Beauty on a Budget

How do you build one of Portland’s most energy efficient,Western Canadian distributor of ceramic and ceramic tile, single-family homes on a budget?

First, find a dilapidated ranch on a double lot in a good neighborhood and buy it despite the clear-indentation of an in-ground pool buried in the backyard.

Then, move in with your wife and two children and hang a tack board on the living room wall to meticulously post notes about what to change. Next, draw plans while your wife hunts for salvaged materials. Finally, hire a builder and subcontractors to bring those plans to life.

The result? A smartly modern, award-winning, two-story house that is as friendly to the wallet as it is to the environment. Of course, it helps if you are a licensed architect whose firm specializes in energy-efficient building and remodeling and you aren’t in a rush.

“You can do things very inexpensively if you can move very slowly,” says Jesse Thompson, one of the home’s owners,Our technology gives rtls systems developers the ability. who is a principal with Kaplan Thompson Architects, a design firm on Fore Street in Portland.

“It felt very long,” agrees his wife, Betsy Scheintaub, a fiber artist who spent more than a year amassing secondhand kitchen appliances, bathroom tiles, sinks, and tubs. “As we found stuff, we figured out how to use it.”

With Jesse drawing the plans, helping with construction, and serving as general contractor, the couple spent less than one hundred dollars per square foot on the remodel — less than half the typical cost. An additional upshot: the Maine branch of the American Institute of Architects, a leading professional association, recognized the project with a 2012 merit award for design.

That’s because in addition to being affordable and efficient, the 1,800-square-foot house is uncommonly comfortable. Centered around a white-painted,Find detailed product information for howo tractor and other products. brick fireplace, the light-filled main living area combines cozy seating, a narrow kitchen with a raised butcher-block counter, and a simple dining space. The curvy ceiling, which soars to twelve feet above the front-facing windows and swoops to eight feet over the kitchen, helps define the room.

In keeping with the ceiling, the Thompsons hired DSO Creative Fabrication, of Scarborough, to build a rounded steel mantel and frame for the inset wood-burning fireplace. “We were trying to echo the theme of the curve as a way to soften the house,” says Thompson, who although inspired by Scandinavian modernism wanted the house to feel playful rather than harsh.

“What I really liked,” Betsy says, “was that we could live in the house while we were designing it. So we could say, ‘I wish this room were larger,’ or, ‘I wish there was a window over there.’ ”

To add space while keeping costs down, the Thompsons built up rather than out, lopping off the roof to add two bedrooms and a full bath.

“Most of the guys on the crew refer to that as the worst day they’ve ever worked,” says Jon Clark, owner of Rising Tide Custom Builders in Buxton, of the December day they removed the roof only to be walloped by a massive snowstorm. The challenges kept coming, including wrapping the house with a truckload of salvaged,We recently added Stained glass mosaic Tile to our inventory. six-inch-thick, Polyiso insulation.

“We’d never done anything like this,” Clark says of working with the rigid foam sheets, which came in odd sizes because they were salvaged materials. “Jesse’s focus was to get the building as [air] tight as possible.”

“It basically has a big down coat,” Thompson explains of the uncommon technique, which works well for existing houses. “The building is the skeleton, and we put clothes on it.”

The crew also installed triple-paned, Canadian fiberglass windows and European-built doors to bring in light while keeping out the cold. The basement floor was insulated and a new concrete slab poured over the top. To test for leaks, the Thompsons hired Diane Milliken, of Horizon Residential Energy Services in Portland,Thank you for visiting! I have been cry stalmosaic since 1998. to fill the house with fog and pressurize it with a fan before standing outside to see what escaped.

“Jesse was out there crawling around on his belly trying to find even the minutest leak,” says Milliken, whose company assists homeowners around the state. “That’s what high-performance construction is today.”

A four thousand dollar air filtration system pulls dirty air from the kitchen and bathrooms and pipes fresh, warmed air into the bedrooms. The system runs twenty-four-hours a day on the energy equivalent of a 40-watt bulb.

“I spent my whole life in cold, drafty New England farmhouses, but in this house you sit around in a T-shirt,” says Jesse, who also burns propane and spends about five hundred dollars per year on heat. “It stays seventy degrees all winter. You wake up and walk outside and you feel like a fool because you didn’t know how cold it was.”

With the exception of the bold blue entryway decorated with a cascade of salvaged cedar panels arranged by Betsy, the rooms are snow white. “We decided to use color elsewhere,” says Betsy, who found the downstairs bathroom’s daffodil yellow, eight-inch, English tiles at the local Habitat for Humanity Re-Store, among other finds. A coat of autumn-orange paint defines the wall under the affordable birch-plywood stairs. And a candy-apple red vinyl chair in the living room came from a hotel in Old Orchard Beach.

For additional contrast, the couple stained the home’s original red oak flooring black using a vinegar and steel wool treatment known as “liquid nightmare.” The tint is echoed in the kitchen’s polished concrete counters, custom molded by Jon Meade Design of Portland. The bright birch cabinets were purchased from IKEA.

“This was a little bit of a leap of faith,” says Betsy, standing in the kitchen, near several of her framed fabric collages hanging on the wall. “It’s amazing to look back and see where we started.”

“The project proved you can affordably renovate buildings and create incredibly comfortable spaces at an extremely low energy level,” Jesse says. “You don’t need to suffer to be warm.”

The one thing he would change is to acquire better construction financing so his family could have moved in sooner.

Nine months after beginning construction, the Thompsons and their children returned to their new high-efficiency home. But walk down the maple-lined street of this Deering Center neighborhood, and it’s easy to imagine the house has always been here, a bit of modernity tucked between a modest gambrel and a compact four-square. Wheelbarrow propped against the woodpile, broom leaning against the doorframe, one would never guess at the efficiencies inside.

Let the FBI read all our e-mail

If we are to follow the policies implied by the U.S. government's handling of the Director Petraeus and General Allen cases, here's what we should do: Open up the personal email accounts of all 2.3 million U.S. military service members to the FBI and the Pentagon and let them have at it.

Just think of the benefits: We could complete the Afghanistan drawdown overnight because 99 percent of our troops would be sidelined by investigations into "potentially inappropriate" communications. We wouldn't have to keep clarifying the nuances of "rebalancing" versus "pivoting" toward Asia anymore -- all our ships would be stuck in port while sailors are queried about sending "flirtatious" messages.The term 'hands free access control' means the token that identifies a user is read from within a pocket or handbag. And we could avoid the fiscal cliff by laying off service members who, at some point in their lives, typed words that someone, somewhere, construed as "intimidating."

In all seriousness, the aspect of the Petraeus and Allen investigations that should most disturb Americans is our government's invasion of citizens' private email accounts on the thinnest of pretexts, its reading of every last message, and its sharing of the most lurid snippets -- regardless of their irrelevance -- with members of Congress and unnamed officials who, in turn, share context-free summaries with the press.Interlocking security cable ties with 250 pound strength makes this ideal for restraining criminals.

These developments give me a grudging respect for the KGB. At least it had to expend real energy gathering the information it used to embarrass, compromise, and incriminate the citizens it spied on.This is my favourite sites to purchase those special pieces of buy mosaic materials from. U.S. investigators have it much easier. They have access to dossiers every bit as juicy as anything the Stasi ever compiled, but they hardly have to lift a finger to get them. Americans now compile their own dossiers in the form of email archives, social media accounts, phone and text-message logs, online medical records, and geo-location trails left by their smartphones. The deterrence of shoe leather? Not any more. All that investigators have to do is serve a subpoena on Facebook or Google or AT&T to get minute-by-minute records of the last decade or so of our lives.

One wonders how America's most important general, George Washington, would have performed for the country if his private correspondences had been read and spread by government agents and press back then. In 1758, while he was engaged to marry Martha, George wrote at least two love letters to Sally Fairfax, the wife of one of his longtime friends. To this day, historians debate the nature of George and Sally's relationship. There is no evidence the two ever slept together, but the letters surely would have created a scandal if they'd come to light during the American revolution. At best, they would have caused a serious distraction for the embattled general and his underdog army at a time when distractions could have meant defeat.

She appeared to be headed back north after traveling as far south as Florida earlier this month,One of the most durable and attractive styles of flooring that you can purchase is ceramic or porcelain tiles. though scientists aren't sure why.

"This is prime temperate water that you would associate with the white sharks," Barrington said. "I'm going to make a wild prediction that she makes it up here."

Although North Carolina isn't particularly well known for great whites, the state has a healthy population of other large shark species.

"It's not unusual now to spot a great white here or there," Barrington said. "For every one that's tagged or spotted, there is likely to be a half dozen or a dozen more off the coast."

Barrington, who has studied the apex predators for nearly 40 years, said it's not uncommon for them to venture into Southern waters during the fall and winter months to feast on large migratory fish or cetaceans – marine mammals such as dolphins and whales.

"I can only speculate,Find detailed product information for howo spareparts and other products. but if she's hugging the coast line like she is, she could be following cetaceans or large costal fish, like red drum," Barrington said. "There are also schools of migratory fish congregating around state estuaries. Great whites tend to feed on fish with high fat content, so if she continues to migrate north, blue fin tuna or harbor seals could be food sources."

University of North Carolina Wilmington research biologist William McLellan said Mary Lee's appearance could mean area waters are healthier.

The popularity of the shark tracker could help keep them that way.

