst situation, they can pay after finishing the project.
by the way, I highly recommend you, always take some money as a deposit (or any other name) in advance before you start to work.
Answer: If you want to be a freelancer, then you should do your due diligence in researching topics such as this.
There are similar stories for the past 10 months, maybe a year, where freelancers were conned to pay something to start work. They were all scammed.
Sometimes there were asking for the costs of the work permit, other times something else.
But in order to do any freelancer work, you will NOT be asked to pay ANYTHING in advance.
Answer: No, it is not safe and is not at all advisable since those will have your personal information + some means of payment... As far as I know, no country can demand a "benevolently" handed money to be refunded... Don't do it!
Answer: The only type of work that may require a deposit is government work. This may be some kind of bond that you pay and submit with an official bid, in case you back out at the last minute and they have to resubmit the request for proposal again.
The thing is that this may cause them to get no bids, in which case, they will resubmit the RFQ without the requirement. If you were to win the bid and sign the contract, the bond would be refunded to you. After that, you can fail at the project and they can take you to court unless a remedy is in writing already on that contract.
The penalty could be something like this: You would owe the city, county or state 10% of the contract or you would pay the difference between your contract (the lowest bid) and the next lowest bid.


what would cause the no.1 sparkplug to foul out 10 minutes after replacing it on a 1997 Buick 3.8 v-6 engine

Question: About 6 months ago, I had some preventative maintenance done on my car that included oil change,  plugs and wires. Within a week of running out of gas my car began "stumble" and idle rough. I ran injector cleaner through system and replaced fuel filter. The problem escalated to a new level when the check engine light began blinking. Trouble codes said multiple sensors needed replaced, and the no, 1 plug was misfiring. Plug was replaced..check engine light went off car ran great for about 10 minutes or maybe 10 miles. Now The "stumbling" is back as well as the "check engine" light. Could a sensor be responsible for this scenario ?
Comment: Is it oil-fouled or fuel fouled?
Comment: fuel fouled. Also the trouble codes indicated the MAP, 02, and 2 other sensors had issues.
Answer: Since you have new plugs and wires you may have a bad coil. Of course one of the new parts may be bad, not unheard of but unlikely. If the fuel injected into the cylinder isn't burned it passes into the exhaust system where the O2 sensor sees a rich condition that is outside the normal parameters and sets a fault code. You need to see if that cylinder is getting spark. Remove the plug wire from the spark plug. Insert a screwdriver in the cable end. Holding the screwdriver handle place the blade of the screwdriver near some metal part of the engine while an assistant cranks the motor for a few seconds. You should be able to see a spark arc from the screwdriver to the metal. You will want to do this test while the engine is hot. It isn't uncommon for coils to work for a short time then fail when it gets hot.
Answer: In general, yes. OIL fouling of the spark would be the correct assumption. However in this particular motor, which is notorius for blown head gaskets and lower intake manifold gasket leaks, allowing coolant into the combustion chamber I would take a look at these first, and in order.
1.  fuel pressure, this all started after you ran out of gas correct?
    you should have a vavle on the fuel rail, to hook up a pressure gage to.
    30-40psi with regulator vacuum hose attached. 45-55psi with hose
    disconnected.
2. #1 fuel injector pulse, is it actually spaying fuel into the cylinder?
    causing no combustion. or is it leaking after shut down and fouling?
?
    is the connector loose?
3.  COILPACK..... do you ever get PO305 code along with your PO301 code?
Also in general there are "oil Rings", to clarify these "rings"  actually control the amount of oil they let by them to coat the cylinder wall for lubrication to reduce friction and heat. They dont seal. The cylinder wall wears to the point were they cant control the amount of oil anymore. The fix is the same tho.
Answer: The number one spark plug failure is caused by oil getting to the spark-plug through piston blow-by - this can be fixed with  new rings / pistons (oversize for best performance)
Comment: This sounds plausible, but it would be nice to give OP some advice on checking whether this is the case. Is the plug/combustion chamber covered in oil?
Comment: in a normal engine the piston will have one if not more  "oil rings" these are to keep oil from reaching the combustion chamber - when your motor starts smoking bad its because the oil is managing to slip by those rings and burn with the gas in your combustion chamber..
Comment: Is that something feasible for a non-expert to fix? I would suspect having it done professionally is more expensive than buying a new engine...
Comment: Starting off by condemning internals is rather harsh. Some checks before rushing into tearing apart a motor would have been a much better starts.
Comment: The main cause of bad spark plugs is exactly what i stated above - OIL - now it could be that the spark plug isn't getting enough voltage to make a very hot spark in which case you could look at replacing the rotary cap, coil, generator, etc...


Why are late answers allowed?

Question: Why are new users allowed to post late answers to questions from so long ago? Most of the times it's not even useful and it clutters up the Top Questions page.
Comment: See also: [Automatically protecting popular questions after a given amount of time](http://meta.superuser.com/questions/2012/automatically-protecting-popular-questions-after-a-given-amount-of-time). A protected question doesn't accept new answers from users with less than 10 rep, but questions are not currently protected automatically.
Comment: The main point of superuser and any forum, is to provide a good database of questions and answers. So even if the person asking has already found his answer. And anyhow, still an incredibly strange question, surely somebody with 1690 rep points seeks to improve his knowledge? So if he has a question and an answer is posted a month later then it's something new to add to his knowledge.
Comment: @nhinkle - they do get autoprotected if 3 answers by low rep (<50) are deleted.
Comment: I know, I didn't have time to write a full answer than as I was on the way out the door. Thanks for the added info @Sathya.
Answer: I don't have the stats to support this, but I honestly don't know if I'd call late answers to old questions mostly not useful. Whenever I review late answers, there are maybe two or three out of twenty that are worth deleting (because they're not an answer or just poor).

But all the other answers have a right to be there and shouldn't be blocked just because there is a possibility the answer might be bad. If you asked a question and waited for a solution, would you appreciate having your post locked (even passively) and risking that the only person who knows the definitive answer can't even tell you because they first need to gain some reputation?
I'd find that frustrating, both

from the side of the person who asked the question – because they might miss a helpful answer and don't even know – and
from the side of the person who answers – because they think they have something to contribute (otherwise they wouldn't care to sign up) but are hindered.

I think we have good enough review processes that clear out unnecessary answers. There aren't that many "late answers" and they can be easily reviewed by our moderators and people with access to the review tools.
Also, as @nhinkle said, some questions that attract bad answers are protected anyway.
Comment: "_When_" an answer is submitted shouldn't be used as a means of judging its quality.
Comment: When I first started using this system, I tried to answer a question.  It was very frustrating for me because the system was rejecting an answer I had put quite a bit of time and effort into answering.  So, out of frustration I posted my answer as a question, and then I found out that the question had been closed.  I think there should also be a grace period after closing where a moderator gets to review answers before they appear to everyone so that good answer aren't lost (I think that sometimes an answer can still be useful for a seemingly bad question that was closed).
Comment: @Randolf I was exactly thinking about these situations, thanks for explaining!
Comment: You missed out "from the side of people looking for questions with good answers"..  It's a rather important "side"
Comment: As a recent example, Apple will finally allow multi-user remote desktop via VNC in the upcoming version of OS X. @Arjan [added a *very* late answer](http://superuser.com/questions/30173/is-there-a-multi-user-remote-desktop-app-for-mac-os-x/295459#295459) to a topic asking for something just like that.
Comment: I'd agree with this. Why rule out the possibility of a better answer just to avoid potential bad answers. As long as a late answer can be flagged, the it seems like the system should still work.
Comment: @Kyle Indeed, the current system works, and with good mods and users reviewing and flagging appropriately, things work. Just needed some clarification on that matter.
Comment: I've personally found some "late answers" useful, for instance when they mention some new language or OS feature that didn't exist when the question was asked. I've also written one or two where I've simply generalized the solution which generally takes longer than develop (and test!) than the ones more quickly made. I don't think anything with the current system is broken and in need of fixing.
Answer: Some questions/answers are not static meaning that over time a better answer may surface.  Since we encourage posters to search for previous answers, it seems we'd want to allow new answers to old questions.
I recently stumbled upon a 2 yr old AD question where a new answer represented a change in technology since the original question was posted.
Answer: Well, consider this question.
Skype status showing always online
It was asked July 22 2009. Notice when the correct answer arrived -- April 11 2010!
So by your logic, we should have shut down that question after a few months and we never would have gotten an answer...
Comment: I'm not saying some answers aren't useful. Especially since things change. But it appears, to me at least, more often than not, new users post late answers that are basically what other users posted previously.
Answer: Eventually, though, another option is to not allow (somehow) new user to post answers to (somehow) old question with accepted answers.
As I remember, while I worked for a BBS in the telephone era, the rule was that however old you are in the system, however old posts (the ratio could be adjusted, obviously) you could reply to and thus raise its discussion. It may not be 100% appropriate (or even 1% appropriate) here, but it's a bright idea.
Comment: This is what the linked topic discussed. And since quite a few people accept answers that are insane workarounds, where a proper solution emerges a while afterwards, it'd hurt the network. I wouldn't consider the handful of non-answers a severe enough issue for such measures.

Why are late answers allowed?


