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12,826 | I often hear and read about Buddha nature.
I wonder, is Buddha nature something common to all varieties of Buddhism? And where in the scriptures can I find out more about this? I'm asking because sometimes when I hear about it, it sounds a bit like the idea of atman as brahman: which I don't understand, because how can that be compatible with anatman and emptiness? | 2015/11/29 | [
"https://buddhism.stackexchange.com/questions/12826",
"https://buddhism.stackexchange.com",
"https://buddhism.stackexchange.com/users/7290/"
] | >
> I'm asking because sometimes when I hear about it, it sounds a bit like the idea of atman as brahman: which I don't understand, because how can that be compatible with anatman and emptiness?
>
>
>
It can be understood in different ways, dependent on tradition.
It certainly does not mean that there is a *soul, an experiencing entity or an inner core*. Remember that this is just a word, a convention.
When practicing insight meditation, one will realize that it cannot mean that there is an atman. It is only when such deep doctrines are treated intellectually, that there arises confusion. These profound doctrines cannot be grasped by the intellect. They can only be understood experientially.
>
> Is there a generally agreed upon idea of what Buddha nature is?
>
>
>
One meaning is, that every being has the capacity to win Nibbana.
Nibbana is already there but its covered in thick layers of ignorance (avijja) and has been plastered over with concepts and conventions.
The unconditioned state is an existing reality, that can be experienced when the meditator has done away with ignorance, clinging and attachment and cultivated the paramitas to full maturity. | According to the buddhism of Nichiren Daishonin, which is a japanese mahayana tradition, the buddha nature is something we all have, at least in latent form. So I agree with the above poster in the sense that the buddha nature, or buddhahood is a quality intrinsic to all living beings - and even non-living things that are also part of this universe - like the emptiness you mention - which being empty, has the potential to manifest life too. It manifests itself when you're in rhythm with your life and environment and are able to bring out the best in you to change your karma and overcome whatever obstacles you were facing. So basically it's when you're being a "hero of your world", and devote your life to the teachings of the lotus sutra. This sutra, or, the middle volume of it, says all prior teachings were "expedient" ways to get people practicing buddhism according to the time, but that actually you don't need lots of lifetimes to become a buddha but can be one now in your present form.
In this way it might relate to concepts of soul in hinduism although I think [wikipedia explains it better](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C4%80tman_%28Hinduism%29#Atman_.E2.80.93_the_difference_between_Hinduism_and_Buddhism).
The mystic law of cause and effect, the way we nichiren buddhists understand it, is basically a pervasive universal vibration or rhythm, a sound, a teaching, working at a fundamental level that we can all tune in to, and I believe it is the collective will that the universe has always had: its wish to grow, learn, flourish and be generally positive. So it's a decentralised vision of "soul" - more like the "force" in star wars (without those new films and their midichlorians, ugh!), or cells in a body. Buddhahood, if seen as something we all have, is something we can all tap into if we have the luck to figure this out ourselves somehow, or hear about it, and we can all try and manifest. I also believe buddhism itself is kind of just common sense, and just wisdom and culture, built up over the ages and continents, which has created a common understanding of the world around us, and a philosophy for how to live it. When we die we see it as drops falling back into the ocean. This is why we live forever: Because we are able to live as long as there is life. We are part of all of it and identify with this concept of unity - as if the first and fundamental mistake even the simplest bugs make, is to think of themselves as separate from what's around them. |
41,664,591 | I'm new to git, and we're just now switching from TFS 2010 to git. We created a new master branch and 3 subsidiary branches off of the master on our remote server. I installed the VS plugin and cloned the remote repository, which downloaded all of the master files into the local repository.
Now, when I make a new local branch off of one of the other remote branches, it deletes all of the local files for the master branch and replaces them with the files for the newly checked out branch. When I checkout master again, it again deletes the new branch locally and replaces it with the master branch.
Is there a way to retain the local files so that switching between branches happens quickly and doesn't have to re-download every file all the time? | 2017/01/15 | [
"https://Stackoverflow.com/questions/41664591",
"https://Stackoverflow.com",
"https://Stackoverflow.com/users/1689456/"
] | Unlike in TFVC, where only the branches that you want are downloaded, Git downloads the whole repository to your local disk. From this repository it creates the working folder with the files at the version/branch you checked out.
When you switch from one branch to another, git replaces only the files that are different from its local cache. No files are transferred when switching.
This has the impact though that, unlike in TFVC, it's not possible to have two branches open at the same time in the same repository (TFVC workspace), instead you'd need to clone the repository again (you can make a local copy of the whole repo) and check out a different branch in your second repository. The same was true in TFVC when you wanted the same branch a two different versions. In order to do that you'd have to create a second workspace.
The underlying reason for this all is that, in git, a branch is nothing more than a pointer to a version. and switching between branches is the same as switching between versions. And because Git has a local copy of all the changes ever made in the repo, switching is fast and efficient (up to a certain size repo of course). | Usually git has all branches locally already, so there are no additional downloads if a branch is checked out. |
41,664,591 | I'm new to git, and we're just now switching from TFS 2010 to git. We created a new master branch and 3 subsidiary branches off of the master on our remote server. I installed the VS plugin and cloned the remote repository, which downloaded all of the master files into the local repository.
Now, when I make a new local branch off of one of the other remote branches, it deletes all of the local files for the master branch and replaces them with the files for the newly checked out branch. When I checkout master again, it again deletes the new branch locally and replaces it with the master branch.
Is there a way to retain the local files so that switching between branches happens quickly and doesn't have to re-download every file all the time? | 2017/01/15 | [
"https://Stackoverflow.com/questions/41664591",
"https://Stackoverflow.com",
"https://Stackoverflow.com/users/1689456/"
] | Unlike in TFVC, where only the branches that you want are downloaded, Git downloads the whole repository to your local disk. From this repository it creates the working folder with the files at the version/branch you checked out.
When you switch from one branch to another, git replaces only the files that are different from its local cache. No files are transferred when switching.
This has the impact though that, unlike in TFVC, it's not possible to have two branches open at the same time in the same repository (TFVC workspace), instead you'd need to clone the repository again (you can make a local copy of the whole repo) and check out a different branch in your second repository. The same was true in TFVC when you wanted the same branch a two different versions. In order to do that you'd have to create a second workspace.
The underlying reason for this all is that, in git, a branch is nothing more than a pointer to a version. and switching between branches is the same as switching between versions. And because Git has a local copy of all the changes ever made in the repo, switching is fast and efficient (up to a certain size repo of course). | When you clone a repository, all the history with all the branches and all the files are downloaded and put, with some other data, in a '.git' folder.
When you check out a branch, the workspace is updated with the local files (no download!)
Normally, a check out is quite quick. If that's not the case, you have a problem with the files that you put in it.
Unlike TFVC, you must not commit binary files or big files.
My advice is that you should clean your history ( surely using 'BFG repo cleaner')
If that's not **really** possible, perhaps you should use 'git-lfs' (supported by Tfs and other git servers).
But, in short term, perhaps you could have a look at 'git worktree' if you want to check out 2 branches in 2 different directories like what you did with TFVC...
But it will not help you get the real power of git :-( |
41,664,591 | I'm new to git, and we're just now switching from TFS 2010 to git. We created a new master branch and 3 subsidiary branches off of the master on our remote server. I installed the VS plugin and cloned the remote repository, which downloaded all of the master files into the local repository.
Now, when I make a new local branch off of one of the other remote branches, it deletes all of the local files for the master branch and replaces them with the files for the newly checked out branch. When I checkout master again, it again deletes the new branch locally and replaces it with the master branch.
Is there a way to retain the local files so that switching between branches happens quickly and doesn't have to re-download every file all the time? | 2017/01/15 | [
"https://Stackoverflow.com/questions/41664591",
"https://Stackoverflow.com",
"https://Stackoverflow.com/users/1689456/"
] | Unlike in TFVC, where only the branches that you want are downloaded, Git downloads the whole repository to your local disk. From this repository it creates the working folder with the files at the version/branch you checked out.
When you switch from one branch to another, git replaces only the files that are different from its local cache. No files are transferred when switching.
This has the impact though that, unlike in TFVC, it's not possible to have two branches open at the same time in the same repository (TFVC workspace), instead you'd need to clone the repository again (you can make a local copy of the whole repo) and check out a different branch in your second repository. The same was true in TFVC when you wanted the same branch a two different versions. In order to do that you'd have to create a second workspace.
The underlying reason for this all is that, in git, a branch is nothing more than a pointer to a version. and switching between branches is the same as switching between versions. And because Git has a local copy of all the changes ever made in the repo, switching is fast and efficient (up to a certain size repo of course). | Branches in git are not deleted, if you do checkout another one. Like stated in the above comments, the documentation mentioned in [working/staging/commit](https://git-scm.com/book/en/v2/Getting-Started-Git-Basics#The-Three-States) do explain this pretty nicely.
Git is distributed, and therefor all Branches are stored on each machine, where you have fetched/pulled it. The whole history of the repository is stored on your machine.
Obviously there is a way to delete Branches (local as well as remote), but this is not part of the current question. |
1,263,108 | I am aware of the FlexCover project, but I want a code analyzer that finds the functions (and classes, I suppose) that have no calls to them at all in the source code.
I suppose I could comment them out one-by-one, but that way lies madness.
It's more than just tidiness: we have many versions of the same functionality and maintaining un-needed versions prevents us from getting rid over several classes and protocols that Really Need To Go Away.
Thanks | 2009/08/11 | [
"https://Stackoverflow.com/questions/1263108",
"https://Stackoverflow.com",
"https://Stackoverflow.com/users/29420/"
] | You might find this helpful:
<http://opensource.adobe.com/wiki/display/flexpmd/FlexPMD>
Good luck. | For C there is a program [ncc](http://students.ceid.upatras.gr/~sxanth/ncc/index.html) which produces some intermediate files which contains for each function a list of all variables accessed as well as functions called. Using that information you can generate a call tree (I once parsed those files to find the (approximate) maximum stack usage (together with information from the map file)).
While ncc is for C, you should be able to use the same principle. You can download and have a look at how it is done for ncc, or maybe you can search for "generate call tree" together with flex or actionscript to see if you find some useful tool. When you have a complete call tree, any function not part of it is a strong candidate for removal. |
984,824 | Trying to use the INDIRECT formula to pull a summary at the end of a large workbook. I have listed the Worksheet names in a single tab and now wish to use these to pull specific cell data into a summary, ie invoice no, net sales, VAT, all of which are on identical cells on each sheet.
If I have the worksheet name in cell A3 in my summary tab and I wish to retrieve data within cell H34 of my specified sheet, I have used the following formula:
=INDIRECT("'"&$A$3&"'!H34",FALSE)
However I am only retrieving the #ref error.
Can anyone tell me what I am doing wrong?
Thanks,
LA | 2015/10/10 | [
"https://superuser.com/questions/984824",
"https://superuser.com",
"https://superuser.com/users/507882/"
] | I ended up replacing and rebuilding each drive in online mode, making sure to disable hotswap before beginning the process.
After replacing all drives, I noted the RAID configuration, deleted it, and recreated it with the same exact settings except with the new size. **I did not initialize the new configuration.**
I restarted the server (all data was kept in the reconfiguration) and found the new space on the volume. I was able to just resize one of my partitions to fill the unused space. | If you want to convert, you have to install all drives at the same time and copy the data. This is probably the fastest way.
If you want to keep the RAID5 and make the disks bigger you have to change one disk at a time and wait for resynch (and hope nothing goes wrong on the other disks at that time) or create a new RAID5 and copy data.
Depends on your system if the array could be grown after replacing disks with bigger ones.
If you have space for all the disks, it's always safer to copy data to the new ones. |
10,376 | There seems to be a widespread sense that the Conservative UK government pushed through legislation to legalise gay marriage.
There appeared to be no great angst with the status quo for gay couples (civil partnerships).
Contrariwise, gay marriage was deeply offensive to many religious people and placed them in a precarious legal position (albeit more perceived than reality) with respect to their deeply held beliefs.
Is this accurate? If so, why did the Conservative government push this legislation through? | 2016/03/27 | [
"https://politics.stackexchange.com/questions/10376",
"https://politics.stackexchange.com",
"https://politics.stackexchange.com/users/6116/"
] | They didn't really push it through, there was very little opposition. The tide of opinion has swung far enough that any political party was going to take more heat for opposing gay marriage than supporting it.
The entrenched religious influence so pervasive in the USA is nothing like so influential in the United Kingdom and even the Church of England is moving gradually towards more acceptance of such things.
Don't forget that while some religious organisations strongly objected to gay marriage many others were asking for the rights to be able to perform marriages for gay couples. | There was quite a significant amount of angst prior to the bill being announced, and a long running campaign - with Stonewall, the LGB rights group, having just engaged in a high-profile U-Turn and stating they now supported same-sex marriage.
Alongside that, LibDem MP Lynne Featherstone had been appointed to the Equalities brief as part of the coalition, and her stated personal mission as minister was to get same-sex marriage through.
Cameron had a few choices: Block it and risk the coalition fall apart on a relatively minor issue, Grudgingly let her have her way and be seen as not in control or get behind it 100% and claim it as a Tory rather than LibDem victory.
Generally, it's better in politics to be seen to be strong and wrong than weak but right, so the wholeheartedly embracing it option was the best course of action. |
10,376 | There seems to be a widespread sense that the Conservative UK government pushed through legislation to legalise gay marriage.
There appeared to be no great angst with the status quo for gay couples (civil partnerships).
Contrariwise, gay marriage was deeply offensive to many religious people and placed them in a precarious legal position (albeit more perceived than reality) with respect to their deeply held beliefs.
Is this accurate? If so, why did the Conservative government push this legislation through? | 2016/03/27 | [
"https://politics.stackexchange.com/questions/10376",
"https://politics.stackexchange.com",
"https://politics.stackexchange.com/users/6116/"
] | They didn't really push it through, there was very little opposition. The tide of opinion has swung far enough that any political party was going to take more heat for opposing gay marriage than supporting it.
The entrenched religious influence so pervasive in the USA is nothing like so influential in the United Kingdom and even the Church of England is moving gradually towards more acceptance of such things.
Don't forget that while some religious organisations strongly objected to gay marriage many others were asking for the rights to be able to perform marriages for gay couples. | Both the top rated answers here reject the premise of the question that The Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Act 2013 was "pushed" through by David Cameron. While the total votes for the Bill were 400 to 175, which suggests a strong majority in favor it is worth noting the under the UK system the government controls the agenda, and given the strong position of the conservative party in the 2010-2015 coalition, that means the Conservative Party at the time the Bill was passed.
The breakdown of the vote can be [seen here](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marriage_(Same_Sex_Couples)_Act_2013) on wikipedia. And while there there is an overall parliamentary majority for the bill, the Conservative Party vote 126 to 134 against The Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Act 2013, so in that sense the Bill was pushed against the wishes of the majority of the party with defacto control of the political agenda.
Unfortunately for this as an answer, it's not clear to me why David Cameron decided to go ahead with this legislation against the majority of his MPs and I haven't been able to find any primary sources regarding his reasoning. The most likely reason is because popular opinion in the UK strongly favoured it at the time. [Wiki-Opinion](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Same-sex_marriage_in_the_United_Kingdom#Public_opinion). According to the linked article support for Gay Marriage had grown from 52% in 2004 rising to 71% in 2012. Although the linked article makes clear these numbers swung wildly depending on the exact wording of the question, as polls only a couple of months apart generate quite different numbers, though almost always with a majority in favour.
In summary, David Cameron pushed the legislation for equal gay marriage through against the opposition of his own party, but with general parliamentary and UK wide popular support, most likely because he agreed with the mood of the country that it was the right thing to do. |
10,376 | There seems to be a widespread sense that the Conservative UK government pushed through legislation to legalise gay marriage.
There appeared to be no great angst with the status quo for gay couples (civil partnerships).
Contrariwise, gay marriage was deeply offensive to many religious people and placed them in a precarious legal position (albeit more perceived than reality) with respect to their deeply held beliefs.
Is this accurate? If so, why did the Conservative government push this legislation through? | 2016/03/27 | [
"https://politics.stackexchange.com/questions/10376",
"https://politics.stackexchange.com",
"https://politics.stackexchange.com/users/6116/"
] | Mr Cameron was PM of a coalition of Conservative and Liberal Democrat MPs at the time of The Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Act 2013, though neither the Conservative 2010 manifesto nor the Coalition Agreement mandated the government to introduce it. The vote for was 400, against 175 and, as such, can not be said to have been pushed through.
The Act covered other aspects of marriage between couples, including sex change of a married person, and consequences for work pensions. In particular, the Act makes clear that marriage is not a religious device; an inter-faith marriage is not always accepted within the respective communities, sometimes resulting in forced conversions, or non-recognition of children.
The Act was largely a sign of the times and somewhat timely due to the coaltion. | There was quite a significant amount of angst prior to the bill being announced, and a long running campaign - with Stonewall, the LGB rights group, having just engaged in a high-profile U-Turn and stating they now supported same-sex marriage.
Alongside that, LibDem MP Lynne Featherstone had been appointed to the Equalities brief as part of the coalition, and her stated personal mission as minister was to get same-sex marriage through.
Cameron had a few choices: Block it and risk the coalition fall apart on a relatively minor issue, Grudgingly let her have her way and be seen as not in control or get behind it 100% and claim it as a Tory rather than LibDem victory.
Generally, it's better in politics to be seen to be strong and wrong than weak but right, so the wholeheartedly embracing it option was the best course of action. |
10,376 | There seems to be a widespread sense that the Conservative UK government pushed through legislation to legalise gay marriage.
There appeared to be no great angst with the status quo for gay couples (civil partnerships).
Contrariwise, gay marriage was deeply offensive to many religious people and placed them in a precarious legal position (albeit more perceived than reality) with respect to their deeply held beliefs.
Is this accurate? If so, why did the Conservative government push this legislation through? | 2016/03/27 | [
"https://politics.stackexchange.com/questions/10376",
"https://politics.stackexchange.com",
"https://politics.stackexchange.com/users/6116/"
] | Mr Cameron was PM of a coalition of Conservative and Liberal Democrat MPs at the time of The Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Act 2013, though neither the Conservative 2010 manifesto nor the Coalition Agreement mandated the government to introduce it. The vote for was 400, against 175 and, as such, can not be said to have been pushed through.
The Act covered other aspects of marriage between couples, including sex change of a married person, and consequences for work pensions. In particular, the Act makes clear that marriage is not a religious device; an inter-faith marriage is not always accepted within the respective communities, sometimes resulting in forced conversions, or non-recognition of children.
The Act was largely a sign of the times and somewhat timely due to the coaltion. | Both the top rated answers here reject the premise of the question that The Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Act 2013 was "pushed" through by David Cameron. While the total votes for the Bill were 400 to 175, which suggests a strong majority in favor it is worth noting the under the UK system the government controls the agenda, and given the strong position of the conservative party in the 2010-2015 coalition, that means the Conservative Party at the time the Bill was passed.
The breakdown of the vote can be [seen here](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marriage_(Same_Sex_Couples)_Act_2013) on wikipedia. And while there there is an overall parliamentary majority for the bill, the Conservative Party vote 126 to 134 against The Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Act 2013, so in that sense the Bill was pushed against the wishes of the majority of the party with defacto control of the political agenda.
Unfortunately for this as an answer, it's not clear to me why David Cameron decided to go ahead with this legislation against the majority of his MPs and I haven't been able to find any primary sources regarding his reasoning. The most likely reason is because popular opinion in the UK strongly favoured it at the time. [Wiki-Opinion](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Same-sex_marriage_in_the_United_Kingdom#Public_opinion). According to the linked article support for Gay Marriage had grown from 52% in 2004 rising to 71% in 2012. Although the linked article makes clear these numbers swung wildly depending on the exact wording of the question, as polls only a couple of months apart generate quite different numbers, though almost always with a majority in favour.
In summary, David Cameron pushed the legislation for equal gay marriage through against the opposition of his own party, but with general parliamentary and UK wide popular support, most likely because he agreed with the mood of the country that it was the right thing to do. |
10,376 | There seems to be a widespread sense that the Conservative UK government pushed through legislation to legalise gay marriage.
There appeared to be no great angst with the status quo for gay couples (civil partnerships).
Contrariwise, gay marriage was deeply offensive to many religious people and placed them in a precarious legal position (albeit more perceived than reality) with respect to their deeply held beliefs.
Is this accurate? If so, why did the Conservative government push this legislation through? | 2016/03/27 | [
"https://politics.stackexchange.com/questions/10376",
"https://politics.stackexchange.com",
"https://politics.stackexchange.com/users/6116/"
] | Both the top rated answers here reject the premise of the question that The Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Act 2013 was "pushed" through by David Cameron. While the total votes for the Bill were 400 to 175, which suggests a strong majority in favor it is worth noting the under the UK system the government controls the agenda, and given the strong position of the conservative party in the 2010-2015 coalition, that means the Conservative Party at the time the Bill was passed.
The breakdown of the vote can be [seen here](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marriage_(Same_Sex_Couples)_Act_2013) on wikipedia. And while there there is an overall parliamentary majority for the bill, the Conservative Party vote 126 to 134 against The Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Act 2013, so in that sense the Bill was pushed against the wishes of the majority of the party with defacto control of the political agenda.
Unfortunately for this as an answer, it's not clear to me why David Cameron decided to go ahead with this legislation against the majority of his MPs and I haven't been able to find any primary sources regarding his reasoning. The most likely reason is because popular opinion in the UK strongly favoured it at the time. [Wiki-Opinion](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Same-sex_marriage_in_the_United_Kingdom#Public_opinion). According to the linked article support for Gay Marriage had grown from 52% in 2004 rising to 71% in 2012. Although the linked article makes clear these numbers swung wildly depending on the exact wording of the question, as polls only a couple of months apart generate quite different numbers, though almost always with a majority in favour.
In summary, David Cameron pushed the legislation for equal gay marriage through against the opposition of his own party, but with general parliamentary and UK wide popular support, most likely because he agreed with the mood of the country that it was the right thing to do. | There was quite a significant amount of angst prior to the bill being announced, and a long running campaign - with Stonewall, the LGB rights group, having just engaged in a high-profile U-Turn and stating they now supported same-sex marriage.
Alongside that, LibDem MP Lynne Featherstone had been appointed to the Equalities brief as part of the coalition, and her stated personal mission as minister was to get same-sex marriage through.
Cameron had a few choices: Block it and risk the coalition fall apart on a relatively minor issue, Grudgingly let her have her way and be seen as not in control or get behind it 100% and claim it as a Tory rather than LibDem victory.
Generally, it's better in politics to be seen to be strong and wrong than weak but right, so the wholeheartedly embracing it option was the best course of action. |
30,909 | So it's my first time using ms project, so forgive me for messing up terminology. Basically the problem is as follows: I have created 3 main tasks with a few subtasks each. I have then asigned predecessors for all tasks. The workdays are mon-fri basically 9-5. Now, there are sometimes a lot of small tasks which follow up on each other. Like contacting a consultant and a cook. However even if i assign one hour or less to such tasks, the next task only starts a day later. This is especially a problem for the last main task which is an event that only takes place for one day. it involves driving and delivering to the location, setting up the stage and the room, and the installations. Some of these tasks could be done at the same time by different people (for which I have also assigned recources). Again, ms Project automatically starts and ends the event on different days, even when i try to change it manually.
Does anybody know what I can do to make sure the event only takes up one day? | 2021/01/05 | [
"https://pm.stackexchange.com/questions/30909",
"https://pm.stackexchange.com",
"https://pm.stackexchange.com/users/43735/"
] | TL;DR
-----
Your goal of encouraging self-managing collective ownership of the product development process is the right one for encouraging team agility. However, the team as whole appears to lack sufficient experience (and possibly the teaming skills) required to fully embrace agility.
The solution is essential to find the X in the implicit X/Y problem. That means identifying the roles and skills missing from the team, and addressing the gaps at a more fundamental level. It seems highly likely that the dysfunction is *organizational*, and probably can't be improved without active leadership from the top.
Analysis and Recommendations
----------------------------
First of all, it's worth noting that you aren't doing formal Scrum, as evidenced by the fact that you have no Scrum Master. Based on your description of the project structure, it seems more likely that you're doing some variation of Kanban or [Scrumbut](https://www.scrum.org/resources/what-scrumbut). The lack of a coaching role or process referee is at least part of the problem, so I'd strongly encourage you to add a Scrum Master, Kanban expert, or agile coach to the team.
Next, acknowledge that you don't actually have a *team*. Instead, you appear to have a group of individual members who are neither self-managing nor collectively invested in delivering a coherent product. This is part of what Scrum was designed to address through its [core accountabilities](https://www.scrumguides.org/scrum-guide.html#scrum-team). While other frameworks certainly allow for agile teams that are real teams, not just a collection of individual contributors, Scrum is the most widely accepted template for encouraging that. You might want to reconsider whether your Kanban or Scrumbut process is sufficient scaffolding for building the type of team you say you want.
Beyond that, you might need to work with line management or senior leadership to determine whether the *organization* is hiring the right sorts of T-shaped people who are *capable* of being self-managing, *want* to be collectively responsible for measurable outcomes, and have the *skills* to collaborate and swarm rather than act solely as individual contributors. Agile frameworks don't magically make mediocre collections of individuals a cohesive team; they simply provide scaffolding that enables self-actualizing people to come together and collaborate more effectively within the limits of their individual skills and abilities.
High [power-distance](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_distance) cultures and organizations often struggle with agile implementations. Companies that hire for narrow technical capabilities and willingness to respect authority frequently run into problems when switching to agile development models that require a different skill set that focuses on:
* creativity,
* independent- and critical-thinking skills,
* a strong drive for collaboration, and
* honest and courageous interpersonal communications.
If the problem is systemic, the problems will need to be addressed top-down from the senior leadership level to gain any real traction. Be honest with yourself, the team, and senior management about the expectations of the team and the skills/experience gaps the team has. It's up to the organization to decide how to fix the expectations they have of the team, and to populate the team with the right people and skills required to make the project successful. Any other approach is simply stepping around the problem without addressing it head-on. | Software developers rarely care about the product they develop and rarely are interested in the domain. If you can find an experienced developer who's interested in the domain - he can start leading the team instead of you. He'll most likely have the same problems as you do, but he's closer to the dev world and will have more authority.
You can also try to get more interest from the team by giving them lectures on the domain. Knowledge may provoke interest. It rarely works, but give it a shot. This will cost you time for sure, but life's not easy :)
Otherwise you'll have to start describing tasks in more details. There's nothing wrong with this - someone has to.
>
> They like to get concrete tasks, very detailed. Which in my opinion is not working well for agile development.
>
>
>
Detailed tasks work fine. In my practice I see that it's actually more performant to separate req & dev activities. It's pretty hard to do both analysis *and* development, even if you *are* able to do both.
It doesn't of course mean that developers should be fully oblivious about the features they work on. If there's a mistake in the requirements they need to be able to spot it.
>
> Shall I make them make the DoD maybe
>
>
>
Well, DoD should be clearly understood by developers anyway. Whether to include requirements review in DoD - that's a good question. Since you want requirements part to be done first - you'll have to make them work on the task description first. But I can't think of a way to formalize this (we don't want devs to just say "yep, I reviewed the description" - this won't cause any changes).
Personally if I have doubts whether a developer can do things right - I ask them to first write in words how they'll implement the task, but this is rather low-level technical thing, that's probably not what you want..
All in all - you have issues with the team. We can spend hours coming up with the ways to encourage them, but usually these problem are solved only by changing the composition of the team. By adding/removing people or changing their roles (e.g. making one of devs responsible for requirements). |
30,909 | So it's my first time using ms project, so forgive me for messing up terminology. Basically the problem is as follows: I have created 3 main tasks with a few subtasks each. I have then asigned predecessors for all tasks. The workdays are mon-fri basically 9-5. Now, there are sometimes a lot of small tasks which follow up on each other. Like contacting a consultant and a cook. However even if i assign one hour or less to such tasks, the next task only starts a day later. This is especially a problem for the last main task which is an event that only takes place for one day. it involves driving and delivering to the location, setting up the stage and the room, and the installations. Some of these tasks could be done at the same time by different people (for which I have also assigned recources). Again, ms Project automatically starts and ends the event on different days, even when i try to change it manually.
Does anybody know what I can do to make sure the event only takes up one day? | 2021/01/05 | [
"https://pm.stackexchange.com/questions/30909",
"https://pm.stackexchange.com",
"https://pm.stackexchange.com/users/43735/"
] | From what you are describing, it looks like:
1. You want your team to be (more) self-organizing and proactive in doing the work, and engaging in conversations with you (the PO) when they spot something missing. You want them to be more Agile.
2. Your developers are more accustomed to being told what to do and to receive detailed task for which they don't really care if there are still unknowns or incomplete things. They seem to be accustomed to a more traditional approach of management.
If you want them to become more Agile, you can't just tell them to go self-organize. That will not work. You need a few things first:
* **a safe environment in which they can make mistakes**. You want an Agile transformation which involves change. And change can be chaotic and confusing. One status quo needs to be replaced with another and the transition will be messy. They will make mistakes, there will be conflicts, there will be undesired results or effects. The team needs to deal with all of this mess, learn from their mistakes, try something else, make a mess, learn, try something else... repeat. Do they have an environment in which they can do this? Or will they be punished for mistakes? Will they be blamed for the mess? Will management intervene to take control of the entire situation and fix things? Will they be pressured to "figure it out already"? If they don't have a safe environment to change in, they will not change.
* even if they have a good environment to work in, **they need guidance**. They might figure things out eventually on their own, but it's always better to give them a helping hand. An experienced Agile coach or experienced Scrum Master, or a new team lead that already has an Agile mindset can pull them out of the existing status quo.
* **competent people**. They might have the support, they might be offered guidance, but if they lack the skills and the proper attitude then no matter how much you try to change the context, the behavior will probably remain unchanged.
