text:
The Living Dead: Two Novels
The zombie craze has been burning steadily for the better part of a decade, and for the most part I've let it pass me by. I enjoy them in small doses--the occasional Resident Evil film, Jonathan Coulton's "Re: Your Brains," John Langan's short story "How the Day Runs Down"--but I'm not committed to the notion, as fandom in general often seems to be, that zombies make everything better and are inherently fun and interesting. I seem to have reached a point in my reading life where killing off all but a minuscule portion of humanity in order to give one's heroes a planet-sized playground to run around in seems not only callous but unimaginative (in much the same way the new Star Trek writers opting to suck an entire planet and most of its inhabitants into a black hole in order to give one of their characters angst was quite literally overkill), and as a joke zombies strike me as a one-note gag (see, for example, the general consensus on Pride and Prejudice with Zombies--that the book plays itself out in its title). Nevertheless, the hoopla around them has gotten so loud that I felt compelled to dip my toes in, and ended up selecting two books which addressed these very concerns, one successfully, the other not so much.
Max Brooks's World War Z is one of the most visible and most highly praised entries in the new zombie canon, and with a great deal of justification. Subtitled "An Oral History of the Zombie War," Brooks's novel, which consists of interviews with participants and survivors of a global, decade-long struggle against zombies, seems determined to defuse most of the clichés of the zombie story. Its canonical form, of the world overrun by the zombie hordes with only a few brave survivors making a stand and restarting civilization from zero, is treated with some derision. As described by a soldier who liberated some of these isolated strongholds at the end of the zombie war, such people were not simply deluded or even dangerous, but tangents--rather insignificant ones--to the actual story.
the body armor was for protection against some of the regular people we found. I'm not talking organized rebels, just the odd LAMoE, Last Man on Earth. There was always one or two in every town, some dude, or chick, who managed to survive. I read somewhere that the United States had the highest number of them in the world, something about our individualistic nature or something. ... The ones we called LAMoEs, those were the ones who were a little too used to being king. King of what, I don't know, Gs and quislings and crazy F-critters, but I guess in their mind they were living the good life, and here we were to take it all away.
Underlying World War Z is the recognition that the world is huge, complicated, and almost infinitely varied, and that no catastrophe can simply end the human experience, in all its many forms, in one fell swoop (in that sense, it reminded me of Paolo Bacigalupi's The Windup Girl). More importantly, this is a novel that recognizes that an event of the scope and nature it describes can never be the story of an individual or even a group, but that individuals and groups can only cast a light on the huge processes that shaped and were shaped by this event. In a way, World War Z seeks to demystify the zombie story, to take it away from the realm of horror and make it SFnal and thus rational. As Brooks describes it, the zombie apocalypse is a hellish combination of global plague--it emerges in China, which, SARS-like, tries to suppress evidence of it, and soon the infected are surging across national borders and carrying the disease all over the globe--environmental catastrophe--initial evidence of the dangers zombies pose is ignored and politicized, and much of the damage they cause is indirect, as they trample the planet's ecosystem by devouring and destroying much of the plant and animal life in their path--and world war--the progress of the struggle against zombies is rather obviously modeled on World War II, sometimes too closely, in fact, as in the emergence of a second Cold War after the zombies are defeated.
World War Z, which is divided into chapters charting the buildup to the zombie apocalypse, the panicked initial reaction to it, and eventual regrouping and retaking of the planet, is actually at its weakest when it describes the war proper. The chapter near the end of the novel, which describes the way in which an initially chastened and demoralized army, which had previously thrown, with very little effect, every high-tech piece of weaponry against an enemy that could only be killed by a direct shot or blow to the head, starts out stirring but quickly becomes mired in technical detail as it shifts between different veterans of different global campaigns to describe the challenges each faced and the techniques each came up with to overcome them. Earlier in the novel, in a chapter titled "The Great Panic," Brooks veers too far into real-world political allegory. The world of World War Z is quite obviously modeled on our own, with the US having recently emerged from a deeply unpopular overseas war and a right-wing, Bush-like president in office (who is later replaced by an obvious Obama analogue). The bungled response of this administration, first to the warnings issued by various intelligence agencies as to the danger posed by zombies, and then to the actual infestation, is portrayed with such vitriol that it almost seems like a vicious parody ("Can you imagine the panic that would have happened," the former White House chief of staff exclaims, in response to being asked why the government stood behind a placebo zombie vaccine, "the protest, the riots, the billions in damage to private property?"), which sits very poorly with the more earnest tone of the rest of the novel.
Where World War Z shines is in its descriptions of the non-military response to the zombie crisis--the intelligence officers who first recognize the problem and write urgent reports calling for swift response; the evacuation plans that collect as many people as possible behind mountainous natural defenses (while leaving vast portions of the population to fend for themselves); the government agencies set up in order to feed, clothe, house, and mostly organize the evacuees, and whose major challenge is finding work for office workers and service providers whose job skills are now useless; the official and unofficial civilian organizations that rise up in response to the crisis. This is a novel that seems to have been written for people like me, who watch shows like Battlestar Galactica and are genuinely annoyed and disappointed that the writers seem to feel that questions like 'where are the food and water coming from' or 'how have the civilians organized themselves' are boring issues to be ignored or gotten out of the way as quickly as possible. It's a novel that recognizes that human life is fractally fascinating--no matter how insignificant or seemingly mundane a problem is, the ways that people deal with it will always be interesting.
And it's a novel that doesn't treat a global catastrophe as if it stops with, or mainly affects, the United States. Though the middle portions of World War Z, which describe how humanity reshapes itself after the evacuation, concentrate mainly on the continental US, the story moves all over the world, and emphasizes that way that different geography and history affect the response to the zombie crisis. I say this, however, more to commend Brooks's intentions than his execution. The portion of the novel that takes place in Israel is riddled with so many of the silliest and most common clichés about my country--the yiddish-inflected voice of the narrator and his job as a Mossad agent, the namechecking of Operation Entebbe, and in general the extremely shallow understanding of Israeli culture (particularly as something distinct from Jewish culture) and national character--that I can only assume that most of the other non-US-set segments are similarly afflicted, and though Israel is described positively (a bit too positively, in fact--in Brooks's imaginary future, the threat of a zombie incursion is enough to put an end to the Israeli-Palestinian crisis) I imagine that Japanese, Russian, or Chinese readers might come away from the novel--which introduces Japan through a character who blames an education that taught him to memorize information but not process it for his complete disassociation from reality, from which he only broke out after his parents had been killed by zombies; in which China, refusing to acknowledge that it is outmatched by the zombies, sends wave upon wave of its citizens to be killed by them; and in which Russia sinks back into totalitarianism, this time of a religious flavor, after the war--feeling quite offended.
In general, World War Z pays for the breadth of its vision with a lack of depth. Brooks isn't quite the writer who can craft three-dimensional, affecting people out of the brief portraits he sketches, so most of the novel's affect comes from the situations he describes. Sometimes these are quite successful--the crew of the International Space Station, who spend the war in orbit maintaining the satellites the army uses to track the zombies' movements, the Hollywood director who finds new purpose making propaganda films, the suburban mother who had dismissed the zombie threat as something unreal or at least far away, who suddenly finds it on her doorstep--though at other times the narratives are jokey or perfunctory. In its best moments, however, World War Z delivers a kind of horror that is so much more effective, because so much more real, than the kind represented by zombies--the horror that the life we've gotten used will be taken away, that the entire world order will change, not end but change, under our noses, forcing us to scramble in order to survive. It's terrifying because our grandparents and in some cases our parents did live through that sort of upheaval, and it's one that we might live through again.