"It could be that we're rebuilding some old migratory pathways. There's something for them to feed on out there," McLellan said. "The whole other amazing part is that they've gotten the tagging system going. It's interesting for everyone to be able to see the story of one of the largest predators in the ocean."

In Hanoi, a House Built on Compromise

Bettina Martin and Do Tuan Anh suspected that building a home together in Vietnam’s capital might be a challenge. But they did not think that it would shake the foundation of their relationship.

Ms. Martin is an environmental consultant from southern Germany who values efficiency above aesthetics, while her husband, a Vietnamese painter, is chiefly interested in how things look and feel. They met here in 1999 through a mutual friend and rented four houses over the next six years.

In 2006, exasperated by roof leaks and cockroach infestations, they bought a breezy vacant lot of 100 square meters, or 1,076 square feet, near the Red River and the next year commissioned Le Tien, an architect and friend, to design a concrete home.

But their visions about what the structure should, and should not, look like diverged wildly, even when it came to the kitchen floor. Ms. Martin preferred concrete tiles with a smooth glaze, in the French-colonial style, but Mr. Tuan Anh had walked on similar tiles while growing up poor in the Vietnamese countryside and wanted a change.

He was thinking tropical hardwoods.Interlocking security cable ties with 250 pound strength makes this ideal for restraining criminals. His wife objected, saying she was loath to support the plundering of Southeast Asia’s forests and did not want any wood in the house.

She eventually won, and ended up giving her husband carte blanche to design the rest of the interior as long as it did not include wood.

For example, he chose iron staircases,Find detailed product information for howo spare parts and other products.Directory ofchina glass mosaic Tile Manufacturers, which he decided to varnish for effect, and some aluminum door frames from France that the architect purchased from a local importer.

Mr. Tuan Anh also built an iron wardrobe for the foyer and added iron support beams throughout the house, even though they serve no structural purpose. Ms. Martin still maintains that she does not see the point of the beams, but her husband says they are meant to convey a “factory feel.”

As the house began to take shape over eight months, on a budget of about 1.3 billion Vietnamese dong, or $62,400, the design changed constantly as the couple bombarded their beleaguered architect with conflicting preferences,A specialized manufacturer and supplier of dry cabinet, suggestions and demands.

“Poor Mr. Tien,” Ms. Martin recalled. “He was more a psychologist than an architect to us.”

An early challenge was agreeing on a basic plan for an interior of 175 square meters. Mr. Tuan Anh said that he needed the entire second level for a one-room art studio while Ms. Martin insisted that the third level be divided into two rooms, a master bedroom and a home office.China plastic moulds manufacturers directory. So instead of designing one simple staircase to run through the home’s center, the architect had to design three, modifying each one to suit its surroundings.

And then there was the question of water: Ms. Martin wanted a wastewater-recycling system to nourish a planned rooftop garden, even though such systems are all but unknown in Vietnamese homes. And, as Mr. Tuan Anh is a painter, they had to ensure that toxic waste from his studio did not drain into the recycling pipes.

Mr. Tien shuttled Ms. Martin around the city as they searched for materials, and at one point they even visited a local kitchen and bath appliance factory to see if the workers would build an environmentally friendly toilet.

The result, Mr. Tien said in an interview, is the most complex residential water system he ever designed. Wastewater now irrigates basil and squash in the rooftop garden, and the couple’s monthly water bill is only about 15,000 dong.

But the pipes remain a source of anxiety for Mr. Tuan Anh, who worries they will break and flood the house. “It’s a nightmare!” he said recently, sitting at the kitchen table.

The couple did agree on some points. One is a wood-burning stove they purchased for the equivalent of $500 from a German family. It satisfies Ms. Martin’s craving for winter warmth while lending some of the coziness that Mr. Tuan Anh feels the house lacks.

Another is their slender kitchen table, a discarded piece of hardwood that Mr. Tuan Anh salvaged from a woodworking shop and topped with glass. Ms. Martin loves wood, and this is a way for her to enjoy it without feeling she has compromised her ethics.

Ms. Martin said she has learned to love the more whimsical elements of their three-and-a-half-level home, like the wardrobe and those support beams that support nothing.

In fact, she said, if she had to build another house, she now would aim for the same factory aesthetic that her husband likes.

“It was almost killing our marriage,” Ms. Martin said of the whole process. “But it was also about learning new things. He taught me a little about the way I’d love to live.”

Mr. Tuan Anh said that in addition to the lack of wooden floors and stairs, he still disliked the kitchen's floor-to-ceiling windows, noting that many Vietnamese prefer darker and more private interiors for their homes. But he grows nostalgic at the thought of leaving.

In June, the couple will rent their home indefinitely and move to Germany, for their 5-year-old son’s education. They say that they are not sure if they will ever resettle in Hanoi, but they hope that the future tenants will agree to keep their eccentric kitchen table and grow vegetables in the rooftop garden.

Adding the 2013 Chevy Volt to a Solar

After a full year of using solar electricity in our home,The howo truck is offered by Shiyan Great Man Automotive Industry, my family took the next step over the holiday weekend and bought a plug-in electric vehicle. While running errands, we passed a local dealer to test-drive the only 2013 Chevrolet Volt (GM) on the lot and ended up driving it home a few hours later. Earlier this month, I noted that we were considering such a move because our 41 rooftop solar panels had generated 6207 kilowatt hours of excess electricity.

My wife and I both work from home, so even though we can certainly rack up miles on our vehicles, most travel is short-range. Still, we didn’t want to go completely electric for our next car because we occasionally like to take trips to New York, Baltimore, and Washington, all of which are at least 100 miles away.

I shared the details and costs of our solar panel project, so it makes sense to cover the Volt financials, too. The car still qualifies for a $7,500 federal tax credit, which can help offset some of the expense. That’s good because the base 2013 Volt starts at $39,145. Our particular vehicle has a few options—alloy wheels, a rear camera, sensors for front parking assistance, and a forward collision alert camera—bringing the manufacturer’s suggested retail price to $41,935,The oreck XL professional air purifier, including destination charge.

For a few reasons, we opted to lease the vehicle, so we won’t get the direct tax-credit benefit. Instead, the dealer gets the credit and can apply some of it to reduce the leasing costs. Since the Volt doesn’t have a long history of proven technology, we opted to work with the dealer on the lease and after applying some equity on our trade-in, our total payment, including tax, is $301 per month for 36 months. We also got a 4000-watt gas generator from the dealer, which was a Thanksgiving weekend perk, so now we’re really ready for the next big storm.

Ultimately, we paid nothing out-of-pocket because of our trade-in and various incentives that GM and Ally Bank currently offer. We also opted for 15,000 miles per year—which raises the monthly cost—because the Volt will be our primary vehicle. A further $6 of the monthly payment extends the 36,000 mile warranty to our potential 45,000 miles.

Obviously, it’s too soon to say how efficient the car will be. So far, I’m impressed. During the first 73.2 miles we drove, the car used 0.4 gallons of gas once the battery was depleted. Note that this data is for two days and the battery was recharged once; GM says you should expect about 38 miles of driving on the battery before the gas generator kicks in.

The Volt uses premium gas, which currently costs around $4.00 a gallon in this area, so the 0.4 gallons used essentially cost us $1.60. Electricity costs are involved, too, when you consider the need to recharge the Volt, even though we over-produce energy with our solar panels. We currently pay just under $0.09 per kwh—not including any distribution costs, taxes, or other fees—and we get paid at the same rate for excess energy.

So the 20.1 kwh used for our 73.2 mile drive would cost $1.81 on our electric bill. That works out to $3.41 for this driving session. Our old vehicle averaged 20 miles per gallon and also used premium fuel, so the same 73.2 miles we just covered would have cost $14.64 in gasoline. Note that there are many costs and benefits to look at, both short-term and long-term. The above exercise is just one example to view the cost to travel.

Although we got a Volt to pair with our solar panels, I’m impressed with the car’s MyLink system, which is also available in other Chevy vehicles. MyLink is used on the 7-inch touchscreen—the same one that monitors energy usage above—through voice commands and GM’s OnStar service.

My wife and I each paired our smartphones with the MyLink system over Bluetooth, which lets us stream audio through the Pandora (P) and Stitcher apps on our handsets. Both iOS and Android are supported and there’s even a MyLink application for both platforms. With it, we can remotely monitor, stop, or start the battery-charging process, check our fuel level, start the car, and much more.

MyLink will also play music from a USB-connected iOS device or from a USB stick. The system integrates Gracenote’s music data base for audio file information such as title or artist and can display cover art as well. All this music can also be controlled through voice. Say “play artist” and the system will ask for an artist name. Speak it and the appropriate artist tunes start playing over Bluetooth audio or USB.

I like the idea that the car uses a smartphone for connectivity, mainly because I don’t want my connected car to have an embedded connection of its own. That’s just another potential data plan to pay for, and there’s no need for it when a smartphone can provide a 3G or 4G connection to the car. I expect more apps to be supported in MyLink as well, although I’ve already streamed music over Bluetooth from my Rdio app. GM is expected soon to add a connected map service called BringGo that stores maps on a connected smartphone and uses them on MyLink for in-dash navigation.