* **time**. Even if you are lucky and get the previous things, it will still take some time. Don't expect things to change overnight or in one week. Some Agile teams can even take months to become well oiled machines, while many other teams never truly become Agile but just go through the motions.
Figure out were you stand with all of this, and then you can look for ways to push forward a change. | Software developers rarely care about the product they develop and rarely are interested in the domain. If you can find an experienced developer who's interested in the domain - he can start leading the team instead of you. He'll most likely have the same problems as you do, but he's closer to the dev world and will have more authority.
You can also try to get more interest from the team by giving them lectures on the domain. Knowledge may provoke interest. It rarely works, but give it a shot. This will cost you time for sure, but life's not easy :)
Otherwise you'll have to start describing tasks in more details. There's nothing wrong with this - someone has to.
>
> They like to get concrete tasks, very detailed. Which in my opinion is not working well for agile development.
>
>
>
Detailed tasks work fine. In my practice I see that it's actually more performant to separate req & dev activities. It's pretty hard to do both analysis *and* development, even if you *are* able to do both.
It doesn't of course mean that developers should be fully oblivious about the features they work on. If there's a mistake in the requirements they need to be able to spot it.
>
> Shall I make them make the DoD maybe
>
>
>
Well, DoD should be clearly understood by developers anyway. Whether to include requirements review in DoD - that's a good question. Since you want requirements part to be done first - you'll have to make them work on the task description first. But I can't think of a way to formalize this (we don't want devs to just say "yep, I reviewed the description" - this won't cause any changes).
Personally if I have doubts whether a developer can do things right - I ask them to first write in words how they'll implement the task, but this is rather low-level technical thing, that's probably not what you want..
All in all - you have issues with the team. We can spend hours coming up with the ways to encourage them, but usually these problem are solved only by changing the composition of the team. By adding/removing people or changing their roles (e.g. making one of devs responsible for requirements). |
30,909 | So it's my first time using ms project, so forgive me for messing up terminology. Basically the problem is as follows: I have created 3 main tasks with a few subtasks each. I have then asigned predecessors for all tasks. The workdays are mon-fri basically 9-5. Now, there are sometimes a lot of small tasks which follow up on each other. Like contacting a consultant and a cook. However even if i assign one hour or less to such tasks, the next task only starts a day later. This is especially a problem for the last main task which is an event that only takes place for one day. it involves driving and delivering to the location, setting up the stage and the room, and the installations. Some of these tasks could be done at the same time by different people (for which I have also assigned recources). Again, ms Project automatically starts and ends the event on different days, even when i try to change it manually.
Does anybody know what I can do to make sure the event only takes up one day? | 2021/01/05 | [
"https://pm.stackexchange.com/questions/30909",
"https://pm.stackexchange.com",
"https://pm.stackexchange.com/users/43735/"
] | TL;DR
-----
Your goal of encouraging self-managing collective ownership of the product development process is the right one for encouraging team agility. However, the team as whole appears to lack sufficient experience (and possibly the teaming skills) required to fully embrace agility.
The solution is essential to find the X in the implicit X/Y problem. That means identifying the roles and skills missing from the team, and addressing the gaps at a more fundamental level. It seems highly likely that the dysfunction is *organizational*, and probably can't be improved without active leadership from the top.
Analysis and Recommendations
----------------------------
First of all, it's worth noting that you aren't doing formal Scrum, as evidenced by the fact that you have no Scrum Master. Based on your description of the project structure, it seems more likely that you're doing some variation of Kanban or [Scrumbut](https://www.scrum.org/resources/what-scrumbut). The lack of a coaching role or process referee is at least part of the problem, so I'd strongly encourage you to add a Scrum Master, Kanban expert, or agile coach to the team.
Next, acknowledge that you don't actually have a *team*. Instead, you appear to have a group of individual members who are neither self-managing nor collectively invested in delivering a coherent product. This is part of what Scrum was designed to address through its [core accountabilities](https://www.scrumguides.org/scrum-guide.html#scrum-team). While other frameworks certainly allow for agile teams that are real teams, not just a collection of individual contributors, Scrum is the most widely accepted template for encouraging that. You might want to reconsider whether your Kanban or Scrumbut process is sufficient scaffolding for building the type of team you say you want.
Beyond that, you might need to work with line management or senior leadership to determine whether the *organization* is hiring the right sorts of T-shaped people who are *capable* of being self-managing, *want* to be collectively responsible for measurable outcomes, and have the *skills* to collaborate and swarm rather than act solely as individual contributors. Agile frameworks don't magically make mediocre collections of individuals a cohesive team; they simply provide scaffolding that enables self-actualizing people to come together and collaborate more effectively within the limits of their individual skills and abilities.
High [power-distance](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_distance) cultures and organizations often struggle with agile implementations. Companies that hire for narrow technical capabilities and willingness to respect authority frequently run into problems when switching to agile development models that require a different skill set that focuses on:
* creativity,
* independent- and critical-thinking skills,
* a strong drive for collaboration, and
* honest and courageous interpersonal communications.
If the problem is systemic, the problems will need to be addressed top-down from the senior leadership level to gain any real traction. Be honest with yourself, the team, and senior management about the expectations of the team and the skills/experience gaps the team has. It's up to the organization to decide how to fix the expectations they have of the team, and to populate the team with the right people and skills required to make the project successful. Any other approach is simply stepping around the problem without addressing it head-on. | In my view, I would avoid thinking about this issue in the context of software, Agile, Scrum, Kanban or whatever else. I think you need to focus on teaming models and theories as these cross development methods, ideologies, and even industries and domains. There are several credible models out there that have stood the test of time and you would do well reading about them, learning, and trying to see how you can fit them into your context. The Tuckman model has been around a long time. There is the DISC model and the GRIP model. And there are others to research, too.
There are tactical things you can do for this team now and the other answers can shed a light on that; however, I think you need an understanding of the base upon which those tactical solutions live. |
30,909 | So it's my first time using ms project, so forgive me for messing up terminology. Basically the problem is as follows: I have created 3 main tasks with a few subtasks each. I have then asigned predecessors for all tasks. The workdays are mon-fri basically 9-5. Now, there are sometimes a lot of small tasks which follow up on each other. Like contacting a consultant and a cook. However even if i assign one hour or less to such tasks, the next task only starts a day later. This is especially a problem for the last main task which is an event that only takes place for one day. it involves driving and delivering to the location, setting up the stage and the room, and the installations. Some of these tasks could be done at the same time by different people (for which I have also assigned recources). Again, ms Project automatically starts and ends the event on different days, even when i try to change it manually.
Does anybody know what I can do to make sure the event only takes up one day? | 2021/01/05 | [
"https://pm.stackexchange.com/questions/30909",
"https://pm.stackexchange.com",
"https://pm.stackexchange.com/users/43735/"
] | From what you are describing, it looks like:
1. You want your team to be (more) self-organizing and proactive in doing the work, and engaging in conversations with you (the PO) when they spot something missing. You want them to be more Agile.
2. Your developers are more accustomed to being told what to do and to receive detailed task for which they don't really care if there are still unknowns or incomplete things. They seem to be accustomed to a more traditional approach of management.
If you want them to become more Agile, you can't just tell them to go self-organize. That will not work. You need a few things first:
* **a safe environment in which they can make mistakes**. You want an Agile transformation which involves change. And change can be chaotic and confusing. One status quo needs to be replaced with another and the transition will be messy. They will make mistakes, there will be conflicts, there will be undesired results or effects. The team needs to deal with all of this mess, learn from their mistakes, try something else, make a mess, learn, try something else... repeat. Do they have an environment in which they can do this? Or will they be punished for mistakes? Will they be blamed for the mess? Will management intervene to take control of the entire situation and fix things? Will they be pressured to "figure it out already"? If they don't have a safe environment to change in, they will not change.
* even if they have a good environment to work in, **they need guidance**. They might figure things out eventually on their own, but it's always better to give them a helping hand. An experienced Agile coach or experienced Scrum Master, or a new team lead that already has an Agile mindset can pull them out of the existing status quo.
* **competent people**. They might have the support, they might be offered guidance, but if they lack the skills and the proper attitude then no matter how much you try to change the context, the behavior will probably remain unchanged.
* **time**. Even if you are lucky and get the previous things, it will still take some time. Don't expect things to change overnight or in one week. Some Agile teams can even take months to become well oiled machines, while many other teams never truly become Agile but just go through the motions.
Figure out were you stand with all of this, and then you can look for ways to push forward a change. | TL;DR
-----
Your goal of encouraging self-managing collective ownership of the product development process is the right one for encouraging team agility. However, the team as whole appears to lack sufficient experience (and possibly the teaming skills) required to fully embrace agility.
The solution is essential to find the X in the implicit X/Y problem. That means identifying the roles and skills missing from the team, and addressing the gaps at a more fundamental level. It seems highly likely that the dysfunction is *organizational*, and probably can't be improved without active leadership from the top.
Analysis and Recommendations
----------------------------
First of all, it's worth noting that you aren't doing formal Scrum, as evidenced by the fact that you have no Scrum Master. Based on your description of the project structure, it seems more likely that you're doing some variation of Kanban or [Scrumbut](https://www.scrum.org/resources/what-scrumbut). The lack of a coaching role or process referee is at least part of the problem, so I'd strongly encourage you to add a Scrum Master, Kanban expert, or agile coach to the team.
Next, acknowledge that you don't actually have a *team*. Instead, you appear to have a group of individual members who are neither self-managing nor collectively invested in delivering a coherent product. This is part of what Scrum was designed to address through its [core accountabilities](https://www.scrumguides.org/scrum-guide.html#scrum-team). While other frameworks certainly allow for agile teams that are real teams, not just a collection of individual contributors, Scrum is the most widely accepted template for encouraging that. You might want to reconsider whether your Kanban or Scrumbut process is sufficient scaffolding for building the type of team you say you want.
Beyond that, you might need to work with line management or senior leadership to determine whether the *organization* is hiring the right sorts of T-shaped people who are *capable* of being self-managing, *want* to be collectively responsible for measurable outcomes, and have the *skills* to collaborate and swarm rather than act solely as individual contributors. Agile frameworks don't magically make mediocre collections of individuals a cohesive team; they simply provide scaffolding that enables self-actualizing people to come together and collaborate more effectively within the limits of their individual skills and abilities.
High [power-distance](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_distance) cultures and organizations often struggle with agile implementations. Companies that hire for narrow technical capabilities and willingness to respect authority frequently run into problems when switching to agile development models that require a different skill set that focuses on:
* creativity,
* independent- and critical-thinking skills,
* a strong drive for collaboration, and
* honest and courageous interpersonal communications.
If the problem is systemic, the problems will need to be addressed top-down from the senior leadership level to gain any real traction. Be honest with yourself, the team, and senior management about the expectations of the team and the skills/experience gaps the team has. It's up to the organization to decide how to fix the expectations they have of the team, and to populate the team with the right people and skills required to make the project successful. Any other approach is simply stepping around the problem without addressing it head-on. |
30,909 | So it's my first time using ms project, so forgive me for messing up terminology. Basically the problem is as follows: I have created 3 main tasks with a few subtasks each. I have then asigned predecessors for all tasks. The workdays are mon-fri basically 9-5. Now, there are sometimes a lot of small tasks which follow up on each other. Like contacting a consultant and a cook. However even if i assign one hour or less to such tasks, the next task only starts a day later. This is especially a problem for the last main task which is an event that only takes place for one day. it involves driving and delivering to the location, setting up the stage and the room, and the installations. Some of these tasks could be done at the same time by different people (for which I have also assigned recources). Again, ms Project automatically starts and ends the event on different days, even when i try to change it manually.
Does anybody know what I can do to make sure the event only takes up one day? | 2021/01/05 | [
"https://pm.stackexchange.com/questions/30909",
"https://pm.stackexchange.com",
"https://pm.stackexchange.com/users/43735/"
] | From what you are describing, it looks like:
1. You want your team to be (more) self-organizing and proactive in doing the work, and engaging in conversations with you (the PO) when they spot something missing. You want them to be more Agile.
2. Your developers are more accustomed to being told what to do and to receive detailed task for which they don't really care if there are still unknowns or incomplete things. They seem to be accustomed to a more traditional approach of management.
If you want them to become more Agile, you can't just tell them to go self-organize. That will not work. You need a few things first:
* **a safe environment in which they can make mistakes**. You want an Agile transformation which involves change. And change can be chaotic and confusing. One status quo needs to be replaced with another and the transition will be messy. They will make mistakes, there will be conflicts, there will be undesired results or effects. The team needs to deal with all of this mess, learn from their mistakes, try something else, make a mess, learn, try something else... repeat. Do they have an environment in which they can do this? Or will they be punished for mistakes? Will they be blamed for the mess? Will management intervene to take control of the entire situation and fix things? Will they be pressured to "figure it out already"? If they don't have a safe environment to change in, they will not change.
* even if they have a good environment to work in, **they need guidance**. They might figure things out eventually on their own, but it's always better to give them a helping hand. An experienced Agile coach or experienced Scrum Master, or a new team lead that already has an Agile mindset can pull them out of the existing status quo.
* **competent people**. They might have the support, they might be offered guidance, but if they lack the skills and the proper attitude then no matter how much you try to change the context, the behavior will probably remain unchanged.
* **time**. Even if you are lucky and get the previous things, it will still take some time. Don't expect things to change overnight or in one week. Some Agile teams can even take months to become well oiled machines, while many other teams never truly become Agile but just go through the motions.
Figure out were you stand with all of this, and then you can look for ways to push forward a change. | In my view, I would avoid thinking about this issue in the context of software, Agile, Scrum, Kanban or whatever else. I think you need to focus on teaming models and theories as these cross development methods, ideologies, and even industries and domains. There are several credible models out there that have stood the test of time and you would do well reading about them, learning, and trying to see how you can fit them into your context. The Tuckman model has been around a long time. There is the DISC model and the GRIP model. And there are others to research, too.
There are tactical things you can do for this team now and the other answers can shed a light on that; however, I think you need an understanding of the base upon which those tactical solutions live. |
28,404 | The Star Trek universe and ours are identical (as far as we know) until sometime between the 1960s and 1993. We know from Vic Fontaine and various references to Apollo that the 1960s happened very much like they did in reality. We also know that by the 1990s, there were genetic Augments and that starting in 1992, Khan Singh ruled a quarter of the earth's population. I'm pretty sure that *didn't* happen in real life.
Has Star Trek ever explained this? At some point during the second half of the 20th century, there was a moment when our timeline and theirs diverged. | 2012/12/22 | [
"https://scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/28404",
"https://scifi.stackexchange.com",
"https://scifi.stackexchange.com/users/1973/"
] | There are a couple of hints about it in both TOS and Voyager, and brick bats in Enterprise.
In TOS, the timeline has been muddled with by the Enterprise herself twice... once, in the Season 1 episode *[Tomorrow is Yesterday](http://www.chakoteya.net/StarTrek/21.htm)*, and another in Season 2's *[Assignment: Earth](http://www.chakoteya.net/StarTrek/55.htm)*. In both cases, they are interfering with the very 1960's they were filming in, showing it clearly to be an alternate earth. And that's ignoring The Guardian of Forever and that little drug-induced jaunt to the 1930's.
In Star Trek IV, we see Scotty give the molecular formula for Transparent Aluminum to an engineer in the 1980's. Further direct tampering.
In Voyager, we have \*[Future's End (3.04)](http://www.chakoteya.net/Voyager/304.htm), which is interfering with the timeine.
And Enterprise has the whole Temporal Cold War... so lots of subtle changes happened.
So, from the very earliest days, Kirk, Spock, and McCoy have been altering the timelines.
It's even joked about in DS9 episode *[Trials and Tribble-ations](http://www.chakoteya.net/DS9/503.htm)* that Kirk was a problem:
>
> DULMUR: Be specific, Captain. Which Enterprise? There've been five.
>
> LUCSLY: Six.
>
> SISKO: This was the first Enterprise. Constitution class.
>
> DULMUR: His ship.
>
> LUCSLY: James T Kirk.
>
> SISKO: The one and only.
>
> LUCSLY: Seventeen separate temporal violations. The biggest file on record.
>
> DULMUR: The man was a menace.
>
>
>
It is further worth noting that the Assignment Earth backdrop is the 1960's, and they're launching a military payload on a Saturn V. This never happened in our timeline, so it was divergent by that point already. The Guardian of Forever episode's trip to 1938 or so leaves one man missing; phasered to death (by himself). By 1960, that may have had some effect. Also, we see interference in TNG with the time travel back to the 1880's. Plenty of divergences shown pre-1967. Even a woman running a major shelter and preaching is an oddity in the 1930's.
The *Time's Arrow* Episode of TNG is very much screwing with the timeline and with causality. It pushes back the divergence point into the 1850's. Because of interactions with Guinan, as well, we realize that Earth was being actively meddled with well prior to the TOS episodes' portrayals. | >
> The Star Trek universe and ours are identical (as far as we know) until sometime between the 1960s and 1993. We know from Vic Fontaine and various references to Apollo that the 1960s happened very much like they did in reality. We also know that by the 1990s, there were genetic Augments and that starting in 1992, Khan Singh ruled a quarter of the earth's population. I'm pretty sure that didn't happen in real life.
>
>
> Has Star Trek ever explained this? At some point during the second half of the 20th century, there was a moment when our timeline and theirs diverged.
>
>
>
As recently as 1996 in the second edition of Star Trek Chronology: The History of the Future differences between our universe and the alternate universe of star Trek are noted, but there is no direct statement that our universe and the universe of star trek are alternate and different universes. Events which are never mentioned in any Star Trek movie or episode are listed merely because they happened in our real history, with no realization that they might not have happened in the alternate history of Star Trek.
Star Trek producers and writers have never acknowledged onscreen the difference between the Star Trek timeline and our timeline. It is possible that some of the later stories written after 1996 involving time travel may have been intended first to tell good stories and secondarily to suggest, repeat suggest, possible changes in history which might possibly explain the differences between the two alternate universes.
But no star Trek movie or tv character ever went back in time to Earth's past and pointed out anything in history which was similar or identical to our history and commented that it was different from Earth's recorded history in his timeline.
For example, no Star trek movie or tv character trying to figure out when history was changed ever said: "This book says that a John F. Kennedy was elected president of the US in 1960 and assassinated in 1963, so history must have been changed sometime in or before 1960".
I don't know about star trek books, comic books, etc., so there may be some non canonical reference to the fact that Star Trek is in an alternate universe. |
28,404 | The Star Trek universe and ours are identical (as far as we know) until sometime between the 1960s and 1993. We know from Vic Fontaine and various references to Apollo that the 1960s happened very much like they did in reality. We also know that by the 1990s, there were genetic Augments and that starting in 1992, Khan Singh ruled a quarter of the earth's population. I'm pretty sure that *didn't* happen in real life.
Has Star Trek ever explained this? At some point during the second half of the 20th century, there was a moment when our timeline and theirs diverged. | 2012/12/22 | [
"https://scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/28404",
"https://scifi.stackexchange.com",
"https://scifi.stackexchange.com/users/1973/"
] | There are a couple of hints about it in both TOS and Voyager, and brick bats in Enterprise.
In TOS, the timeline has been muddled with by the Enterprise herself twice... once, in the Season 1 episode *[Tomorrow is Yesterday](http://www.chakoteya.net/StarTrek/21.htm)*, and another in Season 2's *[Assignment: Earth](http://www.chakoteya.net/StarTrek/55.htm)*. In both cases, they are interfering with the very 1960's they were filming in, showing it clearly to be an alternate earth. And that's ignoring The Guardian of Forever and that little drug-induced jaunt to the 1930's.
In Star Trek IV, we see Scotty give the molecular formula for Transparent Aluminum to an engineer in the 1980's. Further direct tampering.
In Voyager, we have \*[Future's End (3.04)](http://www.chakoteya.net/Voyager/304.htm), which is interfering with the timeine.
And Enterprise has the whole Temporal Cold War... so lots of subtle changes happened.
So, from the very earliest days, Kirk, Spock, and McCoy have been altering the timelines.
It's even joked about in DS9 episode *[Trials and Tribble-ations](http://www.chakoteya.net/DS9/503.htm)* that Kirk was a problem:
>
> DULMUR: Be specific, Captain. Which Enterprise? There've been five.
>
> LUCSLY: Six.
>
> SISKO: This was the first Enterprise. Constitution class.
>
> DULMUR: His ship.
>
> LUCSLY: James T Kirk.
>
> SISKO: The one and only.
>
> LUCSLY: Seventeen separate temporal violations. The biggest file on record.
>
> DULMUR: The man was a menace.
>
>
>
It is further worth noting that the Assignment Earth backdrop is the 1960's, and they're launching a military payload on a Saturn V. This never happened in our timeline, so it was divergent by that point already. The Guardian of Forever episode's trip to 1938 or so leaves one man missing; phasered to death (by himself). By 1960, that may have had some effect. Also, we see interference in TNG with the time travel back to the 1880's. Plenty of divergences shown pre-1967. Even a woman running a major shelter and preaching is an oddity in the 1930's.
The *Time's Arrow* Episode of TNG is very much screwing with the timeline and with causality. It pushes back the divergence point into the 1850's. Because of interactions with Guinan, as well, we realize that Earth was being actively meddled with well prior to the TOS episodes' portrayals. | See also Jeffrey Mason "The Disappearing Bum - A Fun look At Time Travels In Star Trek" in *The Best of trek 16* 1991, for a semi serious, semi humorous explanation of how the difference between our timeline and the alternate universe of Star Trek began. |
28,404 | The Star Trek universe and ours are identical (as far as we know) until sometime between the 1960s and 1993. We know from Vic Fontaine and various references to Apollo that the 1960s happened very much like they did in reality. We also know that by the 1990s, there were genetic Augments and that starting in 1992, Khan Singh ruled a quarter of the earth's population. I'm pretty sure that *didn't* happen in real life.
Has Star Trek ever explained this? At some point during the second half of the 20th century, there was a moment when our timeline and theirs diverged. | 2012/12/22 | [
"https://scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/28404",
"https://scifi.stackexchange.com",
"https://scifi.stackexchange.com/users/1973/"
] | >
> The Star Trek universe and ours are identical (as far as we know) until sometime between the 1960s and 1993. We know from Vic Fontaine and various references to Apollo that the 1960s happened very much like they did in reality. We also know that by the 1990s, there were genetic Augments and that starting in 1992, Khan Singh ruled a quarter of the earth's population. I'm pretty sure that didn't happen in real life.
>
>
> Has Star Trek ever explained this? At some point during the second half of the 20th century, there was a moment when our timeline and theirs diverged.
>
>
>
As recently as 1996 in the second edition of Star Trek Chronology: The History of the Future differences between our universe and the alternate universe of star Trek are noted, but there is no direct statement that our universe and the universe of star trek are alternate and different universes. Events which are never mentioned in any Star Trek movie or episode are listed merely because they happened in our real history, with no realization that they might not have happened in the alternate history of Star Trek.
Star Trek producers and writers have never acknowledged onscreen the difference between the Star Trek timeline and our timeline. It is possible that some of the later stories written after 1996 involving time travel may have been intended first to tell good stories and secondarily to suggest, repeat suggest, possible changes in history which might possibly explain the differences between the two alternate universes.
But no star Trek movie or tv character ever went back in time to Earth's past and pointed out anything in history which was similar or identical to our history and commented that it was different from Earth's recorded history in his timeline.
For example, no Star trek movie or tv character trying to figure out when history was changed ever said: "This book says that a John F. Kennedy was elected president of the US in 1960 and assassinated in 1963, so history must have been changed sometime in or before 1960".
I don't know about star trek books, comic books, etc., so there may be some non canonical reference to the fact that Star Trek is in an alternate universe. | See also Jeffrey Mason "The Disappearing Bum - A Fun look At Time Travels In Star Trek" in *The Best of trek 16* 1991, for a semi serious, semi humorous explanation of how the difference between our timeline and the alternate universe of Star Trek began. |
534,717 | >
> At the start of the year unemployment was plumbing new lows.
>
>
>
Can you explain why **"plumbing"** is used and what **"new lows"** means? | 2020/05/18 | [
"https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/534717",
"https://english.stackexchange.com",
"https://english.stackexchange.com/users/385641/"
] | You have to understand the nautical connotation. A sailor would "plumb the depths" of a harbor using a cord with a lead (plumbum) weight on the end of it. In fact, this is where Mark Twain got his moniker.
So, "plumbing new lows" means going "deeper" than previously (in recent history) seen.
(And I'll note that "plumbing" in the sense of pipes gets its name from the common use of lead pipes in prior eras.) | "plumbing" is a sort of measurement.
The rates of unemployment got the lowest points
at various jobs.
That is, the employment rates climbed onto the highest peaks at various fields. |
667 | My son has requested that we add a bedroom to our Heroica castle. I'm looking for some advice on the creation of the bed area.
The Microfig characters are 1x1x2, and the rooms are generally designed to sit on a 6x6 or 8x8 plate, and will have path elements (Tile 2x2 with 1 stud [Part:87580]) on it for the characters and treasure to be placed. | 2011/11/18 | [
"https://bricks.stackexchange.com/questions/667",
"https://bricks.stackexchange.com",
"https://bricks.stackexchange.com/users/56/"
] | Here is my attempt on a 6x6 plate. I built only one wall for the image clarity, but maybe you'd prefer one opposite wall as well.
If you don't have the [tile with the pillow](http://www.bricklink.com/catalogItemIn.asp?P=3069bpx38), replace it with a 1 x 2 slope or something.
Construction details if it's not clear enough:
 | I went with the following set up - note that as the microfig is two bricks high, that means it's actually three studs long:
Castle Bedroom with bedside candle
Castle Bedroom with bedside candle (LDraw) |
8,270,943 | I've created a FormComponentPanel to represent the current time which consists of 3 drop downs for hour and minute and meridiem.
The model object of the FormComponentPanel is a Date object and the model of each drop down represents the selected option, but I need to change the model object in my component according to the options chosen from the drop downs. How can I do that?
Note: I cannot use any other component at this point of the development... I just need to able to get accurate data from the model object. | 2011/11/25 | [
"https://Stackoverflow.com/questions/8270943",
"https://Stackoverflow.com",
"https://Stackoverflow.com/users/674188/"
] | I would propose to use java.util.Calendar instead or even better: [JodaTime](http://joda-time.sourceforge.net/) | I think java.util.Date can be used via 2 ComponentPropertyModel objects, accessing getters/setters as properties "hours", "minutes".
I have no simple idea for "meridiem" property, this need to be coded.
Or use 24h. |
3,810,250 | Lately I asked [**this question**](https://stackoverflow.com/questions/3792039/cant-connect-to-an-online-database-using-my-window-application-c-winforms) regarding connecting my window app to a remote database (MySQL) hosted by some free hosting site. And I got "No way" answers.
How about using a webservice? Is it possible now? | 2010/09/28 | [
"https://Stackoverflow.com/questions/3810250",
"https://Stackoverflow.com",
"https://Stackoverflow.com/users/396335/"
] | Ok (and probably assuming .NET 4.0 on you hosting provider) this should be fairly straightforward:
1. Yes you can access data via a webservice.
2. If you want to with a minimum of effort you can use [WCF Data Services](http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc668792.aspx)
3. Not tried this but...
1. Create a web application
2. "Build" an entity framework model for your data (see [Using MySQL with Entity Framework](https://stackoverflow.com/q/76488/1070) for linking EF to MySQL)
3. Create the data service (which seems mostly to be a matter of doing an add new item in visual studio)
4. Enable access to data service resources - i.e. change some code to make sure you can see what you need.
5. At this point you should end up with CRUD access to your database via a fairly comprehensive web service...
Biggest challenge there will be building the EF model - you really want a local instance of the MySQL database - schema at least - to develop against. | Yes if your webservice is hosted on same server which contains mysql database. You can locally connect to mysql using webservice (which hosting providers allow for sure) and can server data using the service. |
18,413,984 | **Background:**
I have come up with an idea that will make things easier for the company I work for. They even seem excited about the idea. The idea is to make an addin for Outlook to help with a task. So after doing a bit of research (obviously, not enough). I downloaded a trial copy of VS2010 pro and created a VSTO addin.
After creating the addin, it was time to package it for a small test deployment. That's when I found out that this is a much more difficult thing to do. It seems MS does not ship Office 2010 with the runtime needed to run VSTO, so i'd have to package that as well. In a company environment, this is not something simple to do.
So, I might have to go back to the drawing board.
**Meat of the question:**
I've never created an addin for office before, I really want more of a "drop in" solution. I'm not sure if VBA is the right solution. It seems more of a "document" level application (or macro?). Does any one know what would be the best type of solution for this? | 2013/08/24 | [
"https://Stackoverflow.com/questions/18413984",
"https://Stackoverflow.com",
"https://Stackoverflow.com/users/2493605/"
] | Durandal is similar to Angular in that it provides a MV\* framework for client-side SPA web applications.
Angular is mostly, if not all, custom code, whereas Durandal takes existing libraries, mainly Knockout and RequireJS (Sammy dependency has been obviated with the 2.0 release), and provides the plumbing to provide full SPA functionality, including view/view model composition and hash-tag (spa) navigation.
As for Knockout, Durandal relies heavily on Knockout to compose the views and view models. Your view and view model are automatically data-bound when the view is injected into the DOM. The advantage to this is that I can use Knockout to provide the V/VM data-binding, and let Durandal do the work of figuring out which v/vm to use, retrieving it from the server, and composing it into the current screen.
Restated, Durandal provides a way to map views/view models to hash-tag based routes, which give you the SPA navigation. By specifying a `shell`, or layout, view as the main view, a placeholder can be added which Durandal uses to implement what is basically a "screen presenter" pattern. Durandal listens to the URL changes, and can automatically activate, data-bind (using Knockout), and display the view that matches the current URL route.