S.G. Browne's Breathers takes an opposite, but no less idiosyncratic, approach to the zombie story. Subtitled "A Zombie's Lament," it is narrated by Andy Warner, a recently deceased and reanimated zombie. No one knows why, but some of those who die in Andy's world come back to life, slowly decomposing but still in full possession of the memories and personality they had before they died. The undead are feared and reviled. Those whose families will take them in have to obey curfew and are subject to abuse both verbal and physical with no recourse to the law. Those who are unclaimed (from the SPCA, where wandering zombies are delivered by the police) are handed over for organ harvesting, to be used as crash test dummies, or as teaching cadavers for medical students. Andy is relatively lucky in that his parents have allowed them to live in their home, but they are fearful and even openly hostile, and the relatives now caring for his daughter won't let him contact her. The only friends he has are the equally sad and lonely members of his Undead Anonymous group. Andy has pretty much resigned himself to an afterlife of misery when he meets Ray, a zombie who hooks him on human flesh--as it turns out, the means of reversing the undead's decay--and more importantly, re-instills in him a sense of purpose and self-worth. With his fellow group members, Andy starts a campaign for undead rights, even as he experiments with ever more adventurous recipes for his parents' flesh.
Breathes is thus the story of a character who starts out recognizably human and then, after experiencing personal loss and systematic abuse, talks himself into the starting position of the traditional zombie story--a hulking, shuffling horde bent on devouring the living. It sounds like an interesting concept, but the execution leaves much to be desired. Pitched as a comedy, Breathers is rather strong evidence in favor of the belief I expressed at the beginning of this post, that the zombie as a joke wears thin much too fast. The concept of a zombie who is still rational, and can calmly and rationally explain his desire for human flesh, is funny at "Re: Your Brains" length, but even in a slim novel like Breathers it grows old rather quickly. Or maybe the problem is specific to Browne, who never extends his reach beyond the rather obvious gag that the rapidly decomposing, reanimated corpse with a taste for human flesh narrating this novel has such mundane concerns as how to make a pass at a cute member of his support group, or which wine goes best with his latest meal of human, or even laundry.
Ted's arms and legs thrash to no avail. I want to bite into him, to feel his flesh in my mouth--a confection, sweet and decadent, the food of the gods. The temptation is so strong I can almost feel the invincibility seeping into my blood vessels and flowing down my throat, but I don't want to make a mess. A pool of blood and stray bits of human flesh on the floor tends to shout "zombie attack." Besides, I just got my shirt back from the dry cleaners.
That's a pretty obvious kind of joke the first time you encounter it, but Breathers features them on every page. It's not a very funny novel to begin with and by its end it is decidedly tedious. Some humor might have been drawn from Browne's portrait of humanity's reactions to zombies, or from the hypocrisy of Andy's campaign for human rights even as he goes on a clandestine killing spree, and the novel does gesture in both of these directions, but rather thinly. Our glimpses of humanity are concentrated mostly on Andy's immediate environs, which is to say his parents, who are deliberately made horrible so that we won't feel too bad when Andy eats them, and it's only towards the end of the novel that Browne introduces the conflict between Andy's public face and private activities, and he races through these final chapters as though not quite capable of performing the feat Brooks does in World War Z, and imagining a believable real-world reaction to zombies. Whether the problem is in the basic concept or in the fact that it was Browne who executed it, Breathers is a disappointing and predictable read.
That, then, was the mixed result of my foray into zombie fiction. I'm still not sure I understand just why this particular monster has so captured fandom's imagination. Brooks only makes an interesting story out of zombies by stripping away most of what's familiar about them and veering far off the canonical form of the zombie story, and Browne, by sticking to his one-joke guns, creates something utterly boring. Nevertheless, the phenomenon is here to stay, in books and on screen (both novels have been optioned for adaptation into film, though I can't quite imagine how one could make a successful movie out of a novel as center-less as World War Z, and suspect that a strong script might easily elevate Breathers above its lackluster source material). Maybe in another ten years' time, I'll dip my toes in again.
books essays
Matt Hilliard said…
Well, zombies are a fad, and as such some of the enthusiasm will pass. But zombies still aren't going anyway. I assume you don't play video games since you don't mention them here but they are positively infested with zombies and have been for a long time.
My take on all this is that zombies are a result of moral challenges to traditional stories. Action heroes in movies and video games generally need a lot of faceless enemies to chop through. Not too long ago, it was perfectly acceptable to have these simply be some other nationality or ethnic group: a hero would kill, say, Russians by the truckload and no one batted an eye.
While there are still some examples of that, it's fortunately becoming less and less acceptable, so people are casting about for antagonists whose slaughter is morally neutral. Nazis meet this criteria, and right now there are mountains of World War II video games as a result. In other games and children's cartoons, the bad guys employ a thoroughly implausible number of robots. But for the present day, where is theoretically plausible adult action to turn?
Obviously zombies fit the bill. Even better, they usually come with a post-apocalyptic setting that as an added bonus involves a lot of people who have cast aside civilization in favor of barbarism and who thus are also subject to guiltless killing (and serve as more intelligent foils to the hero).
The good news is that the need for zombie-like enemies isn't very strong in written fiction, where action is less important and there's much more bandwidth to explore moral issues. Even fantasy seems to finally be moving away from Tolkiens' orcs, which serve the same purpose.
KdS said…
The President in "World War Z" is quite clearly Colin Powell, and the "whacko" Vice-President Howard Dean.
From the UK perspective, I was not convinced by the references to the mystic power of royalty, and was absolutely outraged by the slighting reference to Clement Atlee and the explanation of Winston Churchill's electoral defeat after WWII. (Most historians agree that it was nothing to do with war-weariness, but a rejection of Churchill's conservative ideology by a mass population who had just fought a war and wanted real improvements of their own country.)
What I liked about WWZ was the decentered-ness of it, as you said. That the war was won, inasmuch as it was won, by institutions rather than heroic individuals holding off the masses by power of their manly wills. I liked the screwups and political failures and the slow rebuild and the attention to logistics and worldbuilding.
The last I heard about the proposed movie, J. Michael Straczinsky was rumored to be the scriptwriter, which makes me cringe. And like you, I have no idea how to make that novel into a movie unless you take away everything that makes it an interesting novel--they would have to have a Hero, and a Last Stand, and all that, and it just doesn't work for WWZ.
Abigail Nussbaum said…
Matt:
I suspect you're right about the popularity of zombies. In theory at least I'm intrigued by the notion of porting over some of the cornerstone tropes and character types of comic books and video games into written fiction - not just zombies but superheroes and others - but I've yet to come across an example that truly marries the two modes successfully. World War Z comes closest, but it does so by scooping out some of the fundamental characteristics of both zombie stories and the modern novel.
KdS:
Could be. I took the reference to this family in Nigeria as a nod towards Obama's Kenyan and Indonesian family ties. Not to mention that Powell is a Republican and, at the time of the novel's writing, was still backing up the Iraq war. That said, the novel was published in 2006 so it's possible that Obama was not yet on Brooks's radar.
Cofax:
Last I'd heard, Straczinsky was off the project, which on the whole is probably a good thing. He's certainly got experience in breaking the Hollywood mold, but even in his formal experimentation he always hews very closely to the heroic individual mode that World War Z, as you say, so refreshingly avoids. Which is not to say that I think anyone else could make a successful movie out of this novel, and that's not even a criticism of Hollywood. By the end of the book my patience was flagging - once the danger of the zombies is mostly contained the interview format starts to seem nitpicky. That's not a major concern in a written work, where the reader controls their reading speed, but I can easily imagine a straight adaptation of the book, where the viewer is a passive recipient of information on the moviemakers' schedule, being a little boring.
I believe that there was a government of national unity situation where the President and Vice-President were of different parties. The Vice-President is certainly Dean as Brooks alludes explicitly to the press criticisms of his overexcited speech after losing the Iowa primary that ended his hopes of becoming the Democratic candidate in 2004.
In fact the Dean character talks about another person from his party who would have made a better Vice-President if the country had been ready to have two black men as President and VP, and I think that was a reference to Obama.
KdS I was enraged by that comment about Attlee too! I liked most of the rest though. I liked the description of a British propaganda film with 'How soon is now' as the soundtrack. That's how they should make the film, too. A collage of items.
Zanke said…
I think you could have picked better books than those. Breathers doesn't follow the standard rules, it's an author trying out something new. World War Z is a decent book, but there are others that are better. Try Day by Day Armageddon by J. L. Bourne and Plague of the Dead by ZA Recht.


