Grub rescue unknown filesystem...the ultimate hopelessness

Question: I know the question has been asked so many times but in my case whatever I do as indicated in the following post (all solutions are tried) 'unknown filesystem' is the ultimate reply..
Grub rescue - error: unknown filesystem
I also tried live USB of boot-disk-recovery which too fails to identify my device partition holding Ubuntu 12.04 x32 (which by the way is sdb2) Although it created bootscript which is attached below.
 Boot Info Script e7fc706 + Boot-Repair extra info      [Boot-Info 31Jan2013]

============================= Boot Info Summary: ===============================

 => Syslinux MBR (4.04 and higher) is installed in the MBR of /dev/sda.
 => Grub2 (v1.99) is installed in the MBR of /dev/sdb and looks at sector 1 of
    the same hard drive for core.img. core.img is at this location and looks
    for (,msdos2)/boot/grub on this drive.

sda1: __________________________________________________________________________

    File system:       vfat
    Boot sector type:  SYSLINUX 4.05 20120702
    Boot sector info:  Syslinux looks at sector 1030576 of /dev/sda1 for its
                       second stage. SYSLINUX is installed in the  directory.
                       According to the info in the boot sector, sda1 starts
                       at sector 0. But according to the info from fdisk,
                       sda1 starts at sector 62.
    Operating System:
    Boot files:        /syslinux/syslinux.cfg /ldlinux.sys

sdb1: __________________________________________________________________________

    File system:       swap
    Boot sector type:  -
    Boot sector info:

sdb2: __________________________________________________________________________

    File system:
    Boot sector type:  -
    Boot sector info:
    Mounting failed:   mount: unknown filesystem type ''

sdb3: __________________________________________________________________________

    File system:       Extended Partition
    Boot sector type:  Unknown
    Boot sector info:

sdb5: __________________________________________________________________________

    File system:
    Boot sector type:  Windows Vista: NTFS
    Boot sector info:
    Mounting failed:   mount: unknown filesystem type ''
mount: unknown filesystem type ''

============================ Drive/Partition Info: =============================

Drive: sda _____________________________________________________________________

Disk /dev/sda: 4003 MB, 4003463168 bytes
124 heads, 62 sectors/track, 1017 cylinders, total 7819264 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes

Partition  Boot  Start Sector    End Sector  # of Sectors  Id System

/dev/sda1    *             62     7,818,695     7,818,634   c W95 FAT32 (LBA)

Drive: sdb _____________________________________________________________________

Disk /dev/sdb: 80.0 GB, 80026360832 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 9729 cylinders, total 156301486 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes

Partition  Boot  Start Sector    End Sector  # of Sectors  Id System

/dev/sdb1               2,048     2,000,895     1,998,848  82 Linux swap / Solaris
/dev/sdb2    *      2,000,896    58,644,479    56,643,584  83 Linux
/dev/sdb3          58,646,526   156,301,311    97,654,786   5 Extended
/dev/sdb5          58,646,528   156,301,311    97,654,784   7 NTFS / exFAT / HPFS

"blkid" output: ________________________________________________________________

Device           UUID                                   TYPE       LABEL

/dev/loop0                                              squashfs
/dev/sda1        3273-D2BD                              vfat
/dev/sdb1        19d35932-1dbf-4be0-83aa-3d76b646dd80   swap

================================ Mount points: =================================

Device           Mount_Point              Type       Options

/dev/loop0       /rofs                    squashfs   (ro,noatime)
/dev/sda1        /cdrom                   vfat       (ro,noatime,fmask=0022,dmask=0022,codepage=437,iocharset=iso8859-1,shortname=mixed,errors=remount-ro)

========================= sda1/syslinux/syslinux.cfg: ==========================

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
# D-I config version 2.0
include menu.cfg
default vesamenu.c32
prompt 0
timeout 300
ui gfxboot bootlogo
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

================= sda1: Location of files loaded by Syslinux: ==================

           GiB - GB             File                                 Fragment(s)

            ?? = ??             syslinux/syslinux.cfg                          1
            ?? = ??             ldlinux.sys                                    1
            ?? = ??             syslinux/chain.c32                             1
            ?? = ??             syslinux/gfxboot.c32                           1
            ?? = ??             syslinux/vesamenu.c32                          1

============== sda1: Version of COM32(R) files used by Syslinux: ===============

 syslinux/chain.c32                 :  COM32R module (v4.xx)
 syslinux/gfxboot.c32               :  COM32R module (v4.xx)
 syslinux/vesamenu.c32              :  COM32R module (v4.xx)

======================== Unknown MBRs/Boot Sectors/etc: ========================

Unknown BootLoader on sdb3

00000000  d6 d6 d6 d6 d6 d6 d6 d6  d6 d6 d6 d6 d6 d6 d6 d6  |................|
*
000001b0  d6 d6 d6 d6 d6 d6 d6 d6  d6 d6 d6 d6 d6 d6 00 fe  |................|
000001c0  ff ff 07 fe ff ff 02 00  00 00 00 18 d2 05 00 00  |................|
000001d0  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |................|
*
000001f0  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 55 aa  |..............U.|
00000200

=============================== StdErr Messages: ===============================

File descriptor 8 (/proc/2401/mounts) leaked on lvscan invocation. Parent PID 7264: bash
  No volume groups found

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION :
=================== log of boot-repair 2013-11-26__17h13 ===================
boot-repair version : 3.198~ppa16~raring
boot-sav version : 3.198~ppa16~raring
glade2script version : 3.2.2~ppa45~raring
boot-sav-extra version : 3.198~ppa16~raring
File descriptor 8 (/proc/2401/mounts) leaked on lvs invocation. Parent PID 4002: /bin/sh
No volume groups found
boot-repair is executed in live-session (Boot-Repair-Disk 32bit 24avr2013, raring, Ubuntu, i686)
ls: cannot access /home/usr/.config: No such file or directory
CPU op-mode(s):        32-bit, 64-bit
noprompt cdrom-detect/try-usb=true file=/cdrom/preseed/lubuntu.seed boot=casper initrd=/casper/initrd.lz quiet splash --

=================== os-prober:

=================== blkid:
/dev/loop0: TYPE="squashfs"
/dev/sda1: UUID="3273-D2BD" TYPE="vfat"
/dev/sdb1: UUID="19d35932-1dbf-4be0-83aa-3d76b646dd80" TYPE="swap"

=================== UEFI/Legacy mode:
This live-session is not EFI-compatible.
SecureBoot maybe enabled.

=================== PARTITIONS & DISKS:

=================== parted -l:

Model: Kingston DT 101 G2 (scsi)
Disk /dev/sda: 4003MB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/512B
Partition Table: msdos

Number  Start   End     Size    Type     File system  Flags
1      31.7kB  4003MB  4003MB  primary  fat32        boot, lba

Model:  Mass Storage Device (scsi)
Disk /dev/sdb: 80.0GB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/512B
Partition Table: msdos

Number  Start   End     Size    Type      File system     Flags
1      1049kB  1024MB  1023MB  primary   linux-swap(v1)
2      1024MB  30.0GB  29.0GB  primary                   boot
3      30.0GB  80.0GB  50.0GB  extended
5      30.0GB  80.0GB  50.0GB  logical   ntfs

=================== parted -lm:

BYT;
/dev/sda:4003MB:scsi:512:512:msdos:Kingston DT 101 G2;
1:31.7kB:4003MB:4003MB:fat32::boot, lba;

BYT;
/dev/sdb:80.0GB:scsi:512:512:msdos: Mass Storage Device;
1:1049kB:1024MB:1023MB:linux-swap(v1)::;
2:1024MB:30.0GB:29.0GB:::boot;
3:30.0GB:80.0GB:50.0GB:::;
5:30.0GB:80.0GB:50.0GB:ntfs::;

=================== mount:
/cow on / type overlayfs (rw)
proc on /proc type proc (rw,noexec,nosuid,nodev)
sysfs on /sys type sysfs (rw,noexec,nosuid,nodev)
udev on /dev type devtmpfs (rw,mode=0755)
devpts on /dev/pts type devpts (rw,noexec,nosuid,gid=5,mode=0620)
tmpfs on /run type tmpfs (rw,noexec,nosuid,size=10%,mode=0755)
/dev/sda1 on /cdrom type vfat (ro,noatime,fmask=0022,dmask=0022,codepage=437,iocharset=iso8859-1,shortname=mixed,errors=remount-ro)
/dev/loop0 on /rofs type squashfs (ro,noatime)
none on /sys/fs/cgroup type tmpfs (rw)
none on /sys/fs/fuse/connections type fusectl (rw)
none on /sys/kernel/debug type debugfs (rw)
none on /sys/kernel/security type securityfs (rw)
tmpfs on /tmp type tmpfs (rw,nosuid,nodev)
none on /run/lock type tmpfs (rw,noexec,nosuid,nodev,size=5242880)
none on /run/shm type tmpfs (rw,nosuid,nodev)
none on /run/user type tmpfs (rw,noexec,nosuid,nodev,size=104857600,mode=0755)
gvfsd-fuse on /run/user/lubuntu/gvfs type fuse.gvfsd-fuse (rw,nosuid,nodev,user=lubuntu)

=================== ls:
/sys/block/sda (filtered):  alignment_offset bdi capability dev device discard_alignment events events_async events_poll_msecs ext_range holders inflight power queue range removable ro sda1 size slaves stat subsystem trace uevent
/sys/block/sdb (filtered):  alignment_offset bdi capability dev device discard_alignment events events_async events_poll_msecs ext_range holders inflight power queue range removable ro sdb1 sdb2 sdb3 sdb5 size slaves stat subsystem trace uevent
/dev (filtered):  agpgart alarm ashmem autofs binder block bsg btrfs-control bus char console core cpu cpu_dma_latency disk dri ecryptfs fb0 fd full fuse fw0 hidraw0 hidraw1 hidraw2 hpet input kmsg kvm log mapper mcelog mem net network_latency network_throughput null oldmem port ppp psaux ptmx pts random rfkill rtc rtc0 sda sda1 sdb sdb1 sdb2 sdb3 sdb5 sg0 sg1 shm snapshot snd stderr stdin stdout uinput urandom usb v4l vga_arbiter vhost-net video0 zero
ls /dev/mapper:  control

=================== df -Th:

