How can I use a 240 volt circuit for 240v and 120v appliance as per code?

Question: I have a double wall oven (40 amps) on a separate circuit and want to replace with single wall oven (20 amps) and wall microwave (120v, 2000 watt). How can I use the 240v feed to supply the wall oven (240v) and microwave (120v)? Is this code compliant. The reason for asking is that a new wire is difficult to lay in existing home.
Comment: How many wires are in the existing cable?  Are they hot-hot-neutral-(ground?) or is there no neutral?
Answer: If the microwave is going to be plugged in to a receptacle, which almost all are, then the following articles apply:

406.4 General Installation Requirements.  Receptacle outlets shall be located in branch circuits in accordance with Part III of Article 210. General installation requirements shall be in accordance with 406.4(A) through (F).
(A) Grounding Type.  Except as provided in 406.4(D) [this refers to replacing old two prong receptacles and doesn't apply to your case], receptacles installed on 15- and 20-ampere branch circuits shall be of the grounding type. Grounding-type receptacles shall be installed only on circuits of the voltage class and current for which they are rated, except as provided in Table 210.21(B)(2) and Table 210.21(B)(3).

This is a crude recreation of the Table, notice 40 amp circuits require 40 amp receptacles.

Table 210.21(B)(3) Receptacle Ratings for Various Size Circuits
Circuit Rating (Amperes) : Receptacle Rating (Amperes)
15 : Not over 15
20 : 15 or 20
30 : 30
40 : 40 or 50
50 : 50

This means a receptacle on a 40 amp circuit has to be rated 40 or 50 amps.
If your microwave is hard-wired, then there is an exception to allow taps on a 50 amp circuit but not on anything smaller so this exception does not apply to your 40 amp circuit.

210.19(A)(3) Exception No. 1: Conductors tapped from a 50-ampere branch circuit supplying electric ranges, wall-mounted electric ovens, and counter-mounted electric cooking units shall have an ampacity of not less than 20 amperes and shall be sufficient for the load to be served. These tap conductors include any conductors that are a part of the leads supplied with the appliance that are smaller than the branch-circuit conductors. The taps shall not be longer than necessary for servicing the appliance. [This means the microwave would have to be hard-wired with minimum #12 wire.]

So, after reading through these articles, my opinion is that you will need to run a separate circuit for the microwave. And as long as you are doing it, you should make it a 20 amp circuit to allow for a higher powered microwave. In this case, doing the difficult thing is the safer and Code compliant thing.
Good luck!
Comment: Code fails to mention 40A receptacles don't exist on the market, and NEMA refuses to define them, so that exception is really about allowing a 50A receptacle on a 40A circuit with 40A wire (#8). A 20A circuit is a minimum for a 2000W microwave, as a 15A can only supply 1800W in any case.  Even a 20A can only supply 1920W continuous, but hopefully a microwave is not a continuous load.
Answer: If you no longer need the 240V 40A circuit. You should be able to convert it to a 20 ampere circuit, by simply replacing the 40 ampere breaker with a 20 ampere breaker.   This will give you a 240V 20A circuit.
Since you need two 120V circuits, you're going to have to supply a neutral.   I'm assuming the oven was supplied by only two wires (+ground). If that's the case, you'll have to pull new cable/wire.  If the circuit was run through conduit, you may have enough space to simply pull a neutral conductor.  If it's a cable, you're likely going to have to pull a new 12/3+ground cable from the panel to the oven.
Once you pull the new cable/wire, you'll connect it up as follows... The two ungrounded (hot) conductors will attach to the double pole 20A breaker.  The grounded (neutral) connects to the neutral bar in the panel. And the grounding conductor connects to the grounding bar in the panel.
Answer: To make a very long story short, you can't. The code does not allow it and it would result in a hazardous situation.  You have to run a second set of wires for the microwave over.  Happy wiring. P.


Is there any difference between the tags "grammaticality" and "grammatically"?

Question: The tag description for "grammaticality" says, "Grammaticality refers to whether something obeys the rules of grammar for English." The tag "grammatically" has no description, but its 23 questions all seem to be concerned with whether something obeys the rules of English grammar. Four of the questions under this tag follow the format of "Is ________ correct/grammatically correct?" and several others ask which of two options is correct. It seems that all of these questions fit the description of the "grammaticality" tag, so does the "grammatically" tag have some other purpose that sets it apart?
Comment: 'grammatically' sounds like a typo preserved
Comment: @Mari-LouA: that's to transfer "grammaticality" to "grammatically", which we presumably don't want. The other way round requires users who have rep on "grammatically"; there are only 11 such questions, so it may take some time.
Comment: I just gave the last needed vote, so it's a synonym now :) I would have done so earlier had I been online :)
Comment: Should all the questions with that tag be tagged as "grammaticality" instead? That tag has close to 3,000 questions, so it was definitely there first.
Comment: Well-spotted, I've never noticed the anomaly. Synonym tag should be voted on, asap,before people forget.
Comment: @Mari-LouA: the system has some rather draconian rules about who is allowed to vote on tag synonyms. Frankly, I'm surprised it allowed me to suggest the synonym at all.
Comment: What @Nicole said. I've done a few (some of which had *both* tags, which seems totally daft to me).
Comment: Ahh, only two users have bothered to vote so far. C'mon how much time does this take?
Comment: I tried to vote on it, but I don't have enough rep from that tag, apparently.
Comment: To upvote the synonym one needs to have 2,500 rep and at least 5 points earned by asking or answering any question tagged "grammaticality". There are plenty of users and mods who fit the criteria
Comment: There are now three votes for the suggested synonym which Martha has posted in her answer.
Comment: @Mari-LouA: 2 days later, and it's still at three votes. I'm not sure if there really are that many people who meet the voting criteria, even though I don't believe Tim is correct about which tag is the significant one. The problem, I think, is with the "5 points", which sounds like "5 rep" — i.e. trivially easy — but actually means "net five upvotes" and isn't very easy at all.
Comment: Oh, I thought it was the equivalent of one upvote on a question. Five points can't mean the same as five upvotes, that's 50 points!? But even so, there are better "qualified" and more experienced users than I who must have earned those points. Tchrist, regdwight, medica, fumblefingers, andrew leach, hellion, john lawler etc.
Comment: @Mari-Lou Perhaps they haven't seen this post, then.
Comment: Perhaps they don't care...
Comment: Thanks oerkelens!
Answer: I have suggested grammatically as a synonym of grammaticality.  I believe that if the synonym is approved, re-tagging becomes unnecessary, but that may just be wishful thinking on my part. In any case, if the system will let you, please vote on the synonym suggestion.
(It should go without saying that I believe the "grammatically" tag is a typo for "grammaticality".)
ETA: the synonym is now approved (thanks for the last vote, oerkelens!), and I was right: the system automatically re-tagged all the relevant questions.
Comment: @Nicole: if the person who originally created the tag had high enough rep, then no, there was no approval required. Subsequent users of the tag probably started typing "grammat...", at which point both tags came up, and they chose the wrong one -- the two words *look* almost identical. Or, for the ones who used both tags, they decided "well, let's just cover all our bases".
Comment: Another possibility: someone wants to add the (nonexistent) tag "grammatically-correct" to a question. As soon as they get to the hyphen, the possibilities list goes empty, so they backspace until the list comes back up again, and choose the closest (read: only) match, namely [tag:grammatically].
Comment: I retagged a few before I got bored and decided to let others finish the job, but in retrospect yours is a better approach. It turns out I *can* endorse your synonym proposal, but I recall that on other similar occasions in the past I've not been able to do this because I don't happen to have enough rep gained from questions associated with the specific tag involved. Your reasoning as to how 22 people managed to select the "inappropriate" alternative (after one initial mistake) sounds convincing to me; dealing with it your way should mean we'll avoid it cropping up again in future.
Comment: It seemed like a typo to me, too, but I wondered if 23 different people could make the same typo. Besides, the creation of the tag must have been approved, right?


Level of obligation of married women covering their hair

Question: Does a married woman have to cover her hair based on a biblical commandment or a rabbinic decree?
Comment: @SethJ there are several questions that ask about covering hair in specific situations (see related questions at right), but I couldn't find the general "is it d'oraita or d'rabbanan" question, so probably not a dupe.  (David, he meant that this might be a duplicate of an existing question; if so we would link it to the other, which may already have answers that you could use.)
Comment: I feel like this must be a dupe, but I can't find it.
Comment: What do you mean? And what can't you find?
Answer: The gemara in Ketubot derives the requirement from the laws of the Sotah in bamidbar 5:18. As the woman is required to UNcover her hair, there must have been covering on it.
The discussion is much more complex, but you can read about it here.
Comment: That doesn't really answer whether it's _mid'oraysa_ or _mid'rabanan_. (Is it a _d'rasha_ or an _asmachta_?)
Comment: the linked page discusses that and gives the options (paragraphs 2-4).
Comment: you can however interpret the gemara and pasuk to teach us that it is tznius. Because the jews lived in the middle east, they were living with arabs and people with similiar traditions. So the torah might be teaching us that it is forbidden to be less modest than the people which we live among. Look at Sarah avraham's wife for example, the pasuk says he didnt see her face, because she always had it covered. probably very similiar to modern day muslem woman. I believe the torah is commanding us in an inyun of tznius, not ervah.
Comment: @msh210 That is an Asmachta. An alluded support from written Torah for the Rabbinic prohibition of a married woman going out in public with hair uncovered.
Answer: It depends on who you ask, and how they interpret the sources.
The Mishna on Ketubot 72a list it as Das Yehudit (which the gemara contrasts with DeOraysa):

מתני' ואלו יוצאות שלא בכתובה העוברת על דת משה ויהודית ואיזו היא דת משה מאכילתו שאינו מעושר ומשמשתו נדה ולא קוצה לה חלה ונודרת ואינה מקיימת ואיזוהי דת יהודית יוצאה וראשה פרוע וטווה בשוק ומדברת עם כל אדם אבא שאול אומר אף המקללת יולדיו בפניו רבי טרפון אומר אף הקולנית ואיזוהי קולנית לכשהיא מדברת בתוך ביתה ושכיניה שומעין קולה:
"And these go out [of marriage] without their ketuba -- those who violate Dat Moshe and Dat Yehudit... And what is [a violation of] Dat Yehudit? She goes out with her hair uncovered..."