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It's been years since the ether turned deadly and the colonies on Mars fell silent. But the (mad) scientists of the Explorer's Society believe a window is opening that will allow a small, fast etherflier to make it to Mars intact. But what will you find when you get there?


text:
by Derek Thomas
For John Bunyan, a Puritan to his fingertips, the Christian life was an experience of conflict and tension with this world. Imprisoned for upwards of twelve years, he experienced firsthand the world's hostility. Cheerful and sanguine by temperament, his portrayal of what believers can expect from this world is both solemn and dark: the path that leads to the Celestial City winds through unavoidable places of considerable, even deadly, danger — places like the town called Vanity with its "lusty Fair." Here, all the resources of protection and resolution will be needed to prevent contamination and possible destruction.
Christian, in Bunyan's allegory, is both a pilgrim on a journey (road-trip) to heaven and a warrior in conflict with temptations from within (indwelling sin) and without (the world in its opposition to all things godly). It is a principle that Christian is taught early in the journey that every believer can expect to be both fascinated by and drawn towards the world. He can also expect to be repulsed and attacked when all offers are spurned. "Hell hath no fury…," in this case, "like the world scorned."
Vanity Fair, described in various dictionaries as the "vain and frivolous way of life especially in large cities," and the "place or scene of ostentation or empty, idle amusement and frivolity," represents for Bunyan the world in all its gaudiness: alluring and seductive, offering merchandise of all kinds — some innocent enough in themselves but designed to misdirect the affections away from our love for God and our love for His kingdom. What is Bunyan teaching us here? Several things.
First and foremost, Vanity Fair represents Bunyan's attempt to warn every Christian of the reality of temptation and the need to resist it. There is always a "gospel-focus" in Bunyan's writings, and he is careful to note that believers can resist temptation in the knowledge that their Savior has done so on their behalf: "The prince of Princes himself, when here, went through this Town to his own Country, and that upon a Fair-day too: Yea, and as I think it was Beelzebub, the chief Lord of this Fair, that invited him to buy of his Vanities; yea, would have him made Lord of the Fair, would he but have done him Reverence as he went through the Town."
Vanity Fair thus signals the need to "Keep watch on yourself, lest you too be tempted" (Gal. 6:1), with the assurance that "we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin" (Heb. 4:15).
Then again, Vanity Fair establishes the truth that Christians are citizens of the kingdom of heaven and must therefore sit loose to the attractions of this world, however innocent they may appear to be in themselves. Christian and Faithful (Christian's trusty companion) stood out "like sore thumbs" in Vanity Fair. Not only did they not purchase anything, they refused to be drawn aside and enticed by what it offered, having discovered "solid joys and lasting treasures" elsewhere in communion with Jesus Christ. As citizens of heaven they adopted the viewpoint that they must not conform to this world (Phil. 3:20).
On offer in Vanity Fair are both material things (gold, pearls, precious stones, etc.) as well as honors (titles, preferments — designed to turn one's head). Additionally, Bunyan mentions "the ware of Rome and her merchandise is greatly promoted in the fair" — an allusion to the beguiling nature of Roman Catholic teaching that had suggested (barely a hundred years in Bunyan's past) that indulgences could be purchased so as to make a sinner's journey through purgatory that much quicker. To all of these, Bunyan's faithful companions say "No!"
Believers are the special targets of the world's hostility. Though "Beelzebub, Apollyon and their Legions" are involved in the allurement of Vanity Fair, they are not center stage here; that will be later in the journey. Here the focus is upon the first of the evil triumvirate of hostility: the world, the flesh, and the devil. Those who refuse to conform to the pattern of this world can expect to be taunted and ridiculed (Christian and Faithful were bad-mouthed and heckled). As pilgrims who marched to the beat of a different drummer, Christian and Faithful looked (dressed) and spoke differently — something to which the townsfolk took great exception. It is interesting that it was, in particular, their speech that caused such offense. Talk of holy things always offends, but it had been holy conversation of this kind from poor women in Bedford that had been the means to bring young John Bunyan to repentance. Consequently, in Bunyan's allegory, Christian and Faithful are taken, beaten, and incarcerated (something Bunyan, of course, knew only too well). They are eventually charged with disturbing the peace of the city by their lack of conformity. Bunyan's choice of names here is deliciously instructive: Mr. Hate-Good as the Judge, and jurors who include such characters as Mr. Malice, Mr. Love-lust, Mr. Live-loose, Mr. High-mind, Mr. Cruelty, and Mr. Hate-light! If such charges were brought against us, would there be sufficient evidence to convict?
Believers must be prepared to sacrifice everything, including their lives, for the cause of the Gospel. The mockery of the trial that they received is reflective of another: that of their blessed Lord. We must follow in Jesus' footsteps, even to the point of martyrdom if necessary. Courage in the midst of trial is a virtue, and Bunyan's poetry is particularly telling:
Now Faithful play the Man, speak for thy God.
Fear not the wicked's malice, nor their rod:
Speak boldly man, the Truth is on thy side;
Die for it, and to Life in triumph ride.
The description of Faithful's end is one of the most moving in the entire book, for having brutally put Faithful to death and abused his body, Bunyan adds: "Now I saw that there stood behind the multitude a Chariot and a couple of Horses, waiting for Faithful who (as soon as his adversaries had dispatched him) was taken up into it, and straightway was carried up through the Clouds, with sound of Trumpet, the nearest way to the Celestial Gate." As the third-century North African theologian Tertullian wrote: "The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church." Thus Faithful's death kindled a light in Vanity Fair that would not easily be put out, and a certain man named Hopeful, upon seeing it, openly joined with Christian on his journey. And Bunyan adds, "there were many more of the men in the Fair that would take their time and follow after."
In an age of rampant consumerism, when the deity of fashion demands unswerving allegiance, Bunyan's radical separation from the world's ways is both necessary and instructive as a template for discerning the true nature of radical Christianity. If Christians are to be counter-cultural, saying "No!" to this world and "Yes!" to Jesus will demand much energy, cost the same blood, sweat, and tears as Bunyan describes here. Resisting conformity to this world by stubborn other-worldliness is the only sure way of maintaining a Christ-like discipleship that keeps the goal in focus — assurance of finally entering into the Celestial City at the end of the journey. As Christian eventually sings:
Who would true valour see,
Let him come hither;
One here will constant be,
Come wind, come weather;
There's no discouragement
Shall make him once relent
His first avowed intent
To be a pilgrim.
Dr. Derek W.H. Thomas is senior minister of the First Presbyterian Church in Columbia, S.C., and Chancellor's Professor of Systematic and Pastoral Theology at Reformed Theological Seminary. He is a Ligonier Ministries teaching fellow and author of many books, including How the Gospel Brings Us All the Way Home, Calvin's Teaching on Job, Strength for the Weary, and, with Dr. Sinclair B. Ferguson, Ichthus: Jesus Christ, God's Son, the Saviour.
More from Derek Thomas
Wily Jacob
The Veracity of God
Limping Home to God
The Decree of God
All Resources by Derek Thomas

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


text:
__author__ = 'Bohdan Mushkevych'

from threading import Thread
import socket

from amqp import AMQPError

from synergy.conf import settings
from synergy.mq.flopsy import Consumer
from synergy.system.performance_tracker import SimpleTracker
from synergy.system.synergy_process import SynergyProcess

class AbstractMqWorker(SynergyProcess):
    """
    class works as an abstract basement for all workers and aggregators
    it registers in the mq and awaits for the messages
    """

    def __init__(self, process_name):
        """:param process_name: id of the process, the worker will be performing """
        super(AbstractMqWorker, self).__init__(process_name)
        self.mq_timeout_seconds = 0
        self._init_mq_timeout_seconds()

        self.consumer = None
        self._init_mq_consumer()

        self.main_thread = None
        self.performance_ticker = None
        self._init_performance_ticker(self.logger)

        msg_suffix = 'in Production Mode'
        if settings.settings['under_test']:
            msg_suffix = 'in Testing Mode'
        self.logger.info('Started %s %s' % (self.process_name, msg_suffix))

    def __del__(self):
        try:
            self.logger.info('Closing Flopsy Consumer...')
            self.consumer.close()
        except Exception as e:
            self.logger.error('Exception caught while closing Flopsy Consumer: %s' % str(e))

        try:
            self.logger.info('Canceling Performance Tracker...')
            self.performance_ticker.cancel()
        except Exception as e:
            self.logger.error('Exception caught while cancelling the performance_ticker: %s' % str(e))
        super(AbstractMqWorker, self).__del__()

    # ********************** abstract methods ****************************
    def _init_performance_ticker(self, logger):
        self.performance_ticker = SimpleTracker(logger)
        self.performance_ticker.start()

    def _init_mq_consumer(self):
        self.consumer = Consumer(self.process_name)

    def _init_mq_timeout_seconds(self):
        if 'mq_timeout_sec' in settings.settings:
            self.mq_timeout_seconds = settings.settings['mq_timeout_sec']

    # ********************** thread-related methods ****************************
    def _mq_callback(self, message):
        """ abstract method to process messages from MQ
        :param message: mq message"""
        pass

    def _run_mq_listener(self):
        try:
            self.consumer.register(self._mq_callback)
            self.consumer.wait(self.mq_timeout_seconds)
        except socket.timeout as e:
            self.logger.warn('Queue %s is likely empty. Worker exits due to: %s' % (self.consumer.queue, str(e)))
        except (AMQPError, IOError) as e:
            self.logger.error('AMQPError: %s' % str(e))
        finally:
            self.__del__()
            self.logger.info('Exiting main thread. All auxiliary threads stopped.')

    def start(self, *_):
        self.main_thread = Thread(target=self._run_mq_listener)
        self.main_thread.start()

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


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In addition, of course, it provides an excellent opportunity to network with colleagues. Please click here to see the latest delegate list.


