Can Naruto use Wood Style?

Question: After the Great Ninja War, Naruto's right arm was replaced by an artificial arm made up of Hashirama Senju's cells. To perform Wood Style, user requires a vast amount of chakra and Naruto can easily manage that.
Comment: Wood style has more than just chakra requirements. Its a Kekkei Genkai of chakra natures, which means that it requires an affinity for multiple elements, something which only a fraction of Shinobi have, and Naruto does not. Also, you may want to expand on the reasoning for including the artificial arm in the question here. As it stands, it looks like some random fact unrelated to the question, but considering how much I know about the Naruto series, it isn't or at least shouldn't seem so.
Answer: Wood Style requires water and earth affinity as it's a combination of these, while Naruto has wind affinity.
Using Combined Styles also requires Kekkei Genkai, which Naruto doesn't have.
So unless the author comes up with something in the future (like somehow forming his own chakra into the one he received from Hagoromo or into the chakras he received from the tailed beasts) Naruto is highly unlikely to be able to use Wood Style.
Comment: Who said Naruto has only wind chakra. That's only his natural nature affinity. In addition, he can use the other 4 nature affinities plus Lava, Magnet, Boil, Yin, Yang and Yin-Yang affinities. http://naruto.wikia.com/wiki/Naruto_Uzumaki#Part%20I
Comment: Mastering a chakra type the user doesn't have affinity with requires a great amount of time and effort. Naruto is too young to have mastered two.
Comment: I couldn't edit so I'll continue:
Naruto is too young to have mastered two chakra types he doesn't have affinity with. (We know ha has some knowledge in earth, but that's it) || He can't use the chakra types you mentioned by himselh, rather he WAS able to use them when he had the tailed beasts' and Hagoromo's chakra. || Added some info to my answer about Kekkei Genkai
Comment: @SahanDeSilva Wood style is created not by using earth and water together, but by having an affinity for them, which allows you to use them together. Naruto does not have that affinity. The theory is that Naruto could do the same thing he does to create tailed beast chakra, but through the fake Hashirama arm. In theory, doing so, he could create wood style chakra, and control it. This has been shown to work in the past via Danzo, whos arm turned into a tree when he lost control of Hashiramas cells. So its all in theory that its possible, but I agree with Gorzius in that its unlikely he has.
Comment: Guys. All i said was that Naruto has more than Wind nature affinity. I never argued that he could / couldn't master wood style. :)
Answer: Given that Naruto has access to Six Paths Sage Mode - a power that gives him instantaneous mastery over the five basic Changes in Chaka Nature + that of Yin-Yang Release, is a reincarnation of Indra Otsutsuki - a power that grants him access to his ultimate form, Asura Kurama Mode, as well gained the affinity of the remaining tailed beasts and was thusly able to master Lava, Boil, and Magnet Release, as seen in Sage Art: Super Tailed Beast Rasenshuriken, I see no reason why Naruto - now also in procession of an arm grafted from cells of the First Hokage, Hashirama Senju, who, despite not being a member of the Otsutsuki clan, mastered Wood Release - should (in theory), be able to use Wood Style were he to meditate on the earth- and water-based nature combination Kekki Genkai using the Six Paths' power.
Comment: Implanting Hashirama's cells do not immediately mean you can use Wood Release. Remember Orochimaru's experiment? Only Yamato was the successful one out of many candidates. There's a possibility he can but there's also a possibility he cannot.
Comment: naruto is a reincarnation of asura otsutsuki not indra
Answer: I would like to believe that he can. There are a few evidences that show this.
 SPOILER ALERT
After gaining Sage of Six Paths powers he was show to be able to use several kekkai genkai including magnet release, and lava release. While fighting white zetsu his Kyubi cloak the defeated zetsus where turned into a cloak with the 9 tails chakra. During the fight with Pain, after Naruto became enraged and released the 4 tailed cloak, we can see naruto raise a large forest of roots from the ground similar to the Deep Forest Emergence used by Hashirama
Comment: Sources? Chapters? Episode numbers? Possibly screenshots? Because I could not remember Naruto ever using wood style. Just because he unlocked the other kekkai genkai doesn't mean he can automatically use Wood release.

Can Naruto use Wood Style?


How to freelance in the UK without violating the terms of my visa?

Question: I am a non-UK student studying in the UK. I have a visa and everything is pretty good, but my visa states that I can work no more than 20 hours per week. I don't want to have any problems, so how can I freelance, for instance, and prove that I have worked not more than allowed?
Answer: If you are on Tier 4 (students on full-time degree), you have more restrictions besides the number of hours. One of this is no self-employment (which includes freelance and consultancy or creating your own company).
Comment: Thank you, is book writing considered freelance, e.g. Amazon (they have some sort of program, I don't remember how it's called) book writing etc? Where can I read more about these limitations?
Comment: @Anna-Lischen: you can download the full policy guide from: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/guidance-on-application-for-uk-visa-as-tier-4-student. If the link gets broken someday, browse the www.gov.uk/ site. I don't believe publishing is considered work, self-employed or not, unless someone commissions you to write. I also don't believe you'll need a visa of any kind to enroll and publish through Amazon.
Answer:
I don't want to have any problems, so how can I freelance, for
  instance, and prove that I have worked not more than allowed?

It's quite simple, you can observe the hours-per-week cap and further demonstrate that you have no income from UK sources (and no income that can be attributed to UK sources) during your student visa.


Did Sellars's argument against the Myth of the Given defeat Husserl's phenomenology?

Question: Sellars's argument against "the myth of the given" is a powerful argument defeating fundamentalism in epistemology. Edmund Husserl considered "the given" to be "unconditionally/absolutely(?) given", and we construct (in one of  my understandings of Husserl) objects from given phenomena, so it looks like a kind of fundamentalism. At the same time, Husserl opposes fundamentalism, but I do not know how he does it. So did Sellars defeat Husserl's phenomenology?
Comment: Consider: http://emft.ro/images/pdf/soffer.pdf
Comment: I found in sep "(However, in principle not even beliefs forming part of a subject's lifeworld are immune to revision. Hence, Husserl must not be regarded as an epistemological foundationalist; see Føllesdal 1988.)"
Answer: There is something to it, but things are more complicated. Sellars was not arguing against Husserl specifically, it is unlikely that he was even familiar with his phenomenology. He does draw on the continental tradition, unusually for an analytic philosopher, but mostly on Kant and Hegel. And his primary target were sense data theorists like his father, rather than Husserl. But after the early 20th century revolutions in physics and mathematics there was a remarkably parallel, considering their mutual isolation, movement in both traditions against fundamentalism in epistemology, against the "given" through which everything else is justified.
The difference between sense data and transcendental phenomena is that the latter are not received from mere sense perception. Husserl introduces also "ideal" perception, but it is a source of "the given" nonetheless. In a nutshell, one of the Sellars's chief arguments against "the given" is a dilemma: either our concepts, in which "the given" is received, are innate and absolute, which is highly implausible, or they are learned, and then "the given" is not given. Coming to grips with this second horn creates major problems for any traditional (metaphysical) realism, which already Sellars tried to tackle.
But even before Sellars's Empiricism and the Philosophy of Mind Adorno wrote a paper Husserl and the Problem of Idealism, later expanded into a book Against Epistemology, where he launched a very similar critique directed at Husserl's (and Bergson's) phenomenology specifically. The following passage (in Miller's translation) is eerily reminiscent of Sellars, who also uses color red as an example:

"The accentuated "red moment" isolates the moment "color" from the present perception. If this
  were isolated as an autonomous unity, it would thereby fall into relations with other colors.
  Otherwise the color moment could not be isolated as autonomous at all, for in present perception
  it is simply blended into other things. It attains autonomy only by being brought together with a
  completely distinct dimension of experience, namely past acquaintance [Kenntnis] with color as
  such. Insofar as it is representative of "color," the "red moment" is familiar to consciousness beyond
  sheer present experience. Its concept is presupposed, no matter how primitive and little actualized
  it may be; it does not come out of the hic et nunc."

The hic et nunc (here and now) is Husserl's common shorthand for phenomenological givenness. Miller's Phenomenology's negative dialectic: Adorno's critique of Husserl's epistemological foundationalism is a good commentary on Adorno's critique, and Sachs's The ideology of modernity and the Myth of the Given compares' McDowell's (post-Sellarsian) solution of the Myth of the Given dilemma to Adorno's. Soffer's Revisiting the Myth: Husserl and Sellars on the Given explores similarities and differences in their respective conceptions of givenness.
As for the defeat, it is certainly true that the early "pure" (intellectualist) and static version of Husserl's phenomenology was undermined by the critique of the "givenness". Husserl himself, in his later works, came to recognize "the problem of language", the difficulty with pouring phenomenological insights into pre-existent conceptual templates, which he optimistically waived away in Logical Investigations, and even in Ideas I, as unproblematic except in a technical sense. In response he developed a version of genetic phenomenology that attempts to trace concepts, also phenomenologically, to their primordial roots in (idealized) historical experience by bringing the entire genesis of concepts to the "givenness", a kind of experiential phenomenological reconstruction.
This was supplemented by immersing the entire phenomenology into the Lebenswelt (Lifeworld) of non-conceptual lived experience and praxis, introduced under the influence of rising at the time life philosophy and existentialism (primarily received through Husserl's star pupil, Heidegger). Husserl's last major work, Crisis of European Sciences, is written in the spirit of such "impure" genetic phenomenology, and it is this version that became dominant in the phenomenological movement after his death, from Merleau-Ponty on. In this sense, Husserl, and later phenomenologists, did abandon the traditional (intellectualist) epistemological foundationalism, see From a Continental Point of View by D'Agostini:

"Particularly, in the first decades of the century, there was the demand for defining philosophy in relation to the new 'sciences of thought': mathematical logic and empirical  'naturalistic'  psychology... However, it was not on behalf of pure thought that the battle was won. On the contrary, the very adjective 'pure' soon began to fade, and the research culminated (for Heidegger since the 1923 winter courses on Faktizität) with the victory of impure existential thought. According to Heidegger, Jaspers and the heirs of neo-Kantianism, as well as the later Husserl, the sense of philosophical theory is preserved if and only if it is assumed in its impure version. Even the neo-Kantian effort at refounding the sense of a 'pure' philosophical logic ended up turning into a form of 'culturalism': from the 'logic of experience' Cassirer turned to the 'philosophy of culture'."