If you're familiar with WPF, you may think of Durandal as providing Prism-like functionality as its main offering, along with other goodies designed to support building single-page-applications for the web. | Durandal is a "full featured" SPA framework, whereas Knockout is just data-binding. It is similar in scope to Angular. |
18,413,984 | **Background:**
I have come up with an idea that will make things easier for the company I work for. They even seem excited about the idea. The idea is to make an addin for Outlook to help with a task. So after doing a bit of research (obviously, not enough). I downloaded a trial copy of VS2010 pro and created a VSTO addin.
After creating the addin, it was time to package it for a small test deployment. That's when I found out that this is a much more difficult thing to do. It seems MS does not ship Office 2010 with the runtime needed to run VSTO, so i'd have to package that as well. In a company environment, this is not something simple to do.
So, I might have to go back to the drawing board.
**Meat of the question:**
I've never created an addin for office before, I really want more of a "drop in" solution. I'm not sure if VBA is the right solution. It seems more of a "document" level application (or macro?). Does any one know what would be the best type of solution for this? | 2013/08/24 | [
"https://Stackoverflow.com/questions/18413984",
"https://Stackoverflow.com",
"https://Stackoverflow.com/users/2493605/"
] | Durandal is similar to Angular in that it provides a MV\* framework for client-side SPA web applications.
Angular is mostly, if not all, custom code, whereas Durandal takes existing libraries, mainly Knockout and RequireJS (Sammy dependency has been obviated with the 2.0 release), and provides the plumbing to provide full SPA functionality, including view/view model composition and hash-tag (spa) navigation.
As for Knockout, Durandal relies heavily on Knockout to compose the views and view models. Your view and view model are automatically data-bound when the view is injected into the DOM. The advantage to this is that I can use Knockout to provide the V/VM data-binding, and let Durandal do the work of figuring out which v/vm to use, retrieving it from the server, and composing it into the current screen.
Restated, Durandal provides a way to map views/view models to hash-tag based routes, which give you the SPA navigation. By specifying a `shell`, or layout, view as the main view, a placeholder can be added which Durandal uses to implement what is basically a "screen presenter" pattern. Durandal listens to the URL changes, and can automatically activate, data-bind (using Knockout), and display the view that matches the current URL route.
If you're familiar with WPF, you may think of Durandal as providing Prism-like functionality as its main offering, along with other goodies designed to support building single-page-applications for the web. | Durandal has several benefits, but also builds on existing libraries. It has a dependency on
1. RequireJS
2. Knockout
3. jQuery
These are not "maybes." They are hard dependencies. Durandal cannot work without them.
At it's core, Durandal add's the very powerful **compose** binding to knockout. This binding will automatically locate the view (an HTML file) when passed a viewmodel, retrieve it from the server, bind it to the viewmodel, and insert them into the DOM. Similar behavior can be achieved using the knockout `template` binding, but managing the templates can become cumbersome. Composition also adds lifecycle events to the process, which can help ensure that viewmodels are setup and torn-down correctly. It also provides optional DOM caching.
Durandal also provides some framework structure. It provides a simple plugin API, which is used by its **router** to give SPA navigation via hash or push-state. It encourages the organization of viewmodels and views by overridable convention, as well as the use of Require AMD modules. It also provides a simple event module to allow application wide events to be created and consumed. |
18,413,984 | **Background:**
I have come up with an idea that will make things easier for the company I work for. They even seem excited about the idea. The idea is to make an addin for Outlook to help with a task. So after doing a bit of research (obviously, not enough). I downloaded a trial copy of VS2010 pro and created a VSTO addin.
After creating the addin, it was time to package it for a small test deployment. That's when I found out that this is a much more difficult thing to do. It seems MS does not ship Office 2010 with the runtime needed to run VSTO, so i'd have to package that as well. In a company environment, this is not something simple to do.
So, I might have to go back to the drawing board.
**Meat of the question:**
I've never created an addin for office before, I really want more of a "drop in" solution. I'm not sure if VBA is the right solution. It seems more of a "document" level application (or macro?). Does any one know what would be the best type of solution for this? | 2013/08/24 | [
"https://Stackoverflow.com/questions/18413984",
"https://Stackoverflow.com",
"https://Stackoverflow.com/users/2493605/"
] | Durandal is similar to Angular in that it provides a MV\* framework for client-side SPA web applications.
Angular is mostly, if not all, custom code, whereas Durandal takes existing libraries, mainly Knockout and RequireJS (Sammy dependency has been obviated with the 2.0 release), and provides the plumbing to provide full SPA functionality, including view/view model composition and hash-tag (spa) navigation.
As for Knockout, Durandal relies heavily on Knockout to compose the views and view models. Your view and view model are automatically data-bound when the view is injected into the DOM. The advantage to this is that I can use Knockout to provide the V/VM data-binding, and let Durandal do the work of figuring out which v/vm to use, retrieving it from the server, and composing it into the current screen.
Restated, Durandal provides a way to map views/view models to hash-tag based routes, which give you the SPA navigation. By specifying a `shell`, or layout, view as the main view, a placeholder can be added which Durandal uses to implement what is basically a "screen presenter" pattern. Durandal listens to the URL changes, and can automatically activate, data-bind (using Knockout), and display the view that matches the current URL route.
If you're familiar with WPF, you may think of Durandal as providing Prism-like functionality as its main offering, along with other goodies designed to support building single-page-applications for the web. | Magento 2 stand on Knockout and RequireJS.
Durandal can be added on top of it so more possibility come with use latest features (components, templates etc).
It is better because:
* it is more stable and major than other framework, less errors occur
* great documentation
* simple api
* more SEO friendly! (you can have all html seved and use it like component, mixed situation). Angular 2 stand on mixing logic with presentation.
* html5 standard data and binding with better code redability (just try read html in react)
* still maintained
* creator of Durandal was for some time Angular Developer (3 month) so there is some similarity going on there in thinking.
* Work in old browser ! (IE6 >)
There also cons but mainly because it don't give so much function in one pack and not newly, cutting edge technology, was adopted.
Pleas share more point about Durandal :)
More there: <https://johnpapa.net/compare-durandal-to-angular-not-knockout-to-angular/> |
18,413,984 | **Background:**
I have come up with an idea that will make things easier for the company I work for. They even seem excited about the idea. The idea is to make an addin for Outlook to help with a task. So after doing a bit of research (obviously, not enough). I downloaded a trial copy of VS2010 pro and created a VSTO addin.
After creating the addin, it was time to package it for a small test deployment. That's when I found out that this is a much more difficult thing to do. It seems MS does not ship Office 2010 with the runtime needed to run VSTO, so i'd have to package that as well. In a company environment, this is not something simple to do.
So, I might have to go back to the drawing board.
**Meat of the question:**
I've never created an addin for office before, I really want more of a "drop in" solution. I'm not sure if VBA is the right solution. It seems more of a "document" level application (or macro?). Does any one know what would be the best type of solution for this? | 2013/08/24 | [
"https://Stackoverflow.com/questions/18413984",
"https://Stackoverflow.com",
"https://Stackoverflow.com/users/2493605/"
] | Durandal is a "full featured" SPA framework, whereas Knockout is just data-binding. It is similar in scope to Angular. | Magento 2 stand on Knockout and RequireJS.
Durandal can be added on top of it so more possibility come with use latest features (components, templates etc).
It is better because:
* it is more stable and major than other framework, less errors occur
* great documentation
* simple api
* more SEO friendly! (you can have all html seved and use it like component, mixed situation). Angular 2 stand on mixing logic with presentation.
* html5 standard data and binding with better code redability (just try read html in react)
* still maintained
* creator of Durandal was for some time Angular Developer (3 month) so there is some similarity going on there in thinking.
* Work in old browser ! (IE6 >)
There also cons but mainly because it don't give so much function in one pack and not newly, cutting edge technology, was adopted.
Pleas share more point about Durandal :)
More there: <https://johnpapa.net/compare-durandal-to-angular-not-knockout-to-angular/> |
18,413,984 | **Background:**
I have come up with an idea that will make things easier for the company I work for. They even seem excited about the idea. The idea is to make an addin for Outlook to help with a task. So after doing a bit of research (obviously, not enough). I downloaded a trial copy of VS2010 pro and created a VSTO addin.
After creating the addin, it was time to package it for a small test deployment. That's when I found out that this is a much more difficult thing to do. It seems MS does not ship Office 2010 with the runtime needed to run VSTO, so i'd have to package that as well. In a company environment, this is not something simple to do.
So, I might have to go back to the drawing board.
**Meat of the question:**
I've never created an addin for office before, I really want more of a "drop in" solution. I'm not sure if VBA is the right solution. It seems more of a "document" level application (or macro?). Does any one know what would be the best type of solution for this? | 2013/08/24 | [
"https://Stackoverflow.com/questions/18413984",
"https://Stackoverflow.com",
"https://Stackoverflow.com/users/2493605/"
] | Durandal has several benefits, but also builds on existing libraries. It has a dependency on
1. RequireJS
2. Knockout
3. jQuery
These are not "maybes." They are hard dependencies. Durandal cannot work without them.
At it's core, Durandal add's the very powerful **compose** binding to knockout. This binding will automatically locate the view (an HTML file) when passed a viewmodel, retrieve it from the server, bind it to the viewmodel, and insert them into the DOM. Similar behavior can be achieved using the knockout `template` binding, but managing the templates can become cumbersome. Composition also adds lifecycle events to the process, which can help ensure that viewmodels are setup and torn-down correctly. It also provides optional DOM caching.
Durandal also provides some framework structure. It provides a simple plugin API, which is used by its **router** to give SPA navigation via hash or push-state. It encourages the organization of viewmodels and views by overridable convention, as well as the use of Require AMD modules. It also provides a simple event module to allow application wide events to be created and consumed. | Magento 2 stand on Knockout and RequireJS.
Durandal can be added on top of it so more possibility come with use latest features (components, templates etc).
It is better because:
* it is more stable and major than other framework, less errors occur
* great documentation
* simple api
* more SEO friendly! (you can have all html seved and use it like component, mixed situation). Angular 2 stand on mixing logic with presentation.
* html5 standard data and binding with better code redability (just try read html in react)
* still maintained
* creator of Durandal was for some time Angular Developer (3 month) so there is some similarity going on there in thinking.
* Work in old browser ! (IE6 >)
There also cons but mainly because it don't give so much function in one pack and not newly, cutting edge technology, was adopted.
Pleas share more point about Durandal :)
More there: <https://johnpapa.net/compare-durandal-to-angular-not-knockout-to-angular/> |
6,554,671 | I need to access a website and get information through it. I need to pass through an ldap authentication in ie for this.i just know the ip of the LDAP server.I thought of doing this through JNDI but still I don't know how to get the parameters of the server for authentication. Could someone tell me how to pass on the authentication connecting to this server. | 2011/07/02 | [
"https://Stackoverflow.com/questions/6554671",
"https://Stackoverflow.com",
"https://Stackoverflow.com/users/737993/"
] | With a rather vague question I am just going to point you to [Spring LDAP](http://www.springsource.org/ldap) which is easy to use and has good documentation on all things related to LDAP and Java. | You can't 'find' it, and you can't 'get' the server parameters for authentication either. You have to know it all in advance. You can make this stuff configuration parameters of your Web-app. In Tomcat you can define an LDAP Resource in context.xml and support it via an LdapObectFactory as described in the Tomcat Resource documentation. |
6,554,671 | I need to access a website and get information through it. I need to pass through an ldap authentication in ie for this.i just know the ip of the LDAP server.I thought of doing this through JNDI but still I don't know how to get the parameters of the server for authentication. Could someone tell me how to pass on the authentication connecting to this server. | 2011/07/02 | [
"https://Stackoverflow.com/questions/6554671",
"https://Stackoverflow.com",
"https://Stackoverflow.com/users/737993/"
] | With a rather vague question I am just going to point you to [Spring LDAP](http://www.springsource.org/ldap) which is easy to use and has good documentation on all things related to LDAP and Java. | you "need" the information about the server's (host) ip or name and the base DN of the directory where you entries are. you aren't going to find this anywhere - these will be specified by the server that you are trying to connect to.
This is how you generally authenticate against a ldap server:
1. Get login (or email) and password from user.
2. Bind to the LDAP server anonymously (or using a service account if
anonymous binds are disabled)
3. Search the directory using an appropriate filter to identify the
record for the specific login name provided.
4. If one and only one entry is returned, that is the entry you want
- get the DN of the entry. (If zero, or more than one entries are
returned, return "no such user")
5. Re-bind to the LDAP directory using the DN returned in step 4 and
the password from step 1
6. If the LDAP server allows the bind, the login is successful.
Otherwise, return "invalid password" |
41,949 | It says on a dictionary that ‘bang’ means to hit violently or noisily. However, I think the following *bang* means merely put or place because the object is a rat and because Ron ‘placed him’ after the witch’s words.
But why is she saying “bang” in this situation?
(Ron is talking with the consultant witch of a magical pet shop.)
>
> ”It’s my rat,” he told the witch. “He’s been a bit off-color ever since I brought him back from Egypt.”
>
>
> ”Bang him on the counter,” said the witch, pulling a pair of heavy black spectacles out of her pocket.
>
>
> Ron lifted Scabbers out of his inside pocket and placed him next to the cage of his fellow rats, …(*Harry Potter 3* [US Version]: p.58)
>
>
> | 2011/09/15 | [
"https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/41949",
"https://english.stackexchange.com",
"https://english.stackexchange.com/users/-1/"
] | It means that even though it may not have been necessary, the officials sent the escort as a precaution. "Caution" is a synonym for "carefulness" and "prudence," so in acting out of an "abundance of caution," the officials were acting with a lot of carefulness.
The common English saying "Better to be safe than sorry" expresses the same idea. | It means, "somebody panicked and we wasted $50 thou of the taxpayers' money almost shooting down a civilian airliner and now we need a catch-phrase to justify it."
"Three people locked themselves in the bathroom." *Everyone* locks himself in the bathroom. On an airplane, the light won't even go on until you lock yourself in there. The (false) implication was, people locked themselves in *and wouldn't come out*.
In fact, two people spent more time in the bathroom than some third person felt was appropriate. When the two finished using the bathroom *for its intended purpose*, they returned peaceably to their seats.
The upshot was people sitting near the third person gave him that "Dude, what is *wrong* with you?" look and the whole matter was forgotten. Hah-hah, I'm kidding of course: the upshot was the US Air Force (old motto: "Aim High!", new motto: "Faster than you can take a crap!") scrambled two F-16s in order to ...
Well, what? In the four serious attempts to crash US airliners since the WTC attacks, the attackers in every case were tackled and immobilized by fellow passengers, who reasoned, correctly, that it wouldn't matter to them whether they died crashing into a corn-field or into an office building but it make a big difference to other people. Even if those two guys in the lavatories had been carrying something more dangerous than loose bowels, they still wouldn't have been able to commandeer or destroy the plane.
The F-16s, by contrast, were perfectly capable of bring down the flight and killing all aboard. Don't think it could happen? Ask the passengers of [Korean Air Lines Flight 007](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korean_Air_Lines_Flight_007) or [Iran Air Flight 655](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran_Air_Flight_655). They too were brought down by "an abundance of caution."
**OBLIGATORY ENGLISH.STACKEXCHANGE CONTENT**
Why do I bring this up here? Why not post it in rants.stackexchange.com? (No, it doesn't exist but I totally fell for it the first time somebody suggested I go there.) Because you don't have be George Orwell to see that corrupted language is used by dishonest people -- dishonest politicians in particular but dishonest people in general -- to hide what they're doing and thereby continue doing it.
Yes, "an abundance of caution" literally means something like "better safe than sorry" but in this context and many others it means "I panicked and wasted a lot of money and endangered some innocent people and now I want you to help us all pretend I'm not an idiot".
It's important that we use language (when we speak and when we listen) precisely and carefully, so idiots like the FAA guy don't get away with their idiocy.
I now return you to your regularly scheduled web-site. All "tl;dr" will be stoically acknowledged. |
41,949 | It says on a dictionary that ‘bang’ means to hit violently or noisily. However, I think the following *bang* means merely put or place because the object is a rat and because Ron ‘placed him’ after the witch’s words.
But why is she saying “bang” in this situation?
(Ron is talking with the consultant witch of a magical pet shop.)
>
> ”It’s my rat,” he told the witch. “He’s been a bit off-color ever since I brought him back from Egypt.”
>
>
> ”Bang him on the counter,” said the witch, pulling a pair of heavy black spectacles out of her pocket.
>
>
> Ron lifted Scabbers out of his inside pocket and placed him next to the cage of his fellow rats, …(*Harry Potter 3* [US Version]: p.58)
>
>
> | 2011/09/15 | [
"https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/41949",
"https://english.stackexchange.com",
"https://english.stackexchange.com/users/-1/"
] | It means that even though it may not have been necessary, the officials sent the escort as a precaution. "Caution" is a synonym for "carefulness" and "prudence," so in acting out of an "abundance of caution," the officials were acting with a lot of carefulness.
The common English saying "Better to be safe than sorry" expresses the same idea. | The origin is a Latin phrase, *ex abundante cautela*, used in Roman courts, and transferred to English/American courtrooms, and then to everyday life. The original phrase refers to verbiage in a contract specifying (for example) what happens if a 90-year old has further children. Since there has been a recent move from using Latin phrases which not everyone understands to using English translations, which (as in this case) not even the user understands, the usual meaning is approximately "there's no good reason". |
75,108 | Can anyone help me with solving this puzzle:
Draw arrows in all fields around the diagram in a way that every arrow is pointing at least one number inside. The numbers inside the boxes equal the number of arrows pointing at them. The arrows can point horizontally, vertically or diagonally.
Here is an [example](https://rohanrao.blogspot.com/2010/11/puzzle-no328.html) showing how to solve this type of puzzle.
![arrows puzzle[1]](https://i.stack.imgur.com/EzcXY.jpg)
This is from a job interview so I have no source. | 2018/11/13 | [
"https://puzzling.stackexchange.com/questions/75108",
"https://puzzling.stackexchange.com",
"https://puzzling.stackexchange.com/users/53877/"
] | I think this is the answer desired:
>
> [](https://i.stack.imgur.com/8Tmoa.png)
>
>
>
I started by
>
> Assuming at least one arrows each in an inverted A shape, based on the prevalence of 5s and 4s, in columns 1 and 4, and rows 2 and 4. After that, it was primarily guesswork, placing lines, then working backwards to determine what arrows would cause those lines.
>
>
> | This solution:
>
> 1. places an arrow in every field around the diagram;
> 2. each arrow points at one or more numbers inside;
> 3. satisfies the condition of having the numbers in the boxes equaling the numbers of arrows pointing at them!
>
>
>
That being said, the person who is giving you the interview may not like it.
>
> [](https://i.stack.imgur.com/oSRPy.jpg)
>
>
>
:P |
75,108 | Can anyone help me with solving this puzzle:
Draw arrows in all fields around the diagram in a way that every arrow is pointing at least one number inside. The numbers inside the boxes equal the number of arrows pointing at them. The arrows can point horizontally, vertically or diagonally.
Here is an [example](https://rohanrao.blogspot.com/2010/11/puzzle-no328.html) showing how to solve this type of puzzle.
![arrows puzzle[1]](https://i.stack.imgur.com/EzcXY.jpg)
This is from a job interview so I have no source. | 2018/11/13 | [
"https://puzzling.stackexchange.com/questions/75108",
"https://puzzling.stackexchange.com",
"https://puzzling.stackexchange.com/users/53877/"
] | The first clue I spotted was:
>
> The second column has exactly one vertical arrow.
>
>
>
This can be proven as:
>
> It can't have two vertical arrows because of the 1 in it. If it has zero vertical arrows, then the 4 at (2,2) is forced, and then the 4 at (2,4) is forced. But then the 4 at (4,4) can't be achieved, because of it's six arrow squares, three have already been used: (4,0), (0,4) and (3,5).
>
>
>
Secondly you can spot that:
>
> As the 1 in the second column is already covered, the arrows on row 1 must point diagonally downwards.
>
>
> | This solution:
>
> 1. places an arrow in every field around the diagram;
> 2. each arrow points at one or more numbers inside;
> 3. satisfies the condition of having the numbers in the boxes equaling the numbers of arrows pointing at them!
>
>
>
That being said, the person who is giving you the interview may not like it.
>
> [](https://i.stack.imgur.com/oSRPy.jpg)
>
>
>
:P |
75,108 | Can anyone help me with solving this puzzle:
Draw arrows in all fields around the diagram in a way that every arrow is pointing at least one number inside. The numbers inside the boxes equal the number of arrows pointing at them. The arrows can point horizontally, vertically or diagonally.
Here is an [example](https://rohanrao.blogspot.com/2010/11/puzzle-no328.html) showing how to solve this type of puzzle.
![arrows puzzle[1]](https://i.stack.imgur.com/EzcXY.jpg)
This is from a job interview so I have no source. | 2018/11/13 | [
"https://puzzling.stackexchange.com/questions/75108",
"https://puzzling.stackexchange.com",
"https://puzzling.stackexchange.com/users/53877/"
] | I think this is the answer desired:
>
> [](https://i.stack.imgur.com/8Tmoa.png)
>
>
>
I started by
>
> Assuming at least one arrows each in an inverted A shape, based on the prevalence of 5s and 4s, in columns 1 and 4, and rows 2 and 4. After that, it was primarily guesswork, placing lines, then working backwards to determine what arrows would cause those lines.
>
>
> | This is a possibility:
>
> 
>
>
>
I'm sure there are others. |
75,108 | Can anyone help me with solving this puzzle:
Draw arrows in all fields around the diagram in a way that every arrow is pointing at least one number inside. The numbers inside the boxes equal the number of arrows pointing at them. The arrows can point horizontally, vertically or diagonally.
Here is an [example](https://rohanrao.blogspot.com/2010/11/puzzle-no328.html) showing how to solve this type of puzzle.
![arrows puzzle[1]](https://i.stack.imgur.com/EzcXY.jpg)
This is from a job interview so I have no source. | 2018/11/13 | [
"https://puzzling.stackexchange.com/questions/75108",
"https://puzzling.stackexchange.com",
"https://puzzling.stackexchange.com/users/53877/"
] | The first clue I spotted was:
>
> The second column has exactly one vertical arrow.
>
>
>
This can be proven as:
>
> It can't have two vertical arrows because of the 1 in it. If it has zero vertical arrows, then the 4 at (2,2) is forced, and then the 4 at (2,4) is forced. But then the 4 at (4,4) can't be achieved, because of it's six arrow squares, three have already been used: (4,0), (0,4) and (3,5).
>
>
>
Secondly you can spot that:
>
> As the 1 in the second column is already covered, the arrows on row 1 must point diagonally downwards.
>
>
> | This is a possibility:
>
> 
>
>
>
I'm sure there are others. |
1,706,533 | I have a raspberry pi currently set up with Pi-Hole. Unfortunately, I cannot change the DNS settings on my ISP provided router (called a "Funbox 3.0"). It has a DNS tab with textboxes for "primary IPv4 DNS" and "secondary IPv4 DNS", but they're greyed out and cannot be modified.
This means I can't automagically have all devices on my network use the Pi-Hole for DNS instead of the router.
Are these DNS settings part of the DHCP protocol, or are they a separate thing? i.e. If I turn off DHCP on my router and then turn it on in Pi-Hole, will the DNS settings now also also point to the Pi-Hole? | 2022/02/23 | [
"https://superuser.com/questions/1706533",
"https://superuser.com",
"https://superuser.com/users/526130/"
] | Typically, a DHCP server supplies devices with the at least following:
* an IP address
* the subnet mask
* the IP address of the router responsible for communication outside the subnet
* the time this is valid for
* and important for this: the address of at least one DNS server(which the client does not have to use)
PiHole does include its own optional DHCP server.
I did run this exact setup successfully for a few years.
There is also a [Tutorial](https://discourse.pi-hole.net/t/how-do-i-use-pi-holes-built-in-dhcp-server-and-why-would-i-want-to/3026) on the pi-hole forum with detailed instructions, and they explicitly state this as a potential solution to your problem. | Even if you cannot change the DNS setting on the router, nothing prevents
you for setting a different DNS server on each of your devices.
You can therefore set your computers to use your own internal DNS server.
This won't conflict with the router of the ISP. |
1,706,533 | I have a raspberry pi currently set up with Pi-Hole. Unfortunately, I cannot change the DNS settings on my ISP provided router (called a "Funbox 3.0"). It has a DNS tab with textboxes for "primary IPv4 DNS" and "secondary IPv4 DNS", but they're greyed out and cannot be modified.
This means I can't automagically have all devices on my network use the Pi-Hole for DNS instead of the router.
Are these DNS settings part of the DHCP protocol, or are they a separate thing? i.e. If I turn off DHCP on my router and then turn it on in Pi-Hole, will the DNS settings now also also point to the Pi-Hole? | 2022/02/23 | [
"https://superuser.com/questions/1706533",
"https://superuser.com",
"https://superuser.com/users/526130/"
] | Typically, a DHCP server supplies devices with the at least following:
* an IP address
* the subnet mask
* the IP address of the router responsible for communication outside the subnet
* the time this is valid for
* and important for this: the address of at least one DNS server(which the client does not have to use)
PiHole does include its own optional DHCP server.
I did run this exact setup successfully for a few years.
There is also a [Tutorial](https://discourse.pi-hole.net/t/how-do-i-use-pi-holes-built-in-dhcp-server-and-why-would-i-want-to/3026) on the pi-hole forum with detailed instructions, and they explicitly state this as a potential solution to your problem. | DHCP and DNS are 2 separate services.
However: In most cases the DHCP server tells the DHCP clients which DNS servers to use.
If you can't configure the provider router to supply your own DNS server to the clients there are basically 2 solutions:
1. You can always configure your clients to use an alternative DNS server (your pihole) if you are willing to manually configure each client (and this can be a major hassle in some cases).
2. The most flexible option is to setup your own DHCP server that supplies ip-adresses and the DNS settings to the clients, but this is only feasible if the DHCP in the provider-router can be completely turned OFF. If it remains running you will have 2 DHCP servers on your network, which will cause major problems.
(The DHCP can be done on the pi in parallel to its pihole functionality.) |
9,367,094 | I am learning Java EE and wanna build up a complete management system for a restaurant. Now I am confused what presentation layer should I use for my RMS because I heard that the struts 2 is one of the best UI layer but, the thing is, if I am using spring for my business logic layer then I can use the spring MVC can't I? By the way, I am really interested to build a complete application which is follow the multi-tier architecture. | 2012/02/20 | [
"https://Stackoverflow.com/questions/9367094",
"https://Stackoverflow.com",
"https://Stackoverflow.com/users/1218008/"
] | Yes, of course you can use Spring MVC.
You can use Struts 2 if you'd like as well, because Spring integrates with it nicely.
But I don't see any reason why you'd want to do that. The person who told you that Struts 2 is
>
> one of the best UI layer [sic]
>
>
>
is misguided. If you compare it to Spring MVC, you'll see that the two are based on similar ideas, but Spring improves on Struts. JSF has superceded Struts as the default Java EE web view technology, so it's not even considered "best" by the Java EE standard.
Stick with Spring. You won't be sorry. | I will not blame struts 2, indeed it's a great product, I work with it every day. But in my experience spring MVC is a lot simpler and clearer. This doesn't mean you don't get as much features.
Try both, and you'll see what I mean.
Tell us which one you choose! |
6,523 | Note: I have figured out one case: The meteor is splash from an impact on a close-in moon. I'm looking for any path from deep space.
My understanding is that anything from deep space will inherently pick up the escape velocity in it's fall and thus there is no possibility in the simple case. I'm not so sure about what could happen after an encounter with one or more moons, though. | 2014/10/05 | [
"https://astronomy.stackexchange.com/questions/6523",
"https://astronomy.stackexchange.com",
"https://astronomy.stackexchange.com/users/2036/"
] | If you mean the escape velocity of the Earth, then no. Any meteor that enters the earth's atmosphere and burns up or collides with the earth must have had higher than the escape velocity, purely because they were not from that one body.
Unless of course as you say they have ricocheted of another object in orbit sufficiently reducing the kinetic energy to below escape levels | Edited. I thought about this wrong.
A slowly spiraling in orbit would hit the earth at not much more than orbital speed, which is escape velocity over the square root of 2, but not a meteor approaching from a distance, so I thought about this the wrong way. Answer is no. |
114,110 | What I plan for my campaign is to drop hints about some greater evil, and whenever my players reach the natural point of realization, have them go off on a search to stop it. I wanna do it naturally, so I don't have a point in mind where I have a big reveal, I want to players to create it, in a manner of speaking.
How do I foreshadow the Big Bad (without leaving too large a trail of clues so that they realize it too soon after the campaign starts) so there's not that same anticipation, but not so vague that they get frustrated? | 2018/01/25 | [
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/114110",
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com",
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com/users/41952/"
] | I like to use some mechanics from the [Gumshoe](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gumshoe_System) RPG system for these sort of mystery like elements.
Notably, Gumshoe has key clues which PC can't fail to find as long as they look. I would take some time to come up with 4-5 key clues. They should be things or pieces of information that the PCs can use to solve the mystery and it will require that they get most, if not all, to solve.
Quick Example:
Key Clues
1. You find a half eaten carrot, but the bite marks don't seem human.
2. The only thing you notice is a pile of strange glowing ooze. As you're looking at it, a rat climbs out and you realize that its slowly growing bigger.
3. When you inspect the body, you notice that he is clutching a lucky rabbit's foot.
4. The man tells you that someone let Farmer Jed's prized bunnies out of their cage; the locals helped find most of them but there might still be a few running around town.
The Finale: A large mutant rabbit lumbers towards you, it looks like it wants to fight.
The clues are vague and even with all of them you might not realize there is a giant mutant rabbit behind the scenes, but once you see one everything pieces it's self together.