text:
Outward Outdoors
Be Wild
The Appalachian Trail Hostels That Will Not Close
Leave a Comment	/ Nature's Beauty, Places to Visit, Travel / By Nicholas
David Magee is not so sure how much he should say about running a hostel along the Appalachian Trail. This year when the coronavirus pandemic has dashed all but a few thru-hiking dreams.
For three years, Magee has owned The Station at 19E, a compound-like hostel along the Tennessee-North Carolina border. He begins, off the record, with a litany of grievances. For example, how the Appalachian Trail Conservancy (ATC) caused a panic when it told hikers to go home. How people in the wider trail community lampooned him for staying open and putting his financial health over public health. How townspeople have called to threaten his business. After a few minutes, Magee decides he wants everything to be on the record; he reckons his renegade actions warrant documentation.
"I am doing what I have to do to protect my community—and the hikers who aren't leaving," he says. "I'm going to be on the right side of history with this thing."
Station 19E
Four days later, Magee's hesitation has hardened into the conviction of a crusader. The moment I step out of my car at The Station at 19E, he parades around the property, pointing out the ways he's using this slump in business to refine his empire. Outside, a construction crew is cutting sliding doors into the walls of The Station's dim music hall to boost eventual capacity. Magee beams at the towering totem pole—topped by the AT's circular sigil—recently installed for advertising. And inside, an employee named Rocky bounds around with an infinite to-do list, offering me a fist bump until he registers the mask on my face. He laughs.
Magee hands Rocky a credit card and dispatches him to a hardware store a few miles away in Roan Mountain, Tennessee, the nearby village of 1,000 people with a restaurant legendary to hikers for barbecue and burgers. In his light gray Station at 19E T-shirt, tucked across his slight paunch into faded blue jeans, and his Appalachian Trail Conservancy hat, Magee reminds me of a baseball coach, just waiting for his team to arrive. When they're ready, he'll be here. The Station, after all, has not closed at all to thru-hikers during the pandemic.
"I'm a firefighter. We run into the fire, not the other way. That's not in my nature," says Magee, who was once a volunteer with Roan Mountain's unit. "If I've got droves of hikers walking into my town, that's not OK with me. People will call and say, 'Dave, there are two hikers walking into town. Come get 'em.'
Hostels on the Appalachian Trail
Magee is a member of a small but staunch confederation of hostel owners along the Southern half of the Appalachian Trail who have rebelled against conventional coronavirus wisdom. In addition to the ATC's recommendation in mid-March, the U.S. Forest Service, and National Park Service officially shuttered some sections. In Maine, Baxter State Park, the trail's northern terminus, announced it would be closed to hikers going above treeline at least until July.
Many hostels from Georgia to Maine have responded in kind, closing for a season that never really began and, in some cases, saying the loss of revenue means they may never return. But a half-dozen hostels that dot the trail as it snakes across the boundaries of Tennessee, North Carolina, Virginia, and West Virginia have remained open, serving between 100 and 300 hikers who have defied those guidelines. They see it as their civic duty—not only to the hikers who remain on the trail but also to their small towns. They are the safeguard between the two populations, the stopgap.
At The Station, near the trail's 400-mile mark, Magee scoops hikers at the trailhead half a mile away and has his staff run any errands they need, keeping them out of the town's Dollar General and assorted restaurants, open for takeout when I visited in late April. More than 200 miles north, in Pearisburg, Virginia, Pippa Chapman has a similar routine for her hostel, Angel's Rest. Clad in personal protective equipment, her employees pick up hikers at the trail, put their gear in plastic bags, and take them to shower and get into clean clothes before allowing them to visit the neighboring Food Lion in optional face masks the hostel provides.
A necessity in the Wild
"I could say I'm not dealing with hikers at all this year. But then I'd have to run into them at my grocery store anyway," says Chapman, a chiropractor who has lived in Pearisburg for 25 years. "I have an obligation to deal directly with them. Otherwise, I would be letting my community down."
Not everyone sees it that way. "This is America, of course, so everyone can make their own choices," ATC president Sandi Marra says with a sigh. "But I worry long-term for their liability and their physical health. There are consequences for making those decisions. And in these small towns, people have long memories."
Critics of hostel owners like Magee and Chapman often say they're just trying to get rich at a time when other hostels have closed. But the owners balk at the suggestion, laughing in a way that implies "I wish." By this time in the season, Magee has typically seen 800 hikers. This year, he's hosted about 160, giving many of them cash to help them get off the trail, he says. For hikers who intend to press ahead, Magee has kept his prices on food, fuel, and booze stable, refusing to gouge them with convenience fees. He calls the four months when thru-hikers parade through Roan Mountain. He refers to it as "my Christmas," the period that brings in most of his annual revenue. This year, he says he'll be lucky to make a quarter of what he expected during the span.
In Virginia, Chapman closed her chiropractor business in early April after running out of personal protective equipment for herself and her patients. She'd hoped to use its income to float the flagging hostel, but that won't happen now. "Hell, it's something I work on every day, continually researching funding," she says. "There's zero money. We have bills to pay, whether or not hikers are coming. We're losing money."
As Magee and Chapman discuss their decision, they flirt with an anti-authority sense of home rule. And the idea that each region of the country knows what's best for itself. This dynamic has again become a national tinderbox during the COVID-19 pandemic. As it has many times throughout U.S. history. The tension between these hostels and trail leadership reflects deep divisions between local and federal guidance at large.
"We're working with our local authorities to appropriately deal with the hikers. We want to be able to operate our businesses based on local regulations. That's what we've done," says Chapman. In mid-April, she responded to an ATC email by saying she would subsequently distance herself from the national organization. "Every section has its own logistical issues, and we have systems in place to address them. They made a decision without consulting the communities that have to do that every year."
At The Station, Magee doubles down on these provincial motives. He beams when he calls a group of 11 recent thru-hikers "The Resistance." He lampoons the "bad predictions" of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and he asks another of his employees, a former anti-nuclear activist named Crazy Wolf, to talk about the fundamental flaws with federal data.
The Station is situated along the Overmountain Victory National Historic Trail, a monument to revolutionary war renegades who displaced indigenous Americans before contributing to key Revolutionary War victories in the region. Magee embraces their fierce sort of backwoods independence. A New Hampshire native, he tells me about an ancestor, Hannah Duston, who scalped her captors during King Philip's War in the 17th century. I remind him of the time a year earlier when I was thru-hiking the Appalachian Trail and he was carting me through Roan Mountain. He spotted Sovereign, the man who was later charged with murdering a fellow hiker after local authorities let him out of jail. Magee said he could handle the man himself, patting the Smith & Wesson he keeps on his hip.
Both Magee and Chapman cite their coordination with key local officials as they developed plans for staying open safely. Jason Stinnett, a senior environmental health specialist at the Virginia Department of Health stationed in Pearisburg, consulted with Chapman about complying with the state's executive orders about campgrounds. But he says he did not know his advice was being used to facilitate hikers continuing north on the Appalachian Trail.
"I don't think people here are expressly worried about a hiker coming from Tennessee and spreading coronavirus, but we understand it can happen," says Stinnett. "But we have a stay-at-home order through June 10, and we expect people to adhere to that unless they're going out for essentials. I don't see how an Appalachian Trail hiker fits that definition." (Virginia's stay-at-home order does include a broad exemption for "outdoor activity," but Stinnett says thru-hikers should stay home, and portions of the trail in Virginia have been closed.)
In Roan Mountain, Magee says he worked with Mike Hill. He is a veteran county commissioner instrumental in the town's official designation as a "trail community." But Hill insists Magee has often appeared cavalier to public health concerns, especially since one of Virginia's 800 COVID-19 fatalities was a Roan Mountain resident. Hill chastised Magee for briefly running a coronavirus takeout special—a Reuben, chips, and a Corona beer for $8.99, advertised with the slogan "If you don't want the Coronavirus, you can have a Coke"—and pled with him to close the business to locals if he was going to serve hikers.
"I agree it's our job as a trail community to help people as best we can. But one sneeze from a local takes out everybody on the trail," says Hill. "I want all my friends to be OK. That way I can have a beer and hear live music at The Station one day. But I won't be able to do that if they go out of business or they die. It's tiptoeing through a minefield."
Magee admits he's made mistakes in responding to the pandemic and that his libertine attitude may have cost him goodwill. But he also seems convinced that the worst is almost over. The morning I was there, a mother and daughter interested in hiking the trail over a weekend. They asked if he could supply a shuttle and a private room. He reluctantly said no. The money sounded nice. However, it was still too early to let in such outsiders who might infect thru-hikers or vice versa.
"Well, that's my fear, that I'm on the wrong side of this thing," he says. "But I have done what I think I can to help my town, so I'll just have to see."
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text:
La gare de Cavignac est une gare ferroviaire française de la ligne de Chartres à Bordeaux-Saint-Jean située sur le territoire de la commune de Cavignac, dans le département de la Gironde, en région Nouvelle-Aquitaine.

C'est une halte voyageurs de la Société nationale des chemins de fer français (SNCF) du réseau TER Nouvelle-Aquitaine desservie par des trains express régionaux.

Situation ferroviaire
Établie à  d'altitude, la gare de Cavignac est située au point kilométrique (PK) 576,527 de la ligne de Chartres à Bordeaux-Saint-Jean, entre les gares de Saint-Mariens - Saint-Yzan et de Gauriaguet.

Ancienne gare de bifurcation, elle était au PK 0,000 l'origine de la ligne de Cavignac à Coutras (déclassée), avant la gare de Marcenais.

Histoire

Construite en 1876, c'est d'abord une simple halte pour les marchandises et les déchargements. Le premier train voyageur s'arrête en 1911. La gestion de la gare marchandise (bâtiment central) ferma en 1956 et le dernier train de déchargement s'arrêta en 1971.

En 2014, c'est une gare voyageurs d'intérêt local (catégorie C : moins de  par an de 2010 à 2011), qui dispose de deux quais.

En 2019, selon les estimations de la SNCF, la fréquentation annuelle de la gare était de , contre  en 2018 et  en 2017.

Service des voyageurs

Accueil
Halte SNCF, c'est un point d'arrêt non géré (PANG) à entrée libre, équipée de deux abris de quai.

Desserte

Cavignac est une halte voyageurs du réseau , desservie par des trains express régionaux de la relation Saint-Mariens - Saint-Yzan – Saint-André-de-Cubzac – Bordeaux (ligne 43.1U).

Intermodalité
Un parking pour les véhicules y est aménagé.

Patrimoine ferroviaire
L'ancien bâtiment voyageurs est devenu une habitation privée.

Notes et références

Voir aussi

Articles connexes
 Liste de gares en France
 Liste des gares de Nouvelle-Aquitaine
 Ligne de Chartres à Bordeaux-Saint-Jean
 Schéma de la ligne de Chartres à Bordeaux-Saint-Jean
 Ligne de Cavignac à Coutras, déclassée mais utilisée partiellement par le Train touristique de Guîtres à Marcenais.

Liens externes

Gare en Gironde
Ligne de Chartres à Bordeaux-Saint-Jean
Ligne de Cavignac à Coutras

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


Master Manufacturing SUT-05-060J-MM Tree Sprayer 60 Gallon.
Great for Tree Spraying and Orchard Spraying.
Comet APS-41 Three Diaphragm Pump.
25' High Pressure 1/2" Hose.
10 GPM @ 525 PSI.
Platform Dimensions are 26" W x 53" L.


text:
Q: How do I center a JDialog on screen? How do I go about positioning a JDialog at the center of the screen?

