You don't need us to tell you that Gigi Hadid is having a major moment right now. Not only is the It model walking every show from Balmain to Tommy Hilfiger to Victoria's Secret, but her face is also all over the Internet, she's best friends with fellow It girl Kendall Jenner, and she's majorly killing (and seemingly enjoying) the spotlight.
News came out yesterday that Hadid's personal cell phone was recently hacked, and the 20-year-old is fighting the attack with full force. To help embolden the model to stick to her guns, we took a quick browse through her Instagram and have decided she officially wins at social media.
Keep scrolling to see 10 times Gigi Hadid totally won at Instagram!
…and Taylor, Selena, and Lily.
When she looked flawless backstage at every major runway show.
When she casually posed with one of the few people more famous than her.
When she rolled around on the floor with a bunch of cute kids.
When she expressed pure joy with BFF Kendall Jenner over their Victoria's Secret runway debuts.
When she showed us the right way to be a ballerina.
When she flaunted her gams in Versace.
When she gave us a peek into what it's really like to prepare for a paparazzi onslaught.
When she showed us that, yes, she eats carbs.
What's your favorite Gigi Hadid moment? Tell us in the comments below, and shop some of the It model's favorite wardrobe staples too!


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Stuart Lancaster finds redemption over the Irish Sea
Adam Hathaway
Stuart Lancaster is on the other side of the water after walking the plank with England last year and has got a smile on his face again
The smile is back: Stuart Lancaster is enjoying life with Leinster
TAGS: Champions CupLeinsterNorthamptonStuart Lancaster
Just over a year ago Stuart Lancaster's world fell apart and judging by his expression as England exited their own World Cup before the knock-out stages you would have got long odds on him smiling in the foreseeable future. But happily for one of rugby's good guys the grin is back and it is Irish eyes that are smiling too.
The 47-year old packed his rucksack after leaving the England job and has had roles with the Football Association, Atlanta Falcons, had a chat with the British Cycling, and Counties Manukau in the Mitre 10 Cup in New Zealand.
Now Lancaster is back in a tracksuit, doing what he likes most, coaching and not having to do with all the associated stuff that comes with being an international coach. At Leinster, who he joined in September, his title is senior coach – Leo Cullen is head coach, and after four years of dealing with sponsors, media, clubs and trying to run a Test team.
Back on the paddock: Lancaster has some top-quality to work with at Leinster
It suits Leinster just fine too – they are level on points with Munster at the top of the PRO12 – and the Cumbrian is coaching a large chunk of the best Irish talent on a daily basis.
"One thing I wanted to clarify before I committed to the role was what is the role?" said Lancaster. "I am very much hands-on coaching. A lot of the bigger picture stuff like selection calls are Leo's as is the relationship with Ireland Rugby and recruitment.
"For me it's more hands-on coaching with attack and defence. Girvan Dempsey would do the backs and John Fogarty does the scrum and I do the rest which is a change from the England role which was more of the bigger picture.
"I am really enjoying it and just to be able to think about training sessions, how to evolve defence and attack and to see progress. There are a group of talented players here, 13 played for Ireland not so long ago. It helps because we have a similar defensive system to Ireland – Andy Farrell and I know each other very well – and the team were coached by Joe Schmidt and Matt O'Connor so they have a good framework in attack and I've tried to add my own personality to it."
Crossing paths: Leinster and Andy Farrell's share the same defensive pattern
Lancaster was seen as damaged goods after the World Cup but the RFU missed a trick by not keeping him on in some capacity. No-one, after his years at Twickenham in various guises, knows more about the up-and-coming talent in England and there must have been a job for him somewhere in the building.
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It would not have been like a new Manchester United office having Sir Alex Ferguson in the office next door and, as Lancaster has virtually no ego, he would not have ruffled any feathers with his successor as top dog with the senior team.
But once that die was cast Lancaster had to rebuild his reputation and the last couple of months have done a bit of that, helped by the fact that he has got some decent players to work with in Dublin.
"As a coach you always have to prove yourself," he said. "I'm certainly having to prove myself to players here. These players are top end players who have been coached by some very good coaches. That's what drives me more than anything else.
The main man: Lancaster has been impressed by Eddie Jones' impact
"I don't miss certain parts of the (head coach) job and I do enjoy being back coaching again. We'll see. I'm pretty open-minded about the future. It's been a great move to come back into a top-end European club. Great players – but I've learned now not to plan too far ahead."
When England made it 14 wins in a row, 13 under Eddie Jones and one under Lancaster, with their 37-21 victory over Australia, Jones was quick to credit the work that his predecessor had done in unearthing a decent group of players. The current all-conquering squad is basically the same one that crashed out of the World Cup, with one or two tweaks, and it would be strange man who did not feel some regret about watching his former charges beat all-comers in the last 12 months. But Lancaster, who is now renting a flat in Dublin, does not do regret.
On the front foot: Lancaster has been unsurprised by England's form
"Very few international teams have been on that sort of winning run," he added. "It's fantastic really, but in terms of success, I'm not surprised. Because the I know the team and know how good the players are. I think the credit goes to Eddie and his coaches and they have done a brilliant job in getting the best out of a very experienced team.
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"When the World Cup came we had about 450 caps in the starting side – now it's about 600-700 with an average age of 25. I always said that the new phase of England rugby would be successful. But nothing happens by chance and the coaches, and in particular Eddie, deserve the credit for that.
"Good luck to them for the Six Nations, I know from working over here how competitive that Six Nations programme is going to be. Being in Ireland now, all roads are leading to the Aviva on St Patrick's Day. It will be some Six Nations, which is great for the competition, but also for the Lions."