If you want the problem to be more solvable you can add more clues, secondary clues that people won't necessarily find, or create clues that are less vague.
To make it harder to solve, you can add red herrings or multiple bad guys leaving clues.
With foreshadowing in particular it's less important that the mystery is solvable and more important that things line up in hindsight. | It's hard to give specific examples, since every campaign is different, but what I might suggest is the use of red herrings. Rather than giving your players no clues, maybe give them a bunch of clues - some which seem related, or some entirely unrelated. Have similar clues appear at different 'events', and maybe some of those clues link together in ways which only become apparent when they find another connecting clue or note.
Using a note to tip the players off can also work as a hard-end for how long it should take them to work it out, and can potentially blow their minds if it suddenly connects all the previous clues by making them see them in a different light. |
114,110 | What I plan for my campaign is to drop hints about some greater evil, and whenever my players reach the natural point of realization, have them go off on a search to stop it. I wanna do it naturally, so I don't have a point in mind where I have a big reveal, I want to players to create it, in a manner of speaking.
How do I foreshadow the Big Bad (without leaving too large a trail of clues so that they realize it too soon after the campaign starts) so there's not that same anticipation, but not so vague that they get frustrated? | 2018/01/25 | [
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/114110",
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com",
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com/users/41952/"
] | When I want to let the PCs find the Big Bad in their own sweet time, I use a similar logic of the [Einstein Logic Puzzle](http://www.begent.org/einstein.htm). I sort the readily known facts and the unknown facts and see which one are absolutely needed to reach the fact through inference. Half of my players love the challenge, the other half are more "SMASH!" types, I just do other things for their fun.
After sorting, I put the facts in the world and let them discover at their own pace. Sometimes they solve it with brains, sometimes with might. Most of the times they find the Big Bad in a good time, but once they found it really soon by chance (really, one player had a hunch and did something crazy that paid off) and another a Kingdom fell because they made a wrong turn (stuff happens).
I don't know if you can use it in your campaign, but this method does exactly what do you want.
I'm doing an impromptu example, so it will not be challenging.
**Facts:**
1. The big bad is a devil summoner.
2. A paladin detected evil in the devil summoner, but couldn't see him/her properly.
3. Three people had previously said that they would laugh if the city turned to ashes. Jahad, Klein and Mira.
**Unknown Facts (Clues):**
1. Klein was never seen using magic.
2. Mira is temperamental and prone to violence.
3. Jahad spend half of his days drunk since his wife demise.
4. Klein is a disgraced fallen noble.
5. Mira graduated in a Bard School.
6. Jahad was apprentice of a Royal Wizard.
7. Klein is the chief of a local crime syndicate.
8. Mira was sexually assaulted by the duke as a teenager and despises him.
9. Jahad is addicted to gamble and has money problems.
10. Mira killed a man that harassed her last year and left him in pieces.
11. The necromancer in the graveyard was was loyal the devil summoner, and destroyed his own body before being captured.
12. Jahad gave his wands to Klein to pay a debt.
13. The 2nd victim was Mira's old friend, Jahad's lover and Klein's employee.
14. Klein's day job is of a respected merchant, trusted by his suppliers and clients.
15. Jahad mother's was executed by the duke for murder of a noble.
16. An used blank spell scroll was found near the third summoning that day.
17. A waitress stole a Wall of Chaos scroll from the drunken Jahad and sold at the black market.
18. A speak with dead spell with the 4th victim reveals that the summoner uses scrolls to summon.
19. Jahad killed 3 bandits with a Scorching Ray.
20. Klein has a wand chamber hidden in his shortsword.
The clues are not readily available, they need to search while other things happen and the story advances. Like I said, this example isn't very challenging if you get 5 or 6 of the most important clues. | It's hard to give specific examples, since every campaign is different, but what I might suggest is the use of red herrings. Rather than giving your players no clues, maybe give them a bunch of clues - some which seem related, or some entirely unrelated. Have similar clues appear at different 'events', and maybe some of those clues link together in ways which only become apparent when they find another connecting clue or note.
Using a note to tip the players off can also work as a hard-end for how long it should take them to work it out, and can potentially blow their minds if it suddenly connects all the previous clues by making them see them in a different light. |
114,110 | What I plan for my campaign is to drop hints about some greater evil, and whenever my players reach the natural point of realization, have them go off on a search to stop it. I wanna do it naturally, so I don't have a point in mind where I have a big reveal, I want to players to create it, in a manner of speaking.
How do I foreshadow the Big Bad (without leaving too large a trail of clues so that they realize it too soon after the campaign starts) so there's not that same anticipation, but not so vague that they get frustrated? | 2018/01/25 | [
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/114110",
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com",
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com/users/41952/"
] | When I want to let the PCs find the Big Bad in their own sweet time, I use a similar logic of the [Einstein Logic Puzzle](http://www.begent.org/einstein.htm). I sort the readily known facts and the unknown facts and see which one are absolutely needed to reach the fact through inference. Half of my players love the challenge, the other half are more "SMASH!" types, I just do other things for their fun.
After sorting, I put the facts in the world and let them discover at their own pace. Sometimes they solve it with brains, sometimes with might. Most of the times they find the Big Bad in a good time, but once they found it really soon by chance (really, one player had a hunch and did something crazy that paid off) and another a Kingdom fell because they made a wrong turn (stuff happens).
I don't know if you can use it in your campaign, but this method does exactly what do you want.
I'm doing an impromptu example, so it will not be challenging.
**Facts:**
1. The big bad is a devil summoner.
2. A paladin detected evil in the devil summoner, but couldn't see him/her properly.
3. Three people had previously said that they would laugh if the city turned to ashes. Jahad, Klein and Mira.
**Unknown Facts (Clues):**
1. Klein was never seen using magic.
2. Mira is temperamental and prone to violence.
3. Jahad spend half of his days drunk since his wife demise.
4. Klein is a disgraced fallen noble.
5. Mira graduated in a Bard School.
6. Jahad was apprentice of a Royal Wizard.
7. Klein is the chief of a local crime syndicate.
8. Mira was sexually assaulted by the duke as a teenager and despises him.
9. Jahad is addicted to gamble and has money problems.
10. Mira killed a man that harassed her last year and left him in pieces.
11. The necromancer in the graveyard was was loyal the devil summoner, and destroyed his own body before being captured.
12. Jahad gave his wands to Klein to pay a debt.
13. The 2nd victim was Mira's old friend, Jahad's lover and Klein's employee.
14. Klein's day job is of a respected merchant, trusted by his suppliers and clients.
15. Jahad mother's was executed by the duke for murder of a noble.
16. An used blank spell scroll was found near the third summoning that day.
17. A waitress stole a Wall of Chaos scroll from the drunken Jahad and sold at the black market.
18. A speak with dead spell with the 4th victim reveals that the summoner uses scrolls to summon.
19. Jahad killed 3 bandits with a Scorching Ray.
20. Klein has a wand chamber hidden in his shortsword.
The clues are not readily available, they need to search while other things happen and the story advances. Like I said, this example isn't very challenging if you get 5 or 6 of the most important clues. | I like to use some mechanics from the [Gumshoe](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gumshoe_System) RPG system for these sort of mystery like elements.
Notably, Gumshoe has key clues which PC can't fail to find as long as they look. I would take some time to come up with 4-5 key clues. They should be things or pieces of information that the PCs can use to solve the mystery and it will require that they get most, if not all, to solve.
Quick Example:
Key Clues
1. You find a half eaten carrot, but the bite marks don't seem human.
2. The only thing you notice is a pile of strange glowing ooze. As you're looking at it, a rat climbs out and you realize that its slowly growing bigger.
3. When you inspect the body, you notice that he is clutching a lucky rabbit's foot.
4. The man tells you that someone let Farmer Jed's prized bunnies out of their cage; the locals helped find most of them but there might still be a few running around town.
The Finale: A large mutant rabbit lumbers towards you, it looks like it wants to fight.
The clues are vague and even with all of them you might not realize there is a giant mutant rabbit behind the scenes, but once you see one everything pieces it's self together.
If you want the problem to be more solvable you can add more clues, secondary clues that people won't necessarily find, or create clues that are less vague.
To make it harder to solve, you can add red herrings or multiple bad guys leaving clues.
With foreshadowing in particular it's less important that the mystery is solvable and more important that things line up in hindsight. |
114,110 | What I plan for my campaign is to drop hints about some greater evil, and whenever my players reach the natural point of realization, have them go off on a search to stop it. I wanna do it naturally, so I don't have a point in mind where I have a big reveal, I want to players to create it, in a manner of speaking.
How do I foreshadow the Big Bad (without leaving too large a trail of clues so that they realize it too soon after the campaign starts) so there's not that same anticipation, but not so vague that they get frustrated? | 2018/01/25 | [
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/114110",
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com",
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com/users/41952/"
] | I like to use some mechanics from the [Gumshoe](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gumshoe_System) RPG system for these sort of mystery like elements.
Notably, Gumshoe has key clues which PC can't fail to find as long as they look. I would take some time to come up with 4-5 key clues. They should be things or pieces of information that the PCs can use to solve the mystery and it will require that they get most, if not all, to solve.
Quick Example:
Key Clues
1. You find a half eaten carrot, but the bite marks don't seem human.
2. The only thing you notice is a pile of strange glowing ooze. As you're looking at it, a rat climbs out and you realize that its slowly growing bigger.
3. When you inspect the body, you notice that he is clutching a lucky rabbit's foot.
4. The man tells you that someone let Farmer Jed's prized bunnies out of their cage; the locals helped find most of them but there might still be a few running around town.
The Finale: A large mutant rabbit lumbers towards you, it looks like it wants to fight.
The clues are vague and even with all of them you might not realize there is a giant mutant rabbit behind the scenes, but once you see one everything pieces it's self together.
If you want the problem to be more solvable you can add more clues, secondary clues that people won't necessarily find, or create clues that are less vague.
To make it harder to solve, you can add red herrings or multiple bad guys leaving clues.
With foreshadowing in particular it's less important that the mystery is solvable and more important that things line up in hindsight. | Make your clues do double duty.
Suppose the Big Bad is Vecna.
Vecna is a lich-turned-god and enemy of Ioun, the god of Knowledge. He broke the bonds of Orcus, the god of undeath and liches. He is a god of Secrets.
* Corrupt cultists of Ioun.
* Sub-boss is a (lesser) Lich working against Orcus, god of Undeath. The fact that Orcus is opposed to this Lich is discovered. The fact that Lich's are *usually* thralls of Orcus is discovered. It is unknown how this Lich broke Orcus' hold. The players can get help from Orcus to defeat this sub-boss.
* Bad guy whose catch phrases is "Knowledge is power, and secrets are deadly." Maybe someone overthrowing a kingdom. A Vizir. This catchphrase can be used to track down the conspiracy.
* Priest supporting some bad guy is fake, not actually a priest of that god at all.
* Enemy who players are about to defeat and who knows too much is found with his eyes and hands cut out before they fight him.
* Players are leaked a true secret that leads them to do harm and forwards an enemy's agenda.
* Another MSEG (medium sized evil guy) is found missing an eye.
* Someone vaguely refers to some Deathknight as "The Hand". Speculates that maybe they where "The Hand of the King" in life.
This builds up over time. Each "secret" is a clue, but it is both a clue leading towards their current adventure and the over-adventure.
Eventually they discover the highest ranks of the Church of Ioun have been corrupted, triggering a civil war within the Church. This is when (if the players haven't worked it out) the BBEG is revealed to be Vecna, acting through his hand and eye.
Especially early on, hints should be dual-purpose, not appear to be "plot widows". Later on you can start adding some seeming plot widows -- dangling hints that there is something strange going on. Initial hints should be amgibuous and vague; for each hint, have at least 3 interpretations, and only one of them is your BBEG. This is the phase when players finding out about the BBEG (or guessing) is ok. Finally, confirm their suspicions. |
114,110 | What I plan for my campaign is to drop hints about some greater evil, and whenever my players reach the natural point of realization, have them go off on a search to stop it. I wanna do it naturally, so I don't have a point in mind where I have a big reveal, I want to players to create it, in a manner of speaking.
How do I foreshadow the Big Bad (without leaving too large a trail of clues so that they realize it too soon after the campaign starts) so there's not that same anticipation, but not so vague that they get frustrated? | 2018/01/25 | [
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/114110",
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com",
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com/users/41952/"
] | I like to use some mechanics from the [Gumshoe](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gumshoe_System) RPG system for these sort of mystery like elements.
Notably, Gumshoe has key clues which PC can't fail to find as long as they look. I would take some time to come up with 4-5 key clues. They should be things or pieces of information that the PCs can use to solve the mystery and it will require that they get most, if not all, to solve.
Quick Example:
Key Clues
1. You find a half eaten carrot, but the bite marks don't seem human.
2. The only thing you notice is a pile of strange glowing ooze. As you're looking at it, a rat climbs out and you realize that its slowly growing bigger.
3. When you inspect the body, you notice that he is clutching a lucky rabbit's foot.
4. The man tells you that someone let Farmer Jed's prized bunnies out of their cage; the locals helped find most of them but there might still be a few running around town.
The Finale: A large mutant rabbit lumbers towards you, it looks like it wants to fight.
The clues are vague and even with all of them you might not realize there is a giant mutant rabbit behind the scenes, but once you see one everything pieces it's self together.
If you want the problem to be more solvable you can add more clues, secondary clues that people won't necessarily find, or create clues that are less vague.
To make it harder to solve, you can add red herrings or multiple bad guys leaving clues.
With foreshadowing in particular it's less important that the mystery is solvable and more important that things line up in hindsight. | One thing to remember is that an RPG is *not* a book or movie! For the most part, and RPG is a story where the player characters are the main characters.
When I was younger, I found that anytime I tried to get "clever," I would lose players. This did take time to sink in, but it eventually did.
When foreshadowing, be very obvious, but aim it at the big bads employees, and enterprises he controls. For example, maybe a gain that he secretly controls is killing the big bad's enemies. The players concentrate on the gang. Then one of the big bad's lieutenant's embezzles a *lot* of money. The big bad's wife is cheating on him and then dies in an accident.
As for clues, I not only agree with the three-clue rule, but I use the rule of obvious clues. If there is a clue that the characters *must* find to continue the adventure and they aren't searching for a secret safe, then put the clue somewhere the characters are searching. Maybe they search the desk instead, and reveal the clue inside a secret drawer that they automatically find. (I don't require rolls for things that a character would automatically do.)
I try not to overestimate the abilities of the players. Perhaps the character is Sherlock Holmes, but the player certainly isn't.
Another rule I have is to never build an adventure that requires an NPC to solve things. If none of the characters is a detective (or equivalent) I save my mystery adventure for a later time. I'll provide an NPC only if the characters hire one, and this NPC will never be better than the characters except in his one area of expertise. If the characters hire a detective, then he will be a average detective at best. |
114,110 | What I plan for my campaign is to drop hints about some greater evil, and whenever my players reach the natural point of realization, have them go off on a search to stop it. I wanna do it naturally, so I don't have a point in mind where I have a big reveal, I want to players to create it, in a manner of speaking.
How do I foreshadow the Big Bad (without leaving too large a trail of clues so that they realize it too soon after the campaign starts) so there's not that same anticipation, but not so vague that they get frustrated? | 2018/01/25 | [
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/114110",
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com",
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com/users/41952/"
] | When I want to let the PCs find the Big Bad in their own sweet time, I use a similar logic of the [Einstein Logic Puzzle](http://www.begent.org/einstein.htm). I sort the readily known facts and the unknown facts and see which one are absolutely needed to reach the fact through inference. Half of my players love the challenge, the other half are more "SMASH!" types, I just do other things for their fun.
After sorting, I put the facts in the world and let them discover at their own pace. Sometimes they solve it with brains, sometimes with might. Most of the times they find the Big Bad in a good time, but once they found it really soon by chance (really, one player had a hunch and did something crazy that paid off) and another a Kingdom fell because they made a wrong turn (stuff happens).
I don't know if you can use it in your campaign, but this method does exactly what do you want.
I'm doing an impromptu example, so it will not be challenging.
**Facts:**
1. The big bad is a devil summoner.
2. A paladin detected evil in the devil summoner, but couldn't see him/her properly.
3. Three people had previously said that they would laugh if the city turned to ashes. Jahad, Klein and Mira.
**Unknown Facts (Clues):**
1. Klein was never seen using magic.
2. Mira is temperamental and prone to violence.
3. Jahad spend half of his days drunk since his wife demise.
4. Klein is a disgraced fallen noble.
5. Mira graduated in a Bard School.
6. Jahad was apprentice of a Royal Wizard.
7. Klein is the chief of a local crime syndicate.
8. Mira was sexually assaulted by the duke as a teenager and despises him.
9. Jahad is addicted to gamble and has money problems.
10. Mira killed a man that harassed her last year and left him in pieces.
11. The necromancer in the graveyard was was loyal the devil summoner, and destroyed his own body before being captured.
12. Jahad gave his wands to Klein to pay a debt.
13. The 2nd victim was Mira's old friend, Jahad's lover and Klein's employee.
14. Klein's day job is of a respected merchant, trusted by his suppliers and clients.
15. Jahad mother's was executed by the duke for murder of a noble.
16. An used blank spell scroll was found near the third summoning that day.
17. A waitress stole a Wall of Chaos scroll from the drunken Jahad and sold at the black market.
18. A speak with dead spell with the 4th victim reveals that the summoner uses scrolls to summon.
19. Jahad killed 3 bandits with a Scorching Ray.
20. Klein has a wand chamber hidden in his shortsword.
The clues are not readily available, they need to search while other things happen and the story advances. Like I said, this example isn't very challenging if you get 5 or 6 of the most important clues. | Make your clues do double duty.
Suppose the Big Bad is Vecna.
Vecna is a lich-turned-god and enemy of Ioun, the god of Knowledge. He broke the bonds of Orcus, the god of undeath and liches. He is a god of Secrets.
* Corrupt cultists of Ioun.
* Sub-boss is a (lesser) Lich working against Orcus, god of Undeath. The fact that Orcus is opposed to this Lich is discovered. The fact that Lich's are *usually* thralls of Orcus is discovered. It is unknown how this Lich broke Orcus' hold. The players can get help from Orcus to defeat this sub-boss.
* Bad guy whose catch phrases is "Knowledge is power, and secrets are deadly." Maybe someone overthrowing a kingdom. A Vizir. This catchphrase can be used to track down the conspiracy.
* Priest supporting some bad guy is fake, not actually a priest of that god at all.
* Enemy who players are about to defeat and who knows too much is found with his eyes and hands cut out before they fight him.
* Players are leaked a true secret that leads them to do harm and forwards an enemy's agenda.
* Another MSEG (medium sized evil guy) is found missing an eye.
* Someone vaguely refers to some Deathknight as "The Hand". Speculates that maybe they where "The Hand of the King" in life.
This builds up over time. Each "secret" is a clue, but it is both a clue leading towards their current adventure and the over-adventure.
Eventually they discover the highest ranks of the Church of Ioun have been corrupted, triggering a civil war within the Church. This is when (if the players haven't worked it out) the BBEG is revealed to be Vecna, acting through his hand and eye.
Especially early on, hints should be dual-purpose, not appear to be "plot widows". Later on you can start adding some seeming plot widows -- dangling hints that there is something strange going on. Initial hints should be amgibuous and vague; for each hint, have at least 3 interpretations, and only one of them is your BBEG. This is the phase when players finding out about the BBEG (or guessing) is ok. Finally, confirm their suspicions. |
114,110 | What I plan for my campaign is to drop hints about some greater evil, and whenever my players reach the natural point of realization, have them go off on a search to stop it. I wanna do it naturally, so I don't have a point in mind where I have a big reveal, I want to players to create it, in a manner of speaking.
How do I foreshadow the Big Bad (without leaving too large a trail of clues so that they realize it too soon after the campaign starts) so there's not that same anticipation, but not so vague that they get frustrated? | 2018/01/25 | [
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/114110",
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com",
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com/users/41952/"
] | When I want to let the PCs find the Big Bad in their own sweet time, I use a similar logic of the [Einstein Logic Puzzle](http://www.begent.org/einstein.htm). I sort the readily known facts and the unknown facts and see which one are absolutely needed to reach the fact through inference. Half of my players love the challenge, the other half are more "SMASH!" types, I just do other things for their fun.
After sorting, I put the facts in the world and let them discover at their own pace. Sometimes they solve it with brains, sometimes with might. Most of the times they find the Big Bad in a good time, but once they found it really soon by chance (really, one player had a hunch and did something crazy that paid off) and another a Kingdom fell because they made a wrong turn (stuff happens).
I don't know if you can use it in your campaign, but this method does exactly what do you want.
I'm doing an impromptu example, so it will not be challenging.
**Facts:**
1. The big bad is a devil summoner.
2. A paladin detected evil in the devil summoner, but couldn't see him/her properly.
3. Three people had previously said that they would laugh if the city turned to ashes. Jahad, Klein and Mira.
**Unknown Facts (Clues):**
1. Klein was never seen using magic.
2. Mira is temperamental and prone to violence.
3. Jahad spend half of his days drunk since his wife demise.
4. Klein is a disgraced fallen noble.
5. Mira graduated in a Bard School.
6. Jahad was apprentice of a Royal Wizard.
7. Klein is the chief of a local crime syndicate.
8. Mira was sexually assaulted by the duke as a teenager and despises him.
9. Jahad is addicted to gamble and has money problems.
10. Mira killed a man that harassed her last year and left him in pieces.
11. The necromancer in the graveyard was was loyal the devil summoner, and destroyed his own body before being captured.
12. Jahad gave his wands to Klein to pay a debt.
13. The 2nd victim was Mira's old friend, Jahad's lover and Klein's employee.
14. Klein's day job is of a respected merchant, trusted by his suppliers and clients.
15. Jahad mother's was executed by the duke for murder of a noble.
16. An used blank spell scroll was found near the third summoning that day.
17. A waitress stole a Wall of Chaos scroll from the drunken Jahad and sold at the black market.
18. A speak with dead spell with the 4th victim reveals that the summoner uses scrolls to summon.
19. Jahad killed 3 bandits with a Scorching Ray.
20. Klein has a wand chamber hidden in his shortsword.
The clues are not readily available, they need to search while other things happen and the story advances. Like I said, this example isn't very challenging if you get 5 or 6 of the most important clues. | One thing to remember is that an RPG is *not* a book or movie! For the most part, and RPG is a story where the player characters are the main characters.
When I was younger, I found that anytime I tried to get "clever," I would lose players. This did take time to sink in, but it eventually did.
When foreshadowing, be very obvious, but aim it at the big bads employees, and enterprises he controls. For example, maybe a gain that he secretly controls is killing the big bad's enemies. The players concentrate on the gang. Then one of the big bad's lieutenant's embezzles a *lot* of money. The big bad's wife is cheating on him and then dies in an accident.
As for clues, I not only agree with the three-clue rule, but I use the rule of obvious clues. If there is a clue that the characters *must* find to continue the adventure and they aren't searching for a secret safe, then put the clue somewhere the characters are searching. Maybe they search the desk instead, and reveal the clue inside a secret drawer that they automatically find. (I don't require rolls for things that a character would automatically do.)
I try not to overestimate the abilities of the players. Perhaps the character is Sherlock Holmes, but the player certainly isn't.
Another rule I have is to never build an adventure that requires an NPC to solve things. If none of the characters is a detective (or equivalent) I save my mystery adventure for a later time. I'll provide an NPC only if the characters hire one, and this NPC will never be better than the characters except in his one area of expertise. If the characters hire a detective, then he will be a average detective at best. |
10,285 | We have various passwords that need to be known to more than one person in our company. For example, the admin password to our internet routers, the password for our web-host, and also a few "non-IT" passwords like safe codes.
Currently, we use an *ad hoc* system of "standard passwords" for low-value systems, and verbal sharing of passwords for more important/potentially damaging systems. I think most people would agree that this is not a good system.
What we would like is a software solution for storing "shared" passwords, with access for each limited to the people who actually need it. Ideally, this would prompt, or enforce, periodic password changes. It should also be able to indicate who has access to a particular password (*e.g.*, who knows the root password for server XYZ?)
**Can you suggest any software solutions for storing *and sharing* passwords?** Is there anything particular to be wary of?
**What is the common practise in small-medium sized companies for this?** | 2009/05/20 | [
"https://serverfault.com/questions/10285",
"https://serverfault.com",
"https://serverfault.com/users/334/"
] | I second Adam's recommendation of PasswordSafe, with the data on a network folder. I have two considerations in this area. One is having a single version, so that all who need the data are getting the current data.
1- PasswordSafe uses a standardized format for the file, so there are other solutions which can read it, including KeePass.
2- Put the password file on a secure share, and have a nightly script which copies it to a couple of locations on the network. Perhaps copy it to a share on another server (off-site if possible) and to a USB drive left in the server. You want the file at least one place where it isn't protected by a password that it is storing!
3- Store the installer (or executable version of the program) in the same spots as the key file, so that you can get at it quickly if needed.
4- Have people open the file READ-ONLY, unless they have to make a change.
5- If necessary, you can create multiple password files, one for the credentials that everyone on the team needs, and one for the credentials for the really sensitive things.
I would **not** recommend moving to a web-based solution. An internally hosted solution could be OK, but it seems like a lot of trouble. I am also concerned about it being a single point-of-failure. | I know this isn't exactly the answer you want but in my place of work its exactly the same, trusted members of staff are given the relevant passwords, passwords are not shared amongst devices and they are not written down. The system tends to work quite well as administration of devices is usually the responsibility of only a couple of members of staff. We also have a very good staff retention so trust can be built up over a long period of time. |
10,285 | We have various passwords that need to be known to more than one person in our company. For example, the admin password to our internet routers, the password for our web-host, and also a few "non-IT" passwords like safe codes.
Currently, we use an *ad hoc* system of "standard passwords" for low-value systems, and verbal sharing of passwords for more important/potentially damaging systems. I think most people would agree that this is not a good system.
What we would like is a software solution for storing "shared" passwords, with access for each limited to the people who actually need it. Ideally, this would prompt, or enforce, periodic password changes. It should also be able to indicate who has access to a particular password (*e.g.*, who knows the root password for server XYZ?)
**Can you suggest any software solutions for storing *and sharing* passwords?** Is there anything particular to be wary of?
**What is the common practise in small-medium sized companies for this?** | 2009/05/20 | [
"https://serverfault.com/questions/10285",
"https://serverfault.com",
"https://serverfault.com/users/334/"
] | I face this problem every time I go to a new startup. First thing I do is make a couple of "Password safes" with a program like this one (or one of its derivatives):
<http://passwordsafe.sourceforge.net/>
Set strong combinations and throw them up on a network share. Segment by area of responsibility... central infrastructure, production servers, dev/QA, etc.
Once there's enough momentum, and assuming I have the proper Windows environment dependencies, I like to move everyone to this:
<http://www.clickstudios.com.au/passwordstate.html>
It has features for both shared and personal credentials. | Use GPG with the Symmetric option to encrypt a text file with all the passwords in it. Then all you need to do is provide the one pass-phrase to other admins. When an admin leaves the company, then just re-encrypt the text file with a new pass-phrase. |
10,285 | We have various passwords that need to be known to more than one person in our company. For example, the admin password to our internet routers, the password for our web-host, and also a few "non-IT" passwords like safe codes.
Currently, we use an *ad hoc* system of "standard passwords" for low-value systems, and verbal sharing of passwords for more important/potentially damaging systems. I think most people would agree that this is not a good system.
What we would like is a software solution for storing "shared" passwords, with access for each limited to the people who actually need it. Ideally, this would prompt, or enforce, periodic password changes. It should also be able to indicate who has access to a particular password (*e.g.*, who knows the root password for server XYZ?)
**Can you suggest any software solutions for storing *and sharing* passwords?** Is there anything particular to be wary of?
**What is the common practise in small-medium sized companies for this?** | 2009/05/20 | [
"https://serverfault.com/questions/10285",
"https://serverfault.com",
"https://serverfault.com/users/334/"
] | I face this problem every time I go to a new startup. First thing I do is make a couple of "Password safes" with a program like this one (or one of its derivatives):
<http://passwordsafe.sourceforge.net/>
Set strong combinations and throw them up on a network share. Segment by area of responsibility... central infrastructure, production servers, dev/QA, etc.
Once there's enough momentum, and assuming I have the proper Windows environment dependencies, I like to move everyone to this:
<http://www.clickstudios.com.au/passwordstate.html>
It has features for both shared and personal credentials. | Wow, good thread! Nobody's mentioned my preferred solution (except in passing), so I'll give a shout-out to KeePass. Nicely extendable, with password-, key- or AD-based authentication. Does the job nicely for us. |
10,285 | We have various passwords that need to be known to more than one person in our company. For example, the admin password to our internet routers, the password for our web-host, and also a few "non-IT" passwords like safe codes.
Currently, we use an *ad hoc* system of "standard passwords" for low-value systems, and verbal sharing of passwords for more important/potentially damaging systems. I think most people would agree that this is not a good system.
What we would like is a software solution for storing "shared" passwords, with access for each limited to the people who actually need it. Ideally, this would prompt, or enforce, periodic password changes. It should also be able to indicate who has access to a particular password (*e.g.*, who knows the root password for server XYZ?)
**Can you suggest any software solutions for storing *and sharing* passwords?** Is there anything particular to be wary of?
**What is the common practise in small-medium sized companies for this?** | 2009/05/20 | [
"https://serverfault.com/questions/10285",
"https://serverfault.com",
"https://serverfault.com/users/334/"
] | Not to be forgotten is the need to be able to *revoke* passwords if an employee leaves/is fired. There have been several cases noted in popular media of employees being fired and 'getting back' at their company using passwords that were still active after they left.
