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Tech —

Flashback infections not waning after all; 650,000 Macs still hijacked

Estimates reported earlier this week showing a sharp decrease in the number of …

This image charts the number of Flashback bots from April 3 to April 19.

Analysis declaring the demise of the Flashback Mac backdoor has been greatly exaggerated, said researchers with a Russia-based antivirus firm, who on late Friday estimated there are 650,000 unique OS X machines currently infected by the malware.

The estimate by Doctor Web is in stark contrast to analysis provided Wednesday by Symantec, which showed the number of compromised systems had dropped from more than half a million to about 140,000. Following the release of the latest Doctor Web estimate, Symantec updated its post to say company researchers now believe their servers "are receiving limited infection counts" for the malware.

The revised numbers are the result of so-called sinkholes that researchers construct to act as surrogate command and control servers for hijacked machines. To give the Flashback botnet resilience against a takedown of the real command channels, the malware uses the current date, and certain code-embedded parameters, to dynamically generate alternate domain names the infected Macs report to. By registering the domains ahead of the Flashback operators, security researchers are able to create benign control servers that can prevent the bots from receiving harmful commands and can also conduct reconnaissance on the targeted malware.

According to Doctor Web, different sinkholes used by different researchers have returned vastly different statistics about the machines reporting to them. Mac antivirus provider Intego has concurred with those findings, at least in part, it said, because some domain name system lookup services are blocking the IP resolution of some of the domains used by the sinkholes.

"The effect here is that the Macs are still infected, but they will not be able to contact the command and control servers, and especially, cannot be counted by sinkholes," Intego researcher Peter James wrote in a post published on Friday morning.

Both Doctor Web and the update from Symantec went on to say a specific sinkhole at IP address was failing to close TCP connections after being contacted by infected machines.

This screen capture shows a sinkhole at keeping a TCP connection open with an infected machine.
This screen capture shows a sinkhole at keeping a TCP connection open with an infected machine.

"As the result, bots switch to the standby mode and wait for the server's reply and no longer respond to further commands," Friday's post from Doctor Web stated. "As a consequence, they do not communicate with other command centers, many of which have been registered by information security specialists."

The post estimates that a total of 817,879 bots have been a part of the botnet at one time or another since Doctor Web first started monitoring it on April 4. On Monday, 717,004 unique IP addresses and 595,816 Mac unique user IDs checked in. The number of IP addresses and UUIDs the following day were 714,483 and 582,405. And so, of the estimated infected Macs, "the number is still around 650,000," the post said.

The motives behind the Flashback operators remain murky, but researchers suspect the malware may be involved click fraud scams, since it often alters query results retuned by search engines. The malware first spread by masquerading as an update for Adobe's Flash player, and more recently by exploiting a critical Java vulnerability that Apple was slow to patch. Researchers from Kaspersky have said that starting in late February, tens of thousands of sites running WordPress began pushing the malware, suggesting that attackers may have exploited a vulnerability in the blogging tool to mass infect the sites with exploits. On late Friday, WordPress issued a security update here.

Over the past two weeks, Apple and a variety of third-party software providers have offered free tools to diagnose and cure Flashback infections. As researchers started seeing fewer bots reporting to their sinkholes, they assumed the decline was the result of end users patching and repairing their Macs. Now, those assumptions are open to debate.

Said Intego's James: "The realization now that the actual number of infected Macs is a multiple of the numbers cited recently in the press suggest that as many Macs are disinfected others are being infected."

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Tag Archives: Dutch Antillean

The Divided Dutch-Antillean Writer (essay and poetry translations)

In Small Axe Salon, platform for Caribbean literature and ideas.

Recently gone ”live” in online publication, my article The Divided Dutch-Antillean Writer and the Unifying Force of Translation, and English translations I made of three of Curaçaoan poet Frank Martinus Arion’s verses from Papiamentu and from Dutch. Other manifestoes in the anthology are from Haitian and Puerto Rican writers on translation and creole languages, in the anthology published online and in print by the Caribbean-studies platform Small Axe.

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Tag Archives: critique

Montserrat Visits

Jon Bolles, Admissions Councelor from Montserrat visited a class of 30 interested Drawing and Painting students and then the Art Portfolio class last Tuesday to talk about all things art and Montserrat. Mr. Bolles is a 2012 graduate of the … Continue reading

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Posts Tagged ‘Cockneys vs. Zombies’

Golden Zombey Logo Season 5 is over people, 1/2 a decade of zombie movies in the can. The end of the season means that it is time to hand out the coveted Golden Zombeys! Celebrating the best and the worst that Zombie Movie Night had to offer. Eligible movies were any that were viewed as part of Zombie Movie Night between October 2013 and September 2014. Here’s a quick rundown of the winners. Congratulations to all! For a more detailed presentation including nominees, pictures, and explanations for each winner, click the link:

13:14 Zombeys PDF

2014 Hall of Fame Inductee: Shaun of the Dead

Best Zombie Movie Night Feature: The Battery

Best Actor in a Zombie Movie: Dan Palmer – Stalled

Best Actress in a Zombie Movie: Najarra Townsend – Contracted

Best Supporting Actor in a Zombie Movie: Jarrod Pistilli – Buck Wild

Best Supporting Actress in a Zombie Movie: Caroline Williams – Contracted

Outstanding Zombie in a Zombie Movie: Propeller Head – Frankenstein’s Army

Best Villain (Non-Zombie): Dr. Viktor Frankenstein – Frankenstein’s Army

Best Zombie-Fighting Duo or Team: Overtime – Raph & Max

Best Zombie Comedy: Dead Before Dawn

Best Nudity: Night of the Creeps

Best Foreign Film: Eaters

Most Memorable Massacring of Zombies: Zombie Hunter – Father Jesus with an Axe

Most Original Zombie Origin: Attack of the Vegan Zombies – Witchcraft and Blood/Alcohol Content

Best Soundtrack: The Battery

Most Bizarre Zombie Behavior: The Dead Matter – Zombie’s Day Out

Best Unintentional Comedy: Zombie Massacre – The President of the United States

Worst Ending: Dorm of the Dead

Biggest “WTF” Moment: Frankenstein’s Army

Best Poster Art: Eaters

Check out previous years’ winners here


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Bret Berta

Bret Berta is currently the Director of Product Management and Chip Implementations for FIS Card Personalization.� He has 11 years of experience in the card personalization industry and his team is responsible for the successful migration to chip cards for over 6,000 programs representing over 3,000 financial institutions in the U.S. Market.Bret is an active member of the Smart Card Alliance and EMV Migration Forum, and has a Business Administration degree from Illinois State University.


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Wink Poppy Midnight

wpmWink Poppy Midnight by April Genevieve Tucholke
Young Adult Contemporary, Mystery, Magical Realism

Every story needs a hero.
Every story needs a villain.
Every story needs a secret.

Wink is the odd, mysterious neighbor girl, wild red hair and freckles. Poppy is the blond bully and the beautiful, manipulative high school queen bee. Midnight is the sweet, uncertain boy caught between them. Wink. Poppy. Midnight. Two girls. One boy. Three voices that burst onto the page in short, sharp, bewitching chapters, and spiral swiftly and inexorably toward something terrible or tricky or tremendous.

What really happened?
Someone knows.
Someone is lying.

The Bells were the Orphans who lived in the Bell farm, consisting of three boys and two girls. All redheads, except for Bee. Everyone said the Bell kids were witches and weirdo’s.

+ The oldest boy (aside from Leaf) Felix, at fourteen years old, was quieter than the others, though his eyes were lively enough

+ The twins were Hops and Moon, both 10, were the wildest

+ Bee was seven

+ After that came Peach, the youngest at five or six years old, but had the same loud, rascally fierceness of the twins

+ And Wink, the oldest since Leaf left

The Yellow peril were Poppy’s inner circle–it was a reference to opium, because, you know, Poppy. But everyone just called them the Yellows. Two guys and two girls and none of them half as evil or as beautiful as Poppy. The Yellows surrounded Poppy like rays around the sun.

The guys were:

+ Thomas
+ Briggs.

The girls were:

+ Poppy
+ Buttercup
+ Zoe

Mrs. Bell read Midnight’s tarot, and here’s what was in store for him.

Images are from the Wild Unknown tarot deck and differs from others decks. This is just the tarot deck I use.

Three of Swords: Upright: Painful separation, sorrow heartbreak, grief, rejection.
Reversed: Releasing pain, optimism, forgiveness.