Yet the gemara there presents another Tannaitic source which (as per the gemara's interpretation) regards it as Biblical:

ראשה פרוע דאורייתא היא דכתיב (במדבר ה, יח) ופרע את ראש האשה ותנא דבי רבי ישמעאל אזהרה לבנות ישראל שלא יצאו בפרוע ראש
"But with her hair uncovered is Biblical, for it is written [Numbers 5:18] 'And he uncovers the head of the woman' and they taught in the academy of Rabbi Yishmael: this is a warning to daughters of Israel not to go out with uncovered hair."

The gemara then harmonizes it by explaining that there are two levels of requirement and how different levels of covering, in different locations, satisfy the different levels. See inside.
That is the normative halacha. (Though see how various Rishonim and Acharonim might interpret that gemara, perhaps moving it from this fixed point.)
What follows is my own chiddush in the matter. I would point out that one might disagree with the gemara and interpret that "warning" in Tana deVei Rabbi Yishmael as something other than a Biblical requirement.
And that if one looks in the Sifrei, a close but not identical picture emerges:

ופרע את ראש האשה: Another explanation: This teaches regarding daughters of Israel that they cover their hair. And though this is not a proof to the matter, there is a reference to the matter, in [II Shmuel 13]: 'And Tamar put ashes on her hair'"

One might argue that this is evidence of the true intent of the derasha, even as it appears in Tana deVei Rabbi Yishmael, that this is revealing the Dat Yehudis, the tznius practice of women even back then, rather than instituting a Biblical requirement.
Comment: Reminds me of  והזרתם את בני ישראל מטומאתם מכאן א"ר ירמיה אזהרה לבני ישראל שיפרשו מנשותיהן סמוך לוסתן which many take as an Asmachta.
Comment: Regarding your chiddush, see Benei Vanim 3:22 at the very end.


Convert MPG w/ AC3 audio to something else - on a Mac

Question: I'm helping with a small volunteer media team, and they have several .mpg videos that don't appear to have sound when played in QuickTime, iTunes, Real Player, etc, on the local Mac machine.
I was able to hear audio after transferring one of the movies to a Windows machine that had VLC media player on it. Through VLC I was able to discover that the audio stream is  a52 / AC3 format.
We use Autodesk Cleaner in our normal workflow of converting the format of our videos to FLV, but for some reason it's unable to convert this particular batch of videos (well, the video converts fine, but with no audio).
Obviously, it seems that there's a codec issue here, but I'm not sure how to correct it. (I'm not extremely familiar with Macs, and/or Autodesk Cleaner).
I've seen the Perian codec pack, but I'm not sure that having the codecs on the system will enable Cleaner to convert these videos (particularly the audio stream, since the video converts fine).
Is there something obvious that I'm overlooking, or will we have to use something else for this particular batch of videos? If so, what?
Answer: Handbrake has a Mac OSX version.
It might work for you.


Automatic wake up from "sleep" of kubuntu after ssh connection attempt

Question: Is there a way to set Kubuntu up so that it wakes up automatically from sleep mode upon ssh connection attempt? I know there is something like WoL, but that's not what I need (am I right?).
Comment: I think you need WOL to do it
Comment: @Fivesheep how to do it?
Answer: Before ssh, you have to send a wol magic package from a machine which is in the same lan with your kubuntu system. it depends on what device you have, it can be a computer or router. for ubuntu, you can install "wakeonlan".
make sure you have wol enabled in your motherboard's bios settings
Comment: It dont really need to be in the same LAN. You can send Magic packets over the internet.
Answer: For those running Tomato by Shibby, other Tomato based, or OpenWRT firmware on their router, you could write a little script to automatically wake up any PC on your local network that receives a new connection on its SSH port. I've written about this on my blog and the code is on github gist.


Funds from coinbase never showed in my Multibit wallet

Question: I know this question has been asked and answered a bunch of times so I am sorry for doing the same. I am basically a moron when it comes to this stuff and very new to digital currency.
So here's the deal opened an account with coinbase got my funds in there. I tried to use bit coin-qt but that has been syncing for literally 10 days now so I used multi bit instead. Did a small $5 transfer from CB to my MB wallet no problems I even figured out how to send it to someone else after that. Here is where the problem starts I went to deposit more funds from CB to my MB wallet using the same wallet. CB went through the pending process which took about an hour on the CB site it says transaction went through but the funds never arrived in my MB wallet. I tried resetting my blockchain and nothing. So now I see all of the kind folks on here talking about going to the GO function ( I run Mac OS ) or searching hidden files or searching something like ~librara/username/.wallet or something of the sort. So like I said in the beginning I am a moron and know nothing about what that means. Please help me figure out where on my computer that wallet and money went. Oh and bye the way the bitcoin wallet address still shows in my wallets list and its the same address that CB sent the funds to. Thanks in advance for any and all help
Comment: Your answer is hard to read as it's a giant block of text. It'd be more readable with proper paragraphing.
Answer: Hopefully you understand already that the coins themselves are in no way on your computer -- your wallet is just a key that lets you spend coins that are yours.
Everything you need to verify that you own those funds in question is available in the blockchain (and on your Coinbase account).
Simply look at your Coinbase transaction where it says it sent BTC to your wallet address. Click advanced details if you want the actual bitcoin transaction information. Here you can verify that your wallet address was the recipient of the BTC you sent to it. You should be able to click on the link for that address to see the value being held on it.
If you're feeling paranoid and want to cross-check Coinbase's blockchain data, just head over to http://blockchain.info/ and do a search on either the transaction hash or your wallet's receiving address. You should see the exact same information that you found on Coinbase.
I can't help you figure out how to use Multibit, but needless to say, if you lose the private key stored in your wallet, then you will be permanently unable to access the funds at that wallet's address. I can offer only the following tips based on your question:

Make backups (duh).
Mac OS X is closely related to UNIX (and Linux-style operating systems), where files and directories can be hidden by prefixing them with a dot. Similarly, the ~ character is short for your home directory.
You can view hidden files and folders easily by learning how to use Terminal (really, the ls -a, pwd, and cd commands would be all you need at this point, and are safe to mess around with... but MAKE BACKUPS).
You can view inside hidden directories using the finder by using the Go to Folder command (from the Go menu, or shortcut command-shift-g) and then typing the UNIX-style path of where you want to access. Note that you still won't be able to see any hidden files within this directory.
The ~/Library directory is not prefixed with a dot, but it is hidden by default on new Mac OS X systems. You can still get to it easily by using one of the methods listed above, or by opening the Go menu and then holding option, or if you want it to be visible permanently, navigate to your Home folder and hit command-J (or View menu -> show view options), and then check the box for "Show Library Folder".


Is it possible to grow the corn kernels from commercial popcorn?

Question: It doesn't seem like there's any process that would kill the kernels, as they're just being dried out. So would it be theoretically possible to grow the kernels into full corn plants? Would there be any difference between the kernels found in commercial, microwavable, bagged popcorn and corn kernels sold specifically for planting?
Comment: I'm talking about the corn you'd find in a bag of Orville Redenbacher's or something like that
Comment: Are you talking about pop corn kernels sold for planting? Or sweet or other varieties of corn?
Comment: So pop corn, then...
Comment: I would think that some kinds of it should grow. However, we spilled loads of commercial corn kernels on the ground and none of them grew this spring. I planted many Glass Gem corn seeds (meant to be planted), and every single one seemed to germinate (and very quickly). I don't know if the commercial corn was sterile, treated with heat, or if it just needed something more, but even without proper care, you'd think at least one seed out of a whole lot would have grown.
Comment: Of course even garden seeds are commercial. What I meant in my comment wasn't the variety or type of corn (but rather popcorn sold to be used for food instead of for planting).
Answer: It is possible to grow plants from the kernels you get for making popcorn, but remember this is a corn that isn't any good as sweet corn. it it very starchy and not sweet. it would only be good to use for more popcorn.
Here is a quick tutorial on germinating the seed.
In essence, what they recommend is the following:

Get the plain kernels for home made popcorn from the market (unflavoured).
Place the kernels in between damp sheets of kitchen paper to germinate.
The kernels that have germinated should then be planted out into the
ground in blocks of at least 3 x 3 (as corn is wind pollinated) and spaced at roughly 1' apart.
Keep watered in dry spells.
Leave the ears of corn on the
plants until the leaves surrounding the corn have browned.
Bring the ears in to dry out further.
Once fully dried, twist off the kernels to use as you would with store bought.