Simple way to store/read data from file in C++

Question: I've been running various simulations with C++, and doing so has often involved saving lots of data to file (real/complex matrices, arrays, etc) and then reading them into other programs later. However, I have been unable to figure out a consistent and simple way of doing so. My solutions often involve several dozen lines of difficult-to-read code for each different kind of data structure that I want to save/read from a file. Are there any known libraries that can do this, or at least aid in the process? If there are any sort of matrix libraries that allow automatic saving/reading of matrices/vectors to file, that would also be helpful (Eigen does not have this option, as far as I can tell).
Comment: Will HDF5 work?
Comment: What is your goal? To read the data you write from other programs? If all you want is to read the data into your own program again, there is little wrong with just doing a memory dump of your data structure in a format of your choice. But it's a different matter if you want to interact with other programs.
Comment: @WolfgangBangerth makes a good point or two.  But don't forget that the definition of *other programs* includes any program you wrote more than about 1 week ago and for which you have already started to forget (OK, maybe 2 weeks, I'm getting on) the precise details of the file structure and contents.  Files which contain their own metadata are a tremendous boon.
Answer: Numpy has a file format that is pretty simple, which makes it perfectly compatible with basically every other high level language. (https://www.numpy.org/devdocs/reference/generated/numpy.lib.format.html) It looks like the format is much lighter than boost or hdf5. The docs say it should be easy enough to write a parser yourself, if necessary, which I would tend to believe. Cursory googling also suggests there are a number of existing lightweight libraries in C++ for <code>.npy</code> files (such as https://github.com/rogersce/cnpy). As as added benefit, you'd always be able to load your files in python and examine them by hand in a nice python interpreter like ipython, which can be a little tricky to achieve in C++ otherwise.
Answer: You can use boost's serialization facilities, which can be straightforwardly extended to support custom data structures. If you use Eigen you can adapt something like this in order to suit your needs.
Comment: I don't know why I didn't think of this when writing my comment above. Yes, use boost serialization. It's a great library.
Answer: Cereal is a straight-forward and easy-to-use serialization library for C++ data structures. It knows all of the STL data structures and adapting custom classes for use with it is easy.
Example code:
<code>#include <cereal/types/unordered_map.hpp>
#include <cereal/types/memory.hpp>
#include <cereal/archives/binary.hpp>
#include <fstream>

struct MyRecord
{
  uint8_t x, y;
  float z;

  template <class Archive>
  void serialize( Archive & ar )
  {
    ar( x, y, z );
  }
};

struct SomeData
{
  int32_t id;
  std::shared_ptr<std::unordered_map<uint32_t, MyRecord>> data;

  template <class Archive>
  void save( Archive & ar ) const
  {
    ar( data );
  }

  template <class Archive>
  void load( Archive & ar )
  {
    static int32_t idGen = 0;
    id = idGen++;
    ar( data );
  }
};

int main()
{
  std::ofstream os("out.cereal", std::ios::binary);
  cereal::BinaryOutputArchive archive( os );

  SomeData myData;
  archive( myData );

  return 0;
}
</code>


Ubuntu does not remember keyboard layout

Question: I'm trying to set an alternate keyboard layout, but I'm having trouble doing so.
I chose "Deutsch (Neo2)" during installation of 12.04, and this is the only layout I need. I have Ubuntu on my laptop (Lenovo X121e), where the layout works fine, and on my desktop, where I also chose it during installation. But here, it changes back to American Layout after reboot, although the layout dialog claims it to be "Deutsch (Neo2)". When I select it, it does changes to Neo. However, all the shortcuts for Unity stop working, e.g. Alt+Tab, or Ctrl+Alt+Right to change workspace.
Comment: Related: http://askubuntu.com/q/638420/652.
Answer: It is an only one bug I have found so far as well. Here is my temporary fix: Alt+Shift to toggle between Norwegian and Thai keyboards.
<code>sudo setxkbmap -option grp:alt_shift_toggle no,th
</code>
Answer: I have a similar problem, and the setxkbmap command worked well.
The problem is not fixed however, Ubuntu 12.04 has problems with setting
keyboard language.
Ive seen many threads on this and almost every time the answer is to change
the keyboard language in system settings > Keyboard Layout.
The case is however, this is not why I am having problems, I do all this and
yet it sticks to keyboard language that is not norwegian.
For that matter, I were stuck with english regardless what I did.
Now what I did was adding swedish keyboard language, then removed norwegian.
So swedish worked, so I added norwegian and set it to norwegian.
The language now stuck to swedish.
Phnakarin's method in terminal worked well though.
I installed swedish and english US keyboard and did this:
    udo setxkbmap -option grp:alt_shift_toggle no,se,us
Only posting this to highlight two things, the setxkbmap method works.
And that there's a bug with keyboard language GUI module.
Answer: I had the same problem with switching between input languages. I set up CTRL+SHIFT method of switching between layouts during Ubuntu installation. However this shortcut didn't work and I had to switch layout manually by clicking the appropriate icon on the upper Gnome/Unity tool-bar.
Recently I found the solution:
Go to the upper tool-bar keyboard menu -> Keyboard Layout Settings -> Options -> Key(s) to change layout -> choose your shortcut (in my case the shortcut CTRL+SHIFT wasn't marked) -> VOILÀ! everything works!
P.S. You may reach this "Options" menu from System Settings -> Keyboard Layout -> Options...


how to assemble chords when having bass and treble cleff notes

Question: when you have notes in the bass and the treble clef how do you determine the chords?
should I look only at the treble clef to determine the type of triad or 7th and look at the bass clef as just an accompanying bass note?
if the treble clef only has two notes, do I use the bass note then to make a triad?
Answer: You must take all notes into consideration. The song could be arranged in different ways, with chords in the treble cleff and bass in the bass cleff, or arpeggios that go from the bass cleff all the way to the treble cleff, for example.
So if you have CEGB in the bass cleff and EGB in the treble, it would be inaccurate to look at the treble cleff and say it's a Em, because that C on the bass makes it clearly a Cmaj7, right? All notes matter.
Comment: I like that your example shows the bass tone is harmonically essential.
Answer: If you have the melody in the treble and also the bass, then that is already a good indication of the harmony.  Of course there would still be various possibilities, and it is up to you to choose what works best for you.  The bass line is more likely to indicate your harmony as the melody could be harmonized in almost endless ways.  Look at the combination and see what it suggests and what suits the piece best.
Answer: There are two answers to this.
If you want to analyse the harmony, all the notes matter.  In fact, the bass note probably matters more than any of the others!
But if you're a guitarist wanting to know what shapes to play, and there will also be a bass player in the band, it can be useful to look at just the treble clef. To take @coconochao's example, EGB in the treble, C in the bass.  Yes, overall it's Cmaj7.   But the composer/arranger didn't put all four notes in the upper part, and maybe you shouldn't either.   You play EGB, leave C to the bass player.  Whether you think of this as 'I play Em' or as 'I play Cmaj7 but omit the root note' doesn't make any practical difference.


Do I regain storage space if I delete files from my Dropbox folder?

Question: If I clear files from Dropbox do I then regain storage space?
Answer: Yes, you regain storage space when you delete files from Dropbox.
Also, with Dropbox, if you had lots of pending camera uploads that couldn't be uploaded to your Dropbox because it was full. Once you have cleared some space, those camera uploads will start to be uploaded to your Dropbox again.
Answer: Yes, you can regain storage space by deleting files in your Dropbox. Already deleted files don't count and permanently deleting them will not change anything.


Is the KC-135 landing gear life limited?

Question: I'm looking for information about the KC-135 landing gear. Specifically I want to know if its life limited and if so where is it documented? If its NOT life limited where is that documented? I'm talking about gear that has regularly been maintained or gear that's been overhauled. I've been looking on the internet and a variety of 135 manuals.
Comment: Welcome to aviation stack exchange! Very good question. Gotta upvote.
Answer: All landing gears have a limited lifespan unless they undertake in really, really big maintenance, as we saw with the Antonov 225, which went under maintenance for 18 months! And the KC-135 is no exception. Most landing gears last about 20 years, and the one's of the KC-135's is designed for 30 years. But even though it was designed for only 30 years, the operators of the KC-135 still extend it's life by a lot, with as you said, regular maintenance. So, you might see some KC-135 landing gears that are 40 years old!

Aging landing gear life extension
The committee is concerned that the Air Force has been extending the use of aircraft landing gear far beyond their original design life. The KC-135 was designed for a 30-year lifetime, but will retire at 86 years and the B-52, designed for a 30-year life, will retire at 94 years.

Source: congress.gov


Send Test and Next not clickable (greyed) due to missing value in reply_id field (i think)

Question: Similar to this question and this one but different issues. All required fields and tokens are filled in. But db is showing Null for reply_id field, whereas all earlier mailings have an '8' in that field. I can't see if this is settable via the UI and am unsure why this would either now be required, or the default is NULL. This site recently upgraded from 4.4.19 to 4.6.8 with no warnings related to this afaik.
Answer: Not sure if this is the answer, or a better identification of the problem.
I see that in Headers, Footers etc Auto-responder ID is '8' but is not set as default.
Not sure if setting it to default, and saving and reopening my mailing resulted in button being clickable or if that was the one I edited in DB.
Will have to look in to whether someone turned that default off or it is was a minor glitch in the upgrading.
Comment: In my case, I had a site where the Auto-responder (from Administer > CiviMail > Headers, Footers, and Automatic Messages) was disabled when the first mailing was created (actually, all of the pre-configured messages/headers/footers were disabled). Enabling all of them and setting as default didn't fix the already created mailing (the "Send Test" and "Next" buttons were still disabled) but everything worked properly in a new mailing, created after enabling pre-configured messages/headers/footers.
Comment: Is this something that 'is' settable via the UI and I am being blind? Should an error msg be showing on the civimail screen if no reply_id is set?
Comment: and hit this again - in this case client set up a Xmas Auto Reponder. And concur that setting the Standard one as Default doesn't resolve for existing Draft Mailings but does for future ones - note these values are in civicrm_mailing_component table
Comment: and the missing value that affects the draft ones is civicrm_mailing.reply_id which appears to not get reset when the Draft is saved


How can I fix a Google Earth 6.2 installation that went bad?