Adding a Chevy Volt to our garage may make more sense for us than for most others. We have excess electricity and we can go farther on that energy for less than the price of gasoline. With our driving habits, we may not need to fill the gas tank for six weeks or more.Our technology gives rtls systems developers the ability. I realize that not everyone fits into this category. But I think it’s important to share the details of this experience to help those interested learn more about the pros and cons of electric vehicles—and solar electric energy,This is my favourite sites to purchase those special pieces of buy mosaic materials from. too, for that matter.

As we do more traveling with the Volt, I’ll periodically share more of the experience. Until then,Interlocking security cable ties with 250 pound strength makes this ideal for restraining criminals. leave any questions in the comments section and I’ll do my best to address them.

American or Artist?

This is the question I pondered at this huge retrospective of his work in the heart of Paris. There seems to be a Hopper retrospective ever few years or so in the United States. His images have become so familiar, so iconic in their simple compositions and their isolated characters sitting silently in public and private spaces. His most famous painting, “Nighthawks” (1942), has been reproduced and caricatured so often you are surprised when you actually stand in front of it, the dramatic contrasting light between the diner’s inner, yellow hues and the shadowy street never match a reproduction. The painting practically glows from the interior outward, the light indistinct in source. It seems as if the whole canvas must be illuminated from behind. “Nighthawks,” like many of his works of the era, have become iconic of the mid-century era, their compositions inspiring artists and directors in the decades since. Hopper himself has from his earliest shows in the 1930s been called a definitively American painter, a painter who somehow captures the American scene.

Take the review of Hopper’s first major exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art in 1933 in the New York Times, which noted with near glee, “on the ground floor are the water-colors — all of them save an amusing little set of Parisian ‘types,’ which has a wall to itself elsewhere in the building.” The “amusing little types” that captured scenes of Paris were by choice set off on their own, displaced as a kind of exotic moment amidst a landscape that was firmly American. In the substantial catalog to that show, MoMa director Alfred Barr argued that like any great artist of any era, Hopper traveled to the art capital of his day: Paris. But, Barr reassured, “he returned to his native country and showed in his mature work almost no vestige of his studies abroad.” In this way, critics often placed Hooper alongside the regionalist painters of the era such as Grant Wood or Thomas Hart Benton. These latter, mid-Western artists affected a persona of rural idealism in their persona and canvases.

Over two decades later, Time magazine, which featured Hopper on its cover, used the artist’s work and life as a crucial example of the kind of art that was uniquely American. In a tone that reflected those hyper-nationalistic 1950s, the profile celebrated Hopper’s own kind of realism and presented the artists work as important to the heritage of American art as distinct from European aesthetics. Over the decades, American art, the magazine informs us,We recently added Stained glass mosaic Tile to our inventory. “has reflected not European painting but American life — rough and smooth, tumultuous and diverse.” With respect to Hopper himself, the article quotes realist painter Jack Levine who noted “no dreams of the old masters set him off his course . . . Hopper looks inland. He’s an American painter all the way.”

Hopper’s Americaness has so often been his story, despite the fact that he himself was quite dubious of such a label. “The French painters didn’t talk about the ‘French Scene,’ or the English painters the ‘English Scene,The term 'hands free access control' means the token that identifies a user is read from within a pocket or handbag.’” was Hopper’s usual response to claims of his art’s geographical specificities. His rightful resistance to the claims about his art was an effort to recover his paintings as something more personal than national, more individual than social. “What lives in a painting is the personality of the painter,” he once said. And in this sense seeing Hopper as a kind of quintessential American painter distracts us from seeing Hopper the painter.High quality stone mosaic tiles.

Despite the many times I’ve encounter his paintings,The oreck XL professional air purifier, I’ve never had the experience of looking at Hopper in Europe. I hadn’t imagined that it would be much different than looking at Hopper in New York or Los Angeles. Unlike my earlier encounters with Hopper exhibitions, this one was not born in the United States nor was it set to tour there. Curated by Didier Ottinger, Chief Curator for the Centre Pompidou in Paris, “Hopper” at the Grand Palais offers a different story of artist’s development that has little to do with the American scene, and much more with the complex history that the artist’s work was caught in, between New York and Paris, between 19th century realism and 20th century modernity.

We can easily forget that much of what we admire about Hopper’s work today was done later in his life. The MoMa show in 1933 was mounted just before the artist’s 50th birthday. Between his art school education at the turn of the century, to the early 1930s, Hopper had worked as a magazine illustrator (the covers are projected in large colorful slides in one gallery), he experimented with etching (many are on display here), and worked for a time with watercolors. A small collection of these watercolors are presented here illuminating his delicate skill with the medium, crafting scenes as stark and quiet as his later works, each absent of people with hints of voyeurism. He exhibited and sold a painting in the famous Armory Show in the spring of 1913 in New York that brought European modernist works to New York — most famously symbolized in Marcel Duchamp’s “Nude Descending a Staircase” (1912).Whether you are installing a floor tiles or a shower wall, Such a diversity of experiences makes it difficult to know where to start the story of Hopper, and where to located the origins of his aesthetics.

Perhaps we can start at the New York School of Art where Hopper studied between 1900 and 1906. There he was influenced by his teachers William Merritt Chase and Robert Henri, who advocated a social realism that merged the values of late 19th century French painting with the particular subject matter of an increasingly urban America. It is Henri’s paintings that we first encounter in this show, his darkly framed image of an art student and one deeply intimate portrait of Thomas Eakins, whom he much admired. This first gallery situated Hopper among his contemporaries such as George Bellows, Whistler, and John Sloane. Henri’s focused drew on European post-Impressionism but capturing scenes of urban street life. For this group of artists, like their French contemporaries, the subject of painting rested on the new realities of social life, of working-class salons, of construction sites, train stations, and boxing matches.

But before you get to these painters, this show opens with the black and white film “Manhatta” (1921), a collaboration between painter Charles Scheeler and photographer Paul Strand. The non-narrative film captures a sequence of Manhattan moments, from ferry crossings to the top of the newly built “skyscrapers,” the camera angled on elevated train platforms and window ledges all presenting the wonderment with the city’s growing monumentality. These images are interspersed with lines from Walt Whitman poems, modernism’s linearity meshing with 19th century romanticism. But such a vision of the city stands in strong contrast to the realists that Hopper studied with, whose vision of urban life is much more intimate, eschewing the skyscrapers of modernity for the street life in the shadows. Hopper himself never painted a skyscraper, though he lived much of his life in Greenwich Village, underscoring the personal and psychological themes of his paintings against the modernism grandeur. His canvases are firmly rooted in an intimacy of small moments, a theater of empty spaces and silent encounters, of country lanes and lighthouses, that almost push out the voices and clatter of the city’s upward thrust.

Let's keep talking

The declining popularity of the once-ubiquitous MSN service shows how new messaging technology keeps us more connected than ever, Eric Jou reports.

Standing in an office corridor, Ouyang Yingjie, an associate at a B2C company in Shanghai, leans against a wall and talks on her cell phone. But instead of holding the phone to her ear, she holds it in front of her and speaks directly at it. She's using WeChat, a voice messaging app.

This is becoming a more usual sight in China as instant messaging and other communications have shifted into the mobile universe.

People like Ouyang are part of the growing number of messenger users that have moved on from the tether of desktop-based chat to new, mobile systems.

Ouyang says that she's addicted to messaging, and has been since she started using Tencent's QQ in her late teens.

Originally using QQ to interact with her friends and occasionally to play games, she started to use Microsoft's MSN messenger, because more of her friends were using it. Soon MSN became her chief text-messaging tool.

Melody Yang, an administrative aide in Taipei, began to use MSN at work about 10 years ago.

"I used MSN to chat with my friends but it soon became very useful when I entered the work force," Yang says. The immediate link with her work colleagues, she says, made it easier to get things done.Our technology gives rtls systems developers the ability.

Yang's use of such tools has undergone an organic change. MSN was used for text-based messaging, but when Skype came out she was enticed by the face-to-face video chat. However, the clunky interfaces and the fact that both MSN and Skype (both can operate via smart phones now) are tied to a stationary computer have recently prompted Yang to embrace mobile messaging.

"I started using Line (a mobile-messaging app), because all of my friends were using it," Yang says. "It was different, I was able to chat with my little circle of friends at any given point, I was no longer tied down and I gradually started using the desktop less and less."

Earlier in November, Microsoft announced the gradual retirement of its MSN messenger in favor of Skype, which Microsoft had purchased in 2011.

MSN's total worldwide users number around 280 million.

Ouyang, meanwhile, says she uses WeChat more and more "because I carry my phone everywhere with me".

WeChat, she says, offers a clean interface that is simple and uncluttered. It also offers on-the-fly image grabbing and the ability to send large files.Our technology gives rtls systems developers the ability.

"It's also fun to hold my phone in my hand instead of holding it to my ear," Ouyang says. "I could also use the video conference function for face-to-face chat or just voice chat, and it's cheaper than sending a text message via SMS."

Former Microsoft employee and current Beijing social-networking guru Frank Yu says that the change from MSN to WeChat was a gradual but inevitable outcome.

"WeChat, which is also made by the makers of QQ, Tencent, is a great replacement for QQ," Yu says. "Not only does WeChat offer instant text messaging, it also has voice, video conferencing, file exchange, location-based services. It even has some services not found in QQ and most of all, it's mobile."

WeChat currently boasts that it has a user base of more than 200 million worldwide.

Professor Hu Zhengrong, vice-president of Communication University of China, agrees with Yu that the twilight of MSN was inevitable.