A: Two helpers for centering within the screen or within the parent.
// Center on screen ( absolute true/false (exact center or 25% upper left) )
public void centerOnScreen(final Component c, final boolean absolute) {
    final int width = c.getWidth();
    final int height = c.getHeight();
    final Dimension screenSize = Toolkit.getDefaultToolkit().getScreenSize();
    int x = (screenSize.width / 2) - (width / 2);
    int y = (screenSize.height / 2) - (height / 2);
    if (!absolute) {
        x /= 2;
        y /= 2;
    }
    c.setLocation(x, y);
}

// Center on parent ( absolute true/false (exact center or 25% upper left) )
public void centerOnParent(final Window child, final boolean absolute) {
    child.pack();
    boolean useChildsOwner = child.getOwner() != null ? ((child.getOwner() instanceof JFrame) || (child.getOwner() instanceof JDialog)) : false;
    final Dimension screenSize = Toolkit.getDefaultToolkit().getScreenSize();
    final Dimension parentSize = useChildsOwner ? child.getOwner().getSize() : screenSize ;
    final Point parentLocationOnScreen = useChildsOwner ? child.getOwner().getLocationOnScreen() : new Point(0,0) ;
    final Dimension childSize = child.getSize();
    childSize.width = Math.min(childSize.width, screenSize.width);
    childSize.height = Math.min(childSize.height, screenSize.height);
    child.setSize(childSize);
    int x;
    int y;
    if ((child.getOwner() != null) && child.getOwner().isShowing()) {
        x = (parentSize.width - childSize.width) / 2;
        y = (parentSize.height - childSize.height) / 2;
        x += parentLocationOnScreen.x;
        y += parentLocationOnScreen.y;
    } else {
        x = (screenSize.width - childSize.width) / 2;
        y = (screenSize.height - childSize.height) / 2;
    }
    if (!absolute) {
        x /= 2;
        y /= 2;
    }
    child.setLocation(x, y);
}

A: here's my solution to retrieve screen dimension with multiple monitors.
import java.awt.*;
import javax.swing.JFrame;

/**
 * Méthodes statiques pour récupérer les informations d'un écran.
 *
 * @author Jean-Claude Stritt
 * @version 1.0 / 24.2.2009
 */
public class ScreenInfo {

  /**
   * Permet de récupérer le numéro de l'écran par rapport à la fenêtre affichée.
   * @return le numéro 1, 2, ... (ID) de l'écran
   */
  public static int getScreenID( JFrame jf ) {
    int scrID = 1;
    GraphicsEnvironment ge = GraphicsEnvironment.getLocalGraphicsEnvironment();
    GraphicsDevice[] gd = ge.getScreenDevices();
    for (int i = 0; i < gd.length; i++) {
      GraphicsConfiguration gc = gd[i].getDefaultConfiguration();
      Rectangle r = gc.getBounds();
      if (r.contains(jf.getLocation())) {
        scrID = i+1;
      }
    }
    return scrID;
  }

  /**
   * Permet de récupérer la dimension (largeur, hauteur) en px d'un écran spécifié.
   * @param scrID --> le n° d'écran
   * @return la dimension (largeur, hauteur) en pixels de l'écran spécifié
   */
  public static Dimension getScreenDimension( int scrID ) {
    Dimension d = new Dimension(0, 0);
    if (scrID > 0) {
      GraphicsEnvironment ge = GraphicsEnvironment.getLocalGraphicsEnvironment();
      DisplayMode mode = ge.getScreenDevices()[scrID - 1].getDisplayMode();
      d.setSize(mode.getWidth(), mode.getHeight());
    }
    return d;
  }

  /**
   * Permet de récupérer la largeur en pixels d'un écran spécifié.
   * @param scrID --> le n° d'écran
   * @return la largeur en px de l'écran spécifié
   */
  public static int getScreenWidth( int scrID ) {
    Dimension d = getScreenDimension(scrID);
    return d.width;
  }

  /**
   * Permet de récupérer la hauteur en pixels d'un écran spécifié.
   * @param scrID --> le n° d'écran
   * @return la hauteur en px de l'écran spécifié
   */
  public static int getScreenHeight( int scrID ) {
    Dimension d = getScreenDimension(scrID);
    return d.height;
  }

}

A: AFAIK you can pass a GraphicEnvironment to each JDialog/JFrame/JWindow constructor. This object describes the monitor to use.

A: In Java 1.4+ you can do:
final JDialog d = new JDialog();
d.setSize(200,200);
d.setLocationRelativeTo(null);
d.setVisible(true);

Or perhaps (pre 1.4):
final JDialog d = new JDialog();
d.setSize(200, 200);
final Toolkit toolkit = Toolkit.getDefaultToolkit();
final Dimension screenSize = toolkit.getScreenSize();
final int x = (screenSize.width - d.getWidth()) / 2;
final int y = (screenSize.height - d.getHeight()) / 2;
d.setLocation(x, y);
d.setVisible(true);

A: Use this line after the pack() method:
setLocation((Toolkit.getDefaultToolkit().getScreenSize().width)/2 - getWidth()/2, (Toolkit.getDefaultToolkit().getScreenSize().height)/2 - getHeight()/2);

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


Mailchimp's automation feature allows you to create targeted emails that send when triggered by a specific date, event, or contact's activity. Our Automation Builder offers powerful segmenting, scheduling, and design tools in one easy-to-use package, so you can send email campaigns that inform, reward, and engage your contacts, automatically.
In this article, you'll learn about automation and how you can use it in your email marketing plan.
When we talk about automation, we use some terminology that's a little different from how we talk about other tools and tasks in Mailchimp.
An email or series of emails sent to a contact based on a specific trigger.
Any distributed content that's created and measured in Mailchimp, including automations.
The settings, schedule, and content for distributing a series of automated emails.
The period of time between a trigger event and a send.
A batch of contacts who have met an automation's criteria, and are waiting to receive the next email in a series.
The event that starts an automation email or series. For example, someone subscribes to your marketing or purchases a particular product.
A regular email campaign sends to your contacts at the time you choose. With an automation campaign, emails are sent automatically to specific contacts as they meet your trigger and sending criteria.
Choose an automation type, create one email or a series of emails, and set your sending criteria. We'll use activity and contact data to determine who should receive your emails and when. After you set up an automation, Mailchimp will manage your queue and email sends, so your emails get to the right people at the right time.
For marketers whose contacts have a clear path from signup to conversion or repeat engagement, automation can streamline communication. Depending on your business model, you might send a birthday coupon once a year or a series of solicitations every few days.
When you convert regularly sent campaigns to automations, you'll reduce the amount of time you spend on content creation and increase your ROI.
If you connect your store to Mailchimp, you can also use automation for transactional messages, like abandoned cart emails and order notifications. These automations will reach anyone who abandons a cart or places an order in your store, even if they haven't subscribed to your marketing emails.
A workflow is the schedule, trigger settings, and content for your emails in an automation. Trigger settings cover a variety of different criteria, like a subscribed contact's birthday or signup date, or when someone makes a purchase. Mailchimp offers many automation types with built-in triggers and other configuration details for common activities, but if our pre-built options don't fit your needs, you can modify them or create a custom workflow from scratch. You can also pause and edit the settings of an active automation.
After a subscribed contact receives the first email in an automation series, they'll receive every email in the sequence, unless they are removed from the automation. Subscribers can only trigger and receive the emails in an automation one time, with the exception of date-based automations, abandoned cart emails, order notifications, and product retargeting emails.
To learn more about different automation workflows, read Automation Types.
The Campaigns page in your account gives an overview of each automation, including sending status and performance trends.
The Campaigns page gives you the option to view your campaigns based on their status. Click Draft to see only campaigns you are working on and haven't sent yet, or click Ongoing to view active and paused campaigns. You can find your archived automations in the Archived folder.
Next to the name of each automation, we'll display a label to indicate its sending status, so you can quickly tell whether things are working as expected.
Draft Your automation hasn't started.
Sending Your automation is sending. To edit emails, you'll need to pause them first.
Paused All of the emails in your automation are paused.
Some Paused Your automation is sending, but at least one email is paused.
Archived You've ended the automation. You can replicate it or view its report data.
On the Campaigns page, you'll be able to view open and click rates for each automation. Hover over the percentages of opens or clicks to see the total number.
If an automation uses e-commerce data, the revenue dollar amount will show here, too.
To see more information about your automation's ongoing performance, click the drop-down menu and choose View report.
Learn about Mailchimp's automation types and how you can use them.
Learn about the triggers you can use to activate automations, ranging from list subscription, product purchases, cart abandonment, and more.