Question: I saw on a couple sites that there were instructions for installing Google Earth 6.2, so I did it.  The results were not good.  Now, every place I view is broken into rectangles of somewhat different colors, making it very difficult to use.

It does this whether I zoom in or out, and no matter where on the planet I look.
If I could completely remove Google Earth and reinstall it, I could give it another try, but I don't know how to get it completely off my system.  I even went into my home directory and found the .googleearth folder and deleted it and then tried reinstalling, but it's always the same story.
Has anyone seen something like this before, and/or have a way to fix it?  Thanks!
UPDATE
I tried the instructions on WebUpd8, which basicaly were just that there was an update.  I downloaded the 64-bit deb from the Google Earth site, and double-clicked it.  It opened the Software Center and said it would conflict, so I figured I should uninstall the previous version.  When I then tried to install the new version, it seemed to go well, until I opened it and saw how it looked.  So I thought perhaps I had not completely removed the prior version.
I tried running sudo apt-get purge google-earth* googleearth* and then removing everything from /opt/google/earth/free, hoping to clear out any remnants that could interfere with a fresh install, but those haven't worked.
I then followed some older instructions from WebUpd8 for installing Google Earth 6.1 by building a an installable deb with Google-Earth-Package.  I now have that older Google Earth working, but 6.2 is still on the computer, too, and is still looking really bad.
UPDATE 2
Output from recommended commands:
    ~$ sudo dpkg --list | grep earth
[sudo] password for mdk:
ii  google-earth-stable                    18.104.22.16805-r0                           Explore, search and discover the planet
ii  googleearth                            126.96.36.1997+0.6.0-1                      Google Earth, a 3D map/planet viewer
ii  googleearth-package                    0.6.1                                   utility to automatically build a Debian package of Google Earth

Of course, that's after trying to get things working by reinstalling 6.0.3.  It shows they're both still there.
~$ sudo apt-get install --reinstall google-earth
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
E: Unable to locate package google-earth

Comment: What instructions did you follow and what makes you think removing it and re-installing it is going to make any difference ? Have you considered filing a bug with Google ?
Comment: Have you tried sudo apt-get reinstall google-earth?
Comment: I tried "sudo apt-get reinstall google-earth" when I read your comment, but it didn't work; it just gave me the error "Invalid operation reinstall".
Comment: I will file it as bug with Google, now that it appears it wasn't some little thing I did wrong.
Answer: come now... that's one you could've found yourself ;)
sudo apt-get install --reinstall google-earth

try as well
sudo dpkg --list | grep earth


What are the Area Control Center (ACC) frequencies for Germany?

Question: I'm looking for the frequencies of all Area Control Centers (ACC) in Germany. What are they, or where are they published?
Answer: The radio frequencies used by German ACC sectors are listed in AIP Germany ENR 2.1 (page 36 onward). This is the standard place to find ACC frequencies for any country in the world.
There are too many frequencies to list here, but you can find the full document here. Below is a screenshot of page 36. Column 1 contains the sector name and dimension, column 4 contains the frequency(ies) used by that sector.
Answer: Okey I found it out.
The map of Germany ACC sectors you can find here:
https://www.eurocontrol.int/sites/default/files/content/documents/nm/cartography/erc09l-23may2019.pdf
If you have your airway and name of sectors, then you are able to find the frequency on this site:
http://www.aviascan.de/downloads/Sector%20Information%20Manual%20Germany.pdf
Comment: The last link you mention is a document from a very old ATC game. You can definitely not trust the information found there.


Why do fencers point their back foot to the side in the en garde position?

Question:
I would expect that given fencing's linear nature, it would be more advantageous to angle the back foot more forward to push off. Why does the foot point off to the side in the basic stance?
Answer: Mainly for versatility and stability. In fencing your actions moving backwards are just as important as your actions moving forwards. A lot of people think of it as advancing on your opponent or retreating from them, but the point of those things isn't to capture or cede strip, it is to open and close distance.
When you're fencing, you know your range and you know where you're most effective. When you're new, you only know these things for perfect control and balance situations. As you get better and more experienced, you also start to get a sense of where those points are during motion and in situations of imbalance. At that point, what direction you're moving matters much less than whether the space between you and your opponent is opening, closing, or static. And your opponent is trying to do the same thing. So you're both trying to manage optimum distance at the same time. Micro changes in direction and pace are really really important.
If your foot is turned too far forwards, while it favors forward motion, it doesn't provide any stability in terms of quick changes of direction. If your foot is turned too far backwards, you just fall over.
Posting guidelines says "Share your research" - I've been a fencer since 1985, competitive on the national level since 1990. I have taught beginners for most of that time.
Comment: A related question, especially if you've been watching the Olympics, is why they bounce the way they do. I don't favor that myself, but it is effective for setting up rhythm expectations in your opponent. If you do it well and you're in control, bouncing in rhythm and then breaking that pattern can surprise an opponent, catch them napping between beats. Perhaps more importantly, if you practice it regularly, it is something you can do without conscious thought, but it throws a lot of motion noise for your opponent to track while watching for meaningful important motions that require attention.
Comment: You're echoing what Bruce Lee said WRT broken rhythms, so you must be right ;)
Answer: It has been a while since I fenced, but my understanding of the foot position is to increase stability during a deep thrust like the one shown below. Look at the leg slightly above the "C" of the fencer on the right. Were their foot in any other position, they would not be able to extend as much.
Comment: The lunge stance seems quite similar to a bow (front) stance. I don't see how turning the back foot 90 degrees out to the side gives better extension than having the back foot at 45 degrees, for example.
Comment: @mattm I am not familiar with the "bow front stance" so cannot comment either way.
Comment: FYI, bow stance variations are common to many martial arts and yoga, where it is called the warrior pose. One example is http://martialarts.stackexchange.com/a/6083/5961.
Answer: I still remember the start of my very first fencing lesson at school. We had no swords, the instructor just paired is up and gave us a game. We had to touch each other with our right thumbs and shout whenever a touch landed. Five minutes later we were all laughing when he suddenly shouted "freeze!". We all did. "You are all standing with one arm out and one pulled back. You all have your feet at 90 degrees which means that your bodies are 45 degrees to your partner". And so we were.
The position is natural compromise that allows forward movement, reduces exposure of the body and puts the weapon up front.
Answer: In Shotokan karate, the stance is known as kokustu-dachi. It is a defensive stance that keeps the target area farther away from the opponent, yet easily shifts into a front stance/lunge (zenkustu-dachi) when an opponent leaves an opening. I assume it is the same with fencing.  The back foot, at a right angle to the front (which is pointed at the opponent), provides a great deal of stability and support to a  subsequent attack. As with fencing, modern karate competitors often bounce, with the back foot angled more forward.  This toe-bounce gives a bit more directional flexibility, quick acceleration, and helps to keep the body loose and relaxed during a match. There is a sacrifice in power, as the acceleration from a toe bounce comes primarily from the gastrocnemius (calf) muscles first as opposed to a traditional lunge which is initiated in the biceps femoris muscle and the gluteus maximus.  In fencing, I assume the overall power of strike is less important than the sheer speed of a strike. Anyway, dynamic fighting typically includes both bouncing and set feet (think of boxing, where the fighters bounce, but also set their feet for a power stroke).
Answer: We have had some considerations in our Judo training regarding the open foot-stance. I can only report here, I have no (e.g. biomechanical) informations soppurting this. It only makes sense for me.
The main points have been that:
a) The thrust forward is more stable. Having your back foot in line forces you to either rest rather on your heel, which makes it impossible to have explosive movements forward or you rest on your forefoot in order to have the possibility to accelerate forwards explosively, but having only small parts of your foot on the ground has the disadvantage that you loose great amounts of adhesion - you are more at risk of slipping.
b) Possibly not that important for fencing, but in Judo, the stability against being pushed backwards is better as well: If you have the back foot in line and rest on your heel, you tend to roll over it and you have no muscles functional to work against it (the calf is stretched), if you rest on your forefoot the point of slipping is your main problem.
Both points may be avoided by pointing the back foot to the side: Full adhesion and the possibility of explosive thrust. In Judo, another point is the mobility sidewards, but this can be ignored in fencing, of course.


Use ASP page from web application in SharePoint

Question: I'm trying to use existing aspx page in SharePoint 2010. Page it self depend on some 3rd party classes and I provided source for them and additional assemblies, and project compiles and deploys to sharepoint correctly.
Page is put in layouts directory. Page definition has also a Page directive:
<%@ Page Language="C#" AutoEventWireup="true" CodeFile="Frameset.aspx.cs" Inherits="Frameset.Test.Source.Frameset.Frameset_Frameset"  %>

File Frameset.aspx.cs is present and project compiles without error. But when I try to access that page, I'm getting following error:
System.Web.HttpException: The file '/_layouts/Frameset.Test/Frameset/Frameset.aspx.cs' does not exist.

When I change CodeFile to CodeBehind, I'm getting following error:
System.Web.HttpException: Could not load type 'Frameset.Test.Source.Frameset.Frameset_Frameset'.

Which is strange, because this type (class) is defined in Frameset.aspx.cs, and VS doesn't complain about missing types.
Answer: As far as I know, code-behind usage in SharePoint requires you to specify the full assembly name of the assembly that contains the codebehind class (that is - assuming that your assembly is deployed to the gac). Please see if by using the full name your problem is resolved, ie:
<%@ Page Language="C#" AutoEventWireup="true" CodeFile="Frameset.aspx.cs"
   Inherits="Frameset.Test.Source.Frameset.Frameset_Frameset, ........, Version=#.#.#.#, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=##########"  %>


What is Vishnu's body made of according to Vaishnavism and Advaita?