The Three of Swords represents rejection, sadness, loneliness, heartbreak, betrayal, separation and grief. Such events feel so painful because they are unexpected. However, the Three of Swords often serves as a warning sign to show when one or more of these are possible. By preparing for this difficult event, the emotional blow can be minimized or even prevented entirely.

The Three of Swords is also about release. When you have suffered a major setback, or loss, it is a good time to have a good cry, which is all part of the cleansing process. Expressing your sadness and letting it all out will then help you to move on to better times. However, it is also important that you continue to focus on the future path ahead. There can be a risk that you may become overly absorbed in the loss and the surrounding emotions that you lose sight of the need to just let go and move on. The loss becomes your focus rather than the recovery. It is time to accept the loss and then move forward with your life. [Source]

Two of Swords: Upright: Indecision, choices, truce, stalemate, blocked emotions.
Reversed: Indecision, confusion, information overload.

The Two of Swords is a card of choice and of the difficulty of making a decision. The woman in this card is blindfolded, and this may be intentionally so, indicating that she is avoiding making a very difficult decision. Her state of calm and relaxation may be indicative that she is trying to avoid this important decision in order to bring about peace of mind. However, the decision must still be made. Therefore, the appearance of the Two of Swords indicates that you are currently being faced with a difficult decision but you are attempting to hide from it and pretending to yourself and others that if you ignore the decision long enough, it will go away of its own accord. However, the decision will not go away simply by your willing it to depart. Your conscience will eventually force you into facing your refusal to deal directly with the situation.

The Two of Swords often represents a stalemate where there is no winner or loser. You may be at loggerheads with another person and failing to see each other’s points of view. What is needed is a truce, where you either ‘agree to disagree’ or you seek to understand each other’s points of view before coming to a final solution. Thus, not only does this card represent potential conflict through a stalemate, it also represents making peace through a truce. [Source]

The Chariot: Upright: Control, will power, victory, assertion, determination.
Reversed: Lack of control and direction, aggression.

The Chariot represents conquest, victory and overcoming opposition through your confidence and control. Any success will be a result of applying these factors to the situation. You will need to use the strength of your willpower to overcome any obstacles or challenges in your way. You may even find that by leveraging any opposing forces surrounding you at this time you can use them to your advantage. You must be determined, self-disciplined, and hard working. If you are, you will triumph over any difficulties or anyone who is trying to limit you. This struggle will ultimately make you stronger. [Source]

The Lovers: Upright: Love, union, relationships, values alignment, choices.
Reversed: Disharmony, imbalance, misalignment of values.

The Lovers represent perfection, harmony and mutual attractiveness. Their trust in one another gives them strength and confidence to overcome the obstacles in life. The bond that the two lovers has created is incredibly strong and is often reflective of a marriage, soul mate connection or very intimate and close relationship.

When the Lovers card appears in a reading, it is important to think about what decisions and choices you are facing. The fact that the Lovers is a Major Arcana card indicates that these decisions or choices are incredibly important and significant so it is essential that you choose the right path. There may be an easy option available but you will need to ask yourself whether this is the right path for you in the long run. Oftentimes, it is the more difficult path that will bring you the greatest benefit, particularly on a deeper level. [Source]

There are a few tales that come into play in Wink Poppy Midnight that have woven deep into the story, and are also told/mentioned/referenced to by our colorful storyteller, Wink. Here are a few of the mass, pictured below.

wpm books

“Every story needs a hero.”
–April Genevieve Tucholke, Wink Poppy Midnight (ARC pg. 12)

“Every story needs a villain. The villain is just as important as the hero.”
–April Genevieve Tucholke, Wink Poppy Midnight (ARC pg. 15)

“We were like the three Fates, weaving the story together, threads of gold, red, and midnight blue.”
–April Genevieve Tucholke, Wink Poppy Midnight (ARC pg. 111)

“There’s no keeping a roamer. You can tie them down, cage them up like a bird, and it will work for a while, but eventually they will break free and then they’ll run until they die.”
–April Genevieve Tucholke, Wink Poppy Midnight (ARC pg. 229)

**Quotes are taken directly from an uncorrected advanced review copy and are subject to change in final copy**

[Reblog on Tumblr!]

April Genevieve Tucholke is the author of Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea, Between the Spark and the Burn, and Wink Poppy Midnight. She also curated the horror anthology Slasher Girls & Monster Boys. She has received four starred reviews and her novels have been chosen for the Junior Library Guild, Kids’ Indie Next picks, and YALSA Teens Top Ten. When she’s not writing, April likes walking in the woods with her two cheerful dogs, exploring abandoned houses, and drinking expensive coffee. She has lived in many places around the world, and currently resides in Oregon with her husband.

Website | Twitter | Instagram | Goodreads

Amazon | B&N | iBooks | Kobo | Books A Million | Indiebound | Book Depository | Overdrive

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Vacancy details

Vacancy title
Site Agent
Contract type
Full time permanent
London/Home Counties

Site Agent

Location: Essex, Cambridgeshire, Hertfordshire, Bedfordshire, Suffolk and Norfolk

Talented people are the key to our success

About us:

Would you like to work for a progressive and ambitious company which is also one of the most successful within the UK construction and infrastructure industry?

Morgan Sindall provides national construction and infrastructure services to private and public sector customers across a comprehensive range of markets. We aim to create great results for our customers, partners and ourselves.

The Project:

The Eastern Highways Alliance (EHA) is a group of 11 local authorities in the east of England. Its aim is to support the EHA Members to achieve better quality highway, public realm and infrastructure schemes at lower cost by combining and sharing resources. The EHA Members have agreed that this is best achieved by implementation of best practice principles. They are looking for partners who support this vision with a streamlined supply chain as well as building the skills of EHF2’s supply chain to support delivery.

The Framework is valued at £750 million over a four year period. The Framework started in April 2016. Since the start of 2017 the pipeline of opportunities has grown and currently Contractors have visibility of approximately £450 million of Projects.

Morgan Sindall is the most successful Contractor on the framework having been awarded three projects with a combined project value of £22 million. A further £50 million over four Projects is currently being tendered (July 2017) and it is envisage that this level of tender opportunity will continue through 2018 and 2019.

We have a fantastic opportunity within our Infrastructure business for an ambitious and talented Site Agents to work on our Eastern Highways Framework.

We are looking for Site Agents who will be responsible for the management of the construction site in order to achieve required project delivery to the customers’ objectives, while maintaining standards of health and safety, quality, environmental impact and cost control. Previous Highways & General Civils experience would be advantageous, equally we would welcome applicants from a Rail or other Heavy Civils background.

This would be the ideal role for an experienced Sub Agent (or similar) to take that step up into a Site Agent role.

This is an excellent opportunity to work within a successful, growing and exciting team.

As a Site Agent you will:

  • Ensure accurate implementation of all engineering controls and compliance with the contract drawings and specification
  • Produce risk assessments and method statements for safe execution of the works
  • Ensure work is executed in a safe manner meeting legal guidelines set out in health safety and requirements and environmental compliance
  • Manage site activities to ensure work is completed on time and within budget

Already experienced as a Site Agent, you will have an understanding and knowledge of NEC 3 conditions of contract, collaborative working and Programme Management. You will hold a relevant industry qualification and a CSCS card.

About the Highways Team:

Our projects encompass motorway widening, congestion relief, safety improvement and bypass schemes. Recent work includes M62 Smart Motorways, Lincolnshire’s new A1073 bypass, the A1 Improvement scheme from Dishforth to Barton in North Yorkshire, and the M74 Completion Project through central Glasgow, Scotland’s largest infrastructure scheme. Under Early Contractor Involvement (ECI) schemes, we engage with our customers as early as possible to maximise innovation, efficiency and cost savings.

Morgan Sindall is an equal opportunities employer and has been accredited with the Positive About Disabled People ‘Two Ticks’ accreditation.  We are also an Investors in People company.

Morgan Sindall is unable to employ anyone who does not have the legal right to live and work in the UK.

In the recruitment process all applicants are required to provide the necessary right to work information and documentation.

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Clarksville, NC Attorney

Need an attorney in Clarksville, NC?

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If you're facing criminal charges of any kind in Clarksville, NC and you need a criminal defense lawyer that has a strong record and over 10 years of experience in dealing with the North Carolina criminal justice system. Regardless of the charges your case matters to us. Having a trusted and competent lawyer that's willing to fight in your corner can make a world of difference. Please look over our criminal law practice areas and tell me about your case when you're ready.

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August 28, 2017
Why Cannabis Can Be Considered A Better Option For Chronic Pain?