N.B. A great tip, if your patch suffers from rodent or squirrel attack (they do love corn), is to place empty soda bottles over the ears of corn with ventilation holes punched into it so that you don't encourage mildew to attack the corn.
Comment: This is a great answer, but what I'm looking for if is a bag of popcorn could be used to propagate more corn. If I could open a bag of "Light Butter Popcorn" from, say, PopSecret and grow some from that.
Answer: It is possible to do, but your results will vary. The stuff you buy for food popcorn isn't specifically grown for seed; it may be an F1 hybrid and the generation that you grow out may not produce the same as the parents. (This is probably what happened to @michelle -- she mentions that the results were unpredictable.) If you just want to try it as an experiment, go for it, but if you actually want popcorn that will grow predictably, you can buy popcorn varieties, e.g.  Pennsylvania Dutch Butter Flavored Popcorn.
Comment: 2 miles - boggles the mind, doesn't it?!? No wonder so many organic growers have such problems with GMO cross-contamination.
Comment: Baby rice is an open pollinated heirloom, which is why I was surprised. I was thinking maybe it was a cross-pollination issue, though?
Comment: Yes, my guess would cross-pollination. Corn grown for seed wants to have an isolation distance of **2 miles** (!), so when growing for seed you'd want to bag the ears (and possibly the tassels). This would be a huge hassle if you're growing for food, so I'd guess that grocery store corn will all be cross-pollination "contaminated".
Comment: You'd probably expect a 10% drop in productivity when planting F2 seeds ( the kernels from a F1 hybrid corn ).
Comment: @michelle some crops is worse than that. It is why some plants can't be shipped to this or that whole state in the USA because your trees or plants can affect commercial growers of _whatever_ in that state.
Answer: Yes, it should be possible. I've never tried Orville Redenbacher, but I have grown other grocery store popcorn and it grew just fine. The only problem for me was that the results were kind of unpredictable. The package I grew from said it was baby rice popcorn. I've grown baby rice before, and expected the plants to be 5 feet tall or so. The plants that grew from the grocery store seeds were closer to 10 feet tall - very surprising!
Answer: I germinated all the popcorn kernels I tried.  I will see if they grow into corn stalks.  They were organic popcorn from the grocery store.  I put a folded up paper towel in the bottom of a one cup measuring cup and soaked it with water.  I put the corn in and put saran wrap on top in a warm place and they germinated in one day.  I planted them into a peat pellet. Now waiting for more growth.
Comment: Keep us posted here if it works!
Answer: The quick answer is: It depends, but you probably won't get the same product as the one you bought.
The other answers really do a good job breaking this down. Growing something from a commercial product would come with two questions that you likely don't know the answer to from the packaging.
The first is: Did the seeds you bought come from hybrid plants? For corn specifically, the answer is probably yes. Most conventional, commercial growers use hybrid seeds because they have higher yields and since they are in the business of producing big yields, they likely are. When you plant the seeds of hybrid plants they "don't grow true" to the original plant which means that the offspring will be different from the parents - they be weaker, smaller, more susceptible to disease, or actually better! but likely worse.
However, if you bought from a grower who used an heirloom or landrace variety, this may in fact "grow true". That is, resulting (corn) plant would grow just like its parent plant(s) without the problems that come with F2 (or second generation) hybrid seeds.
The second factor is: Were the seeds irradiated? This is probably not the case for seeds (corn) that was grown in your country of origin, but may be the case for imported crops. Radiation is used on some imports with the express goal of killing the seed/any bacteria/fungus/disease etc that it may harbor. This would kill the corn seed and may mean that it won't grow.
The easiest, best way to grow popcorn generation after generation would be to choose an heirloom variety from the internet or from someone in your community who already has expertise and can suggest a good variety for your growing conditions. And remember, corn is wind pollinated so you have to grow a 10ft x 10ft plot (~3m x 3m) to ensure good pollination.
Answer: Corn is a kernel not a seed. However, it can be planted in the ground to grow corn stalks. My friends have been able to grow corn this way. Have fun gardening!
Comment: The question is about commercial popcorn you buy for popping (not for just any corn, and not seed packets of corn marketed for gardeners).
Comment: Although kernel usually refers to a seed with the hull removed, with corn, the seeds are called kernels.


Misjudging Volumes in All-Grain

Question: So I brewed my second all-grain batch today, and, like with my first all-grain batch, I misjudged the final volume and ended up with slightly under 4 gallons in my carboy. Does anyone have any good resources for approximately how much will boil off? I guess I'm undershooting because I don't want to be too low on my gravity with too much volume, but at the same time going through a brew day and cheating myself out of over a gallon of beer isn't efficient for time or money.
Answer: It doesn't matter what other people get.  Everyone's equipment is different, and everyones environment (climate, humidity) is different.  In 90minutes I boil off between 1.25 to 1.5 gallons.  Equipment variances are just to great person to person, especially when it comes to the boil right.  What one guy calls a rolling boil could be someone else's idea of a simmer. etc etc.
You would really do yourself a better service if you figure out what your boil off rate was yourself rather than looking for an equation.  Just look at what volume you started with and where you ended up.  Then make adjustments for next time.
The least talked about but most important part of all grain brewing is probably volume measurements.  You need to accurately be able to measure the water going into the mash, the wort coming out of the mash (grain absorption), the amount in the kettle pre and post boil (evap rate), and the amount making it into the fermenter (brewhouse efficiency).
Take the time now in your early all grain brewing career and make some sort of measuring stick for your kettle.  Do it before you brew your next batch and it will make the process much less of a mystery going forward.
Comment: Thanks for the solid advice, especially the measuring stick idea. I brewed a Pliny the Elder clone today and hit my gravity and volume exactly. Excellent!
Comment: Glad it helped.
Answer: Though your beer is stronger than it would have been.. :)
Here's a pretty good calculator for figuring out how much water to start with, which is a huge plus: http://www.brew365.com/mash_sparge_water_calculator.php
Do you know how fast you boil off water? Aka what your evaporation rate is? If so, you can do some fun math and figure it out.
Start with total gravity. Total gravity is how much sugar is in your wort, regardless of volume. Add 1000 gallons or boil it to a syrup, total gravity remains the same.
Take a reading (at room temp) with your hydrometer (if you have one. If not, get one.)
I like to take the 1.0 out of the reading, so 1.050 becomes 50. If you need a formula for that, it's ( gravity reading - 1 ) * 100
Multiply that number times the number of gallons you currently have. So, 6 gallons at 1.050:
50 * 6 = 300
300 total gravity points
If you know you boil off at 1 gallon per hour, then at the end of the boil, you'll have 5 gallons, with a gravity of 1.060:
300 gravity points / 5 gallons = 60
If you want to get to a gravity of, say, 1.060, and want to know how much water to boil off (simple version):
300 gravity points / 60 original gravity = 5
6 gallons (current volume) - 5 gallons (desired volume) = 1 gallon
This can get more complex, obviously. If you want to boil it down so that at the start of your timed boil you're at enough volume to end with 5 gallons, you have to know your evaporation rate. But, you can still figure it out.
I hope that helps, if not, please comment and I'll try to expand on it.
Comment: How does all that gravity calculations equate to boil off rate??? Record your starting volume and your finishing volume pre and post boil.  Subtract the post from the pre- and that's how much water you evap in your boil time (60 or 90 minutes) Figure the percent if you like. I think all the gravity calcs here confusion the original issue. But they are valuable calcs to know regardless
Comment: How does all that gravity calculations equate to boil off rate???  Start with the amount of water you have at the end of 60 or 90 minutes you have a new volume.  Figure the percent and that's HIS boil off rate.  I think all the gravity calcs here confusion the original issue.  But they are valuable calcs to know regardless.
Comment: I guess I was more answering how to figure out how much to boil off to achieve the gravity you want, assuming you know your boil off rate. I didn't even think to explain that part! ha, oops. +1 sir.
Comment: I just built a calculator for this, actually: http://pjhoberman.com/tools/volume_adjustment.html
Answer: I've been brewing all grain for six years and I'm finally getting the right volume into the keg at the end of the brew.  You can get close with calculations.
Mash
The grain absorbs about one pint per pound.  Divide the weight of your grain by eight to get the number of gallons it will absorb.  You won't lose any water during sparging because the grain has already absorbed as much water as it can hold.
It is important, however, to figure out how much sweet wort you leave behind in the mash tun.  My cooler with manifold tun couldn't suck up all the liquid in the bottom.  I'd leave a quart or more in it.
Boil
Measure the pre-boil volume.  It is an important aid in figuring the final gravity and hop utilization.
Don't blast the wort. It's sufficient to maintain a 6-10% evaporation rate according to the pros I talk to.  Listen to the Brew Strong episode on the boil for the whos and whyfores.
Hops and trub will absorb a small amount of water, especially in an IPA.
Measure the post-boil volume.  Keep in mind that boiling water takes up 4% more volume than water at room temperature.  In other words, if you have 5 gallons of wort at a boil, it will seem like 5.2 gallons.  Adjust accordingly.
Account for any wort left in the kettle when all is said and done.  I was wasting almost a quart before changing my pick up tube.

Misjudging Volumes in All-Grain


What is the association of the 4 house animals to the Hogwarts houses and who picked them?

Question: In Harry Potter each Hogwarts house has its own animal that represents it; is it ever explained how these animals came to represent a specific house? I never read a canon explanation to who chose the animals, is that known?
Comment: I'm not sure from the question if you're curious only about the in-universe stories of Hogwarts heraldry, or are also interested in JK Rowling's choices, possibly based on medieval symbolism.
Answer: Since the four founders were involved in choosing students for their houses, it seems reasonable to assume that they also chose their house animal.
Reading the welcome letters on Pottermore offers one explanation: the animals were chosen because they had the traits that the founders valued in their students.

Slytherin and the snake. From the welcome letter:

We're like our emblem, the snake: sleek, powerful, and frequently misunderstood.

It's also well-known that Salazar Slytherin was a Parselmouth, and had an affinity with snakes. (I don't know if Parseltongue had such a negative connotation when Hogwarts was founded; if so, I'm surprised he chose to advertise it.)
Gryffindor and the lion. From the welcome letter:

Our emblem is the lion, the bravest of all creatures

The lion is often depicted as the "king of the jungle/beasts" and as a symbol of bravery. If you look on heraldic crests, the lion is a popular choice for royalty, for similar reasons. It's easy to see why Godric chose it.
Ravenclaw and the eagle. From the welcome letter:

Our emblem is the eagle, which soars where others cannot climb

This is a not-so-subtle reference to the fact that Ravenclaws believe themselves to be more intelligent than other students.
You could look at the answers to When is a raven like an eagle? When it's on the Ravenclaw house crest for a bit more discussion of the Ravenclaw house crest.
Hufflepuff and the badger. From the welcome letter:

Hufflepuffs are trustworthy and loyal. We don't shoot our mouths off, but cross us at your peril; like our emblem, the badger, we will protect ourselves, our friends and our families against all-comers. […] Like badgers, we know exactly how to lie low – and how to defend ourselves.

I discussed Hufflepuff's association with the badger more fully in another answer on the site.

Somebody who knows more about history than me might be able to comment on thehistorical significance of these symbols in medieval times (when these animals would have been chosen).
Comment: Didn't the Eagle also have a Raven coloured Claw?
Answer: 2 of the 4 are pretty obvious:
Salazar Slytherin was a Parselmouth, therefore very close to snakes, which immediatly leads to the snake as a symbol.
To be in Gryffindor one has to be brave beyond any other personal quality, what animal stands for courage? Exactly: The lion.
As far as the other to houses are concerned:
Ravenclaw:

Or yet in wise old Ravenclaw
  If you've a ready mind
  Where those of
  wit and learning
  Will always find their kind.