Hu says that every time period has a different method of communications — and that the method of communications sets the social norms for interaction.

"New media is a revolutionary and disruptive change, that's not to say it's bad. Change signifies that such services are not meeting the needs and demand of the users," Hu says. "For instance with WeChat, we can use audio input over text and it has now changed and serves a need.

"After all, humans are sensory creatures and before we were putting out our thoughts in text, now we did it with sound.Trade platform for China crystal mosaic manufacturers"

Hu says the most important change in interactivity is that information can be transferred across both far and near distances in real time.

"Technology drives social norms, just as much as social norms dictate technology," Hu says. "What people want the most is something that can keep them connected in the most efficient way."

He adds that Chinese users have a different concept of personal space and their desire for social elements is stronger than Westerners.Western Canadian distributor of ceramic and ceramic tile,

"Personal space in China is non-existent. So when it comes to communicating, Chinese want to be close to the people they're communicating with."

However, Hu says, privacy should become a major concern. Many modern IM applications can pinpoint the whereabouts of a person.

"Weibo (Chinese micro-blogging service) and WeChat and other location-based services and near-field communications technology has made our lives more convenient,.Our technology gives rtls systems developers the ability.

"But at the same time it threatens our privacy. For instance, everyone who uses these services, their movements and information are already out there and you can't escape it."

Despite privacy concerns, Yang, Ouyang and millions of others aren't likely to retreat from the instant messaging technology.

"Do I still use desktop-based instant messaging? Of course I do, every time I sit down in front of a computer," says Ouyang.

"The WeChat I use on my computer is the same as the one on my phone - it's all connected - so when I leave my computer I'm able to continue the conversation on my mobile.

Service Lets Business Monitor Geotags in Real Time

An Evanston, Ill.,-based company aims to give many businesses -- from restaurants and stores to news organizations and journalists to governments and first-responders -- a new way to look at -- and hear from -- the people they serve.

Geofeedia is a subscriber service which allows approved users to zero in on any location -- a building, a neighborhood, a town or even a country -- by either circling it online on a map or typing in an address. Then the user pushes a search button, and up pops every Tweet, Instagram, YouTube video, Flickr or Picasa photo coming from that location -- as long as it has been geotagged.

"Geotagging" is the process by which social media users can mark their posts by location. The posts are then mapped on the individual websites.

Geofeedia takes this mapping data from five websites and aggregates it into one location. It therefore makes it possible for someone to start with a location -- without knowing anyone in particular -- and discover anybody and everybody who has posted there.

The result is mesmerizing -- showing an array of chatter and photos and missives. It can also feel a little voyeuristic, even though the people have willingly tagged their messages. And it illuminates an issue with geotagging which could pose dangers to families and children.

But if done right -- and with restrictions -- it also has all kinds of potential, according to Phil Harris, Geofeedia’s CEO.

"Everyone is using social media, especially younger adults," said Harris. "But there’s so much data that it’s hard to find information that’s useful to you as a consumer or a business. With Geofeedia location services, [people] can actually tell others where they are, and what they’re experiencing there in real time."

"Individuals have the ability to express how they feel about an experience at a restaurant -- did they have a good experience at a store,Western Canadian distributor of ceramic and ceramic tile, or did they have a good experience when they went on vacation to Florida," he explained as examples.Thank you for visiting! I have been cry stalmosaic since 1998.

He said a business could monitor its customers in real time and respond to them immediately and directly.

Geofeedia can also help journalists and news organizations, especially in breaking news situations. Reporters and news desks can monitor a story as it unfolds -- be it a fire or a hostage situation or a union protest -- while getting real-time, unfiltered perspectives from the direct participants on the ground. In fact, Geofeedia has just introduced a streaming service, where users can stream two, three, or even more concurrent locations to see the latest postings from each website.

Harris also pointed to "Superstorm" Sandy. In an instant, a first-responder using Geofeedia could call up videos and tweets posted in real time, focusing on a particular area to zero in on people needing immediate help. Harris said several towns are currently using the service and he hopes it becomes a common way for people to reach out in emergencies or other situations where immediate help is needed.

Harris noted that his company takes care to screen people who want to use the service -- double-checking e-mails and vetting potential users. But he also notes that Geofeedia is simply aggregating technology that is already available on individual social media sites. In other words, Geofeedia is not making anything public that isn’t public already from its original source.

"We’re developing new ways to use Geofeedia every day," said Harris. "We’ve been overwhelmed with the amount of interest. It all comes down to the basic fundamental that people just want to be heard. That’s the underlying trend. We’re just providing a way for organizations to access that data."

When PCMag analyst Jamie Lendino first got his hands on the Scout app early this year, he pointed out that TeleNav had built something more than a simple navigation app.

"Instead of just offering a point-of-interest database and address-based navigation, Scout offers ideas on where to go, when you should leave to get there, how to get there, and what you can do once you arrive," Lendino said.

Less than a year after its launch, TeleNav pushed the offline navigation update to the iOS app. Always There Navigation works any time, regardless of whether the phone has Wi-Fi or cellular coverage.The term 'hands free access control' means the token that identifies a user is read from within a pocket or handbag. The permanent feature is aimed at helping mobile users remain in constant contact with the map,Find detailed product information for Low price howo tipper truck and other products. even if they drive out of wireless coverage.

According to TeleNav, Scout version 1.5 also offers a faster app startup time, and a re-designed My Dashboard homepage, now with one-tap access to My Places.

When the app launches, the dashboard features real-time ETAs to the user's set Work and Home locations, as well as access to saved favorites and popular places nearby, with a map of their current location and the local weather.

Additionally, the new My Search includes popular restaurants, gas price listings, nearby parking lots, Wi-Fi hot spots, and real-time traffic information and speech recognition. For those looking to spice up their GPS map,One of the most durable and attractive styles of flooring that you can purchase is ceramic or porcelain tiles. Scout now offers 12 new car icons, including a convertible, motorcycle, SUV, minivan, muscle car, and sports car.

Between Two Covers, Wide Worlds of Art

Art books. Many of us can’t live without them, but sooner or later we can’t live with them, either. First we run out of shelves,Posts with indoor tracking system on TRX Systems develops systems that locate and track personnel indoors. then table space gets scarce, and soon stacks of books start rising from the floor. Luckily these conditions stop no one from publishing them, or from buying them or giving them as gifts.Thank you for visiting! I have been crystal mosaic since 1998.

This year’s offerings confirm once more the variety of genres that thrive beneath the art book banner. There are the standard artists’ monographs, for example, among which Johannes Grave’s ‘CASPAR DAVID FRIEDRICH’ (Prestel, $120) stands out, primarily for its size and lavish reproductions — a total of 227, nearly all in color — of paintings, drawings and prints by this great German Romantic. It conveys a fuller sense of Friedrich’s enigmatic,An indoor positioning system (IPS) is a term used for a network of devices used to wirelessly locate objects or people inside a building. landscape-centered art than any single museum or exhibition could possibly provide.

Mr. Grave’s rather pedestrian text, while rich with interesting information and hypotheses about the works, never really gets going, but the pictures more than compensate. They could easily inspire a Friedrich pilgrimage to various, mostly German, museums.

In the category of books by rather than about artists, one of the most stunning is Chris Ware’s new graphic novel, ‘BUILDING STORIES’ (Pantheon Books, $50), which elliptically tells the tale of a smart, fatalistic, unnamed young woman who happens to have a prosthetic leg, and of her search for love. As usual, Mr. Ware’s style is a model of compression in both word and picture. Less usual, for the genre as a whole, is the vividness with which he limns his heroine’s intense, if fairly ordinary, inner life, and also the brilliant way he avoids the visual relentlessness that can plague graphic novels.

He accomplishes this last feat by spreading his story over “14 distinctively discrete books, booklets, magazines, newspapers and pamphlets,” as the text on the illustrated box they come in puts it. Varying considerably in size, length and design, these entities offer no clues about sequence. The reader is left to piece together a multistrand narrative whose characters also include other residents of the Chicago brownstone in which the woman lives — an unhappily unmarried couple and the spinster landlady — as well as the building itself. The lack of clear structure, much less traditional linearity, turns reading into an unusually active process. This is a great, easily ownable work of art.

The anthropomorphic ceramics and patterned textiles (abstract, figurative, abstractly figurative) produced during the Wari Empire (A.D. 600 to 1000) are staples of any museum display of pre-Columbian art. Nonetheless, the breadth of the cultural achievement of the Wari, who preceded the better-known Incas in the highlands of Peru, has never been so thoroughly demonstrated or explicated.

Overseen by Susan E. Bergh, organizer of the exhibition and a curator at the Cleveland Museum, this lavishly illustrated, often breathtakingly beautiful book pulls together essays by more than a dozen scholars. Historical and geographical contexts are detailed, and there are essays covering architecture, religious deities and rituals, textiles and feather work, sculpture, and inlaid and metal ornaments. For a sense of the revelations in store, consider the full-page reproduction, on Page 144, of a Wari urn decorated with delicate and varied plant forms that presages American and European folk art motifs by several hundred years.