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


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Nicolas Davila, 90, passed away Tuesday, Feb. 24, 2015, at a local hospital.
Visitation and a Vigil of the Deceased were Thursday, Feb. 26, 2015, in the Hernandez, Lopez and Sons Southside Chapel, Loop 20 and Zapata Hwy.
Funeral services will begin at 9:05 a.m. on Friday, Feb. 27, 2015, departing from the funeral home chapel.
Holy Mass will be celebrated at 9:30 a.m. at Nuestra Señora del Rosario Catholic Church.


A member of two international networks of law firms, we provide access to legal services globally.
Whiteford Taylor & Preston announced today that D. Shane Smith, a leading Richmond-based business, tax and estate planning attorney, has joined the firm as a partner.
Remote working is commonplace in the workplace today, though some organizations treat this as an informal perk. If your company allows this flexibility, be sure that you have taken appropriate steps to adopt a formal policy that includes the requirement for execution of a telework agreement between the company and the employee in order to minimize the risk that can accompany this arrangement.
More and more associations are moving toward the automatic renewal model for their membership dues. From a financial standpoint, it is a no-brainer for associations, and it can also serve as a convenient model for both associations and their members who don't want to risk having their memberships lapse.
WTP will host a panel of international privacy experts for an in-depth discussion of how implementation of GDPR has played out in actual practice.


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Q: Can the column number in a google sheets WHERE clause be a variable? Can the column number in a where clause be a variable? Here's a simple query:
=query(MasterData!B2:BR,"Select B where AJ <>''",1)

Is it possible to swap out AJ with something like:
=match($B$1,MasterData!2:2,0)

I've tried this but it doesn't work:
=query(MasterData!$B$2:$BR,"Select B where 'Col'& match($B$1,MasterData!2:2,0) <>''",1)

B1 is a drop down menu and AJ is Col36 The idea is to have the column the where clause evaluates driven by a menu.
Example Data:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1L01n2U3cJgrt5ILKvv19cwYcBnc-lP7g0dWxrb8knNM/edit?usp=sharing
In this example, I'm trying to fix the formula in the "Query with variable column in WHERE" tab, cell A16
Thanks for the help!

A: EDIT (Following OP's presented sample sheet)
IN SHORT

Can the column number in a google sheets WHERE clause be a variable?

Yes it can
You need to comply with the following

*

*Use curly quotes {} and use Col1, Col2, Col3 etc

*After Col use  "&.......&" where ...... is anything that returns the column number.

As an example
=query({C2:H11},"Select Col1, Col5 where Col"&IF(A1=2,2,"xxx")&" <>''",1)

For this particular question as stated by the OP
You could use the formula (ranges and cells as in your test sheet):
=query({$C$2:$F},"Select Col1 where Col"&B2&" <>''",1)

OR
Change your Data validation drop-list in cell A2 to 2,3,4 and use A2 in your query instead of B2.
OR
use any formula within your where query clause as long as you get the Column number there.

Original answer
Assuming the match formula itself is correct (giving the correct column number), you would need to correct your query syntax to:
=query({MasterData!$B$2:$BR},"Select Col1 where Col"& match($B$1,MasterData!2:2,0)&" <>''",1)

You cannot use letters as columns and at the same time use Col1, Col2 etc.
So we use the curly {} quotes and everything can be referred as Col1, Col2, Col36
As for when referencing the cell (as B1 here) the syntax should be
" & YourCellFormulaHere & " .