An even more radical rethinking of classical phenomenology is found in the early works of Derrida, who builds on Adorno's critique and charts his path toward the post-structuralist deconstruction.
Comment: +1. Are you sure Sellars wasn't familiar with phenomenology? I've wondered, given that he would have been familair with Ryle and Chisholm, for instance, who both were familiar.
Comment: @transitionsynthesis At least, he does not allude to it in EPM, as far as I can tell, while Hegel and a list of empiricists are explicitly mentioned and analyzed. McDowell, who scrutinizes Sellars and Davidson in much detail, also does not mentions Husserl's phenomenology in connection with them.
Comment: @Conifold Thanks. To be clear, I wasn't challenging you. I don't have any special reason to think Sellars was, but I was curious since I've found it's not entirely widely known that Ryles' Concept of Mind came directly off the heels of Ryles' study of phenomenology.
Comment: @transitionsynthesis I didn't take like that, it is just my impression, and I didn't know about Ryle. I'd myself like to read Sellars's biography that explores his influences in detail, but I do not know of one. When I was reading EPM and Mind and World it surprised me that they do not even mention Husserl, which seemed natural, and then I was struck by parallels between Sellars and Adorno, with no obvious transmission link. It is possible that he picked up something in Oxford, and it would be exciting to find out for sure.
Answer: Just out of interest, there is an article called Autobiographical Reflections by Sellars available online wherein he details that he was introduced to Husserl when he studied under Marvin Farber. He also mentions phenomenology in his article on Phenomenalism (in like one line, where he describes it as conceptual analysis). So, he was familiar with the tradition.
Also, I'm currently writing a paper for an upcoming edition of Synthese which answers precisely the question you are asking. It takes quite a lot of nuance to get to the bottom of it, as understanding Husserl and Sellars is tricky. Stay tuned!


Use of Include with async await

Question: I have an EF query in which I am returning an 'Item' by it's unique identifier. I'm using the scaffolded controller provided by MVC and this works ok, but now I want it to return a list of tags which belong to the item.
I thought I might be able to use 'Include' as shown below to eager fetch the tags. However this does not seem to be allowed when using async.
Item item = await db.Items.Include("Tags").FindAsync(id);

Can anybody explain why this won't work and suggest an alternative way to bring back the item's tags?
Cheers
Ben
Comment: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/data/jj819165.aspx
Answer: Find() and FindAsync() are methods on type DbSet (which is what db.Items is). Include() returns a DbQuery object, which is why FindAsync() is not available. Use SingleOrDefaultAsync() to do the same thing as FindAsync() (the difference is it will go straight to the database and won't look in the context to see if the entity exists first)...
Item item = await db.Items.Include("Tags").SingleOrDefaultAsync(i => i.Id == id);

Comment: Note performance diff between Single() vs First() where former looks finds record and then keeps looking to check if another exists while latter returns upon hitting the record
Comment: Thanks very much. Clear and concise answer. Great!
Answer: Followed by @Anthony and @Korayem answer, I recommend to do as below for safer code.
Item item = await db.Items.Include(o => o.Tags).FirstOrDefaultAsync(i => i.Id == id);

if(item == default(Item))
    return NotFound();

Use of Include with async await


Symfony HWIOAuthBundle get user events and likes from facebook

Question: I'm creating an app using FOSUserBundle and HWIOAuth bundle. The problem is that I cant figure out how to so I get information about the events user attended to  or other likes than "favorite_teams". I tried adding user_events to the scope but with no luck. I mean it asked me for additional permission about the events but when i var_dump the response I can't see any information about the events.
I've integrated HWIOAuthBundle with FOSUserBundle using this tutorial https://gist.github.com/danvbe/4476697
my scope in config is scope: "email, public_profile, user_likes, publish_actions, user_events, user_groups, user_interests"
and to be more exact all the info related to likes I get is favorite_teams no musicians nothing.
Comment: Why the downvotes? This is a good question - i am looking forward to the answer because i have the same problem.
Answer: I integrated hwioauthBundle to connect with facebook and invit friends to join my web app(woops it's not authorized anymore in api 2) but first i used graph api explorer to test facebook api and when i wanted call api in a controller i used facebook php sdk and in my controller :
$user = $this->getUser();
if ($user && $accessToken = $user->getFacebookAccessToken())
{
    $session = new FacebookSession($accessToken);
    $session->setDefaultApplication($this->container->getParameter('facebook_client_id'), $this->container->getParameter('facebook_client_secret'));
    $friendsData = (new FacebookRequest(
          $session, 'GET', '/me/friends'
        ))->execute()->getGraphObject()->asArray();
}

I hope it help.


The editor doesn't respond after accepting the manuscript

Question: The journal editor accepted my paper and told me to ask his assistant about the next steps in the publication process. Four months ago I corrected some minor points and sent an updated manuscript to the assistant. Since then the editor's assistant remained silent. About two weeks ago I asked him about the status of the manuscript and next steps, but he hasn't replied yet. What should I do? Could the editor reject my manuscript after acceptance?
Comment: It is unclear whether your lack of response concerns the editor or the editor's assistant. The main questions indicates one thing but the text the other. So, who has not responded, the editor or assistant?
Comment: I haven't received any response from both of them. The editor hasn't contacted me after accepting the manuscript and his assistant hasn't responded to my latest letter.
Comment: When you say 'corrected some minor points' do you mean you reviewed the proof and corrected typos? Or did you somehow re-submit an edited version of your already-accepted paper?
Comment: No, I just changed acknowledgement and clearly informed the editor's assistant that it was the only change. Everything else remained the same.
Answer: You should write to the editor and tell him what you have told us.  Really your concrete problem is that your correspondence has not been returned so you don't know what's going on.  Maybe everything is proceeding as it should, maybe it isn't, but you need a reply.

Could editor reject my manuscript after acceptance?

Why do you even ask?  Are you worried that the editor thought, "No, hang on, I don't want to publish this paper after all.  Let's not publish it, never contact the author again, and hope for the best"?!?  That's just totally loopy, unprofessional behavior.  In this big, bad world of ours, anything could happen, but the chance of this happening to you -- provided only that you are dealing with a partway reputable, professional journal (essentially: not a journal that you learned about via a spammy, semi-literate email) -- is negligibly small.
Just get back in contact with the editor ASAP and take it from there.  Be polite, but be persistent.  Give the editor a week or two to reply.  I honestly expect that he will.  If not, write to the editor-in-chief / managing editor / some other members of the editorial board.  You'll hear back from someone.  Again, don't assume that something has gone terribly wrong, and certainly don't worry that your polite, professional behavior will jeopardize the future of your paper.
Comment: "So it is ok to mention that I couldn't get a response from his assistant, right?" Yes, it is okay and you should say it.
Comment: Thank you very much for your reply and suggestions!! So it is ok to mention that I couldn't get a response from his assistant, right?
Yes, this is exactly a reputable journal in my field! Perhaps I'm a bit anxious because previously the editor and his assistant responded to the letters very quickly, but then the assistant didn't respond to the latest letter. And it seemed slightly strange for me.
Comment: @Michele if not anything else, your emails to the assistant could just be being sent to spam, so he never got them.
Answer: You should write to the editor explaining that you have not received any further communication about the status of your manuscript for the last four months and that the assistant has not replied to your e-mail. I'm sure you will receive a reply from the editor. If you do not receive a reply from the editor within a couple of weeks, try to get hold of his number and call him. If that doesn't work, write to the editor-in-chief or managing editor of the journal.
Regarding your second question, once a manuscript has been accepted, the decision cannot be reversed, unless a major ethical breach, such as duplicate publication, salami slicing, or undisclosed conflict of interest, has been detected. However, if your manuscript free from these problems, you need not worry: it will not be rejected.


What frequency/bit depth were the Beatles recorded at?

Question: I read an article about how magnetic tape in the early 1960's could only record roughly 100kbs. Does this mean the master recordings of the Beatles are relatively low quality compared to the 768kbs (16 bit by 48 kHz) that cds use today? I know some of their music was recorded on vinyl record. Does anyone know what equivalent bit rate of those records would be?
Answer: The article you read has either been misinterpreted or was monstrously misleading. It is possible that what they were referring to was the fact that the frequency response required from an analogue medium was only enough to record 100kB/s of digital information. That does not mean that the recording quality of the original recording was equivalent to a digital recording of that bandwidth. Such a conclusion is entirely incorrect.
The Beatles were originally recorded using analogue tape technology. The frequency response of the analogue tape machinery that was used is entirely independent of any digital sampling bitrate that might be used in the future to encode such a recording.
Recordings done way before the Beatles were performing still stand up to scrutiny today as extremely high-quality recordings.
You should be sure to understand the difference between analogue and digital recording techniques. With analogue, the microphone, preamp, recording media and reproduction circuit are all significant contributors to the signal path. With digital audio everything between the Analogue to Digital Converters and the Digital to Analogue Converters is simply a matter of data storage and transmission.
Answer: There is no way to compare them because one is analog and one is digital. The way to calculate kbps is:
bit depth * sample rate * channels
Neither vinyl nor cassettes use bit depth or sample rates. The best you can try to compare is the similarity between bit depth of the CD and dynamic range of the cassette or vinyl
Comment: That's incorrect. There is a fairly simple way to compare the two: the sample rate directly translates to the bandwidth of the recording (44 kHz sampling  = 20 kHz bandwidth), and the bit depth tells you the SNR (1 bit = 6 dB of SNR, if we ignore noise shaping).
Comment: @Hobbes although that is true I would say that it is the same as asking what the equivalent pixel density is of an original Van Gogh painting is. You can compare the aspect ratio and canvas size but you are not going to calculate ppi.
Comment: that's not the same though. Audio reproduction is governed by the Shannon-Nyquist sampling theorem, and you can build an AD-DA chain that perfectly reproduces the original signal. For visual media, we're far away from being able to do that because you'd have to scan individual atoms to get a perfect reproduction.
Comment: @Hobbes well you should answer the question and tell him the bit rate equivalent of the original Beatles recordings.
Answer: Looking at the specs of the IBM 2401 tape drive from that era, you can see it's at least more complicated than that. The fastest of the 3 models recorded 90 kbyte/s while running the tape at 112.5 inch/s (and you thought a 15 inch/s tape recorder was fast), and the data rate rose with tape speed.
That does not mean this was the limit of the medium, though. Tape drives were often used for long-term storage, so the format was designed to be readable even when the tape degraded: they allocated a lot of physical space for each bit so it'd remain readable if there were physical defects on the tape (dropouts).
The specs for a multitrack audio recorder from that era shows what's possible if you use the tape to its limits. The Telefunken M15 was the direct successor to the M10a that appears to have been used for several Beatles records.
Frequency response: 30Hz to 16kHz (15 ips)
Signal to Noise Ratio: 65dB
This is roughly equivalent to 32-36 kHz sampling at 11 bits. That's a data rate of 36k x 2 x 11 = 792 kbit/s for 2 channels. CD is 1411 kbit/s of audio, plus some error correction and other data.
I don't think the Beatles ever recorded directly to vinyl, the article indicates they used tape decks. These would have been used for the mastering process, with vinyl as the end product only.