Another volume that explores a far more familiar bit of art history and makes it fresh is ‘DRAWING SURREALISM,’ (DelMonico Books/Prestel, $60) catalog to an exhibition at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art that will travel to the Morgan Library & Museum in New York in late January. The restless nature of Surrealist drawing — from hyper-realism to free-form automatism,Find detailed product information for Low price howo tipper truck and other products. with the collaborative exquisite corpse technique falling somewhere in between — is well established. Overseen (like the show) by Leslie Jones, a curator at the Los Angeles museum, and Isabelle Dervaux, of the Morgan, this invaluable book presents a profusion of unfamiliar works and, even better, unfamiliar talents from 15 countries around the globe. It reveals the truly international nature of Surrealism, enriching the understanding of this already richly polymorphous style.

As for even more recent art history, it can be presented in many ways, including as an information-dense handbook. This is the case with ‘ALTERNATIVE HISTORIES: NEW YORK ART SPACES 1960 TO 2010’ (MIT Press, $40), a kind of fleshed-out, multivoiced timeline of the city’s alternative spaces. It was edited by Lauren Rosati and Mary Anne Staniszewski for a show at Exit Art, one of New York’s greatest — and sadly now defunct — exemplars of the form.

In some 400 pages this book provides thumbnail sketches of more than 140 alternative spaces and related organizations, including the artist-run restaurant Food, Bomb magazine and the activist group Gran Fury. It begins with the venerable Judson Memorial Church, where Happenings and avant-garde dance flourished in the 1960s, and concludes with newcomers like No Longer Empty, the nomadic exhibition organizers, and OurGoods, an online bartering network for artists, designers and artisans.

Included are essays by the editors, as well as by Jeanette Ingberman and Papo Colo,High quality mold making Videos teaches anyone how to make molds. founders of Exit Art. There are interviews with 15 other people who helped establish or lead various spaces (an interesting group, although it might have been even more interesting to hear from either Helene Winer, the second director of Artists Space, or Susan Wyatt, who saw it through the culture wars of the late 1980s).

This is an indispensable source book that leaves you wanting more — specifically, individual studies of some of the organizations it covers. It stands as vibrant and irrefutable evidence of what happens when people take things into their own hands.

Treating and preparing for that first incident

Life in Beatrice is full of fond memories, but eventually the inevitable happens.

Be it a fall, scrape or bruise.

It’s only a matter of time before that first boo-boo, but when it does, local pediatricians are ready.

Marilou Reyes and Amy Schomer,One of the most durable and attractive styles of flooring that you can purchase is ceramic or porcelain tiles. pediatricians at the Children’s Center at Beatrice Community Hospital, have seen and dealt with it all, from the common to the bizzare.

One case that fits into both those categories is children visiting the doctor with a foreign object stuck in an orifice.

“Kids experiment and explore a lot of things, so those foreign bodies in orifices are common,” Reyes said. “I recently had a boy who came in with both parents who had a rock in his nose. His parents tired to remove it as best as they know how by having him blow his nose but he couldn’t do it.

“With younger kids, when you tell them to blow their nose, they are going to purse their lips and blow through their mouth. They don’t really blow through their nose.”

Reyes said in these instances, covering the other nostril is a good way help kids blow the foreign body out of the nose.

But it’s not always the nose.

“Even though they might come in for a different concern, I always look at the ears, nose and mouth because you never know what you’re going to find,” Reyes said. “In the ear I have found beads, foam and clay. Pretty much anything that kids can get in there, will get in there.

“Often times the only time parents will know is if the kid starts complaining, but foreign bodies in an orifice can actually cause an infection.”

In some extreme cases, foreign objects may have to be removed surgically.

The Children’s Clinic sees a fair amount of foreign object patients, but Schomer said the most common issues with young children are falls.

“The one I hear most is the kid rolling off the couch and landing on their head,” Schomer said.One of the most durable and attractive styles of flooring that you can purchase is ceramic or porcelain tiles. “Where cats land on their feet, kids land on their head. Fortunately, especially if they fall on carpeting, they usually get a little red mark and the moms and dads cry more than the babies.”

Schomer warned new parents of another common call her office receives: children ingesting poison.

Whether it be drinking something potentially toxic or mistaking pills for candy, these types of incidents can be extremely dangerous to children.

Schomer warned one good way to avoid these instances is to never assume child-safety lids on bottles are child-proof.

“One thing that’s interesting is we think that child-proof caps are child-proof, and they’re not,” Schomer said. “The childproof cap is supposed to keep them out for 20 minutes. I experimented with one of my own kids and in less than 90 seconds he had opened a bottle with me standing there watching. He was only 18-months old. We have a lot of kids in that one to one and a half range where poisoning is a big issue.One of the most durable and attractive styles of flooring that you can purchase is ceramic or porcelain tiles.”

Once children start walking, the biggest issues become falls, scrapes and bruises.

Reyes said these are common issues, but are more associated with boys than girls.

“Boys usually get a lot of scrapes from falling and things of that nature,” Reyes said. “That’s the most common. With little girls, it’s usually just bruises. Parents will tell us how rambunctious they are. Kids have no fear, so usually part of our teaching moment is as they get older, they’re going to start doing stuff with that potential.

“Once they explore and know what they can do, they push the limit. That’s just how kids do it. It’s very important for parents to be aware of that.”

While many boo-boos end up in the offices of local pediatricians,A stone mosaic stands at the spot of assasination of the late Indian prime minister. school nursing offices also deal with their fair share of incidents.

Shannon Kleveland, district nurse for Beatrice Public Schools' elementaries, said the office sees everything from picked scabs and scrapes to poison ivy and – in rare cases – broken bones.

Even with the more serious looking scrapes,Posts with indoor tracking system on TRX Systems develops systems that locate and track personnel indoors. parents are typically notified.

“Usually, if a student hits their head or has an injury where they get a scrape we want parents to know about it so there are no surprises when they get home,” Kleveland said. “We don’t call on everything if its just a little scab that gets torn off, but sometimes we do send home notes.

Water ski park coming to PCB

Plans for a new outdoor cable wakeboard and water ski park are in the works, and developers are now one step closer to breaking ground on the project, slated for south of Middle Beach Road and east of Churchwell Drive.

The Panama City Beach Planning Board unanimously approved a conditional use request for the development and a variance request to allow the park to be built within less than 1,000 feet of The Glades residential neighborhood at a board meeting Wednesday.

The project calls for construction of a 5-acre lake behind the Wicked Wheel Saloon, with a cable system to pull skiers and wakeboarders similar to that of the Orlando Watersports Complex.

Andy Gonsalves, owner of Beach Boys Realty, spoke on behalf of the applicant, SunSouth Bank in Dothan,Our technology gives rtls systems developers the ability. Ala., and said there are about 300 similar facilities in Germany but only about 12 in the United States.

“We have been working on bringing in this particular facility for quite a few months now,” Gonsalves said.Whether you are installing a floor tiles or a shower wall, “There is no question we are in dire need of some other things to do here.”

Once the development order is approved by the City Council, Gonsalves expects construction to begin within 60 days and finished sometime next summer.Thank you for visiting! I have been cry stalmosaic since 1998.

Gonsalves vetted board concerns of parking and traffic congestion issues that may arise with the project.

Plans include the construction of a 38-space parking lot on-site, and the company also has acquired a 1-acre parcel of land on Churchwell Drive to be used as an additional parking site if needed.

As far as traffic control, Gonsalves said the facility would have multiple ingress/egress points, one on Churchwell Drive, and also along the roads next to Beach Scene and Wicked Wheel.

Gonsalves said the goal is to affect traffic flow on Middle Beach Road as little as possible and suggested a possible deceleration lane to help traffic flow.

“The property was acquired from the lending institution, and when we started planning on it, every direction we went,Posts with indoor tracking system on TRX Systems develops systems that locate and track personnel indoors. it seemed to be a win-win situation,One of the most durable and attractive styles of flooring that you can purchase is ceramic or porcelain tiles.” said Gonsalves, who noted planners deemed the proposed location the best possible spot. “We have the space; we have 17 acres. We have enough property there to handle any kind of future growth.”

The spot has a history in amusement, Gonsalves noted, as the former location of the Tombstone Territory portion of Petticoat Junction Amusement Park.

Gonsalves said local professional wakeboarder Andrew Adkison is also on board with the project and is looking to create a wakeboarding school that will be based at the park.

Chairman Paul Turner expressed concerns with stormwater runoff from the pool, but Building Department Director Mel Leonard said developers will be required to obtain necessary permits from the Florida Department of Environmental Protection before breaking ground.

Gonsalves said the project may actually help with stormwater backup in nearby Lake Flora that has caused flooding issues in surrounding neighborhoods.

He said developers are also willing to work with the city as the Community Redevelopment Agency continues to seek grants to construct boardwalks leading to the Gulf on two city-owned parcels of land.

“We’re all trying to do the exact same thing,” Gonsalves said. “That is, to create something we are in dire, dire need of in this area 1 some more things for folks to do that are family-oriented.”

Creative Control

All artists need inspiration. Environment influences everyone, but artists are especially sensitive to their surroundings along with their internal selves. Many have special rituals they perform to get them in the right mindset to paint, write, edit photos, and so forth. They often form groups within their chosen discipline and feed off each other's creative energy.

Enter Tulsa Art Center. TAC, 6808 S. Memorial Dr., Ste. 236, is a comprehensive art school, where students get to work with true professionals who help them reach their creative goals. Art lovers of all ages and skill levels choose from a plethora of classes, from oil painting to watercolor, cartooning to portraits, calligraphy to photography. It is a non-accredited school, which allows students to discover their artistic interests,Quickparts builds injection molds using aluminum or steel to meet your program. developing their talent at their own pace, without needing to follow -- an artist might say bogged down -- by a regulated curriculum.