I think from wise to eagle is not that far a fetch, I also consider this to be pretty obvious.
Finally: Hufflepuff:
The badger is known for having a gentle nature and has come to be the symbol of love and loyalty; both are traits of Hufflepuff house. It also is an ordinary animal if there is any, If there is a more specific reason out there I have not seen it yet
Answer: I've not seen Rowling give any explanation of her 'real world' choices, but had assumed they were based on medieval mystical or alchemical sources (such as Galen's humours and elements) similar to using the name of Nicolas Flamel.  Of course it would be natural for each ancient family to have a coat of arms, so it's a bit of nice detail for the Harry Potter world.  Rowling has said:

It is the tradition to have four houses, but in this case, I wanted
  them to correspond roughly to the four elements. So Gryffindor is
  fire, Ravenclaw is air, Hufflepuff is earth, and Slytherin is water

Fire is associated with yellow bile and choleric temperament, which in turn is shown in Minerva Britanna (1612) as wielding a sword and accompanied by a lion.  Leo is also astrologically a Fire symbol.  However, I believe fire is also associated with salamanders and snakes.
If Ravenclaw corresponds to air, that is associated with sanguineness and birds of all kinds.  Hufflepuff is earth and so associated with burrowing creatures.  Slytherin is water, phlegmatic and so could be a turtle, salmon or frog (or astrologically scorpion), but perhaps for narrative reasons is here a threatening serpent.
It's occurred to me that the symbols may share a common origin with RA Lafferty's 1969 novel Fourth Mansions, which refers to C16 Teresa [Cepeda] of Avila's Interior Castle.
Fourth Mansions fantasises about four secret influences latent in humanity, monsters blocking the way to the castle, represented by a badger, a falcon, a python and a toad.  These obviously don't match up completely: badgers are the faithful defenders, 'stubborn holers into the earth'; the soaring falcons are the far-sighted authority; the python symbolises 'illicit wisdom' and prophecy, but 'unaccountably, the Lion symbol is alternate to the Python' so they might be closest paradoxically to the Gryffindors; toads resurrect themselves and prevent progress in a similar way to Voldemort and perhaps Slytherin.
This is speculation on my part as I don't think these are in Interior Castle itself, but Rowling might have been influenced by related Christian or esoteric literature.
Edit: I also see the claim Rowling was consciously referring to a 'Battle Chess' computer game (maybe, but I'm dubious), and this essay explores symbolism of each mascot.
Answer: While this may not be what J. K. Rowling intended originally, this is what the badger symbolizes and its character traits. Note that she originally considered the bear as the symbol so these traits would connect. What was Helga Hufflepuff's animal 'avatar'?
The badger symbolism shows how the badger is actually regarded and also how Hufflepuff can bring out the best traits in a student. Even the mountain lion will hesitate to take on a badger and it shows that "size" can be irrelevant in defending what is yours.
Animal Symbolism of the Badger

The badger stops at nothing to get what it wants, and this is a lesson
  for us to be persistent in our pursuits. Specifically, those with the
  badger totem often attract this creature because he/she has difficulty
  finishing what is started. The badger will help with this aspect in
  life. You can call upon the stubborn, strong-willed nature of the
  badger to help you complete any project you start.
The badger is also fiercly independent and can be quite aggressive
  when threatened. This is a lesson for us to stand our ground and make
  our presence known when the situation calls for it. Although smaller
  in stature, the badger commands attention from friend and foe alike.

Badger Symbolism

The white stripe is symbolic of how open it is, providing knowledge
  and enlightenment to other animals and the earth.
The strong jaws tie the badger to the mysteries of the "word" – in
  particular the magic of storytelling. Badger reminds us to remember
  stories and give them away to people when they are needed.
The remarkable digger hints at the ability to see beneath the surface
  of all things and people. Also, the closeness to herbs and roots make
  badger dynamic healers.
Loners and solitary, badgers teach us to be self-reliant and
  comfortable with ourselves.
Bold and ferocious when cornered, badger reminds us to never
  surrender.
The badger imparts persistence, determination and endurance. Badger
  also gives mental energy and fighting spirit. It would rather die than
  give up, so badger teaches us how to stick to a project and see it
  through to completion.
Answer: For ravenclaw, I found a Youtube video (not by me)
Comment: Link-only answers are frowned upon. If the link dies, your answer becomes utterly worthless. Why not give us a short description of what the video actually says?
Comment: and while a great video, it only answer 1/4 of the question....


Is Unity 2D ever coming back?

Question: I have some computers which only operate on Unity 2D because of their hardware, so I rely on Unity 2D and Ubuntu 12.04. In the future I could use Gnome Shell, I could use Unity 3D via llvmpipe (which is real slow) or even LXDE, but I just love Unity 2D and its speed. Is it ever coming back for newer Ubuntu releases?
Answer: The only way unity 2d will ever come back, is as part of petition, etc.
It is such a shame to see it go, maybe a community version might come about?
Answer: Unity 2D is definitely deprecated now in favour of standard Unity via llvmpipe. It's not coming back.
Performance of llvmpipe may, however, continue to improve over time. I couldn't guarantee that it will ever match the speed of Unity 2D, but time will tell.

Is Unity 2D ever coming back?


How to simulate long exposure light trails?

Question: How can I apply long exposure lighting effects to a road (ideally using Photoshop or Illustrator)? See the image below for an example.
How can this be achieved?

Comment: People achieve this by taking long exposure photographs of cars going by. I suppose your best bet would be to google Light trail tutorial or maybe Long exposure tutorial. As far as faking this in photoshop goes, You might want to try this with thinner brush strokes http://graphicdesign.stackexchange.com/questions/17443/how-to-draw-different-coloured-waves-in-photoshop/17448#17448 But I would rather buy stock photos than do it all in photoshop.
Comment: You might find questions related to this in: http://photo.stackexchange.com
Comment: @Joonas you mean, its not possible in Photoshop ?
Comment: No. This is what I did with the method I suggested to you in my first comment with the GD.SE link: http://i.stack.imgur.com/xCJ9L.jpg ( ...I did it pretty quickly and it looks ok'ish. With a fair amount of time and by looking at reference images, you could get a pretty good result.. ). As I mentioned I would totally rather buy a stock photo image than spend my time doing this in photoshop.
Answer: Assuming you're starting with a nice night photo of an empty road without any headlights...

I'd make vector drawing first, to draw several curves where the headlight trails should be.  Have some of them start or end in random places - simulating where cars happened to be at the beginning or end of the long exposure. Use the photo as a reference, but don't include in the output.  Draw white or lightly colored orangish/yellowish lines on a transparent layer.  Give these lines a thickness, whatever is right for the photo - the size an average headlight should appear if it were on a car on the road. If the cars come from very far, perspective will make the headlights appear larger close up, so taper the thickness somehow. Save as PNG (whatever preserves alpha), same size as original image.
My example is bad in that simple straight lines are good, but of course curves would be more dramatic.  Curves would be especially dramatic on a straight street, but let's not explore that today.

Then in Photoshop (actually I used GIMP so my terminology may be different) the original goes on the bottom layer, then the headlight trails image, then finally any buildings, trees, whatever obstructing the view of the headlights, isolated from the original photo.

(to make it obvious for illustration, the isolated car was made blue-violet)
So far, it looks terrible, but we have the right stack.  Blur the headlights slightly - a few pixels at most.  Set the opacity of the headlights layer to somewhere 30% -  50% maybe more.   Use Addition compositing mode, not the default blending mode.
It'll still look fake due to being too uniform in brightness.  Use an eraser gently make the headlight trails more transparent in places.  They should be the least transparent (appearing brightest) where the cars are closest to heading toward the viewer - this effect shows nicely in your example photo.

You may want to duplicate the headlight layer, set it to 10-20% opacity, and blur it more - 10-20 px, or enough that adjacent trails start to overlap. This also is Addition not the normal blending mode.

As an artist, it's up to you to refine the image to look better. Variety in brightness, color (but close to white)   Also, some subtle kinks or jiggles make them look real, but this is best dealt with when making the vector drawing.
I didn't mention tail lights yet, but of course the same procedure applies but make them red.
I don't know of any plug-in or built-in lighting effect or feature that can do all this automatically.  But then, I don't keep up with new Photoshop paraphernalia.
Comment: +1. An advantage of not using a plug-in is that a new(er) user gets more comfortable with the tool.
Answer: Per the asker's request, here's a solution that can be done in Illustrator:
First place the picture in Illustrator and lock that layer. Then, with the pen tool make paths that are similar in shape to what you are looking for.

After you've made a few, you can star picking the colors you need. Unlock the layer with the picture, lock and hide the layer with the stroked you made and choose a color on the light path. Save these colors to your swatches and relock the picture, unhide and unlock the paths.
Select the paths. Make sure you have stroke color selected and select gradient (the middle button underneath the stroke and fill selectors)

Now, select each path individually and open your gradient tool. Make sure you put the color mode in RGB (I think it defaults to Greyscale) by clicking the dropdown in the upper right of the tool window and select RGB. Now select the fist color in the gradient tool and change it to the colors you saves to your swatches and start adjusting where they need to go on the slider. You may have to click the reverse button above it if your colors are backwards on the stroke.

Once you have as many as you want, you can thin out the stroke thickness if they seemed too much.

You should have something similar which you can then copy into Photoshop and create some glow effects and shadowing or anything else that Illustrator doesn't do as well as Photoshop.

Keep in mind that the pen tool which I used in this tutorial has a steep learning curve so it will take a lot of practice to get the lines right if you've never used the tool before. I suggest watching a few tutorials on YouTube before starting, just as a primer.
Answer:
Draw path
copy paste it + adjust
once done, stroke all paths with medium soft brush white color all on same layer.
apply layer mask, and make close some transparent while further or center being the most dense/apparent.
apply inner glow and outer glow, in blending options select layer mask hides effect.
Answer: A major point to remember when doing light trails, which is exhibited on your example image, is that they are from car lights and so the road is affected as well as the lights themselves. Although the light emission itself draws the trail, the light is cast on the road.
You need to ensure you (on a layer underneath your trails) appear to 'light up' the road.
The trails can then sit on top of the lit-up road, giving you an extra degree of realism.
Another tip is to ensure that the trails also vary in size, brightness and slight offsets of colour. Think the difference between a truck, a car and a motorbike; a road would feature all of these, and if you are doing something similar to the example image, they could each be in any lane.
Colour variations stay with the bright, but some vehicles have a pure white light, some show a  slight yellow tint, and others show a blue-ish tint. Vehicles travelling in the opposite direction have red lights as well, so keep this in mind. Indicators (turn signals) between lanes are orange!