Why is a gi worn left side over right?

Question: I know the proper way to put on your gi is to put the left side over the right side, but why is this? Where did this custom come from? I think it applies to all martial arts (at least I know it does for Aikido, Karate and Judo) or are there any exceptions?
Comment: Oh well, I guess I've been wearing mine wrong for the past two years.
Answer: Gi, or more properly dōgi (道着) is wafuku (和服), or Japanese Clothing, and the handedness (for lack of a better word) of kimono is that it is worn with the left panel over the right. It is mostly out of tradition, likely with roots in the the codification of Shintō traditions in which an order of things must be observed (for instance, when praying at a Shintō shrine, one washes their left hand first). This however is a guess based upon when we start to see the adoption of the left-over-right dressing correlating dates of Shintō's codification. As has been mentioned, in those occasions in which the body in a modern funeral is dressed in wafuku, the right panel is placed over the left.
Prior to the Heian period, we see a much larger variation in the styles of dress:

Yayoi Period
Kofun (Burial Mound) Period
Asuka Period

During the Nara period, the tradition was to wear a form of proto-kimono which overlapped right over left.
The modern kimono as a style of dress came into fashion during the Heian period, at which point it was adopted out of convenience and ease of construction (the tailor no longer needed concern himself with the shape of the body wearing the garment).
There are periods, as well, within the history of Japan in which the style of clothing has been controlled by law. For instance, government officials in the Meiji era were required to wear yofuku (Western Clothing) to official events. Sumptuary laws in the Edo period required the ostentatious colors of the Heian period to be forsaken for subdued colors (so that the wealthier merchant class would not upstage the less wealthy but higher caste Samurai), which lead to brocade being added to clothing as a means of displaying wealth.
Therefore, in answer to your question of "Why do we overlap left over right?", the answer is simple: Tradition. It's the same reason that we may bow to a kamidana, or that we do not wear shoes inside the dojo.
Comment: @JPHellemons which is why there's four paragraphs explaining the origin of modern *wafuku*, the law affecting its wear at various points, and the customs of order in Japanese culture.
Comment: I know, but my point is that http://www.bookmice.net/darkchilde/japan/khist3.html explains that women had right over left. Man had to wear it left over right because of the weapons. I believe that weapons are the main reason and because of that, I voted for Dungarth's answer.
Comment: sorry, but a tradition is often based on something else.
Comment: The nara period was over 1000 years ago, and about 700-800 years before most arts of Japanese origin in which one would wear a *gi* were even codified.
Comment: This doesn't answer the question. As you yourself say previously the style was to wear jackets right over left, but a change occurred in society at some point. This change was stipulated in the [Yōrō Code](https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=GLsbxozhjV8C&pg=PA133&lpg=PA133&dq=yoro+clothing+code) of 718, where the left over right style is described as being modelled after the Chinese fashion.
Answer: I seem to have been thaught a story similar to what Sardathrion explains, yet slightly different. Sadly, though, I have no reference other than "my sensei told me".
According to my sensei, people wore the left side on top because the inside of the kimono became easily accessible with the right hand, a bit like a big pocket, allowing to dissimulate weapons (most likely a tanto, or short knife) or carry small fans (which were popular in high society).
When someone died, they no longer needed to carry/hide weapons, at least not on this side anymore (I will admit I am not familiar with the traditionnal japanese afterlife). This is why, still according to my sensei, one would be buried with the right side over.
Comment: To support this answer: (Judo) during the Kime-no-kata there are armed attacks. Idori, Tsukkomi and Yoko tsuki have a knife hidden in the gi as described in the answer. This can only be done when you have left over right. http://judoinfo.com/katakime.htm
Comment: It may be something akin to button sides, which would explain the difference in death: http://www.primermagazine.com/2010/field-manual/why-do-men%E2%80%99s-and-women%E2%80%99s-shirts-button-on-different-sides "Mens' buttons are on the right side because men have always tended to dress themselves and most men (and women, for that matter) are right-handed.

Womens' buttons are on the left side because years ago (say, during the Victorian Era), the women that could afford fancy clothing with a bunch of buttons would rely on maids to help dress them."
Comment: Very interesting story!
Comment: Very interesting indeed; in fact it makes sense. I wonder why bother changing sides (from left side over to right side over) at the time of death: why not just leave it as it is (left side over)?
Answer: Origin of keikogi, and Japanese left-over-right dress tradition
The uniforms of karate, aikido, kendo, Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, sambo etc are derived from the uniforms of judo, which were themselves based off of everyday Japanese clothing. As such, the tradition of wearing keikogi jackets left-side over right was likewise adopted from the traditional way to wear clothes generally. This tradition, like many Japanese cultural artefacts, was imported from China:

The Yо̄rо̄ Clothing Code of 718 marked a high point of Chinese-influenced politics for the early Japanese state.
The code specified that all robes should be crossed left side over right in Chinese fashion. Such "sidedness" of clothing is important in many cultures. Precisely because of the natural arbitrariness of left and right, sides can be used to express cultural differences of great import. A garment's sidedness is not something to be reversed lightly. The Chinese considered right-over-left a mark of barbarism. This explains the Japanese decision to abandon their traditional mode. All Japanese robes, including kimono, have wrapped left over right since the Yо̄rо̄ Clothing Code demanded it.

Kimono: Fashioning Culture, Liza Dalby

Being civilised in the eighth century meant being like the Chinese... Following the relocation of the Japanese Imperial Court to Nara in 710, many other Chinese-instituted reforms took  place, including the adoption of the courtly dress code, which was sanctioned by the Tang dynasty. Significantly, the Yoro Clothing Code, instituted in 718, stipulated that all robes be overlapped frontally from left to right in typical Chinese fashion.
8. Izutsu, Nihon josei fukushokushi, 31. See discussion of the Yoro Clothing Code, the Yoro ritsuryо̄, 31.

The Kimono Inspiration: Art and Art-to-wear in America (Part 3) The Textile Museum, Washington D.C.

Other keikogi variations
Whilst most Japanese-related martial arts still use a style of gi not substantially different from the 1907 judo design, some have notably redesigned the jacket:

Taekwondo's dobok (cf. "dōgi"). While traditionally was modelled after the Japanese judogi, a newer ITDF style modelled after the traditional Korean dress hanbok (with a closed v-neck jecket) is now common.

Sambo's kurtka has epilettes and belt loops.
Answer: As far as I know the left side over right is for the living. Dead bodies get kimono tied right over left.  Some sources include wikipedia and Japan Zone for example. So, unless you are an undead, there are no exceptions.
Comment: Zombie karateka are the exception :)
Comment: Dang, I'm gonna have to aquire that movie and watch it one weekend.
Comment: @slugster: I would class zombie karateka as undead so covered by the exception rule.  Ditto for [yakuza zombies with guns from the 444th portal aka Forest Of Resurrection](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0275773/).
Comment: Versus is a damn awesome movie.
Comment: It is just awesome. Do it now.
Comment: Could you add a summary of what the two links say about the two ways of tying a kimono?
Comment: @MikeP I am afraid I will not. I am no longer contributing to SE until such a time that they stop being evil towards their users.
Answer: It may be something akin to button sides. This may explain the difference in death as well, as few corpses dress themselves.

Mens' buttons are on the right side because men have always tended to dress themselves and most men (and women, for that matter) are right-handed. Womens' buttons are on the left side because years ago (say, during the Victorian Era), the women that could afford fancy clothing with a bunch of buttons would rely on maids to help dress them.

Why Do Men's and Women's Shirts Button on Different Sides? (primermagazine.com)

As a righty, I know I find it easier to tie the left side first as the whole top is less secure and my right hand is in a more comfortable position to do the tie, while the second tie (left over right) my left hand is now on point and it's a bit more awkward.
Comment: +1, not sure if this is accurate but it's a good theory.
Answer: Handedness in all cultures is related to codes of chivalry, and western and eastern clothes (flys for pants, buttoning on shirts, flaps on Keikogi or kimono, robes or kilts) are generally right-handed for cross-body weapon wielding in men's clothing.
Women do not typically wield weapons cross-body and so do not need to worry about their lapels, flaps or flys catching on their weapon guards.  It is also a sign of their "weaker sex" and need of protection that their clothing is "left-handed."  Thanks, Tailors!!
Mores about right-hand dominance vs left-handedness can influence dress codes in specific cultures, especially in Middle Eastern and Indonesian dress codes.
Modern tailoring and dressing is individualized and can deviate from traditional and cultural dress codes.

Why is a gi worn left side over right?


Implementing strafe jumping

Question: As a Defrag player, I would like to add advanced movements to my (simple) game, in particular strafe jumping. I currently have basic fps movements (WASD and free look to be clear), but how can I add quake-like movement techniques?
This article explains very well the theory behind it, but I really don't know where to start to actually implement it.
Comment: But what a bug it is!
Comment: You want to implement a bug into your game?
Answer: The article you linked to first explains how the game works and then discusses at length how to exploit the way it works to strafe-jump. I believe only a few paragraphs are useful to you: the one about how the engine decides whether to add an acceleration vector times a small amount of time (which amounts to a small variation of the speed vector):

So when we try to apply an acceleration at some angle to the velocity, we will be allowed to accelerate provided that the component of our current velocity in the proposed direction is less than 320ups.

and how it truncates that small variation of speed so the component of the resulting speed vector along the acceleration direction doesn't exceed a predefined maximum:

If your v.cos(delta) is less than 320 but still very close to 320, applying the usual constant acceleration for a single frame would be enough to take you over 320ups in that direction. This is something the engine checks for, and if the situation exists, the applied acceleration will be only enough to take you up to the 320ups limit (so it would be  320 - v.cos(theta)   ), and not beyond.