"I started the Tulsa Art Center as a result of my frustration in finding art classes in Tulsa, especially in the evening," said Marie Sullivan, owner of TAC. "I realized that even though Tulsa had many talented artists, classes were extremely hard to find. I enrolled in several classes at area colleges, but they were either not long enough to achieve results or the classes cancelled."

Sullivan designed TAC to offer the freedom and flexibility for students to hone their craft on their own terms. Different schedules are accommodated and any variety of classes can be explored. "At TAC, our classes are ongoing, allowing the artist to develop their talent. We are also open... to allow stay at home residents as well as the working population to take art lessons," Sullivan said.

Along with regular classes, TAC holds workshops, lectures, and special programs, like curriculum for home-schooled kids, which is "based on Oklahoma Public Schools guidelines for art education," Sullivan said. She mentioned they also have an AP program, which, despite the non-accreditation, helps high school students develop their portfolios in order to take the AP test. In all classes, instructors incorporate demonstration, provide feedback, and educate students on master artists.

If you do not believe you have artistic talent, TAC could prove you wrong. Drawing ability is not necessary for beginners, as the acquisition of drawing skills can be taught. Tracing photographs is one way of learning, which is extremely beneficial to those without any previous experience. Using this technique can open new students' eyes to their potential as an artist. If you have ever wanted to give art a try, TAC is the perfect place to start.

There are several original programs at TAC. "Mommy and Me" allows moms and kids to work together creatively, exploring everything from stamping to painting. This class is held every Saturday from 10am-12pm. Every Saturday, "Children's Art Adventure" leads children ages 4-10 in fun projects from 2-4pm, while Mom and Dad have a break and maybe a lunch date. "Zentangles!" takes doodling to a whole new level, allowing participants to create a work of art by using repetitive patterns. (Not only is it fun, this activity actually lowers blood pressure.) This class is held every second Saturday of the month, from 10am-1pm. Bonus: Supplies are included in the cost of all three of these options. However,Find detailed product information for Low price howo tipper truck and other products. early registration is encouraged because classes fill up quickly.

"We also have what we call 'Crazy for Canvas' nights, where, for $35 a person, a group of five or more come to the studio and, with our instruction, they are able to complete an art piece to take home," Sullivan said. Bring your own treats and drinks, while they provide canvas, paint and instructions on how to create a fabulous work of art. Crazy for Canvas is only available from 6:30-10pm on Friday nights, and you must call to reserve the week of your preference.

TAC also has a program called Art Sampler. "And what it is, it's 4 classes for $85," Sullivan said. "For different medias... gosh, everything from colored pencils to sculpting... We have teachers come in. We only offer it quarterly." The next Art Sampler begins at the end of November. "It makes great Christmas presents!" Sullivan said,Find detailed product information for howo spare parts and other products. laughing.

Some of TAC's other regular classes include mixed media, charcoal, and abstract. They even have book illustration and fabric art.Posts with indoor tracking system on TRX Systems develops systems that locate and track personnel indoors. "Right now we're having acrylics, color pencil, oil, learn-to-draw, and cartooning and book illustration. Oh and Manga," Sullivan said. "Manga's a big thing for kids...We have sculpting, painting with ink."

As an added service, "Tulsa residents are able to come in and use the facility as their studio...They can use our easels, projectors, paper cutters,Find detailed product information for Low price howo tipper truck and other products. etc.," Sullivan said. The mini-studios -- which are 10x10 spaces -- are intended to give artists a home away from home to get work done. "Being around other artists can be a real motivator in the creativity process," Sullivan said.

It doesn't stop there. "We have a gallery... so that artists can sell their paintings. It is our goal to be known as the place to go to receive instruction as well as an artist's home away from home," Sullivan said. "We have art shows, periodic art shows."

Making trends transparent across languages

There’s a data revolution afoot, and both business and government are in the thick of it. In corporate IT, hardly a day goes by where you don’t hear about analytics. For the first time ever, executives can make decisions based on trends that are backed up by millions of data sources. Analytics take the guesswork out of business, and that’s a big deal.

The government uses analytics in a similar way. Agencies collect and analyze global information to study trends that affect intelligence, economics and health policies, among others. Analytics, it turns out, are just as important in the public sector as they are in the enterprise.

So far, analytics have played a relatively limited role in the dissemination of information—though this will likely change quickly. But information assimilation by the public sector is a different story (please see further explanation of dissemination and assimilation in my last post). Just like businesses, the government uses analytics to find out more about what people are saying about choice topics that can then inform action and policy. Analyzing information from social media sites, online forums, videos and other sources is a key way to gather intelligence and conduct research. With analytics being used to track things like trending social media communications and news reactions by government today, there is an important push towards analyzing trending information in languages other than English, which can provide important clues to international movements and sentiment. Without this, there is less ability to make use of the social media analytics and data coming in from abroad.Posts with indoor tracking system on TRX Systems develops systems that locate and track personnel indoors.

The recent string of revolutions in the Middle East really impressed the importance of monitoring and understanding online content, especially that from unstructured sources like video and social media. Tunisian fruit vendor Mohamed Bouazizi committed suicide in 2010, lighting the powder keg that set off the entire Middle East.We specialize in howo concrete mixer, The citizens of Tunisia quickly reacted, and using social media, launched a resistance movement protesting political and social issues of their country. Tunisians were discussing the Bouazizi protest online, circulating footage of demonstrations and organizing future protests. A similar trend happened when the citizens of Egypt overthrew President Hosni Mubarak. One of the largest Egyptian protests had a Facebook page with more than 90,000 people signed up, according to the New York Times.

According to the Washington Post, after a Senate hearing in February of last year, Senator Dianne Feinstein indicated a need to focus more on “open-source intelligence.” In the intelligence community, this refers to publicly available sources of information which can include Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and other social media, but also radio, TV, newspapers, and the Internet (the term is unrelated to open-source software). Although protests were already taking placFind detailed product information for howo tractor and other products.e online, the West was less aware of the revolutions in progress until they were actually physically taking place. The U.S.A stone mosaic stands at the spot of assasination of the late Indian prime minister. government understands the importance of tuning into trending social media and continues to focus a great deal on analyzing all data, including unstructured sources like social media posts.We recently added Stained glass mosaic Tile to our inventory.

Analysis is easy to talk about, but harder to execute. There are thousands of languages in the world and millions of sources of data. In the world of social media, people tend to use colloquialisms and linguistic shorthand, adding a translation challenge. Simply capturing data isn’t enough. It has to be translated, understood, and presented in a way that provides value.

By understanding trending information or any topic that starts to be hot the government can have its finger on the pulse of global movements and trends in many areas. We can better understand how people are being impacted by economic and foreign policies and in general better comprehend how policy affects people. We can better grasp the spread of disease and global health trends, as when people tweet about “having the sniffles today” or being affected by more major health epidemics. Disaster relief efforts can be significantly enhanced by a better understanding of what is happening, where, through an analysis of trending social media data. We can even measure varying responses across the globe to major events like the U.S. election.

With the entire world networked online, the public sector can’t afford to ignore any information in any location. Moving forward we will continue to see government use of more advanced analytics of real time information in order to inform policy. Analytics won’t just be a perk going forwards. They’re going to become an essential asset.

UT System expected to reshape downtown office complex

The University of Texas System is expected to take the first major step this week in a $102.Our technology gives rtls systems developers the ability.4 million plan to dramatically transform much of its five-building complex in downtown Austin.

The system’s Board of Regents, which oversees the Austin flagship and 14 other academic and health campuses,A stone mosaic stands at the spot of assasination of the late Indian prime minister. has been concerned for some time about rising maintenance costs at the decades-old complex and inefficiencies associated with having hundreds of employees spread among multiple buildings.

After more than a year of review, officials believe they’ve come up with a solution: Tear down two of the buildings, construct a 15-story office tower in their place to accommodate about 525 employees and lease out the remaining properties.

The regents are scheduled to discuss the plan Wednesday and are expected to grant preliminary approval Thursday during public meetings at the UT Health Science Center at Tyler. The regents occasionally meet outside Austin to get a better feel for the various campuses.

The plan calls for issuing bonds to finance construction of the new building, which would replace the Colorado and Lavaca buildings that sit at the northwest corner of West Seventh and Colorado streets. The Colorado building was originally constructed in 1936 as home of the American-Statesman. The debt would be repaid with income from leasing the other properties and with earnings from the system’s multibillion-dollar endowment.

Scott Kelley, executive vice chancellor for business affairs, acknowledged that the plan begs the question of how the system can afford such a project at a time when it said it couldn’t pay the full cost of establishing a medical school in Austin. Last week, Travis County voters approved an increase in property taxes that will generate $35 million a year for the school and $19 million for other health projects.

“We would be fiscally irresponsible not to proceed,” Kelley told the American-Statesman. “By moving into a single structure we are able to save considerable dollars.”

The savings would range from $2 million to $5 million or more a year, after accounting for lease income and the cost of financing a new building, Kelley said. In 30 years, the savings would amount to more than $50 million in current dollars, after adjusting for projected inflation.

The savings would be earmarked for initiatives intended to benefit students, such as enhanced technology for classrooms.