100 million Americans suffer from chronic pain – the equivalent of 1/3 of the US itself. Chronic pain is defined as pain that exists for more than 12 weeks. However, what many don’t realize is that this pain commonly coincides alongside other serious symptoms and conditions, from sleeping disturbances, weakened immune systems, anxiety, depression and [read more…]

April 30, 2017
The other kind of green beauty!

San Francisco Chronicle. Created by Mara Gordon, who named the company for her aunt, Aunt Zelda’s Cannabis-Infused Coconut Topical is marketed for muscle and nerve pain (perfect for my post-gym days), rashes, dryness and for healing minor cuts. After hearing from another user about its effectiveness at reducing breakouts and lessening blemishes, I tested the [read more…]

Cannabis, cannabis medicine, Skin Care, Topicals
April 10, 2017

Do you want to go for your dreams and creative endeavors, but get stopped again and again, whether it be by your own mind, or life’s dramas? Then join me for an amazing journey and FREE online event called The Unstoppable Woman: Secrets on Turning Challenges into Growth, Finding Joy and Gratitude Daily and Loving [read more…]

April 9, 2017
Marijuana Belongs on Your Face

I’m a Skincare Junkie SOURCE: HELLOMD, P Hadfield- I am a skincare junkie, a fact I readily admit to. I moisturize every morning and night without fail and the thought that you might not, leaves my jaw wide open with the words “OH, NO!”, rapidly coming forth. As a result of my somewhat complex skincare [read more…]

CBD, Skin Care, Topicals
April 7, 2017
Mara Gordon will be speaking at the 2017 World Medical Cannabis Conference 04/21-04/22 in Pittsburgh!

Mara will be joining the “Cannabis Testing & Quality Control ” panel on April 21st, at 1 pm. #MedCannConEx is the first physician-led medical cannabis conference that will include over 35 different panel discussions from former NFL stars Ricky Williams, Marvin Washington, Todd Herremans, Eben Britton, Nate Jackson, and over 75 cannabis physicians, entrepreneurs, investors [read more…]

December 14, 2016
Free Live-Stream with Aunt Zelda’s Founder Mara Gordon

Aunt Zelda’s is proud to bring you this live-stream event in partnership with our friends at GreenFlower Media. This has been a great year of research and education. Join us as Aunt Zelda’s founder Mara Gordon talks about treating cancer with cannabis. This free live-stream event will be accessible from any device, so click this link [read more…]

Aunt Zelda's™ High Lights, Cannabis, cannabis medicine
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Kicking It Up a Notch for XMas 2010

ALG groupies will know that every year, I try to kick the light costume up a notch. The first light suit was a meager two or three strings of normal, incandescent mini-lights pinned to some black sweats. I pulled the lead-acid battery out of the UPS (uninteruptable power supply) that Grande Cable installed in my closet to protect all the fiber optic cable crap they mounted on the side of my house (don’t worry Grande, I put it back when I was done with it)  and I hooked it up to a bulky inverter. The whole setup weighed about eight or ten pounds and would run just long enough to get to the Trail of Lights race from the parking lot, linger a bit, do a fast walk/slow run race and get back to the car.

In following years, I upgraded to LED lights, brought on LakewayLightGuy(aka Richard Davis), got a smaller inverter, and added many more strings (LakewayLightGuy’s bigger C7-style strings actually outshine ME now!) and a rudimentary sequencer. Last year, we went to one-piece jumpsuits and I added the spectacular Autonomous Cape.

So anyway, what to do this year?! Although I’m already busy getting this year’s luminescent Halloween costume together – not to mention blogging about it – I know from experience that if I’m going to add anything to the Christmas outfit, I need to get an early start on it, especially if it’s significant.  After all, half of my November is usually taken up getting the house lights up 🙂

Well, I think significant might be an understatement…

Initially, I had some thoughts about connecting the light-sequencing program to the suit and cape. I tried my home-written light-sequencing program out (the one I use on my house) on Cherie’s Dell Mini and it seemed to have more than enough horsepower to run it. That just leaves the somewhat complicated task of building a mobile light relay box or something. So, this guy at work, Jay, got me looking at some hobbyist automation stuff. I’ll go into more detail in a subsequent post but, to make a long story short, I got all motivated and decided to do a mesh-networked, software-sequenced setup that coordinates both light suits, the capes, and hopefully a couple of new light staffs.  Here’s a schematic:

Light Suit Mesh Network Schematic

If all goes well, I’ll have a Dell Mini inside my suit running the sequencing software which will drive an Arduino microcontroller that will be mesh-networked with all the endpoints (suits, staffs and cape). My plan is to have the sound broadcast via bluetooth to one of the two light staffs, which will have a cannibalized set of bluetooth speakers inside it. It’s going to require a couple hundred bucks in off-the-shelf electronics, some custom-built electronics, and a bunch of software enhancements to drive it all.  This is all pretty ambitious, so I may only pull off part of it but, if successful, I think it will be a hell of an upgrade for 2010!

I’ll post more geeky details for anyone interested soon.

This entry was posted in Christmas. Bookmark the permalink.

One Response to Kicking It Up a Notch for XMas 2010

  1. Pingback: Meshed Network Light Suit Technical Details (part 1) | Austinlightguy's Blog

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Enjoy the Freedom a Pop-Top Can Bring

It’s easy to see why so many Australian holidaymakers opt for a Jayco Journey or Starcraft Pop Top. Combining the storage advantages of a Caravan, with the hitch-and-go freedom of a Camper Trailer, they’re ideal for extended road trips, weekend getaways and everything in between.

Nationwide Support

Nationwide Support

100+ service and dealer locations

Roadside Assistance

Roadside Assistance

24 hours, 365 days, 3 years

Warranty Program

Warranty Program

12-month comprehensive coverage

Better Value

Better Value

More features for less cost

Plenty of Space, Easy to Tow

Do you want the living space of a larger RV, with the towing and storage convenience of a smaller RV? Introducing the Jayco Pop Top. Pull down the roof, and the reduced height enables easy storage under your garage, less wind resistance and lower clearance. Pop up the roof when you set up camp, and enjoy your spacious home away from home. Gain the freedom to simply go where you please.

Jayco Journey pop-top transparent background
Pop-Top features

Fully Featured

There’s something to be said about design that achieves both practicality and comfort. Your Jayco Pop Top is equipped to bring you and your family the kind of holiday that makes wonderful memories. Return after an energetic day to your roomy lounge and dining setting with comfortable high-resilience Dunlop foam cushions for years of comfort and support, Euro Style furniture, full kitchen with fridge and microwave, and lift up beds with orthopaedic design. Fall in love with RV holidaying all over again.

Pop-Top features
Pop-Top features
Pop-Top features

quotes This has been a great van. Well finished and tows a treat. This is our 4th jayco and their back up is excellent. quotes

Rated 5 stars on Nov 21, 2014

We have had the Starcraft outback for about 7 weeks now and have done approx 10,000 ks. It is a 20 foot with the pedder suspension. Lighting system is great bed is good and is quite attractive, We would thoroughly recommend these vans.

Russell, Australia

Easy, carefree holidays

Setup is a snap. So too is towing. Lighter, and more compact in transit, a Jayco Pop Top can be hauled more easily, and by a wide variety of vehicles. And when not en route to some fabulous holiday spot, it fits conveniently under your carport.

Weight from 1140kg

Height from 2.3m

Jayco Journey Outback

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Jayco's new Interlocking Roof System with extruded corners, which increases structural strength and stability, offers better insulation, provides superior wet weather performance and creates a cleaner, more streamlined appearance.

caravan cut-away view

Travel Smoother & Safer with
JTECH Suspension

Developed after an extensive two year testing program covering thousands of kilometres on second class roads, JTECH suspension has been designed specifically to keep your Jayco strong and safe under harsh Australian conditions. Delivering greater stability, a smoother ride, more precise handling and increased ground clearance without increased ride height, it makes towing easier than ever before.

JTech suspension

custom icon Optional Extras
Personalise Your Pop-Top

It’s nice to know that while the standard Jayco Pop Top has more than you need for that special getaway, you do have the opportunity to add delightful extras. Make your nights as fun as your days with a high-end entertainment system. Dine in style with an outdoor slide-out BBQ. You can even opt for a water filtration system. Pick and choose just what you want for your RV, and truly make it your own.

Jayco Silverline Caravan
solar panels
caravan shower
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compass icon white Optional Extras
The Jayco Outback Package

If your inner explorer wants to take on the road less travelled, go for the Outback upgrade. The Outback package gives your Caravan more added strength and clearance for towing in rugged conditions, as well as other bonus features. Each model of Jayco Caravan comes with the option to upgrade to Outback for an improved off-road experience.