text:
Home / Home Loans / Does the ME Bank redraw debacle show offset accounts are the way to go?
Does the ME Bank redraw debacle show offset accounts are the way to go?
By Alex Brewster on May 08, 2020
Photo by Javier Allegue Barros on Unsplash
ME Bank outraged customers and caught the eye of regulators when it made changes to redraw facilities last week - changes which the bank is now allowing customers to reverse.
The boutique bank, owned by 26 industry super funds, angered thousands of borrowers when, without much warning, it drastically reduced the amount they could redraw from their home loans.
This meant that many customers lost access to tens of thousands of dollars' worth of extra repayments (payments above the minimum required) they'd made on their mortgage to get ahead. Money which customers thought they could redraw at the drop of a hat - such as for emergencies - had suddenly been permanently sucked into their mortgage.
Customers took to social media to voice their anger, with one writing on Facebook: "Yep, bit of a shock when l discovered over $50000 missing from our redraw Friday. Poor reason for it happening, in 20 years we have never been behind on the loan, clearly we pay more than the min weekly. This money also pays our 1/4 tax bill. Not happy ME. Tried to call, on hold for far too long."
Buying a home or looking to refinance? The table below features home loans with some of the lowest variable interest rates on the market for owner occupiers.
Smart Booster Home Loan
Discount variable for 1 year <=80% LVR
Unlimited redraw facility
Monthly repayments: $1,476
Rate (p.a.)
Discount variable for 1 year
Base criteria of: a $400,000 loan amount, variable, principal and interest (P&I) home loans with an LVR (loan-to-value) ratio of at least 80%. If products listed have an LVR <80%, they will be clearly identified in the product name along with the specific LVR. The product and rate must be clearly published on the Product Provider's web site. Monthly repayments were calculated based on the selected products' advertised rates, applied to a $400,000 loan with a 30-year loan term.
On the Monday following a maelstrom in the weekend newspapers over the move, ME's Chief Executive Jamie McPhee issued a statement to customers which said the change was made to prevent customers from falling behind their original repayment schedules.
"Our assessment showed there was a group of customers who were at risk of going above their scheduled home loan balance, if they were to activate the full redraw facility," Mr McPhee said.
"We adjusted their redraw facility to be in line with their original repayment schedule.
"In the current environment, we thought it particularly important to ensure that customers were not inadvertently at risk of not meeting their repayment commitments."
Mr McPhee said the change only affected some legacy home loans, with no effects on home loans originated over the past 5 years.
But come Friday, ME Bank announced customers who wished to reinstate their redraw limits could do so by contacting them.
2/3 - Some of our customers have told us they want their redraw limits changed back to what they were before. We are going to do that. Customers can call our dedicated hotline on 1300 308 357, or visit https://t.co/pXUP0wc3jR to reinstate their redraw limit online.
— ME (@mebank) May 8, 2020
3/3 - We acknowledge this change was poorly communicated and has upset our customers. We are deeply sorry; we were trying to do the right thing but we went about it the wrong way.
ME Bank's redraw facility change sparked speculation the move was made in order to shrink the size of its loan book and reduce the risk of defaults.
Financial Counselling Australia chief executive Fiona Guthrie told Savings.com.au if the bank was so concerned about customers it should've talked with them before making the changes.
"If ME wanted to help those customers who are experiencing financial hardship, they should have spoken with them first and asked what they could do to alleviate some of their financial stress," Ms Guthrie said.
"It should not be a one size fits all approach. They should have spoken with them about all their options and legal rights."
Was what ME Bank did legal?
Changes to redraw facilities aren't uncommon or illegal. In 2018, the Commonwealth Bank (CBA) made changes to how minimum repayments were calculated, based on current loan balances and amounts available in a redraw facility.
If borrowers had amounts available to redraw, but reduced their repayments to the new minimum, the available redraw amount would slowly shrink to zero over the loan term.
But unlike ME Bank, CBA proactively contacted customers and gave a months notice, while also stating on its explainer page: "If you have a home loan and you're currently using a redraw facility to deposit money that you plan on using later, an offset account may better suit your needs."
Which is why customers were outraged and the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority (APRA) contacted ME Bank, seeking information about the changes.
It's not uncommon to change the terms of a redraw facility, but not communicating changes to customers is and could land the lender in hot water with the corporate watchdog.
The Code of Banking Practice outlines rules around changes to products, and communication which is fair, timely, and appropriate is essential for compliance.
Many affected customers were not made aware of the changes to their redraw facility until days after they were made, while some weren't notified at all.
Mortgage Choice Chief Executive Susan Mitchell told Savings.com.au we can only assume ME Bank had a legal right to do what they did but should've made clear why the change was made.
"In the current environment when consumers are understandably feeling uncertain about their finances, additional care should have been taken to communicate over and above any legal requirements," Ms Mitchell said.
"Some of those customers may have lost their jobs and may have had peace of mind in believing they had additional savings they could rely on.
"I believe that ME Bank should have notified its customers before the change was made, so that customers had the opportunity to understand the situation they were in and contact the bank if necessary."
Nicole Pedersen-McKinnon, author of Get Mortgage Free Like Me, told Savings.com.au ME were "kind of beating around the bush about an error."
"So fundamentally what ME Bank isn't explicitly saying is that they have made a mistake in calculating minimum repayments along the way," she said.
"Because if a customer had put money in addition to those minimum repayments, then there's no reason they shouldn't be able to take out that exact same amount of money unless ME Bank hadn't stuffed up the calculation of what was going to discharge the loan over the contracted loan term."
Is an offset account a safer option than a redraw facility?
What many people don't understand is the extra repayments borrowers make into a redraw facility don't belong to them - they belong to the lender, who allows them access to it.
Furthermore, changes to the redraw facility, how much you can take out, how often, how much it costs, will also typically be at the lender's discretion, based on the contract you sign and what's in the fine print.
Ms Pedersen-McKinnon said an offset is a far safer option than a redraw facility due to its separation from the home loan.
"So an offset account has an identical interest rate saving as sticking the money directly in your loan, but it's a connected account that is effectively quarantined from your lender," she said.
"So rather than being an all in one pot, that's all on the lender's radar, it sits alongside it quietly doing its beautiful thing."
Ms Mitchell said that while paying additional amounts off your loan helps reduce the interest you pay, there are some risks of holding funds in redraw rather than offset.
"The severity of the risks all depend on the customer's personal circumstances which is why it's important to speak to a mortgage broker who can explain the differences," she said.
"The lender usually has the legal right to reduce the available redraw amount as ME Bank did.
"This is not a great customer experience and it is unlikely a lender would do this without sufficient reason.
"Whilst the removal of redraw impacts the customer's access to liquid funds, it does not usually change the borrower's credit limit or exposure to the bank."
Ms Mitchell added that while offset accounts were less risky than redraw facilities, they still were not without their faults.
"Offsets are separate deposit accounts. Amounts in these types of accounts are guaranteed by the government up to an amount of $250,000," she said.
"If a borrower holds funds greater than $250,000 in an offset then those amounts greater than $250,000 will not be covered by the Government guarantee in the unlikely event of the bank becoming insolvent."
Will we see more adjustments to redraw facilities in the future?
Ms Pedersen-McKinnon said it was vital people understood what they were getting into when signing documents for a home loan.
"The new danger in Australia is that in the fine print, as many loan documents, it says that when you've overpaid and you get into financial trouble, a bank can withhold that money from you to service your debt," she said.
"Although this will come as a huge shock to people, that's quite valid because if you're at risk of not being able to meet your repayments, then you owe them money and they can take it if you've made the mistake of sitting it with them in the first place."
Ms Pedersen-McKinnon said while lenders were currently supporting borrowers experiencing financial hardship, as profit margins shrunk, banks would again start acting in their own self-interests.
"This has been proven to be dangerous in other crises and we've seen banks in Australia now choose to use that money to cushion themselves rather than to honour the spirit of redraw for their customers.
"Don't miss the fact that CBA did this two years ago and ME bank is not the first and it won't be the last to do this."
The entire market was not considered in selecting the above products. Rather, a cut-down portion of the market has been considered which includes retail products from at least the big four banks, the top 10 customer-owned institutions and Australia's larger non-banks:
The big four banks are: ANZ, CBA, NAB and Westpac
The top 10 customer-owned Institutions are the ten largest mutual banks, credit unions and building societies in Australia, ranked by assets under management in November 2020. They are (in descending order): Credit Union Australia, Newcastle Permanent, Heritage Bank, Peoples' Choice Credit Union, Teachers Mutual Bank, Greater Bank, IMB Bank, Beyond Bank, Bank Australia and P&N Bank.
The larger non-bank lenders are those who (in 2020) has more than $9 billion in Australian funded loans and advances. These groups are: Resimac, Pepper, Liberty and Firstmac.
Some providers' products may not be available in all states. To be considered, the product and rate must be clearly published on the product provider's web site.
In the interests of full disclosure, Savings.com.au, Performance Drive and Loans.com.au are part of the Firstmac Group. To read about how Savings.com.au manages potential conflicts of interest, along with how we get paid, please click through onto the web site links.
*Comparison rate is based on a loan of $150,000 over a term of 25 years. Please note the comparison rate only applies to the examples given. Different loan amounts and terms will result in different comparison rates. Costs such as redraw fees and costs savings, such as fee waivers, are not included in the comparison rate but may influence the cost of the loan.
Alex Brewster Alex joined Savings.com.au in 2019. He is passionate about providing Australians with the information and tools needed to make them financially stable for their futures.
Collections: Home Loan News Editor's choice ME Bank
HomeBuilder and first home buyers see home loan commitments hit record highs
ME Bank, Freedom Lend cut home loan rates
How to protect your home from storms
New year, new home loan rate cuts
Home building ramps up in end-of-year push
Refinance home loans
Investing home loans
Fixed home loans
Variable home loans
Offset home loans


text:
Апетлон () — коммуна () в Австрии, в федеральной земле Бургенланд.

Входит в состав округа Нойзидль-ам-Зе. Население составляет около 1,8 тысяч человек. Занимает площадь 82,21 км². Официальный код — 10702.

Политическая ситуация
Бургомистр коммуны — Рональд Пайер (АНП) по результатам выборов 2007 года.

Совет представителей коммуны () состоит из 21 места.

 АНП занимает 11 мест.
 СДПА занимает 9 мест.
 АПС занимает 1 место.

Примечания

Города Бургенланда


As the creative director of London-based Shiro Studio, Andrea Morgante was chosen by Peroni Nastro Azzurro UK to update the iconic beer brand's glassware. As one of the world's most recognizable beers, and one that is intrinsically connected to its Italian heritage, Morgante was mindful of this provenance when rethinking the design.
The design's ribbed surface is not only a detail that engages light to better illustrate the beer's liquid quality, it is specifically designed to enhance the nucleation process, which catalyzes carbonation, resulting in a prolonged stream of bubbles that enhance the taste and drinking experience.
The line consists of four pieces of varying volume, from from the 568ml pint glass to a 200ml tumbler for Peroni-based cocktails. The glassware is currently being released in select UK venues.
This entry was posted on Tuesday, August 1st, 2017 at 3:25 pm	and is filed under DESIGN. You can follow any comments to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.