Question: What is Vishnu's body made up of? What are the bodies made of when he incarnates as Rama, Krishna, Narasimha? Is Vishnu soul or the body? When he incarnates does he enter other avatars bodies? I want to know from both Vaishnav and Advait perspective
Answer: sath chit Ananda /  chinmayananda (truth, intelligence, and pleasure) is the body of lord ever radiant. sarva antaryami ..that is why it is difficult give form for the above. in order human body to realize hindus gave form. so that the five material sense can grasp which is abstract and proceed in spiritual development.
viswothirnaroopay chinmanyananda roopinaye hygrivaye vidhyadhiraja thubiam namaste swagaha swagaha namaha (hygriva Upanishad)
still if you are not able to conceive they gave chakra, sankha, mahamudra and pushthaka adhyam chaturbujam sampoorna chandrasankhasham hyagriva upashmahe
he is both mother and father.. of the existence..
According to kath Upanishad and madhva philoshophy one should not distinguish between avatara and moolaroopa.. that is satchitananda roopa, so no difference in avatara also including parasurama..
so god wont have destructive physical body like us he was never born in any womb, he only showed himself, and also while leaving he didn't leave physical body, the above statement is agreed by all acharyas (sankara, madhva and Ramanuja acharya
Comment: Is this from advaita point of view or vaishnava view?
Comment: Hindu point of view (advaita accepts sath chit ananda) sankara accepts Hari sarvothama
Answer: I can answer this from the Vaishnava perspective. Note that Lord Vishnu is 'vibhu' meaning he is present everywhere and all pervasive. Also note that He does not need a body to perform the cosmic functions of creation, protection and dissolution of the universe, he can do all this by his mere will, or 'Sankalpa'. However, he does take on a body exclusively only for the sake of his devotees, who are always yearning for a vision of him. The body which he takes up is not made of any material substance consisting of the five elements but it is actually made up of a spiritual material called suddha sattva (pure sattva). This consists of the pure 'sattva' quality which is not mixed with other gunas like 'rajo' or 'tamas'. His incarnations are of two kinds - one is when he himself descends with his spiritual body - examples are Rama and Krishna. The other kind of avatar is called the 'avesha' avatar where he temporarily enters the body of a human being thus endowing the person with special powers - example is Parasurama.
Coming to your final question - "Is Vishnu soul or body?". As per our acharyas, there are three realities, or 'Tattvas'. These are chit, achit and Ishwara. 'Chit' refers to sentient matter such as the atomic souls inside all living creatures. 'Achit' refers to insentient matter like stones, rocks, etc.'Ishwara' refers to the supreme God Vishnu. As per the vishishtadvaita philosophy expounded by Ramanujacharya, Lord Vishnu has the entire universe comprising of both 'chit' and 'achit' as his body. In this sense, Lord Vishnu may be considered as the paramatma, or supersoul of the entire universe. However, in another sense, we may also think of Him as the supersoul along with the body consisting of 'chit' and 'achit', just as we think of human beings as soul+body. In this sense, all of us the individual jivatmas are part or 'amsa' of God. Finally, I may remark that God is beyond human comprehension and we cannot really categorize him into buckets like 'soul' or 'body'. Though we can always try to improve our understanding of him, a complete understanding may always elude us.


How can I remove bitterness from custard after adding pineapple to it?

Question: I recently made custard with a huge amount of milk, custard powder and sugar. After boiling it for few minutes I added vanilla essence to it. After it was settled I added apple and pineapple. Then I placed the whole mixture in the fridge and the custard was tasting fine at that time. But after a half hour of cooling, when I tasted the mixture it was bitter. I googled about the issue and found out that milk and pineapple are not good friends, but I don't want to waste the whole thing now. Is there any way to reduce the bitterness?
Answer: You can't. This is caused by an irreversible chemical reaction. The bitterness is there to stay.
If it is just a tad too much for you, you can try diluting: make more pudding and mix it into the bitter pudding. But if it is the strong bitterness I know from mixing milk and fruit enzymes, that won't help either.
Comment: Indeed, the reaction happens mostly at the place where the pineapple touches the milk. If your pineapple was rather dry, scooping out a generous amount of pudding from around the pieces can help. If the pineapple's juice got mixed throughout the pudding, it won't be enough. You'll have to taste and see.
Comment: got it. thanks. Will try separating all the pineapple pieces and then diluting the mixture a bit. Hope that brings down the bitterness level.


IPv6: Why not use /126 on P2P links for IPv6?

Question: In IPv4 we use /30 to conserve addresses. So why do some people recommend using /64 on P2P links instead of /126? I get using a /64 on regular subnets but isn't using a /64 when there will only ever be two addresses in use on P2P links tremendous waste of addresses?
Comment: Hi, please consider the perspectives expressed in [RFC 6164](http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc6164)
Answer: Many of us do use /126's on PTP links.  I personally like being able to identify something as a network infrastructure PTP link just based on the first 64 bits of the address, so I reserve a /64 to pull the /126's from.  Different people have different opinions on what's important, so...shrug
Incidentally (#1), because IPv6 doesn't have the concept of a broadcast address or a network address on an IP network, you could actually use /127's instead of /126's.  Beware that, although /127's netmasks are perfectly valid, some vendor gear has (wrongly) not allowed them,  considering /127's netmasks "invalid", which means you may run into some vendor support issues if you decide to try using them. This is why I use /126's.
Incidentally (#2), if your links are truly defined as PTP links, you should be able to use any IP addresses without them having to be in a common IP network at all.
Comment: At one point, Brocade in the FastIron line and perhaps in the NetIron line didn't allow it.  I haven't checked recent firmware versions, so I don't know if that is still the case or not.
Comment: Brocade isn't a small company, either. Good insight.
Comment: Can you give an example of a vendor that restricts the use of /127s?
Answer: There are two parts to the answer.
First, to answer your question directly: the official recommendation on this topic has changed. In the past, RFC 3627 is titled "Use of /127 Prefix Length Between Routers Considered Harmful" The current recommendation is different, though: RFC 6164 recommends using a /127 (not a /126!) on point-to-point links. Both RFCs outline the reasons for the respective recommendations.
The second part of the answer is that generally, outside point-to-point links, IPv6 will break with any prefix longer than /64. It is actually not IPv6 itself, but many of the protocols it uses, such as SLAAC, Neighbor Discovery, etc. Since a point-to-point link does not involve any form of discovery, that consideration is not relevant, and a /127 will work.
Comment: [RFC 6547](https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc6547) clarifies the fact that RFC 3627 has been moved to Historical Status, and that RFC 6164 obsoletes it.
Answer: Because IPv6 always recommends using /64 for all links.
For the second part of the question, is it a waste?
A /64 has 18,446,744,073,709,551,615, or 18 quintillion addresses.
Most IPv4 subnets are less than 255 hosts. Assume that you have a network with 255 hosts on it and they're given a /64 prefix. That means that 255 hosts are assigned a v6 address, leaving 18,446,744,073,709,551,360 addresses unused. That's over 99.99%. To be more accurate, that's sixteen 9's, or effectively 100% "waste".
Even if you had a subnet with 1,000,000 hosts on it, that's 18,446,744,073,708,551,616 wasted addresses, or still over 99.99%. Only thirteen 9's this time, but still effectively 100% "waste".
So the percentage difference between using one million addresses or two addresses on a single link is negligible.
And just so you can see what these numbers look like.
<code>* Two hosts is 99.9999999999999999891579782751449556599254719913005828857422% unused.
* 255 hosts is 99.9999999999999986176422300809818466404976788908243179321289% unused.
* 1M  hosts is 99.99999999999457898913757247782996273599565029144287109375% unused.
* 4B  hosts is 99.999999976716935634613037109375% unused.
</code>
Even the entire IPv4 Internet placed on a single /64 link would leave effectively 100% of the addresses unused. When you look at the numbers like this, using anything other than a /64 on a link is just silly.
Comment: In addition to my full answer, I wanted to comment on this one.  The statement that IPv6 always recommends using /64 for all links is no longer valid.  http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc6164
Comment: A lot of ISPs DO use /126 for point to point links.  I guess old habits die hard ;-)
Comment: They do, but hopefully realizing that the *entire IPv4 Internet* is still effectively 0% of a /64 may bring some proper perspective.
Comment: One possible reason (I'm not an ISP) may be that they can take a single /64 subnet and put all of their links into it.  It may make management and troubleshooting easier.
Comment: @bahamat I don't think you fully answered your original question. _"Because IPv6 always recommends using /64 for all links"_ does not answer _"So why do some people recommend using /64 on P2P links instead of /126?"_.
Comment: @MichaelHampton Some ISPs like to keep customer networks separate from uplinks (which they might consider their own networks).  So they would never advertise uplinks to the Internet, only customer routes.
Comment: @Ron Wouldn't that seriously complicate route aggregation? i.e. blow up the ISP's internal routing tables?
Answer: So as an ISP, I wanted to add a comment to this.  Specifically we use both GUAs and ULAs (unique local addresses) for our internal routing. This means that we have a block (/48) that is from a /32 GUA pool, but that we filter at our edges turning them into ULAs. The bigger /32 GUA is still advertised, but the /48 ULA is filtered out at our edges.  We use this ULA for much of our internal addressing needs (AS specific) as well as PtP links.
All of our PtP links are a complete /64 block, however they are specifically configured as a /127 on the routers. This was to specifically deal with ping-pong attacks when are possible in both IPv4 and IPv6 space. You rarely see it in IPv4 space because we all use /30s for PtP links there. In IPv6 space however, using the /64 creates the ability for these types of attacks (see https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc6164#section-5.1)
As mentioned before, allocating a /64 for these links seems like a waste, but once you spend a lot of time making your IPv6 address plan (a good read is https://www.amazon.com/IPv6-Address-Planning-Designing-Future-ebook-dp-B00PCZMAOW/dp/B00PCZMAOW) you see that it is MUCH easier to never delve beyond /64 in your plans.
Also as mentioned before, since we are talking PtP links only, a /127 does not suffer from any of the normal issues of going beyond a /64.  Why don't we use un-numbered addresses for PtP links?  Mostly for debugging purposes, traces, monitoring, etc.
--- I forgot to mention (after re-reading some of the comments above...)  If you're using a /126 as your PtP link, you still suffer from the same ping-pong issue as a /64. Why? Because the 00 and 11 bits in your /126 are valid IPv6 addresses (whereas in IPv4 they aren't, they serve a different purpose).  So although a /32 (two bits from /32) works for IPv4, a /127 (1 bit from /128) is what you need for IPv6.
Comment: Unfortunately, the big carriers (ATT, VzB, etc.) insist that `/127` links are not allowed, and they insist that we use `/126` links with them. We must carefully test any equipment we use for that to make sure it is immune to ping pong attacks.