To determine which package best suits your needs, review Outback and Non-Outback model features for our Starcraft and Silverline.

Jayco Journey Outback rear view
Outback options
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Outback options

Explore the Models

The all-new Journey is our flagship Pop Top range. Your other option is one of our ever-affordable Starcraft Pop Tops.

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Quality and versatility meet comfort and style.

Join the RV Life Club

Join over 30,000 other South Australians by becoming a member of the RV Life Club and receive our monthly caravan news and lifestyle e-magazine as well as discounts at SA outdoor leisure businesses.


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Volunteer Resource Center

AMA Volunteer Statement of Beliefs

Volunteers represent a key strategic asset of the AMA
  • They provide an integral role in guiding the content deliverables to the membership

  • Their in-market experience allows AMA content to be current and relevant to the various constituencies

  • The work that they do on behalf of AMA allows far broader and deeper support to the membership than would otherwise be possible

In recognition of the importance of Volunteers to the organization, the AMA will:

  • Treat our volunteers as partners

  • Support our volunteers with appropriate resources

  • Respond to their requests thoroughly and in a timely manner

  • Truly appreciate the work that they do on behalf of AMA

  • Acknowledge the contributions that they have made to the organization

  • Thank them sincerely for their efforts

The AMA invites all members to get actively involved in your association. There are numerous volunteer opportunities at both the local and the national level that will expand your marketing network and knowledge while supporting the marketing profession.

Become a Member
Access our innovative members-only resources and tools to further your marketing practice.

 Volunteer Spotlight

Evan Carroll

AMA Ric Sweeney Chapter
Volunteer of the Year: 2017

AMA Triangle Chapter
President: 2014-15


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Wednesday, November 27, 2013

Chilli Pineapple Fried Rice

2 cups cooked jasmine rice( day old cooked rice)
1 cup pineapple cut into cubes
1/2 cup frozen thawed green peas
5-6 cloves of garlic finely chopped
2 tbsp finely chopped ginger
3 green chillies finely chopped
2 tbsp finely chopped spring onion (white part)
2 tsp chilli oil
a pinch of yellow food colour(optional)
2 eggs lightly beaten (skip if your a vegetarian)
2 tbsp spring onion greens
salt to taste

For the sauce
2 Tbsp golden moutain seasioning sauce or light soya sauce
2 tbsp pineapple juice
1/2 tsp sugar
1 tsp oyester sauce

  • In a bowl add all the ingredients mentioned under "Sauce" and keep aside
  • Heat a wok, add 1 tsp oil and then add egg and scramble it and keep aside
  • Add 2 tsp oil in the same wok and then add ginger,garlic green chilli and spring onion whites and stir fry for a min and then add rice, salt and stir fry for 3-4 minutes on a high flame
  • Reduce the heat and then add the green peas,pineapple cubes, food colour , sauce and mix well and cook for a min
  • Add egg, spring onion greens and mix well
  • Lastly add the chilli oil and mix it well and cook for 2 min and then serve hot


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Congratulations regarding your Ford Transit Purchase!

Derek Montalvo at Mullinax Ford of Mobile (251) 391-7354

Congratulations to Bill Loveall regarding the purchase of his all new 2015 Ford Transit! Bill made the drive from Long Beach Mississippi to Mullinax Ford of Mobile to conduct business. Thanks for your business Bill and enjoy your new Transit!

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Ford Expedition Tops List Of Longest-Lasting Light-Duty Vehicles

Derek Montalvo at Mullinax Ford of Mobile (251) 391-7354

The Ford Expedition comes in at number one on a list of light-duty passenger vehicles with the highest percentage of high-mileage examples still on the road. The list, compiled by website based on an analysis of more than 13 million registered vehicles, looked at the percentage of each model with more than 200,000 miles on the odometer.According to the study, 5.7% of all Ford Expedition examples still on the road are over 200,000 miles. That’s more than four times the average across all models of 1.3%.

Perhaps not surprisingly, the Ford F-150 was also on the list, although in twelfth place with 2.1% of examples having logged 200,000 miles or more. That’s just above the GMC Sierra 1500 (2.0%), and just below the Chevrolet Silverado 1500 (2.2%). A fourth pickup truck – the Toyota Tacoma – also made the list, in ninth place with 2.5% of examples over 200,000…

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UPS drivers don’t turn left—and it saves them 10 million gallons of gas a year

We are fond of cars. In fact, in our mind, we all have that one car which is always in our dreams. We think that if, one day, I made it to, be a billionaire, I will definitely buy that car. That most expensive car is our dream car. We know it from head to […]

via Dream Cars – 9 most expensive cars in the world — Young & Desi

Driver Safety Market for Passenger Cars by Technology, Off-Highway Vehicle, and Region – Global Forecast to 2025

“Growing health and safety concerns and technological advancements in the automotive sector are expected to fuel the demand for driver safety systems for both, passenger cars and off-highway vehicles.”
The driver safety market is projected to grow at a CAGR of 6.24%, to reach a market size of USD 3.20 billion by 2025. Key factors driving the growth of the driver safety market are increasingly stringent safety regulations and the rising demand for luxury and comfort in the passenger car segment. Factors restraining the growth of the driver safety market include the high cost of the system and its complex nature.

The study contains insights provided by various industry experts, ranging from component suppliers to Tier 1 companies and OEMs. The break-up of the primaries is as follows:
• By Company Type – Tier 1 – 55 %, Tier 2 – 20%, and Tier 3 – 25%
• By Designation…

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Europe Solar Carport Market Report 2017

This report studies sales (consumption) of Solar Carport in Europe market, especially in Germany, France, UK, Russia, Italy, Spain and Benelux, focuses on top players in these countries, with sales, price, revenue and market share for each player in these Countries, covering
Envision Solar
Phoenix Solar
Kokko Shisetsu Kogyo
Orion Solar

Split by product type, with sales, revenue, price, market share and growth rate of each type, can be divided into
1-row vehicle arrangement
2-row single slope vehicle arrangement
2-row dual slope vehicle arrangement

Split by application, this report focuses on sales, market share and growth rate of Solar Carport in each application, can be divided into

Table of Contents

Europe Solar Carport Market Report 2017
1 Solar Carport Overview

2 Europe Solar Carport by Manufacturers, Type and Application

3 Germany Solar Carport (Volume, Value and Sales Price)

4 France…

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Here’s the Callaway Corvette C7 AeroWagen shooting brake in the flesh


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Fixing stuff and maybe other things.

Oooh! This has us mildly steamed:

So they totally ripped-off our annual counter-terrorism simulation. No big deal. Frankly, IndyLaw, we’re flattered. Even if you pretty much copied us on everything from your fake CNN site right down to what you named your live video feed.

But hey, it’s cool—until you allude that yours might be the first counter-terrorism simulation of its kind.

Not cool, IndyLaw. Not cool.

In any case, the real first-of-its-kind simulation (started in 2007) is coming again in 2010, and it’s going to be excellent.

And here’s a little documentary about it:

Posted under: General Stuff

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CarsCampers & MotorhomesAuto Buying & SellingAuto RepairTrucks, SUVs, & VansMotorcycles & ScootersAll-Terrain VehiclesSafe DrivingCommercial VehiclesAutomotive Industry

Catalytic Converter: Avoid Unnecessary Repairs and Save Your Money

Updated on October 4, 2017
Glenn Stok profile image

Glenn Stok is skilled at researching, analyzing and evaluating technological products and has a knack for clearly explaining their features.

Your check engine light is on. Your mechanic told you that you need a new catalytic converter and it will cost you $800.

Even worse, you need to have an annual inspection soon and your vehicle won’t pass unless you get your catalytic converter repaired.

What the mechanic is not telling you is that it might just be a malfunctioning sensor, or the catalytic converter may be full of crud. It’s not that they are lying to you. They just really don’t know.

Most people think the only way to know for sure is to replace the catalytic converter, reset the check engine light, and see if it comes back on.

A few of my friends already had this experience and I wish they came to me first. I found an alternate solution that worked twice for me already, and it worked for a few friends who listened to me.

This Is What I Did When It Happened to Me

When my check engine light came on, I read the Onboard Diagnostics (OBD) trouble code that’s stored in my car’s computer. I used an OBD diagnostic scanner that I bought on Amazon. You can get one for under $20. It works with all cars sold since 1996. Since then, all cars had to be OBD-II compliant.

The scanner has an LCD display that clearly shows the trouble code and indicates which device is malfunctioning in your car. Some mechanics charge you just to do the same thing, and you’re still no better off.

I feel like it’s a no-brainer to be able to read my car’s computer diagnostic trouble codes by myself, so I know for sure what’s going on.