Although not primarily a reviewer of legal materials, Kirkus Reviews is one of the most outstanding and respected review magazines devoted to book media. It was founded in 1933 by Virginia Kirkus (1893-1981) a former head of the children's book department of Harper & Bros. with the idea of holding book reviewing to a very high standard, being selective in both the books reviewed and the people assgned to review them. The first year they received about 20 advance galley proofs.
This is a tall order whch even under the best conditions would be difficult to duplicate under present conditions. It was therefore distressing to hear last month that Kirkus Reviews would be shut down and cease publication..
Hopefully miracles do happen because I was informed today that a business deal is currently being worked out with a new buyer and that Kirkus will not suspend publication as announced earlier. This is great news for all who love and respect books. The world will remin a much better place if Kirkus and other organizations like it can be resurrected and continue setting high standards for all of us.


text:
Personalized Arts Focused Learning - 4:33
Kara May, Art in Motion Creative Arts Schools
https://comcastnewsmakers.com/Videos/2019/12/10/Kara-May
Art in Motion focuses on social and emotional learning through arts and academic core learning. Students can grow and learn in both areas.
Hosted by: Ellee Pai Hong Produced by: Greater Chicago Newsmakers Team
#Illinois #Local
Other videos hosted by Ellee Pai Hong
Combating Nationwide Child Trafficking
Combating Nationwide Child Trafficking - 6:46
Each year, as many as 300,000 American children are at risk of being victimized of commercial sexual exploitation.
Teresa Huizar, Executive Director of the National Children's Alliance, discusses the prevalence of this issue in all 50 states and the importance of engaging communities to better protect children.
https://comcastnewsmakers.com/Videos/2020/1/2/Combating-Nationwide-Child-Trafficking
Safeguarding Digital Privacy: Computer Security Flaw
Safeguarding Digital Privacy: Computer Security Flaw - 6:03
In 2018, major security flaws were discovered in nearly every mobile device, computer and server manufactured within the last 20 years, making them susceptible to hacking.
Sally Greenberg, Executive Director of the National Consumers League, shares how you can protect your personal data.
https://comcastnewsmakers.com/Videos/2020/1/2/Safeguarding-Digital-Privacy-Computer-Security-Flaw
Preventing Relationship Abuse and Violence
Preventing Relationship Abuse and Violence - 6:06
In the United States, nearly 20 people per minute become victims of intimate-partner violence.
Ojeda Hall, Executive Director of One Love – Maryland Region, outlines the warning signs of domestic abuse and shares how young people can build healthy, loving relationships.
https://comcastnewsmakers.com/Videos/2020/1/2/Preventing-Relationship-Abuse-and-Violence
Human Trafficking: Fighting Modern-Day Slavery in the U.S.
Human Trafficking: Fighting Modern-Day Slavery in the U.S. - 5:15
According to the ILO, approximately 40 million people worldwide are victims of human trafficking, a multibillion-dollar criminal industry.
Caroline Diemar, Director of the National Human Trafficking Hotline, details the many forms of modern-day slavery and shares how her organization is fighting this global epidemic.
https://comcastnewsmakers.com/Videos/2020/1/2/Human-Trafficking-Fighting-Modern-Day-Slavery-in-the-US
Musical Theater to Heal Trauma
Musical Theater to Heal Trauma - 4:32
Storycatchers Theater uses stories to help incarcerated youth in Juvenile Detention Centers has proven to be an effective coping mechanism. These stories help youth to make amends with their past and reshape their future.
https://comcastnewsmakers.com/Videos/2019/12/10/Priya-Shah
The Autism Hero Project
The Autism Hero Project - 4:33
1 in 59 children are diagnosed with Autism. Early intervention is key. The Autism Hero Project helps families with insurance costs so they can access ABA therapy.
https://comcastnewsmakers.com/Videos/2019/12/10/Tamika-Lechee-Morales
What's Important with State Representative West
What's Important with State Representative West - 4:32
State Representative West is a full-time legislator who is focused on providing opportunities for Rockford to thrive. He is dedicated to making sure that all Rockford residents have an opportunity to be successful, and he supports the organizations in the community that are fighting to make a difference in people's lives. Rep. West furthermore believes in building community so that Rockford can work together to build a brighter future. Representative West will discuss his views of the Rockford, its people, and its organizations.
https://comcastnewsmakers.com/Videos/2019/9/23/Maurice-West
Do Over Me!
Do Over Me! - 4:31
do-over.me is a personalized service that offers assessment of individuals, market their strengths and help people to find jobs.
https://comcastnewsmakers.com/Videos/2019/4/22/Cynthia-Wade
Always Growing
Always Growing - 4:36
The Village of Flossmoor is always growing, always developing. The village in infilling existing vacant spaces and adding new businesses. New village positions are not only marketing the village but also creating and promoting new events.
https://comcastnewsmakers.com/Videos/2019/4/22/Paul-Braun
Cook County Budget, No New Taxes
Cook County Budget, No New Taxes - 4:32
The Cook County Board has passed a balanced budget for 2020. There are no new taxes and no new fees for the new year.
https://comcastnewsmakers.com/Videos/2019/12/10/Peter-Silvestri


When you're buying a car, the actual price of the vehicle is just one part of the puzzle. You want to make sure that you get a great price on the car – but you should also try to get a great rate on your auto loan. How? Here are a few of our top tips.
If you're interested in shopping for a used Mercedes, you're making a great decision. A used or pre-owned Mercedes will offer a fantastic driving experience but is much more affordable than a brand-new model.
But when you're buying a car, the actual price of the vehicle is just one part of the puzzle. You want to make sure that you get a great price on the car – but you should also try to get a great rate on your auto loan. How? Here are a few of our top tips.
Your credit score is the biggest factor when it comes to the loan rates you'll get. As a rule, the higher your credit score is, the lower APR (interest rate) you'll pay, resulting in a cheaper auto loan.
You can get a free copy of your credit report once per year from Annual Credit Report, a U.S. government-funded website. Then, once you see your score, do a bit of research on rates for used cars in your area, to understand how much you can expect to pay.
Once you know the APR you can expect to pay, you can use a car loan calculator, and play around with some numbers to see what you can afford to pay every month, as well as the total cost of a loan. Use this information to create a budget – this will make it easier to understand which used Mercedes vehicles are in your price range.
You should avoid doing anything like opening new credit cards, or opening any other credit accounts when car shopping. Doing so can actually harm your credit score, which may result in a more expensive loan.
While most used Mercedes dealers will offer in-house financing, getting pre-approved for a loan from another local bank or credit union may help you get a better rate.
Loan pre-approval also proves to the dealer that you're a serious, qualified buyer, which can help you when negotiating the price of a used Mercedes.
It's likely that each bank will offer you a different rate, so check out a few different places, and see who will offer you the best rate.
When you apply for a loan, a "hard inquiry" is applied to your credit report. This will lower your score slightly. But don't panic! This is normal – and, on the bright side, any loan applications made within a 2-week period will only impact your score once.
However, if you keep applying for loans outside of this period, your credit score may decline again – and you won't get the best deal. So when "shopping" for a loan, limit yourself to a 2-week period. This should be plenty of time to get approved for a loan, and buy a used Mercedes.
The longer your loan term is, the lower your monthly payments will be – but your loan will be more expensive in the long run.
What do we mean? Let's consider a loan for a pre-owned $40,000 Mercedes-Benz GLE 350. A 5-year loan at a 4% APR will cost you $737 per month. Over the lifetime of the loan, you'll pay $4,200 in interest.
But if we extend that loan term to 6 years, you'll pay $626 per month, but more than $5,000 in interest. Extended to 7 years, you'll pay only $547 per month, but nearly $6,000 in interest.
Because you'll pay more in interest for a longer loan, and your car will continue to depreciate and lose value, you could end up being "underwater." That is, you may end up owing more than the car is worth, even after paying it off for several years.
So make sure you stick to your budget. Understand how much you can afford to pay each month, and don't try to extend your budget by getting a longer loan term.
Follow These Tips – Get A Great Deal On Your Used Mercedes!
Shopping for a car loan may seem tough, but it's simple. As long as you understand your finances and your credit score, and the basics about how car loans work, you can make sure you get a great deal when financing your next used Mercedes!


U.S. Housing Secretary Shaun Donovan is playing Julie the Cruise Director on the Titanic, telling everyone 'Don't worry, there's no icebergs in these waters. Really, if you see any floating ice in front of us, it's not the visible tenth of a catastrophe to come.' Unfortunately ice is visible, it is an iceberg, and the leading edge of the submerged ice is already ripping into our democracy and our economy, leaving deep damage.
The happy talk to distract attention from the iceberg comes from two camps and has two synergistic messages.
So let's take a good look at the foreclosure fraud iceberg.


The news here isn't really that the IRS targeted 501(c)4 groups for their political affiliation --- we've been aware for a long time of their efforts to do that --- but that, as part of a settlement between the DOJ and Tea Party groups, they've actually issued an apology. The IRS almost never apologizes to anyone for anything. But in response, the wronged groups had essentially two words for the IRS.
Don't blame Tea Party groups for having a tepid reaction to the long-awaited apology. The damage was done to them (and, arguably, to the country) during the 2012 elections, when instead of fighting to preserve the Constitution and elect leaders who favored limited government, simpler and fairer taxes, and sane spending, they were forced to lawyer-up and fight for their own existence. The hearings with Lois Lerner didn't take place until 2013; by then, Barack Obama had already been safely re-elected. And we all know how much he respected the Constitution.
Notice that they never admit deliberately targeting these groups. (And spare me the chin music about some progressive groups being targeted as well. If a few were targeted by this bunch, it was most likely to cover their tracks or because they happened to have a suspicious word in their name, like "American.") If this had been nothing more than innocent mismanagement, Lois Lerner would have simply explained how it happened instead of pleading the Fifth, heading off to retirement, and never apologizing for a thing.