Filesystem     Type       Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
/cow           overlayfs  1.5G   19M  1.5G   2% /
udev           devtmpfs   1.5G   12K  1.5G   1% /dev
tmpfs          tmpfs      300M  816K  299M   1% /run
/dev/sda1      vfat       3.8G  496M  3.3G  14% /cdrom
/dev/loop0     squashfs   431M  431M     0 100% /rofs
none           tmpfs      4.0K     0  4.0K   0% /sys/fs/cgroup
tmpfs          tmpfs      1.5G  8.0K  1.5G   1% /tmp
none           tmpfs      5.0M     0  5.0M   0% /run/lock
none           tmpfs      1.5G     0  1.5G   0% /run/shm
none           tmpfs      100M   12K  100M   1% /run/user

=================== fdisk -l:

Disk /dev/sda: 4003 MB, 4003463168 bytes
124 heads, 62 sectors/track, 1017 cylinders, total 7819264 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x00011134

Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
/dev/sda1   *          62     7818695     3909317    c  W95 FAT32 (LBA)

Disk /dev/sdb: 80.0 GB, 80026360832 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 9729 cylinders, total 156301486 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x7add7add

Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
/dev/sdb1            2048     2000895      999424   82  Linux swap / Solaris
/dev/sdb2   *     2000896    58644479    28321792   83  Linux
/dev/sdb3        58646526   156301311    48827393    5  Extended
/dev/sdb5        58646528   156301311    48827392    7  HPFS/NTFS/exFAT

Error: no partitions

=================== Default settings
Recommended-Repair
This setting would reinstall the  of .
Additional repair would be performed:  repair-filesystems

=================== Settings chosen by the user
Boot-Info
This setting will not act on the MBR.

No change has been performed on your computer.

While I attach this sdb (as external) to any running OS following observations were made:
In Linux Mint's gPArted:
Partitions /sdb1 (ext4) & /sdb5 (ntfs) both have exclamation marks! (thus my ntfs too is corrupted somehow)
In Win7
/sdb5 also can't be accessed rather windows offer me to format it to use it. chkdsk can't access this ntfs partition!
I have tested my hd for bad sectors but it's healthy & why it shouldn't be its only ~3 months old. Now I have tried whatever I can for the last 2 days but now you guys I look upon for assistance
UPDATE 1
I have tried fsck.ext4 -v /dev/sdb2 but bad superblock error was returned. Used mke2fs -n /dev/sdb2 to get a list of backup superblocks & finally upon each block number e2fsck -b <block_number> /dev/xxx was performed with no success :(
Source for above method
UPDATE 2
Used testdisk utility & performed deep search for lost partitions & then tried to list files upon each found partition some of the NTFS partiton allowed me to enter them but there were no files only "System Volume Information" stuff (some files I put in my /dev/sd5 should be there!). It displayed that hd structure is present but I can't hook up in the Linux partition nether testdisk was able to list files of that particular partition
UPDATE 3
This is the 3rd day & still I can't get it to work so I am writing a prologue of how did my problem really started...This 80gb drive though is my internal PC drive but frequently I also attach this as an external drive to my laptop. The drive was working fine for about 3 months.
Under linux Mint (in my laptop) I attached it 3 days before (& I often do that) as an external USB drive. There I transferred ~16gb of data to its NTFS partition /dev/sdb5. It went smoothly with ~25mb/sec rate & then I (what I do always) issued through context menu 'Safely remove drive' & it removed drive (I think that was what supposed to happen) nothing special! but later when I tried to boot it nightmare started...
After a quick Google search I must acknowledge that Linux may also corrupt your Grub & all even when drive isn't properly unmounted, thats really a shame to find because in windows I just pull out my USBs when transfer finishes but yes in *nix I do have found that even when transfer is completed & you pull out drive only to find nothing has been transferred! Bad luck if you used cut/paste
Answer: Several problems:

Windows really wants to be on a primary partition, not a logical
partition in the extended partition, and that's the partition which
should have the boot flag, not the linux partition, which does not
care.  * Oh its just for data, nevermind.
Maybe you really don't have a filesystem on sdb2.
    Everything seems to indicate that.  So just reinstall Ubuntu there
    (After fixing the Windows partition problem).

With no blkids being listed for the partitions, it does not look good for recovery.  I suppose you could check the partition with dd, grab a few blocks at a time in locations spread across the partition, and look for strings, to see if the data even exists.  But if it's just configuration data, definitely not worth the effort.  For more valuable data, if the usual tools don't help, there's always brute force, dd the whole partition, split it up into manageable chunks, look for strings of interest, then edit the chunk with the interesting stuff -- a massive undertaking.
Comment: There is no windows, there is just linux! /dev/sdb5 is just a logical NTFS storage drive! I know I can reinstall ubuntu but then why should I bother to question here. Are all my configurations are gone/unrecoverable?


Google Play Services required permissions

Question: Why does Google Play Services require so many permissions.  Access to my phone, contacts, text messages, camera, microphone,  and even body sensors cannot be turned off without constant push notices saying they must be turned on for it to work properly. I didn't know my phone had "body sensors". It is the only app in my phone with such a request. I find all these demands for access to every  aspect of my phone way too invasive into my personal information. No possible permission is excluded. Do I have to keep this app running or can I disable it?
Comment: For example: My new phone won't sync my *contacts* until Play Services has access to my *camera* and *body sensors*. I'd pretty much forgotten about phone rooting until I saw this app. Considering a google-free rootkit now, on principle.
Answer: Google Play Services is kind of a "service provider" for other apps on your device. A look into our google-play-services tag-wiki will give you some details and explain some of the permissions this app requires. For example it requires access to your location as it offers location services to other apps.
If you'd disable this, several of your apps will probably no longer function the way they did before. Some apps won't care. But especially other Google Apps will complain (Gmail and Google Maps definitely will). As the Settings app is not affected, you can try that out (if the effect is too strong, you can always revert your change).
On the other had, you could also try revoking some permissions from the Google Play Services app, if your Android lets you (it's a system app, so depending on your device and Android version you might not be able to do that).
Comment: Doesn't this defeat the purpose of having app permissions? If I don't want an app to know my location, I can disable the app location permissions, but then it can use Play Services to get the info anyway. Am I misunderstanding something?
Comment: I've revoked the **location** access from `Google Play Services` app, but granted it to `Google Map`. `Google Map` works just fine even after that. So this doesn't match your answer. May be there is something else here we are missing.
Comment: @Fayaz Play Services is an API that apps can use, but apps don't have to use it, they can access the services of Android also in other ways. Perhaps that is what Google Map is doing. The main reason Play Services exists is that  it is an app which can be updated without having to update the whole OS which is not possible on some older devices. For an app that does use Play Services I THINK (and hope) that you need to give permissions to both Play Services and the app. I wish Google would clarify this question by giving a simple answer themselves.
Comment: @Coo I'd hope it gives the location only to apps which have the permission. But I can't tell. Play services also includes AdMob & Co.
Comment: @Fayaz it might work while on GPS. But network location? Apart from that, I wouldn't trust the permission staying removed. Deep as it is ingrained in the system, it might simply grant it back to itself. As Playstore simply gets reenabled (and updated) if you disable it (I've experienced that multiple times, back when I still had GApps on a device – luckily I no longer have).
Answer: It is because new android >6.0 ask for permissions on any app ,even on system apps. Don't be scared. Allow them, because it is services for all google apps. Without that youtube ,gmail, chrome won't work. It's neccesary. And because it is neccesary it request a lot. Google wants from you to doenload all their apps to use.
And it request contacts and dialing  because he want to backup your contact to google servers in case of losing data.
Comment: What has needing so many permissions to do with Android 6's runtime permissions? And why would that be necessary? Why is the "dialing" permission required to backup contacts? Sorry for being direct, but that's pure nonsense. the only thing I can agree to here is that Play Services offers its functionality to a lot of apps.


What colour space to use when printing digital photos?

Question: As is customary with preparing images for print in a magazine or newspaper, I convert my digital photos from RGB to CMYK before inserting into my publishing application. However, when I'm printing photos at my local photo lab, I leave them in RGB. In fact, I once tried printing a CMYK image; the printed colours were completely off. In what way are the printing machines at the photo lab different from the traditional offset printers?
Comment: I personally use Adobe RGB, but I'm curious to know the answer.
Comment: Please see this answer for more useful information on color profiles and printing: http://photo.stackexchange.com/questions/2624/what-are-color-profiles-and-where-would-i-find-information-on-using-them-properly/2626#2626
Answer: The lab photo printers are likely to be dye-sublimation, or silver-halide (where the digital image is projected onto normal photo paper) which unlike lithography don't require halftoning, however they still use ink and thus follow the subtractive colour model, so the principal is the same.
The reason your colours were off is probably due to CMYK conversion using a different colour model than the one the printer uses (Photoshop defualts to SWOP CMYK, which I believe was developed for an offset print process), as the dyes in a photo lab printer will be different in colour to the ones used in lithographic printer and so require different quantities of each colour in order to [try to] replicate a given RGB value.
Unless advised otherwise by the printers you're probably best using the widest gamut available to you (usually Adobe RGB, which will likely contain 99% if not all of the printer gamut) and let the printer handle the CMYK conversion. You can ask the printer for a colour profile for their equipment in order to have more control over this process and "soft proof" the expected results on your monitor. But unless you need to edit the image in CYMK (for example to get a specific black mix) doing the coversion yourself will just create much larger files (since you can't use jpeg for this) and runs the risk of incorrect results if done with the wrong profile.
At the end of the day producing artwork for a subtractive print process using an additive output device (i.e. a computer monitor) is error prone. It will take several attempts to get the colours how you want them when printing.
Comment: You're absolutely right: the CMYK profile I used is for web offset printing. As you suggest, I'll probably just stick with Adobe RGB and have the printer perform the conversion for me. Thanks!
Answer: The vast majority of photo labs only know how to handle sRGB images. Many of the RA-4 based digital mini-labs don't recognize embedded profiles and just treat everything as sRGB.
There are new inkjet-based minilabs showing up in some locations now, but they're still catering to consumers printing direct from point-n-shoot jpeg's, so your best bet is still to stick with sRGB.
Some labs catering to "pros" (namely wedding/portrait photogs) might support Adobe RGB in addition to sRGB, but don't assume that's true; always ask first.
Even if you're using a lab that prints with inkjets, they're almost certainly using RGB-based drivers, so don't assume that just because the printer has subtractive inks that you should be handing them a CMYK file. Never give a photo lab CMYK images.
There are some fine-art printers and high-end service bureaus out there who have a fully color-managed workflow and can handle pretty much any embedded profile; but they are pretty rare (and expensive).
Answer: Well, if you are taking photos to a local lab you have to adapt to what they do. Some labs accept multiple color-spaces and others may just ignore the color-space in your photos which is why the colors look off when you get the print.
Regardless of what they accept you should ask about what they USE. Most labs always convert to a specific color space, regardless of what they accept. If you want the most reliable output then I suggest you convert to the color-space used by the lab. If you ask and they do not know, find another lab or submit sRGB which stacks the odds in your favor.