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


Emerson says there is but one mind, and that we are all different expressions of it.
The Mental Science student means the same thing when he says there is but one Life, of which we are but individual manifestations.
If there is but one Life, then life is omnipresent–it fills all space. There is nothing outside of it. Indeed, there is no outside. There is but one Life. This Life is the universal Principle of Being that men call God.
There is a Life Principle, and it is unlimited; it is one. It holds the visible universe in place, though it is invisible. It is a self-existent principle. It underlies universal law. It is the one Law–the Law of Attraction–and beside it there is no other law. It is also the very essence of love; and the recognition of it as love is expressed by us in love for each other.
All the races of men have felt the presence and the power of this Law of Attraction, whose ultimate expression is love, or life, in a myriad of different forms.
The undeviating Law has never been violated, and never will be. And this is our hope. It is unchanging, diseaseless, deathless; and a knowledge of it conforms us to it in a way that renders us diseaseless and deathless.
A more scientific statement of the same truth would have been this: The Law and man are one; or, man and all the visible universe are one with the law of their being–one with the indestructible Life Principle, or the Law of Attraction; the Love Essence.
Now, the object of Mental Science, as I teach it, is to rescue man from his beliefs in his own limitations by showing him his true relations to the Universal Law; thus demonstrating to him the unlimited possibilities of his being.
Unlimited, I say, because he is in the image and character of the omnipotent Law. He is an exponent of the Law, and cannot divorce himself from it, except by his own false and foolish beliefs.
To be divorced from the Universal Spirit of Life would be instant annihilation. On the other hand, to know more of this Universal Spirit of Life than we now know, would be to have more life, more health, more strength, more intelligence, more beauty and more opulence. Or, rather, it would be to be these things, instead  of having them. To truly mental creatures, such as we are, knowing more is being more.
The crying want of the race is a remedy for present conditions of sickness, poverty and death; and the whole strength of my effort in these lessons is to furnish a clue to this remedy. Now is the time to be saved. Tomorrow will not only bring its own needs, but its own remedies.
In Mental Science, the great principle laid down is this: Man is conjoined to the Eternal Life Principle. He is that Principle–its very self in objectivity–and in proportion as he becomes intellectually conscious of this tremendous truth, he finds an unfailing supply to all his needs, and grows more into a knowledge of his own mastery.
We are manifestations of the unchanging Life Principle; of the Universal Spirit of Being; the inextinguishable I AM. It is the soul to nature–the body. It is internal man. Man is the external of it. And the seeming two are one.
This Law, or Principle, is man in subjectivity.
Visible man is the Law, or Principle, in objectivity.
When the race knows this great truth, it will appreciate its own dignity and worth and power, and then there will be no more (so-called) sin and sickness and death; no more shedding of tears; no more want or sorrow or the feebleness of old age. We shall know that we are one with the deathless Law of Being, and that our progression through the realms of the universe will be by constantly knowing more and more of the power and beauty and opulence of the Law, which is the vital spark within us.
There is but one substance.
This substance is both seen and unseen.
On its unseen side, it is the Universal Spirit of Life, or the Law of Attraction, which is love.
On its seen side, it is Intelligence, or mind–falsely called dead matter.
All is real. All is transitional. All is perpetual. The universe yields its substance to man in proportion as he comes into an intellectual understanding of it.
There is no limit as to the supply you may receive; there need be no limit to your demand. But unless you demand aright, you may as well not demand at all. Mental Science will teach you how to demand; and in so doing, it will unlock the store-house of the universe to you.
And yet, it is all one substance, through and through the great whole. Thought is substance just the same as rock is; the endless variety of objects and conditions to be met with everywhere is this one substance in many different degrees of positive and negative development, the difference in the manifestation being due to different degrees of development, and not to difference in substance. We can think of nothing that is not substance. This one substance is apparent in all the different forms of life, both animate and inanimate–in the minerals, animals,  plants, and in man, it expresses itself in different degrees of positive and negative (or intelligent and unintelligent) development. The rocks are not so intelligent as my hand, and my hand is not so intelligent as my brain, etc.; but the rock is not absolutely negative, not absolutely devoid of intelligence, or vitality, because it contains the possibility of all development, and it does develop. The possibility of all life is in it. It bides its time for incorporation into these bodies of ours and its evolvement into the highest thought.
And where is the dividing line between positive and negative? In strict truth, there is no dividing line; but for the sake of convenience in making these lessons clearer we will establish one; and it shall be at that point in development where we begin to be consciously intelligent; where we begin to reason on things, and to investigate ourselves and our surroundings. In short, it shall be as nearly as possible at that point where the intuitive life of the lower order of animals passes into the consciously intelligent life of man; though it must be remembered that even inanimate things have intelligence, but their intelligence is unconscious; by which I mean that it takes no thought of itself; does not reason on itself. Man is the highest expression of conscious intelligence. It is the consciousness of intelligence that makes him the creature of power that he is, and that gives him the authority to rule over all things. I have said that the universe is one mighty magnet. It is all one. It is not hard to understand that all the varied forms of life–seen and unseen–are composed of this one mental substance when we consider that steam, snow and ice are all different conditions of water. "Uni" means one. This idea of oneness must have had firm lodgment in the minds of those who first began to formulate our language; hence the name universe as applied to the whole. The universe is a universe, and not a diverse. Bear this in mind; for if the student loses sight of this point in these lessons, his bearings will be gone, and from that time on, he will find nothing in them that he can clearly understand.