This is typically 2 parts:
1. Knowing all the passwords that need to be changed (otherwise you default to all which is tedious)
2. Manually changing them or automating the process with a tool or script.
Another important factor is ensuring that password policy is followed when the changes are made - e.g. how do you know that the same password was not used on multiple accounts or that a weak password was not used? | I second Adam's recommendation of PasswordSafe, with the data on a network folder. I have two considerations in this area. One is having a single version, so that all who need the data are getting the current data.
1- PasswordSafe uses a standardized format for the file, so there are other solutions which can read it, including KeePass.
2- Put the password file on a secure share, and have a nightly script which copies it to a couple of locations on the network. Perhaps copy it to a share on another server (off-site if possible) and to a USB drive left in the server. You want the file at least one place where it isn't protected by a password that it is storing!
3- Store the installer (or executable version of the program) in the same spots as the key file, so that you can get at it quickly if needed.
4- Have people open the file READ-ONLY, unless they have to make a change.
5- If necessary, you can create multiple password files, one for the credentials that everyone on the team needs, and one for the credentials for the really sensitive things.
I would **not** recommend moving to a web-based solution. An internally hosted solution could be OK, but it seems like a lot of trouble. I am also concerned about it being a single point-of-failure. |
10,285 | We have various passwords that need to be known to more than one person in our company. For example, the admin password to our internet routers, the password for our web-host, and also a few "non-IT" passwords like safe codes.
Currently, we use an *ad hoc* system of "standard passwords" for low-value systems, and verbal sharing of passwords for more important/potentially damaging systems. I think most people would agree that this is not a good system.
What we would like is a software solution for storing "shared" passwords, with access for each limited to the people who actually need it. Ideally, this would prompt, or enforce, periodic password changes. It should also be able to indicate who has access to a particular password (*e.g.*, who knows the root password for server XYZ?)
**Can you suggest any software solutions for storing *and sharing* passwords?** Is there anything particular to be wary of?
**What is the common practise in small-medium sized companies for this?** | 2009/05/20 | [
"https://serverfault.com/questions/10285",
"https://serverfault.com",
"https://serverfault.com/users/334/"
] | There's a [Lifehacker](http://lifehacker.com/5265813/passpack-provides-secure-loginpassword-sharing) post from today about [Passpack](http://www.passpack.com/en/password-provisioning/), it might be worth a look. | I know this isn't exactly the answer you want but in my place of work its exactly the same, trusted members of staff are given the relevant passwords, passwords are not shared amongst devices and they are not written down. The system tends to work quite well as administration of devices is usually the responsibility of only a couple of members of staff. We also have a very good staff retention so trust can be built up over a long period of time. |
10,285 | We have various passwords that need to be known to more than one person in our company. For example, the admin password to our internet routers, the password for our web-host, and also a few "non-IT" passwords like safe codes.
Currently, we use an *ad hoc* system of "standard passwords" for low-value systems, and verbal sharing of passwords for more important/potentially damaging systems. I think most people would agree that this is not a good system.
What we would like is a software solution for storing "shared" passwords, with access for each limited to the people who actually need it. Ideally, this would prompt, or enforce, periodic password changes. It should also be able to indicate who has access to a particular password (*e.g.*, who knows the root password for server XYZ?)
**Can you suggest any software solutions for storing *and sharing* passwords?** Is there anything particular to be wary of?
**What is the common practise in small-medium sized companies for this?** | 2009/05/20 | [
"https://serverfault.com/questions/10285",
"https://serverfault.com",
"https://serverfault.com/users/334/"
] | Use GPG with the Symmetric option to encrypt a text file with all the passwords in it. Then all you need to do is provide the one pass-phrase to other admins. When an admin leaves the company, then just re-encrypt the text file with a new pass-phrase. | You might want to use some sort of password vault software - that way you can give authorized users their own access to it and make sure the information does not leak by people leaving notes around. A good one probably doesn't even display the password, just drops it into the clipboard for cut'n paste. |
10,285 | We have various passwords that need to be known to more than one person in our company. For example, the admin password to our internet routers, the password for our web-host, and also a few "non-IT" passwords like safe codes.
Currently, we use an *ad hoc* system of "standard passwords" for low-value systems, and verbal sharing of passwords for more important/potentially damaging systems. I think most people would agree that this is not a good system.
What we would like is a software solution for storing "shared" passwords, with access for each limited to the people who actually need it. Ideally, this would prompt, or enforce, periodic password changes. It should also be able to indicate who has access to a particular password (*e.g.*, who knows the root password for server XYZ?)
**Can you suggest any software solutions for storing *and sharing* passwords?** Is there anything particular to be wary of?
**What is the common practise in small-medium sized companies for this?** | 2009/05/20 | [
"https://serverfault.com/questions/10285",
"https://serverfault.com",
"https://serverfault.com/users/334/"
] | Not to be forgotten is the need to be able to *revoke* passwords if an employee leaves/is fired. There have been several cases noted in popular media of employees being fired and 'getting back' at their company using passwords that were still active after they left.
This is typically 2 parts:
1. Knowing all the passwords that need to be changed (otherwise you default to all which is tedious)
2. Manually changing them or automating the process with a tool or script.
Another important factor is ensuring that password policy is followed when the changes are made - e.g. how do you know that the same password was not used on multiple accounts or that a weak password was not used? | We have a system like the President and the Bomb - two people each know half of the password. That way you'll never get a situation where a single rogue admin goes off and makes unapproved changes on their own. |
10,285 | We have various passwords that need to be known to more than one person in our company. For example, the admin password to our internet routers, the password for our web-host, and also a few "non-IT" passwords like safe codes.
Currently, we use an *ad hoc* system of "standard passwords" for low-value systems, and verbal sharing of passwords for more important/potentially damaging systems. I think most people would agree that this is not a good system.
What we would like is a software solution for storing "shared" passwords, with access for each limited to the people who actually need it. Ideally, this would prompt, or enforce, periodic password changes. It should also be able to indicate who has access to a particular password (*e.g.*, who knows the root password for server XYZ?)
**Can you suggest any software solutions for storing *and sharing* passwords?** Is there anything particular to be wary of?
**What is the common practise in small-medium sized companies for this?** | 2009/05/20 | [
"https://serverfault.com/questions/10285",
"https://serverfault.com",
"https://serverfault.com/users/334/"
] | Centrify has been working for me. | You might want to use some sort of password vault software - that way you can give authorized users their own access to it and make sure the information does not leak by people leaving notes around. A good one probably doesn't even display the password, just drops it into the clipboard for cut'n paste. |
10,285 | We have various passwords that need to be known to more than one person in our company. For example, the admin password to our internet routers, the password for our web-host, and also a few "non-IT" passwords like safe codes.
Currently, we use an *ad hoc* system of "standard passwords" for low-value systems, and verbal sharing of passwords for more important/potentially damaging systems. I think most people would agree that this is not a good system.
What we would like is a software solution for storing "shared" passwords, with access for each limited to the people who actually need it. Ideally, this would prompt, or enforce, periodic password changes. It should also be able to indicate who has access to a particular password (*e.g.*, who knows the root password for server XYZ?)
**Can you suggest any software solutions for storing *and sharing* passwords?** Is there anything particular to be wary of?
**What is the common practise in small-medium sized companies for this?** | 2009/05/20 | [
"https://serverfault.com/questions/10285",
"https://serverfault.com",
"https://serverfault.com/users/334/"
] | For accessing servers:
Provide access to one server and use it as a jumpbox and manage the accounts on the jump box. Any one assumed to be trusted to the jumpbox is trusted to the remote resource. This way everyone has their own password and the password on the server for the particular account can be kept secret.
For accessing other resources:
Limit access to only essential personnel. Make sure to manage a list of trusted users. Change the password every 90 days and update the list of trusted users. Give people notice of the pending change 15, 7, and 1 day in advance. Only distribute the password to managers and allow them to determine who needs access. Use utilities to log access and regularly let users know they are closely monitored systems. Any funny business on the servers should be a known terminable offense. | You might want to use some sort of password vault software - that way you can give authorized users their own access to it and make sure the information does not leak by people leaving notes around. A good one probably doesn't even display the password, just drops it into the clipboard for cut'n paste. |
10,285 | We have various passwords that need to be known to more than one person in our company. For example, the admin password to our internet routers, the password for our web-host, and also a few "non-IT" passwords like safe codes.
Currently, we use an *ad hoc* system of "standard passwords" for low-value systems, and verbal sharing of passwords for more important/potentially damaging systems. I think most people would agree that this is not a good system.
What we would like is a software solution for storing "shared" passwords, with access for each limited to the people who actually need it. Ideally, this would prompt, or enforce, periodic password changes. It should also be able to indicate who has access to a particular password (*e.g.*, who knows the root password for server XYZ?)
**Can you suggest any software solutions for storing *and sharing* passwords?** Is there anything particular to be wary of?
**What is the common practise in small-medium sized companies for this?** | 2009/05/20 | [
"https://serverfault.com/questions/10285",
"https://serverfault.com",
"https://serverfault.com/users/334/"
] | I've been using [LastPass](http://www.lastpass.com) for a while now and love it. I spent a bit of time researching this question in last year and I liked how LastPass had done it.
* All info is stored on their site (and a local copy) in an encrypted bundle that only you have the password to decrypt
* All passwords are shareable and revocable, you can even share them without giving access to the password itself (for web logins)
* Plugins for the major browsers
* Lots of other features | We have a system like the President and the Bomb - two people each know half of the password. That way you'll never get a situation where a single rogue admin goes off and makes unapproved changes on their own. |
373,921 | What is the word for *a group of businesses all selling the same product in the same location*? For example, many cities have streets lined only by jewelry stores, clothing shops, or some other specific type of merchant.
I'm looking for a way to describe that situation, something similar to the word **hub** . | 2017/02/16 | [
"https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/373921",
"https://english.stackexchange.com",
"https://english.stackexchange.com/users/220580/"
] | Both "knowledge hoarding" and "information hoarding" are terms used in professional environments to describe people who do just what you describe. They refuse to share information or innovation with others, keeping it to themselves for any number of reasons: accolades, promotions, pay incentives, etc. If you do a Google search on "Knowledge hoarding," you will find a number of resources (Bloomberg, Forbes, and Harvard Business Review, to name a few) which address it from varying standpoints. Does that term fit your needs? I can't think of a single word that describes the same thing, but if I come up with one, I will certainly share it with you. | A **classifier**:
>
> A person or thing that classifies something[1](https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/classifier).
>
>
> Example sentence by the same source[1](https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/classifier):
>
>
> *‘According to press reports, an initial panel of classifiers was prepared to release the film.’*
>
>
>
Meaning of the verb *to classify*:
>
> Designate (documents or information) as officially secret[2](https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/classify).
>
>
> Example sentence by the same source[2](https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/classify):
>
>
> *‘But remember that information is classified for a certain time period.’*
>
>
> |
594,355 | There are well-known definitions of complete geodesic and [geodesically complete spacetime](https://ncatlab.org/nlab/show/geodesic+completeness):
1. **A geodesic is complete** if an affine parameter for the geodesic extends to ±∞.
2. A spacetime is **geodesically complete** if all inextendible causal geodesics are complete.
For example, **Minkowski spacetime is geodesically complete**, as is the spacetime describing a static spherical star.
However, the **Kruskal spacetime** (extension of Schwarzschild spacetime) **is geodesically incomplete** because some geodesics have $r \to 0$ in finite affine parameter and hence cannot be extended to infinite affine parameter.
**Is this notion usefull in general relativity?**
**What is physical interpretation of geodesical completeness?**
**How are geodesically complete and incomplete spaces different in physical sence?**
**Is it possible to extend incomplete spacetime to geodesically complete?**
Edit: useful link [Light Rays, Singularities, and All That](https://arxiv.org/abs/1901.03928) | 2020/11/16 | [
"https://physics.stackexchange.com/questions/594355",
"https://physics.stackexchange.com",
"https://physics.stackexchange.com/users/203557/"
] | >
> Is this notion usefull in general relativity?
>
>
>
Yes.
>
> What is physical interpretation of geodesical completeness?
>
>
>
Typically this means there is a singularity in the spacetime that prevents the geodesics from being continued, for example at the center of a black hole, or the Big Bang singularity. It could also mean there is some boundary to the spacetime, or there is some puncture (for example if you remove the point at the origin).
However the physical interpretation of a singularity itself is complicated. Most physicists believe that Nature does not have singularities, and the singularities in the classical solutions of GR are really a sign that GR is breaking down. So geodesic incompleteness may say more about the incompleteness of GR, than of spacetime.
>
> How are geodesically complete and incomplete spaces different in physical sence?
>
>
>
See above.
>
> Is it possible to extend incomplete spacetime to geodesically complete?
>
>
>
Not without changing the spacetime. For example, if the spacetime has a puncture you could "fill in" the puncture. But you wouldn't be able to extend the Scwarzschild solution in a way that avoids the singularity.
---
By the way, a note on terminology. You said:
>
> Kruskal spacetime (extension of Schwarzschild spacetime)
>
>
>
A more common usage of these words would be to say there is a black hole spacetime (the Schwarzschild solution), which can be described in Schwarzschild coordinates or Kruskal coordinates. The word "spacetime" should refer to the invariant geometry; what is different between Kruskal and Schwarzschild are the **coordinates**, not the spacetime itself. | >
> Is this notion usefull in general relativity?
>
>
>
In GR, more useful than geodesic completness is geodesical maximality, which tells you that every geodesic either goes to infinite values of affine parameter or ends in singularity. That is due to the fact, that GR spacetimes can have singularities, so demanding geodesical completness is too restrictive.
However you want to to extend the manifold so that it is maximal. The spacetime where some geodesics would end at finite amount of affine parameter without arriving at singularity is quite a weird idea. Imagine taking a ship and traveling on one of this geodesics. This would mean that you would reach the end of the geodesics in finite amount of proper time. Then what? You cease to exist without any good reason? |
273,062 | I was installing a file from the terminal and then hit F12 to minimize the terminal so I could get access to a text file. After I obtained the needed information, I hit F12 but the terminal wouldn't appear. The top bar said Terminator but no matter what I did it wouldn't visually appear. I ended up having to open another instance of the terminal reboot and not make that mistake again.
Is there a way to get the terminal to appear in a situation like this? | 2013/03/27 | [
"https://askubuntu.com/questions/273062",
"https://askubuntu.com",
"https://askubuntu.com/users/141336/"
] | Ubuntu is the original creation for better or worse. It aims to be a 'modern' desktop system with a lot of eye candy. For older systems, it probably is not the best system as it is somewhat heavy on your system, although most likely not as heavy as Windows. Canonical (the company that is the creator of Ubuntu) has taken a lot of flak lately for going more their own way instead of staying with the community that helped develop Ubuntu. Unlike Microsoft or Apple products, Linux is heavily community-based. While there are some people who get paid to work on Linux, the overwhelming majority do this out of their own good will. Ubuntu was originally based on the Gnome desktop enviros. Canonical has abandoned those in favor or their own original desktop system. There was some effort made to retain a Gnome-LIKE environment alternative, but I am unsure if Canonical has abandoned that for later versions.
In the past, as in all things Linux, some people decided they wanted to make a different version of Ubuntu. One version is based on the KDE desktop environment. It is like how different version of Windows look different, but it would be more akin to how Apple looks and feels different. One thing about KDE is there are a lot of options. For your average user it may be overwhelming. If you like lots of things to play with, then Kubuntu is a nice choice. Personally, I like Kubuntu. There are a lot of applications included designed to fit with the style and theme of Kubuntu. If you prefer a more traditional menu-style system, Kubuntu would be better although you are not limited to using it that way.
Lubuntu is a nice alternative. It is based on the LXDE environment which aims to be lightweight. It's a great distro (short for distribution) for old systems (not ancient systems) as it aims to keep the impact on your system low. However, some people just like Lubuntu on their newer systems because it runs fast and takes up less resources. I'm not sure if there are any apps specifically designed for Lubuntu, but the apps that are included are picked because they are lightweight too. They won't have all the bells and whistles of apps on vanilla Ubuntu or on Kubuntu, but neither are they stripped. (Most users only use a small percent of all the features in a given program, so the programs focus on the most common used items.)
**Side note**: A new distro called LXLE based on Lubuntu was recently announced:
"LXLE, which is short for “Lubuntu Extra Life Extension,” is actually based on Lubuntu 12.04, but it adds many extra features. First and foremost, LXLE is designed “to try to remain as light as possible while providing an incredibly rich environment of programs, features, and aesthetics,” the project team explains."
<http://www.pcworld.com/article/2031825/have-an-older-pc-try-the-new-ubuntu-linux-based-lxle.html>
-- If might be worth looking at if Lubuntu interests you, but you may want to stick with Lubuntu if you looking for something that already has been established for a whiles...
It's a lot personal opinion and/or preference. Underneath, both Kubuntu and Lubuntu are based off of Ubuntu's underworkings. Strictly speaking, the changes are more than just the desktop environments, but for practical purposes that's the easiest way to view it.
You might also look at Linux Mint which is based off of Ubuntu too. It's grown from a small but popular alternative to Ubuntu to become somewhat of a rival project spawning over different desktop enviros. Right now it is based over a combination of Cinnamon (a fork, similar to how Kubuntu and Lubuntu are forks of Ubuntu, of Gnome 3) and Mate (which is what Gnome 2 has changed to). Linux Mint was designed to provide a complete experience right out of the box without having to download additional packages after installing the OS. Personally I found it lighter weight than Ubuntu in the past and a crisper interface. It's a nice fit between Ubuntu and Lubuntu. They also have a (relatively) new KDE version of Mint.
Just in case you are wondering, desktop environments are not limited to Ubuntu. They tend to be developed independently of the OS so they can fit into different Linux distributions. And yes, you can actually install multiple desktop environments onto the same installation, but things can start looking quite messy (as each environment has their own particular set of applications which may not be on the others) although generally everything runs okay. Aside from being a mess, you get to pick at login which desktop to use which can be kind of fun if not necessarily the best experience.
For Ubuntu, Kubuntu, and Lubuntu I recommend going with 12.04. That is a long-term support release and will give you more time to get use to them. Mint follows their own numbering scheme. Mint 14 is the latest version.
That's probably a lot of info, and that's just an overview. As others said, the best way is to just try each one out. If you have a spare machine, you can create one of more environments and install a distro of your choice. After installing, you'll get a menu when you boot up to boot to Windows or Linux. Have fun! =) | They are indeed largely the same except for the default set of packages you have after installation. For some, this means it has another desktop environment but [other variations exist](http://www.ubuntu.com/project/about-ubuntu/derivatives). |
273,062 | I was installing a file from the terminal and then hit F12 to minimize the terminal so I could get access to a text file. After I obtained the needed information, I hit F12 but the terminal wouldn't appear. The top bar said Terminator but no matter what I did it wouldn't visually appear. I ended up having to open another instance of the terminal reboot and not make that mistake again.
Is there a way to get the terminal to appear in a situation like this? | 2013/03/27 | [
"https://askubuntu.com/questions/273062",
"https://askubuntu.com",
"https://askubuntu.com/users/141336/"
] | They are indeed largely the same except for the default set of packages you have after installation. For some, this means it has another desktop environment but [other variations exist](http://www.ubuntu.com/project/about-ubuntu/derivatives). | Kubuntu is based on KDE desktop, while Ubuntu uses the GNOME desktop. Gnome requires a lot more typing of commands in the terminal than KDE, which is more of a user-friendly environment. KDE is glossier, slicker, and can have things like 3D bouncing/stretching/exploding folders, while Gnome is more scaled back, plain jane. Gnome is "supposed" to be better on older equipment, using less resources, but I find Kubuntu so much faster than Ubuntu it's incredible. |
273,062 | I was installing a file from the terminal and then hit F12 to minimize the terminal so I could get access to a text file. After I obtained the needed information, I hit F12 but the terminal wouldn't appear. The top bar said Terminator but no matter what I did it wouldn't visually appear. I ended up having to open another instance of the terminal reboot and not make that mistake again.
Is there a way to get the terminal to appear in a situation like this? | 2013/03/27 | [
"https://askubuntu.com/questions/273062",
"https://askubuntu.com",
"https://askubuntu.com/users/141336/"
] | Ubuntu is the original creation for better or worse. It aims to be a 'modern' desktop system with a lot of eye candy. For older systems, it probably is not the best system as it is somewhat heavy on your system, although most likely not as heavy as Windows. Canonical (the company that is the creator of Ubuntu) has taken a lot of flak lately for going more their own way instead of staying with the community that helped develop Ubuntu. Unlike Microsoft or Apple products, Linux is heavily community-based. While there are some people who get paid to work on Linux, the overwhelming majority do this out of their own good will. Ubuntu was originally based on the Gnome desktop enviros. Canonical has abandoned those in favor or their own original desktop system. There was some effort made to retain a Gnome-LIKE environment alternative, but I am unsure if Canonical has abandoned that for later versions.
In the past, as in all things Linux, some people decided they wanted to make a different version of Ubuntu. One version is based on the KDE desktop environment. It is like how different version of Windows look different, but it would be more akin to how Apple looks and feels different. One thing about KDE is there are a lot of options. For your average user it may be overwhelming. If you like lots of things to play with, then Kubuntu is a nice choice. Personally, I like Kubuntu. There are a lot of applications included designed to fit with the style and theme of Kubuntu. If you prefer a more traditional menu-style system, Kubuntu would be better although you are not limited to using it that way.
Lubuntu is a nice alternative. It is based on the LXDE environment which aims to be lightweight. It's a great distro (short for distribution) for old systems (not ancient systems) as it aims to keep the impact on your system low. However, some people just like Lubuntu on their newer systems because it runs fast and takes up less resources. I'm not sure if there are any apps specifically designed for Lubuntu, but the apps that are included are picked because they are lightweight too. They won't have all the bells and whistles of apps on vanilla Ubuntu or on Kubuntu, but neither are they stripped. (Most users only use a small percent of all the features in a given program, so the programs focus on the most common used items.)
**Side note**: A new distro called LXLE based on Lubuntu was recently announced:
"LXLE, which is short for “Lubuntu Extra Life Extension,” is actually based on Lubuntu 12.04, but it adds many extra features. First and foremost, LXLE is designed “to try to remain as light as possible while providing an incredibly rich environment of programs, features, and aesthetics,” the project team explains."
<http://www.pcworld.com/article/2031825/have-an-older-pc-try-the-new-ubuntu-linux-based-lxle.html>
-- If might be worth looking at if Lubuntu interests you, but you may want to stick with Lubuntu if you looking for something that already has been established for a whiles...
It's a lot personal opinion and/or preference. Underneath, both Kubuntu and Lubuntu are based off of Ubuntu's underworkings. Strictly speaking, the changes are more than just the desktop environments, but for practical purposes that's the easiest way to view it.
You might also look at Linux Mint which is based off of Ubuntu too. It's grown from a small but popular alternative to Ubuntu to become somewhat of a rival project spawning over different desktop enviros. Right now it is based over a combination of Cinnamon (a fork, similar to how Kubuntu and Lubuntu are forks of Ubuntu, of Gnome 3) and Mate (which is what Gnome 2 has changed to). Linux Mint was designed to provide a complete experience right out of the box without having to download additional packages after installing the OS. Personally I found it lighter weight than Ubuntu in the past and a crisper interface. It's a nice fit between Ubuntu and Lubuntu. They also have a (relatively) new KDE version of Mint.
Just in case you are wondering, desktop environments are not limited to Ubuntu. They tend to be developed independently of the OS so they can fit into different Linux distributions. And yes, you can actually install multiple desktop environments onto the same installation, but things can start looking quite messy (as each environment has their own particular set of applications which may not be on the others) although generally everything runs okay. Aside from being a mess, you get to pick at login which desktop to use which can be kind of fun if not necessarily the best experience.
For Ubuntu, Kubuntu, and Lubuntu I recommend going with 12.04. That is a long-term support release and will give you more time to get use to them. Mint follows their own numbering scheme. Mint 14 is the latest version.
That's probably a lot of info, and that's just an overview. As others said, the best way is to just try each one out. If you have a spare machine, you can create one of more environments and install a distro of your choice. After installing, you'll get a menu when you boot up to boot to Windows or Linux. Have fun! =) | Kubuntu is based on KDE desktop, while Ubuntu uses the GNOME desktop. Gnome requires a lot more typing of commands in the terminal than KDE, which is more of a user-friendly environment. KDE is glossier, slicker, and can have things like 3D bouncing/stretching/exploding folders, while Gnome is more scaled back, plain jane. Gnome is "supposed" to be better on older equipment, using less resources, but I find Kubuntu so much faster than Ubuntu it's incredible. |
102,530 | In this question on *Pan's Labyrinth*: [Is the "Pale Man" from Pan's Labyrinth based on any mythological character?](https://scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/71960/is-the-pale-man-from-pans-labyrinth-based-on-any-mythological-character)
the accepted answer includes this quote from del Toro:
>
> “The idea in ‘Pan’s Labyrinth’ was it [the Pale Man] was going to represent the church,"
>
>
>
What do the other creatures / challenges represent? | 2015/09/11 | [
"https://scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/102530",
"https://scifi.stackexchange.com",
"https://scifi.stackexchange.com/users/46591/"
] | Guillermo Del Toro said:
>
> Toad is rich devouring the tree - the wealth of the world - from inside and deprive others.
>
>
> The mandrake root represents the baby.
>
>
>
The sequence of the mandrake has its roots in the medieval magic; its cry has the power to kill one who hears (the mother in the movie).
The faun (Pan) is a creature of the Greco-Roman mythology.
>
> Pan was to rejuvenate and beautify gradually throughout the movie; it is understood that the girl is not to be influenced by appearances when a beautiful Pan makes an horrible proposal to her.
>
>
>
The film is based on Greco-Roman myths , legends and fairy tales. References to the book by Lewis Carroll *Alice in wonderland* in the film are legion:
* the pocket watch,
* the descent of the heroin between the roots of a tree,
* the too small door,
* foods that you should not eat.
If you want more the labyrinth evokes the myth of Theseus and the Minotaur. | The Pale man does not represent the Church the Pale man represents the Vidal the captain. Ironically they both sat in front of a fire and both were at the head of the table. As well both only see through power because when the pale and was seeking out Ophelia he looked through the eyes on his hands which symbolize power, the need to stay in power ,will to do anything to stay there. Its messed up a bit however hope it helps |
102,530 | In this question on *Pan's Labyrinth*: [Is the "Pale Man" from Pan's Labyrinth based on any mythological character?](https://scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/71960/is-the-pale-man-from-pans-labyrinth-based-on-any-mythological-character)
the accepted answer includes this quote from del Toro:
>
> “The idea in ‘Pan’s Labyrinth’ was it [the Pale Man] was going to represent the church,"
>
>
>
What do the other creatures / challenges represent? | 2015/09/11 | [
"https://scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/102530",
"https://scifi.stackexchange.com",
"https://scifi.stackexchange.com/users/46591/"
] | Guillermo Del Toro said:
>
> Toad is rich devouring the tree - the wealth of the world - from inside and deprive others.
>
>
> The mandrake root represents the baby.
>
>
>
The sequence of the mandrake has its roots in the medieval magic; its cry has the power to kill one who hears (the mother in the movie).
The faun (Pan) is a creature of the Greco-Roman mythology.
>
> Pan was to rejuvenate and beautify gradually throughout the movie; it is understood that the girl is not to be influenced by appearances when a beautiful Pan makes an horrible proposal to her.
>
>
>
The film is based on Greco-Roman myths , legends and fairy tales. References to the book by Lewis Carroll *Alice in wonderland* in the film are legion:
* the pocket watch,
* the descent of the heroin between the roots of a tree,
* the too small door,
* foods that you should not eat.
If you want more the labyrinth evokes the myth of Theseus and the Minotaur. | The pale man represents the vatican.
The faun represents our broken truth.
The fairies represent instincts/gut feelings.
The frog represents greed/capitalism.
The mandrake was the baby, which would kill the mother as we all knew.
Her dad and his military goons represented the devil/the oppression.
Her mother represents women, who had no choice but to marry into higher class families to make it through patriarchy.
The rebels represented the red and black resistance to the oppression.
The underworld represents the lucid truth.
And she, as the main character, represents the fool. |
102,530 | In this question on *Pan's Labyrinth*: [Is the "Pale Man" from Pan's Labyrinth based on any mythological character?](https://scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/71960/is-the-pale-man-from-pans-labyrinth-based-on-any-mythological-character)
the accepted answer includes this quote from del Toro:
>
> “The idea in ‘Pan’s Labyrinth’ was it [the Pale Man] was going to represent the church,"
>
>
>
What do the other creatures / challenges represent? | 2015/09/11 | [
"https://scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/102530",
"https://scifi.stackexchange.com",
"https://scifi.stackexchange.com/users/46591/"
] | Guillermo Del Toro said:
>
> Toad is rich devouring the tree - the wealth of the world - from inside and deprive others.
>
>
> The mandrake root represents the baby.
>
>
>
The sequence of the mandrake has its roots in the medieval magic; its cry has the power to kill one who hears (the mother in the movie).
The faun (Pan) is a creature of the Greco-Roman mythology.
>
> Pan was to rejuvenate and beautify gradually throughout the movie; it is understood that the girl is not to be influenced by appearances when a beautiful Pan makes an horrible proposal to her.
>
>
>
The film is based on Greco-Roman myths , legends and fairy tales. References to the book by Lewis Carroll *Alice in wonderland* in the film are legion:
* the pocket watch,
* the descent of the heroin between the roots of a tree,
* the too small door,
* foods that you should not eat.
If you want more the labyrinth evokes the myth of Theseus and the Minotaur. | I don't care if the creator doesn't agree with me, but Pan's Labyrinth is basically a grimmdark Narnia, with more focus on why escapism succs, as you can't decide what's worse: A Nazi with a flashlight, or one of those child devouring monsters.
As far as I'm regarded, I think the Pale Man was partially inspired by a Japanese yokai, the [Tenome](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenome), who succed the bones out of its victim's body.