Just to spare you some confusion when actually implementing the thing, note that the author refers to the vector "a" as the "acceleration vector" but throughout the article it is used sometimes as a unit vector having the same direction as the acceleration vector as in

v.a = v.cos(delta)

or as an amount of speed as in

arccos( (320-a)/v )

or even as a distance (length) as in

a = s.T

where "s" is the global maximum speed (the g_speed variable in the engine) and T is the duration of a frame. So be careful when handling such quirky maths. Here's a rundown to make everything clear:
To sum up in physics/applied maths notation: the player has a speed vector v(t) at time t and we want to compute his speed vector v(t+dt) at time t + dt where dt is a small amount of time. Here, dt will be the duration of a frame, or 1/(framerate). There exists a speed constant V used to cap other speeds or something along those lines, and we will use that constant.
We know v(t) and we can deduce the direction u towards which the player wants to move using the currently pressed movement keys. u is a unit vector. The amount of speed we initially want to add to v(t) is A.dt.u where A, a real number, is the unique, global movement acceleration constant, so that v(t+dt) = v(t) + A.dt.u.
Note that A is not a speed, but an acceleration! The engine uses the same variable g_speed for the global acceleration induced by pressing movement keys AND for the maximum speed, because it simplifies the handling of movement when on the ground, hence the confusion we saw earlier.
We want to add that amount of speed A.dt.u, but we need to truncate it if it makes the component of the resulting vector v(t+dt) bigger than V along u. Therefore, we get the following pseudocode:
// what we want to compute
Vector3D nextSpeed;
// the acceleration direction u, which is a unit vector
Vector3D accelDir = computeAccelDir(pressedkeys);
// our dot product, "v.cos(delta)"
float vcosdelta = currentSpeed.dotProduct(accelDir);
// the total speed along the acceleration direction u (unless we truncate it)
float totalSpeedComponent = vcosdelta + A*dt;
// is it small enough?
if (totalSpeedComponent < V)
{
    nextSpeed = currentSpeed.add(accelDir.times(A*dt));
} else { // no! it's too big! We must truncate -_-'
    nextSpeed = currentSpeed.add(accelDir.times(V - vcosdelta));
}

Sorry for the poor variable names. Please have better variable naming habits than mine. Here, I compute and store float totalSpeedComponent even though I could directly use V - vcosdelta - A*dt in the first if statement, but that was for understandability.
I hope I didn't miss anything. Remember you can customize both A (the global movement-induced acceleration) and V (the maximum speed along acceleration direction).
That being said, just translate that and adapt it to your codebase, I think I got most of it right.
major edit: I forgot to add that this only works in the air! Don't forget to make it so that, if the player lands with the jump key pressed, he only touches the ground for 1 frame at most before he jumps again! Special handling of physics might be required during that particular frame. It's 6AM. Bed.
Comment: Thanks for your answer, I'll try it as soon as possible.
Comment: Reading [this](https://github.com/id-Software/Quake-III-Arena/blob/master/code/game/bg_pmove.c) also helps.
Answer: Actually, I think driven by the question in this post, Adrian "Flafla2" Biagioli has created a very well written and explained post/answer on this same topic.
Here: http://flafla2.github.io/2015/02/14/bunnyhop.html
The product of the post is a C# implementation of the system:

// accelDir: normalized direction that the player has requested to move (taking into account the movement keys and look direction)
// prevVelocity: The current velocity of the player, before any additional calculations
// accelerate: The server-defined player acceleration value
// max_velocity: The server-defined maximum player velocity (this is not strictly adhered to due to strafejumping)
private Vector3 Accelerate(Vector3 accelDir, Vector3 prevVelocity, float accelerate, float max_velocity)
{
    float projVel = Vector3.Dot(prevVelocity, accelDir); // Vector projection of Current velocity onto accelDir.
    float accelVel = accelerate * Time.fixedDeltaTime; // Accelerated velocity in direction of movment

    // If necessary, truncate the accelerated velocity so the vector projection does not exceed max_velocity
    if(projVel + accelVel > max_velocity)
        accelVel = max_velocity - projVel;

    return prevVelocity + accelDir * accelVel;
}

private Vector3 MoveGround(Vector3 accelDir, Vector3 prevVelocity)
{
    // Apply Friction
    float speed = prevVelocity.magnitude;
    if (speed != 0) // To avoid divide by zero errors
    {
        float drop = speed * friction * Time.fixedDeltaTime;
        prevVelocity *= Mathf.Max(speed - drop, 0) / speed; // Scale the velocity based on friction.
    }

    // ground_accelerate and max_velocity_ground are server-defined movement variables
    return Accelerate(accelDir, prevVelocity, ground_accelerate, max_velocity_ground);
}

private Vector3 MoveAir(Vector3 accelDir, Vector3 prevVelocity)
{
    // air_accelerate and max_velocity_air are server-defined movement variables
    return Accelerate(accelDir, prevVelocity, air_accelerate, max_velocity_air);
}

All credits to Adrian.

Implementing strafe jumping


If I rasterize a vector, then make it a vector again, will quality be lost?

Question: In other words, is quality lost when transferring assets from Photoshop to Illustrator, and back and forth?
Comment: Hi. Welcome to GDSE. The answer to your question is yes, but there's no need to do that.  You can place an Illustrator vector in Photohsop as a Smart Object.
Comment: That depends on how you define quality. But yes almost definitely youll just get everything horribly broken.
Answer: Yes, there will be quality loss generally.
However, there is typically little need to double-convert artwork for use between AI and PS.

Photoshop can place (linked  or embed) Illustrator vectors, as vector.
Illustrator can place (linked  or embeded) Photoshop raster, as raster.
Answer: Yes But Predictive AI Helps
A vector is a mathematical formula that is resolution independent. No matter what scale it is, it always has infinite quality.
A raster, however, is resolution dependent and is made up of pixels and pixels aren't infinite.
So by its very definition, a raster image is always less quality than a vector. Whether or not that is noticeable or not is a different matter.
A good quality raster will look identical to a vector if the raster perfectly matches the pixel definition of the screen it's displayed on, but if it is resized or displayed on a screen with a higher pixel definition, it will have less quality than it's vector counterpart.
If you try to make it a vector again (tracing), the vector will only match the raster pixels, therefore it will be less quality than the original.
Predictive AI
However, new algorithms are emerging that use predictive AI to make images higher quality when vectorising and resing as rasters.
This means that you can make your image higher quality than it was when it was a raster, but probably not as good as it was when it was its original vector.

Two artificial intelligence systems built by Google are able to
  transform a heavily pixellated, low quality, image into a clear photo
  or a person or object.
Computer scientists from Google Brain, the central Google AI team,
  have shown it's not only possible to enhance a picture's resolution,
  they can fill in missing details in the process. In a paper – Pixel
  Recursive Super Resolution – three researchers from the Silicon Valley
  firm trained their system on small 8x8 pixel images of celebrity faces
  and photos of bedrooms.

Further reading: Deep Learning/AI
Magenta Machine Learning

Magenta is a research project exploring the role of machine learning
  in the process of creating art and music. Primarily this involves
  developing new deep learning and reinforcement learning algorithms for
  generating songs, images, drawings, and other materials.

Machine Learning to Enhance Your Low-Res Photos

We've recently seen a number of interesting approaches to improving
  low-resolution images using machine learning, including ones from
  researchers at Google, and at the Max Planck Institute for Intelligent
  Systems. Now, you can try an AI-powered enhancing tool for yourself
  with just a couple of clicks.
Comment: I really do not like your section on what vectors are versus what raster images are. It somehow tries to justify discrete versus continious in terms fo something as weakly defined as "resolution". Not only is continious more than infinitely more denser, it is also differentiable etc. Also i dont like use of word mathematical in definition one but omission in definition 2 since both are in fact mathematical objects.
Comment: Well, this is what they taught us at uni. I'm now 42 and have been a graphic professional working with Blue Chip companies including ICI for over 20 years. I would have hoped I knew a thing or two about graphics. Maybe you mean, you don't like the fact that my answer was more likeable than yours? #Gamification
Comment: Didn't write an answer. Anyway i have no doubt that something to this effect was the explanation you were given, you see it often. But just because its often repeated does not make it a good explanation. I have no doubt that the original explanation was not good enough, its just that it has mutated over time. There are two factors to this being bad. 1. it deals with infinite resolution. Well vectors don't have infinite resolution as such they have a continuous curve but that is not the same thing. 2. It does not define how raster images work. This is a huge problem since people don't know.
Answer: If you want to change the illustrator file back and forward i think the best solution is embed it was a smart object in Photoshop. That way, everytime you change it on Illustrator, the changes are apllied on Photoshop.
You can read more about it at Photoshop's documentation: https://helpx.adobe.com/photoshop/using/create-smart-objects.html


Are single character names common?

Question: I was wondering if having only one character in your name is common or not. I was born in the US and not very familiar with the culture, so I'm not sure if it's odd or out of place. I've seen other people names that have 2 characters like Min-jun and such but I feel out of place whenever I say my name with those who are familiar with the culture.
Comment: no its not, and you most likely have 2 characters in total
Comment: Here's a few more famous Korean stars with shorter names: 장혁, 이특, 이루.
Answer: 현 is a perfectly normal name.  I even know someone with that name.
Single-character given names are not that uncommon, and you could find many well-known people with single-character names: 김구 (independence fighter), 신립 (a general in Joseon era), 최영 (another general in Goryeo era), 심훈 (a novelist in the Japanese colony era), 김훈 (a famous contemporary novelist), 최훈 (a comic artist), 진영 (a congressman), 허재 (a basketball player), 강민 (a professional Starcraft player), and on and on.
You might feel "out of place" because in Korean-American society some people have a habit of using only the first character of their given name.  E.g., someone might be named 김현석, and then he might write his name as Hyun Seok Kim, and go by just "Hyun" most of the time.  So when a Korean-American hears your name is Hyun, they might not be sure if it's your "real" Korean name or if you have another character after it which you just chopped off.
However, if you were in Korea, such a practice won't happen and nobody would find anything strange with 현.  :)
Answer: Nah man not at all. And personally I find single-character names (외자 이름) pretty cool, so no worries. There have been some famous people with that kind of name, so, while it's definitely not common, it's not weird at all. If it makes you feel any better, there are people with two-character last names, so their full name either end up in 4 characters, or 3 characters with a single character first name.

Are single character names common?


Elementary OS 0.3 Freya can't be installed

Question: [![HALF WAY PAUSED INSTALLATION ]..During installation Elementary OS Freya, I clicked on Install Elementary ,Then when "Preparing to Elementary screen comes simply clicked on 2 options  DOWNLOAD UPDATES WHILE AND INSTALLING AND INSTALL 3rd-PARTY SOFTWARE and clicked continue .After that the black wheel just rotating and rotating,,2 hours gone nothing comes.....

PLEASE I NEED HELP
BY THE WAY
MY LAPTOP - HP COMPAQ NX6320 (PRETTY OLD MODEL) 8 YEARS APPROX.
RAM - 1 GB
HDD- 80 GB
NO GRAPHICS CARD
I SUCCESSFULLY INSTALLED OS LIKE WINDOWS ALL VERSIONS INCLUDING WINDOWS 10,UBUNTU 16.04 LTS,LINUX MINT,ON THIS ABOVE SAID LAPTOP.
Answer: Since it is an old laptop, I would recommend checking if the hard drive is still operational. You should be able to do this from the live CD / USB by installing Disks from the app center and then running a SMART test on the hard drive. If you have numerous relocated sectors and / or categories marked as fail in the Assessment column your hard drive is bad.
Answer: Try running it without connecting to the internet and without installing updates or third-party software. Then just install that stuff and connect to wifi after you boot from hardware.