Should one give an access to Issues Tracking System to a project sponsor?

Question: Should a project sponsor have an access to Issues Tracking System (call it a "bug list")? If yes, how do you manage a potential conflict between sponsor's expectations of bug-free quality and a list of bugs he/she is seeing?
Comment: I don't think that any serious project sponsor/client could expect a bug-free system. The problem, I think, mainly about authorization: how much should the sponsor see so that he doesn't get mad about things he doesn't know.
Answer: I'd argue the business sponsor has a right to know the current state of the project and what the known defects are at any given point. If the sponsor expects bug-free quality, and there are bugs in the product, then the sponsor deserves to know that these expectations are not met. As far as that aspect goes, I wouldn't say there's a conflict of interest.
I see other problem areas, though. If the project sponsor is allowed access to the issue tracker, then everybody involved should know that. Developers might employ a language internally that they would not use in a system exposed to the sponsor.
Other than that, it usually interrupts the developers if the sponsor is allowed to add issues, and set priorities. The sponsor and project manager might have different opinions about what is defined as a bug and what is a change request, and such discussion should be held separately. For these reasons, I wouldn't give the project sponsor write access to the issue tracker.
Comment: I have some similar experience about this situation. Actually, I agree with you that giving them the right to create issues may causes lots of trouble; but in fact, I think we should allow them to comment on existing issues. In this way we would know if they have any problem.
Comment: Regarding the issue of developers employing a language that they would not use if exposed to sponsor, I ask team members to ensure they always use a language that is appropriate. Anything (project documentation, sandbox systems, test databases, etc.) can come under audit at any point in time so it is better to be safe and prevent any issues related to data privacy or political correctness. Plus it saves embarrassing situations like silly information appearing by mistake in a document or a system shown to customers.
Answer: The project sponsor should absolutely have to the issue list. This is necessary to ensure a common understanding of issues and facilitate communication which is important to maintaining a good relationship among all stakeholders.
To manage a sponsor's expectations it is important to include in your issue list:

Severity: High/Medium/Low. Only High severity issues are showstoppers.
Impact: If the issue is not resolved, what is the impact on the deliverable. Also equally as important, if the issue needs to be resolved, what will is the time/cost impact.
Usual items such as owner, target resolution date, etc.
Answer: The project sponsor doesn't need to see the issue list while the deliverable is being developed. It is your job, as project manager, to take care of the project -not the sponsor's.
This kind of visibility into the process can lead to a lot of wasted time trying to explain details to someone who doesn't have experience in the specifics of this type of project. It also can give the impression that you are trying to offload your responsibilities onto the sponsor e.g. "you saw the list, Mr. Sponsor, and you didn't say anything about x,y or z."
However, once the project is complete the sponsor should have a full accounting of where the deliverable meets the requirements and quality standards -and where it doesn't.
Answer: I am having a hard time imagining why you would not want to do this?
I am going to assume that you are using some form of Agile development, maybe I am wrong and if so sorry.
Bugs or defects exist only outside of an iteration, meaning any issue discovered within an iteration is corrected or it is discussed with the sponsor and he/she agrees that it ok to ship or not.  If not then the story is not shipped and it is reprioritized for possible acceptace in the next iteration.
Without complete visibility into the defects, how does the sponsor make informed decisions on the priority of issues in the backlog.
Answer: Yes, though there should be a way of making an issue private or a comment private so that developers do not fear being honest.
"It's a bit of a hack, but we think we can get away with storing the password in plain text for now", while not good, is better than not mentioning anything.  The PM can still see that and decide whether to take action.
Answer: The answer in terms of giving access to the sponsor is yes since the sponsor pays for the project and (under standard project contracts) owns what is being produced as part of that project (including project documentation like an issues list).
I think the key however is in understanding why your sponsor wants to have access so you as a PM can offer him/her the best solution to meet his/her needs and expectations. For examples:

(s)he may want to see the issues because currently there is no visibility on the level of quality of what is being developed. In this case, it would be more efficient for you agree with the sponsor to report regularly on the level of bugs than your sponsor going through an issues list by him/herself.
perhaps there is an issue of trust; the sponsor is being told everything is going well but heard a comment that the system if full of bugs so wants to have a look at the list to form his/her own opinion. In this case the PM should address this with the sponsor and ensures that communications are clear and straightened.
maybe the sponsor is naturally curious and in fact very keen to understand how things are being done, which is a positive thing, so access may actually help to keep him/her involved.

If you agree to give access, make sure your sponsor understands how to use the system and that your team knows about it. I believe in most cases read-only access should be sufficient unless the sponsor actually has a agreed responsibility to identify or manage issues.
Answer: If the sponsor requests access, provide it.  If not, don't.  There is a huge difference between a working tool in which all kinds of un-scrubbed data are going in and out and a client-ready report.  There is already a very human resistance in the escalation of issues and risks, as if by doing so you are advertising your inability to manage things.  We all know intellectually it is quite the opposite; however, the resistance continues.  If your client has access, my bet is that resistance will be exacerbated.  Further, what is supposed to be your working tool will become a client-ready deliverable.  You will see your issue management (and risk management) capability come to a grinding halt.
Do not confuse what I am writing as if I am suggesting you should be withholding information from your client.  I advocate running as transparent as possible; however, there is a naturally applied filter you use during the escalation and reporting process.  Not a filter to hide things the client should know but a filter to hide things about which the client does not need to worry.
Answer: This is a great question. On the one hand if the issue tracking is in the hands of a sponsor who will pick through each and every bug and add comments, call you and ask for status on a specific bug (when it's right there in the tracking tool), copy and paste details of the issue into outside emails to other stakeholders and create bad blood...then he/she probably should not be allowed access. But then, if you have a sponsor like this then you'll have headaches throughout the project for other reasons.
In general, I agree with those who said that the sponsor should be allowed full access to the issue tracking tool, and in most cases these people wouldn't even have the time to pick through each issue. But, if he ever did want to get more information on something, the details are there for him. Access to the issue tracking system should be granted with the understanding that the project manager makes decisions regarding priorities unless the sponsor is consulted specifically. Also, the sponsor should understand that any communication should continue to go through the PM, if he posts notes to the developers directly through the issue tracking tool, this will be much less productive.
Like some who mentioned, it would be ideal to have control over what issues the sponsor sees. LiquidPlanner is an excellent option for those who want this ability, the client portals will give the team control over what the client/sponsor can see and not see. This should help create a happy balance for all.


Is there a connection between the Navadurga and the Dashmahavidya?

Question: Navratri festival is going on and we are told about the nine forms of the Goddess also called Nava-Durga that are worshipped in these 9 days. However, I just recently came to know that some people also worship the Dash-Mahavidyas in these days. I want to know is there a connection between the two?
Comment: Generally nava durga are now more popular because many blogs and books and tv shows talk about them. Since they are nine in number they are related that way to nine nights. But in shastras there is less information on these deities. Where as plenty of texts on the subject of mahavidya
Comment: The Nava Durga are forms of Parvati and Dash Mahavidyas are form of Sati bith of whom are forms of Goddess Shakti/so that can be a connection between them.
Answer: The Nava Durga, if you properly notice are forms of Parvati. As Wikipedia mentions:

The nine manifested forms of Goddess Durga (Gauri) or (Parvati) are: Shailaputri, Brahmacharini, Chandraghanta, Kushmanda, Skandamata, Katyayini, Kaalratri, Mahagauri and Siddhidhatri.

The Dash Mahavidyas are mentioned as forms of Sati (Parvati's previous incarnation) or sometimes as those of Parvati herself as mentioned in the various accounts given in the answers to this question I had asked earlier. These are the ten:

The Mahavidyas are considered Tantric in nature, and are usually identified as:

Kali – The ultimate form of Brahman, "Devourer of Time" (Supreme Deity of Kalikula systems).
Tara – The Goddess as Guide and Protector, or Who Saves. Who offers the ultimate knowledge which gives salvation. She is the goddess of all sources of energy. The energy of the sun is also a grant from her.
Tripura Sundari (Shodashi) – The Goddess Who is "Beautiful in the Three Worlds" (Supreme Deity of Srikula systems); the "Tantric Parvati" or the "Moksha Mukta".
Bhuvaneshvari – The Goddess as World Mother, or Whose Body is the Cosmos.
Bhairavi – The Fierce Goddess.
Chhinnamasta – The self-decapitated Goddess[5].
Dhumavati – The Widow Goddess, or the Goddess of death.
Bagalamukhi – The Goddess Who Paralyzes Enemies.
Matangi – the Prime Minister of Lalita (in Srikula systems); the "Tantric Saraswati".
Kamala – The Lotus Goddess; the "Tantric Lakshmi".