Storywise, I think it's more of a childhood tale monster manifesting *(Ophelia is mental interpretation)* or you get to see the origin of the monster in the tale *(HOLY SHIT! everything was REAL interpretation)*.
Just as with the movie as a whole, you can't decide which one is worse.
**Addendum:** This formula is mostly true to the other creatures as well, they are the result of looking back at childhood tales with a grown-up mind:
* Do you remember [that fun story about a frog that exploded](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=93TqBYC80SY)?
* Fairies were certainly 20% darker in their original myths (though I have no idea regarding them)
* Pan is an obvious one...
* ...So is the mandrake.
* The Pale Man, as I said before is not the church, nor a pedophile priest, you dirty atheist communists. It's just your plain old child eating monster that parents used in their psychological warfare against kids to [discourage inappropriate behaviors](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Struwwelpeter#Stories), such as suckling your thumb.
* Ophelia's adoptive father represents [the lethality of an ordinary flashlight](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xyzSvVh9BDo).
* The whole thing about the underworld with the fair folk was shamelessly ripped-off from [Irish mythology](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celtic_Otherworld#Irish_mythology).
I mentioned two interpretations before, here they go:
**Ophelia is mental:**
**Proposal:** Ophelia is nutz, mainly due to the fact that his adoptive father is a murderous lunatic.
**Evidence:** Why didn't Ophelia just simply take father's luger and 420 trickshotted the Pale Man?
**Everything was real:**
**Proposal:** All those f@@#ed up stories were true, and the Pale man did in fact, slaughter a bunch of toddlers and kept their shoes for unknown reasons.
**Evidence:** Ophelia's mom seemed to get better after the mandrake was installed under her bed. |
102,530 | In this question on *Pan's Labyrinth*: [Is the "Pale Man" from Pan's Labyrinth based on any mythological character?](https://scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/71960/is-the-pale-man-from-pans-labyrinth-based-on-any-mythological-character)
the accepted answer includes this quote from del Toro:
>
> “The idea in ‘Pan’s Labyrinth’ was it [the Pale Man] was going to represent the church,"
>
>
>
What do the other creatures / challenges represent? | 2015/09/11 | [
"https://scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/102530",
"https://scifi.stackexchange.com",
"https://scifi.stackexchange.com/users/46591/"
] | Guillermo Del Toro said:
>
> Toad is rich devouring the tree - the wealth of the world - from inside and deprive others.
>
>
> The mandrake root represents the baby.
>
>
>
The sequence of the mandrake has its roots in the medieval magic; its cry has the power to kill one who hears (the mother in the movie).
The faun (Pan) is a creature of the Greco-Roman mythology.
>
> Pan was to rejuvenate and beautify gradually throughout the movie; it is understood that the girl is not to be influenced by appearances when a beautiful Pan makes an horrible proposal to her.
>
>
>
The film is based on Greco-Roman myths , legends and fairy tales. References to the book by Lewis Carroll *Alice in wonderland* in the film are legion:
* the pocket watch,
* the descent of the heroin between the roots of a tree,
* the too small door,
* foods that you should not eat.
If you want more the labyrinth evokes the myth of Theseus and the Minotaur. | With each creature they represent something in the real world, for example the pale man represents the corruption in the world like Hitler. During its time period there is a shot showing of the shoes showing previous victims of the pale man also mirror victims of the holocaust, this makes sense considering its time period.
With the Faun we see the guardians who previously or remain to raise Ofelia. An example of this would be when Ofelia’s mother. In this scene she says “Tomorrow, I’ll give you a surprise” Ofelia “A surprise” M “yes” O “A book” M “No, something much better”, later on she receives a book from the Faun as seen here. Another would be when her step-father captures the rebel and the story reaches high tensions. This corresponds with the Faun who gets angry with her about failing the test. Then there’s obvious clues like the mandrake root who represents the baby/mother condition.
Not to mention the toad who in the book describes as quote “A monstrous toad has settled in its roots and won’t let the tree thrive”. This represents greed of the rich people taking the wealth from the people. |
102,530 | In this question on *Pan's Labyrinth*: [Is the "Pale Man" from Pan's Labyrinth based on any mythological character?](https://scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/71960/is-the-pale-man-from-pans-labyrinth-based-on-any-mythological-character)
the accepted answer includes this quote from del Toro:
>
> “The idea in ‘Pan’s Labyrinth’ was it [the Pale Man] was going to represent the church,"
>
>
>
What do the other creatures / challenges represent? | 2015/09/11 | [
"https://scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/102530",
"https://scifi.stackexchange.com",
"https://scifi.stackexchange.com/users/46591/"
] | The pale man represents the vatican.
The faun represents our broken truth.
The fairies represent instincts/gut feelings.
The frog represents greed/capitalism.
The mandrake was the baby, which would kill the mother as we all knew.
Her dad and his military goons represented the devil/the oppression.
Her mother represents women, who had no choice but to marry into higher class families to make it through patriarchy.
The rebels represented the red and black resistance to the oppression.
The underworld represents the lucid truth.
And she, as the main character, represents the fool. | The Pale man does not represent the Church the Pale man represents the Vidal the captain. Ironically they both sat in front of a fire and both were at the head of the table. As well both only see through power because when the pale and was seeking out Ophelia he looked through the eyes on his hands which symbolize power, the need to stay in power ,will to do anything to stay there. Its messed up a bit however hope it helps |
102,530 | In this question on *Pan's Labyrinth*: [Is the "Pale Man" from Pan's Labyrinth based on any mythological character?](https://scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/71960/is-the-pale-man-from-pans-labyrinth-based-on-any-mythological-character)
the accepted answer includes this quote from del Toro:
>
> “The idea in ‘Pan’s Labyrinth’ was it [the Pale Man] was going to represent the church,"
>
>
>
What do the other creatures / challenges represent? | 2015/09/11 | [
"https://scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/102530",
"https://scifi.stackexchange.com",
"https://scifi.stackexchange.com/users/46591/"
] | With each creature they represent something in the real world, for example the pale man represents the corruption in the world like Hitler. During its time period there is a shot showing of the shoes showing previous victims of the pale man also mirror victims of the holocaust, this makes sense considering its time period.
With the Faun we see the guardians who previously or remain to raise Ofelia. An example of this would be when Ofelia’s mother. In this scene she says “Tomorrow, I’ll give you a surprise” Ofelia “A surprise” M “yes” O “A book” M “No, something much better”, later on she receives a book from the Faun as seen here. Another would be when her step-father captures the rebel and the story reaches high tensions. This corresponds with the Faun who gets angry with her about failing the test. Then there’s obvious clues like the mandrake root who represents the baby/mother condition.
Not to mention the toad who in the book describes as quote “A monstrous toad has settled in its roots and won’t let the tree thrive”. This represents greed of the rich people taking the wealth from the people. | The Pale man does not represent the Church the Pale man represents the Vidal the captain. Ironically they both sat in front of a fire and both were at the head of the table. As well both only see through power because when the pale and was seeking out Ophelia he looked through the eyes on his hands which symbolize power, the need to stay in power ,will to do anything to stay there. Its messed up a bit however hope it helps |
102,530 | In this question on *Pan's Labyrinth*: [Is the "Pale Man" from Pan's Labyrinth based on any mythological character?](https://scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/71960/is-the-pale-man-from-pans-labyrinth-based-on-any-mythological-character)
the accepted answer includes this quote from del Toro:
>
> “The idea in ‘Pan’s Labyrinth’ was it [the Pale Man] was going to represent the church,"
>
>
>
What do the other creatures / challenges represent? | 2015/09/11 | [
"https://scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/102530",
"https://scifi.stackexchange.com",
"https://scifi.stackexchange.com/users/46591/"
] | The pale man represents the vatican.
The faun represents our broken truth.
The fairies represent instincts/gut feelings.
The frog represents greed/capitalism.
The mandrake was the baby, which would kill the mother as we all knew.
Her dad and his military goons represented the devil/the oppression.
Her mother represents women, who had no choice but to marry into higher class families to make it through patriarchy.
The rebels represented the red and black resistance to the oppression.
The underworld represents the lucid truth.
And she, as the main character, represents the fool. | I don't care if the creator doesn't agree with me, but Pan's Labyrinth is basically a grimmdark Narnia, with more focus on why escapism succs, as you can't decide what's worse: A Nazi with a flashlight, or one of those child devouring monsters.
As far as I'm regarded, I think the Pale Man was partially inspired by a Japanese yokai, the [Tenome](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenome), who succed the bones out of its victim's body.
Storywise, I think it's more of a childhood tale monster manifesting *(Ophelia is mental interpretation)* or you get to see the origin of the monster in the tale *(HOLY SHIT! everything was REAL interpretation)*.
Just as with the movie as a whole, you can't decide which one is worse.
**Addendum:** This formula is mostly true to the other creatures as well, they are the result of looking back at childhood tales with a grown-up mind:
* Do you remember [that fun story about a frog that exploded](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=93TqBYC80SY)?
* Fairies were certainly 20% darker in their original myths (though I have no idea regarding them)
* Pan is an obvious one...
* ...So is the mandrake.
* The Pale Man, as I said before is not the church, nor a pedophile priest, you dirty atheist communists. It's just your plain old child eating monster that parents used in their psychological warfare against kids to [discourage inappropriate behaviors](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Struwwelpeter#Stories), such as suckling your thumb.
* Ophelia's adoptive father represents [the lethality of an ordinary flashlight](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xyzSvVh9BDo).
* The whole thing about the underworld with the fair folk was shamelessly ripped-off from [Irish mythology](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celtic_Otherworld#Irish_mythology).
I mentioned two interpretations before, here they go:
**Ophelia is mental:**
**Proposal:** Ophelia is nutz, mainly due to the fact that his adoptive father is a murderous lunatic.
**Evidence:** Why didn't Ophelia just simply take father's luger and 420 trickshotted the Pale Man?
**Everything was real:**
**Proposal:** All those f@@#ed up stories were true, and the Pale man did in fact, slaughter a bunch of toddlers and kept their shoes for unknown reasons.
**Evidence:** Ophelia's mom seemed to get better after the mandrake was installed under her bed. |
102,530 | In this question on *Pan's Labyrinth*: [Is the "Pale Man" from Pan's Labyrinth based on any mythological character?](https://scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/71960/is-the-pale-man-from-pans-labyrinth-based-on-any-mythological-character)
the accepted answer includes this quote from del Toro:
>
> “The idea in ‘Pan’s Labyrinth’ was it [the Pale Man] was going to represent the church,"
>
>
>
What do the other creatures / challenges represent? | 2015/09/11 | [
"https://scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/102530",
"https://scifi.stackexchange.com",
"https://scifi.stackexchange.com/users/46591/"
] | With each creature they represent something in the real world, for example the pale man represents the corruption in the world like Hitler. During its time period there is a shot showing of the shoes showing previous victims of the pale man also mirror victims of the holocaust, this makes sense considering its time period.
With the Faun we see the guardians who previously or remain to raise Ofelia. An example of this would be when Ofelia’s mother. In this scene she says “Tomorrow, I’ll give you a surprise” Ofelia “A surprise” M “yes” O “A book” M “No, something much better”, later on she receives a book from the Faun as seen here. Another would be when her step-father captures the rebel and the story reaches high tensions. This corresponds with the Faun who gets angry with her about failing the test. Then there’s obvious clues like the mandrake root who represents the baby/mother condition.
Not to mention the toad who in the book describes as quote “A monstrous toad has settled in its roots and won’t let the tree thrive”. This represents greed of the rich people taking the wealth from the people. | The pale man represents the vatican.
The faun represents our broken truth.
The fairies represent instincts/gut feelings.
The frog represents greed/capitalism.
The mandrake was the baby, which would kill the mother as we all knew.
Her dad and his military goons represented the devil/the oppression.
Her mother represents women, who had no choice but to marry into higher class families to make it through patriarchy.
The rebels represented the red and black resistance to the oppression.
The underworld represents the lucid truth.
And she, as the main character, represents the fool. |
102,530 | In this question on *Pan's Labyrinth*: [Is the "Pale Man" from Pan's Labyrinth based on any mythological character?](https://scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/71960/is-the-pale-man-from-pans-labyrinth-based-on-any-mythological-character)
the accepted answer includes this quote from del Toro:
>
> “The idea in ‘Pan’s Labyrinth’ was it [the Pale Man] was going to represent the church,"
>
>
>
What do the other creatures / challenges represent? | 2015/09/11 | [
"https://scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/102530",
"https://scifi.stackexchange.com",
"https://scifi.stackexchange.com/users/46591/"
] | With each creature they represent something in the real world, for example the pale man represents the corruption in the world like Hitler. During its time period there is a shot showing of the shoes showing previous victims of the pale man also mirror victims of the holocaust, this makes sense considering its time period.
With the Faun we see the guardians who previously or remain to raise Ofelia. An example of this would be when Ofelia’s mother. In this scene she says “Tomorrow, I’ll give you a surprise” Ofelia “A surprise” M “yes” O “A book” M “No, something much better”, later on she receives a book from the Faun as seen here. Another would be when her step-father captures the rebel and the story reaches high tensions. This corresponds with the Faun who gets angry with her about failing the test. Then there’s obvious clues like the mandrake root who represents the baby/mother condition.
Not to mention the toad who in the book describes as quote “A monstrous toad has settled in its roots and won’t let the tree thrive”. This represents greed of the rich people taking the wealth from the people. | I don't care if the creator doesn't agree with me, but Pan's Labyrinth is basically a grimmdark Narnia, with more focus on why escapism succs, as you can't decide what's worse: A Nazi with a flashlight, or one of those child devouring monsters.
As far as I'm regarded, I think the Pale Man was partially inspired by a Japanese yokai, the [Tenome](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenome), who succed the bones out of its victim's body.
Storywise, I think it's more of a childhood tale monster manifesting *(Ophelia is mental interpretation)* or you get to see the origin of the monster in the tale *(HOLY SHIT! everything was REAL interpretation)*.
Just as with the movie as a whole, you can't decide which one is worse.
**Addendum:** This formula is mostly true to the other creatures as well, they are the result of looking back at childhood tales with a grown-up mind:
* Do you remember [that fun story about a frog that exploded](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=93TqBYC80SY)?
* Fairies were certainly 20% darker in their original myths (though I have no idea regarding them)
* Pan is an obvious one...
* ...So is the mandrake.
* The Pale Man, as I said before is not the church, nor a pedophile priest, you dirty atheist communists. It's just your plain old child eating monster that parents used in their psychological warfare against kids to [discourage inappropriate behaviors](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Struwwelpeter#Stories), such as suckling your thumb.
* Ophelia's adoptive father represents [the lethality of an ordinary flashlight](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xyzSvVh9BDo).
* The whole thing about the underworld with the fair folk was shamelessly ripped-off from [Irish mythology](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celtic_Otherworld#Irish_mythology).
I mentioned two interpretations before, here they go:
**Ophelia is mental:**
**Proposal:** Ophelia is nutz, mainly due to the fact that his adoptive father is a murderous lunatic.
**Evidence:** Why didn't Ophelia just simply take father's luger and 420 trickshotted the Pale Man?
**Everything was real:**
**Proposal:** All those f@@#ed up stories were true, and the Pale man did in fact, slaughter a bunch of toddlers and kept their shoes for unknown reasons.
**Evidence:** Ophelia's mom seemed to get better after the mandrake was installed under her bed. |
4,005,481 | There is a JSP script for login to a Server. Currently user credentials are being accepted through HTTP Header and the login.jsp file is so designed that once the user provides credentials the user is redirected to a redirectURL which is a fully qualified URL containing Username and Password in query string and hence the user is able to access the page he wants but problem is the password is being visible in the browser address bar.
So, what are the ways by which I can hide the user password in the url. | 2010/10/23 | [
"https://Stackoverflow.com/questions/4005481",
"https://Stackoverflow.com",
"https://Stackoverflow.com/users/441694/"
] | You can use http POST parameters instead of GET parameters in the request. They won't be visible anymore in the URL address bar. | In addition to the above suggestions regarding using POST parameters, if i were you, i would probably reconsider how your password management is being done as you should not be needing to pass passwords in plain text from one page to the other in your application at all.
Even if you need to pass the passwords from one page to another, you should consider hashing the password and then passing the hash and then let the page's validate if the hash is a valid one - because hopefully your database will have the hashed values in them
NOTE : If you are storing the passwords in plain text in your database, thats something thats a definite no-no as well |
4,005,481 | There is a JSP script for login to a Server. Currently user credentials are being accepted through HTTP Header and the login.jsp file is so designed that once the user provides credentials the user is redirected to a redirectURL which is a fully qualified URL containing Username and Password in query string and hence the user is able to access the page he wants but problem is the password is being visible in the browser address bar.
So, what are the ways by which I can hide the user password in the url. | 2010/10/23 | [
"https://Stackoverflow.com/questions/4005481",
"https://Stackoverflow.com",
"https://Stackoverflow.com/users/441694/"
] | I don't know about JSP but you should propably use [POST request](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/POST_%28HTTP%29) | In addition to the above suggestions regarding using POST parameters, if i were you, i would probably reconsider how your password management is being done as you should not be needing to pass passwords in plain text from one page to the other in your application at all.
Even if you need to pass the passwords from one page to another, you should consider hashing the password and then passing the hash and then let the page's validate if the hash is a valid one - because hopefully your database will have the hashed values in them
NOTE : If you are storing the passwords in plain text in your database, thats something thats a definite no-no as well |
4,005,481 | There is a JSP script for login to a Server. Currently user credentials are being accepted through HTTP Header and the login.jsp file is so designed that once the user provides credentials the user is redirected to a redirectURL which is a fully qualified URL containing Username and Password in query string and hence the user is able to access the page he wants but problem is the password is being visible in the browser address bar.
So, what are the ways by which I can hide the user password in the url. | 2010/10/23 | [
"https://Stackoverflow.com/questions/4005481",
"https://Stackoverflow.com",
"https://Stackoverflow.com/users/441694/"
] | Others suggested using `POST`, which is the correct method for this. But it is not enough to guarantee that a man-in-the-middle can't see the password. In order to prevent that you should enable TLS (SSL) on your server and serve the page over https | In addition to the above suggestions regarding using POST parameters, if i were you, i would probably reconsider how your password management is being done as you should not be needing to pass passwords in plain text from one page to the other in your application at all.
Even if you need to pass the passwords from one page to another, you should consider hashing the password and then passing the hash and then let the page's validate if the hash is a valid one - because hopefully your database will have the hashed values in them
NOTE : If you are storing the passwords in plain text in your database, thats something thats a definite no-no as well |
59,781,386 | I have my website running on a t2.2xlarge instance (no ELB in between). I am able to SSH to this instance 99% of the time using the key mechanism.
However, when the website is down, sometimes I am not able to SSH to this instance as all though instance state is RUNNING. Timeout error is returned in those 1% cases.
There is no change between the ways when I am able to connect to the instance and when I am not.
Connection method "EC2 Instance Connect (browser-based SSH connection)" mentioned on AWS EC2 home page also never helped:
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/sxIoN.png)
Gone through all the posts and below link but no luck since SSH worked 99% of the time:
[Troubleshooting Connecting to Your Instance](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AWSEC2/latest/UserGuide/TroubleshootingInstancesConnecting.html#TroubleshootingInstancesConnectionTimeout)
Best part is "System Status Checks" mentioned on the EC2 home page also show - System reachability check passed. This time I submitted feedback to them regarding this issue but yet to get revert.
I typically wait for few minutes and then restart the instance. This is the worst option but I could not find any alternative.
Please suggest how to find root cause and fix this issue. | 2020/01/17 | [
"https://Stackoverflow.com/questions/59781386",
"https://Stackoverflow.com",
"https://Stackoverflow.com/users/2584053/"
] | This is a hard one.
If, when the problem occurs, it can only be recovered by a reboot, then it makes it hard to debug because you cannot login while the problem is occurring. This type of problem is normally caused by software running on the instance, rather than anything to do with Amazon EC2 itself.
First thing to check would be **Amazon CloudWatch Logs** to see whether the CPU is 100% when the problem happens.
Next thing to check is the **log files on the computer**, which you can examine after the restart. You could configure a script to continually log the CPU and processes in use to a log file, so that you can examine them later to determine the underlying cause.
See:
* [How to log CPU load?](https://askubuntu.com/a/22033)
* [How do I Find Out Linux CPU Utilization? - nixCraft](https://www.cyberciti.biz/tips/how-do-i-find-out-linux-cpu-utilization.html) | Kindly Close open SSH connections and allow only specific IP ranges!.
To recover your instance you can trigger a cloudwatch event with reference to this link [Instance recovery](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AWSEC2/latest/UserGuide/ec2-instance-recover.html) |
24,269,414 | This is driving me insane and I had it working b4 but I forgot what I need to enter...After I F5 a C# Azure Mobile Service, I go to the URI using a browser and it shows me the initial test page stating "This mobile service is up and running." Clicking the "Try it out link" pops a login dialog. Where do I get these values???? | 2014/06/17 | [
"https://Stackoverflow.com/questions/24269414",
"https://Stackoverflow.com",
"https://Stackoverflow.com/users/780546/"
] | User name can be anything, password is the application key or master key from the config page in the portal. I believe you can lock it down as well, to just master key / no access if desired, but don't remember off the top of my head. | Phillipv is right, except when I first tried to do this I used usernames like "admin" or blank. For some reason that didn't work. I used "asd" and it did work. That makes absolutely no sense to me with my current understanding of my set up but I just thought I would mention it in case someone else had a similar issue. |
71,039 | Protestant and Christian denominations have their own founders and many of them have already died. Pope Francis once gave a remark on Marthin Luther that he was a good man., most probably are blessed by the prayers of the faithful members of his founded church and now enjoying the glory in the presence of God in Heaven.
I want to ask the view of Protestant & Christian denominations as they believe in the teaching of "heaven or hell" only. I tend to believe that all deceased different Protestant founders and Christian denominations leaders are already in heaven. Since they do not believe that dead people even those who are in Heaven can hear our prayers.
I just wonder why If their founders who are now in heaven would not pray for the welfare of the Church he founded and simply detach from communion with them.
I might be mistaken on my understanding, so I want to ask if the current members was implored to seek in prayers their deceased founder or leaders for guidance and intercession of their founders for the benefit of their church. If not, are their founder no longer in communion with his founded church after his death? | 2019/05/20 | [
"https://christianity.stackexchange.com/questions/71039",
"https://christianity.stackexchange.com",
"https://christianity.stackexchange.com/users/45498/"
] | I'd like to start by pointing out a small error. 'Protestant' is a branch of Christianity, so it's not grammatically correct to talk about 'Protestant and Christian' as two different things. You might say 'Protestant and other Christian...' (The other main branches are Catholic and Orthodox.)
Now to the main question. Protestants do not in general believe in asking the dead to intercede, no matter how holy they were. Some would say it was an Unchristian practice, but for most it is a preference for asking God directly. This is the case even for founders of movements.
There are different beliefs about whether the dead can hear our prayers or not. Some say the dead are not conscious of what is occurring on Earth, but some say they are. If they are then there is no reason to think they might not intercede on behalf of others. | It’s most peculiar to me that this question is asked of Bible believers.
The Bible says that those who have passed on from this life are dead in Christ.
>
> “For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the **dead in Christ shall rise first**:”
> 1 Thessalonians 4:16
>
>
>
Considering these that are dead in Christ are in the category of the dead the Bible forbids communication with the dead in multiple places
>
> “**There shall not be found among you** anyone who makes his son or his daughter pass through the fire, one who uses divination, one who practices witchcraft, or one who interprets omens, or a sorcerer, or one who casts a spell, or a medium, or a spiritist, or **one who calls up the dead**.”
> Deuteronomy 18:10-11
>
>
>
Further you are not even allowed to mutilate yourself from the dead, whether ceremonially, or in honor of or otherwise. They are dead.
>
> “You shall not make any cuts in your body for the dead nor make any tattoo marks on yourselves: I am the LORD.”
> Leviticus 19:28
>
>
>
There is the parable of the rich man and Lazarus. Aside from the fact that both Abraham and the rich man are on the other side of death Abraham’s response indicates that the dead can’t do anything for the living, because the living have Moses and the prophets. If praying was an option then why didn’t the rich man ask Lazarus or Abraham to pray for his brothers?
But the rich man argues that if someone like Lazarus, who did not go to the place of torment, were to resurrect then the living will take note and his brothers would change.
In other words those who have crossed over or the dead are ineffective for the living.
I don’t see any examples of Scripture encouraging praying to the dead.
The example of Saul calling the spirit of Samuel the prophet, the text says that an *elohim* was seen which if you study demonology you will understand this was a fallen son of God, that was seen. He was mimicking Samuel. It wasn’t Samuel’s spirit. The dark side doesn’t have ownership of God’s children and Samuel could not prophecy on his own, he had to hear from God. Not possible that the Holy Spirit would be forced to prophecy through a medium calling up the dead. Too many issues with this passage to claim Saul prayed to the dead. Saul dabbled in sorcery.
Again this is a very strange concept but I get the impression you genuinely believe this is Biblical by the way you’ve phrased your question. Maybe you can show where this has Biblical backing.
The Revelation text you quote 5:8,9 that can be the prayers of the living saints. It could be the prayers collected from the saints in the past. None of that indicates that dead people are interceding in heaven on behalf of the living.
Not to mention there is no name given that has authority, except one. So praying in the name of another like a dead saint is futile.
>
> “And there is salvation in no one else; for there is no other name under heaven that has been given among men by which we must be saved.””
> Acts 4:12
>
>
> |
45,518 | [The National Poster Example http://www.dkngstudios.com/images/national.gif](http://www.dkngstudios.com/images/national.gif)
Can anyone give me some tips or point me to a tutorial that can help me learn how to add details like grit and texture to vector graphics like in the above image by [DKNG Studios](http://www.dkngstudios.com/work/featured-work/)? I assume it involves a lot of photoshop brushes and/or textures but I've been unsuccessful in finding any go-to methods.
Often with textures I find it hard to achieve the exact results I'm looking for and they can really increase my file size and make the artwork convoluted.
Brushes can be useful but I find them to work better in photoshop and it can become difficult to constantly switch between the programs, especially when trying to keep the layers straight.
I've found tutorials explaining vector halftones but still have a lot of trouble implementing them well.
Any help is greatly appreciated.
Thanks,
Pierce | 2015/01/08 | [
"https://graphicdesign.stackexchange.com/questions/45518",
"https://graphicdesign.stackexchange.com",
"https://graphicdesign.stackexchange.com/users/32242/"
] | Many images which use textures or "grunge" appearances in Illustrator take advantage of **Opacity Masks** and embedded *raster* images. Even though Illustrator is vector at its core, there are times where utilizing the subtle variations in a raster image can be helpful. Trying to create distressed or mottled backgrounds is certainly one such case.
First, find a raster image with a texture you like. It's easiest if it's a greyscale image (but color images work). Greyscale simply allows the raster image to adjust *values* rather than possibly also altering the color of (what will be) underlying objects.
So a grey scale texture image:
Open the Illustrator artwork:
Now, if I want to add the texture to the light brown background area:
* Import the raster texture image
* Position it *above* the object I want to apply it to
* Select the texture image and the object below it
* Click the `Make Mask` button on the **Transparency Panel**
You can then click the mask *thumbnail* on the Transparency Panel and move the raster image around to see how it effects the object it is applied to.
Large animated gif attached. It may take a moment to load
What the **Opacity Mask** does is hide portions of the light brown rectangle allowing the dark brown rectangle to show through it. Like all masks, the dark areas of the raster image hide content and the white areas show content.
You could apply an Opacity Mask to the artwork as a whole or use several varying textures and apply them to separate objects.
This is often how "grudge" appearances are achieved with Illustrator.
Be aware: This *does* use raster images. And with that in mind the raster mask is just as susceptible to "broken pixels" as any raster image should to overly enlarge the artwork. Unlike most vector creation, you need to pay attention to the PPI and any scaling you do if using this technique.
---
You could also auto-trace the raster texture and then use a standard clipping mask in Illustrator. However, often auto-tracing raster texture images results in unwieldy large files which can quickly become unworkable. Illustrator tends to get slower and slower with each new complex vector object. In addition, some subtle texture variations simply aren't possible using vector paths.
---
The following existing questions also refer to how to "distress" vector graphics:
[Add imperfections to vector graphics / drawings](https://graphicdesign.stackexchange.com/questions/16575/add-imperfections-to-vector-graphics-drawings?rq=1)
[How to get a construction paper look in photoshop or illustrator](https://graphicdesign.stackexchange.com/questions/15683/how-to-get-a-construction-paper-look-in-photoshop-or-illustrator/15688#15688) | Similar to Photoshop, Illustrator also has blending modes. Placing a texture over a vector and then setting the Blending mode, located on the Transparency panel, to something like Overlay may help achieve the look you are hoping for. |
45,518 | [The National Poster Example http://www.dkngstudios.com/images/national.gif](http://www.dkngstudios.com/images/national.gif)
Can anyone give me some tips or point me to a tutorial that can help me learn how to add details like grit and texture to vector graphics like in the above image by [DKNG Studios](http://www.dkngstudios.com/work/featured-work/)? I assume it involves a lot of photoshop brushes and/or textures but I've been unsuccessful in finding any go-to methods.
Often with textures I find it hard to achieve the exact results I'm looking for and they can really increase my file size and make the artwork convoluted.
Brushes can be useful but I find them to work better in photoshop and it can become difficult to constantly switch between the programs, especially when trying to keep the layers straight.
I've found tutorials explaining vector halftones but still have a lot of trouble implementing them well.
Any help is greatly appreciated.
Thanks,
Pierce | 2015/01/08 | [
"https://graphicdesign.stackexchange.com/questions/45518",
"https://graphicdesign.stackexchange.com",
"https://graphicdesign.stackexchange.com/users/32242/"
] | Many images which use textures or "grunge" appearances in Illustrator take advantage of **Opacity Masks** and embedded *raster* images. Even though Illustrator is vector at its core, there are times where utilizing the subtle variations in a raster image can be helpful. Trying to create distressed or mottled backgrounds is certainly one such case.