Install Ubuntu alongside windows

Question: When we install ubuntu along with windows 7 do we need any other drivers other than what we have installed on windows?
Answer: Driver's for Ubuntu is different from Windows, you might not find all the drivers you have for Windows, graphics drivers can be installed using "Software Updater", others you may have to search online in you computer's manufacturer's website.
Answer: Ubuntu comes packaged with generic drivers for a lot of hardware available so all your hardware will probably work out-of the-box. In special circumstances, you will need to install proprietary drivers (this is for instancey the case for NVidia graphics cards). You can enable these after the install.
If you are worried that some special hardware might not work, there are several programms that list hardware that will work under Ubuntu. You can find them via this page

Install Ubuntu alongside windows


How does Amy escape capture?

Question: In the movie Gone Girl, Amy has killed a man. She has his blood all over him. The cameras in the house would prove that Neil's character was innocent. Even the smallest of investigations would prove her guilty or at least cast suspicion on her. What made the FBI trust her when even the detective doesn't trust her?
Comment: Your question might be a possible duplicate of this one, http://movies.stackexchange.com/questions/28431/why-was-amy-not-arrested
Comment: I'm asking more specifically from the surveillance tapes. She asks the cops to go have a look at it. I was waiting to see what they see in those tapes. They just ignored that sentence of hers. Wasn't that her only alibi?
Answer: What the film maker's want us to believe:
She was clever.
You say the cameras in (correction: outside) the house prove Neil's innocence. How? They show a man turning up to a woman who is in permanent confinement in a house, bringing her clothes and food, but never leaving with her.. His actions certainly don't look entirely innocent - it suggests she is a prisoner inside.
Couple that with her staged escape attempts, where she pretended she was a prisoner/tied up for the cameras, and suddenly he looks like a dangerous suspect who has imprisoned this poor woman.
She plays heavily on this and, in his death scene, acts as if she has been raped and has had to kill him to finally escape her captor.
Of course, you could argue that for a long time she wasn't in the house (when she was missing), but this is largely irrelevant - he could have been keeping her anywhere during this time.
A perfectly plausible diverging opinion:
It's certainly arguable as a plot hole.
She arrived at the house willingly and there would be footage of him every day leaving the house for work and her doing... nothing. Not escaping, not running, not fighting. Other than her one apparent staged attempt, she's never near the doors - and likely there would be some footage somewhere showing her just inside the threshold of the property, totally calm and nonplussed.
The NY Post certainly felt this was a plot hole. Another arguable issue was that if he was shown to be in the house during her supposed abduction, he would have a solid alibi. Alas - none of this appeared to matter to the film-makers and it is never covered.
Comment: Were there cameras inside the house? I thought they were all external cameras....
Comment: True. I meant more out of universe as in "this is a plot hole and here's why", whereas the first was "it's a not a plot hole, this is how the makers intended it to be and here's why it works..."
Comment: Yes, the second point you mention as out of universe.. well isn't it in-universe as well? The footage would include her walking in to his house without any force. At that point she never planned to kill him, it is only later on. So she didn't really prep the cameras for her captivity except for that one time she pours wine on her and acts like a silly woman. It's plain glass if she wanted she could break it and leave. The cameras were outside the door... a glass door.
Comment: @MattD: Quite right. Updated my answer accordingly.
Comment: Her not struggling when she first went into his house isn't necessarily a plot hole or unbelievable.  If he had threatened her or whatever, there's a good chance she wouldn't fight back in order to conceivably save herself harm.  Her not running or trying to escape can be explained to the cops as he had her tied up or locked in a room, where she would have had 0 chance to escape, and since there weren't any or many cameras inside, no one could really dispute that if she sold it to the detectives.
Comment: @New-To-IT: It's a bit fishy. She walked into the house under no duress whatsoever. He could have had her tied up, but a serious forensic search would show that he hadn't. But ultimately, I suppose it's also the story of a well-off, attractive, white woman and how she is ultimately trusted and treated as the victim without thought.
Comment: @AndrewMartin I'm just saying it's not that uncommon, at least in the movies.  If he had threatened her by saying "if you try anything I'll kill you", it's possible she just walked in the house, I don't see that as a plot hole whatsoever.  Just from my experience with kidnapping type movies, people in them do a lot of stuff under no duress in fear of being killed.
Answer: There is another possible explanation, though I also think this was a big plot hole. Home security video surveillance systems don't keep recordings forever. At some point, the videotape (on older systems) or hard drive (on modern ones) gets full of video and older footage needs to be overwritten by newer footage. It's conceivable that Amy's arrival at the house was captured on video that was later overwritten by newer video, and that the only relevant footage that the FBI found was her later staged performance.
However, it's obvious from the movie that NPH spared no expense when it came to his house and I really doubt that his video surveillance system didn't have enough capacity to record for months on end without recycling. So though this explanation occurred to me, in the context of the movie I don't buy it.
I also seem to recall Amy saying during questioning at the end of the movie that she had been abducted by NPH much earlier than she actually arrived there, like from the beginning of her disappearance. The surveillance video from the time before she actually showed up at NPH's house would presumably have proven that wrong, showing NPH going about his life as normal when he was supposedly abducting Amy and keeping her prisoner. That was ignored too (if I remember the ending correctly).
Answer: The cameras are all outside the house.
The reason she performs the bits of theater that she does (spilling the wine, pretending to tie herself up), is so that she will appear on the external camera as someone who is being held against their will.
There's no footage of the actual murder taking place, but there was evidence that she had sex with her "captor" (which is why she waited for him to finish before killing him), so all video footage will backup her claim of kidnapping and rape.
The only possible exception is her initial arrival, when she was in disguise, and not yet pretending to be held captive, but she could easily say that she was terrified for her life at that point, and trying not to provoke him.

How does Amy escape capture?


How can a young child be taught not to bully?

Question: How can an 18 month old be taught that bullying is not ok? He seems to like causing the trouble it brings upon him, and bullying, mean acts also seem to please him. He likes to sit on his younger cousin (my son), push him down, and steal his toys. His parents seem to be at a loss about it, and I don't really have any good suggestions to give. Thanks.
Comment: It's much more likely that it's not mean acts, but rather acts that provide a reaction. Mean acts have a very noticeable reaction - crying. At 18 months, the child probably isn't even fully aware that whatever it's assaulting has feelings - it just knows it reacts, and that's kind of fun.
Answer: When you are talking about babies and toddlers, bullying is a lot simpler than it can be with older children.  At this age, it's pretty much one of three scenarios:

Someone taught the child bullying behavior.
If the child's parents encourage the behavior, it's unlikely you'll be able to un-teach it.  Better to just stop spending time with that family.  If it was something picked up at daycare, etc. and the child has been removed from the source, continue per below.
The child gets something he/she wants through bullying behavior.
The child doesn't grasp that the behavior is naughty.
In either of these cases, normal behavior modification techniques (details below) are the answer.  Children under two generally can't grok (I tried to find a source to link, but all the good studies seem to be paywalled) that others have feelings.  A ten-year-old can look at the child they hurt and see the effect on that child.  An 18-month-old likely isn't yet at the level of cognitive development to do that.  If it gets them attention, or a toy the smaller child had, or a feeling of control, they will repeat the behavior over and over.

So, that leaves the question of how to fix it...

Watch closely.  Until the behavior has been ended, don't leave the little ones alone.  Every time the behavior repeats without immediate consequence, it is reinforced.  (By the same token, you can never let it go because it's "not that bad yet" etc. -- that teaches that the behavior is okay.)
When the child does something inappropriate, the nearest adult should immediately pick him/her up and return anything he/she has taken to the other child.  (Hint: if the smaller child is already hurt, you have probably waited too long.)
In a firm, low voice, tell the child "No. We do not $whatever.  That is naughty."  And plunk him/her in time out, then walk away.  Everyone should basically pretend the naughty kid isn't there.  Even looking directly at him/her is attention that reinforces the behavior.  1.5 - 2 minutes is a good length of time-out for a child that young.
Lavish attention on the younger child, make sure he/she is having fun without the bully (and more importantly, the bully learns that time-out is a not-fun place, and being out there is fun).
When the time-out is over, the person who put the naughty child in time out should pick him/her up (make eye contact at eye level) and repeat what the child has done wrong, and have him/her apologize.  If the child is not yet verbal, use the sign for "I'm sorry": the right fist circled over the heart one time.  Demonstrate if this is new, but the child does not get out of time-out without an apology to the child he/she was bullying.  (Hugs are good, too)
Let the kids try playing together again, and if it's going well, make sure there is lots of positive attention for both.