The universe, to be a universe and not a diverse, is composed altogether of one substance, elaborated into many and varied forms of individuality, both animate and inanimate. The substance out of which all is evolved is the same throughout the whole, but the degrees of development, or intelligence, differ in regard to negative and positive, or immature and more mature expression. For it is the degree of development, or intelligence, in an object, that gives character to the object–size, form, color, power of motion, etc. In other words, each individuality is dependent for that which makes it more or less individualized upon the degree to which its intellect is developed.
And what shall we call this one substance of the universe; mind or matter? We cannot call it matter because the word is used and understood to express the absence of intelligence and vitality, when in reality there is not an atom in all the universe absolutely devoid of intelligence and vitality. We must call this one substance of which all is evolved "mind," or "mental substance," or "intelligence," to distinguish it from the old belief in dead matter.
But for this point we might call the universal substance by any other name, provided we understood that there was only one substance. The visible universe is one vast mind; one vast laboratory for the evolvement of truth, or the making manifest of the Law.
The Law alone is absolute. All visible life is the manifestation of certain phases of the Law. It is the making apparent of many shades of the Law through many different shades of recognition of the Law's power. Every manifestation is intelligence, and all intelligence shows forth as substance.
And did we have our starting point, 'way back, millions of ages ago, in the deadness and dullness of such crude  beginnings of intelligence as the rocks exhibit? Who can say we ever had a beginning? We must have been latent in the eternal mind forever. But there was a time when we were organized in individuality, no doubt, but still individuality. Drawn to coherence through the Law of Attraction, we became individual lives; and we have come up through the ages, always accreting intelligence through the power of recognition and appropriation, until we are here today and able to reason about our long journey, our surroundings, and how to gain such control over them as to mold them to our liking. To mold these surroundings to our liking is the secret of Mental Science which these lessons are attempting to unravel. We have been helpless because we did not know our strength–not because we did not possess strength. Strength has been latent within us, and so has health, because Omnipresent Being is in everything, constantly developing from negative to positive–and constantly asserting a riper unfoldment of its own enormous vitality. But only knowledge could make us aware of this, and the knowledge was lacking.
The law is the great I am. It existed always, and may be had for the perceiving. The first step toward the appropriation of truth is to recognize it. This is the fulfilling of the first injunction: "Believe, if you would be saved." Belief is recognition. It is the wakening of the intelligence to a perception of truth. To recognize a truth is to believe it. After believing–recognition–what then? To him that overcometh are all the promises given. And that which we are to overcome is our former habit of unbelief in the omnipotence and omnipresence of Eternal Being. To climb high enough in the scale of intelligence to perceive that a truth is a truth, is to place that truth within our reach; and is recognition. To then bring our will-power into operation, and by its operation to overcome our former unbeliefs that conflict with the acceptance of the new truth, this will make that truth our own; and is appropriation. We grow step by step in this mighty magnet–the universe–by recognition and appropriation of truth. We have now come up far enough in the light of our constantly increasing intelligence to recognize a very great truth, indeed–the truth that in all the universe there is no evil, nothing but absolute Life or Being; and because we have at last recognized this master truth, we are called upon to bring all our past beliefs under review and judge them by a stronger light than they were ever subjected to before.
The evolutionary view of creation is the correct one. That man has ascended the scale of life from the nomad, I do not doubt. For man to be all, it is necessary that he should live all. We have lived all so far as we have come; no less a power than that gained by having conquered every condition of life that we have been over; for it is only by overcoming our environments through intelligence, or the recognition of truth, and the exertion of the will in its appropriation, that we come into such power as will enable us to mold our conditions to our liking–thus establishing us consciously in our true position of mastery. Since man is the highest expression of the Law of Being, and since his life lay folded in the animal life, and the animal life lay locked in the vegetable life, and the vegetable life was unwrapped from the remoter earth conditions still; and since he has gained the apex in his long series of developments by conquest over crude conditions through his increasing knowledge and appropriation of truth (whether he gained it consciously or otherwise)–he is at the present time master of the earth and all its conditions. He is master by virtue of having lived all below him–lived every obstacle out of sight–and put every one under his feet. His being in the human form, with a dim foreshadowing of his free moral agency is a proof of his mastership. But he has not recognized this, because the  conquest and the effort to attain it were almost unconscious with him up to the present time, when his reasoning faculties are just beginning to develop; when he is just coming into the position where he can see what he has been doing, and can trace the long, slow journey by which he became the embodiment, or expression, of all the truth or intelligence he has recognized on the way.
Man, like the universe, is a magnet; he is a whole. Being a whole, he has his positive and negative poles. Thought is the positive pole of the magnet man, and his body is the negative pole; and between these two poles of positive and negative, he ranges the entire scale of his life.
Thought is the most positive, and hence the most powerful factor in the magnet man. His brain is probably the next most positive degree or factor in him, because it generates the thought which controls him. The brain, then, is more negative than the thought. His body, controlled by the thought which his brain generates, is more negative than either brain or thoughts; thus showing that the physical body (the negative role of the magnet man) is the most closely allied to the negative earthly conditions of any part of him; and being the most negative or earthly part, he has already gained control over it in having conquered earthly conditions to reach his present position. The old history says that man was created out of the dust of the earth. This statement, with its mental interpretation, is in full accord with the evolutionary theory, and is literally true. The life of man was and is found contained in that crude stratum of mind called "the dust of the earth." And it is the effort of Mental Science to make this apparent to the student, in order to put those negations of the Life Principle or the Law of Being, called sin, sickness and death, under his feet. Then, as I have said, we have at last climbed to a recognition of a saving truth, and, therefore, absolute–the truth that all is good and there is no evil; or that all is life and there is no death.