Itai


Are Shannon entropy and Boltzmann entropy mutually convertible?

Question: Are Shannon entropy and Boltzmann entropy mutually convertible, much like mass and energy according to Einstein's formula?
Comment: Nothing theoretical but [here](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Zentralfriedhof_Vienna_-_Boltzmann.JPG) is the Boltzmann formula on his grave in Vienna.
Answer: In practice the only difference is that Boltzmann entropy deals with a thermodynamical constant $K_B$:
$
H = -K_B\sum_{i=1}^{N} P_i log_e\ P_i
$
i assume you already know that if $K_B=1$ you have Shannon entropy in a different base.
However the conceptual backgrounds are important; probability of events (Shannon) and probability of a particle being in one of $N$ states (Boltzmann) under a thermodynamical context.
There is theoretical work in making the formal link between the two notions of entropy. Take a look at the work of Edwin Jaynes.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edwin_Jaynes
Comment: Changing the constant $K_B$ is the same thing as changing the base of the logarithm, because $\log_a x = \log_b x / \log_b a$. There is no difference between Shannon entropy and Boltzmann entropy except for a change of units.
Comment: I would be interested to know whether there could be not only a formal link but sort of a practical link, much like when mass is transformed into energy. As layman I have a little bit "speculative" thought: If in a certain empirical study I have collected data, there is yet no information for me. I get information after I apply, say, a statistical software to the data. But that software must be run on a machine, where thermodynamical processes are certainly involved. So I "guess" that the informational entropy comes somehow from the thermodynamical entropy involved there.
Comment: I cannot prove the following but i think in the case you mention, one should consider entropy on the first event when the data has been collected and contained. Even when at that point there is no practical information for a specific field, that is already information in terms of Shannon entropy. From here, there could be a natural representation of the data as particles for Boltzmann entropy.
Answer: As has already been answered, Shannon entropy and Boltzman entropy are the same thing, although they are measured in different units. You also asked whether there is a practical link. It may not be practical yet, but the idea of algorithmic cooling uses the link between these two concepts, and has indeed been experimentally demonstrated.
Answer: I just found the following paragraphs from J. R. Pierce, An Introduction to Information Theory, p.206, which I surmise would also support the thinking that one could practically use a computer and a deterministic program to turn a string A into a string B of higher Shanon entropy:
"We can regard any process which specifies something concerning which state a system in in as a message source. This source generates a message which reduces our uncertainty as to what state the system is in. Such a source has a certain communication-theory entropy per message. This entropy is equal to the number of binary digits necessary to transmit a message generated by the source. It takes a particular energy per binary digit to transmit the message against a noise corresponding to the temperature T of the system."
"The message reduces our uncertainty as to what state the system is in, thus reducing the entropy (of statistical mechanics) of the system. The reduction of entropy increases the free energy of the system. But the increase in free energy is just equal to the minimum energy necessary to transmit the message which led to the increase of free energy, an energy proportional to the entropy of communication theory."
"This, I believe, is the relation between the entropy of communication theory and that of
statistical mechanics. One pays a price for information which leads to a reduction of the
statistical-mechanical entropy of a system. This price is proportional to the communication-theory entropy of the message source which procudes the information. It is always just high enough so that a perpetual motion machine of the second kind is impossible."


When should you branch?

Question: When working with a SCM system, when should you branch?
Answer: In general term, the main purpose of branching (a VCS - Version Control System - feature) is to achieve code isolation.
You have at least one branch, which can be enough for sequential development, and is used for many tasks being recording (committed) on that same unique branch.
But that model shows quickly its limit:
When you have a development effort (refactoring, evolution, bug-fixes, ...) and you realize you cannot safely make those changes in the same branch than your current development branch (because you would break API, or introduce code that would break everything), then you need a another branch.
(To isolate that new code for the legacy one, even though the two code sets will be merge later on)
So that is your answer right there:
You should branch whenever you cannot pursue and record two development efforts in one branch.
(without having an horribly complicated history to maintain).

A branch can be useful even if you are the only one working on the source code, or if you are many.
But you should not make "one branch per developer":
The isolation purpose is made to isolate a development effort (a task which can be as general as "let's develop the next version of our software" or as specific as "let's fix bug 23"),
not to isolate a resource.
(a branch called "VonC" means nothing to another developer: What if "VonC" leaves the project? What are you supposed to do with it?
a branch called "bugfix_212" can be interpreted in the context of a bug tracking system for instance, and any developer can use it with at least some idea about what he is supposed to do with it)
A branch is not a tag (SVN is a Revision System which tries to propose versioning features like branching and tagging through directories with cheap file copy: that does not mean a tag is a branch)
To define a branch means also defining a merge workflow: you need to know where to merge your branch when you are done with it.
For that, the chapter 7 of Practical Perforce (Laura WINGERD - O'Reilly) is a good introduction (VCS agnostic) to merge workflow between different kind of branches:  "
"How Software Evolves" (pdf)
It defines the term codeline (branch which records significant evolution steps of the code, either through tags at certain points, or through important merge back to the branch)
It introduce the mainline model (a central codeline to record releases), and describes various purposes for branching:

Active development streams: an persistent codeline when sequential various developments take place
tasks branches: short-lived branches for more specific task (bug-fix is a classic one, but you can also define a branch for a merge effort you know to be complex to complete: you can merge, commit and test in that task branch without introducing problem for the main current development branch)
staging branch: for preparing a release, with some pre-production specific data or config files.
Private branches, ad hoc branches, and sparse branches: for very small tasks, just to be able to commit some work in progress without waiting for formal completion or test review.
That allows to "commit early, commit often".

Other interesting concepts around VCS: Basics concepts
(about ClearCase originally, but also valid for any VCS)
Answer: There are several uses for branching. One of the most common uses is for separating projects that once had a common code base. This is very useful to experiment with your code, without affecting the main trunk.
In general, you would see two branch types:

Feature Branch: If a particular feature is disruptive enough that you don't want the entire development team to be affected in its early stages, you can create a branch on which to do this work.
Fixes Branch: While development continues on the main trunk, a fixes branch can be created to hold the fixes to the latest released version of the software.

You may be interested in checking out the following article, which explains the principles of branching, and when to use them:

Ned Batchelder - Subversion branching quick start
Comment: I never heard or thought of the common use you mentioned but that is a really cool idea. I really might use this in the upcoming project. Thanks for pointing it out.
Answer: All the 21th century SCMs are telling you:
Branch for every task you've to work on, no matter whether this is a new feature, a bugfix, a test, whatever. This is called topic branch, and it changes the way you work with your SCM.
You get:

Better isolation
Better traceability -> you associate tasks with branches, not individual changesets, which makes you free to commit as many times as you want and doesn't impose a limit like "one checkin per task".
Tasks are independent (normally starting from a stable baseline, so you only focus on your code, not on fixing bugs from your folks), and you can choose whether you want to integrate them at some point or later, but they're always under version control
You can review code easily (from the version control, not pre-commit bullshit) before hitting the main line

Tools that can do it:

Git
Mercurial
Plastic SCM

Tools that CAN'T do it:

SVN
CVS
VSS
TFS
Perforce
Comment: SVN is not good merging. Due to lack of proper merge tracking. Also because creating a branch is not as cheap as in the ones I pointed, it ends up being a nightmare under real conditions.
Comment: @PaimanSamadian multiple checkins are great to explain intermediate changes and ease review. Also, if you are working a few hours on something, multiple checkins are great.
Comment: Why you can't do it with SVN??
Comment: @PaimanSamadian: "Isn't once per task enough when the task isn't a complicated feature?" Sure. By the same token, when the task *is* complicated, one commit *isn't* enough (I commit every few minutes if things are going well). Why force one commit per task? • "Also bugs from folks can easily make their ways to the main branch" Actually not. Part of the point of a feature branch workflow is that it makes code review and testing possible *before* the code is merged into the main branch.
Comment: Better traceability: Why would you want to commit as many times as you want? Isn't once per task enough when the task isn't a complicated feature? Also bugs from folks can easily make their ways to the main branch and make it not "stable" and not "safe", right at the moment when they merge.
Answer: It also depends on the SCM tool you are using. Modern SCMs (git, mercurial, etc.) make it increasingly easy to create and destroy branches whenever needed. This allows you to, for example, make one branch per bug that you are working on. Once you merge your results into the trunk, you discard the branch.
Other SCMs, for example subversion and CVS, have a much "heavier" branching paradigm. That means, a branch is considered appropriate only for something bigger than a twenty-something-line patch. There, branches are classically used to track entire development tracks, like a previous or future product version.
Answer: When you need to make significant and/or experimental changes to your codebase, particularly if you want to commit intermediate changes, without affecting trunk.
Answer: It depends on what type of SCM you're using.
In the newer distributed versions (like git and mercurial), you're creating branches all the time and remerging anyway. I'll often work on a separate branch for a while just because someone's broken the build on the mainline, or because the network's down, and then merge changes back in later when it's fixed, and it's so easy to do that it's not even annoying.
The document (short and readable) that most helped me understand what was going in in the distributed systems is: UnderstandingMercurial.
In the older systems with a central repository, (like CVS, SVN and ClearCase), then it's a much more serious issue which needs to be decided at a team level, and the answer should be more like 'to maintain an old release whilst allowing development to continue on the main line', or 'as part of a major experiment'.
The distributed model is much better, I think, and lacking only nice graphical tools to become the dominant paradigm. However it's not as widely understood, and the concepts are different, so it can be confusing for new users.
Answer: I find the advice from Laura Wingerd & Christopher Seiwald at Perforce is really concise and useful:
<code>* Branch only when necessary.
* Don't copy when you mean to branch.
* Branch on incompatible policy.
* Branch late.
* Branch, instead of freeze.
</code>
See http://www.perforce.com/sites/default/files/pdf/perforce-best-practices.pdf for a detailed explanation of each of them and other best practice.
Comment: P4 peoplee used to say this, but nowadays their marketing is telling something different. They tried to avoid branching for years, simply because they can't do task or topic branches as good as other systems out there like Git
Comment: Response in 2015! The reason to avoid branch is to avoid the need to merge - not because Perforce didn't have task/topic branch (you can do "task branch" in streams - in Perforce we call it "task streams". As others have mentioned - branching is implied in DVCS and the question becomes irreverent. I reckon the discussion should be limited to only tools that works in the client-server fashion. Or DVCS used in a centralize fashion (since the 2015.1 release you can use Perforce in a DVCS mode - best of both worlds).
Answer: There are various purposes for branching:

Feature/bug branches. Dynamic and active branches that get moved back into the trunk when the feature/bugfix is complete.
Static branches (tags in Subversion, though in essence just a 'normal branch'). They provide a static snapshot of say, a release. Even though they could be worked on, they remain untouched.
Answer: The need for branching may also arise:
 when you want to provide a hotfix to a particular customer (say important) and you are unsure whether the fix will be part of future releases
Answer: When you need to make changes, based on your current branch, not destined for the next release from that branch (and not before).
For example, we work on trunk usually.  Around the time of release, someone's going to need to make a change that we don't want in the current release (it may be before release, at the moment it's usually after release).  This is when we branch, to put the release on its own branch and continue development for the next release on trunk.
Answer: Whenever you feel like it.
You probably won't very frequently if you work with a centralized SCM since the branches are part of the official repository, and that doesn't really invite much experimentation, not to mention that merges really hurt.
OTOH, there's no technical difference between a branch and a checkout in distributed SCMs, and merges are a lot easier.  You'll feel like branching a whole lot more often.
Answer: Leaving all the technicalities aside.....
Branch when you know its easier to merge back!
Keeping in mind that merging will always be effected with how the work is carried out in a project.
Once this achieved all the other tertiary issues will come in to play.

When should you branch?


How can I limit user to only enter one item in a list?

Question: I am creating subsites for individual clients. In the subsites I have different lists that capture information for the client. Some of those lists would be repeating (a client might have three properties, for example), meaning that they can add items ("rows"). But other lists really only need to capture one set of information.  Now, I guess I could edit the view to disable the "Add item" button, but is there a cleaner way to prevent a user from entering more than one "row" of information into a list?
Answer: There are several way that you could do this. You could use an event receiver to enforce the constraint or you could use a field set to the value of the individual's user name and set it to be unique. You could do this with a workflow if you wanted a "code free" way of doing it. However, they could go back and change the value of this field.
In this case, I would likely use an event receiver as it would have fewer moving parts and could not be easily subverted but could still be disabled by an admin if required at some point.
Answer: As Dan suggested, it's better to use Calculated value as default:

Also, you can add this script to the NewForm.aspx:
<code>$("[id^='Title_']").disabled = true
</code>
It will make sure the users cannot change the Title field:

Also, you can disable Quick Edit mode for the list to insure there is no easy workaround
I don't think using Workflows is an elegant solution
Answer: You could add a person/group column called 'AlreadyCreatedBy'.  You could set that column to require unique values.  Then, enable content approval on the list.  Set up a workflow that copies 'Created By' to 'AlreadyCreatedBy' and if it succeeds then set the approval status of the item to approved.
Comment: So if a list is "approved" then it prevents further entry? Seems like overkill. Is there no other way?
Comment: The approval process would prevent further items from showing up in the list.  The Workflow itself would handle approval.
Answer: If the client, in your case, is entering in a single-row set of data, it sounds like an opportunity to make use of surveys. Surveys can be configured to allow only one submission and that can further be configured to allow edits in the future, or it can be locked down (if I recall correctly)
Answer: Have used this with SharePoint 2010:

Column "Title" changed to calculated value "=Me"
Created next workflow in SharePoint Designer:

If Current Item:Title equals Current List:Title
Delete item Current Item

Result: New entry will be created and in some seconds removed.
Answer: something easy to do is to declare a column unique, then set default value to anything and hide the column so it cant be modified by the user.


Could cats see through the invisibility cloak?

Question: In the series, it is strongly hinted, but never confirmed, that cats could see through the Invisibility Cloak. Is there definitive evidence on this, one way or another, and either way, what explains why cats seem to be able to sense people? Thanks!
Answer: Cats (and most animals in general) rely on all of their senses more than people do. While a cat may not be able to see through an invisibility cloak they most likely would be able to hear or smell something there, which would naturally arouse their suspicion.
Answer: I don't think cats can see through Invisibility Cloaks.

Then a noise in the next room made Harry jump. Harry had only just raised his wand when they heard someone speak -- and it wasn't Malfoy.
"Sniff around, my sweet, they may be lurking in a corner."
It was Filch speaking to Mrs. Norris.
(Sorcerer's Stone - Page 157 - US Hardcover)

and

They hadn't realized how loud they'd been talking.
"Quick!"
Ron threw the cloak back over them as the luminous eyes of Mrs. Norris came round the door. Ron and Harry stood quite still, both thinking the same thing -- did the cloak work on cats? After what seemed an age, she turned and left.
"This isn't safe -- she might have gone for Filch. I'll bet she heard us. Come on."
And Ron pulled Harry out of the room.
(Sorcerer's Stone - Page 211 - US Hardcover)

and

"I know what you're thinking about, Harry, that mirror. Don't go back tonight."
"Why not?"
"I dunno. I've just got a bad feeling about it -- and anyway, you've had too many close shaves already. Filch, Snape, and Mrs. Norris are wandering around. So what if they can't see you? What if they walk into you? What if you knock something over?"
(Sorcerer's Stone - Page 212 - US Hardcover)

About Invisibility Cloaks, Tales of Beedle the Bard makes it clear that:

Death's Cloak (the Invisibility Cloak that is a Hallow) is of a uniquely durable nature. Invisibility Cloaks are not, generally, infallible. They may rip or grow opaque with age, or the charms placed upon them may wear off, or be countered by charms of revealment. This is why witches and wizards usually turn, in the first instance, to Disillusionment Charms for self-camoflague or concealment. Albus Dumbledore was known to be able to perform a Disillusionment Charm so powerful as to render himself invisible without the need for a cloak.
(Tales of Beedle the Bard - Page 163 - US Collector's Edition)

Conceivably, if a cat encountered an individual wearing a ripped, opaque, or disenchanted cloak, the cat might be able to see through it more readily than a human, as cats have keener eyesight.
The main instance I know of in canon is when the trio is seen under the Invisibility Cloak in Chamber of Secrets, when Dumbledore uses Homenum Revelio to see the trio in the corner of Hagrid's hut when Cornelius Fudge comes to arrest Hagrid as a suspect in the Basilisk attacks.
The only cats I know of in canon are Filch's Mrs. Norris, Professor McGonagall in her Animagus form, Hermione's Crookshanks (who is half Kneazle), and Slytherin Millicent Bullstrode's cat (which provides the cat hair for Hermione's Polyjuice accident, where she turns into a cat). Arabella Figg does a "roaring trade" in half cat/half Kneazle kittens; Kneazles are known for being able to detect unsavory or suspicious characters, so perhaps a cat-Kneazle combo would be more sensitive to things they cannot see, but that's not implicitly stated.
Perhaps there are examples of cats seeing through Invisibility Cloaks in the books, but I can't recall any offhand. Someone else might be able to better answer this question if it is indeed true cats have this ability.
Comment: Where is it said that "Dumbledore uses Homenum Revelio to see the trio in the corner of Hagrid's hut"? Not in the books, as far as I know?
Comment: http://www.the-leaky-cauldron.org/2007/7/30/j-k-rowling-web-chat-transcript/
Comment: Didn't Moody's eye also see through Harry's cloak?
Comment: if you cant recall, then possibly it isnt there.. +1 to slytherincess..
Answer: To add this quote seems to show Mrs. Norris was able to smell through the invisibility cloak, but not see.

Mrs. Norris was peering around Filch's legs. . . . Harry had
  the distinct impression that she could smell him. . . . Why had he
  filled that bath with so much perfumed foam?
Answer: In the goblet of fire Harry is trapped on the stairs and he is pretty sure Mrs. Norris can see him even with his cloak. Also, in DH nagini is able to see Harry and Hermione under the cloak while they are in Godrics Hallows because she beckons them (whilst inside the body of Bathilda). But then maybe the animals are just using their heighten sense of smell, while also being able discern the scent of a human.


Birth of the Gas Giant Planets?

Question: How does a gas giant planet form like Saturn and Jupiter, and why just gas? Why didn't they form any solid surface?
Comment: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Formation_and_evolution_of_the_Solar_System contains most of the basic information.
Answer: As @RobJeffries says, this information is mostly in the relevant wikipedia article.
The answer is really in two parts:
Firstly, they don't have solid surfaces because the elements they are made of don't have solid forms at the temperatures and pressures that arise inside the planets. In particular, Jupiter and Saturn are made mostly of hydrogen and helium which only become solid at rather low temperatures and the planets are still hot due to the heat created by their formation, heating from the Sun and some heat released by internal processes.
This, of course, begs the question of why those two planets are made mostly of hydrogen and helium, when the others are not. I should start with the caveat that a lot of aspects of this are still areas of active research and debate among scientists, and could not be considered settled  or universally accepted.  As more evidence is gathered and computer models (used for making checkable predictions from underlying theories) are refined,views of this may change.
So the solar system started out as a cloud of gas and dust. While it was mostly hydrogen and helium (still around since the big bang) it had significant amounts of other elements present in it which had been produced in older generations of stars. Some chance concentration of mass, or external shock (eg from a supernova) caused it to start to collapse and, under the influence of its own gravity, fluid dynamics and the conservation of angular momentum, a large part of it formed a ball (called a protostar) at the centre which was heated up by the collapse process itself. Around that, gas and dust formed a flat disk (oriented according to the original net angular momentum of the clump). Within that disk, tiny grains of solid matter formed. Far from the protostar, those grains were mostly made of compounds relatively light elements (carbon, oxygen, nitrogen, hydrogen) which we collectively call "ices". Closer to the protostar, its heat stopped ices from solidifying, but still allowed grains of iron, rock-like materials and so on.
When these grains collided, they stuck together, gradually forming bigger and bigger lumps. In the outer system they were lumps of ice, a lot like comets, in the inner system, something more like lumps of rock (like some asteroids). These then started holding together and pulling in more material by their own gravity and eventually grew into planets. At some point during this process fusion started in the Sun, and drove awat most of the remaining gas and dust. After that the planets grew by collisions.
So in the inner system, you got rocky planets like Mercury, Venus, Earth and Mars. A bit further out you got icy planets like Uranus, Neptune and Pluto. A couple of those icy planets  happened to get big enough, quickly enough, to attract a lot of hydrogen and helium gas before the Sun lit up. They are Jupiter and Saturn.