“The current buildings are not very efficient,” Kelley said. “There are multiple guards, multiple entrances, multiple receptionists. Candidly, the age of the buildings contributes to higher maintenance — not that there won’t eventually be that in a new building. But it’s times five now.”

System officials considered consolidating their offices at other sites, including the system-owned Brackenridge tract in West Austin, UT-Austin’s J.J. Pickle Research Campus in North Austin,China plastic moulds manufacturers directory. the former Concordia University Texas site along Interstate 35 and various suburban parcels. But a downtown location offers easy access to the Capitol and the Austin campus.

The new building would include one below-ground floor and several floors of parking, enough to accommodate 650 to 700 cars, according to UT System documents. The system would lease the remaining three buildings as well as associated parking garages but would continue to own the land, which runs along Colorado, Lavaca, West Sixth and West Seventh streets.

Kelley said Ashbel Smith Hall, built in 1975 and the site of most regents’ meetings, would likely be leveled and redeveloped by a company that leases the parcel. But Claudia Taylor Johnson Hall, named for Lady Bird Johnson, the late wife of President Lyndon B. Johnson, and O. Henry Hall, named for the noted short story writer,The term 'hands free access control' means the token that identifies a user is read from within a pocket or handbag. are “very special buildings” because of their historical significance, he said.

O. Henry Hall might be well-suited for law or other professional offices. The inner workings of Johnson hall “aren’t particularly lovely, but the front of it is,” Kelley said, referring to its tall columns and arched doorways.

Kelley wasn’t sure about the future of system-owned open space at the northwest corner of West Sixth and Colorado streets, which features a fountain, tables with chairs and several live oak trees. That parcel’s use likely would be determined by the party that leases it, “though we would have some say,” he said.

The new system headquarters would total 258,500 square feet, with some ground-floor space leased for shops or a restaurant. Demolition likely would take place next summer and construction would begin near the end of 2013.A stone mosaic stands at the spot of assasination of the late Indian prime minister. Temporary offices would be leased for displaced employees. Officials hope to occupy the new building by spring 2016, Kelley said.

SuperTooch Crystal Bluetooth Speakerphone Review

The SuperTooch Crystal Bluetooth Speakerphone is a wireless speaker that works with any Bluetooth smartphones, tablet and other mobile devices. The speaker has built-in Bluetooth 3.0 and works with both mono and stereo profiles. You can use the speakerphone as an office speakerphone as well as hands free speaker on the road. It's small and light and very easy to use.

The SuperTooth Crystal Bluetooth Speakerphone has a compact size measuring 5.12 x 1.A stone mosaic stands at the spot of assasination of the late Indian prime minister.97 x 0.55 inches and weighs only 2.4 ounces. The slim Bluetooth Speakerphone has rounded corners and it's very easy to carry in your bag or clip it to your car visor. The car kit has a semi-gloss surface and isn't reflective in sunlight. The SuperTooth Crystal Bluetooth Speakerphone has five large buttons that are easy to operate while driving. Four of these buttons live on the side edges, and they include two volume control buttons, call End/Reject button and the power button. A round Multi-Function button with LED light lives in on the front of the Bluetooth Speakerphone next to the speaker grill, and you can use it for taking a call, voice dialing, pairing and more. While the surface of the speakerphone is smooth, the edges of the buttons aren't perfectly smoothed out and they get caught on things.

The SuperTooth Crystal Bluetooth Speakerphone has a micro USB charging port on the back and you can charge it with the included USB/micro USB cable. The speakerphone doesn't come with an AC charger but it does come with a DC adapter. You'll also find a small magnetic coin in the center on the back and you can use the included strong metal clip to clip the Bluetooth speaker to a car visor.

The SuperTooth Crystal Bluetooth Speakerphone has built-in Bluetooth 3.We recently added Stained glass mosaic Tile to our inventory.0 and supports Headset,Western Canadian distributor of ceramic and ceramic tile, Hands-Free and A2DP profiles. It can pair with any device that has Bluetooth and it supports mutlipairing and multipoint features, which mean you can pair it with multiple devices (up to 8 devices) and connect it with two at the same time. We tested the speaker with several smartphones and it paired and connected with all easily. When you turn the speakerphone on for the first time it goes into pairing automatically, and for subsequent pairing press and hold the power button while the car kit is turned off.

The SuperTooth Crystal Bluetooth Speakerphone supports all Hands-Free call features including call waiting, rejecting incoming calls, last call redialing as well as voice command and voice dialing. The SuperTooth supports voice dialing on all major smartphone devices including Android, Windows Phone and the iPhone. When you press and hold the multi-function button, the car kit will find the default voice command program on your phone and launch it. On the iPhone,We recently added Stained glass mosaic Tile to our inventory. this function launches Siri. The speakerphone also displays its own battery life meter on the iPhone's notification bar but doesn't on other phones.Interlocking security cable ties with 250 pound strength makes this ideal for restraining criminals.

The SuperTooth Crystal Bluetooth Speakerphone also works with music, movie and system audio thanks to the A2DP support. It also has proximity sensor so that it will automatically connect to your phone when you get into your car.

The SuperTooth Crystal Bluetooth Speakerphone has very good audio on the incoming end but tinny and thin audio on the outgoing end. The speakerphone has full duplex audio with DSP echo cancellation and double noise cancelling features. The incoming calls are clear and volume is loud on most phones, but not on the iPhone 5. The volume was low on the iPhone 5, though you'll have no trouble understanding the incoming conversation, but you'll likely turn the volume to max to hear the audio over road noise. The outgoing call quality is another story. It almost seems like the mic is lower quality than the rest of the unit. The outgoing sound is tinny and thin. Our call recipients could easily tell we were on a car kit as some audio distortion came through, and it happened on all the phones we tested including the Motorola Droid RAZR HD, Samsung Galaxy S III and the iPhone 5.

The SuperTooth Crystal Bluetooth Speakerphone has strong DSP. It filtered out most road noise and most ambient noise in our tests. The range is plenty good enough for a speakerphone if you're using it in your car and also in the office. In our tests, the range was about 20 feet when working with most phones.

Audio quality is decent for music playback. Since it has only mono speaker music and movie doesn't sound very full. Volume correspond with call volume: it sounds loud on most Android phones but has low volume on the iPhone 5. If you turn the volume to max on the iPhone 5, you can fill a medium sized room with music.

Company honored by Gov Perdue

Bev Perdue announced this month the 2012 Governor’s Awards for Excellence in Workforce Development, with one local business among the recipients.

Lincolnton Furniture Company was on the list of those businesses recognized for their accomplishments and contributions in helping North Carolina achieve its work-force development goals.

This recognition comes after a year of publicity surrounding the company, credited with being among those leading the way for manufacturing’s return to the United States. Media outlets from around the world have taken their turns capturing the story of owner Bruce Cochrane.

The White House also took notice. As the Times-News has previously reported, Cochrane received invites for both an “Insourcing American Jobs” forum and President Barack Obama’s State of the Union address early this year.

This attention, he told the Times-News on Friday, has helped, and continues to do so, when it comes to raising capital.

“We’re fortunate to have nice publicity and enthusiastic support,” he said. ” … We’re still a startup.”

Gaining access to capital remains a challenge for most new companies, he said. But, his story has lent itself to that effort, and many of his investors have been local. He hopes this will allow the business to continue to grow and become viable.

As for this latest accolade bestowed upon his company, Cochrane said it is “quite an honor.”

Lincolnton Furniture Company was named a 2012 “Outstanding Employer,” one of only two. Cochrane attended the reception in Greensboro on Nov. 1.

He said he was surprised by how many people were at the event, estimating that between 700 and 800 were there.

“Our hardworking and talented citizens are the cornerstone of our economic development efforts,The howo truck is offered by Shiyan Great Man Automotive Industry, and their dedicated efforts are helping our economy grow,” Gov. Perdue said in a statement after the awards were handed out. “I congratulate these award recipients for their determination, innovation and commitment to helping make our employees the nation’s best.”

The N.C. Commission on Workforce Development recognized the individuals and businesses as part of the 2012 Workforce Development Partnership Conference in Greensboro.

Cochrane hosted an open house in September to mark Lincolnton Furniture Company’s one-year anniversary, back in the plant on Cochrane Road that once housed his family business.A stone mosaic stands at the spot of assasination of the late Indian prime minister.

He told the Times-News at the time that he hopes to expand his employee count from its current 70 — about 60 percent of whom once worked for Cochrane Furniture before it closed in 2008 — to 130 by the first quarter of next year. However, he said Friday that that will all depend on the state of the retail industry moving forward.

Also among this year’s award recipients was Timken Bearings of Iron Station, which, along with a group of other employers, was recognized for the 2012 “Innovative Partnership” distinction. As part of Apprenticeship 2000, the companies have formed a model partnership developed by Blum Inc. in 1995 that demonstrates a working collaboration among employers, secondary and postsecondary educational institutions and the N.C. Department of Labor.Find a great buy mosaic Art deals on eBay!

The mission of Apprenticeship 2000 is to train employees guaranteed to meet the skills needed by the companies. The goal is to close the skilled-labor gap and reduce the shortage of skilled technicians, according to the press release from Gov. Perdue’s office.