How can the idea of reincarnation be true if all the information of who we are is already destroyed

Question: Because our consciousness can only persist in our brain. When the brain is destroyed, our consciousness is destroyed as well. We become no one. How can the idea of reincarnation be true if all the information of who we are is already destroyed. We are just new when we are born and we can't pass the consciousness or memory to any new born baby.
Comment: In Buddhism, 'consciousness' ('vinnana') is sense awareness. It is not 'memory'. Also, consciousness does not carry or store mental impurities, such as ignorance & craving. It is the 'citta' (mind-heart) that stores mental impurities. This is why the state of enlightenment is called 'citta vimutti' or 'liberation of mind' rather than 'vinnana vimutti' or 'liberation of consciousness'. When the Buddha declared his liberation, he said: "the citta has entered into that state which cannot be conditioned by craving again". Therefore, I am not sure of the focus on consciousness being reincarnated.
Comment: I downvoted because I fail to take your statement as a question. Maybe you could add an actual question mark somewhere.
Comment: Could you state (what you think is) the nature of the relationship between brain and consciousness? Are they causally related according to you? If so, what type of cause would the brain be? Or are they related by way of being the same entity?
Comment: Have a look at following link, http://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/authors/thanissaro/truth_of_rebirth.html
Comment: @gaj If you think that link answers the question, then please post it as an answer (not as a comment) and quote whichever piece of it is most relevant to the question.
Answer: if you take it literally, Buddhism does not teach "reincarnation" because to actually reincarnate, there has to be something permanent like a soul to transmigrate from one life to another.  Consciousness is not permanent.  It raises and falls all the time.    Now, to understand "reforming" in Buddhism, you need to understand "Satanam/being".  it is  another term as difficult as nirvana because it does not have sign or dimension or anything/.. Buddha said "because ignorance as barrier, desires as bindings, satanam continues to moves in samsara".  In my own words, there is a thing outside of time and dimension that latches on consciousness and takes it as self, me, mine..  as long as ignorant and desires persist, satanam will latch on another consciousness when this one connected to your brain ceases to work.   As long as that feeling we all have that we call "I, me, my" exist, when this body is broken, the "I, me, my" will instantly latch into other body and call that body (5skandhas) as ours.  Do not take satanam or "being" to be the same as permanent soul.   here is link to look up being or satanam
Comment: The Vajira Sutta (SN 5.10) provides more information about the meaning of 'satta'.
Answer:
Because our consciousness can only persist in our brain. When the brain is destroyed, our consciousness is destroyed as well.

Not necessarily but the brain helps as a more convenient store, hence brain damage can hinder memory. Also why you cannot remember of past lives is that you now have a new brain.
Jhana meditators can recall past lives hence this is not necessarily true as sense impressions have persisted. 5 Hindrances is one case of we cannot remember and as meditation overcomes this you can remember better. [(Nīvarana) Sangarava Sutta]
As for conciseness it arises and passes. At death it passes in one body and arise in another. This process don't end at death or with brain damage or death.

How can the idea of reincarnation be true if all the information of who we are is already destroyed. We are just new when we are born and we can't pass the consciousness or memory to any new born baby.

Sense impressions are tied to the mental body while conceptual impressions are tied to the physical body. So if you get brain damaged you cannot think and perhaps learn new concepts but past impressions stay, [Mahā,nidāna Sutta] these sense impressions do persist beyond death as part of the Bhavanga Citta. Recallability depends on the level of hindrances. [(Nīvarana) Sangarava Sutta] The mental impressions that remain are part of the mind (Nama) which does not die at death but passes away in one body and arise in another. For further understanding perhaps you can study the Buddhist rebirth process.
Answer: I think the main problem is that you've already claimed to have understood consciousness.  I think that you should reconsider your claims about consciousness before attempting to tie it in with the concept of rebirth.
As far as I'm aware, the process of becoming a realized individual in Buddhism involves understanding the nature of something such as consciousness.
Overall, my point is that the information you're seeking is something that only a fairly realized individual can convey to you.  If you're really intent on finding out about that, I'd suggest finding a good teacher and learning from that individual.
Answer: The Pali Buddhist scriptures contain a number of statements about consciousness that may help decide if consciousness is related to reincarnation, including the following:

It cognizes, it cognizes': Thus, friend, it is said to be
'consciousness.' And what does it cognize? It cognizes 'pleasant.' It
cognizes 'painful.' It cognizes 'neither painful nor pleasant.' 'It
cognizes, it cognizes': Thus it is said to be 'consciousness.' MN 43
And what is consciousness? These six are classes of consciousness:
eye-consciousness, ear-consciousness, nose-consciousness,
tongue-consciousness, body-consciousness, intellect-consciousness.
This is called consciousness. SN 12.2
Dependent on eye & forms, eye-consciousness arises...Dependent on ear
& sounds, ear-consciousness arises...Dependent on nose & aromas,
nose-consciousness arises...Dependent on tongue & flavors,
tongue-consciousness arises...Dependent on body & tactile sensations,
body-consciousness arises...Dependent on intellect & ideas,
intellect-consciousness arises. MN 18
It's good, monks, that you understand the Dhamma taught by me in this
way, for in many ways I have said of dependently co-arisen
consciousness, 'Apart from a requisite condition, there is no
coming-into-play of consciousness. Consciousness, monks, is
classified simply by the requisite condition in dependence on which
it arises. Consciousness that arises in dependence on the eye & forms
is classified simply as eye-consciousness...etc' MN 38
Were someone to say, 'I will describe a coming, a going, a passing
away, an arising, a growth, an increase or a proliferation of
consciousness apart from form, from feeling, from perception, from
fabrications,' that would be impossible. SN 22.53
Very well then, Kotthita my friend, I will give you an analogy; for
there are cases where it is through the use of an analogy that
intelligent people can understand the meaning of what is being said.
It is as if two sheaves of reeds were to stand leaning against one
another. In the same way, from mentality-&-materiality as a requisite
condition comes consciousness, from consciousness as a requisite
condition comes mentality-&-materiality. SN 12.67
It would be better for the uninstructed run-of-the-mill person to
hold to the body composed of the four great elements, rather than the
mind, as the self. Why is that? Because this body composed of the
four great elements is seen standing for a year, two years, three,
four, five, ten, twenty, thirty, forty, fifty, a hundred years or
more. But what's called 'mind,' 'intellect,' or 'consciousness' by
day and by night arises as one thing and ceases as another. SN 12.61
"Now what do you think of this, O monks? Is consciousness permanent
or impermanent?" "Impermanent, O Lord." SN 22.59
Answer: Consciousness does not reside in brain. Otherwise re-incarnation of any form is not possible. Consciousness is the holding structure without which body and mind does not function and therefore cease to exist. This holding structure too contains part of memory and therefore memories live for sometime. But even this structure is not a permanent and disjoint phenomenon. It is like a wave which arises and perishes in ocean. You can call ocean of consciousness as super-consciousness from where individual consciousness arise as a wave and then dissolves. But the wave does not dissolve completely. Some part of wave is preserved and some part is picked up from ocean. Therefore suffering belongs to all of mankind not individual. Also mankind needs to evolve to lower suffering of individual. That is the reason Buddha or any enlightened person never talks about it. It is pretty much a complex subject. I have tried to give a very simplified version.


Hyperbolic orbit: correct?

Question: I'm writing a sci-fi story. The protagonist wants to strap rockets to an asteroid and send it rocketing to earth, into orbit, to harvest the metals, etc. An acquaintance (i lost contact with him but he had possession of the equations) told me that if the protag chooses an asteroid, say 2.5 astronomical units from the sun in the asteroid belt, 90 degrees ahead of the earth, it could be launched at a velocity of 23 km. per second, directly at the sun, it will arrive the required (by my plot) 3 months later. Is this correct? Any other details (velocity at arrival to earth, velocity to kill to get it into LEO, etc.) would be much appreciated.
Comment: I started poking around with the online pork chop plottter, and it does seem like you might need something 23 km/s of delta-V is you insist on getting there in 90 days. I didn't have time to develop a proper answer. If you don't mind it taking a couple of years you can do with massively less. I
Comment: It would be better if he used a Hohmann transfer to bring it to earth.  If he was using a hyperbolic trajectory in the asteroid belt (assuming sun's gravity is dominant), it would conceivably send the asteroid out of the solar system.  Also, he would have to decrease the velocity of the asteroid to send it on a trajectory to earth, not increase.
Comment: Drat the luck, getting the body into earth vicinity within 90 days is crucial to my plot, otherwise the Hohmann orbit does save fuel. Kill=decrease; to about 7km/s in the earth's frame for the LEO.
Comment: Remember relativity. Hyperbolic in terms of what :)? Earth approach yes- in terns of sun, no.
Comment: @chasrob Changing the question after an answer is posted is strongly discouraged in Stack Exchange. I understand that you're doing it for the best of reasons, but it's not the way this site works. You can post the substantial addition information and orbit *instead* in a new question, and ask about it there, and include a link to this question. To get it, don't worry, just click "edit" and scroll down and you'll see your edit in the previous versions. I used the "rollback", edits are not lost, the previous versions are all still there.
Answer: 90 days to Earth? Yes!
Hyperbolic? No.
I did a quick check and yes if you both cancelled the 19 km/s orbital velocity as well as added a 23 km/s radial velocity toward the Sun, you'd intercept 1 AU in 90 days. Without the Sun's gravitational acceleration, the trip would have taken 23 days longer.
You'd then be going 40 km/s and have a heck of a deceleration in store for you if you wanted to be captured in Earth orbit.
However, at this set of speeds and distances, the net energy is still negative. You would still be gravitationally bound to the Sun, so the orbit would not be called hyperbolic. Kinetic and potential energies per unit mass are as follows:
$$\frac{E}{m} = \frac{1}{2} v^2 - \frac{GM_S}{r^2}$$
or about 265 - 354 = -89 million Joules/kg, where the standard gravitational parameter for the Sun $GM_S$ is 1.327E+20 m³/s².