Birth of the Gas Giant Planets?


Finite difference - Explicit / Implicit / Crank Nicolson - Does the implicit method require the least memory?

Question: Examine a dynamic 2D heat equation $\dot{u} = \Delta u$ with zero boundary temperature. A standard finite difference approach is used on a rectangle using a $n\times n$ grid. For the resulting linear systems a banded Cholesky solver is used. Compare the three methods explicit, implicit and Crank-Nicolson for the time stepping.

Explicit method

$$
\begin{gathered}
\frac{u_{i+1,j} - u_{i,j}}{\Delta t} = \kappa \frac{u_{i,j-1} - 2u_{i,j} + u_{i,j+1}}{(\Delta x)^2} \\
u_{i+1,j} = u_{i,j} + \frac{\kappa \Delta t}{(\Delta x)^2}(u_{i,j-1} - 2u_{i,j} + u_{i,j+1})\\
\vec{u}_{i+1} = \vec{u}_i - \kappa \Delta t \textbf{A}_n \cdot \vec{u}_{i}\\
\end{gathered}
$$

Implicit method

$$
\begin{gathered}
\frac{u_{i+1,j} - u_{i,j}}{\Delta t} = \kappa \frac{u_{i+1,j-1} - 2u_{i+1,j} + u_{i+1,j+1}}{(\Delta x)^2} \\
\vec{u}_{i+1} = \vec{u}_i - \kappa \Delta t \textbf{A}_n \cdot \vec{u}_{i+1}\\
u_i = (\mathbb{I}_n + \kappa \Delta t \textbf{A}_n)^{-i}\cdot \vec{u}_0
\end{gathered}
$$

Crank-Nicolson

$$
\begin{gathered}
\frac{u_{i+1, j}-u_{i,j}}{\kappa \Delta t}  = \frac{u_{i,j-1} - 2u_{i,j} + u_{i,j + 1}}{2(\Delta x)^2} + \frac{u_{i+1,j-1} - 2u_{i+1,j} + u_{i+1,j + 1}}{2(\Delta x)^2}\\
\vec{u}_{i+1} - \vec{u}_i = -\frac{\kappa \Delta t}{2}(\textbf{A}_n \cdot \vec{u}_{i+1} + \textbf{A}_n \cdot \vec{u}_i)
\end{gathered}
$$
Here is the question:
Does the implicit method require the least memory?
Here is my proposition for an answer:
I would say that the statement if FALSE
The implicit method requires more computational effort to give an answer, because the matrix $\textbf{A}_n$ needs to be inverted. However, I would say that this is not the reason why the statement is false: for the implicit method there is $\textbf{no extra/less storage needed}$ (compared to the explicit method for example) because there is no extra data generated from the computation (for example no other matrix generated). Is the answer correct as well as the reasoning behind it?
N.B. This question has been originally asked in Mathematics and has been posted here following comments
Answer: You seem to have given the 1D equations for the discretizations, even though the problem is in 2D.
Regardless, the explicit method requires the least memory since you don't even have to form a matrix to compute the solution at the next time step. If you have the solution vector at time $t_i$, you can apply simple stencil operations and directly obtain the solution at time $t_{i+1}$, without forming a matrix. Your storage requirement will be just two solution vectors: one for the current solution, and one for the solution at the next time step.


Crisping Chicken Without Skin

Question: Most of the recipes that call for crispy chicken mention that you must leave the skin on. That's what crisps.
Is it possible to make crispy chicken without skin?
Comment: Have you thought about oven fried chicken? The skin is removed and the meat is soaked in buttermilk with garlic and herbs for a couple of hours. Then it is removed and set to dry uncovered on a rack on a sheet in the fridge. Then it's floured, dunked in egg mixture and covered in seasoned breadcrumbs tossed with olive oil before being baked on a rack in the oven. No skin, uses good olive oil for fat, tastes great, even better than normal fired chicken IMO, and is super crispy.
Answer: It depends on how you define crisp.
You can definitely have a different texture on the outer side of a piece of chicken. In fact, you can't have the same texture as on the inside, unless you are making it sous vide. It will be browned, and drier than the inside. But you can't make it go "crack" when you chomp down on it. You can compare it to the outside of a good steak. So if you want the chicken to be crisp, you really need the skin.
If you don't insist on the chicken itself being crisp, and just need the texture, you can bread the chicken with breadcrumbs, or froth it with batter. Breading is the usual option and works well with pieces shallow fried in a pan, such as chicken breasts or boneless backs. If you are making a whole chicken, you'll have to be creative, and frothing may work better. In any case, a breading or batter cover needs fat to be crisp, so if you are removing the skin for the calorie content, you don't gain anything.
Answer: Simply frying in deep fat will crisp the outside of the skinless chicken. However it has the draw back of making the meat dry and unpleasant to eat. Best done only with thin strips of meat that will cook quickly and so not dry out too much. If dealing with large bits of meat you can cook normally in an over or water then fry after in hot oil for a short time, just long enough to colour the outside, since the inside is already cooked.
In China they crisp chicken by covering it in a very thin layer of corn flour before frying. You want just the thinnest coating. Too much will make the chicken look like it's battered like KFC.
Answer: When in doubt, there's always breading and frying.  It'll put a nice crispy layer on the chicken, and might be what they mean by "crispy chicken."  I know "crispy chicken strips" are generally breaded and fried chicken breast cutlets.
Answer: Crispy chicken can be made without skin as well.Soak chicken pieces in fresh milk for 2 hours.Then add salt pepper chillypowder and other spices of your choice.Beat an egg and mix it with corn flour.Dip the pieces in this mixture and then cover it with bread scrumbs and deep fry.
Actually this method of making crispy chicken works well when we use skinless chicken according to my experience.
Answer: I usually just add salt and pepper to my skinless chicken and then heat my cast iron skillet until it's lightly smoking. Searing it on both sides gives me the crispy outside.  It tastes close to fried chicken to me. :)
Answer: Yes!
I just fried all the pieces from a whole chicken separately. I have a small 1 basket fryer.
I soaked in milk for 2 hours, dried, used coating: corn bread flour-pepper-sage-celery-thyme, rolled in that. Put an (unfrozen) thigh/drumstick in the fryer (350 F), after 7 minutes pulled it out, and let it "set" on paper towels. (You may want to put your basket in the hot oil first so food won't stick). For (2) wings I took 3 minutes, breast just about 14 min.
After I let it "set" the pink went away.
Comment: Was your chicken skinless or did it still have the skin on?
Answer: Soak in vinegar - 2 hrs.
Dry spray oil
Spices I prefer the warm spices
flour and cornmeal let sit in the fridge
An hour before frying set on the counter and fry in peanut oil
Finish cooking in the oven to not dry it out.

Crisping Chicken Without Skin


Can not mount drive after installing windows vista

Question: I have searched for weeks now and have not found an answer to my question. Hopefully you guys can give me a push in the right direction :)
Ok, here is what happened:

I have linux mint on a 1.5 TB hard drive (with all of my media on it), this is the 'every day' computer I use
My brother is running linux and also wanted to run vista on his computer.
I had a spare 500 GB hard drive I was going to use to put vista on and then just have two drives run inside his computer.
I am a college student and had the drive with me at school so I put the drive in my computer, removed the linux mint 1.5 TB hdd and went along with the vista install on the 500 GB hdd. (I did this so all I had to do was pop it in his computer when I came home).
Install went without a hitch (other than its windows) and I removed the 500 GB hdd and set it aside for my next trip home.
I then reconnected the 1.5 TB hdd and the issues started to pop up (here they are in the order I've been getting them):
When I start the computer like normal I get a message saying something about an Ubuntu GRUB version. And then it has a GRUB prompt.
^^Because of this I found that I probably needed to reinstall GRUB. So I booted up a live mint disk. I know I need to know where my / partition is but I wanted to double check. So I go to click on the volume on the desktop and it disappears.

This is where I've been stuck for a few weeks now. Any and all help is appreciated!
From lgeorget's request: I get to the part where I just mounted it, but my drive will not open for me to get files from it. Am I doing something wrong in the process?
Answer: If you can boot on a liveCD, you can enter the fdisk -l command. It will show you all the partitions detected on your disk(s).
You can then mount a partition manually with the command mount <device> <mount point>. <device> is one of the partition fdisk detects (something like /dev/sda1 for example) and <mount point> must be a existing directory (like /mnt for example).
To see which are the detected disks, you can look in your /dev folder for devices like sd[a,b...] or hd[a,b...].