What Is the Catalytic Converter?

The Catalytic Converter is in the line of the exhaust between the engine and the muffler. Its purpose is to reduce emissions from the exhaust with an efficiency level required by each State to control pollution.

The check engine light will come on if it’s below this threshold, determined by oxygen sensors before and after the converter.

PO420 Diagnostic code

Catalyst System Efficiency Below Threshold (Bank 1)

The Infamous Trouble Code P0420

OBD Code P0420 means the catalyst system efficiency is below the threshold. It‘s a generic code—meaning that it applies to all models of vehicles built since 1996.

This is the most common problem that makes the check engine light appear, although there are other problems that can occur. Each one has it’s own unique OBD trouble code. However, I’m going to tell you about an easy method of solving the problem, that you should try first, when your catalyst system is the culprit.

When a mechanic sees P0420 he or she will tell you that you need a new catalytic converter. This trouble code appears when the unit can’t sufficiently reduce the carbon emissions from the exhaust. However, a catalytic converter does not normally wear out. There is usually some other reason for their failure.

If you spend $800 or more to replace the catalytic converter, you may discover the check engine light coming on again later.

Some mechanics will tell you to try replacing the oxygen sensors first, to see if that solves the problem. There are two of them, one before and one after the catalytic converter. This is necessary in order to properly detect catalyst efficiency.

A good mechanic might also do proper testing by using a scope to diagnose the oxygen sensors, or do a vacuum test or backpressure test, and just charge you a fee for the diagnostic service so that you can decide what you want to do as far as repairs are concerned.

So what do you do? Do you order numerous tests? Do you spend less money first for new sensors? Then if that wasn’t the problem, do you spend more money later on a new catalytic converter?

I Have a Better Method

There is also the possibility that the catalytic converter’s efficiency is simply compromised with oil deposits or other contamination, or just plain gunk from the years of exhaust passing through it.

I found that there is an easy method to clean it out, after which it registers good catalyst system efficiency again. However, my method only works if the catalytic converter is malfunctioning due to contamination as I just indicated.

So how do you clean it out? Easy. High-octane gas can blow out the contaminants. When you’re down to almost an empty tank, fill up a full tank with high-octane gasoline—the highest grade available. Don’t fill up if you have a lot of gas in your tank. This will dilute the high-octane gas and my trick won’t work. You only need to do this once.

Drive until you’ve used up half the tank. When I did it, I just did my usual driving. In a couple of weeks I used up half the tank. There’s no rush, no need to drive endlessly in one session. You’ve got time, don’t you?

After you’ve driven with high-octane for a couple of hundred miles, shut off the check engine light with the diagnostic scanner like the one I use.

Now, continue driving as usual for a week. Watch to see if the check engine light stays off. If it continues to stay off, you’ll know it was only a contaminated catalyst system. The high-octane gas actually cleaned it out.

As I mentioned, I’ve done this twice already. The first time lasted several years. When it happened again, I filled up with high-octane and the problem was once again resolved. I passed inspection and the light never came back on, even long after that.

Is this legal?

You’re not doing anything to fool the system when you bring in your car for a state inspection. So why would this be illegal? You simply blasted out the contamination and helped your car’s catalyst system perform to required specs again.

What If It Doesn’t Work?

If the light eventually comes back on, then you have a more serious problem and you might need that expensive replacement. However, there are still other less-costly causes for a trouble code P0420. Such as:

  • Failing oxygen sensor (remember that’s still a possibility).
  • Damaged wiring of the oxygen sensor connections.
  • Leaking exhaust system (exhaust manifold or muffler).

At least you’ll know for sure that you ruled out contamination, which I found to be quite common among my friends who saved money by following my method.

If you do end up getting a new catalytic converter, make sure you get one that meets your States requirements, or else you may find the check engine light coming on again. The safest thing is to get an original manufacturer brand, or one that is legal for all 50 states.

What Next, If You’re Going for a State Inspection?

After you reset the check engine light with the diagnostic scanner, the car’s computer will indicate a “Not ready” status until you’ve driven a while. This usually resets after 50 to 100 miles.

If you go for the inspection before the system indicates “Ready” you will fail the inspection. Before the inspection, attach your code scanner and check the status. Yes, it does that too. You’ll save yourself a trip.

Stay in the Know With the Same Diagnostic Scanner I Use

Professional U480 CAN OBD2 OBD II Car Diagnostic Scanner Engine Code Reader Tool
Professional U480 CAN OBD2 OBD II Car Diagnostic Scanner Engine Code Reader Tool

Now that you have your own diagnostic scanner such as this one that I use, you can always check your emission system’s status yourself. No need to pay a mechanic for a needless reading. Never get sucked into a repair job you may not need.

The way I look at it, this is a small price to pay to be able to do your own review of what's going on with your car. Having a good mechanic you trust is still important, but it's nice to have the ability to know what happening and to do something about it before spending a lot of money.

© 2017 Glenn Stok

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    • Nell Rose profile image

      Nell Rose 9 days ago from England

      Yes my brother said the same! All the cars are sealed in now! long time gone is when you could tie a pair of tights round the watsit! LOL!

    • Glenn Stok profile image

      Glenn Stok 9 days ago from Long Island, NY

      Nell, You're probably better off that you don’t drive. These days cars require a whole different type of maintenance. When I was young, I used to take care of oil changes and other things myself. There was always room to work. Now I can’t even squeeze my hands in far enough to change a dead headlight bulb.

    • Nell Rose profile image

      Nell Rose 10 days ago from England

      Very useful and helpful, and something I know nothing about and as I don't drive I can't really comment. But this will be really useful for someone who has that dreaded 'need a new one' syndrome.

    • MsDora profile image

      Dora Isaac Weithers 2 weeks ago from The Caribbean

      Very helpful, useful information, although I would engage someone else to help me follow the instructions. Thank you.

    • FlourishAnyway profile image

      FlourishAnyway 2 weeks ago from USA

      Extremely useful information, Glenn! Thank you!


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One Hundred Eighteen: I Didn’t Come in Last

“If you are good at in the art of finding consolation, it means that you have the best medicine after the disasters.” – Mehmet Murat ildan

Monday, April 28th

So many of my actions right here and now are wrapped up with being a mom. I look for clothes for my kids before I look for myself. I make sure they’ve bathed before I do. I download the clean version of albums. So when something stands out as being an unchanging and unwavering Tasha thing, I am happy to applaud it.

I had a meeting set with a mother and a school staffer on Monday to talk about gardening with kids with specialized needs. Both women are incredibly active and responsible people, and they get a lot of things moving at that school. Yet here I was on time with my little guy in tow with my cohorts nowhere to be found. The other mom arrived 15 minutes later. I texted the staff member, and she was still in bed! I have retained my status of being a prompt person. Neither potty accidents nor restless children that refuse to get into car seats will hold this woman back!

Maybe it’s not the most responsible and gracious attitude, but I love not coming in last. Second to last is cool. There is distinctly something comforting about knowing that however sad I am about my situation, there is someone else who is nursing a bigger broken heart. I will help that person with all my ability grieve and move on, but better him than me. Now I know there were no broken hearts at the meeting, but I take my small triumphs where I can get them.

What is something about you that has been unwavering over the years?

Tagged , , ,

2 thoughts on “One Hundred Eighteen: I Didn’t Come in Last

  1. Kyna says:

    Before having kids I was usually early. Hard to imagine that now. I’ve learned by being late that sometimes it’s ok to be late. I honestly didn’t know that before.

  2. In this situation, Kyna, it was great that the meeting didn’t start right on time because I had a valuable conversation with the other Mom and the third person had slept in because she had arrived home late on an enjoyable camping trip. The imperfection in promptness allowed for perfection in other areas that were much more rewarding.

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Optimization tips and tricks on Azure SQL Server for Machine Learning Services

Veröffentlicht am 1 Mai, 2017

Data Scientist

Since SQL Server 2016, a new function called R Services has been introduced. Microsoft recently announced a preview for the next version of SQL Server, which extends the advanced analytical ability to Python. This new capability of running R or Python in-database at scale enables us to keep the analytics services close to the data and eliminates the burden of data movements. It also simplifies the development and deployment of intelligent applications. To get the most out of SQL server, knowing how to fine tune the intelligence model itself is far from sufficient and sometimes still fail to meet the performance requirement. There are quite a few optimization tips and tricks that could help us boost the performance significantly. In this post, we apply a few optimization techniques to a resume-matching scenario, which mimics the workflow of large volume prediction aiming to showcase how those techniques could make data analytics more efficient and powerful. The three main optimization techniques introduced in our blog are as follows:

  • Full durable memory-optimized tables
  • CPU affinity and memory allocation
  • Resource governance and concurrent execution

This blog post is a short summary of how the above optimization tips and tricks work with R Services on Azure SQL Server. Those optimization techniques not only work for R Services, but for any Machine Learning Services integrated with SQL Server. Please refer to the full tutorial for sample code and step-by-step walkthroughs.