I call this truth absolute. Being absolute, it makes the demand that every truth not absolute shall adapt itself to it. For the absolute does not conform. It stands in mighty majesty, just as it has stood forever, compelling each soul who climbs to a sight of it to re-adjust every thought of his life to conformity with it. Every life is a manifestation of truth as far as it goes. As far as it manifests anything, it manifests a certain degree of truth, or Being. A snake manifests a certain amount of truth, or Being; but the truth, or Being, manifested by the snake, is negative to the truth, or Being, manifested by me; and the truth, or Being, I now manifest, is negative to that which I will manifest when I learn more of the truth, or the Law of Being. A greater truth circumferences minor truths. It holds them in solution, as it were. A greater truth is all the minor truths, and something more. And thus is man's life a chain of ever widening truth.
The whole growth of our lives depends on our power to recognize more and still more truth, or Being. The recognition of truth is being truth. For we are just what we recognize. To recognize in a small, limited way, we ourselves are small and limited. To recognize that truth is boundless, and to keep discarding the old, ignorant beliefs, and prospecting farther ahead, resolutely investigating all that is worthy of prejudice, a single obsolete opinion to hold us, this is the way to add to our knowledge of truth, and thereby to widen and deepen and strengthen the well-springs of eternal Being within our personal lives; thus enabling us to gradually overcome every form of disease and old age and finally death.
It is by recognition and appropriation of truth that we grow. We take no step forward except by growth. We cannot fly through the universe on the wings of the wind, nor of our own imaginings.  We must grow our way through the future as we have done through the past–by the recognition and the appropriation of truth–and we must yield hard effort in payment of our passage as we go. Truth does not give herself to the sluggard. She demands the full life service of the man as her recompense.
Let me repeat. The Law of Being, or the Eternal Life Principle, exists. It simply is. It had no beginning, and it can have no end. It is the Law of Attraction inherent in mind or substance. And all substance is mind–it is intelligent. It is not only intelligent, but it is intelligence its very self. It is the recognition of the Life Principle by which the Life Principle is fixed in belief and becomes a visible manifestation.
The visible universe is the Life Principle's recognition of itself. All things are dual in the sense of being internal and external. Now the universe is dual in the sense of exterior and interior; or seen and unseen; or energy and intelligence; intelligence being that attribute of the Life Principle by which it recognizes itself or its own functions and powers.
Thus the universe is one, though, in a sense dual in its oneness. It is all Life Principle on its unseen side, and all the perception of the Life Principle, or the recognition of the Life Principle, or the belief in the Life Principle, on its seen side.
These perceptions, or recognitions, or beliefs, change constantly; but the Infinite Principle of Life never changes. The personality of man belongs to the seen side of life. It is individual recognition of the power and functions of the Law. It may be strong today and weak tomorrow, or it may cease to recognize the Law and, therefore, cease to manifest it. This we call death.
At the present time there is scarcely any knowledge of the Law at all. The lives of the present day are more a negation of the Law than a recognition of it. This is why the race is so feeble and sickly and wretched and poverty stricken, and why it grows old before it has gained any life-saving knowledge, and dies before it has begun to grow rightly.
Up to the present time, the children of men have been abortions. As seed germs of a nobler growth, they have simply had vitality enough to reproduce themselves on the same plane of utter negation of all saving knowledge of the Law, without the power to put forth a solitary sprout leading upward to that life above the soil in which they are withering.
You ask why–if the race is a negation of the Law rather than a recognition of it–it should exist at all. It is because all things, even recognition, is negative as well as positive. Moreover, there could be no positive recognition unless preceded by the negative forms of recognition. It is through a long series of efforts on the part of negative recognition that the power is begotten to recognize on the positive side.
Negation of the Law is an incipient form of recognition of the Law. It is a faint or feeble effort to recognize it. The terms "positive" and "negative," as I have already said, are relative.
My expressions "Law of Attraction," "Life Principle," "Law of Being," "Life Force," "Vital Force" and "Energy," all have much the same meaning; they all relate to the unseen side of existence; to the moving power which is out of sight, and which is only perceived by its effects. To perceive these effects is to manifest them, and the manifestation is the externalization, or the showing forth, of the power of the unseen or moving principle of existence.
As there are necessarily various terms used in speaking of the unseen side of life, so there are many terms used in speaking of the seen side. Everything, indeed, that relates to mental capacity, such as the words mind, intelligence, recognition, perception, concept, understanding, truth–for  truth is the verity or the proof of the existence of the law–relates to the visible side of existence. And I might as well explain here that "truth" is one of the most comprehensive of all words; that its real meaning includes every form of belief, erroneous belief as well as more correct belief. For truth means simply verity, and it ranges the entire scale of veritable or visible manifestations from the most negative to the most positive. The truth that denies to man the power I claim for him, is a truth on its own negative or ignorant plane, no less than the truth that man is a seed germ of all power. The latter assertion is also truth, and as a truth it is infinitely more positive than the former truth.
Therefore, the word truth means simply manifestation, or the verification of the Law, or of the Life Principle–the Universal Energy, etc. The word "truth" then, is synonymous with mind, intelligence, recognition, belief, etc., and relates to the manifestation of the Law on the external plane. But, as I said before, the word "truth" being negative as well as positive includes the word "error," just as the word "intelligence" includes (as its negative form of expression) the word "ignorance." All of these words that relate to the external side of life are on the sliding scale from negative to positive; from ignorant beliefs to intelligent beliefs, and from intelligent beliefs to still more intelligent beliefs; from a very limited conception of the Law of Being, and the power of the Law, to a larger conception of it. Therefore, in the external world nothing is fixed; everything is in incessant change, from the fact that all creatures are learning more and still more of the power of the Law.
It is only on the unseen side that we find the absolute and unchangeable; the Eternal I Am, the Law of Attraction, or Love, or Life–Being.