First, find a raster image with a texture you like. It's easiest if it's a greyscale image (but color images work). Greyscale simply allows the raster image to adjust *values* rather than possibly also altering the color of (what will be) underlying objects.
So a grey scale texture image:
Open the Illustrator artwork:
Now, if I want to add the texture to the light brown background area:
* Import the raster texture image
* Position it *above* the object I want to apply it to
* Select the texture image and the object below it
* Click the `Make Mask` button on the **Transparency Panel**
You can then click the mask *thumbnail* on the Transparency Panel and move the raster image around to see how it effects the object it is applied to.
Large animated gif attached. It may take a moment to load
What the **Opacity Mask** does is hide portions of the light brown rectangle allowing the dark brown rectangle to show through it. Like all masks, the dark areas of the raster image hide content and the white areas show content.
You could apply an Opacity Mask to the artwork as a whole or use several varying textures and apply them to separate objects.
This is often how "grudge" appearances are achieved with Illustrator.
Be aware: This *does* use raster images. And with that in mind the raster mask is just as susceptible to "broken pixels" as any raster image should to overly enlarge the artwork. Unlike most vector creation, you need to pay attention to the PPI and any scaling you do if using this technique.
---
You could also auto-trace the raster texture and then use a standard clipping mask in Illustrator. However, often auto-tracing raster texture images results in unwieldy large files which can quickly become unworkable. Illustrator tends to get slower and slower with each new complex vector object. In addition, some subtle texture variations simply aren't possible using vector paths.
---
The following existing questions also refer to how to "distress" vector graphics:
[Add imperfections to vector graphics / drawings](https://graphicdesign.stackexchange.com/questions/16575/add-imperfections-to-vector-graphics-drawings?rq=1)
[How to get a construction paper look in photoshop or illustrator](https://graphicdesign.stackexchange.com/questions/15683/how-to-get-a-construction-paper-look-in-photoshop-or-illustrator/15688#15688) | You can also place a bitmap TIFF file into your Illustrator document. This allows you to colorize it in Illustrator. Here's a tutorial on how to create a bitmap TIFF in Photoshop: <http://knowledgejam.org/home/2014/7/31/creating-textures-with-bitmap-tiffs>
 |
8,281 | As I have found myself learning more about the human body anatomy, and less focused on the human anatomy of the face, I am struggling with the latter.
I am an expressionist. I do want accuracy, and opinion of anatomy. But want more feeling into the piece.
I have been studying the human body for almost ten years, and learning how to draw the human body. I am struggling with how to make the human body more fleshy/plump looking. Less flat. I struggle particularly with the breast/chest bone area.
My question is, **how do I make the human body more fleshy/plump in appearance?**
Realized that yes, contrast is a huge issue that is facing with this. Also taking into consideration the gradient of depth that would be going into a drawing/painting particularly around the chest/collar area. Sometimes realizing maybe the photograph just wasn't the best of choice. What caught my eye about this photograph was the soft purple pink hues of the atmospheric image. Almost in a dream-like state.
I also realized after closer investigation, I was struggling with where the actual light source was coming from, which would cause a lot of issues on my part of the shading.
The original photograph:
Free to use stock image credit:
<https://www.pexels.com/photo/woman-in-black-bra-inside-room-3279545/>
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/nBDeW.jpg)
First steps:
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/Z7Eo2.jpg)
2nd improvement steps:
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/ywXxw.jpg)
3rd improvement steps: I tried the method of turning the image upside down to focus more on its shapes instead of the image as a whole. I also, did a bit of shading/smoothing, compared to the third rendition. Focused on the sternum part of the body as well.
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/OsMDS.jpg)
4th improvement steps(after working with suggestions):
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/FoPEo.jpg) | 2020/06/29 | [
"https://crafts.stackexchange.com/questions/8281",
"https://crafts.stackexchange.com",
"https://crafts.stackexchange.com/users/8260/"
] | I think the main reasons the curviness seems lacking is because **the contrast is too high or uneven, and your hatching doesn't follow the curves of the body.**
The quite abrupt ending of the shading on the breast(s) - the upper part, that seems to be erased with a kneaded eraser in a dotted way, and the dark area of the person's right breast (image 1) - gives the idea there is a sudden concavity or bulge where the transition should be smooth. *Curviness, plumpness or fleshiness are all about smooth transitions.*
Also look at the curvature and the colour value of the sternum in the original image: it's not as bright as the highlights on the sitter's breast, and there is a gradation from right to left, where it is partially obscured by the right breast.
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/6jW9B.jpg)
Image 1
The shadow on the left shoulder has its darkest shade in the contour, close to the light, while the original has a quite even cast shadow, and the rest of the shadow seems flat because it seems completely independent of the shape underneath it (image 1).
I suggest following the lines of the body while hatching, and initially only focusing on the shading that is a direct consequence of the local shapes - the shade underneath the collar bone, the even subtler shade in the depression of the tissue between the arm and breast, and the shade on top of the shoulder (very hard to see here, but compare it to the original):
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/wfsyG.jpg)
After these have been shaded satisfactorily, the cast shadow can be drawn on top of it, evenly, so the underlying structure will remain visible.
**Treat the entire body as the one single entity it is, and shade accordingly**: note the lightest parts (the faces where the light hits at such an angle that it bounces directly towards the observer), and the darkest parts (that are opposite the light source or obscured by other parts or objects), and shade these all evenly.
---
Some additional remarks:
* The [sternocleidomastoid](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sternocleidomastoid_muscle) muscle seems a little misaligned: in your drawing it seems to originate at the sternum on the left side (of the person in the picture), while it should originate at the right side.
* Make it a habit to look at the shape of areas *between* forms, as they will often give evident clues of how the shapes on both sides are related.
For example:
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/wxx0p.png)
* The shading on the face is very well done, because there is an obvious visual transition between the shaded and lit part of the face.
* The shading on the person's right shoulder is also well done, but to emphasize the light hitting it, I suggest making the edge of that well-lit part a lot lighter - unless you plan on making the background darker. Contours are imaginary help lines and don't really occur in real life. They should almost without exception be as light or dark as the shape it is the edge of (they seem to occur in photographs sometimes, but that has to do with the way light is captured and/or the compression of images).
* Consider working with charcoal to (partially) circumvent the problem of hatching (depending on the quality/type of charcoal and paper), as smooth transitions will be a lot easier to attain. | This is meant as an addition to Joachims answer, so I won't repeat what he already pointed out.
I'm sorry if this sounds nitpicky, but it seems to me like you start the process of drawing with the contour of the person, then you add the outlines of the strongest shadows to give the flat contour some dimension and lastly you fill the outline with different shades of grey to mimic the contrast you see in the photo. That approach is what leads you to get the shadows wrong.
Personally I find it easier to think of my final picture in 3 main tones that I apply in precisely this order:
* The base color (a medium tone)
* Shadows (a darker tone)
* Highlights (the lightest tone)
*Admittedly I usually paint with acryllics, so setting highlights is as easy as adding a brighter paint. In drawings you either have to leave the highlighted areas bare or erase your lines in the area.*
In your painting I see only 2 of those tones: shadows and highlights.
To show you what I mean with 3 tones I opened the original photo in MS Paint and converted it to a 256 color bitmap. This reduction of colors makes the areas of the body more visible. The shadows are converted to a blueish purple, the highlights almost a pink, the medium tone a brown. To make it more visible I highlighted the medium tone in a second example.
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/yRHBT.png)
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/4rXxC.png)
It covers the sternum, her right shoulder and most of her right breast and the right side of her left breast. In your drawing these areas are so light that you cannot effectively highlight the parts of the breast that are actually hit by the light.
The gap between her breasts, right above the bra, is almost white in your drawing, which suggests it stands out enough to be hit with lots of light. In the photo it actually has a medium dark tone with gradual transitions towards even darker shadows left and right.
The center of the models left arm in your drawing is almost as bright as her neck. But since it is even further away from the light source than the neck, it actually has to be much darker.
---
In my experience, these errors happen when you concentrate on small areas of the thing you draw instead of the whole thing. You replicate the contrast between colors in very small areas (like right between her breasts) without keeping the overall tone in mind.
Just as Joachim wrote,
>
> Treat the entire body as the one single entity it is.
>
>
>
Start with the contour of the object or person, then start lightly shading all the areas that are not directly hit by light, but ignore the cast shadows in this step. Gradually add more strokes to these areas to work out the 3-dimensional shape. This creates your medium tone. Only then concentrate on details like cast shadows. Since you put the medium tone there before, the overall impression will be much more cohesive.
---
Additional note: Her bra in the original photo is black. In my experience pure black and pure white are extremely problematic colors in painting and drawing. If you actually fill such a big area in flat black, you'll probably smudge it around, creating a mess, and all dimension is lost due to the flat color.
Instead of replicating the photo, I would treat the black bra as dark grey (as you correctly did) and add shadows and highlights according to how the light would be reflected off any other color. Meaning, I would add shadows to the underside of her breasts and keep the triangular tops and straps of her bra lighter than they appear in the photo, just to emphasize the 3-dimensional shape. |
8,281 | As I have found myself learning more about the human body anatomy, and less focused on the human anatomy of the face, I am struggling with the latter.
I am an expressionist. I do want accuracy, and opinion of anatomy. But want more feeling into the piece.
I have been studying the human body for almost ten years, and learning how to draw the human body. I am struggling with how to make the human body more fleshy/plump looking. Less flat. I struggle particularly with the breast/chest bone area.
My question is, **how do I make the human body more fleshy/plump in appearance?**
Realized that yes, contrast is a huge issue that is facing with this. Also taking into consideration the gradient of depth that would be going into a drawing/painting particularly around the chest/collar area. Sometimes realizing maybe the photograph just wasn't the best of choice. What caught my eye about this photograph was the soft purple pink hues of the atmospheric image. Almost in a dream-like state.
I also realized after closer investigation, I was struggling with where the actual light source was coming from, which would cause a lot of issues on my part of the shading.
The original photograph:
Free to use stock image credit:
<https://www.pexels.com/photo/woman-in-black-bra-inside-room-3279545/>
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/nBDeW.jpg)
First steps:
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/Z7Eo2.jpg)
2nd improvement steps:
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/ywXxw.jpg)
3rd improvement steps: I tried the method of turning the image upside down to focus more on its shapes instead of the image as a whole. I also, did a bit of shading/smoothing, compared to the third rendition. Focused on the sternum part of the body as well.
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/OsMDS.jpg)
4th improvement steps(after working with suggestions):
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/FoPEo.jpg) | 2020/06/29 | [
"https://crafts.stackexchange.com/questions/8281",
"https://crafts.stackexchange.com",
"https://crafts.stackexchange.com/users/8260/"
] | I think the main reasons the curviness seems lacking is because **the contrast is too high or uneven, and your hatching doesn't follow the curves of the body.**
The quite abrupt ending of the shading on the breast(s) - the upper part, that seems to be erased with a kneaded eraser in a dotted way, and the dark area of the person's right breast (image 1) - gives the idea there is a sudden concavity or bulge where the transition should be smooth. *Curviness, plumpness or fleshiness are all about smooth transitions.*
Also look at the curvature and the colour value of the sternum in the original image: it's not as bright as the highlights on the sitter's breast, and there is a gradation from right to left, where it is partially obscured by the right breast.
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/6jW9B.jpg)
Image 1
The shadow on the left shoulder has its darkest shade in the contour, close to the light, while the original has a quite even cast shadow, and the rest of the shadow seems flat because it seems completely independent of the shape underneath it (image 1).
I suggest following the lines of the body while hatching, and initially only focusing on the shading that is a direct consequence of the local shapes - the shade underneath the collar bone, the even subtler shade in the depression of the tissue between the arm and breast, and the shade on top of the shoulder (very hard to see here, but compare it to the original):
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/wfsyG.jpg)
After these have been shaded satisfactorily, the cast shadow can be drawn on top of it, evenly, so the underlying structure will remain visible.
**Treat the entire body as the one single entity it is, and shade accordingly**: note the lightest parts (the faces where the light hits at such an angle that it bounces directly towards the observer), and the darkest parts (that are opposite the light source or obscured by other parts or objects), and shade these all evenly.
---
Some additional remarks:
* The [sternocleidomastoid](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sternocleidomastoid_muscle) muscle seems a little misaligned: in your drawing it seems to originate at the sternum on the left side (of the person in the picture), while it should originate at the right side.
* Make it a habit to look at the shape of areas *between* forms, as they will often give evident clues of how the shapes on both sides are related.
For example:
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/wxx0p.png)
* The shading on the face is very well done, because there is an obvious visual transition between the shaded and lit part of the face.
* The shading on the person's right shoulder is also well done, but to emphasize the light hitting it, I suggest making the edge of that well-lit part a lot lighter - unless you plan on making the background darker. Contours are imaginary help lines and don't really occur in real life. They should almost without exception be as light or dark as the shape it is the edge of (they seem to occur in photographs sometimes, but that has to do with the way light is captured and/or the compression of images).
* Consider working with charcoal to (partially) circumvent the problem of hatching (depending on the quality/type of charcoal and paper), as smooth transitions will be a lot easier to attain. | You may need to practice working from photographs that are less 'lingerie catalogue'.
To my eye, this photo looks as though the model's chest has been digitally enlarged. Notice how the skin just above the bra on the left breast is slightly more shaded than the skin above it, and that the shading follows the bra-line rather linearly. That seems unlikely to be a natural contour line. Furthermore, the choice of a pitch-black bra allows for easier digital enlargement
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/TAMKU.png)
Be warned that photographs that are meant to have sex appeal very often alter their models this way, and that the alterations often contain visual errors that you do not want to copy. If it is your goal to draw cleavage, you would be better off working from pre-digital era photos.
I am including a (very quickly done) alteration to your drawing that I think gives it more roundness. Basically, you need a rounded highlight on top of the breasts, more so on her left than her right because of the lighting angle. Note that this highlight is much more prominent with structured bras, which she appears to be wearing.
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/TwxWu.png) |
8,281 | As I have found myself learning more about the human body anatomy, and less focused on the human anatomy of the face, I am struggling with the latter.
I am an expressionist. I do want accuracy, and opinion of anatomy. But want more feeling into the piece.
I have been studying the human body for almost ten years, and learning how to draw the human body. I am struggling with how to make the human body more fleshy/plump looking. Less flat. I struggle particularly with the breast/chest bone area.
My question is, **how do I make the human body more fleshy/plump in appearance?**
Realized that yes, contrast is a huge issue that is facing with this. Also taking into consideration the gradient of depth that would be going into a drawing/painting particularly around the chest/collar area. Sometimes realizing maybe the photograph just wasn't the best of choice. What caught my eye about this photograph was the soft purple pink hues of the atmospheric image. Almost in a dream-like state.
I also realized after closer investigation, I was struggling with where the actual light source was coming from, which would cause a lot of issues on my part of the shading.
The original photograph:
Free to use stock image credit:
<https://www.pexels.com/photo/woman-in-black-bra-inside-room-3279545/>
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/nBDeW.jpg)
First steps:
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/Z7Eo2.jpg)
2nd improvement steps:
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/ywXxw.jpg)
3rd improvement steps: I tried the method of turning the image upside down to focus more on its shapes instead of the image as a whole. I also, did a bit of shading/smoothing, compared to the third rendition. Focused on the sternum part of the body as well.
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/OsMDS.jpg)
4th improvement steps(after working with suggestions):
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/FoPEo.jpg) | 2020/06/29 | [
"https://crafts.stackexchange.com/questions/8281",
"https://crafts.stackexchange.com",
"https://crafts.stackexchange.com/users/8260/"
] | This is meant as an addition to Joachims answer, so I won't repeat what he already pointed out.
I'm sorry if this sounds nitpicky, but it seems to me like you start the process of drawing with the contour of the person, then you add the outlines of the strongest shadows to give the flat contour some dimension and lastly you fill the outline with different shades of grey to mimic the contrast you see in the photo. That approach is what leads you to get the shadows wrong.
Personally I find it easier to think of my final picture in 3 main tones that I apply in precisely this order:
* The base color (a medium tone)
* Shadows (a darker tone)
* Highlights (the lightest tone)
*Admittedly I usually paint with acryllics, so setting highlights is as easy as adding a brighter paint. In drawings you either have to leave the highlighted areas bare or erase your lines in the area.*
In your painting I see only 2 of those tones: shadows and highlights.
To show you what I mean with 3 tones I opened the original photo in MS Paint and converted it to a 256 color bitmap. This reduction of colors makes the areas of the body more visible. The shadows are converted to a blueish purple, the highlights almost a pink, the medium tone a brown. To make it more visible I highlighted the medium tone in a second example.
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/yRHBT.png)
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/4rXxC.png)
It covers the sternum, her right shoulder and most of her right breast and the right side of her left breast. In your drawing these areas are so light that you cannot effectively highlight the parts of the breast that are actually hit by the light.
The gap between her breasts, right above the bra, is almost white in your drawing, which suggests it stands out enough to be hit with lots of light. In the photo it actually has a medium dark tone with gradual transitions towards even darker shadows left and right.
The center of the models left arm in your drawing is almost as bright as her neck. But since it is even further away from the light source than the neck, it actually has to be much darker.
---
In my experience, these errors happen when you concentrate on small areas of the thing you draw instead of the whole thing. You replicate the contrast between colors in very small areas (like right between her breasts) without keeping the overall tone in mind.
Just as Joachim wrote,
>
> Treat the entire body as the one single entity it is.
>
>
>
Start with the contour of the object or person, then start lightly shading all the areas that are not directly hit by light, but ignore the cast shadows in this step. Gradually add more strokes to these areas to work out the 3-dimensional shape. This creates your medium tone. Only then concentrate on details like cast shadows. Since you put the medium tone there before, the overall impression will be much more cohesive.
---
Additional note: Her bra in the original photo is black. In my experience pure black and pure white are extremely problematic colors in painting and drawing. If you actually fill such a big area in flat black, you'll probably smudge it around, creating a mess, and all dimension is lost due to the flat color.
Instead of replicating the photo, I would treat the black bra as dark grey (as you correctly did) and add shadows and highlights according to how the light would be reflected off any other color. Meaning, I would add shadows to the underside of her breasts and keep the triangular tops and straps of her bra lighter than they appear in the photo, just to emphasize the 3-dimensional shape. | You may need to practice working from photographs that are less 'lingerie catalogue'.
To my eye, this photo looks as though the model's chest has been digitally enlarged. Notice how the skin just above the bra on the left breast is slightly more shaded than the skin above it, and that the shading follows the bra-line rather linearly. That seems unlikely to be a natural contour line. Furthermore, the choice of a pitch-black bra allows for easier digital enlargement
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/TAMKU.png)
Be warned that photographs that are meant to have sex appeal very often alter their models this way, and that the alterations often contain visual errors that you do not want to copy. If it is your goal to draw cleavage, you would be better off working from pre-digital era photos.
I am including a (very quickly done) alteration to your drawing that I think gives it more roundness. Basically, you need a rounded highlight on top of the breasts, more so on her left than her right because of the lighting angle. Note that this highlight is much more prominent with structured bras, which she appears to be wearing.
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/TwxWu.png) |
161,273 | I'd like to install a [Google Drive](https://drive.google.com/start#home) client for Xubuntu (12.04).
I'm getting non-English Google results, and I didn't find [grive](https://github.com/Grive/grive/) in the Xubuntu repositories.
Does anyone know of a client that works well for Ubuntu or it's supported derivates (or installation instructions for grive?) | 2012/07/08 | [
"https://askubuntu.com/questions/161273",
"https://askubuntu.com",
"https://askubuntu.com/users/59292/"
] | For Ubuntu 12.04 to 14.10
=========================
**Apparently [grive](http://www.lbreda.com/grive/) exists on a ppa** - I installed it and it works reasonably well. This is preferable in my opinion over the [google-docs-fs](http://www.zimbio.com/Ubuntu+Linux/articles/gVdrI310RS3/Access+Google+Drive+Ubuntu) solution, since that doesn't put your files permanently on your drive, and grive does. Also, grive isn't a commercial venture like InSync - which is described as "free during beta".
The PPA for grive can be found on webupd8's site using these instructions:
[Grive: Open Source Google Drive Client For Linux ~ Web Upd8: Ubuntu / Linux blog](http://www.webupd8.org/2012/05/grive-open-source-google-drive-client.html)
One limitation that the current version of grive has is that it doesn't automatically sync your drive directory. But I found [this blog post describing a script to fix this](http://blog.vel.nu/?p=28) and make grive sync whenever a file in the drive directory is changed.
(This answer is originally based on @uri's comment, which has since disappeared)
EDIT: grive is now officially dead, but [grive2](http://www.webupd8.org/2015/05/grive2-grive-fork-with-google-drive.html) is a fork of the original version with some improvements. | This won't answer your question completely, but I'll post this anyway in case it helps you or other people.
Also, this answer is only going to be useful if you want the client for the sake of accessing your Documents offline.
If you use Google Chrome, you can get the Google Drive extensions which works offline once you activate it on your account. (There is an "Offline Docs" tab in your Google Docs' left side bar.)
You can get the extension here:
<https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/google-drive/apdfllckaahabafndbhieahigkjlhalf>
I must say, it's rather limited. Documents is the only format that you can view and edit. You will be able to view your Spreadsheets, but not edit them. In my case, those limitations are okay since I mostly only use Documents.
More info:
<http://support.google.com/drive/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=1628467> |
1,559,994 | I recently implemented a program using the Microsoft Accessibility API, but have since been told that the new UI Automation has replaced it. Seems like it would be a good investment for next time to learn the newer tool for the job.
So, what are the best references, and hopefully actual tutorials, for programming UI Automation? Specifically, I'm looking for programming "client" applications, i.e. the ones doing the accessing to other program's UI, not just providing access to my own UI. | 2009/10/13 | [
"https://Stackoverflow.com/questions/1559994",
"https://Stackoverflow.com",
"https://Stackoverflow.com/users/175645/"
] | I published a tutorial [An introduction to UI Automation - with Spooky Spirographs](http://blog.functionalfun.net/2009/06/introduction-to-ui-automation-with.html) that has been quite popular. | Here's another tutorial that seems good.
[Automating UI Tests In WPF Applications](http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/magazine/dd483216.aspx) |
1,559,994 | I recently implemented a program using the Microsoft Accessibility API, but have since been told that the new UI Automation has replaced it. Seems like it would be a good investment for next time to learn the newer tool for the job.
So, what are the best references, and hopefully actual tutorials, for programming UI Automation? Specifically, I'm looking for programming "client" applications, i.e. the ones doing the accessing to other program's UI, not just providing access to my own UI. | 2009/10/13 | [
"https://Stackoverflow.com/questions/1559994",
"https://Stackoverflow.com",
"https://Stackoverflow.com/users/175645/"
] | I published a tutorial [An introduction to UI Automation - with Spooky Spirographs](http://blog.functionalfun.net/2009/06/introduction-to-ui-automation-with.html) that has been quite popular. | <http://www.codeproject.com/Articles/34038/UI-Automation-Framework-using-WPF> also a good station to learn something about ui automation |
10,049 | I am working on the BRFSS dataset with the goal of predicting Diabetes. The dataset has 500,000 rows and 405 columns. It is a 0/1 classification problem, the ratio of 0 to 1 is 90:10. I tried using decision trees, logistic regression an ensemble of decision trees and logistic regression and my misclassification rate is almost 14% in all of these methods.
* What should I do to increase the accuracy?
I saw an earlier [post](https://stats.stackexchange.com/questions/9398/supervised-learning-with-rare-events-when-rarity-is-due-to-the-large-number-of) which says subsampling or assigning different weights helps. But I am not sure about the ratio.
* What would be the best ratio to start off with?
* I am working using SAS. Is there a way to do subsampling in SAS?
* I am also interested in trying out the weighted approach. Is there a way to implement this in SAS?
EDIT (28 Apr 2011)
I tried subsampling and my misclassification rate goes up from 14% to 23%. The ratio I used was 50:50 for classes 0 and 1. The original ratio in the data was 90:10 and using the data as it is gave 14% error. So I believe subsampling doesn't work for my data. Would you suggest any other way to improve accuracy? | 2011/04/27 | [
"https://stats.stackexchange.com/questions/10049",
"https://stats.stackexchange.com",
"https://stats.stackexchange.com/users/3897/"
] | The problem is more with the choice of the accuracy scoring rule. Make sure that the ultimate goal is classification as opposed to prediction. The proportion classified correctly is a discontinuous improper scoring rule. An improper scoring rule is one that is optimized by a bogus model. With an improper scoring rule such things as addition of a highly important predictor making the model less accurate can happen. The use of log likelihood (or deviance) or the Brier quadratic scoring rule will help. The concordance index C (which happens to equal the ROC area, making ROCs appear more useful than they really are) is a useful measure of predictive discrimination once the model is finalized. | Based on the output you shared, Maximum # of branches from a node is set at 2. It's possible that raising that limit would give you more options for branches, especially if SAS can take continuous variables and break them up into categories. It's data dredgy, but that's the game we're in, and as long as you crossvalidate you're on solid moral ground :-) |
10,049 | I am working on the BRFSS dataset with the goal of predicting Diabetes. The dataset has 500,000 rows and 405 columns. It is a 0/1 classification problem, the ratio of 0 to 1 is 90:10. I tried using decision trees, logistic regression an ensemble of decision trees and logistic regression and my misclassification rate is almost 14% in all of these methods.
* What should I do to increase the accuracy?
I saw an earlier [post](https://stats.stackexchange.com/questions/9398/supervised-learning-with-rare-events-when-rarity-is-due-to-the-large-number-of) which says subsampling or assigning different weights helps. But I am not sure about the ratio.
* What would be the best ratio to start off with?
* I am working using SAS. Is there a way to do subsampling in SAS?
* I am also interested in trying out the weighted approach. Is there a way to implement this in SAS?
EDIT (28 Apr 2011)
I tried subsampling and my misclassification rate goes up from 14% to 23%. The ratio I used was 50:50 for classes 0 and 1. The original ratio in the data was 90:10 and using the data as it is gave 14% error. So I believe subsampling doesn't work for my data. Would you suggest any other way to improve accuracy? | 2011/04/27 | [
"https://stats.stackexchange.com/questions/10049",
"https://stats.stackexchange.com",
"https://stats.stackexchange.com/users/3897/"
] | The problem is more with the choice of the accuracy scoring rule. Make sure that the ultimate goal is classification as opposed to prediction. The proportion classified correctly is a discontinuous improper scoring rule. An improper scoring rule is one that is optimized by a bogus model. With an improper scoring rule such things as addition of a highly important predictor making the model less accurate can happen. The use of log likelihood (or deviance) or the Brier quadratic scoring rule will help. The concordance index C (which happens to equal the ROC area, making ROCs appear more useful than they really are) is a useful measure of predictive discrimination once the model is finalized. | If you are using tree-based methods, you can play around with the splitting criterion. For example, at each step, choose the split that gives the highest weighted accuracy (the average of the two classes' accuracies).
This can be used as the basis for a random forest too, which should give you a good classifier.
I once used a similar process to boost precision while sacrificing recall. It worked very well (better than thresholding the scores from the classification algorithm which were very noisy anyway). |
28,166 | I saw an awesome post by a user about 1g off-Earth habitats. Radiation protection is provided to humans when habitats have a lot of mass between habitation areas and sources of radiation. Long-term survival in our current evolutionary form absolutely requires gravity (or inertial equivalent) similar to terrestrial. It seems to me that habitats constructed inside circular tunnels are a solution achievable near-term.
Could the Boring Company Excavation Tool be used to create such tunnels in asteroids? (note that Elon Musk owns both The Boring Company and SpaceX) | 2018/06/28 | [
"https://space.stackexchange.com/questions/28166",
"https://space.stackexchange.com",
"https://space.stackexchange.com/users/26344/"
] | Definitely not in current shape, as it depends on tightly packed soil/rock to provide an opposing force to resistance of the ground/rock against the drill. Asteroids, with low gravity, will be far less stable and this sort of forces could easily break apart smaller ones.
Also, starting the tunnel would be a serious problem, as instead of 1g to keep the equipment stable on the ground, it would require active thrust or some sort of anchor system to initiate the tunnel - otherwise the drill will just send the whole machine flying away from the asteroid.
Then there's the whole slew of smaller problems - screw conveyors for loose material depend on gravity to keep it from spinning uselessly around instead of being moved. Cooling - only radiative; coolants like water are expensive and scarce. All bearings, joints, actuators, contact surfaces etc need to be passivated against cold welding. Common lubricants like grease need to be replaced with stuff that works in vacuum and temperatures of space. The tunnels on Earth are to be reinforced with concrete, not really a material you can manufacture in bulk in space; it won't bind in vacuum (where all the water will either freeze or boil off). With no air to slow down debris that get smashed by the machinery, they will keep flying like shrapnel until they bounce off different surfaces enough to come to a rest. There are countless other similar "small things" - none of them impossible to overcome alone, but the sheer number completely overwhelming.
The concept has some merit, but it's not 'pack a machine on a rocket and drill some tunnels' thing. Such a drill would need to be very thoroughly redesigned to be usable in space. | No. A tunnel boring machine is an integrated system that not only cuts a cylindrical hole into rock, but also builds a tunnel (from concrete elements) behind the cutter. The cutter head moves forward by pushing against the completed tunnel segments. It is not designed to create large cavities. Those are made by blasting.
A TBM is also 100 m long (or more), which means you need a very large asteroid to maneuver in.