SharePoint 2013 (office 365) Multi value Managed metadata property in refiners

Question: I have a multi valued managed metadata property in office 365 called products and it only generated 2 crawled properties owstaxidProducts and Products. I tried to associate both to refinablestring01 and see some gibberish(seems like some guid and some value) in the refinement panel. Please help.
Comment: I'll try to replicate this in my tennant. I need to ask the basics though. Is your refiner Multi attribute set? (It should be by default.) When you added your refiner to the Refinement Web part, did you use the Multi-value Refinement Item display template?
Comment: Why should not owstaxidProducts be enough as a refiner?
Comment: I am also having this same problem adding refiners using Managed Meta-Data on Office 365 / Sharepoint Online. After associating with refineablestring01, it becomes available in the Refiners Web-Part but displays as "GPO|#8516df41-etcetc". So a GUID rather than the description. The refiners actually work perfectly to filter the search results but until i can get it to display the Title is worthless to me. The suggestion of trying the Multi attribute set template simply gives check boxes and allows multiple selection but does not help cleaning up the display of the Title. Any pointers releating
Answer: When mapping a crawled property to a refinable managed property, you should select the crawled property with the ows_ prefix!
Don't forget to run the full crawl afterwards
Comment: Yep, that should be it. At least on premise this is usually the case :)
Answer: In case you'd like to get a proper text displayed as a refinable string, you'd need to map ows_NameofYourColumn to a Refinablestring predefined value.
SharePoint crawl is creating two properties for managed metadata columns: ows_ and ows_taxid. The former is a pure text representation. While the later is a value of the managed metadata field with GUID and type associated.
If you'd have initially picked up the wrong mapping and changed it to the correct one later on, you'd need to wait a bit for Search crawler to pickup the correct mapping.
Here is a nice article covering this scenario. It is valid for SharePoint 2013 and SharePoint Online.
Answer: You may get help from this link
Search Refiners with Managed Metadata
Comment: It looks like this post is for SharePoint 2010. The question is about SharePoint 2013 in Office 365. Refinement has changed considerably in the new version.
Comment: Please don't add just a link as answer to a question. If the link is broken, the answer you provided will not be useful for future visitors. Provide an answer of your own and use the link as [reference](http://sharepoint.stackexchange.com/help/referencing). If needed you can block quote the content from your link. More information is found in our help center, especially [How do I write a good answer](http://sharepoint.stackexchange.com/help/how-to-answer)


Ubuntu Unity corner resizing pointer hard to get to display

Question: It seems that a very meticulous hand is needed to get the corner-shaped pointer to display at the corner of a window in order that the window can be re-sized.
Is there anyway to make this more likely to appear?
Answer: Alt + middle-mouse-button click any general region of the window.
(Obviously, the only problem here is that you need a mouse with a middle button)
I prefer this workaround to having more accessible re-size zones. That said, I share your frustration. These picky re-size zones are a persistent problem with Ubuntu; I know the problem existed in 12.04 LTS, my first distro. I wish the amazing Ubuntu team would fix it.


Does Monopoly Follow Standard Auction Procedures?

Question: I am playing a game of Monopoly. One player lands on a property, but chooses not to buy it. I bid first. Another player bids for a higher amount. The rules state that the banker immediately gives the property to the highest bidder. Can I say a higher bid right now even though I've already bidded?
 There was nothing in the rulebook about it. Thanks!
Comment: "I think this is a very unfair rule...if he has a lot of money he'll obviously do a much higher bid" Welcome to Monopoly. Pretty much the whole point of the game is to become rich so you can have an unfair advantage over the poor and drive them to bankruptcy.
Comment: I recall playing an official computer adaptation in the late 90s that allowed multiple bids, but don't have anything to back that up unfortunately.
Answer: If you can't bid more than once in an auction, then you would want to go last. But everyone can't do this.
The standard auction procedure is to sell to the highest bidder. So if someone tops your bid, you have the right to top their bid. Until one person runs out of money, or otherwise gives up bidding. Then the bank is supposed to give the property to the highest final bidder. This is in the interest of the seller, because they get the highest possible price.
If, however, you are using a "one bid" rule, then it should be a secret bid. Everyone writes down their bid on a piece of paper and exposes it simultaneously, so that no one has an advantage by knowing what others bid and reacting to it.
Comment: Ever hear of a [*Dutch Auction*](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dutch_auction), Tom? That might be a nice wrench to throw into the works of this question.
Comment: Correct, a one-bid auction will just turn into people sitting around waiting for someone else to bid first. This could be fixed with a blind bidding system where all bids are revealed simultaneously, however.
Comment: Or players could bid in turn order.
Comment: @ForgetIwaseverhere: I learned about this process 30 years ago, and barely remember it. I wouldn't want the responsibility of explaining it to others.
Comment: @Acccumulation Except bidding in turn order is a huge disadvantage to those closer to the active player. They can either overbid to prevent others from topping their offer, paying more than they would want to or need to, or underbid, which lets others bid above them. If your'e suggesting the bids continue in turn order around the table until no one raises more, this mitigates the issue but still isn't perfect.
Comment: @ForgetIwaseverhere The problem with a dutch auction in Monopoly is setting the starting price, unless you decide to handle that via a house rule also (IE 4x the printed property value), and handle the decreases in a similar way, the person setting the price is also one of the bidders, since the banker is almost always a player in the game.
Comment: @Andrew I was addressing the issue that Nuclear Wang mentioned of people waiting for others to bid, not the issue of it being "fair". Part of turn based games is people often having an advantage based on turn order. That's just part of the game.
Answer: The rules say only "auction it to the highest bidder", which means that your group has to agree on what from of auction to use. The form you are using, where each player has only one bid, suffers from the fact that everybody wants to be the last bidder, and nobody wants to be the first; so there will be a lot of waiting around watching each other. "Only one bid, clockwise starting with the person who landed on the space" is a possibility which advantages the person to the right of the start; "as many bids as you like, each higher than the last" is commoner, giving even more advantage to the richest player. The important thing is that you agree a rule before the game starts.
Comment: @ForgetIwaseverhere I don't see the connection?
Comment: The richest player has an advantage in any auction situation, Even if it is single bid clockwise and if they are the first to bid, they can almost guarantee a win by bidding higher than anyone else is likely willing to pay, or guarantee it with a bid more than anyone else can pay, though this becomes detrimental to the rest of their game.
Comment: @Andrew: Welcome to *capitalism*; the lesson of the game.
Comment: @ForgetIwaseverhere Yes I know the original game was intended to teach how bad and broken capitalism was. It still does that some what, though the message is lessened when people don't follow all the rules as they are in the game, this rule for instance has been ignored in every game of monopoly I have actually ever played or seen played.
Comment: @Andrew: My youngest daughter, at twelve, proudly beat her old man and older brother in a straight-up game according to the official rules. We took lots of pictures, and 6 years later she was a school-girls provincial champion curler. I handicapped myself when the kids were little, until they chose to remove the handicap.
Comment: @Andrew: Capitalism is the worst economic system ever developed - except for all the others that have actually been attempted. If you want to teach your kids about life, play games with really good rules.
Answer: It wouldn't be much of an auction if you only had one chance to bid. While it doesn't say it in the rules the auctions will follow standard auction rules where people bid back and forth until no one is willing to bid higher then the current bid. Once that happens the player with the highest bid wins the property. Note that this can also mean the property goes for less then face value.
Also if you are not winning you should remember your last bid as it is possible that the player who won the bid actually can't afford what they bid.
auction

a usually public sale of goods or property, where people make higher and higher bids (= offers of money) for each item, until there are no higher bids and it is sold for the most money offered:
Comment: "It wouldn't be much of an auction if you only had one chance to bid."  Not sure I agree, many games (eg, Medici, Ra)use a 'once round' auction rule where each player either increases a bid or passes.  It creates an interesting dynamic where you know you can only bid once and forces players to make more meaningful bids.   You can also have blind auctions where each player make one secret bid and the winner is the highest.  What you describe (the dutch auction) is just one of many styles.   A problem with this game is the auction type isn't defined in the rules.
Comment: the definition at http://www.dictionary.com/browse/auction?s=t just says the highest bid.  What I'm saying is not all auctions have to allow players to make multiple bids and that these auctions are tactically different.
Comment: @MildlyPerilous That isn't an auction but a bid since the very definition of an auction which I also included is multiple rounds of bidding
Comment: @MildlyPerilous The one I pulled was more specific and I will point out if you ever watch any type of auction related show on tv there will never be only one chance for someone to bid. And outside of games I highly doubt that you will find anyone who thinks an auction is just bidding once and hoping you don't get outbid. Not to mention when you consider the age of Monopoly you have to consider what they meant with the auction rule.
Comment: @JoeW There are different auction systems that don't. The "one secret bid" can sometimes extract a HIGHER value than an open bid system, because you have outbid competition without knowing their range. My wife is a professional antique dealer, and we go to a lot of auctions. When you're the only one that wants an item, you get it for dirt cheap - if we had to put what we were actually willing to pay and only got one bid, we'd spend a LOT more at auctions!
Comment: @JoeW Also, it's safe to say that Cambridge took liberties when decreeing that "English Auction" is *the* definition of an auction. It is most certainly not the only style of auction, and it is found in the wild: consider when a government accepts bids from contractors to build something, like a road. Once you've submit a proposal then see your competitors are beating you, you generally can't change your bid.
Answer: As other answers indicate, Monopoly doesn't provide specific rule for the auction and most groups allow many increasing bids.  This can lead to long auctions with bids increasing by just a dollar.  I asked how to shorten the typical auction, and have provided my own recommendation which is to require a 10% increase for each bid.
As you have experienced, your group's one bid rule creates a huge advantage for the last bidder, who presumably would only need to add $1 to the 2nd to last bid to win.
Since your group is used to one bid auctions, my +10% method could be adjusted to a +50% or 100% minimum increase.  Requiring later bids to significantly increase greatly reduces the advantage of going last.
Not sure how your group has resolved the issue of who gets to/has to bid first and/or last.  The ordering of who bids will still be important, adjusting the % increase required shifts the advantage to earlier bidders.
Comment: So just don't futz around with these Stupid Pet Tricks, I mean House Rules, and just hols a standard New York Auction which is what most people naturally think of when they hear the word "*auction*". The group will waste more time discussing and finalizing these "*house rules*" than would ever be lost running auctions in a game.
Answer: Have always played all auctions as multiple bids allowed, the highest bidder winning the auction,{Generally agreed by all players}
but cash only. {ref.Hasbro.Inc.(c)2012;Heading. Buying Property "...the buyer pays to the bank the amount of the bid in cash and receives the Title Deed card for that property"}
If a player bids more than they can pay in cash, no fund raising allowed,
the auction starts again with this player excluded.{ House Rule circa 1974}
This is our family/house rules from Waddingtons UK rule book,{ John Waddingtons distributed MONOPOLY under licence from Parker Brothers, in the UK, from 1930's}
 laid down by our mother, Christmas 1974.
I hope this edit is useful in explaining my 1st attempt in answering a question
Comment: To address the original question @Curious Kid, both the above rules[PB1935] and[W1972], state under the Heading 'Banker' to 'Select as Banker a player who will also make a good auctioneer'. In my opinion the role of a good auctioneer is to secure the highest bid possible, which under a single bid auction would not necessarily attain this, thus suggesting a multiple bid auction as the intended rule of play.
Comment: This does not add anything to the question that was not covered in other answers
Comment: I disagree - this answer brings up cash only, which is not mentioned elsewhere, and also perhaps cites a rules source ("Waddingtons UK rule book"?). It isn't a _good_ answer yet in part because it's unclear what's actually being sourced from official rules vs house rules, but I wouldn't delete it quite yet without giving them a chance to clarify.
Comment: just edited original post, hope this helps.
Comment: been researching. found several editions of monopoly rules.
Comment: I have sourced a copy of the Parker Bros.inc (c) 1935 edition rules [PB 1935] and a copy of the Waddingtons ltd. UK distributed, Parker Bros.inc (c) 1972 [W 1972], the rules I learned the game from circa 1973.
Comment: @Benjamin Cosman, re 'cash only'. This is the way I have always played the game. ref above editions of rules [PB1935],[W1972], under Heading 'Landing on unowned property' both state, when property not bought, '... the Banker must immediately offer this property for sale by auction and must sell it to the highest bidder, accepting money in payment...' Mortgaging or Selling property are not 'at any time rules'


Why didn't the Allies wait for the nuclear bomb before invading Normandy?