Description of the Sample Use Case

The sample use case for both this blog and its associated tutorial is a resume-matching example. Finding the best candidate for a job position has long been an art that is labor intensive and requires a lot of manual efforts from search agents. How to find candidates with certain technical or specialized qualities from massive amount of information collected from diverse sources has become a new big challenge. We developed a model to search good matches among millions of resumes for a giving position. Being formulated as a binary classification problem, the machine learning model takes both the resume and job description as the inputs and produces the probability of being a good match for each resume-job pair. A user defined probability threshold is then used to further filter out all good matches.

A key challenge in this use case is that for each new job, we will need to match it with millions of resumes within a reasonable time frame. The feature engineering step, which produces thousands of features (2600 in this case), is a significant performance bottleneck during scoring. Hence, achieving a low matching (scoring) latency is the main objective in this use case.

There are many different types of optimization techniques, and we are going to discuss a few of them using the resume-matching scenario. In this blog, we will explain why and how those optimization techniques work from high level. For more detailed explanations and background knowledge, please refer to the included reference links. In the tutorial, the results are expected to be reproducible using similar hardware configuration and the SQL scripts.

Memory-optimized table

Nowadays, memory is no longer a problem for a modern machine in terms of size and speed. People can get ‘value of RAM’ with the advancement of hardware. In the meantime, data has been produced far more quickly than ever before and some tasks need to process those data with low latency. Memory-optimized tables can leverage the advancement of hardware to tackle this problem. Memory-optimized tables mainly reside in memory so that data is read from and written to memory [1]. However, for durability purposes a second copy of the table is maintained on disk and data is only read from disk during database recovery. The performance could be optimized with high scalability and low latency using memory especially when we need to read from and write to tables very frequently [2]. You can find a detailed introduction of memory-optimized tables on this blog [1]. You can also watch this video [3] to learn more about the performance benefits of using In-Memory OLTP.

In the resume-matching scenario, we will need to read all the resume features from the database and match all of them with a new job opening. By using memory-optimized tables, resume features are stored in main memory and disk IO could be significantly reduced. In addition, since we need to write all the predictions back to the database concurrently from different batches, extra performance gain could be achieved by using memory-optimized table. With the support of memory-optimized table on SQL Server, we achieved low latency on reading from/writing to tables and a seamless experience during development. Full durable memory-optimized tables were created along with creating the database. The rest of the development is exactly the same as before without knowing where the data is stored.

CPU affinity and memory allocation

With SQL Server 2014 SP2 and later version, soft-NUMA is automatically enabled at the database-instance level when starting the SQL Server service [4, 5, 6]. If the database engine server detects more than 8 physical cores per NUMA node or socket, it will automatically create soft-NUMA nodes that ideally contain 8 cores. But it can go down to 5 or up to 9 logical cores per node. You can find the log information when SQL Server detects more than 8 physical cores in each socket.

SQL log of auto Soft-NUMA

Figure 1: SQL log of auto Soft-NUMA, 4 soft NUMA nodes were created

As shown in Figure 1, our test consisted of 20 physical cores among which 4 soft-NUMA nodes were created automatically such that each node contained 5 cores. Soft-NUMA enables the ability to partition service threads per node and that generally increases scalability and performance by reducing IO and lazy writer bottlenecks. We then further created 4 SQL resource pools and 4 external resource pools [7] to specify the CPU affinity of using the same set of CPUs in each node. By doing this, both SQL Server and the R processes can eliminate foreign memory access since the processes will be within the same NUMA node. Hence, memory access latency could be reduced. Subsequently, those resource pools are then assigned to different workload groups to enhance hardware resource consumption.

Soft-NUMA and CPU affinity cannot divide physical memory in each physical NUMA node. All the soft NUMA nodes in the same physical NUMA node receive memory from the same OS memory block and there is no memory-to-processor affinity. However, we should pay attention to the memory allocation between SQL Server and the R processes. By default, only 20% of memory is allocated to R services and that is not enough for most of the data analytical tasks. Please see How To: Create a Resource Pool for R [7] for more information. We need to fine tune memory allocation between those two and of course the best configuration varies case by case. In the resume-matching use case, we increased the external memory resource allocation to 70% which was the best configuration.

Resource governance and concurrent scoring

To scale up the scoring problem, a good practice is to adopt the map-reduce approach in which we split millions of resumes into multiple batches, and then execute multiple scoring concurrently. The parallel processing framework is illustrated in Figure 2.

Parallel processing

Figure 2: Illustration of parallel processing in multiple batches

Those batches will be processed on different CPU sets, and the results will be collected and written back to the database. Resource governance in SQL Server is designed to implement this idea. We can create resource governance for R services on SQL Server [8] by routing those scoring batches into different workload groups (Figure. 3). More information about resource governor could be found on this blog [9].

Resource governer

Figure 3: Resource governor (from: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/sql/relational-databases/resource-governor/resource-governor)

Resource governor can help divide the available resources (CPU and memory) on a SQL Server to minimize the workload competition using a classifier function [10, 11]. It provides multitenancy and resource isolation on SQL Server for different tasks to potentially improve the execution and provide predictable performance.

Other Tricks

One pain point with R is that when we conduct feature engineering it is usually processed on a single CPU. This is a major performance bottleneck for most of the data analysis tasks. In our resume-matching use case, we need to produce 2,500 cross-product features that will be then combined with the original 100 features (Figure 4). This whole process would take significant amount of time if everything was done on a single CPU.

Feature engineering

Figure 4: Feature engineering of our resume-matching use case

One trick here is to create a R function for feature engineering and to pass it as rxTransform function during training. The machine learning algorithm is implemented with parallel processing. As part of the training, the feature engineering is also processed on multiple CPUs. In comparison with regular approach in which feature engineering is conducted before training and scoring, we observed a 16% performance improvement in terms of scoring time.

Another trick that can potentially improves the performance is to use SQL compute context within R [12]. Since we have isolated resources for different batch executions, we need to isolate the SQL query for each batch as well. By using SQL compute context, we can parallelize the SQL query to extract data from tables and constrain the data on the same workload group.

Results and Conclusion

To fully illustrate those tips and tricks, we have published a very detailed step-by-step tutorial. A few benchmark tests for scoring 1.1 million rows of data were also conducted. We used both the RevoScaleR and MicrosoftML packages to train a prediction model separately. We then compared the scoring time if using those optimizations versus without optimizations. Figure 5 and 6 summarize the best performance results using RevoScaleR and MicrosoftML packages. The tests were conducted on the same Azure SQL Server VM using the same SQL query and R codes. Eight batches for one matching job were used in all tests.

RevoScaleR results

Figure 5: RevoScaleR scoring results

MicrosoftML results

Figure 6: MicrosoftML scoring results

The results suggested that the number of features had a significant impact on the scoring time. Also, using those optimization tips and tricks could significantly improve the performance in terms of scoring time. The improvement was even more prominent if more features were used in the prediction model.

Lastly, we would like to express our thanks to Umachandar Jayachandran, Amit Banerjee, Ramkumar Chandrasekaran, Wee Hyong Tok, Xinwei Xue, James Ren, Lixin Gong, Ivan Popivanov, Costin Eseanu, Mario Bourgoin, Katherine Lin and Yiyu Chen for the great discussions, proofreading and test-driving the tutorial accompanying this blog post.