This will take a while to work -- first, the 18mo has to grasp that the consequence is causally linked to the behavior; then he/she will test different behaviors to see which ones get a time-out; finally, he/she will experiment with not getting caught and/or test occasionally after the lesson is learned just to see if anything has changed.
You'll note that this is a little different than the normal time-out routine I recommend for older children (2+), in that there is no warning.  This is because a lot of 18mo (I'd guess most of them) don't grasp punishments that are separated, even a little, from the behavior that prompts them.  The no-warning approach is also good for 2yos that have trouble connecting it all, though almost all older 2yo kids and 3-and-ups will grasp it and should get warnings.
Answer: There is something that a teacher told us regarding the bullying between our toddler (3) and our infant (1 year). When the toddler does something to his baby sister that is not terrible but just not nice (like taking away a toy she is holding) you should talk to the toddler about how he hurt the offend-ed's feelings. Since the baby can not, they can't express their reaction with words.
It is important to try to explain to the toddler that his actions affected someone else in a wrong way. She stressed that small punishments (like timeouts or saying sorry) might not be effective because then kids might think that its OK to do the bad things as long as they say sorry afterward.
You will have to decide at what age you think the child would be ready to start "understanding", but you can always start talking about it early and eventually he/she will catch on.  If the child is not exposed to many kids, it could be also that he just does not know yet how to share and "play-nice" with others.  He could be just pushing and exploring his boundaries.
Answer: Usually bullying can be back referenced to bad parenting, or a bad experience the boy had.
Maybe the father treats the mother like that? Or it can be that he didn't get to much attention. Or not enough love, not enough care, not enough softness. It is very ease to neglect a child without even noticing that you neglect him.
It also can be that he is jealous. Children don't do things based on genes or because they thought out that. Especially not if they are so young. Everything and i mean everything that a child does comes from observation in this early stage. He must have seen it somewhere or experienced it, or he is expressing a bad feeling an uneasiness, something that he don't like but can't quit figure out what it is and can't express himself otherwise either.
Maybe he just wants some love some softness you must find that one out.
As to how to teach him to stop it? That's easy. TELL HIM TO STOP IT! :) And if he doesn't listen? Well there are a number of things:

Carefully try to explain to him that what he is doing is wrong ( after you find out why he is doing it )
That wont help of course because he is too young. So you have to give him a timeout. Don't punish him by showing him what he does is wrong by doing it to him. Or even hitting him or whatever. He wont understand it why you do it.

A timeout is a good thing. Let him sit on a chair for 3 minutes. If he tries to get up, set him back on. And so forth. You are the parent, you have to establish that.
So, i hope this could help you. I know you probably mostly thought about this too, so i hope someone more experienced can help more maybe.
Gergely.
Comment: I disagree that in an 18 month old bullying is bad parenting or bad experiences. More likely it's completely natural.
Answer: We've been trying to deal with this problem ourselves.  My son is nearly 2 yr 10 months, my daughter is 11 months.  She is fascinated with her older brother, but he wants nothing to do with her most of the time, so will shove her out of the way, knock her over, grab her toys away, or even hit her on the head.  It's a major problem and we've been trying every trick.
A large part of it seems to be jealousy.  He'll even admit this if questioned (but I wonder if he is just saying that because it's an answer that "works".)
We've mainly been following an approach such as the one suggested by Hannibal, but time outs don't seem to faze him much any more.  Sometimes we require him to apologize, but I don't think he really understands the purpose of that so it tends to get ritualized; now we've been using it more as an optional thing he can do to lessen his punishment.  We do a LOT of explaining about good manners vs. bad manners.  We can get him to promise, promise promise not to touch or hit her, and then 2 minutes later: bonk! waah!
A couple days ago I tried something new.  We got one of his stuffed animals and pretended that was his sister, and played at giving her bottles and soothing her when she cried.  It gave a neutral way to talk about being nice vs. being mean.  I voiced the baby cries, which was a nice change for me!
Since then we've noticed him being more empathetic to her.  It's only been a few days so we'll see how it goes, but there's an increase in good big-brother actions like bringing her toys or pacifiers and reduction in bad behaviors.  Just like with the doll, we have started giving him extra feedback about how his actions please or displease his sister.  Hopefully the extra attention we're giving him when he does good things will be positive reinforcement.
Answer: The tricky part of the question is that you are not the parent of the bully, you are the parent of the one being bullied. Although you ask what can be done to stop the bully, you don't actually have the position to do this because most of the time you aren't with that child and you can't enforce consistency. Of course, the advice here is great for the parent of the bully.
You also have a challenge because the children are cousins, so you can't avoid contact until the behaviour improves (which I did with a bullying child and my son and it worked well, the two boys are great friends now). I would do what you can in that direction. Talk to the child's parents and say that you are concerned for your child (it may be embarrassing but they need to know). You could try agreeing to go away from each other when it happens (this may be difficult for your child but its probably better than being bullied)
In the end you can hope the behaviour will stop, but your focus needs to be on how you can protect and support your child if it doesn't
Comment: -1: oh yes you do have the position to act when the other child *sits on your child*. if someone is doing my son wrong then that automatically grants me the permission to iterfere. Especially if it's a relative; it's much easier to talk to his parents about a coordinated effort and reaction than it would be with strangers at the park.
Comment: oh you have the right to act all right - its just that the advice given so far won't help stop it, since it relies on consistency, not just the bully getting response from people they see sometimes - its stuff parents have to do and do consistently


How to rotate (svg) symbols in QGIS map composer to match map rotation?

Question: Because of my thesis layout requirements, I have to rotate 270° some of my maps in composer.
There are (many) svg smbols (icons), and they are rotated as well.
I would like to (non-)rotate them in order to keep them upright, so one doesn't have to continuosly rotate the page or the neck ;)
Is there a way to do that? Note that I would like to do it on the composer stage since some of my maps are normally placed north-south.
Thanks for the attention!
Comment: See this closed question http://gis.stackexchange.com/questions/27149/symbol-rotation-by-using-rotation-field
Comment: thanks, but maybe I didn't explain well my problem: I use the same layers in different layouts, some with the "global", rotated, map and some with portion of the global map in the original orientation. so in the global map the symbols have to be rotated, but not on the "portions".
Answer: I think that what you could do is create 2 different layers of points.
One for the Global and one for the portions
If you do that you should be able to independently rotate the svg icons by double clicking the icons on the layers panel and then doing the same thing within the properties panel and selecting the rotate to the desired angle.
This might be achievable if you separate the two data files in excel and saving them as a CSV file
Comment: Ok, so the short answer is I can't do it. thanks. The problem with your solution is, if I want/have to change something in the symbols, I have to do it twice.
Answer: Here's an approach which would work in QGIS 2.2 and above. You can set a data defined rotation on the symbol which matches whether the map is being rendered in a specific composer map or to the main map canvas - this is done using the '$map' variable. $map will be 'canvas' for the main window, or a map item's id if it's being rendered in a composition.
So, to begin, set the map item's id to something like "rotated_map_01":

Then, in your layer's symbol properties, click the "Data Defined Properties" button:

Check "Angle" and click the expression builder button. You want to enter an expression along this lines of
<code>CASE WHEN $map LIKE 'rotated_map%' THEN 270 ELSE 0 END
</code>

This expression will return 270 if the map item's id begins with "rotated_map_", or 0 otherwise. So, in any composer maps with an id "rotated_map_01", "rotated_map_02", etc the symbol will be rotated 270 degrees!
Comment: Thanks for the answer. Unfortunately I didn't use QGIS anymore (finished my thesis and still have to find a job :( ) but this method will come in handy when I'll use it again!


SonicWall TZ190 Enhanced VPN issues

Question: I am using a SonicWall TZ190 and a Cisco device (I don't know the specs of this device. I will try to get it ASAP) to initiate an Office to Office VPN link. The tunnel will stay active for days, but randomly once a week or once every two weeks, the connection will drop. When I check the logs in the sonicwall device, it gives me a "IPSec (ESP) packet dropped" error around this time. The only way to get the link back up is ping the remote network from a device on our LAN. Once I do the ping, the VPN tunnel is active again. Does anyone have any ideas why this would keep disconnecting?
Answer: It could just be the Internet conditions or the ISPs at either end. VPNs at the end of everything are "best effort" connectivity options when the general ISP services themselves are basically best effort too, otherwise it would be a private circuit with some SLA in place.
Is seems like your VPN configuration is doing what it is suppose to, recover when there is traffic between the points.
Answer: I believe I have solved this problem, but I am not going to mark complete until we have tested the VPN for a week.
The Sonicwall TZ 190 was on firmware 126.96.36.199, so I updated to 4.2.1. This seems to have solved the issue.
Comment: The only way I have been able to solve this issue is to setup a ping to run every 5 minutes from the server using the site to site.

SonicWall TZ190 Enhanced VPN issues


Text Style in InDesign and Adobe Illustrator?

Question: There is something similar to Microsft Word Text Styles, in Adobe InDesign and Illustrator?
For example I choose: "Style 1", for many paragraphs, and then I can change the font of all of them at once?
Answer: Yes there is in both, in fact there are two:

Paragraph styles for chunks of text ending with a carriage return (paragraphs, list items, headers, table cell contents, etc).
Character styles for any amount of text. You can give a paragraph a paragraph style, then give snippets of text within it character styles on top of the paragraph style.

More info: InDesign, Illustrator. There's also basic support for character and paragraph styles in Photoshop from CS6.
To find options for setting them, open the Character Style and Paragraph Style windows from the Window menu (in Illustrator they're under Window > Type , in InDesign, under Window > Type and Tables ).
If you're working from Word documents with Word styles already set up, you can place the word document and map the Word styles to existing InDesign styles for a clean import .
Use them, and use them a lot. Also note that styles can inherit from other styles: so you can update multiple styles at once as well as multiple blocks of text. There's also a lot of nice advanced stuff particularly in InDesign that can be done with styles, particularly with paragraph styles, such as using them to auto-generate tables of contents and setting formulas (grep/regex) to automatically apply styles to certain patterns of text. It's worth doing some research on.

There are lots of other features based on the same principle of set a style once, then update all its instances at once. There are Table and Cell Styles for InDesign tables, and Graphic Styles (Illustrator) and Object Styles (InDesign) which is a similar idea for saving fill, stroke effects and other such effects for graphic images / frames. There are also Illustrator Symbols which are whole graphics where each instance can be edited as one.
Comment: Just a note. The hierarchical dependency of paragraph and character styles work differently between Indesign and Illustrator. In Indesign Character Styles take precedence. In Illustrator, Paragraph Styles take precedence. This can be horribly confusing at times until you realize it.
Answer: In illustrator CS5 (under MacOSX) you can go to the menu tab Help and do a search on "Paragraph Styles" ... open it and edit as you wish.
read this for further insight: http://help.adobe.com/en_US/illustrator/cs/using/WS714a382cdf7d304e7e07d0100196cbc5f-6395a.html


Cisco ISE - CLI Accounting

Question: We've recently installed a POC for Cisco ISE and have confirmed that we are able to log into the switches that poll it for RADIUS information. Since we've moved from TACACS+, we can't seem to find the area of ISE that contains the accounting information for commands entered on the switches/routers that poll ISE. Is there a comparable tool on ISE? Will it require extra commands be entered on the config level?
Comment: ISE isn't intended as a TACACS+ substitute, it's primarily used for client authentication (such as 802.1x / EAP).  Are you trying to perform CLI command accounting with ISE or are you doing some form of 802.1x with it?
Comment: We are mainly using it for 802.1x but we need something that performs CLI command accounting as well.
Comment: You should use a real TACACS+ server for CLI accounting.
Comment: It was my understanding that Cisco's ACS+ was EOL, which is why we were moving to ISE in the first place. Are you suggesting that we use ACS+ or are you saying ISE cannot perform accounting?
Answer:
It was my understanding that Cisco's ACS+ was EOL, which is why we were moving to ISE in the first place.