Here's a short Python script for the calculation.
<code>def deriv(X, t):
    x, v = X
    acc = -GMs/x**2
    return np.array([v, acc])

import numpy as np
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
from scipy.integrate import odeint as ODEint

GMs = 1.327E+20

AU  = 150E+06*1000. # meters
km  = 1000.         # meters
day = 24.*3600.     # sec

v0  = -23000        # m/s
x0  = 2.5 * AU      # m/s

vorb = np.sqrt(GMs/x0)
print "vorb: ", vorb

X0 = np.array([x0, v0])

ke = 0.5 * v0**2    # Joules/kg
pe = -GMs/x0
e  = ke + pe
print "ke: ", ke
print "pe: ", pe
print "e:  ", e

time = day * np.arange(0, 90, 0.1)

answer, info = ODEint(deriv, X0, time, full_output=True)

x, v = answer.T
x_free = x0 + v0 * time
v_free = v0 * np.ones_like(time)

plt.figure()
plt.subplot(2, 1, 1)
plt.plot(time/day, x/AU, linewidth=1.5)
# plt.plot(time/day, x_free/AU, '--k')
plt.title('Distance from Sun (AU) vs time (days)', fontsize=16)
plt.subplot(2, 1, 2)
plt.plot(time/day, v/km, linewidth=1.5)
# plt.plot(time/day, v_free/km, '--k')
plt.title('speed (km/s) vs time (days)', fontsize=16)
plt.show()
</code>
Comment: It would be a hyperbolic trajectory of the Earth, @chasrob, an additional change would be required at Earth to turn it into an orbit, and it's likely more than can be acheived with a combination of aerobraking and lunar gravity assist.
Comment: @chasrob. It's not head on. The Asteroid is moving at right angles to the Earth on arrival,, so if neither asteroid nor Earth had gravity, relative velocity on arrival is about 50 km/s, using those numbers. Earth's gravity well will nudge things a little higher, and wanting an Earth orbit rather than a dead stop will nudge things lower, but it's not going to reach 70 km/s
Comment: Trying to visualize this... as the asteroid approaches, the earth is moving at ~30km/s, head-on, the asteroid 40 km/s, a roughly 7km/s orbit of earth is needed, so a retro burn of 30+40-7... about 60km/s is required to put it into a earth orbit?
Comment: The mass(fuel) > mass(asteroid). :(  A 90 day travel time is not going to work. Rewrite time...
Comment: @chasrob consider a coincidence then? Have a look at all of the references and listen to the conference call described in the question [Have there been any documented mini-moons since 2006 RH120?](https://space.stackexchange.com/q/16738/12102) Many believe that from time to time near-earth asteroids will get temporarily trapped in the Earth-Moon system in what I call "squiggle orbits". If there's some way to take advantage of an unusual opportunity, that would be a nice way to do it. However they are usually small because in general the number of asteroids go up quickly with decreasing size.
Comment: @chasrob if you like you can discuss more in the [Pod Bay](https://chat.stackexchange.com/rooms/9682/the-pod-bay) which is the general chat room for the site, or even open a new chat room about this topic and mention it here to other users. I don't know if it would be helpful or not, but if there's more to calculate to test, that might work nicely! Here's a different [example](https://chat.stackexchange.com/rooms/83502/discussion-between-uhoh-and-happy-koala)
Comment: Great detective work, thanks! Reviewing what the acquaintance told me, I didn't notice before that it was a two step operation. More complicated, now that I realize it; 2 burns are required.
Comment: @notovny: you're right, I'm wrong, it's moving at right angles. So its velocity is 50-55 kllcks per second?  uhoh: Very interesting mini-moons. Maybe I can use them in the narrative instead. Closer, less fuel intensive. With those wild orbits the protag will have to enlist NASA, eh? :)
Answer: Big problem here:  There's no way this can actually be done.
Lesser issue:  That's a mighty hot rocket, at a minimum it's fusion based.  You need a total of about 100 km/sec to put it Earth orbit in the time given.  (Look at uhoh's answer--and note that he's only getting a flyby, not a capture.)
Main issue:  The basic problem here is that asteroids are generally quite weak and without a lot of study you can't be sure there are no weaknesses in your target asteroid.  You're planning some big burns that must be done fast if you want to meet your 90 day time limit--almost certainly the result is the asteroid comes apart.
Side issue:  Earth is going to take a very dim view of what you're up to.  Expect a military response.  Make a little mistake with your navigation and you've got anywhere from a city killer to an extinction event depending on the size of your rock.

Hyperbolic orbit: correct?


Why is my YTM incorrect? How does accrued interest play into Yield to Maturity?

Question: I'm writing some software that includes a feature to calculate Yield to Maturity for a Bond. I'm using an HP 10bii Financial Calculator to double check the answers produced by my software. I'm running into a problem where the output of my code sometimes doesn't match up with the physical plastic calculator. I don't know much about Bonds except for what I've learned while trying to understand how to write this code. :)
Here's the scenario I've been testing with:
Purchase Price: $110
    Call Value: $100
Coupon Rate/CPN%: 5%
Annual Coupons
Actual Year (as opposed to a 360 day year)
Settlement Date: Dec 1, 2009
Maturity Date: Jan 1, 2020

From that, I'm trying to calculate the Yield to Maturity (YTM%). I started with a more "normal" Settlement -> Maturity date (i.e. Jan 1, 2010 -> Jan 1, 2020). For those dates, my code works just fine and I get the right answer (3.780524135%).
However, when I push the Settlement Date back one month (Dec 1, 2009 -> Jan 1, 2020), then my calculated YTM% is slightly wrong.
The plastic 10bii calculator gives me: 3.787688399%
                 My software gives me: 3.788517337%

That's pretty close, but not close enough for my software. :) Whenever I calculate using a Settlement date that matches up exactly with a period boundary (a coupon date, if I'm using that terminology correctly), then the answer produced by my software is exactly right. Whenever the Settlement Date lands on any other date (non-coupon date), then my answer is slightly wrong. This leads me to believe that the discrepancy is related to the amount of interest which has accrued on the bond during the period leading up to the next coupon... but I really don't know how the interest is supposed to be handled on Bonds. I'm a real estate investor and a computer nerd, so I'm really good with TVM and Notes, but Bonds aren't something I've had a lot of experience with. :)
This is how my algorithm works:
Step 1) Determine the coupon/period dates the surround the Settlement Date.
This Bond uses annual periods, so counting backward from the Maturity Date... Jan 1, 2020 -> Jan 1, 2019 ..etc.. Jan 1, 2010 -> Jan 1, 2009. So, the coupon period that surrounds the Settlement Date is: [Jan 1, 2009 | Settlement: Dec 1, 2009 | Jan 1, 2010].
Rounding down to whole periods, that's 10 periods.
Step 2) Determine the fractional part of the remaining period
First, determine how many days there are from the Settlement Date to the end of the current period. (Dec 1, 2009 -> Jan 1, 2010) = 31. Next, divide that by the total number of days in that period = 365. So, 31/365 = 0.08493150685. Add that to the number of whole periods in Step 1. Num periods from Settlement to Maturity = 10.08493150685
Step 3) Perform a standard interest rate TVM calculation:
N = 10.08493150685
PV = -110
PMT = +5
FV = +100

Interest rate (I/YR) is calculated to be: 3.788517337%
If I put those inputs into my plastic calculator, I get the same interest rate. So, my software is performing Step 3 correctly given those inputs, but since this interest rate doesn't match the YTM% calculated for the overall Bond thats says to me that I'm not giving it the right inputs in Step 3.
Do you see anything I'm doing wrong?
In the above calculation, I'm paying \$110 now, then a month later I receive \$5 (\$100 x 5%) and I continue to receive a $5 payment on each Jan 1st until Jan 1st, 2020 when I receive the face value on the Bond (\$100). Am I modelling how a Bond sale actually works? (albeit a bond that I'm purchasing above par?)
I'm not doing anything with the interest that accrued from Jan 1, 2009 -> Dec 1, 2009 (i.e. the part of the period that comes before the Settlement Date). Is that accrued interest supposed to be included in one of my values in Step 3?
I tried taking the interest rate that the plastic calculator gives me (3.787688399%) and putting that into I/YR and then calculating N to see if I was calculating using the wrong number of periods, but the value I get would be equivalent to 10 years + 27 days instead of 10 years + 31 days. So, that seems wrong. That's why I'm assuming there is a problem with one of my PV, PMT, or FV values (and potentially N).
Any help is appreciated!
Edit:
I did some automated testing to compare my software output with the plastic 10bii output. I found that the farther I get away from a coupon date, the worse my answer and the closer I get, the better.
 #:  Difference  | Settlement Date
 0:  0.000828938 | 2009-12-01
 1:  0.000000000 | 2010-01-01
 2:  0.000827953 | 2010-02-01
 3:  0.001450767 | 2010-03-01
 4:  0.001999783 | 2010-04-01
 5:  0.002388311 | 2010-05-01
 6:  0.002639847 | 2010-06-01
 7:  0.002735772 | 2010-07-01
 8:  0.002679892 | 2010-08-01
 9:  0.002463739 | 2010-09-01
10:  0.002099264 | 2010-10-01
11:  0.001559277 | 2010-11-01
12:  0.000875747 | 2010-12-01
13:  0.000000000 | 2011-01-01
14:  0.000875541 | 2011-02-01

This says to me that it's not the accrued interest, because if it was the AccInt then the discrepancy would grow and grow and then drop to 0 at each coupon period. The fact that it grows for 6 months and then shrinks for 6 months says to me something else is going on.
What aspect of the YTM am I missing?
Edit 2:
I've tried calculating the amount of accrued interest and both adding and subtracting that from the PV (which I think is the "dirty" price?), but that just makes my YTM calculation go much further away from the target number. Interest accrued from Jan 1, 2009 -> Nov 30, so the amount accrued was 4.58 out of 5.00. So, when I make the PV -114.58 or -105.42 that just gives me wildly wrong answers. :(
Answer: In a case like this, where the settlement date is in the middle of the coupon period, it is not right to use PV = -110 (minus the purchase price) in Step 3.
Instead you should increase the purchase price by the accrued interest, which is a fraction of the coupon based on how far the settlement date is within the current coupon period. (So for ex if you are in the middle of the period add half a coupon. In your example I believe you are eleven twelvefths into the settlement period, so try -110-5*(11/12) for PV.
Comment: Hi Alex! Thank you for your response. That was the first thing I tried as well, so my PV was -114.58 (full coupon = 5). That caused me to get an answer that was even farther away from the correct answer. Should be '3.787690', but was '3.279252'. I tried reducing the PV by 4.58, but again, no good. :(


What is the connection between Kali and Kaliyug?