Question: Congruent to the argument that dropping the bomb on Japan saved US and axis lives.
Comment: Perhaps because at the time of the invasion, no one knew for sure whether the bomb would be successful? (Indeed, did anyone in the European chain of command actually know about the project?)  D-Day was June 6, 1944, the Trinity test wasn't until July 16, 1945.
Comment: A related question you (and @jamesqf) might find enlightening is http://history.stackexchange.com/questions/10618/when-was-general-douglas-macarthur-made-aware-of-the-manhattan-project/10628#10628
Answer: The driving force behind the Manhattan Project was less about using an atomic bomb and more about getting one before the Germans did. It was known the Germans had their own atomic bomb project and prominent physicists, including Einstein, warned the US government about the possibility of such a bomb.  This was the driving force behind the Manhattan Project: get nukes before the Germans do.
Developing nukes was a hedge against someone else getting them first.  No military operation would be held up for the bomb.
In particular in the spring of 1944 the atomic bomb was still a ways off, but it was still not known how long that would be, or if it would work. Thin Man, a gun-type plutonium bomb, wasn't working out. The simpler Little Boy required uranium in quantities only available in August 1945 for a single bomb. The more efficient, but more complex, implosion device Fat Man remained untested until Trinity in July 1945. Delaying the land invasion of Europe for an untested device which wasn't yet ready was not even considered.
Then there's the problem that secrecy on the Manhattan Project was so tight that most military leaders didn't know about it.  They can't plan for what they didn't know about.

The invasion had to happen as quickly as possible for other reasons.
The Western Allies were already fighting in Italy.  Delaying the invasion of France meant that fight would be left unsupported.  It would leave dozens of fully-equipped US divisions sitting around on the British Isles doing nothing.
The invasion relied on surprise, and every day that went by meant another day that the timing and landing site could be compromised.
Every day that went by also meant the Germans could pour more concrete, plant more mines, and generally strengthen their Atlantic Wall defenses.
Despite Allied advances in the Battle of the Atlantic, U-Boats remained a threat.  An invasion of Europe would cut off their bases on the western coast of France.  Waiting a year meant more shipping sunk.
Meanwhile the V-1 and V-2 were known to be coming, bombing could only delay them.  The launch sites were in Northern France and on the Dutch coast and the introduction of mobile V-2 launchers made stopping them by bombing difficult.  Once launched, a V-2 could not be stopped.  A goal of the invasion was to overrun these launch sites.
To add urgency, the Germans had plenty of things nastier than explosives they could load into the V-2. Radioactive material, poison gas, chemical and biological weapons.  They could use the V-2 to rain destruction down on Britain.  In 1944 Germany still refused to use such weapons, but it was not known how long they would restrain themselves in the face of the advancing Soviets.

Then there's the Soviets.  They had been asking for a second front for years and were not happy with merely an invasion of Italy.  To delay further meant further straining the alliance.  A delay might mean the Soviets would seek a separate peace with Germany, and Germany could then turn its full might to defending against invasion.
In summer of 1944 the Soviets already had the Germans on the run.  If the Western Allies delayed their landing there was a real danger of the Soviets conquering Germany before the Western Allies leaving Germany and all of Eastern Europe under Soviet control.

Eastern Front Aug 1943 - Dec 1944 Source
As much as they pretended to be allies, the US and particularly Britain did not trust the Soviets.  The Western Allies were afraid of a victorious Soviet army overrunning all of Germany and possibly Europe.  The Western Allies had to be part of the race to Berlin.
Comment: I think the last paragraph about not wanting to give continental Europe to the Soviets far outweighed the others...
Comment: "Meanwhile V2 rockets were raining down on London" -- the first rocket wasn't launched at London until 3 months after D-Day, but you seem to place it before.
Comment: @JohnColeman Good catch. V-2 rockets were known by the Allies, but not yet operational.
Comment: I've even heard that a lot of the reason why the US was reluctant to get involved in WWII was that many people high up in the government hoped Hitler would take out Stalin first.
Comment: Re "*The device remained untested, nobody was sure it would work.*" This is false in regards the U-235 bomb. In fact confidence in it was so high no great thought to testing it was ever under consideration. The Trinity test was for the very much more complicated Plutonium bomb used at Nagasaki, about which confidence was much less - but fuel availability much greater (at least prior to September, 1945.
Comment: @PieterGeerkens It's true Little Boy (gun-type, uranium) was a deliberately simple design and built as a hedge, the lack of an all-up test was a calculated risk; there was only enough uranium for a single bomb. Little Boy was only given the full go-ahead after it was realized Thin Man (gun-type, plutonium) wouldn't work in July 1944. If Trinity failed, they had enough uranium for one Little Boy in August 1945 which would *probably* work and would have to wait months for another go. That's a lot of "if" to delay the invasion of Europe.
Comment: To be pedantic, not even the V1 attacks predated D-Day. The first was about a week later. But, again, Allied intelligence knew they were coming and the anticipated attacks did lend some urgency to D-Day.
Comment: @JohnColeman You are right. Operations against the V-1 started almost a year earlier.
Comment: @Schwern: You have the timeline wrong. Little Boy was always Plan A; backed up by research into a faster enrichment process which came to fruition in September 1945 and was operational by the end of 1945. That speeded up U-235 enrichment by more than 10 times (from 6 months/bomb -> 10 to 14 days/bomb). The Pu bomb was envisioned only at Los Alamos as they realized how much Pu was being produced. Originally it was thought the Pu bomb could be the same simple design as Little Boy, but calculations should that incorrect. Then design of the the implosion bomb that became the Fat man began.
Comment: @Schwern: It wasn't even known that [Plutonium was fissile until mid or late 1941](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plutonium#Discovery). It wasn't until early 1944 that any substantial quantity of Plutonium even existed - it being a wholly man-made metal. And only then could a Pu bomb even be envisioned.
Comment: @PieterGeerkens "*It wasn't until early 1944 that any substantial quantity of Plutonium even existed - it being a wholly man-made metal. And only then could a Pu bomb even be envisioned.*" It's true plutonium was unavailable, but a Pu bomb was envisioned anyway; Oppenheimer was working on Thin Man in 1943. Once they got the Pu they realized a gun-type/Pu bomb wouldn't work. But I'm not presenting a timeline. For the purposes of answering the question, it's sufficient to know where things were at while the invasion was being planned.
Comment: @Schwern: Just saw your edit - I'm satisfied with that correction.
Answer: For one thing, the atomic bomb simply wasn't needed in the European Theater. The reason it was considered a superior choice over a land invasion in the Pacific is largely cultural. The Japanese culture at the time valued honor over life, meaning that a good death was preferable to surrender or capture. Had the US attempted a conventional invasion of Japan we would have likely found ourselves fighting not only the military but the citizenry. Choosing to fight and die instead of surrendering to the invaders, virtually all civilians would become a threat resulting in massive casualties on both sides. The use of atomic weaponry was seen as a better alternative, reducing axis casualties and all but eliminating allied casualties.
In Europe, by contrast, much of the land being taken in France and Belgium was being liberated from the Germans. As such, allied forces were greeted largely as heroes by locals, and were even joined by local resistance groups such as the Free French Forces. This, along with the participation of the USSR (who likely would have joined in an invasion of Japan as well) meant that atomic weapons were not really necessary in Europe.
In addition, the opening of a Western Front in Europe was considered a priority in order to divert German resources and relieve pressure on the Soviet Union, therefore there was not time to wait for nuclear development.
(Credit to @Merkava120 for reminding me of this last reason.)
Comment: Also, the Allied leaders agreed to take Germany out first, as soon as they could, and then deal with Japan. So they weren't going to wait a year for the atomic bombs to be ready.
Comment: And they needed to divert German resources away from the Eastern Front. Thanks for reminding me!
Comment: The atomic bomb wasn't really needed in the Pacific Theater, either: the aptly-named [Operation Starvation](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Starvation) would have resulted in Japanese collapse within a year.  It certainly sped things up, though.
Answer: The timetable was settled at the Tehran Conference late 1943, the first meeting of the "Big Three" Allied leaders. Once Hitler invaded the Soviet Union in 1941, Britain, and later the US, gave support to the USSR. Stalin had been strongly pushing for a Western Front to be opened up and at the Tehran Conference the US and Britain committed to launching Operation Overlord in Northern France by May 1944. Obviously it was slightly delayed but that was the timetable decided upon. The Soviets also planned an attack of their own to occur at the same time for maximum effect.
The atomic bomb didn't really factor into their plans since it's tough to, essentially, rely on a scientific breakthrough when you're drawing up battle plans. Can't really draw up advanced battle plans around something that didn't exist at the time though if it was ready before D-day I'm sure things would have been completely different.
Source: U.S. State Department article on the Tehran Conference
Answer: In the case of Japan, the U.S. had completed (and tested) the A-bomb about the time that they were ready to invade Japan. That made it an "either/or" option that President Truman was fully aware of.
In the case of Normandy, the U.S. was ready to invade in June, 1944, but the status of the bomb, while in progress, was uncertain. In fact, its completion was about a year away, few people "knew," and the ones who knew the best weren't telling others in the military, or elsewhere in the chain of command because of "need to know" issues; even President Roosevelt barely knew, and then not "for sure." That said, the Americans went about their business in 1944 as if the bomb were not an eventuality.
Comment: Something that occurs to me -- the U235 "gun" bomb (Little Boy) was used without testing, as the scientists considered it a "sure thing". How much before the end of the European war would sufficient U235 have been available to make a Little Boy bomb? Of course, you can't starve the plutonium reactors at Hanford of their fuel, and beyond a certain point, nuking Berlin could not be justified (i.e., Germany was certainly defeated anyway).
Comment: @PhilPerry: Research into faster means of enriching U-235 was ongoing as part of the Manhattan Project, came to fruition in September 1945; and was in production by the end of the year. Prior to that, U-235 was being enriched at the rate of 1 bomb's worth every 6 months. So late July, 1945, is the date you're looking for. That production schedule would have been known at least 6 months in advance I  suspectc.