As you see while the Nava Durga are more benign in nature the Dash Mahavidyas are more fierce and war-like. However, both of them are forms of Goddess Shakti and both the lists include Ma Kali so that is the connection between them.
Comment: Possibly because the Navadurga appeal more to the householders while Mahavidyas due to their fierce nature are worshipped more by the Tantriks
Comment: Thank you sir for the answer! Why do people worship either of these but not both?
Comment: Every goddess is coming from parashakti so what's the connection? No mahAvidya are not fierce. See for example sodashi , bhuvaneshwari, kamalaa etc. And which scripture gives pooja paddhati of navadurga can you tell ?
Answer: Nava Durga are Nine Niddhis that are forms of Devi
9 Nidhis (treasures) are(also corresponding to 9 planets and their 9 jewels):
refer https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Navaratna
(Ruby (maanikyam) for Surya (taraneh) (Sun),
Pearl (muktaaphalam) for Chandra (Moon),
Red Coral (vidrumam) for Mangala (maaheya) (Mars),
Emerald (marakatam) for Budha (saumya) (Mercury),
Yellow sapphire (pushparajam) for Bṛhaspati (devejya) (Jupiter),
Diamond (vajram) for Shukra (asurachaarya) (Venus),
Blue sapphire (niilam) for Shani (Saturn),
Hessonite (gomeda) or Rahu)
Cat's Eye (vaidooryam) for Ketu)

1) Mahapadma: Great lotus flower
2) Padma: Lotus/ a Himalayan lake with treasures
3) Shankha: Conch shell
4) Makara: Crocodile/ Antimony
5) Kachchhapa: Tortoise or turtle shell
6) Mukunda: Cinnabar/ Quick Silver
7) Kunda: Jasmine/ Arsenic
8) Nila: Sapphire/ Antimony
9) Kharva: Cups, vessels baked in fire

while her 8 arms or Ashtabhuja are 8 supreme manifestations
8 Siddhis (Supernatural powers) are:

1) Aṇimā: Ability to reduce one's size
2) Mahima: Ability to increase one's size
3) Garima: Ability to increase one's weight infinitely
4) Laghima: Ability to become lighter than the lightest
5) Prāpti: Ability to Obtain anything
6) Prākāmya: Ability to acquire anything desired
7) Iṣiṭva: Lordship over creation
8) Vaśitva: Having control over things

Devi is pure power. Puranas are just simple fun stories to explain complex thing like Devi and her's creation power.
Hanuman and Ganesha are the ones who mastered all 9 niddhi and 8 siddhis, from Hanuman Chalisa:

Ashta siddhi nava nidhi ke dātā, asa bara dīnha jānakī mātā

Dashmahavidya is part of Tantra which is part of Shakta and Shaivism as well, so Shaivism had impact on Shakta texts leading to number 10 which is confusing
Even Lord Krishna, the most powerful God had 8 main wives corresponding to 8 forms of Shakti. The rest 8 women were together called "Ashtabharya".They were the principal wives of Lord Krishna namely,
Rukmini
Satyabhama
Jambavati
Kalindi
Nagnajiti
Mitravinda
Lakshmana
Bhadra
And the number 1008 is also 1000+8
The highest Chakra that represents Purusha/Shiva is Sahasrara Chakra and has 1000 petals http://www.tantra-kundalini.com/sahasrara.htm
8 are main forms of Shakti as explained above
Together 1008 represents the entire cosmos and is revered as a holy number for a Guru who has attained highest state of Paramhans


How do I FREEZE/stop/lock a MYSQL database? THen how do I enable the databse back to normal?

Question: Basically, I need to stop it.  (So that I can do backup without new data).
Everything "frozen".
THen, how do I enable it so that people can make changes to it again?
Answer: To expand on 3dinfluence's answer.  mysqldump will lock the tables with a read lock before dumping them (which is what you're after when you say "freeze").  Depending on your storage engine, the UPDATES (and possibly SELECTS) will be queued up until the dump is complete (at which point it'll unlock the tables).
if you want to do it manually, the command you'll want will be something like (adjust to suit if you don't want the global lock).
flush tables with read lock;

This will apply a global lock and flushes the query cache.  You can then remove the lock with
unlock tables;

Answer: You can just use mysqldump command to get a snapshot of a running database without locking or freezing it.
Comment: But i want to freeze it?
Answer: if your database is stored on lvm - use snapshot feature. you can use own script or for instance mylvmbackup.
if you use innodb database - you can use mysqldump with single-transaction option, or you can try xtrabackup.
with all those options you will not have to take the database offline during the backup.


How to assign all members at once in Trello's card?

Question: I run an agency. We have about 60 artists + other members. When there is an audition, I want to create a card and add all members with one action, not one by one, as I do now. Is this possible? And if yes, how do I do that?
Answer: Trello recently implemented Card Copying functionality, allowing you to copy members, checklists, labels, attachments, and comments from one card to another.  If you're only looking to keep the same members from one card to another, simply uncheck all of the options other than "Members".  This would allow you to copy all 60 members from the old card while avoiding copying any of the data from the previous card.


Ubuntu 12.10 NTFS on USB drive problems

Question: I installed 12.10 a while ago, but I am now experiencing problems with USB devices. At first I had problems copying files to a flash disk. I was told that there is not enough space on the disk, but the amount of files amounted to a fraction of the capacity of the device. I formatted the flash drive with gparted and copied the files. Then I ejected the device and the moment I pulled out the device I got an error message about not being able to write to the disk. At first I thought I pulled the disk to quickly, but repeating the exercise a few times discovered that this happened even when waiting ten minutes before removing the drive after ejecting it. If I re-insert the disk, I get an error message that the drive could not be mounted. Since then I have had similar problems when writing files to an external hard drive. I'm not getting the same problem on my other PC with Ubuntu 11.10. I'm desperate at this stage as I can't write files to external device. Ubuntu 12.10 keeps on corrupting the file system.
Answer: I know it's probably too late to help you but maybe others can find a helpful explanation here for a workaround to this issue http://itsfoss.com/how-to-format-a-sd-card-or-usb-drive-in-ubuntu-12-10/
Comment: Welcome to Ask Ubuntu! Whilst this may theoretically answer the question, [it would be preferable](http://meta.stackexchange.com/q/8259) to include the essential parts of the answer here, and provide the link for reference.

Ubuntu 12.10 NTFS on USB drive problems


Regular Expression to Context-Free Grammar

Question: Anyone knows if there is an algorithm for directly write the context-free grammar that generates a given regular expression?
Comment: Do you want the CFG that generates the valid regular expression strings like "a*(a|b)", or do you want the CFG that generates strings like "aaaaab" given the regular expression "a*(a|b)"?
Answer: I assume you want to get a grammar that generates the same language as the given regular expression.
You can achieve that by the following steps:

Translate the regular expression into an NFA.
Translate the NFA into a (right-)regular grammar.

Both translations are standard and covered in basic textbooks on formal languages and automata. Note that any regular grammar is also context-free.
Comment: Yes, better than my answer.
Answer: Yes. I give the high-level answer, without many details.
First you have to parse the expressions. That can be done using a simple recursive decent parser. Several examples on the web.
Then you should add "semantic" rules to the parser, when returning from the recursion. Those are standard in any formal language theory course. If $S_1$ and $S_2$ are non-terminals that generate expressions $E_1$ and $E_2$ then we can generate $E_1+E_2$ by $S$ and the rules $S\to S_1$,  $S\to S_2$. We can generate concatenation $E_1 E_2$ by $S$ and the rule $S\to S_1 S_2$. $E_1*$ by $S$ and the rules $S\to S_1 S$, $S\to \lambda$. Assuming we choose fresh nonterminals each time.
Answer: Like a previous answer, I assume you want to get a grammar that generates the same language as the given regular expression $r$.
A recursive algorithm for constructing a context-free grammar $G$ with $L(G) = L(r)$ goes as follows:

if $r = \emptyset$, output a grammar with no production rules (or $S \to S$ if it must have a rule).
if $r = \Lambda$, output $S \to \Lambda$.
if $r = a$ (the expression is just a single letter), output $S \to a$.
if $r = a \cup b$ (union, also notated as + or |): construct disjoint grammars for $a$ and $b$ with start symbols $S_a$ and $S_b$, combine them and add $S \to S_a \mid S_b$.
if $r = lr$ (concatenation, also notated as $\cdot$): construct disjoint grammars for $l$ and $r$ with start symbols $S_l$ and $S_r$, combine them and add $S \to S_l S_r$.
if $r = x^*$ (Kleene star): construct a grammar for $x$ with start symbol $S_x$ and add $S \to S_x S \mid \Lambda$.

This is essentially equivalent to Hendrik's answer, but with more detail which may be useful.


What's the origin of the idiom "don't give it the time of day"?

Question: Twice in the past few hours, I've seen the idiom "don't give it the time of day". Now, I immediately knew and understood what the people using the phrase meant, but then I realized that I didn't know why that phrase means what it means. I Googled the phrase "time of day idiom" because I was particularly interested in the origin/etymology of the "time of day" part. I readily found the meaning (which I already knew), but was stymied as to its origin (which is what I wanted). Thus, I ask: what is the origin/etymology of the idiom?
Comment: I visited Galway, Ireland, where there is a tower in the centre of the old town. The story I was told was that centuries ago the town folk voted to pay for a town clock to be placed on the tower. They placed a face on three sides of the tower, but left one side without a clock because the families who lived on that side of the town didn't contribute (or were unpopular, can't remember which). So they "wouldn't give them the time of day"! I've always liked this story of the origin of the saying.
Answer: An answer at answers.com quotes American Heritage Dictionary of Idioms to the effect that to not give someone the time of day means

Ignore someone, refuse to pay the slightest attention to someone, as in He's tried to be friendly but she won't give him the time of day. This expression, first recorded in 1864, alludes to refusing even to answer the question, "What time is it?"