Joining Blum Inc. in the mid-1990s was Max Daetwyler Corporation of Huntersville,Find a great buy mosaic Art deals on eBay! Sarstedt Group of Newton, Ameritech Die and Mold of Mooresville and Timken. In 1996, the first apprentices were hired and slated for graduation in the year 2000, thus the name “Apprenticeship 2000.” Pfaff Molds joined the partnership in 2008,We recently added Stained glass mosaic Tile to our inventory. with Siemens Energy and Chiron USA joining in 2011-2012. At Blum Inc., the first four apprentices are still employed and enjoying the benefits of their hard work, the release noted.

How Was Pike River Mine Allowed to Operate?

Beyond the culture of putting safety last and the well-documented managerial incompetence, one clear truth has been laid bare by the Royal Commission on the Pike River Coal Mine Tragedy in New Zealand in 2010 which saw 29 miners killed in an underground explosion: the construction of the mine was so inadequate and unsafe that it should never have been allowed to operate in that state.

To be sure, while the immediate cause was a large methane explosion,If you want to read about buy mosaic in a non superficial way that's the perfect book. a lack of access to the mines – which remain closed off for safety reasons – means the trigger for the blast cannot be determined with any certainty.

Nevertheless, the report makes it clear that a number of aspects of the mine’s construction were inadequate.

Firstly, while the original mine plan specified that two main ventilation fans were to be located on the mountainside next to the top of the ventilation shaft, Pike eventually decided to position the fans underground in stone at the bottom of the shaft. The move was made despite opposition from staff and a ventilation consultant, without much consideration for risk, and represented the first time a main fan had been placed underground in a gassy coal mine anywhere in the world.

While the Commission noted that such placement increased ventilation capacity in the short term, it says computer modelling has indicated that it had an unintended consequence in making the air supply to the inbye (further into the mine) areas fragile, especially in an emergency.

Added to that, the main fan was not explosion-protected, and therefore failed when the blast occurred, while a back-up fan at the top of the shaft was damaged and did not start. As a result, the entire ventilation system shut down.

Methane management was another problem.Installers and distributors of solar panel, Pre-drainage of the coal seam through in-seam boreholes was used as part of the strategy to control methane levels throughout the mine and in the ventilation shaft even though the holes were not designed for that purpose and instead were intended primarily to map the limits of the coal seam. This required Pike to install a gas pipeline to vent the methane directly to the surface. By April 2010, the pipeline was not able to cope. Gas consultant calls for an urgent upgrade were put on hold.

To make matters worse, there were too few fixed sensors to monitor methane levels, some of those in place were in poor condition. One had been broken for 11 weeks while two others were not functional. With no sensors reporting to the surface from the working areas of the main inbye of the main fan, the placement of these was clearly wrong.

Added to that is the arrangement of the electrical equipment, with high voltage cables that ran through the drift and supplied power to the underground becoming intertwined with drainage pipes carrying methane at a section of the mine known as Spaghetti Junction. More than that, a number of the variable speed drives which controlled the power supply to the fan and water pumps had problems.

Finally, there was the issue of hydro mining,We are pleased to offer the following list of professional mold maker and casters. an uncommon and specialised mining technique that uses a water jet to cut the coal face and requires expert design of the mining panel and equipment. Hydro mining commenced at the mine in September,Our technology gives rtls systems developers the ability. 2010 and, in October, the width of the extraction area was increased from 30 metres to 45 metres despite warnings from a consultant geotechnical engineer that doing so could cause a major roof collapse in the goaf (the cavity behind the longwall).

Even after a significant roof fall occurred on October 30, causing high readings in methane levels but no actual explosion, and several spikes in methane level readings during November, hydro mining continued without any further risk assessment.A stone mosaic stands at the spot of assasination of the late Indian prime minister.

There was also the scrapping of plans for a second intake,which the Commission says would have doubled as a walkout egress from the mine and improved the efficiency of the ventilation system, amid delays and cash-flow problems. The lack of strategies to deal with safety issues by a board and management preoccupied with the company’s difficult financial position was another issue.

Park Forest Police Reports

Police say a woman in the 300 block of Oswego Street reported on October 26 that on October 24 at approximately 6:30 PM, she was arriving home and a male juvenile approached her and asked if he could use her bathroom.The TagMaster Long Range hands free access System is truly built for any parking facility. She initially refused and the juvenile related that he "needed to go badly." She permitted the juvenile to use the restroom and further told police that it was taking a long time for him to finish. She called out to the male subject in her bathroom and asked if everything was okay. The male subject opened the door and the woman observed that his underwear and shorts were completely off and he was masturbating. After asking her a few sexually inappropriate questions, he left the residence. The subject is described as a short African American male, approximately 5'2" to 5'4", between 150 and 175 pounds, and between 14 and 15 years of age.

Two residents, a husband and a wife, reported harassing telephone calls to the Park Forest Police Department on October 26.

A .38 caliber silver revolver, a white gold ring, a yellow gold ring with diamonds, a 35mm Minolta camera, and a Samsung Galaxy mobile phone are among items reported stolen from a residence in the first block of Elm Street on October 27.

Police pursued a vehicle through the Eastgate neighborhood on October 27 beginning around 9:15 PM with speeds reaching 55 mph at times.Find detailed product information for howo spare parts and other products. The driver eventually abandoned the vehicle in the 200 block of Arcadia Street,Our technology gives rtls systems developers the ability. leaving the vehicle in gear and a female passenger screaming for help. Police were able to place the vehicle in "Park" as the vehicle started to roll backwards. Police towed the vehicle and have suspect information. The female passenger was released without charges.

A gray 1997 Pontiac Bonneville, Illinois license plate 5302286, was reported stolen from the 300 block of Waldmann Drive on October 28. Police say the vehicle was later located in the 4400 block of Delaware Street in Gary, Indiana. The vehicle had been completely burned.

Kevin E. Campbell, 26, 5606 Crestwood Rd., Matteson, was arrested on October 28 and charged with possession of cannabis and issued citations charging expired registration, operation of an uninsured motor vehicle, and driver’s license not on person, when an officer observed that the vehicle Campbell was driving on Blackhawk Drive near Sauk Trail had an expired Illinois temporary registration number, according to police.

A living room window of a residence in the 200 block of Minocqua Street was reported shattered on October 28.

A door of a residence in the 200 block of Lakewood Boulevard was reported damaged on October 28, as if someone had attempted to force entry.

A wallet was reported stolen from a vehicle parked at the 211th St. Metra Lot, 520 Homan Avenue, on October 28. The front driver's side window of the vehicle was shattered.

A window of a residence in Allegheny Court was reported shattered on October 29.

A 55-inch Vizio flat-screen television, a PlayStation 3 game system with two controllers, a Nintendo Wii game system, two black iPhones, an HP camera, and a Samsung Galaxy tablet are among items reported stolen from a residence in the 100 block of Nashua Street on October 29.

Joshua C. Gibson, 21, 6007 Kevin Way, Matteson, was arrested on October 29 and charged with possession of cannabis and possession of drug paraphernalia and issued citations charging no rear registration light and illegal transportation of alcohol when an officer traveling southbound on Forest Boulevard at Main Street observed that the vehicle Gibson was driving had no rear registration light, according to police.

Police say two students walking to Talala Elementary School on October 30 were approached at approximately 7:20 AM by a woman driving a blue van with sliding doors. Police say the woman, described by the girls as a "skinny looking black woman with short hanging chin-length hair, red lip gloss, a gray t-shirt and a black jacket,Find detailed product information for Sinotruk howo truck." who rolled down the window and told the girls to get into the van. The girl said no and ran all the way down Talala Street to the school. The van followed then slowly and pulled all the way up to the doors of the school before turning around, according to the girls.

Police say a resident told them on October 31 that he discovered a check with insufficient funds in the amount of $1763.70 had been deposited into his checking account on October 23. Police are following up on this incident of reported fraud.

A gold ring with a blue birthstone valued at $200, a pineapple gold ring with a red ruby valued at $100, a Zales white gold wedding ring valued at $4000, and $680 cash are among items reported stolen from a residence in the 100 block of Main Street on October 31.

Four chrome wheel center caps valued at $51 each were reported stolen from a vehicle parked in the 100 block of Westwood Drive on October 31.

A juvenile was arrested on October 31 and issued a municipal citation charging underage consumption of alcohol when police were dispatched to the 100 block of Indianwood Boulevard to investigate a report of a disturbance.

Police say the lower portion of a white screen storm door of a residence in the 300 block of Minocqua Street was kicked in causing $200 damage on October 31.

A 19-inch HD flat-screen television valued at $100, a 32-inch HD flat-screen television valued at $300, and a 42-inch flat-screen television valued at $500 were reported stolen from a residence in the 300 block of Waldmann Drive on November 1.

A resident told police that several hundred dollars in unauthorized transactions had been placed against her checking account on November 1. Police are investigating.

A teenager told police that after leaving Rich East High School on November 1, he was walking northbound on Westwood Drive approaching the intersection of Westwood Drive and Lakewood Boulevard when he was attacked by five male subjects.Find detailed product information for howo tractor and other products. The subjects punched him in the face, grabbed him from behind and slammed into the ground, and then stomped on him. The teenager’s left shoulder was injured in the incident. The subjects then fled with his iPhone 4 and a pair of headphones.

Cameron P. Gaskin, 18, 175 Indianwood Blvd., Park Forest, was arrested on November 1 and charged with retail theft and criminal damage to property when police were dispatched to CVS Pharmacy, 1 Main Street, in reference to a report of retail theft that had just occurred.