[1] Introduction to Memory-Optimized Tables

[2] Demonstration: Performance Improvement of In-Memory OLTP

[3] 17-minute video explaining In-Memory OLTP and demonstrating performance benefits

[4] Understanding Non-uniform Memory Access

[5] How SQL Server Supports NUMA

[6] Soft-NUMA (SQL Server)

[7] How To: Create a Resource Pool for R

[8] Resource Governance for R Services

[9] Resource Governor

[10] Introducing Resource Governor

[11] SQL SERVER – Simple Example to Configure Resource Governor – Introduction to Resource Governor

[12] Define and Use Compute Contexts


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Azure SQL Database now supports powerful geo-replication features for all service tiers

Közzétéve: április 25, 2016

Principal Program Manager, Azure SQL Database

The built-in active geo-replication has been generally available to the Premium databases for over a year. As a growing number of SaaS customers use the multi-tenant design pattern, including the use of elastic pools, we receive feedback that consistent geo-replication capability independent of the database type would be beneficial to these applications. Today we are happy to announce that we have extended active geo-replication to all service tiers. The capabilities now available to all databases include:

  • Ability to create the secondary database in any region in the world
  • Ability to connect to the secondary database with read-only access
  • Ability to create up to 4 parallel secondary databases in the same or different region
  • Ability to configure performance objective of the secondary database
  • When failover is activated to one of the secondary databases, other secondaries are automatically linked to the new primary

The secondary database is priced at 1x price of the selected performance objective. For example if your application requires a P2 primary database but the secondary databases is configured with P1 performance objective you will be charged the price of P1 for the secondary. This option is not recommended for applications with high database write activity as it may result  in increased replication lag and therefore, has high risk of substantial data loss after failover.  Note, the secondary database must be in the same service tier than the primary. Therefore if you are using S0 or P1 performance objective for the primary you cannot configure a secondary database with lower performance objective.

To take advantage of this additional functionality you can create one or several readable secondaries of any Basic or Standard database on V12 server as illustrated below. You will not be required to upgrade to Premium.

Extended active geo-replication

In addition to Azure Portal you can configure readable secondary using T-SQL, PowerShell or REST API.

Deprecation of Standard geo-replication

Because active geo-replication is a superset of standard geo-replication and is available to all service tiers, the standard geo-replication configuration option will be retired in 12 months. Until then the feature will remain fully supported.


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REVIEW: Nameless #1

(Image Comics, 2015)

Written by Grant Morrison
Art by Chris Burnham
Colors by Nathan Fairbairn
Letters by Simon Bowland

Part of the attraction of comic books is that, for as long as I can remember, the artist and the writer both get a good deal of fame. (Colorists and Letterers are on the upswing now as well, as they should be.) It’s a symbiotic relationship that the artist and writer need each other, despite past accomplishments, to make a book work. Any comic with a great story and awful art will just sit on the shelf forever because no one wants to pick it up. Good art will make a sale perhaps, but the story is what keeps pull boxes full. Grant Morrison is one of those names that will sell books no matter the artwork. His accomplishments are varied and many. He’s authored some of the most major story-arcs in comics, and is battle-tested when it comes to writing. His was the first name I saw when I looked at the cover for Nameless, out from Image Comics this week.

This is Morrison to the nth degree. He weaves the psychic sucker punch of a major disaster in with the coming apocalypse. I mean, of course he does. This is Grant Morrison.

Nameless begins in a dream and ends in a fantasy. The main character is literally called “Nameless”, so chosen because he un-named himself to hide from the “veiled lady” who haunts his dreams. Nameless is a lucid dreamer for hire, trying to steal a key from the veiled lady that will do…some pretty bad stuff. The government wants in on Nameless’ abilities, and confronts him with a dire prediction that corrals him into their own plan.

Morrison doesn’t pull any punches and keeps your mind racing throughout the book. He creeps you out just enough to make you want to turn the next page, only to make you squirm some more.

This is where the symbiotic relationship really comes into effect, because despite the great wording of Morrison’s story, there is no replacing a great artist. Chris Burnham has worked on Batman, Incorporated and Elephantmen. He’s got a gritty and realistic style that is perfect for this book, and is part of the reason you’ll squirm so much as you read it. In Nameless Burnham’s style make it feel like you’re reading an EC horror comic from the 50’s.

The coloring by Nathan Fairbairn and letters by Simon Bowland only add to the great overall look of the book. Fairbairn balances the color, splashing a red panel amidst the blue/grey/greens to make it pop. It’s an aspect of comic creation that is often overlooked. Think about that for a second. When I turn the page, or scroll down as the case may be, my eye is drawn to the red panel amidst the blues. Before I read one word, really before I’ve had a chance to process the image, I’m looking at that panel first, seeing what’s happening, using it to inform how I read what has preceded it on the page before I’ve even read it. That’s an amazing talent, one that should be acclaimed and considered when coloring a book. As well the placement of letters, which need to be hidden within a panel so that they don’t disrupt the flow of the art or the story, but are still legible and make sense. I’ve seen Simon Bowland’s work before, and he is top notch.

Nameless reminds us how important the artist(s)/writer team is when applied to a comic book. The balance of the visual medium with the written word, the balance of color to image, word to panel. It’s all a high-wire act. But when you’ve got Grant Morrison and Chris Burnham in the lead, you can bet that Nameless will be on your pull list, and that it will stay there.

Brad-profilepicBrad Gischia is a writer and artist living in the frozen Upper Peninsula of Michigan. He is married and has three kids and a dog, who all put up with his incessant prattling about comic books.
Twitter – brad@comicwasteland

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The Guilt Trip 2013 (Part 1)

It’s Wednesday.  I’ve been here since Monday.  I’m surrounded by things I don’t want to do.  I have a headache.  For the second day in a row the coffee I’ve made is horrible (even though it’s Starbucks coffee).  It’s pouring down rain, lightning and thundering.

 Yesterday we went to see Mom.  I managed to get us lost on the way, my memory of the backroads from Sarcoxie to Carthage not quite as good as I thought it was.  I think she knew who I was which is an improvement over last year.  Even recalled that my aunt Maxine had told her we were coming.

 Missouri2013 007

We stayed for an hour, took a walk around the assisted living facility.  She only repeated the same questions a couple of times.  After an hour she seemed to fade, perhaps thinking I was my cousin Louella and asking if I ever hear from Marilyn (Louella’s sister who passed away).  This is how I know it’s time to leave although my mother invites us to stay for lunch.

We’ve had a big breakfast at the Hungry House at Maxine’s invitation earlier and no appetite so we decline.  Plus, we have things to sort through back at Mom’s house.  Clothes, books, drawers, photos.

After a year unoccupied there is a layer of dusty grime covering the interior and the air is musty and there are cobwebs in places cobwebs have no business being.  Bill has taken on the task of vacuuming the entire house, most of which is covered in carpeting that should have been replaced years ago.  I can’t stand to walk on it barefoot.

There’s been so much rain it’s too wet to have the grass mowed.  The house looks like what it is:  sad and neglected.  A wisteria vine has overgrown its boundaries near the driveway.  Tuesday afternoon I attacked it. My dad would have taken care of this.  He’d never have let the yard look this way.

Once again we cleared the vine that had begun to overgrow the front stoop.  If I thought I could get Dad’s lawnmower out of the shed (which is falling apart) I’d have mowed the grass.  But Bill says the mower’s been sitting there so long the gas is probably no good and the oil probably dried up.  He doesn’t even want to try it.  He’s probably right.  He usually is about these things.

After we visit Mom we stop at Wal-Mart.  I need rubber gloves if I’m to keep digging through drawers and boxes because who knows what lurks there.  I find a pretty hanging plant and a cute garden gnome for my aunt Maxine because she’s always been the gardener in the family.  Her birthday was Sunday.  She’s 93 now and thinks her heart is what’s slowing her down physically.  Says she has little energy, although she’s happy to sit and talk or read or watch TV.  But physical exertion wears her out, even a walk to the mailbox.

Maxine has always been real in a way my mother never was.  I never could really talk to my mother, but Maxine is like my dad in many ways.  You can talk to her about anything and everything.  She’s been my favorite aunt forever, perhaps because she’s childless.  She always had time and interest in me and my brothers.  She’s eleven years older than my mother but seems years younger.

No idea what this blog is about?  Check out the series of last year’s blogs about a similar trip starting here:

or check out my guest blog post here:

The Annual Guilt Trip-A Guest Post by Barb Meyers

Visit me at

Follow my infrequent posts on Twitter @barbmeyers and @ajtillock

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A week ago I cried. A senseless act 40 miles from my house took the life of 49 people. My home is a beach town that most families from Orlando use as their weekend retreat. Central Florida is the United States’ collective backyard. It is the place we all go to play, relax, to escape our jobs and stress, to enjoy beautiful weather and beaches.

The local news has been saturated with footage of not only the violence but with pictures and stories of the people, that for no good reason, are no longer with us. I have friends who could have been one of those faces on TV and feel grateful that they were not.

As with many of us who lift, I was bullied as a child. When I was old enough, I turned to weights to become bigger, stronger and faster. It was my solution to control the hate and anger directed my way and to not be a victim.

Strength Training

This has now given me over thirty years of weight training, with rarely a break, and for good reason. When you want to get good at something so demanding and difficult, you must develop a deep passion. This passion, when invested correctly, has dividends that you will reap, that you could not have known about before you started. Weight training has become not only my discipline but my teacher, therapist, and love.