Question: What is the connection between Kali and Kaliyug? Kaalii is the goddess that takes the darkness away (Kali) but which scripture does it come from? And is there an explanation of the close connection of the the two words?
Thanks
Comment: Kaali is different from kali. Kaali is dark or black, kali is filth or dirt.
Comment: These are two different words. काली and कलि.  What connection are you talking about?  I have never read anything suggesting any connection between goddess kAlI काली and Kaliyug कलियुग . Kaliyug is named after कलि kali gandharva who has power over this era.
Answer: In Hinduism (or Sanatana Dharma), there is a beautiful concept where even the non living things and abstract ideas also exist in personified form. It is because Consciousness runs everything as Shrutis/ Vedas state:

प्रज्ञानं ब्रह्म (Aitreya Upanishad 3.3)
Prajnanam Brahma
ie. Pure Consciousness is Brahman

And Shrutis/Vedas also state:

सर्वं खल्विदं ब्रह्म (Chhandogya Upanishad 3.14.1)
Sarva Khalvidam Brahman
ie. Everything is Brahman

So, from above as we know everything is Brahman and we also know pure consciousness is Brahman. So,we can say Everything is Pure Consciousness.
So, even non - living things and abstract ideas also exist in personified form. For eg. Days and Nights are phenomenon but there exists a personified form of Days and Nights.
Similarly Vedas are eternal voices. But they also exist in personified form. For eg. RigVeda has it's own form, own shape. And same for other Vedas like Samaveda, YajurVeda and Atharvaveda.
And not only this there are personified form of Anger (Krodha), Attachment (Moha), Buddhi (Intellect), etc...
And in the similar way among the four Yugas namely:

Satya Yuga, Treta Yuga, Dwapara Yuga and KaliYuga.
They all exist in their personified form also.

Kali Yuga as the name implies is the age of darkness. So, Kali is personification of age of darkness.
As per Puranic accounts the present age running is Kali Yuga / Kali age. And the personified Kaliyuga is the Kali. Kali has it's respective forms and attributes as reflected by the present age.
His main agenda is to spread violence, adharma and cruelty in the society. He tries his best to trigger such events. He will be defeated by coming incarnation of Lord Vishnu named Kalki.
Here is the description of Kali demon from Kalki Purana:

After the annihilation, the secondary creator of the universe, Lord Brahma, the grandfather of everyone, who was born on the universal lotus flower, created Sin personified, having a black complexion, from his back. The name of Sin personified was Adharma By faithfully hearing about, chanting, and remembering the descendents of Adharma, one quickly becomes freed from all sinful reactions. The wife of Adharma (Irreligion), was named Mithya (Falsehood), She was very beautiful, and had eyes like those of a cat They had a son named Dambha (Pride), who was always very angry and eneigetic. Dambha had a sister named Maya, and within her womb, he begot a son named Lobha, (Greed), and a daughter named Nikrti (Cunning), Lobha begot a son named Krodha (Anger), in the womb of Nikrti. Himsa (Violence), was Krodha's sister. From the womb of Himsa, Krodha begot a son named Kali. Kali is always seen to be holding his genitals in his left hand. His complexion is very black, like black ointment that has been mixed with oil. Kali's abdomen is like that of a crow, his face is frightening to behold, and his tongue is red and appears to be full of greed. His appearance is very fearful and a bad smell emanates from his body. Kali is very fond of playing chess, drinking wine, enjoying the company of prostitutes, and associating with gold merchants. Kali's sister was Durukti, (Harsh Speech). From Durukti's womb, Kali begot a son named Bhaya, (Fear), and a daughter named, Mrtyu (Death). Bhaya begot a son named Niraya (Hell) from the womb of Mrtyu and Niraya begot ten thousand sons in the womb of his sister, Yatana (Excessive Pain). Thus I have described the destructive progeny of Kali, who were all blasphemers of genuine religious principles. All these relatives of Kali were the destroyers of sacrifice, study of the Vedas, and charity, because they transgressed all the Vedic principles of religion. They were reservoirs of mental distress, disease, old age, destruction of religious principles, sorrow, lamentation, and fear. [Kalki Purana 1.14-22]

So, his form and birth clearly describe his attribute.
As seen above he is born from Violence and Anger. Harsh speech is his sister. From his sister he begot a son named Fear.
One doesn't need to wonder or be surprised seeing the above description. How can Violence and Anger be father and mother and etc.. etc.. questions.? As I already told before, everything, even the abstract ideas have their own personified form.
On the other hand Kaali (with long 'a') is name of Goddess and she is one of the forms of Goddess Durga. She is Supremely merciful and mother of all and at the same time She is also terrible Annhilator of even time. Kala means time and Kaali is one who rules or even annhilates time.
Here is one of the story of Godesses Kali when she was invoked during encounter with two demons named Chanda and Munda and she emerges from Forehead of Ambika. It is inside Devi Mahatmyam of Markandeya Purana:

ततः कोपं चकारोच्चैरम्बिका तानरीन् प्रति।
कोपेन चास्या वदनं मषीवर्णमभूत्तदा॥५॥
भ्रुकुटीकुटिलात्तस्या ललाटफलकाद्द्रुतम्।
काली करालवदना विनिष्क्रान्तासिपाशिनी॥६॥
विचित्रखट्‌वाङ्‌गधरा नरमालाविभूषणा।
द्वीपिचर्मपरीधाना शुष्कमांसातिभैरवा॥७॥
अतिविस्तारवदना जिह्वाललनभीषणा।
निमग्नारक्तनयना नादापूरितदिङ्‌मुखा॥८॥
सा वेगेनाभिपतिता घातयन्ती महासुरान्।
सैन्ये तत्र सुरारीणामभक्षयत तद्‌बलम्॥९॥
Thereupon Ambika became terribly angry with those foes, and her anger her countenance then became dark as ink. Out from the surface of her forehead, fierce with frown, issued suddenly Kali of terrible countenance, armed with a sword and noose. Bearing the strange skull-topped staff, decorated with a garland of skulls, clad in a tiger's skin, very appalling owing to her emaciated flesh, with gaping mouth, fearful with her tongue lolling out, having deep-sunk reddish eyes and filling the regions of the sky with her roars, and falling upon impetuously and slaughtering the great asuras in that army, she devoured those hosts of the foes of the devas.
Comment: Hari OM Tezz thanks for your elaborate and detailed answer! So you seems to suggest there is no connection between Kaali Maa and Kali yuga?
Comment: Yes my friend there is no connection between the demon Kali and Goddess KALI.
Answer: There is a connection between Kali and Kali yuga, but Kali in this regard is not a goddess but is the personality of Kali, who is the cause of all irreligion, the master of Kali-yuga, who was lower than a śūdra, disguised as a king.
You can read about that in the Bhagavatam, canto 1, chapters 16 and 17 at http://www.vedabase.com/en/sb/1
I suggest you to read those two chapters and you'll see in detail who exactly Kali is and how is he related to the age of Kali or Kali yuga.
Comment: @ArunachalaKarthik As far as I know there is no direct connection between goddess Kali and Kali yuga. The only connection that I know of when it comes to Kali and Kali yuga is that what you can read above in my answer.
Comment: Ok I see its Śrīla Prabhupāda's linage from the webpage that you suggest I read ;)  I have respect for Vaishnavas but I will prefare to have the perspective of the Shakties also, since the epics about Mother Kaalii is from their scriptures. I know you guys disagrees on these things. Thanks


How to populate Unique ID field after sorting?

Question: I am trying to create an new unique id field in a feature class. I already have one field called "SITE_ID_FD", but it is historical. The format of the unique value in that field isn't what our current format is, so I am creating a new field with the new format.
Old Format = M001, M002, K003, K004, S005, M006, etc
New format = 12001, 12002, 12003, 12004, 12005, 12006, etc
I wrote the following script:
fc = r"Z:\test.gdb\testfc"

x = 12001

cursor = arcpy.UpdateCursor(fc)

for row in cursor:
    row.setValue("SITE_ID", x)
    cursor.updateRow(row)
    x+= 1

This works fine, but it populates the new id field based on the default sorting of objectID. I need to sort 2 fields first and then populate the new id field based on that sorting (I want to sort by a field called 'SITE' and then by the old id field "SITE_ID_FD")
I tried running the script from the python window in ArcMap after manually sorting the 2 fields in hopes that the python would honor the sort, but it doesn't. I'm not sure how to do this in python. Can anyone suggest a method?
Answer: Try using the sort_fields parameter of the UpdateCursor function, e.g.:
cursor = arcpy.UpdateCursor(fc, , , , "SITE A; SITE_ID_FD A")


Is it 'Minor Edit Week' or something?

Question: I've noticed that this week we're getting a lot of tiny pointless edits to posts (https://serverfault.com/users/100013/jakegould, https://serverfault.com/users/294235/lnux?tab=activity) - how are they getting approved and should we do something about it?
Comment: What could we do about it anyway? 2k users don't need a review for their edits, and others are motivated by the free rep points they get for changing `teh` to `the`...
Comment: It's *always* bowb the front page week...
Answer:
Should we do something about these minor edits?

Tiny, trivial edits are discouraged and should be rejected when you encounter them in the review queue.
Although it is a good thing to edit and improve incorrect and outdated content the main disadvantage is that even a minor edit (on an older Q&A) bumps it to front page. So make your edits count on those posts.
On newly posted Q&A's; if you feel you can make the post better, and are inclined to do so, please edit!

How are they getting approved?

It only takes a minimal amount of rep before a user is allowed to propose edits to Q&A's, but those are not applied automatically. They enter a review queue where they need to be approved by 2 established users (= rep > 2000) or a moderator.  Those same users can see the audit trail and the review history here: https://serverfault.com/review/suggested-edits/history
Maybe the original author of the question/answer can also allow edits outside of the review queue, I'm not sure.
Established users (= rep > 2000) get the privilege to have their edits applied immediately, without peer review.

The user you linked to: https://serverfault.com/users/100013/jakegould?tab=activity

Is one such established users (= rep > 2000) who has achieved both the privilege to have their edits applied immediately, without peer review and the privilege to participate in the edit review queue.

The edit you linked to here: https://serverfault.com/users/294235/lnux?tab=activity

Was by a low-rep user and got approved from the review queue here by a fellow moderator.
Comment: A checkbox "minor edit only, do not bump to front page" would be helpful. It would encourage to correct spelling and punctuation errors, but not not pollute the front page with 2 year old questions that are already answered (where you have to hunt for the new timestamp).

Is it 'Minor Edit Week' or something?


How can I move my Steam saves from One hard drive to another?