By contrast, an answer at tywkiwdbi.blogspot.com says:

the expression goes far back beyond the time when people wore watches... In Shakespeare's day, the meaning was quite clear. "Good time of day" or "fair time of day" was a salutation just like "good morning" or "good evening"...We no longer greet people by saying "good time of day," but we still use the idea of giving such a greeting as a sign of favorable attention. In other words, refusing to give someone the time of day is thinking so little of him that you would not say hello to him on the street." (credit to Scribal Terror)

If tywkiwdbi and Scribal Terror are right, then the expression is rather older than the AHD Dictionary of Idioms said.
Edit: The BBC Learning English presentation "Not give someone the time of day" says:

Long ago, in Shakespeare's time, the phrase 'good time of day' was a greeting often used. These days we say 'good morning' [or 'good afternoon'] … So to say that you wouldn't give someone the time of day means you wouldn't want to greet them or say hello. So the saying means you refuse to give someone your attention.

As an example of the phrase used in Shakespeare's time, consider King Henry VI, part II, Act III, scene I, as Queen Margaret speaks:

Can you not see? or will ye not observe
      The strangeness of his alter'd countenance?
  ...
  We know the time since he was mild and affable,
  ...
      But meet him now, and, be it in the morn,
      When every one will give the time of day,
      He knits his brow and shows an angry eye,
      And passeth by with stiff unbowed knee,

Edit 2: Another example from Shakespeare (as pointed out by ΜετάEd's reference) is from King Richard III, Act I, scene III, when Buckingham says "Good time of day unto your royal grace!".  Note, Shakespeare is believed to have written both plays about 1591; he might or might not have put 16th-century speech into the mouths of 15th-century people.  Henry VI was King of England and/or France at various times between 1422 and 1471, and Richard III from 1483 until his demise in 1485.
Comment: I am far more likely to rely on AHD than a blogger, without evidence.
Comment: @ΜετάEd, me too; so I've added better evidence
Comment: OEtmD agrees with BBC and gives a better Shakespeare quotation: http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=time
Answer: The phrase supposes that the smallest favour you can do for somebody is telling them what time it is when they ask.
So not giving them the time of day amounts to ignoring their tiny request, and by implication ignoring them.
In your example this has extended to ignoring some thing.


First time getting a logo designed

Question: I just had someone design my logo, and when I try to place it on a vistaprint business card the logo came with a white background already making it look real odd. I just wanted the logo itself so when I place it on any background it would be that color.  Is this common?  Is there a certain format to ask for, because I will be using this logo for business cards, website, merchandise, promo items, banners etc.  The logo was also too small and looked even worse when I made it bigger because of the white background.
Comment: How experienced is your logo designer?
Comment: You should have made sure that your logo was a .png file which means that the background is clear.
Comment: @Alex:  Any good reason you suggest an RGB bitmap format over CMYK vectors? An experience designer would provide different formats for the different purposes that JResto1557 lists.
Comment: @Jongware No, reason I just really like how versatile `.png` images are.
Comment: Who designed the business card?
Comment: Actually i doubt the png will help as it sounds like a color profile mismatch
Answer: Congratulations on your first logo.
You will likely deal with more contractors in the future, so allow me to explain some fundamentals so you can ensure you get what you need in the future.
Bitmap Images
These are your every day digital images. Bitmaps are comprised of tiny squares of color (pixels) that together form an image.
Example 1
If you have a 200 × 200 pixel image and you attempt to render it at 300 × 300 px, it will suffer a loss of fidelity (blur) because a lot of pixel information is missing.
Example 2
You're working with a designer, and she asks for a headshot for the team section of your website. In this instance, you will want to send her the largest image you have—let's say 1000 × 1000 px.
For her design, she may resize the image and end up only using 400 × 400 px for the image. When you downscale the image, you willingly give up pixel information—but the image fidelity will likely be a lot better. (No missing information, just sacrificed information.)
So while you may be able to see a single strand of hair in the original 1000 × 1000 px image, the 400 × 400 px may not show that—but the image won't be noticeably blurry.
Example 3
You need a 16 × 16 px icon, which only has 256 pixels of information. At these sizes, it becomes exponentially important those pixels be deliberately placed—rather than interpreted by downscaling a larger image, which can cause blurring at very small sizes.
Vector Images
Ah, the good stuff. These "images" are actually mathematical instructions  (points, curves and shapes) that can be rendered by a graphics application like Photoshop or Illustrator.
The process for creating these images is a lot different, but the salient advantage of vector is the image can be rendered at any size. For this reason, it's imperative logos be finalized and delivered in a vector format.
Example 4
Based on the visual acuity of the human eye, 300 dots per inch (DPI) is the standard for high resolution prints. If you need a 40" × 20" poster with your logo on it, that's 40*300 × 20*300 pixels... that's a 12,000 × 6,000 px image you need for a high quality poster print.
That's a pretty large bitmap!
With artwork in a vector format, it's a simple matter to export your logo from Photoshop or Illustrator at 12,000 × 6,000—or even 120,000 × 60,000 px.

So...

"Is there a certain format to ask for, because I will be using this logo for business cards, website, merchandise, promo items, banners etc."

You should make sure (before working with the designer) that you will receive the original artwork in Illustrator's .AI, and .EPS just incase future contractors or printers don't have Illustrator.
I would also recommend asking the designer to provide a few sizes for your ease of use, e.g:

Full color, 1000 × 500 px .PNG with transparent background
Single color, 1000 x 500 px .PNG with transparent background
Full color, 300 × 150 px .JPG on white
Single color, 300 × 150 px .JPG on white
etc.

It'll be up to you figure out sizes make the most sense—but don't be afraid to learn how to open, resize/crop and export images yourself. It will go a long way to not have incorrectly sized or blurry images when you need to make a good impression for your business.
Answer: You have to make sure you export your logo into ".png". This will make sure you're background keeps transparant. Are you designing in illustrator? Make sure it's a vector logo, issue to using your logo in different sizes and keeping it professional.
Comment: This answer can be misleading. PNG does support transparency. So does PSD. So does EPS. So does SVG. And other formats. A professional designer would provide the correct format(s) as required by the job - and often times that is a selection of formats for different mediums. Its not just "save it as PNG".
Comment: Thank you so much for the education.  Now I have a better understanding of what I need and what to ask for

First time getting a logo designed


How do I get my game back on Steam?

Question: I formatted my computer recently and when I logged in only a couple of the games I had were in my library. The one I am missing needs me to pay to get it back again. The game is Total War: Warhammer II.
Comment: This is a question you should ask to the Steam support team directly. You can do so from the Steam software by clicking on "Help" -> "Steam Support".
Comment: Note that games that are free to play do not appear in your library until they are installed again.
Answer: It is possible that a filter in Steam is hiding some of your games. Ensure that your filter is set to show all games.

If that does not solve your problem, I suggest logging into Steam through your web browser to verify whether or not the game is in your account.
Once logged in, check your games page to see if your game is there. To do so, visit the following URL, replacing YOUR-USERNAME with your username:
https://steamcommunity.com/id/YOUR-USERNAME/games/?tab=all
Once there, filter for the game you are looking for:

If you still do not see your game, review your purchase history and find when you purchased it: https://store.steampowered.com/account/history/

Once there, click on the purchase of your game and you will be presented with a 'help' screen for that purchase. You should then see commonly asked questions. Click I have a question about this purchase and follow the instructions you are given.

If you are unable to find your game in the transaction history, it is possible that you never purchased the game. If someone else shared the game with you via Steam Family Sharing then sharing may have simply expired, causing the game to be removed from your library. View what games people have shared with you here.

Still not satisfied? Try using the Steam Support page. To contact them directly, keep clicking on the various options you're presented with until you land on one which allows you to contact them directly. (even if the category isn't exactly what you're having an issue with) Clearly explain the issue you are having and hit Send!
I was able to find a contact form by selecting I was charged the wrong amount under one of my game purchases:
Comment: @Asunez I've added the requested information.
Comment: Very detailed and exhaustive answer (+1'd), however - could you also provide the steps to contacting Steam Support directly in case the video gets pulled down for any reason?

How do I get my game back on Steam?


An iPad using my email address

Question: I received an notice on my iPhone saying, "iPad is now using ####@hotmail.com". This is my email address but I don't have an iPad. What does this mean? Thank you.
Comment: It is right about Christmas time. (spoiler alert) There isn't a chance someone will be gifting you with a configured iPad, is there? If there isn't, I would investigate further.
Comment: Change your iCloud password right now.
Answer: If the notice were a pop up, then someone knows your Apple ID and password and entered them into another device.
If it's an email, you will want to check first that it's from Apple and perhaps log into http://appleid.apple.com to check that your account is secured, perhaps changing the password if you feel that is warranted. If you do this, make sure you also change the password to your email, as someone could use that to reset your Apple ID password.
Basically, Apple wants to make sure you know every time you set up a new device with your Apple ID since if you didn't allow it, someone else will then have access to your messages, your apps, etc...
Worst case, you can contact Apple Support if you can't resolve this as they might have better advice specific to your situation and be able to assist in locking / recovering control of your account. Also, if you use the same password here as you use on any other account - they could be compromised as well so you might want to change any account that uses your email and that password going forward.
Answer: Your hotmail account may have been compromised ("hacked").
Or this may just be a phishing attempt to reveal your password or go to a particular site which may then infect your computer.
If I was in your situation, I would check the legitimacy of the mail first (google it), then I would change my password on my hotmail account.

An iPad using my email address


Why 不便 instead of 不便利?

Question: Is there a grammatical (or semantic) reason that explains why the opposite of 便利(な) is 不便(な)rather than 不便利(な)。 I'm asking because I noticed a similar thing possibly occurring with 満足 and 不満 and was wondering if there was some underlying information that could help me better understand Japanese grammar.
Answer: Many on-yomi kanji compounds were made by combining two kanji with similar meanings.