So as I have done before in many times of stress or uncertainty, I looked inward during my training this week as a way to process the world around me and hopefully come to a clearer perspective. When you train for as long as I have, just picking up the weight sets off a series of chemicals in my brain that begin to instantly provide comfort and clarity. The decades of heavy lifting have hardened my bones, toughened my tendons and made my muscles dense. I use the vehicle of the body to help sharpen my mind and emotions.

Stone Load

I no longer attempt to lift heavy. That is a young man’s game or maybe older men with a few less miles on them. I now focus on perfect form and see each rep as a zen garden that I create and immediately try and replicate until I am exhausted and lose ability to perform them ideally. In that time the noise of the world becomes quiet and distant and outside distractions disappear.

Michael Gill

This has become trainings greatest gift; the absence of hate, pain or lies. The execution of a perfect jerk or tire flip requires the athlete to leave the noise of the world and enter a special part of the brain that exists only under a specific state of being. Developed by evolutionary processes that increased our ability to survive under life or death situations it can now be used to deal with circumstances when you are overwhelmed. To understand the power of this process and to apply it to your life will forever change you. It is why you see the same people day in and day out for years at hardcore gyms. Some of them no longer compete but push harder than those seeking the medals and adulation of the crowd.

As this new week begins, life has started to become conventional here again. Programming is back to normal on television and radio. My Twitter and Facebook have returned to the usual pictures of families, friends and political bickering. There has been no additional need to see if my friends have checked in as safe. I found no solutions to my questions about the senseless violence but I did find refuge from being reminded about it.

As the families of these people deal with their emotions in the coming weeks and years I hope some of them can find solace somehow. Often in these situations people turn to alcohol or drugs (recreational or prescription) to find escape from the pain. I wrote this in hopes that people who are having trouble coping with what their lives have given them might somehow stumble across it and try and find the peace that is found through exercise. It can heal like no other process and help to cope like nothing else.

We are America’s playground. We are Orlando strong.

Editors note: This article is an op-ed. The views expressed herein are the authors and don’t necessarily reflect the views of BarBend. Claims, assertions, opinions, and quotes have been sourced exclusively by the author.


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Pine River 1894: A 4th of July Celebration!

4th of July

4th of July

4th of July Celebrations

“The glorious fourth will be celebrated as it never was before at Pine River. There are to be horse races, pitching the weight and climbing the greasy pole and a match game of baseball between Pine River nine and the Big Bend nine in the afternoon. The day’s pleasure will wind up with a grand dance in the bowery kindly lent by G. A. Barclay. The Pine River Cornet band, under the leadership of Prof. Sam McConnell will be in attendance all day. The chief orator of the day will be George Barclay.

The glorious Fourth passed off at Pine River in fine shape.  It commenced at sunrise with a salute of one hundred guns.  At ten o’clock a grand street parade took place, headed by the city band under the leadership of Prof. Sam McConnell.  All the various trades of our city were well represented and the mayor and city council rode in carriages.  After parading the principal streets the procession made it s way to the city park, where all kinds of games were indulged in and a patriotic speech was delivered by the mayor.  In the evening the  day’s fun wound up by a grand bowery dance in the park.”

Source:  The Brainerd Tribune, Local News, Pine River, July 7 and 14th, 1894, from the newspaper collection at the Minnesota Historical Society.

It is too bad that George’s speech was not published in the newspaper!  It does sound like it was a wonderful celebration.

Image courtesy of Vintage Holiday Crafts –

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Four Questions to Ask Before Having Gum Surgery

 1. How do I know if I have gum disease?

Gum disease starts when tarter and bacteria trapped under the gum line lead to infection. As a result, the gums become inflamed. Eventually, pockets form between the teeth and gums, making plaque harder to remove. Left untreated, the disease advances and bone damage occurs. Ultimately, this can lead to the extraction of one or more teeth. The main symptoms of gum disease are bad breath, loose teeth and bleeding gums.

 2. How do I know if I really need gum surgery?

Get a second opinion! With Laser Gum Therapy, gum surgery can often be avoided.

 3. Is there an alternative to conventional and painful cut and stitch surgery?

Yes! Now there’s a new, less traumatic treatment for periodontal disease. LANAP (Laser Assisted New Attachment Procedure) utilizes safe and proven laser technology to gently remove harmful bacteria and diseased tissue from the gums.

This removal of bacteria allows the body to heal naturally so the gum pockets improve and the teeth become more stable. But there’s less pain. And, since the gum tissue isn’t cut with a scalpel, there are no stitches, minimal bleeding, and a quicker, much easier recovery.

The benefits to you are:

  • Less pain
  • Faster healing
  • Reduced risk of infection
  • Decreased sensitivity
  • Less time in the dental chair
  • Less bleeding
  • Less post-treatment discomfort
  • Little to no gum recession

 4. How can I get a second opinion?

Barotz Dental is happy to offer a consultation for a second opinion at no cost to you. Call us today at (303) 595-4994 or visit us on the web at

About BarotzDental

Dr. Charles S. Barotz is a 1980 graduate of Georgetown University School of Dentistry and has dedicated his life to provide you with the best that dentistry has to offer. Dr. Barotz is continually educating himself and his staff with the newest dental techniques and approaches, in order to provide you with advanced, state of the art, comfortable, personalized, and antiseptic dental care. Dr. Barotz has been published and lectures internationally on numerous subjects relating to excellence in dentistry.
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Bugatti Veyron Sang Noir - knight's move

What is presented in the photos, and judging by the statements of specialists skeptics and some PR, is a strictly limited edition supercar Bugatti Sang Noir, the material of which hit the Internet like they say "accidentally".

Another "bugatevsky" PR is a good time or a couple of tricky Arab sheikhs who by severe malaise with a solid car and supercar recently started to close up under the "Carbon and skin" a large fleet of vehicles. Maybe so. In this regard, there are many opinions, but no matter how official it should be assumed that it is indeed a limited series «Sang Noir», official information about which should come out just recently - look.

Yet, while I want to refer to our "eyes" and emphasized that the novelty presented in strict black body with a couple of carboxylic inserts, darkened headlamps, reystalingovym cooler and handsome drives in new specific design. Beauty, in turn, acquired full orange color and is complemented by some unknown media "sweets».

With regard to the approximate cost of new items, there is complete silence, as the company itself Bugatti has not yet deigned to do about the "exposure" supercar which any statement. Will wait!

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Bennett reveals top five at Peach Jam

Jason Bennett has evolved. The once shy and clumsy 7-foot-3 center from Arlington Country Day in Jacksonville, Fla., has come out of his shell both socially and on the court and he's seeing the benefits of his improvement. The four-star prospect has five schools he's looking at and hopes to hit the road after his busy July.
Bennett's progression from a big kid that didn't look like he enjoyed the game to a top-flight college prospect has been amazing to watch. Sure, he still has his not so great moments. In fact, his play at the Peach Jam was far from inspiring but the passion was there. He was sticking to what he knows; rebounding and blocking shots.
Coaches were watching him, too. Bennett said he's narrowed out his list to a top five of Cincinnati, North Carolina, Miami, Georgia and Clemson.
The Bearcats head coach Bob Huggins made an appearance on the sidelines. Miami head coach Frank Haith was a fixture at every Tropics game. Georgia and Clemson had assistants on close watch. Carolina head coach Roy Williams saw Bennett go at it with Spencer Hawes, one of the top targets for the Heels.
Even with a number of lurking eyes, Bennett said he's not worried about what people are saying about his game or his recruitment.
"I just try to play my game and let everyone else do the talking," Bennett said.
With a busy month ahead of him and with a solid list of five schools, Bennett said he's ready to see what the schools recruiting him have to offer. He recently tripped to Cincinnati.
"I want to take as many unofficial visits as I can so I can save up my officials," Bennett said.
Bennett said he might be making an unofficial visit to Clemson after the busy July period. The Tigers are a newer school in his list. So is North Carolina and Georgia. What gives?
"With North Carolina, I just like that school. I mean, they are the National Champions," Bennett said. "Georgia has my man Mike Mercer. That's my guy. I'd like to play with him. Plus they made an in-school visit and showed me some love."
Bennett has even turned down some major programs.
"Kentucky just offered me a week ago but I don't think I'm going to look at them," Bennett said. "I think the other schools just fit me the best."
Bennett and the rest of the Miami Tropics will be in Las Vegas for the Main Event and the Las Vegas Summer Classic. Bennett is the No. 34 ranked player in the country by and the No. 4 rated center in the class of 2006.