Question: I'm planning to upgrade my computer's hard drive and I'm not using an imaging program because I'm clean installing - How can I move my Steam game files and game saves from the old harddrive to the new hard drive with Windows 7?
Answer: Steam game files and game saves are two different subjects.
You can copy the Steam folder altogether to the new HD and then do the following:
- delete everything except SteamApps folder and Steam.exe
- run Steam.exe. This will make it re-sync with the Steam Cloud and download everything again and recognize the "just" installed games.
Some games have their auto-install routines which will be triggered on the first run. This reveals itself as the steam installer service requesting authorization.
Save games are mostly under Users/, or the Steam folder itself. Make a backup of the entire users folder in any case you could need something later.
See this Steam How-To describing how you move your installation.
Answer: It depends.
Every game that you have on Steam has its own save strategies. They could store their savegames in My Documents/GameName/ folder or in My Documents/My Games/GameName/ on in Local Settings and so on. I suggest you to create a new question for each game you are interested in.
Steam Cloud
The only exception are the games that supports Steam Cloud feature. If you are not sure, you can check the official page on the Steam Store and look in the feature list to the right.
If games support Steam Cloud you have to do nothing. Save games are stored directly on Steam server and they are automatically synchronized back to your account on your new pc installation.
Some games that support Steam Cloud: Half-Life 2, Portal, Torchlight, Toki Tori, etc.
Microsoft Games For Windows Live
Also some games that use Microsoft's Games For Windows Live service could store save games online. An example is Grand Theft Auto IV.
Comment: Try https://www.gamesave-manager.com/.
Answer: Just copy them over.
Install Steam onto the new computer so that the directory structure is all set up then copy the data files across.
(I don't have Steam installed on this computer (I'm at work!) so I can't verify which folders you need to copy).
Answer: There is a nice tool to backup and restore your savegames and settings for Steam and some other gaming related programs: SaveGameBackup.net
List of features (copied from http://savegamebackup.net/forum/viewtopic.php?f=24&t=316)

Purpose

Backup all of your game saves in just a couple clicks.
Restore games you have previously backed up, even if you change computers or operating systems. You can even share your saves with
  friends.
Support for saving and restoring over the network (UNC) and saving to cloud services, like DropBox and SugarSync.
Currently detecting over 1,200 games!

Free

No ads, no nags. 100% Free. Although there is a donate button if you are feeling generous :)

Easy To Use

A sleek UI and easy to understand controls were designed to make using SGB.net as simple as possible.

Portable

All application settings are stored in the application's folder. This makes SGB.net great for thumb drives.

Multilingual Extensibility

Contains complete out-of-the-box language support for English, Dutch, French, German, Russian, Spanish, and Slovenian languages. New languages can be added at your discretion. They can also be sent to me to be officially included in the next release (via the Forum link in the About tab).
Supports all flavors of Windows from Windows XP SP3 to Windows 7.

Database and XML Driven

Using SQLite to manage all standard entry information. SQLite's unparalleled speed makes it the best choice for SGB.net.
Ability to update database from within the program to keep up to date with the latest database. There is no need (usually) to update the entire program to get new game support.
Using XML to manage all custom entry information. XML is not as quick as SQLite, but it is human-readable, and can therefore be manually edited.
Custom database entries: if a game is not supported, you can add it yourself. This means SGB.net can be used to back up a lot more than
  game saves.

Ignore List

If you don't want to see a game on your list anymore, you can hide it with the Ignore List.

Standardized Zip Archives

Using DotNetZip for standardized zip compression to keep backup archives as small as possible. If you have a multi-core system, DotNetZip will take advantage of it, making it's speeds unmatchable by similar libraries.
The created archives are not password protected, so they can be viewed/edited with any archive manager. All restoration information is stored in the comment section of the zip file.
Comment: savegamebackup.net is now a cyber-squatting website. Pretty sure support has been dropped for that software. You can probably find other similar tools using your favorite search engine.
Comment: Try https://www.gamesave-manager.com/.
Answer: It's very simple. I transfer between two PCs all the time.
Under C:\users\"your username"\my documents\my games\skyrim\saves you will find your save files. (if you have another language of Windows it can be different or if you use something other than Vista/Windows 7)
Simply copy the save files you want over to the other computer in the same directory. I usually only take my quicksave.ess over and send it on mail or use a usb drive.
Comment: Sorry, but there are lots of games that don't do it like that.


What does the recovery tag mean?

Question: What does the recovery tag mean, if anything? Or is it one of those overly broad tags whose questions haven't yet been recategorized into sub-categories?
Answer: It looks like it should be a synonym for data-recovery, but I can't create the synonym that way round as recovery is used more times.
It could also be used for recovery-partition (there are 16 questions with both tags), so just creating the synonym blind might be a bad idea. It might need a manual retagging of each question.
I've made a start removing it from questions that are tagged both recovery and data-recovery
Answer: I am not sure if recovery is really just related to data-recovery. I may want to recover from something that is not data related. I would rather get more opinions on this before creating the synonym.

What does the recovery tag mean?


How to set up inverse search with Okular and Kile

Question: The title pretty much sums it up.  I use the package srcltx in my documents.  I am running Ubuntu with Kile 2.1 and Okular 0.8.2 as a viewer.  I am pretty sure that inverse search should work, but I haven't been able to set it up.  How does one configure the viewer and editor to make this feature work?
Comment: I wish to add that (my version of) Okular (0.20.2) has to be in "browse" mode, not in "zoom" or "selection" mode, for inverse search to work. (For all like me who drove crazy because they wouldn't understand why the feature suddently didn't work anymore.)
Answer: Check this Ubuntu forums thread: How can I do an inverse search between okular and kile?
Here is a summary of the required steps (not tested):

Setup inverse search from Okular:
Settings -> Configure Okular .. -> Editor -> Editor dropdown: "custom text editor"
command: kile %f --line %l
Set up Kile to tell LaTeX to add source info, i.e., set LaTeX build tools from Default to Modern:
Settings -> Configure kile -> Build -> LaTeX -> "Modern" in the dropdown menu
Add a new forwardDVI configuration:
Settings -> Configure kile -> Build -> forwardDVI
then:

"new..." button on the right
choose a name
put the full path to the perl script (see below) as the command (don't forget to escape, i.e., put a backslash in front of any spaces)
put '%target' as Options (the single quotes are important)

#!/usr/bin/perl
# kile2okular. (c) Ian Wood, 2010
# based on:
# kile2xdvi. (c) Juerg Wullschleger, 2009

if($ARGV[0] =~ m/file:(.*)#src:(\S*) (\S*)/){
$dviFile = $1;
$line = $2;
$sourceFile = $3;
$sourcePos = '--unique "'.$line.' '.$sourceFile.'"';
if($dviFile =~ m|.*/([^/]*.dvi)|){
$dviFile = $1;
}else{
print 'usage1: kile2xdvi <dvifile> or kile2xdvi "file:<dvifile>#src:<line> <sourcefile>"'."\n";
exit;
}
}else{
if((!$ARGV[0]) || ($ARGV[0] == "--help") || ($ARGV[0] == "-h")){
print 'usage2: kile2xdvi <dvifile> or kile2xdvi "file:<dvifile>#src:<line> <sourcefile>"'."\n";
exit;
}
$dviFile = $ARGV[0];
$sourcePos = '';
}
if (!(-e $dviFile)){
print "$dviFile: No such file.\n";
exit -1;
}

`okular --unique "$dviFile#src:$line$sourceFile"\n`;
exit;

Comment: @Alessandro C. You do the same thing for PDFLaTeX, just in the build environments choose PDFLaTeX to have the modern type. I also completely ignored the part about the perl script and it still works perfectly.
Comment: What about for PDFLaTeX?
Comment: It'd be great if you can provide a summary of what they found to eventually work. (The answer on the second page of that thread.) This is since (a) a summary can be much more readable and (b) just in case link-rot sets in and that thread disappears. I know this is Ubuntu we are talking about, but .... just in case.
Comment: I got it working with the above steps but without resorting to the script but using okular as the embedded viewer..
Comment: @Dom, Alessandro: I tried it with Kile 2.0.85 and Texlive 2009 in an up-to-date Kubuntu with Okular 0.11.2 and PDF inverse search with pdflatex doesn't work. I also left out the perl script part. DVI inverse search however works with okular.
Dom, what versions are you using?
Comment: @Turion: I'm using Okular version 0.12.2, Kile 2.0.85, all inside KDE version 4.6.2, I realise this is late, but hope it helps. Kile has default profiles for forwardPDF and forwardDVI, but make sure your compilation type is set to modern, whether you're using latex or pdflatex. Okular also has a default profile for using Kile as the text editor.
Answer: I tried what was described here and it did not work. I found this link from the University of Illinois and their suggestions worked; I'm working in Fedora 17, in case it makes any difference. Here is what they suggest:

Open some LaTeX file in Kile
Open "Settings -> Configure Kile..."
Click "Tools -> Build -> LaTeX"
Select the "Modern" configuration
Set the options to -interaction=nonstopmode -src %source
Click "ForwardDVI" in the list
Select the "Embedded Viewer" configuration
Click OK
Click "LaTeX" in the build toolbar menu
Click "ForwardDVI" in the view toolbar menu
Open "Settings -> Configure Viewer..."
Click "Editor"
Select Kile as the editor
Click OK
Scroll to some interesting location in the document and hold down Shift while left-clicking on that location. It should jump to that
  spot in the LaTeX source.
Scroll to some other location in the LaTeX source and click "ForwardDVI". It should jump to that location in the DVI.
Answer: Okular to Kile navigation did not work for me on Ubuntu 14.04.1 in the above mentioned manner.
Then in Configure Kile --> Tools --> Build -->"Select a tool"
I selected all possible tools and where-ever Modern was available I chose it.
Then it worked. Otherwise I have been struggling for two two days, it did not work. I must have wasted about a couple of hours for this at-least.
Hope this post saves time for many other people.
Answer: I am using Ubuntu 14.04. In my case, I could not get inverse search to work using any of the above suggestions while using latex. But it worked with pdflatex by choosing Modern configuration as Puneet suggested.
Comment: Welcome to TeX.SE! I guess this is meant as a comment?


Do I really need a Microsoft account in order to access my Windows Phone?

Question: I notice that many Windows Phone manual mention that user need to create a Microsoft Account in order to access their Windows Phone. Is it true? Can't I skip the process of creating the Windows Phone Microsoft account to a later stage?
Answer: You can skip it during initial setup and add it later. Skipping this step will limit access to some resources e.g. you can't use the marketplace to install applications.
From the MS page: (highlighting a few key items)

Microsoft account
A Microsoft account (formerly Windows Live ID) lets you do all kinds
  of things on your phone. Once you sign in, you can:

Get apps, games, music, and videos from the Store
Play Xbox games with friends and get your Xbox gamerscore and avatar on your phone
Use Xbox Music
Get your Twitter or LinkedIn feeds on your People Hub
Find, ring, lock, or erase a lost phone
Create and restore phone backups
Get personalized suggestions in Local Scout, Music + Videos, and the Store
Chat using Messenger
Sync documents with SkyDrive
Automatically sync your contacts and calendar to Hotmail or Outlook.com
Answer: Any email account can be used for a  Microsoft account.  Shouldn't be a stress point. Just setup your regular email as a Microsoft account and you're good to go.  Wikipedia actually talks about the ability to use any email account for a Microsoft account here - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_account .  Note what this means is you don't have to go get a Hotmail/live/outlook.com account to use a Microsoft account.  You can use gmail/{whatever suites you} for your Microsoft account.
Answer: yes, windows phone and now windows 8 are very much integrated with the microsoft account. the 322 services which microsoft provides are trying to integrate into one big platform. You will need it to use the marketplace, track your apps, contact list