This ain't some sort of heavy hitting Thai curry, you wazzock!
You are looking at the great British future world title holder of Muay Thai. No, of course I've no idea what it is, but this fine lady is Ruqsana Begum, Thai World Championship double bronze medallist and the current Number One Contender for the World Title.
And whatever Muay Thai is (yeah – I could google it, but I've got some typing to do) – it looks a bit tough. And as Ruqsana trains in Bethnal Green at Bill Judd's gym, it probably is. And as with all really talented people – it doesn't just happen overnight – it takes years and years of effort. This hard working lady – also an architecture graduate – started training when she was 18. (Given that she now looks about 17, perhaps L'Oreal should look into this Muay Thai stuff?). There's got to be some pretty proud parents in the background somewhere.
So go and see what all the blood, sweat and tears have gone into, making this Londoner the best we've got. There might even be some on the walls. You can support Ruqsana at the KTMMA 3 fightsport event on 14th March, 2015 at the ILEC Conference Centre, Earls Court.
Tell us about any other Londoner's that you think we should recognise!


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Medication management is pharmacological assessment and interventions, possible modification of existing pharmacological regimen, ongoing determination of pharmacological efficacy, identification and management of adverse effects, initial prescription(s), and renewal(s) as necessary.
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Assist with staff development and activities.
The psychiatrist shall be a physician licensed by the state of New Jersey.
Must be a board certified psychiatrist with two years experience working with youth.
Should be involved in continuing education activities to further his/her own professional development.


text:
Q: How to generate string with a char repeated for n times? I can use the following code to generate a string.
$ awk -e 'BEGIN { for(i=1;i<=10;++i) s = s "x"; print s }'
xxxxxxxxxx

But its complexity is super-linear wrt the string length.
$ time awk -e 'BEGIN { for(i=1;i<=10000000;++i) s = s "x" }'

real    0m0.868s
user    0m0.857s
sys 0m0.008s
$ time awk -e 'BEGIN { for(i=1;i<=100000000;++i) s = s "x" }'

real    0m9.886s
user    0m9.801s
sys 0m0.065s
$ time awk -e 'BEGIN { for(i=1;i<=1000000000;++i) s = s "x" }'

real    1m46.074s
user    1m45.171s
sys 0m0.760s

Is there a better way to repeat a char n times and assign the result to a variable?