Using a TBM to hollow out an asteroid is very inefficient. If you want to remove 90% of the mass inside a 10-km asteroid you're removing 900,000,000,000 m3 of rock, significantly more than any construction project on Earth has ever done. It'd be much easier to mine the surface of the asteroid and use the rock you've broken off to construct a habitat that's hollow to begin with. |
17 | As a related question to: [What's the best definition and explanation of project risk?](https://pm.stackexchange.com/questions/1/whats-the-best-definition-and-explanation-of-project-risk)
What is the most useful way of measuring risk? I've been thought it's best to measure it in additional monetary cost to project budget. By writing down all 'risk events' and their related probabilities and incurred costs, we can calculate the 'risk value' of a project at any given moment in time.
This method seems a bit unintuitive to me though (does not really go well with the word 'risk'). I'd like to know what other methods of measuring risks are there. | 2011/02/07 | [
"https://pm.stackexchange.com/questions/17",
"https://pm.stackexchange.com",
"https://pm.stackexchange.com/users/42/"
] | The only risk I care is "What do I risk if not doing it?"...
It's pretty useful: I work on a lot of risky project, and even if they fails (it's rare), I never lose the whole thing: I just reorient the resources and recycle.
It cause a lack of efficiency day by day, but the risk of "doing" disappears, and I have done in two years most that my three predecessor who prefere only doing choices they can predict the outcome. So it's easy for them to evaluate, and they work very quickly, but they do very few and spend a great deal with evaluating risk and other thing they cannot say without trying out.
I just try, it's less risky ^^ | Quantitative measure is great, but most project risks can likely be managed very well using a 5x5 ordinal scale for both probability and impact, reserving the more intense and harder-to-do quantitative approach for more higher impact risks or where you might need that degree of precision for decision making against several alternatives. |
17 | As a related question to: [What's the best definition and explanation of project risk?](https://pm.stackexchange.com/questions/1/whats-the-best-definition-and-explanation-of-project-risk)
What is the most useful way of measuring risk? I've been thought it's best to measure it in additional monetary cost to project budget. By writing down all 'risk events' and their related probabilities and incurred costs, we can calculate the 'risk value' of a project at any given moment in time.
This method seems a bit unintuitive to me though (does not really go well with the word 'risk'). I'd like to know what other methods of measuring risks are there. | 2011/02/07 | [
"https://pm.stackexchange.com/questions/17",
"https://pm.stackexchange.com",
"https://pm.stackexchange.com/users/42/"
] | I love your questions since I struggle through measuring risk all the time.
I try not to use book definitions but I think to help you I will need to. A risk is defined in PMBOK as
>
> uncertain event or condition that, if it occurs, has an effect on at least one project objective
>
>
>
So the way that I am currently measuring my risk is by categorizing them how they primarily impact the project. Either Scope, Cost or Time and then I measure the possible impact of that value. Now in reality, you could easily make a $$$ amount from any of these 3 aspects, so if you want to simplify the equation, you just covert the scope risk into a dollar amount.
Hope this helps.
Geo | Quantitative measure is great, but most project risks can likely be managed very well using a 5x5 ordinal scale for both probability and impact, reserving the more intense and harder-to-do quantitative approach for more higher impact risks or where you might need that degree of precision for decision making against several alternatives. |
198,130 | Is there a way to get the Polearm Master and Sentinel feats at 1st level? | 2022/05/04 | [
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/198130",
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com",
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com/users/76692/"
] | ### No, unless the DM allows it via an unusual application of optional rules, or via a Theros-specific option.
The only 1st level features granting a choice of feat are the Variant Human and Custom Lineage racial traits:
>
> #### Feat
>
>
> You gain one feat of your choice.
>
>
>
>
> **Feat.** You gain one feat of your choice for which you qualify.
>
>
>
As these are both racial traits of different races, you cannot have both of these traits at the same time. However, the *Dungeon Master's Guide* includes some optional rules for quest rewards that the DM can use to give a character a feat:
>
> A character who agrees to training as a reward must spend downtime with the trainer. In exchange, the character is guaranteed to receive a special benefit. Possible training benefits include the following:
>
>
> * The character gains inspiration daily at dawn for 1d4 + 6 days.
> * The character gains proficiency in a skill.
> * *The character gains a feat.*
>
>
>
Technically, the DM could engineer a situation where you receive a feat as a quest reward, without leveling up to 2nd level, which would be highly unusual. The earliest a character could get two feats under usual circumstances will be a 4th level Variant Human.
Fortunately, reaching 4th level typically does not take long, and you can pick up a second feat then instead of taking an ability score improvement, using the usual rules for feats:
>
> At certain levels, your class gives you the Ability Score Improvement feature. Using the optional feats rule, you can forgo taking that feature to take a feat of your choice instead.
>
>
>
### Theros: A Campaign Specific Method
If you happen to be playing in a *Mythic Odysseys of Theros* campaign, then this is actually possible. Each character in a Theros campaign begins with a supernatural gift:
>
> A character in Theros begins with one supernatural gift chosen from those in this section. Work with the DM to decide where your character’s gift came from. Is it tied to the god you serve? Was it the result of a fateful encounter with a sphinx or an oracle? Does it indicate the nature of your birth? Each gift’s description also includes a table to spark your imagination as you think about your character’s gift.
>
>
> *These supernatural gifts are intended for starting characters*, but some might be bestowed by gods as rewards for remarkable deeds.
>
>
>
This section contains a sidebar that describes using the PHB feats instead of the gifts printed in the *Theros* book:
>
> If your campaign uses the optional feat rules from chapter 6 of the Player’s Handbook, your Dungeon Master might allow you to take a feat as a variant supernatural gift. You gain one feat of your choice. This list suggests twelve feats from the Player’s Handbook, but you can choose any feat your DM allows
>
>
>
Playing a Variant Human in a Theros campaign would make it possible to take both feats at character creation. | No, you can get one at best
---------------------------
The description of feats in the players handbook states:
>
> At certain levels, your class gives you the Ability Score Improvement
> feature. Using the optional feats rule, you can forgo taking that
> feature to take a feat of your choice instead. You can take each feat
> only once, unless the feat’s description says otherwise.
>
>
>
Thus, the general rule is you can only gain a feat when you would gain an ability score improvement. However, There are two races that get a single feat at level 1, The Variant Human from the Phb and Custom Lineage from Tashas Cauldron of Everything:
>
> Feat. You gain one Feat of your choice
>
>
>
Since you can only have one race and no character by default gains a feat at level 1, you can typically only have one feat at most at level 1.
Backgrounds can grant feats,
----------------------------
Newer backgrounds can grant feats, but since this is very new design there are not many of them. The backgrounds in Strixhaven: a Curriculum of Chaos give a player who selects them a feat, but none of them grant Sentienl or Polarm Master.
In [this](https://youtu.be/uMMV4A_qIVw) video, Jeremy Crawford talks about what backgrounds will look like in the design going forward. |
198,130 | Is there a way to get the Polearm Master and Sentinel feats at 1st level? | 2022/05/04 | [
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/198130",
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com",
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com/users/76692/"
] | ### No, unless the DM allows it via an unusual application of optional rules, or via a Theros-specific option.
The only 1st level features granting a choice of feat are the Variant Human and Custom Lineage racial traits:
>
> #### Feat
>
>
> You gain one feat of your choice.
>
>
>
>
> **Feat.** You gain one feat of your choice for which you qualify.
>
>
>
As these are both racial traits of different races, you cannot have both of these traits at the same time. However, the *Dungeon Master's Guide* includes some optional rules for quest rewards that the DM can use to give a character a feat:
>
> A character who agrees to training as a reward must spend downtime with the trainer. In exchange, the character is guaranteed to receive a special benefit. Possible training benefits include the following:
>
>
> * The character gains inspiration daily at dawn for 1d4 + 6 days.
> * The character gains proficiency in a skill.
> * *The character gains a feat.*
>
>
>
Technically, the DM could engineer a situation where you receive a feat as a quest reward, without leveling up to 2nd level, which would be highly unusual. The earliest a character could get two feats under usual circumstances will be a 4th level Variant Human.
Fortunately, reaching 4th level typically does not take long, and you can pick up a second feat then instead of taking an ability score improvement, using the usual rules for feats:
>
> At certain levels, your class gives you the Ability Score Improvement feature. Using the optional feats rule, you can forgo taking that feature to take a feat of your choice instead.
>
>
>
### Theros: A Campaign Specific Method
If you happen to be playing in a *Mythic Odysseys of Theros* campaign, then this is actually possible. Each character in a Theros campaign begins with a supernatural gift:
>
> A character in Theros begins with one supernatural gift chosen from those in this section. Work with the DM to decide where your character’s gift came from. Is it tied to the god you serve? Was it the result of a fateful encounter with a sphinx or an oracle? Does it indicate the nature of your birth? Each gift’s description also includes a table to spark your imagination as you think about your character’s gift.
>
>
> *These supernatural gifts are intended for starting characters*, but some might be bestowed by gods as rewards for remarkable deeds.
>
>
>
This section contains a sidebar that describes using the PHB feats instead of the gifts printed in the *Theros* book:
>
> If your campaign uses the optional feat rules from chapter 6 of the Player’s Handbook, your Dungeon Master might allow you to take a feat as a variant supernatural gift. You gain one feat of your choice. This list suggests twelve feats from the Player’s Handbook, but you can choose any feat your DM allows
>
>
>
Playing a Variant Human in a Theros campaign would make it possible to take both feats at character creation. | No. Well, kinda.
================
As most people have stated before, the way to start with **one** feat at level one is taking the Variant Human race(PHB), or the custom lineage race(Tasha's).
Method 1.
That being said, in Mythic Odysseys of Theros, there are rules for Supernatural Gifts, which are essentially ideas for characters chosen by the gods. One of the starting modifiers suggested is the granting of a feat. The feats suggested are Lucky, Tough and some others, but it does say that the DM may give out different feats if appropriate. This is one way: play in Theros with a DM that endorses this.
Method 2.
Which is not out **yet**. So maybe this is Method 2 for people reading in the future.
The new Dragonlance Book (the UA has been released for play test) has backgrounds which give out specific feats at starting level. I do not believe any of them include Polearm Master nor Sentinel, however the book is not out yet, so there ay end up being one. Or guidelines to create custom feat-giving backgrounds. |
198,130 | Is there a way to get the Polearm Master and Sentinel feats at 1st level? | 2022/05/04 | [
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/198130",
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com",
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com/users/76692/"
] | No. Well, kinda.
================
As most people have stated before, the way to start with **one** feat at level one is taking the Variant Human race(PHB), or the custom lineage race(Tasha's).
Method 1.
That being said, in Mythic Odysseys of Theros, there are rules for Supernatural Gifts, which are essentially ideas for characters chosen by the gods. One of the starting modifiers suggested is the granting of a feat. The feats suggested are Lucky, Tough and some others, but it does say that the DM may give out different feats if appropriate. This is one way: play in Theros with a DM that endorses this.
Method 2.
Which is not out **yet**. So maybe this is Method 2 for people reading in the future.
The new Dragonlance Book (the UA has been released for play test) has backgrounds which give out specific feats at starting level. I do not believe any of them include Polearm Master nor Sentinel, however the book is not out yet, so there ay end up being one. Or guidelines to create custom feat-giving backgrounds. | No, you can get one at best
---------------------------
The description of feats in the players handbook states:
>
> At certain levels, your class gives you the Ability Score Improvement
> feature. Using the optional feats rule, you can forgo taking that
> feature to take a feat of your choice instead. You can take each feat
> only once, unless the feat’s description says otherwise.
>
>
>
Thus, the general rule is you can only gain a feat when you would gain an ability score improvement. However, There are two races that get a single feat at level 1, The Variant Human from the Phb and Custom Lineage from Tashas Cauldron of Everything:
>
> Feat. You gain one Feat of your choice
>
>
>
Since you can only have one race and no character by default gains a feat at level 1, you can typically only have one feat at most at level 1.
Backgrounds can grant feats,
----------------------------
Newer backgrounds can grant feats, but since this is very new design there are not many of them. The backgrounds in Strixhaven: a Curriculum of Chaos give a player who selects them a feat, but none of them grant Sentienl or Polarm Master.
In [this](https://youtu.be/uMMV4A_qIVw) video, Jeremy Crawford talks about what backgrounds will look like in the design going forward. |
36,533 | >
> [Numbers 20:12](https://biblehub.com/numbers/20-12.htm) KJV And the LORD spake unto Moses and Aaron,
> Because ye believed me not, to **sanctify me** in the eyes of the
> children of Israel, therefore ye shall not bring this congregation
> into the land which I have given them.
>
>
>
What does "sanctify me" in Numbers 20:12 mean? How did Moses fail to Sanctify God? | 2018/12/14 | [
"https://hermeneutics.stackexchange.com/questions/36533",
"https://hermeneutics.stackexchange.com",
"https://hermeneutics.stackexchange.com/users/26800/"
] | The Hebrew is perhaps best translated:
>
> And the Lord said to Moses, and to Aaron: Because you did not believe in me, and did not hallow me in the sight of the children of Israel, you will not bring this congregation to the land with I will give to them.
>
>
>
"To hallow" (derived from German roots; or from the Latin derivation, "sanctify") can mean either to make holy (an act of God, or in some priestly capacity, by prayer or other form of dedication intercession) or demonstrate to be or treat as holy in word or deed.
Here, by unbelief or disobedience as regards the manner in which he was to do what God commanded to be done, Moses openly diminished the holiness and majesty of God in the sight of the people, by giving the impression that His precise commands could be spurned for what he instead thought best. He was told, "Take the rod, and assemble the people together, thou and Aaron thy brother, and **speak to the rock before them, and it shall yield waters.** And when thou hast brought forth water out of the rock, all the multitude and their cattle shall drink" (Numbers 20:8); but what he did was he "lifted up his hand, and **struck the rock twice with the rod,**" (20:11) in addition perhaps (although this is doubtful as an attribution to his own power, rather than God's) to the crime of attributing the miracle to himself, "are we able, think you, to bring forth water from this rock?" (20:10). | I will quote what contributer "pehkay" said in regards to this particular verse (reference: [What exactly did Moses do wrong at Meribah?](https://hermeneutics.stackexchange.com/questions/2202/what-exactly-did-moses-do-wrong-at-meribah/36531#36531)) first, and then I will add my own two cents.
From "pehkay":
>
> The key verse is Num. 20:12: "You did not believe in Me, to sanctify
> Me in the eyes of the sons of Israel" (v. 12a). This means that Moses
> and Aaron had not sanctified God; they had not separated God from
> themselves. Moses' speaking was wrong and his striking was also wrong.
> His spirit was completely wrong, and he represented God in a wrong
> way.
>
>
> As God's authorial representative, Moses should have represent Him
> properly. But he implicated God in his error.
>
>
> God's dealing with Moses and Aaron meant that this act was committed
> by Moses and Aaron only, and that God had no part in it. Perhaps,
> Israel's murmuring could have been a rebellion in attitude only; their
> spirit might have been different. This is why God did not judge them.
> Moses should not have judged them rashly when God had not judged them.
> He should not have uttered any unrestrained words according to
> himself.
>
>
> So when Moses makes a mistake and does not confess it, God has to step
> forward to vindicate Himself.
>
>
>
That commentary speaks for itself, and is an excellent answer. I'll piggy-back on that and go from there (even if may be somewhat repetitive):
Upon looking at verse 8 of Numbers 20, The Lord clearly told Moses to ***speak*** to the rock, but because Moses *didn't speak* to the rock as he was commanded, this explains why The Lord chastised him for it, because it made it seem as though the Lord was angry with them (apparently).
I suppose the personal application for this could be: "When God tells you to do something, *do it!*"
Moses didn't follow directions, and for this very reason, Moses' ministry comes to a grinding halt; or, perhaps, more like it hits a bricked wall at infinite speeds! However, it's interesting to point out that even though Moses didn't follow instructions and didn't do what the Lord commanded him to do, and even though Moses misrepresented God on all accounts (hence the phrase in verse 12: "...to sanctify me in the eyes of the children of Israel,...") water still comes out, which proves that God always takes care of His children, and His mercy and longsuffering surely endures beyond mere description.
Because Moses misrepresented God, The Lord punishes them by saying, "You're not going to go into the Promised Land now. You will only be able to see it from far off."
I can relate to this, in perhaps a very minuscule way in comparison to this incredible incident, but I remember when I would do something that would warrant punishment from my mother; she would hit me where it hurt the worst, and at that time, as a teenager, I always looked forward to going out and being with my friends, who I could always see out playing from the windows where we lived. It was something that I looked forward to with utmost delight; I was always excited to go out and have fun, to "hang out" with friends, and enjoy the entire panorama of all that that was. When I would do something that warranted punishment, what would my mother do? She wouldn't allow me to go outside and be with my friends, for sometimes a week or two, depending on how serious the situation was. This was *devastating* to me! Not only did I want to go outside and be with my friends, and *couldn't*, but I would sit and *watch them from the window* ("from afar"), and it was the most *awful*, penetrating feeling.
Obviously my situation was a far cry from the incident that happened here with Moses, but in a strange way, I can relate to the feeling that this must have caused them, and I think that we all can apply something that has happened in our lives that makes this incident with Moses come 'alive' in different ways, even though this was of much greater significance.
With that said, when you synchronize these events, in Exodus 17, at Rephidim, Moses is told to strike the Rock, and of course water flows. He represented God well in that case; Moses "sanctified" God, or represented Him by following instructions.
At Meribah in Numbers 20, he was directed to "speak to" the Rock, but instead Moses strikes the Rock, which in hence misrepresents God, makes them think that perhaps (?) God is angry with them, and doesn't follow instructions, and because of this, the punishment was clear: the denial of the entry into the Promised Land.
Again: I feel that the "personal application" of this is that we shouldn't ever try to justify or crystallize away something that the Holy Spirit is telling us not to do, or vice-versa.
(On that note: Thank God for the prayers God ***doesn't*** answer...) |
28,816,536 | I want to know that,does BDD just work in acceptance test level? If not, does it work in unit test level as well? Does BDD have any suggestion For Unit tests?
thank you | 2015/03/02 | [
"https://Stackoverflow.com/questions/28816536",
"https://Stackoverflow.com",
"https://Stackoverflow.com/users/1570880/"
] | BDD is just a way of defining the specifications for an area of functionality. The idea is to bridge the gap between technical and non-technical people by using human readable syntax of some kind and to use specific examples to define the desired behaviour rather than talking in the abstract. As such it is a tool to help people work together and define the business' requirements for the new functionality. This is the primary point of BDD. Not testing.
The definitions that come out of BDD are however, useful for acceptance testing as they define the expected behaviour that was agreed upon. As such many great tools like cucumber are available to facilitate automation of these scenarios to cut down on your testing time.
With regard to using BDD for something like unit tests, the idea of using BDD and non-technical descriptions is to help involve non-technical people. If there are no non technical people involved in the creation of your unit tests (which I guess is the most likely case) then why bother with it? Technical people can read unit tests that are properly written, just fine. The unit tests that you're writing will come out of the functionality that is described by your BDD scenarios anyway.
However, if there is some technical detail of what you're working on that you're having trouble describing, and your team are comfortable working in a BDD way then definitely give the non-technical language and specific examples approach a go. I just wouldn't bother using the the human readable language version of the example in your unit test.
Edit: After reading xmojmr 's comment about your question, I can absolutely see the benefit of using BDD tools and syntax to make your unit tests more readable/easier to plan out, but I think this is quite different from BDD in general, which is more about bridging a communication gap. | BDD actually [started at the class level](http://dannorth.net/introducing-bdd/). The first incarnation of JBehave was a replacement for JUnit that avoided the word "test". It was only later that the system-level stuff came along after [Dan North explained mock objects to Chris Matts](http://abc.truemesh.com/archives/000377.html), an analyst at the time who was learning how to code.
These days, even unit testing frameworks don't insist that you start your test methods with the word "test", and the frameworks for the dynamic languages are pretty much derived from RSpec, which was [a port of JBehave's early functionality](http://blog.davidchelimsky.net/blog/2007/05/14/an-introduction-to-rspec-part-i/) to Ruby anyway.
So, yes, it's perfectly possible to do BDD at that level.
Of course, [alannichols](https://stackoverflow.com/users/3890924/alannichols) is right in saying that the audience is different, being non-technical.
So why would you want to do BDD?
As Dan says in that first link, it turns out that talking about *behaviour* is more useful than talking about *tests*. In BDD, we just avoid the word *test*. We prefer talking about *examples* and how things should behave rather than pass or fail.
By having conversations around the desired behaviour of a system or class, and providing examples of that behaviour, you can explore it more easily than when you're talking about testing.
However, because it's a non-technical audience, I find it's enough to put the "given, when, then" in comments. You can see [an example here](https://github.com/lunivore/WiPFlash/blob/master/WiPFlash.Behavior/Framework/WaiterBehaviour.cs). You don't need an explicit BDD tool.
If you can't find another dev to talk about the behaviour with, I suggest you [find a rubber duck](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rubber_duck_debugging). |
18,834 | Assume you can use any whistle type, is there a way to choose the pressure point at which a whistle makes noise? For example I have a whistle that starts making noise at 2 psi but I would like to lower that to 1 psi. Would I change the area of the inlet, outlet? what feature would you change to accomplish this? | 2018/01/10 | [
"https://engineering.stackexchange.com/questions/18834",
"https://engineering.stackexchange.com",
"https://engineering.stackexchange.com/users/14448/"
] | The most serious and comprehensive information about whistles is provided by the folks who work on pipe organs: expensive instruments which endure critique by serious listeners, and which require maintenance where they are installed because of their size. A pipe organ's **Flue Pipes** are in fact no different from whistles.
A whistle is a noisemaker that uses no reed. In this sense, we might say that a brass player's lips and a singer's vocal cords are *reeds*, while a flute player is playing a kind of *whistle*.
A whistle has two components: a resonator and an air supply. The resonator's opening may be called its mouth, and the air supply must flow freely past the resonator's mouth in order for it to work.
The air flows over the resonator's *mouth* and sucks out a bit of pressure from the resonator by the Bernoulli principle. Once this pressure is lower inside the resonator, the free air supply flow changes course and starts packing into the resonator, increasing its pressure. This sends a high pressure wave through the resonator which may either bounce back (for a closed resonator) or depart (for an open resonator).
At some moment in time while the air is flowing into the resonator, the pressure inside increases enough to divert the airflow away from the mouth of the resonator. Once the flow is diverted away from the resonator, it begins to remove air from inside and lower the pressure, creating another pressure wave inside. Now the cycle repeats.
The sound you hear originates both from the opening at the top of the resonator and an opening at the bottom (for open resonators) where there is this fluctuating air pressure.
The sound is at a tuned pitch (or frequency) that is the result of the pressure wave bouncing from top to bottom, bottom to top in the resonator. The frequency is a simple matter of length with flue pipes, but I can't even explain what's going on in an ocarina.
>
> How can I reduce the pressure of my whistle?
>
>
>
In order to make a sound, your instrument must initiate the aforedescribed cycle, and also convert the air source's energy into acoustic energy. Improving either (by initiating sound earlier or converting energy more efficiently) may enable your instrument to use less pressure. Here are some conditions which may affect either, in order of my guess for the most important first:
* **Velocity of air supply** (high velocity = earlier initiation of tone)
* **Cross-sectional area of resonator near its mouth** (smaller cross-sectional area = earlier initiation of tone)
* **The resonator being stopped or open** (stopped = earlier initiation of tone)
* **Volumetric flow of air supply** (high flow = more volume)
* **Length along the flow direction of the resonator "mouth"** (must be optimized)
* **Length across the flow direction of the resonator "mouth"** (must be optimized)
* **Distance that the air supply travels freely** (must be optimized)
* **Laminarity of the air supply** (unknown effect by me whether more or less sound)
+ You might increase the laminarity by passing the air supply through a long, straight tube, for instance.
* **Intended pitch of the resonator** (higher pitch = more sound, to a point)
* **Length of the resonator** (shorter length = more sound, to a point)
* **Atmospheric condition** (ambient wind may "kill" the free flow of the air supply)
* **Cross-sectional area of the resonator's other opening for open resonators** (bigger rear opening = more volume)
+ There's a reason tubas, gramophones, Alpenhorns, and megaphones have a flared end: the smaller volumetric velocity produced by the large cross-sectional area enables more sound energy to transfer into the open air, making the best use of the player's effort. This is called **impedance matching**.
As suggested elsewhere, dividing your airflow among multiple resonators may solve your issue. Good luck!
[*Further reading on pipe organ flue pipes ("whistles")*](http://hardmanwurlitzer.com/pipes/) | A whistle works based on flow. For a given whistle design, a certain flow is required to generate the pressure oscillations which generate the sound. You can think of it like suddenly filling the resonator chamber with air, then draining it with the [venturi effect](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venturi_effect), over and over. Below a certain flow rate, the flow is laminar and just exhausts without oscillation.
The volume of the chamber will change the freqency of the sound because it takes more time to fill and drain a larger volume. This will in turn change transmission and energy characteristics of the emitted sound. However, it will have a very small effect on minimum flow required to produce sound.
If you wish to have a whistle trigger off of pressure you will need to configure your system to have your pressure trigger point deliver the minimum airflow to the whistle.
To go from a low pressure to a higher pressure trigger point on the whistle, you can restricting the airflow with a throttling valve, orifice, or a small pipe. Alternatively, you could divert part of the flow to a different path or even a second whistle in parallel.
To go from a high pressure to a lower pressure trigger on the whistle, you will have to decrease the air passage area such that the operational pressure drop across the whistle is high enough for the lower pressure to deliver enough flow. |
33,378 | Upgraded my notebook to Natty Beta 1 two days ago. All seems to be in order except for a very annoying little thing. I used to have Google Chrome as my default browser, and after the upgrade, this default was changed to Firefox. Note that when I go to the Google Chrome settings and to the Firefox setting it seems that Google Chrome is set as my default browser, but whenever I click on a URL from outside a browser it's Firefox that comes up and not Chrome.
Any help will be much appreciated.
Thanks. | 2011/04/03 | [
"https://askubuntu.com/questions/33378",
"https://askubuntu.com",
"https://askubuntu.com/users/4442/"
] | You should file a bug report for this, because this may be a bug that is part of 11.04. Again, 11.04 is in beta, so bugs are bound to happen. | There should be an option in chrome such to check to see if it is the default browser it is easy to change from there.
**Edited**
The button to set chrome as the system default browser is in the preferences menu or chrome. |
33,378 | Upgraded my notebook to Natty Beta 1 two days ago. All seems to be in order except for a very annoying little thing. I used to have Google Chrome as my default browser, and after the upgrade, this default was changed to Firefox. Note that when I go to the Google Chrome settings and to the Firefox setting it seems that Google Chrome is set as my default browser, but whenever I click on a URL from outside a browser it's Firefox that comes up and not Chrome.
Any help will be much appreciated.
Thanks. | 2011/04/03 | [
"https://askubuntu.com/questions/33378",
"https://askubuntu.com",
"https://askubuntu.com/users/4442/"
] | Turns out that there is this little application called "Preferred Applications" and you can set your default browser there. I figured this out, 2 minutes after posting my question. Well, three things are a mystery to me:
1. Why was my default changed?
2. How is a "new" user supposed to know about this "Preferred Applications" utility? This utility is not in the launcher, and I only recalled it by sheer luck.
3. Why are the settings within Firefox and within Google Chrome not working? | You should file a bug report for this, because this may be a bug that is part of 11.04. Again, 11.04 is in beta, so bugs are bound to happen. |
33,378 | Upgraded my notebook to Natty Beta 1 two days ago. All seems to be in order except for a very annoying little thing. I used to have Google Chrome as my default browser, and after the upgrade, this default was changed to Firefox. Note that when I go to the Google Chrome settings and to the Firefox setting it seems that Google Chrome is set as my default browser, but whenever I click on a URL from outside a browser it's Firefox that comes up and not Chrome.
Any help will be much appreciated.
Thanks. | 2011/04/03 | [
"https://askubuntu.com/questions/33378",
"https://askubuntu.com",
"https://askubuntu.com/users/4442/"
] | Turns out that there is this little application called "Preferred Applications" and you can set your default browser there. I figured this out, 2 minutes after posting my question. Well, three things are a mystery to me:
1. Why was my default changed?
2. How is a "new" user supposed to know about this "Preferred Applications" utility? This utility is not in the launcher, and I only recalled it by sheer luck.
3. Why are the settings within Firefox and within Google Chrome not working? | There should be an option in chrome such to check to see if it is the default browser it is easy to change from there.
**Edited**
The button to set chrome as the system default browser is in the preferences menu or chrome. |
33,134 | I love a man who says he loves me and wants to marry me in the Islamic way. I found out that he is still married legally to a woman and will not divorce her. If I marry him, does that make me a zina? Is this haram? | 2016/06/28 | [
"https://islam.stackexchange.com/questions/33134",
"https://islam.stackexchange.com",
"https://islam.stackexchange.com/users/17514/"
] | Zina is an illegal relationship. This means a relationship between two non-married people.
So if there's an Islamic marriage zina is out of question.
According to shari'a a man is allowed to marry up to four women (by [Quran 4:3](http://legacy.quran.com/4/3)) under the condition that he doesn't do injustice to any of them and threats them all as equal.
After that come a few conditions as stated in the comment:
Is polygamy allowed in your country?
Is the first wife aware that he want's to marry an other woman?
AFAIK he doesn't need her approval but he should let her know. Note that the first wife could have made a condition in her marriage contract that he shouldn't marry any other wife, in that case he must respect the contract.
It is sunnah to make a marriage public.
Note in case you are living in a western country where polygamy is **not allowed** an Islamic marriage contract could still be set and approved by Muslims even if it won't be legal or valid according the law. This is a difficult and risky case which many scholars advise to avoid. And if one still want to do so the wife which is not a legal wife in front of the law must assure that here rights (inheritance etc.) are still given, if not she should never sign such a contract or accept such a marriage. | No because Islam allows men to marry four women, but only if you can keep equality amid them. So its not a zina to have sex with second wife. |
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