Somewhere there was a misunderstanding because Cisco ACS 5.6  is currently supported.

Are you suggesting that we use ACS+ or are you saying ISE cannot perform accounting?

ISE is basically just a fancy RADIUS server, which is heavily focused on EAP / 802.1X.  Save yourself pain and suffering, don't hammer the square peg (ISE) into a round hole (CLI accounting).  Cisco ACS is designed for CLI accounting; ISE isn't.
Comment: As of September 30, 2014 ACS 5.4 (what I use) was [announced for EOS](http://products.mcisco.com/c/en/us/products/collateral/security/secure-access-control-system/eos-eol-notice-c51-732647.html?mdfid=285954966); that same announcement lists ACS 5.6 as the migration path.  ACS 5.6 is the latest, but I don't know precisely when it was released
Comment: I'll accept this answer. Do you know when 5.6 was released and when it goes EoL?
Answer: ISE is a RADIUS server.  A TACACS+ server such as Cisco ACS is required for the command level AAA you are looking for.
RADIUS - Remote Authentication Dial In User Service is primarily used for network access AAA.
TACACS+ - Terminal Access Controller Access-Control System is primarily used for Device Administration AAA.

TACACS+ provides for separate and modular authentication, authorization, and accounting facilities enabling more granular AAA, for example the ability to log each command entered by the different users and defining what commands a user may run.  RADIUS cannot do this.

RADIUS encrypts only the password in the access-request packet, from the client to the server.  TACACS+ encrypts the entire body of the packet.

Cisco ISE - CLI Accounting


What different techniques exist for modeling exotics near payoff discontinuities in Finite Difference method?

Question: If you are modeling an exotic, like a binary or a barrier, and hedging it with vanillas that have strikes quite close to the exotic's strike, then a large asset step size, for example,  $\delta S = \frac {K_{max} -K_{min}}{\beta}$, with $\beta = 1 \space or \space 2$, where $K_{min}$ and $K_{max}$ are the min and max of strikes in the basket, does not allow the payoff shape to be correctly modeled. It introduces substantial error in the valuation. To resolve this sort of problem what approaches using FDM do exist?
Answer: Some techniques I can think of include

Use a brownian bridge to get a crossing probability for points near the boundary
Use implicit stepping in your PDE solver (which increases smoothness) as opposed to explicit stepping (which "rings" near discontinuities)
Employ control variates, by using the same grid to price related instruments having easy analytic pricing solutions
Comment: can you expand on the brownian bridge idea?


Graph API: Access Token in paging, am I doing it wrong?

Question: I'm using the Facebook Graph API to grab some information from my facebook page to display on a website. I keep the access token in my php files and make a call to the graph API using curl in order to keep it hidden. However, since you can see the results, my access token appears in the "paging" area like this:
<code>"paging": {
      "previous": "https://graph.facebook.com/[MY_ID]/posts?fields=id,from,message,icon,created_time,updated_time&limit=10&access_token=[MY_TOKEN]&since=1348180212&__previous=1",
      "next": "https://graph.facebook.com/[MY_ID]/posts?fields=id,from,message,icon,created_time,updated_time&limit=10&access_token=[MY_TOKEN]&until=1348016106"
   }
</code>
There's no way to remove the paging section when more content is available, correct? I also can't use the curl option to not immediately print out the results (due to server restrictions) so I can't capture the results first to do what I want with them. Am I approaching this whole thing wrong, or is there a parameter I can send over that can solve this? Thank you very much for any help and insights!
Answer: Nevermind, it turned out to be an insanely random routing issue.


Replace icing sugar

Question: Can I replace icing sugar with corn syrup when I make the sponge cake? I don't have icing sugar and blender t blend sugar. So can I use what to replace icing sugar?
Comment: It would probably be best if you posted the recipe you're trying to follow. This isn't a common substitution in baking.
Answer: You can't make icing with syrup alone because it has too much water in it.
If you were planning to use the syrup in the cake itself you'd have to use more than the amount of sugar called for, and reduce the other liquid. All working by weight. Volume measurements here wouldn't work. But rather than trying to use syrup in the cake mix, it's better to use the finest white sugar you have. Many sponge cake recipes use caster sugar anyway, which is fine but not that fine.

Replace icing sugar


Can a bag of non-organic potatoes that have gone bad be used to mulch an organic garden?

Question: I have a big bag of potatoes I bought that aren't organic and I didn't eat all of them.  They have reached a point where they really aren't worth the trouble to use for food.  Can I cut them up and use them to fertilize/mulch my organic garden without contradicting USDA Organic standards?  It would seem like such a waste to simply throw them in the trash.
Comment: Why does your garden need to meet USDA Organic standards?
Answer: Specifically to the point of what you can do while complying with the relevant USDA Organic standards (and disregarding what might be a "good idea" or "fine with you or me"):
You cannot apply them directly to your organic garden without contradicting the USDA Organic standards ((c)(3) - "in a manner that does not contribute to contamination of crops, soil, or water by ... residues of prohibited substances").
You cannot compost them and apply the compost to your organic garden without contradicting the USDA Organic standards ((d)(1) - "The producer must not use ... Any ... composted plant ... material that contains a synthetic substance not included on the National List of synthetic substances allowed for use in organic crop production").
You may compost them, apply the compost to a non-organic biomass production system (for example, sod/hay), cultivate that non-organic biomass production system for three years in a manner which allows you to transition to organic biomass production at the end of that period, then apply biomass collected from that system to your organic garden (either directly as mulch or after composting).  (This is harder to cite: essentially, but the idea here is that you can use them as a non-approved input and then spend the three years converting to Organic, then use the output - which is Organic - as an approved input.)
Answer: They'll just rot on the ground so not useful for a mulch.
Just put them into your compost bin, or bury them so that they might sprout for the next season though many store bought spuds are treated with sprout inhibitors.
Answer: No!!! I guess you live in the US, right? None organic food is heavily contaminated with pesticides and probably genetically modified. Not a proper addition to compost for organic gardening.
Comment: @JanDoggen it is well known that non-organic potatoes often contain pesticides, for example potatoes are listed 12th in the [EWG list of 'dirty' vegetables](https://www.ewg.org/foodnews/dirty_dozen_list.php)). So if the OP wants an organic garden then adding potato mulch with pesticides is indeed a bad idea. It's unlikely that the pesticides are allowed by USDA standards, but the only way to know for sure is if the OP investigates which kind of pesticides are on the potatoes and with what quantities.
Comment: So it's okay for the OP to eat the potatoes but not to compost them?
Comment: The question wasn't whether it is okay to eat them.  The question says "without contradicting USDA Organic standards".
Comment: The question says *without contradicting USDA Organic standards*. Do you have any numbers to back up your answer?


Is it possible to beat Infinity Blade on the first bloodline?

Question: I've played through two bloodlines so far in Infinity Blade. Both times I made it to the boss, and both times he beat me. I imagine it's possible to beat him after leveling up over the course of many tries, but is it possible to do it on the first bloodline?
Answer: I beat him on first blood line by going the way with most enemies (fighting as many as I could), and spending any skill points I got into attack, and then buying the best sword I could before the fight (for me it was the firebrand). On the first blood line, the god king is at a reasonable speed and parrying his attacks is very straightforward, and not subject to any slow controls like the dodge buttons. If you fail once, you can use your shield and dodge for the rest of the combo.
Once you stop his attack, you should perform a 3 hit combo (left right left) if you dodged, a 4 (left left right right) or 5 hit combo (up down left right up) if you parried. Use your magic in case of trouble or to finish him off (it will take 100 points out of him). Thanks to parrying you will get multiple stab opportunities that will be draining him pretty quickly too.
Once thing to remember about parrying: it is OK to parry the very last swipe of a GK combo, you'll still have a longer time to hit back at him, and sometimes get the stab opportunities. Also, there are only two orientations for parrying: horizontal and vertical, and the direction (left to right or right to left for example) doesn't matter! So there are only two choices, which makes it much easier once you have a feel for that.
If you use parrying the fight is very short (maybe 2 or three minutes) and quite easy (easier than some of the critters on the way to the GK, because they're sooooo slow that parrying them requires much better timing than the GK...). In the end you might take a hit or two, but shouldn't feel the need to heal yourself. Fire swords are good only if the person doesn't have a shield that blocks fire objects.
Answer: It's possible, yes. Just extremely difficult. You just have to avoid his attacks, but seeing as the controls are slow to respond at times, it makes it much harder.
Comment: Needs some more detail on the winning strategy.
Comment: I know. I sometimes feel like if I could play this game with a gamepad, it would be trivially easy.
Answer: At first I played up to about 20 bloodlines and every time the god king defeated me. However IF you choose to join him instead of picking up your sword, all he says is "Together we will vanquish the old corrupt more powerful beings than the deathless.." and then you can choose to fight him again..so joining him is pointless.
You know how your enemies become stronger, faster, and harder to defeat?
Well the god king is always the same: just hard to kill.
So yes I believe it's possible to defeat him on the first bloodline. Say you bought the Infinity Blade, The Patriot (shield), Oruku (helmet), Helio Amrmor,(all the best supplies but ones to REALLY save up for) and the Ring of Ice and Fire, and you were on the first bloodline, you can defeat him by merely avoiding his attacks. However it seems the makers of the game don't let you use your shield sometimes while you fight him, or make the controls slower so you get damaged.
Comment: He's not always the same, He was level 50 on my first 8 or so play throughs, then after I beat him his level became 100.
Answer: No, you can't beat him in the first bloodline... because that's the intro. :D
On the second one, yes, you can do it by restarting from a higher bloodline after leveling up. I actually beat him at level 15, using the heal and shield ring (forgot what that was).
Level up to 15 and buy the best equipment possible (excluding armor), then choose to "Restart from Bloodline 1". You will still be facing the Level 50 God King, and so you can then beat him in Bloodline 1.
Answer: It's possible if you lose as a result of an enemy(except God) and restart the bloodline. Do this again and again until you have a powerful item, and then you will beat him. (This may take a very long time)
Answer: I beat him on the first blood line. It just took me about 5 tries. I closed the game every time he killed me. the key is to only dodge his blows, use the special when you screw up so he doesn't get a combo on you, and use the heal power a lot.
Comment: Solid advice here.
Answer: It's actually not that hard to beat him on the first bloodline. But that's probably because while I was playing, I got some weird glitch and suddenly had $10000000. I bought all the best equipment, mastered it all, (that got me to about level 30) and beat the God King and he only took about 200 health from me. So, it's actually not impossible to beat him on the first bloodline, you just have to be really good, or really lucky and get a glitch :D
Answer: Just start early on and keep playing, and then a few bloodlines later say do the bloodline one and he will be easy.
I did not do this every time, but I beat him seven times. You could also go down the drain or below the elevator to the God King and have the Infinity Blade, put it in the stone and amazing people are behind the doors and beating them opens the door to the creator of god kings.
Comment: The amazing people are harder than the gk and give you the new dragon items.
Answer: You could spend a crap ton of real world money to buy in game gold, get the best stuff, and be really good at it, and maybe then.
I almost beat him on my fifth bloodline, but couldn't heal in between attacks fast enough. Got him easily on my sixth, its not really a very hard game.
Answer: Yes, you can beat the godking in the first bloodline.
When infinity blade was released, the godking seemed unbeatable god. After months went through, the godking now is a piece of cake - the fat pig - the "easy money" resource that brings lots of money after you kill it.