A: Use sprintf to create a string of spaces, then use gsub to replace each space with an x:
$  time awk  'BEGIN {s = sprintf("%*s", 100000000, ""); gsub(".", "x", s)}'

real    0m1.744s
user    0m1.645s
sys 0m0.098s

This can be wrapped in an awk function:
function mkStr(c, n,       s) {
  s = sprintf("%*s", n, "");
  gsub(".", c, s);
  return s;
}

(s is a parameter simply to scope the variable to the function; it needs no argument, and indeed, any argument passed will be ignored.)

Update: there appears to be a significant difference in performance depending on which version of awk you are using. The above test used 20070501, the BSD(?) awk that ships with macOS. gawk-5.1.0 takes significantly longer.
I don't know what accounts for the difference; perhaps there is a solution that is fast in both versions.
Update 2: Ed Morton (in the comments) has verified that gsub is responsible for the slow running time in gawk, could not find a workaround, and has filed a bug report with the maintainers.

A: function loop(n){
        for(i=1;i<=n;i++) s = s "x";
        return s;
}

function repl(n){
        s = sprintf("%*s", n, "");
        gsub(/ /, "x", s);
    return s;
}

function recStack(n,    h){
        switch( n ){
                case 0:
                        return "";
                default:
                        if( n % 2 == 1 ){
                                h = recStack( int((n-1)/2) )
                                return h h "x";
                    } else {
                                h = recStack( int(n/2) )
                                return h h;
                        }
        }
}

function recStackIf(n,    h){
        if( n == 0 ) return "";
        if( n % 2 == 1 ){
                h = recStackIf( int((n-1)/2) ); # create first half
                return h h "x";                 # duplicate + one "x"
        } else {
                h = recStackIf( int(n/2) );  # create first half
                return h h;                  # duplicate
        }
}

function recArray(n,    h, n2){
    if( n in a ) return a[n];
        switch( n ){
                case 0:
                        return a[0] = "";
                default:
                        if( n % 2 == 1 ){
                                n2 = int((n-1)/2);
                                h = recArray( n2 );
                                return a[n] = h h "x";
                        } else {
                                n2 = int(n/2);
                                h = recArray( n2 );
                                return a[n] = h h;
                        }
        }
}

function recArrayIf(n,    h, n2){
    if( n in a ) return a[n];
        if( n == 0 ) return a[0] = "";
        if( n % 2 == 1 ){
                n2 = int((n-1)/2);
                h = recArrayIf( n2 );
                return a[n] = h h "x";
        } else {
                n2 = int(n/2);
                h = recArrayIf( n2 );
                return a[n] = h h;
        }
}

function concat(n){
    exponent = log(n)/log(2)
    m = int(exponent)                   # floor
    m += (m < exponent ? 1 : 0)         # ceiling
    s = "x"
    for (i=1; i<=m; i++) {
        s = s s
    }
    s = substr(s,1,n)
    return s
}

BEGIN {
        switch( F ){
                case "recStack":
                        xxx = recStack( 100000000 );
                        break;
                case "recStackIf":
                        xxx = recStackIf( 100000000 );
                        break;
                case "recArray":
                        xxx = recArray( 100000000 );
                        break;
                case "recArrayIf":
                        xxx = recArrayIf( 100000000 );
                        break;
                case "loop":
                        xxx = loop( 100000000 );
                        break;
                case "repl":
                        xxx = repl( 100000000 );
                        break;
                case "concat":
                        xxx = concat( 100000000 );
                        break;
        }

print length(xxx);
##      xloop = loop(100000000 );
##      if( xxx == xloop ) print "Match";
}

Times are:
# loop :            real 0m5,405s, user 0m5,243s, sys 0m0,160s
# repl :            real 0m7,670s, user 0m7,506s, sys 0m0,164s
# recArray:         real 0m0,302s, user 0m0,141s, sys   0m0,161s
# recArrayIf:       real 0m0,309s, user 0m0,168s, sys   0m0,141s
# recStack:         real 0m0,316s, user 0m0,124s, sys   0m0,192s
# recStackIf:       real 0m0,305s, user 0m0,152s, sys   0m0,152s
# concat:           real 0m0,664s, user 0m0,300s, sys   0m0,364s