満足: 満 ≒ 足 ≒ suffice; satisfy
便利: 便 ≒ 利 ≒ convenience; advantage
明瞭: 明 ≒ 瞭 ≒ clear; visible

This is because the on-reading of each kanji is very short and people needed two kanji to disambiguate. For example, マン by itself is too ambiguous because it can mean ten thousand (万), chronic (慢), etc.
But if you add 不, two kanji is often long enough and you may no longer have to say two similar kanji. There is no such word as [*]不万 (non-ten-thousand?), [*]不慢 (non-chronic?), [*]不勉 (non-study?) or [*]不弁 (non-valve?).

不満
不便

For some compounds, you cannot omit kanji at all (eg 不連続, 不確実). Or omitting one kanji may change the meaning a bit (eg 不明 = unknown vs. 不明瞭 = obscure). Basically you'll have to memorize each word individually.
Comment: @G-Cam 不満足 is less common but [actually in use](https://kotobank.jp/word/%E4%B8%8D%E6%BA%80%E8%B6%B3-620261). 不満 also means *complaint* rather than *dissatisfied*. 不便利 is not used but at least we can understand :-)
Comment: Thanks for the answer as always. One follow-up. I understand that affixes are very much a case-by-case subject and applying rules to them might be a losing battle and I'm not trying to look for shortcuts but I wonder, are 不便利 and 不満足 categorically wrong? They're obviously not in common use (if at all) but if you heard them, would your native ears understand?

Why 不便 instead of 不便利?


iMac with core i5 not works brightness

Question: I have an iMac 2012 with core i5 but the brightness control doesn't work. The brightness works when the screen saver is activated but deosn't work with the F1 and F2 buttons. Now i'm working with an Ubuntu 12.04, How can i solve this problem?
Answer: Because that feature is a hardware related feature you can map the keys for brightness UP and DOWN. I do not remember of the right article right now, but search for mapping keys, and you can make your keys change brightness. Probably you will have to edit a file. There is already a post about that. Sorry for no solution right now, but it is possible to solve it. ;)

iMac with core i5 not works brightness


Broken Navigation Image Gifs,and

Question: Thanks for assisting .. I have just a couple of questions:
1)  I'm a little puzzled by missing navigation icons (see below)..and it would appear to be using a relative reference. I'm hosting CiviCRM on the Google cloud thru Bitnami which is by and large working pretty well. Nowhere in the configuration would appear to allow me to put in specific reference of the IP where CiviCRM is hosted.  I can see the image gifs with the specific IP and image path.  Saw a post Broken Image Link (Menu)  but didnt quite work for me.

2) In configuring the Navigation Menu, I could not remove the sub menu items of Events and other top menu items.  I was able to do so in a local install previously when I would simply click on the Events link, and all the sub menu items displayed below, and I simply deleted the sub menu items, click to refresh and it was done.  With this install on the cloud - there is no response when I click on Events menu item.  But I could right click on it do Rename, Delete and Edit the main menu item.
Answer: The Base URL is set in civicrm.settings.php.  From your screenshot, it looks like you're running CiviCRM on Drupal; find civicrm.settings.php in <drupal root>/sites/default/civicrm.settings.php.

Broken Navigation Image Gifs,and


How to fix wood stain drips?

Question: I have recently finished staining some wood 2x4s but I accidentally put too much stain on the wood. It dripped down to the other sides of the boards and it now looks sloppy and tacky.  We considered re-sanding the wood and starting over or just going over the stain again to try to even it out.  Will re-staining it work?  I don't think it will and I feel like it would be a waste of time.  Any help?  I am an amateur and don't know a lot about this.
Comment: Were you using stain, or a colored varnish? Stain you normally apply, let sit a bit, and then wipe off the excess. Tinted varnish is a different beast.
Comment: @Kaz: Not quite. There are actually three categories. Stains (which, as you say, soak in or are captured by pores in the wood) may use either dyes or pigments. There are also _tints_ which are what you're calling a stain. See, eg, http://www.woodworkersjournal.com/Main/Articles/Staining-and-Dyeing-6072.aspx
Comment: @keshlam If it penetrates into the wood it is called a *dye*; if it consists of a pigment held in a transparent binder on top of the wood, it is a *stain*.  Dyes are applied to bare wood, and it is not considered finished after dying; stains are finishes.
Comment: @keshlam I'm only using the terms the way hardware stores in north America use them, like Home Depot. What they sell as "stain" is basically a paint base of some kind that is tinted translucent. See here: https://www.highlandwoodworking.com/woodnews/march_2006/alan_noel_march.html   Calling this a "stain" does seem like an obnoxious misnomer, and has always bothered me, but the usage is what it is.
Comment: Trying taking a piece of painters tape and tape the other side of the wood where you don't want to have the paint drip down to . Once your done just remove it. Hope it helps
Answer: Well you can do one of a couple things.

Stain the entire board.  This may be the easiest option, just clean up the drips down the side a bit (sanding them).  Then stain the sides and the back side of the board as well.  Rub it on, let it sit for a couple minutes and then wipe it off.  Unless of course as Keshlam mentioned you are working with a stain/sealer combo.  For reference stain sealer combos tend to fade much faster and protect for far less time.
If you don't for whatever reason want to stain the entire board simply sand the sides down and you're done.  It shouldn't be too bad since it ran down the sides, should not have penetrated all that much.  Make sure to sand evenly along the length of the side (including the spots not hit with the stain).
Answer: I did the same thing. I had to start over. But only in the small area that had the drip. I am redoing my kitchen cabinets, and while putting the glaze on the doors some dripped and got on the other side of the door, did not notice it until it had dried. So on the small area I repainted and then glazed. Can't even tell it happened.I was using The Rust-Oleum Cabinet Transformations Kit.

How to fix wood stain drips?


Small equipments for abs

Question: I want to build my abs. I am eating well, and I wonder if there is a piece of small equipment that could be helpful for me to build abs.
Comment: Honestly, your best piece of equipment is yourself. Bodyweight exercises are pretty much all you need to work your abs. Although, if you are looking for equipment, how small do you want it? Small enough that it fits in a spare room? Small enough to fit in the closet? Small enough to fit in a backpack?
Answer: If you're talking about reducing belly fat, you should read up that spot reduction is a myth: you can't target fat on any part of your body.
But directly answering your question the smallest piece of equipment I know of for abdominals is the ab wheel:

A caveat to the ab wheel is that it actually takes a pretty fit person to safely use it. If you can hold a plank for a minute or so, I think you're in a good spot. It can be a lot of load on wrists, shoulders, and your abs.
Used incorrectly, it can put a lot of load on your lower back as well.
Answer: Check gymnastics related workouts and you will be fine regarding core strength. No equipment required.
If you like to get new toys to keep you motivated and/or vary the exercises, paralettes can be a small and very useful piece of equipment, pull up bar and/or rings can also help
Answer: Most important thing in "buliding" your abs is low fat procentage - you proably even know some guys who have never done any exerciese but got some visible abs, just because of genetics.
So, exercieses are second, but matter as well.
So, if the question about an equipment I can recommend pull up bar chrunces as exercise where as an equimpent you can use just some dumbell - just hold it between your legs and perform crunches.

Small equipments for abs


Microsoft SQL BCP Format File - Version?

Question: I have a question regarding Microsoft SQL's Bulk Copy Program (BCP.exe). I am relatively new to using the program so am hoping it's an easy question for some, however I am stuck!
On Server #1 we're running Microsoft SQL 2014, it runs the BCP to export a number of tables. It provides me with a *.DAT and *.FMT file per table.
When I go to import this data on to Server #2 running Microsoft SQL 2012 I receive an error:
SQLState = HY000, NativeError = 0Error = [Microsoft][SQL Server Native Client 11.0][SQL Server]Syntax error at line 2 column 0 in xml format file. | Exit Code: 1

I read there were versioning issues using BCP going from a newer to an older version of SQL, and quickly found a way to manually fix this.
In the FMT file as you may know the very first line contains the SQL version number that exported the data - which in this case is 12.0. If I change this to 11.0 (or 10.0), then re-run the import everything works fine & dandy!
Here is an example of the FMT file before I edit the first line:
12.0
6
1       SQLNCHAR            2       72      ""   1     ListID                                                                       SQL_Latin1_General_CP1_CI_AS
2       SQLNCHAR            2       32      ""   2     EditSequence                                                                 SQL_Latin1_General_CP1_CI_AS
3       SQLNCHAR            2       62      ""   3     Name                                                                         SQL_Latin1_General_CP1_CI_AS
4       SQLBIT              1       1       ""   4     IsActive                                                                     ""
5       SQLNCHAR            2       30      ""   5     PriceLevelType                                                               SQL_Latin1_General_CP1_CI_AS
6       SQLDECIMAL          1       19      ""   6     PriceLevelFixedPercentage

While I can fix this manually I need to automate this system to run very regularly so this is not a long term solution.Please help! Is there anything I can do?
I either need to fix the export so it uses v11.0 or older, or fix the import so it recognizes v12.0. I have tried using the -V flag on both the import & export however this doesn't make a difference on either end.
Thanks in advance for your expert advice.
Comment: My question is the same as this one. Have you figured it out?
https://stackoverflow.com/questions/50640505/bulk-insert-cannot-bulk-load-unknown-version-of-format-file
Answer: I managed to solve this problem by installing Microsoft® Command Line Utilities 11 for SQL Server® and adding the bcp.exe location to the path variables. Now I can export version 11 using bcp 11, thus making the exported format files compatible with SQL 2012. You can download it from here https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=36433
Comment: This however just provides a solution for the existing problem. I would say that there is a bug in bcp. I'll try and add a case in Microsoft.