steve2470
steve2470's JournalHow a 16th Century Book of Insults From a Small British Village Lead to the Name of Batmans City
https://laughingsquid.com/batmans-village-of-fools-gotham-england/In a truly fascinating episode of Things You Might Not Know, host Tom Scott traveled to the Nottingham village of Gotham (pronounced Gautam) to recount the citys unique history in which the residents of the 16th century pretended to be crazy in order to avoid visits by the King. This branded them simultaneously a village of fools, madmen and wise men. The residents bought into the image wholeheartedly and published a book of insults making fun of themselves. Inspired by this book a century later, satirist Washington Irving likened New York City to Gotham (pronounced Gotham) and it stuck, giving D.C. Comics writer Bill Finger the perfect name for Batmans fictional city. Gotham City.
Family of goats jump over a mountain gap
https://twitter.com/AMAZlNGNATURE/status/937945997052751872Sesquipedalophobia: the fear of long words
I just learned this tonight. Interesting.
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/sesquipedalophobia
Does this apply to Rindfleischetikettierungsueberwachungsaufgabenuebertragungsgesetz ?
Colder in Sasketchewan, Canada than high Arctic
https://www.wunderground.com/weather/ca/key-lake/CYKJ-22F at 57.25 °N
Compare to Eureka, Nunavut, Canada (79.98 N) at 1F
https://www.wunderground.com/weather/ca/eureka/CWEU
Always fascinating to see where the cold air pools. I think in a prior incarnation I was an Arctic meteorologist
Arctic normality: -22F at Alert, Nunavut, Canada
https://www.wunderground.com/weather/ca/alert-airport/CYLT82.52 °N. Nice to see this.
A Fascinating Foreign Service Map Ranking Language Difficulty by Time Required to Learn
https://laughingsquid.com/foreign-service-institute-language-difficulty-rankings/?w=750
When a person enters the United States Foreign Service, its imperative that they learn at least one, if not many different languages. The State Department very conveniently offers their own School of Language Studies, which has put together a fascinating map that shows the time needed for an English speaker to learn specific languages, each ranked and categorized by difficulty.
Chrome to stop third-party software injections because they make it crash
https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2017/12/chrome-will-block-third-party-software-from-meddling-with-its-processes/To boost the stability of Chrome, Google has announced that it's going to start blocking third-party software from being injected into the browser.
Third-party software such as anti-virus scanners and video driver utilities often injects libraries into running processes to do things like inspect network traffic, or add custom menu options to menus. Malicious software can also do the same to spy on users, steal passwords, and similar. Google has found that people who have such injected code are 15 percent more likely to see their browser crash. As such, it's going to start blocking such injections.
The change will start in Chrome 66, due in April 2018. If that version crashes, it will warn users that there is something injected that could be causing problems. Chrome 68, due in July 2018, will start blocking the injection; if the browser doesn't run properly, it'll allow the injected software but show a warning. Chrome 72, due in January 2019, will block code injection entirely.
Google says that with its extension and native messaging APIs, many applications that need to inject code into Chrome processes can use these alternative, safe, supported mechanisms instead. Google will also allow certain exemptions even after Chrome 72. Accessibility software (such as screen readers), Input Method Editors (used to compose complex scripts, and essential for many Asian languages), and any code that's been signed by Microsoft will continue to be allowed.
Profile of an incredible woman in software
cross-post from Computer Help and Support
https://news.microsoft.com/stories/people/laura-butler.html
Before I copy/paste the article, I just want to say that I know a lot of people on DU and in RL hate Microsoft. Fair enough. They definitely deserved it back in the bad old Bill Gates/Balmer days. At any rate, try to read the article and put your hatred for the company aside. She's pretty freaking incredible. I talk to her on Twitter a bit.
Children love bubbles and water fountains. Most adults tend to find more exhilaration from an incoming text. Sometimes, however, theres that rarest of souls, a grown-up who manages to find beauty in both. Those are the types of people you want to be around, because their contagious joie de vivre delivers a jolt of energy to your ho-hum day.
Laura Butler, Distinguished Engineer at Microsoft, is one such person. Currently shes standing in harms way for a photo shoot, underneath a massive metallic fountain at the Seattle Center. As the waterworks cascade down, Laura just laughs and twirls her umbrella, a modern-day Mary Poppins. If its not fun, youre doing it wrong. Inspiring words to live by indeed. If I had a second umbrella, I thought, Id probably join her.
Such is the magnetism of Butlers personality. Shes a funny and self-deprecating force of nature, given to free-form monologues that display humor, pathos and massive amounts of brainpower. Lauras incredible energy, intelligence, and dizzying stream of analogies leave you awed in the first five minutes of meeting her, said Microsoft Corporate Vice President and former boss, Darren Laybourn. Microsoft Technical Fellow Richard Ward, a longtime peer, concurs, adding, You never walk away from Laura without learning something new.
Shes quirky, a pop kitsch queen who freely mixes references to '80s anthems ("Safety Dance", cult comedies ("Team America: World Police), and Miss Piggy with nods to high culture (Dostoyevsky, War and Peace, and Horatio Hornblower). Her cats are named Pavlov and Curie, after the scientists. Shes a Star Trek fanatic with an autographed picture of William Shatner and a Spock cookie jar by her desk. She readily admits that she has a thing for the pointy-eared Vulcan and his logical, yet emotional charms. Butler always carries a journal to scrawl notes. Theres a page devoted to television shows, movies and books she wants to consume, another for book ideas she wants to write, to-do lists, little tactical notes for work, and one for potential inventions, such as an umbrella with a cup holder, that are brilliant in their simple utility. As one of Microsofts early employees, shes worked on products dating back to Word for Windows (she jokes that it was just a single Window back then). During her tenure at the company, she has helped design a laundry list of features, including a new user interface in Windows 95, multi-monitor support, and Application and Desktop sharing in NetMeeting, a forefather to Lync. During the Windows Phone 7 revamp, she was the driving force behind the Buttery Smooth metro user interface, including the phones elegant home screen, live tiles, modern interfaces and touch capability. As a Distinguished Engineer at a company filled with brilliant minds (or, as she puts it, people who got beat up in high school), Butler takes her corporate role very seriously. With authority and power comes obligation and responsibility. Thats why shes constantly self-evaluating, not in her own interest but on behalf of her team, wondering: Whats the right thing to do by them? Each person gets that feeling that shes personally invested in their success, said Ward. She knows what everyones working on and the issues theyre having.
Dear Facebook, I do NOT want your constant urging to make more friends
I have to go on FB to do a few things, and every time the ever so caring and altruistic people of Facebook suggest new friends to me! Why, how nice of them!
Look peeps of FB, I'll find my own friends. Please stop. (yea yea I know it will never stop, $$)
Economic depression: when is the next one ?
Just curious about you think.
Economic depression definitions
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Gender: Do not displayMember since: Sat Oct 16, 2004, 01:04 PM
Number of posts: 37,457