Do you like football? Then arrange a football match using this map and add-on. Archive includes a football stadium and an addon to add a soccer ball. The stadium is not large, but it is ideal for playing a small group of people. Football gates have a special mechanism that registers entering ball.
You need at least two players for the game, but it will be a real football if you can invite 6 people. Divide into two teams and set the same skins of various colors (eg you can download Popular Athletes skin pack for MCPE). Before the game, go to the locker room where you get set of items. Use them during the game.
To kick the ball you just need to tap on it. You can also use different potions, it is not prohibited.
Start the game and activate the addon in map settings.
Popular Athletes skin pack for Minecraft PEThe archive contains about 15 skins completely different athletes..


text:
module Releaf::Builders::FormBuilder::Label
  def releaf_label(name, attributes, options = {})
    label_options = options.fetch(:label, {})
    attributes = label_attributes(name, attributes, options)
    text = label_text(name, label_options)

    content = label(name, text, attributes)

    if label_options.fetch(:minimal, false) == true
      content
    else
      content += wrapper(label_options[:description], class: "description") if label_options.fetch(:description, nil).present?
      wrapper(content, class: "label-wrap")
    end
  end

  def label_text(name, options = {})
    if options[:label_text].present?
      options[:label_text]
    else
      if options[:translation_key].present?
        key = options[:translation_key]
      else
        key = name.to_s.sub(/_uid$/, '')
      end

      translate_attribute(key)
    end
  end

  def label_attributes(_name, attributes, _options)
    attributes
  end
end


text:
Work World Chooses SiteSeer
Posted by Sam Lowder on Feb 17, 2021 11:11:40 AM
BOISE, IDAHO (PRWEB) FEBRUARY 17, 2021
SiteSeer Technologies, creator of SiteSeer Professional site selection software and Void Analysis Pro, has welcomed Work World as a new subscriber to the SiteSeer platform. Work World is a specialty retailer of apparel, footwear, accessories and other safety equipment, selling and distributing its products online, via 23 retail locations across California and Nevada, and through relationships with various businesses.
Work World will use SiteSeer Professional's full suite of analytics tools, including SiteSeer's maps, trade areas, reports, customer analytics, hot spots, demographics and more. In addition, the SiteSeer professional services team will build customer profiles for Work World, develop a scorecard that the company can use to screen for the best possible sites, and implement a hotspot layer to help the company understand where the best sites are in its markets.
For over 30 years, Work World has provided the largest selection of top-brand products to the working person—brands including Carhartt, Timberland Pro, Dickies, Keen Utility, Wolverine and others. The company was acquired by Gart Capital Partners in early 2020.
Alex Gart, partner at Gart Capital Partners, says that the company has plans to double the size of Work World over the next three years through acquisition and new site selection. "We are taking a systematic approach to expanding into new markets, and SiteSeer will help us do retroactive analyses to understand the characteristics of our current customers—using UberMedia cell phone data—so we can effectively rank our markets," he says. "That will allow us to focus on where to open stores in the future."
Through SiteSeer's professional services, Gart adds that the company can gain immediate insights. "We are a small team of people with many other priorities as well, so we're thrilled that SiteSeer's team can join us and offer significant expertise as we get up to speed on using the platform," he says. "SiteSeer made this all very easy on us. We needed more than just a software solution. We needed a knowledgeable team with deep retail site selection experience."
Danielle Yanskey, chief operating officer of SiteSeer, says that the SiteSeer professional services team is excited to help Work World make smarter decisions. "Our software will convert metrics into measurement tools that they can use for site selection and market planning," she says. "It's all about helping them make intelligent moves into new markets and understanding their customers. This is an exciting company with so much potential and we are thrilled to help them understand where their best sites are and grow the smart way."
Learn more about SiteSeer professional services at https://www.siteseer.com/siteseer-professional-services.
ABOUT SITESEER TECHNOLOGIES
ABOUT WORK WORLD
Founded in 1990 and headquartered in Vacaville, Calif., Work World is a specialty retailer of apparel, footwear, accessories and other safety equipment for a variety of workers. Work World sells and distributes its products via 23 retail locations across California and Nevada, an online retail site, and through B2B relationships with local small and medium sized businesses. Learn more at http://www.workworld.com.
Topics: Retail Trade Area, Data Partner, Site Selection Software


text:
Six tips for immigrants to navigate health care in New York
By JULIE DINNERSTEIN
Almost half of New Yorkers get health insurance through work. The rest of us need to weed our way through a tangle of public and private options, or go without and keep our fingers crossed that we don't get sick. The situation is all the more complicated for immigrant New Yorkers. (bowdenimages/Getty Images/iStockphoto)
Almost half of New Yorkers get health insurance through work. The rest of us need to weed our way through a tangle of public and private options, or go without and keep our fingers crossed that we don't get sick.
The situation is all the more complicated for immigrant New Yorkers.
Here are six important rules to help immigrant New Yorkers sort through the health care maze.
1. Do not rely on information from your friends across the Hudson River in New Jersey, across the country in California or anywhere else in the U.S.
States have a fair amount of leeway in the running of health insurance programs. What is true for your cousin in Kansas will not necessarily be true for you (unless, of course, you also live in Kansas).
2. Just because you are not eligible for a Social Security number does not mean that you are not eligible for health insurance.
(That said, for some New York programs, immigrants must provide a letter showing that the immigrant has applied for and been denied a Social Security number.)
3. Many low-income immigrant New Yorkers who are not eligible for federal Medicaid are eligible for the state version.
These immigrants, known by the unwieldy term "permanently residing under color of law" (PRUCOL), come in many shapes and sizes. Examples include:
Non-pregnant adults with green cards granted in the last five years;
Immigrants with pending green card applications;
New York residents with non-immigrant visas;
Immigrants with deferred action, including deferred action for childhood arrivals (DACA); and
Immigrants whose deportation has officially been put on hold.
4. Regardless of immigration status, all low-income New Yorkers have access to the following programs:
New York Medicaid for pregnant women and girls;
AIDS Drug Assistance Program (ADAP), which includes treatment and medication for New Yorkers who are HIV+/living with AIDS;
Child Health Plus for New Yorkers under 19; and
Hospital Financial Assistance Law (HFAL) benefits, free or low cost medical care for uninsured or under-insured New Yorkers.
5. Low-income undocumented immigrants in New York City, Westchester County and Nassau County are eligible for Health and Hospital Corporation (HHC) Options.
Get updates on the coronavirus pandemic and other news as it happens with our free breaking news email alerts.
With HHC Options, a New Yorker receives a health insurance card at a New York City public hospital where they can get regular health care and medications with little or no co-pay.
6. In addition to all of the New York programs just mentioned, there are some federal programs that low-income immigrant New Yorkers may also be eligible for:
Federally-funded Medicaid is available to those with green cards for at least five years, as well as green card holders who have had green cards for less than five years who are either under 21 or pregnant, or both. Some immigrants in less common immigration statuses are also eligible.
All green card holders as well as many other categories of lawful immigrants who purchase health insurance through the New York State Marketplace are eligible for tax credits through the Affordable Care Act (known as ACA or Obamacare).
Federally-funded community health care clinics are available to everyone regardless of immigration status.
Federally-funded emergency Medicaid is available to undocumented immigrants.
For more information, read the New York City Human Resources Administration's Guide to Health Insurance and Health Care Services for Immigrants in New York City, available here.
For a very detailed review or immigration statuses and health insurance eligibility, see the Empire Justice website here.
immigrant rights guide


text:
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Linq;
using Lurchsoft.FileData;
using Lurchsoft.FileData.Lines;

namespace Lurchsoft.ParallelWorkshop.Ex03TotalLines
{
    public class TotalLineCount : ITotalLineCount
    {
        private readonly ITextFile[] textFiles;

        public TotalLineCount(params ITextFile[] textFiles)
        {
            this.textFiles = textFiles;
        }

        public int NumberOfCallsToReadAllLines { get; private set; }

        public int GetTotalLineCount()
        {
            // This is inefficient, if called multiple times.
            //
            // How can we ensure that the files are only read once?
            //
            // In this example, do NOT prevent the files being read again, on a different calling thread.
            //
            // Try at least the following solutions: -
            // - Lazy<T>
            // - LazyInitializer<T>
            // - Interlocked.CompareExchange()
            return ReadAllLines().Count();
        }

        private ParallelQuery<string> ReadAllLines()
        {
            ++NumberOfCallsToReadAllLines;
            return textFiles.AsParallel().SelectMany(tf => tf.ReadLines());
        }
    }
}


Join AAA School of Dental Assisting at our Pompano Beach Campus for our Hams and Yams Giveaway!
We'll be handing out Juicy Hams and Sweet Yams to Families in need in the Pompano Beach area.
Stop by December 15th at 12:30 pm and receive a Free Ham for your family to enjoy this Holiday Season!
While onsite, meet with a team member and find out how a career in Dental Assisting can be a great career goal for 2019!
*** Please note, hams and yams will go fast and are a first come, first served basis.


text:
Q: How to add the dependencies of ExcelDataReader and Excel dataset in Azure functions using C# Is it possible to add the reference for ExcelDataReader and ExcelDataset in Azure functions? I uploaded dll file of NuGet packages (exceldatareader.3.4.0.nupkg) to the program. But I'm not sure how actually it has to be used. Can anyone help me to achieve this.
#r "Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Storage"
#r "System.IO"
#r "System.Data"
#r "exceldatareader" //*I'm not able to add this reference|*
using System;
using System.IO;
using System.Net;
using System.Runtime.Serialization.Formatters.Binary;
using Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Storage;
using Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Storage.Blob;
using Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Storage.Auth;
using ExcelDataReader;
using System.Data;

Thank you.

A: To install packages for Azure functions on portal, we need to create dependencies file under function folder. Click View files on the right of function panel, Add file according to runtime.
If your function runtime is ~1, create project.json with following content.
{
  "frameworks": {
    "net46":{
      "dependencies": {
        "ExcelDataReader.DataSet": "3.4.0"
      }
    }
   }
}

If your function runtime is ~2, create function.proj as below.
<Project Sdk="Microsoft.NET.Sdk">
    <PropertyGroup>
        <TargetFramework>netstandard2.0</TargetFramework>
    </PropertyGroup>
    <ItemGroup>
        <PackageReference Include="ExcelDataReader.DataSet" Version="3.4.0"/>
    </ItemGroup>
</Project>

After file created, assemblies will be added to function host environment. Also need to remove unnecessary #r "exceldatareader" or you will got error.