Submit an Answer which does not offer a solution to the exact scenario but solves the problem nevertheless?

Question: I spotted this question. The user was programmatically loading a UIView in iOS and adding it to another element named UIScrollView and his problem was that the view's nib file was not loading or displaying. Since this was horrible re-invention of wheel (As iOS already provides us similar functionality via UITableView), I suggested that he should use UITableView instead of adding subviews with a loop inside a scrollview. This obviously provided him with the results that he wanted but it does not quite answer to his real question. I did not post my suggested approach as an answer for this reason and also because it was true only on his case but for other people facing a similar problem it won't be helpful. I did however gave him a link to correct way of loading a View's nib file (Already answered on SO) in comments. Should I have posted that as an answer? This Meta discussion doesn't quite provide me a solid answer.
Answer: There are many questions asking "how do I do X" when "X" is a poor approach. Occasionally the asker really wants to know about "X". But, more commonly, I believe, the asker wants to solve a problem and thought that "X" was the best method to use. Perhaps this is a version of the X-Y problem.
Reading the linked question (which is about a topic I do not know) it seems the asker thought that "X" was the way to go, but they tried your recommendation and were satisfied with that approach.
I would say that you have provided a good answer to the askers problem and that you should write it up as an answer.
Comment: If another person comes to visit this question, they would be looking for the way to load the view correctly which most likely will not involve using the approach I suggested. I probably should add the link to the already question answer in this regard along with the alternative approach to tackle his specific issue.


safe to update to windows 10 mobile?

Question: I have a non-Nokia non-Lumia Windows phone, made but by a manufacturer in India(Phone model number is Micromax Canvas Win W121). I am running Windows 8.1 Update 2. Now, I am really eager to try out windows 10 mobile, and I know I could do so using Insider Preview..But I wanted to ask if the latest insider build is stable or will it cause any problems(this being my primary phone)..Also I wanted to know that if something were to go wrong, can I restore my phone?? Windows Phone Recovery Tool doesn't have my device listed as a supported device...
Comment: Actually, my phone is not listed on supported phones for insider preview, but some time ago I installed insider preview app and it was showing an available win 10 update...
Comment: That could cause problems. Especially with your phone not on the supported list of recovery tool too. The official release will be around this month. So you could wait. Also you can directly comment on an answer itself.
Answer: The latest windows 10 build is running smoothly but you need to wait for the official release since your phone will not run the insider preview.
You can see the list of supported phones for insider preview here.
The official release will be around this month.
Answer: EDIT AGAIN: The answer below is from 2015. At this point (Nov 2016), W10M is pretty rock-solid, especially the latest release builds (the 1607 version).
I still don't recommend using the Insider Preview builds on your day-to-day device, as those builds do still sometimes have issues, although for the most part they've been functional enough. The biggest problem with them is just the regular rebooting to install updates, honestly. For the non-Insider builds, I've had no problems at all since 1607 came out.

EDIT: The below applies to 10.0.10586.11, there is a newer build that just came out but I haven't tried it yet. I still recommend waiting to learn more.
Personally, I wouldn't actually call the current W10M builds "smooth", maybe not even "safe"; I've re-flashed my phone more times in the last two weeks (which is to say, since the "RTM" build for Insider Fast came out, and the first time I tried upgrading to it) than I have in the last five years. I've experienced everything from the location service crashing and making the phone hang so hard I couldn't even forcibly reboot it, to the phone entering a BSOD loop where it crashed to bluescreen as before even getting to the lock screen. Then there's the minor everyday nuisances, like one time (after a hard-reset on W10M) that SMS backup/restore just flat out didn't work for more than about 100 old messages, not to mention the Maps app crashing about once per hour of navigation use, or the Camera app causing the phone to reboot every so often when you try to view a photo you just took (these happened on multiple flashes and have been reported by others). That's on a Lumia 1520, which is a supported model.
In short, W10M just isn't ready yet. I'd call it an early beta, actually. It's feature-complete, and everything nominally works, but it's buggy and unreliable. You definitely should not install it, in its current form, on anything that you aren't able to re-flash using a PC; one of those hangs was bad enough that the normal hard-reset-from-power-on button combination didn't even work. I wouldn't recommend installing it on any device at present, unless you need a feature only it offers or you want to test stuff on a device that is not your daily use phone.

safe to update to windows 10 mobile?


What happens when I click "No" to "X wants to be able to chat" in Gmail? Will he or she know?

Question: I don't want to be rude. But I don't want to chat with this person in Gmail. Will he/she be notified or otherwise know if I say no to his/her chat request?
Answer: No, they will not receive any notification about your action.
The user will continue to see you in their list with the "Invited" status.
Comment: If the other person asks, I would politely give them an alternative way for them to contact you, that you prefer them to use instead of via Gchat. I use the same technique for "rejecting" people I don't really know on Facebook.
Comment: Follow up: What do I say to this person when I see him/her in person so that he/she doesn't feel rejected?
Answer: S/he sent you a chat invitation. Whether you press "No" or leave it alone, whether s/he gets a notification or not, either way s/he don't get to chat to you. So, the end result is same.
No, s/he wont get any notification.
P.S. - BTW, if that person doesn't get a notification, that's even more rude, that means you are ignoring him/her.
Comment: I respect your opinion, but I think it's my right to decide who can and cannot see my Gchat status. Let me know if you think there are any other ways I can respectfully say "no."


Coconut sugar flavor

Question: I bought a lot of coconut sugar (and have since given it to my MIL).  I baked cupcakes with it and the entire batch of cupcakes fell (there was a crater-like indention in every cupcake).  All of my cane sugar cupcakes rose nicely.  In the cupcakes, I didn't notice much of a different flavor (they still tasted really good despite sinking in the middle).  But when I made fresh lemonade with the coconut sugar, all I could taste was burnt sugar.  Does coconut sugar normally taste burned or could it have just been the brand I bought?  I can't believe coconut sugar is so popular if it all tastes burned.
Comment: Did you try adding coconut powder to the mix. It adds a grainy structure to it and locks more air (almost like sand, but soft). The coconut sugar has a very low melting point. It might've made the cake texture very moist making it hard to rise.
Comment: They rose nicely as they were baking but sunk when cooling.  It was really strange.  There was nothing that should have caused a sinking (like a bang).
Answer: Pretty much all sugar, regardless of source, has to go through a series of refining steps in order to remove moisture and produce crystals.  Common white "table sugar" that we're familiar with in Western countries is the most refined, having gone through a whole series of steps to precipitate and "wash" the crystals to produce a brilliant white.  This process removes the molasses, which has a very distinct burned or toasted flavor, leaving a very pure sweetness.
Coconut sugar is produced from a different source (the coconut palm, obviously) and is reduced down to produce crystals in a similar way, but it's typically less refined afterwards.  It doesn't technically contain molasses, but it does have similar impurities that produce a similar flavor.  In fact:

Coconut sugar is subtly sweet almost like brown sugar but with a slight hint of caramel. However, since coconut sugar is not highly processed, the color, sweetness and flavor can vary depending on the coconut species used, season when it was harvested, where it was harvested and / or the way the "sap" or "toddy" was reduced.
Source: Wikipedia

Brown sugar, by the way, is commercially produced by blending molasses back into refined sugar.  Less-refined sugar, which can have a brown hue, is often marketed as "raw" instead.
So: coconut sugar can vary, and the specific brand that you tried may have been one with more of a bitter, burned, or caramel-like flavor.  You may have better luck with another, but keep in mind that most coconut sugars don't go through refining steps that produces a very pure sweetness like you'd be used to with common white sugar.
As for why it's popular... well, supposedly it's a bit healthier than cane sugars, particularly if you're concerned with blood sugar levels.  Products made with coconut oil seem to be enjoying a trendy popularity, as do alternative sugars (like palm sugar) and it's a fair bet that coconut sugar is benefiting from both fads.  It all comes down to marketing.
Comment: Thanks logophobe.  I knew about brown sugar, but didn't realize that coconut sugar didn't get refined the same way.  I would be OK if it just wasn't sweet, but burned flavor isn't good.  :(

Coconut sugar flavor