What is the difference between 假如 and 例如?

Question: What's the difference between 假如 and 例如? As far as I know, their usage is the same.
Answer: Their usage are quite different.
假如 means "if" or "in case".
例如 means "such as" or "for example".
Answer: I would translate 假如 as a "false if." That is, as a "hypothetical." 例如 translates into "if," in the "example" (例) sense of the word.
Answer: 假如 is a condition word, it means "if" (some conditions happen, then...)
例如 is to list a few examples as to what the speaker was talking about earlier, it means "for example"


How does raw fuel damage the catalytic converter?

Question: I was wondering, if fuel gets in the catalytic converter, how does it damage it?
Comment: Nice simple good question.  I thought there might be a dupe but the specificity of your question makes it a unique and beautiful snowflake.   :-)   +1
Answer: A catalyst is a chemical that contributes in a chemical reaction but remains unchanged after the whole reaction is complete. In a catalytic converter platinum is the catalyst that converts unburned hydrocarbons into H2O and CO2. If there is too much unburned hydrocarbons going into the catalytic converter, it greatly increases the temperature inside the converter. This increased temperature causes the platinum to be oxidized into platinum oxide, thus eliminating the platinum catalyst.
Answer: In addition to what Bill Oertell mentioned excess  unburnt hydrocarbon when passing through a hot catalytic convertor create a secondary combustion chamber that melts the insides and the resulting fragments then block the flow of exhaust. When this happens the engine will not start until the problem is rectified. It sounds like rocks inside the cat. This happened to a friends Ford F-150 (both cats)


Are there any alternative time and date applets for Gnome Panel?

Question: The default time and date applet for Gnome Panel (in Gnome Classic) is buggy and leaks memory. Are there any alternatives I can download? I'm looking for something that will display the current date and time, and ideally have options for displaying other time zones.
Answer: Is gworldclock from the softwarecenter something worth installing ?
It has a plugin for different time-zones.
I found some other packages in the softwarecenter, but they're mostly used for system administration (maybe good enough for you, this I don't know)
Searching in the get-deb site didn't give me something valuable.
I know there are some beautifull widgets (e.g. Webup8 and OMG ubuntu (sites)) in HTC-style, but I'm not shure that is something you were looking for.
I hope this leads you a bit further.
Answer: There appear to be no alternatives to the default time and date applet for having a clock in the Gnome-Panel.
However, I have been able to get useful time displays using Screenlets. They are not perfect in that they can overlap with windows. However, they will suffice until the time and date applet bugs are fixed.


how to get the width of a segment of a circle, given its area?

Question: On a circle, 2 parallel chords delimit a segment of which we know the area : A.
We also know the distance to the center of the circle of 1 chord : d1.
How to find d2, the distance of the other chord to the center of the circle ?
Comment: Do you know $r$ of the circle ?
Answer: Let the  circle be given by $x^2+y^2=r^2$ and assume that the area in question is to the right of the line $x=d$. Then we have to solve the equation
$$2\int_d^x\sqrt{r^2-t^2}\ dt =A$$
for $x$. After expanding the integral you will obtain a transcendental equation for $x$ that can only be solved numerically. (Of course elementary geometric considerations will lead to the same equation.)
Comment: There could be two solutions, right? One with the center inside the segment, one with it outside?
Comment: @Gerry Myerson:  Thank you. I have edited that.
Answer: If we suppose that $r$ is given and that $d_2>d_1$ we may write following equations:
$a)$ case when center is outside of the segment:
$A=(\frac{r^2\theta_1}{2}-\frac{r^2\cdot \sin \theta_1}{2})-(\frac{r^2\theta_2}{2}-\frac{r^2\cdot \sin \theta_2}{2})$
$b)$ case when center is inside of the segment:
$A=r^2\cdot\pi-((\frac{r^2\theta_1}{2}-\frac{r^2\cdot \sin \theta_1}{2})+(\frac{r^2\theta_2}{2}-\frac{r^2\cdot \sin \theta_2}{2}))$
where: $\theta_1=2\arccos(\frac{d_1}{r}) , \theta_2=2\arccos(\frac{d_2}{r})$
So in both cases you have to solve numerically transcedental equation.


Tax Free Zero Coupon Bonds and Taxes

Question: I am an investor in Municipal bonds, including tax free zero coupon bonds. Imagine an investor buys a tax free zero coupon bond at 20 and then keeps the bond for 3 years and sells the bond at 15. He has a capital loss. For tax purposes, can he add to the basis of the bond the interest he "received" on an accrual basis? If so, then he should have a loss more like 7 points.
Answer: A zero-coupon bond does not accrue, or pay, interest. Muni bond exemption only applies to interest, so if there is no interest there is no exemption.
Are you perhaps thinking of Original Issue Discount (OID)? As a US taxpayer if you buy a (long-term) bond issued at a (non-minimal) discount from par value, you are required to treat a portion of that discount as imputed interest each year you hold the bond, and in most cases pay tax on the imputed interest. For a stripped tax-exempt bond you only pay tax on the part that exceeds what the tax-exempt coupon would have been, but for a zero that's all of it. See chapter 1 of Publication 550 current year online here (all years downloadable in PDF from the Forms&Pubs tab)
If you buy through a broker, they will provide this information on form 1099-OID in your end-of-year tax package; if you have to do it yourself see Publication 1212 (in places similar to 550) and weep.
This basic rule applies to all bonds, zero or stripped or normal, although zeros and strips essentially always sell at a discount while coupon-paying bonds only sometimes do; sometimes they sell at a premium, in which case for a taxable bond you have the option to amortize the premium against the interest received. Similarly if you buy in the secondary market, at (additional) discount due to e.g. higher competitive rates or increased issuer risk, you have the option whether to amortize that or defer it, but if you defer it on disposition you must treat it as interest (rather than capital gain).
In all cases you do add imputed OID to basis, as well as market discount if you elected to amortize (and subtract amortized market premium). See the items 'Market discount on bonds' and 'Original Issue Discount (OID) on debt instruments' under (several pages under!) Basis of Investment Property - Stocks and Bonds. And yes this does result in decreasing your taxable gain or increasing your loss on disposition.

Tax Free Zero Coupon Bonds and Taxes


Recording from USB Mic and Stereo Mix at the same time

Question: I have a Realtek soundcard. I want to be able to record audio from my USB mic and from stereomix at the same time. Is this possible? I assume I need to tell my audio drivers that input is coming from usb but the control interface for my sound card doesn't give me the ability to do that. Any advice would be much appreciated
Answer: No, it isn't possible. The entire structure of Windows audio permits only one audio input device to be selected at a time. You can't even do it with a mic plugged into the RealTek. You can select recording from mic, or from the line in, or from the Stereo Mix, or... but not more than one. There just isn't a mixer in that path.


Where's this verdant ridge?

Question:
Reverse image searching turned up nothing, as the log-in box possibly belied the original picture.
Any geographers here? What type of ridge is this?
Comment: If you're using Firefox, try selecting Tools->Page Info, and then select "Media". The background image should be there
Comment: I've done a very similar process to what CSM above but with chrome - I was able to get something I could reverse image search an original: https://wallpapers.99px.ru/wallpapers/239467/ its described as "Sunset on the background of a mountain meadow" with no hint as a location. May be helpful to someone else without the log in box though.
Answer: While not an exact location the original image is available on shutterstock: https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/sunset-mountains-landscape-carpathian-ukraine-579416353 which described the image as being from the Carpathian Mountains in ukraine.

Where's this verdant ridge?


How to shape the weights or nodes during gradient training of neural network? Training with constraints?

Question: Gradient training changes indiscriminately all the weights and nodes of the neural network. But one can imagine the situations when the training should be shaped, e.g.:

One can put constraints on some of the weights. E.g. human brain contains regions whose inner connections are more dense that external connections with different regions. One can try to mimic this region-shaped structure in neural networks as well and hence one can require that inter-regional weights (in opposit to intra-regional weights) are close to zero (except, possibly, for some channels among regions);
One can put constraints on some of the weights in such manner that some layer of neurons have specific structure. E.g. consider the popular encoder-decoder architecture of neural machine translation e.g. https://pytorch.org/tutorials/intermediate/seq2seq_translation_tutorial.html We can see that that the whole output of the encoder is expressed as a single layer of neurons which is forwarded to the input of the decoder. So - one can require that the set of all the possible outputs of the encoder (e.g. the possible values of this single layer of the neurons) forms some kind of structure, e.g. some grammar of some interlingua. This example is for illustration only, I have in mind more complex neural network which has one layer of neurons which indeed should output the encoded words of some interlingua. So, one is required to guid all the weights of the encoder in such manner that this single layer has only allowable values.

So - my question is - are there methods that guide the gradient descent training with additional information about the weights or about the nodes (i.e. about the whole subsets of weights that have some impact on specific layer of nodes)? E.g. about methods that impress the region structure on the neural network or that constrains the values of some nodes to be in specific range only?
Of course, it is quite easy to include such constraints in evolutionary neural networks - one can simply reject the neural networks with weights that violates the constraints. But is it possible to do this in gradient-like training?
Answer: I have a somewhat similar problem, there's this paper that I was supposed to extend (I can explain how): https://bmcbioinformatics.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12859-017-1984-2
What they do is that they have a connection network between input and second layer (giving some biological context to training) I don't know how you can maintain the zero edges during back propagation though.