There's not much difference between the 5 versions of binary decomposition: a bunch of heap memory is used in all cases. Having the global array hang around until the end of all times isn't good and therefore I'd prefer either stack version.
wlaun@terra:/tmp$ gawk -V
GNU Awk 5.0.1, API: 2.0 (GNU MPFR 4.0.2, GNU MP 6.2.0)
wlaun@terra:/tmp$ lscpu
Architecture:                    x86_64
CPU op-mode(s):                  32-bit, 64-bit
Note that the above timing has been done with a statement printing the resulting string's length, which adds about 0.2 s to each version. Also, /usr/bin/time isn't reliable. Here are the relative "real" values from time without the print length(xxx):
# loop:       0m5,248s
# repl:       0m7,705s
# recStack:   0m0,103s
# recStackIf: 0m0,097s
# recArray:   0m0,103s
# recArrayIf: 0m0,099s
# concat:     0m0,455s

Added on request of Ed Morton:
Why is any of the recursive functions faster than any of the linear functions that iterate over O(N) elements? (The "O(N)" is the "big oh" symbol and is used to indicate a value that is N, possibly multiplied and/or incremented by some constant. A circle's circumference is O(r), it's area is O(r²).)
The answer is simple: By dividing N by 2, we get two strings of length O(N/2). This provides the possibility of re-using the result for the first half (no matter how we obtain it) for the second half! Thus, we'll get the second half of the result for free (except for the string copy operation, which is basically a machine instruction on most popular architectures). There is no reason why this great idea should not be applied for creating the first half as well, which means that we get three quarters of the result for free (except - see above). A little overhead results from the single "x" we have to throw in to cater for odd subdivisions of N.
There are many other recursive algorithms along the idea of halving and dealing with both sections individually, the most famous of them are Binary Search and Quicksort.

A: Here's a fast solution using any POSIX awk (tested on an average 8G RAM laptop running cygwin with GNU awk 5.1.0):
time awk -v n=100000000 'BEGIN {
    exponent = log(n)/log(2)
    m = int(exponent)                   # floor
    m += (m < exponent ? 1 : 0)         # ceiling
    s = "x"
    for (i=1; i<=m; i++) {
        s = s s
    }
    s = substr(s,1,n)
}'

real    0m0.665s
user    0m0.328s
sys     0m0.343s

The above just appends a copy of the string to itself until it's at least as big as the target string length and finally truncates it to exactly the desired length. The only somewhat tricky part is calculating how many times to append s to itself and that's just a case of solving 2^m = n for m given you already know n (100000000 in this case), see https://www.calculatorsoup.com/calculators/algebra/exponentsolve.php.
Obviously you could make the loop while ( length(s) < n ) instead of calculating m and that'd make the script briefer but would slow it down a bit (but it'd still be pretty fast):
$ time awk -v n=100000000 'BEGIN{s="x"; while (length(s) < n) s=s s; s=substr(s,1,n)}'

real    0m1.072s
user    0m0.562s
sys     0m0.483s

@JamesBrown had a better idea than calling length() on each iteration that also avoids having to calculate m while being about as fast:
$ time awk -v n=100000000 'BEGIN{s="x"; for (i=1; i<n; i*=2) s=s s; s=substr(s,1,n)}'

real    0m0.710s
user    0m0.281s
sys     0m0.390s

Originally I had the following thinking doubling strings of "x"s would be a faster approach than doubling individual "x"s on each iteration of the loop but it was a bit slower:
$ time awk -v n=100000000 '
    BEGIN {
        d = 1000000
        m = 7
        s = sprintf("%*s",d,"")
        gsub(/ /,"x",s)
        for (i=1; i<=m; i++) {
            s = s s
        }
        s = substr(s,1,n)
    }
'

real    0m1.030s
user    0m0.625s
sys     0m0.375s

The idea in that 2nd script was to generate a string long enough to be meaningful but short enough that gsub() can convert all blanks to "x"s quickly (which I've found to be 1000000 chars by trial and error), then just repeat the above process with fewer iterations.
I opened a bug report with the gawk providers about gsub() being slow for this case, see https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bug-gawk/2021-07/msg00030.html if you're interested, but it looks like the outcome of that will just be that gsub() is a heavy tool, it's not surprising that it takes a long time for 100 million regexp matches, but you can speed it up considerable by setting LC_ALL=C before it runs so gawk doesn't have to worry about multibyte locales.

A: If you are okay with perl:
# assigning to a variable
$ perl -e '$s = "x" x 10'

# printing the string
$ perl -e 'print "x" x 10'
xxxxxxxxxx

Note that there's no newline for the print in the above example, use perl -le if you want one.
Here's a timing comparison:
$ time perl -e '$s = "x" x 100000000'
real    0m0.071s

# script.awk is the first code from Ed Morton's answer
$ time mawk -v n=100000000 -f script.awk
real    0m0.136s

$ time gawk -v n=100000000 -f script.awk
real    0m0.429s

A: extreme test case benchmark - comparing python3's built-in repeater running on compiled C-code, versus user-level scripting of a different algorithm, generating 152.58 bn zeros.
 Starting point :: length =  4  < "0000" > | time =   0.000000 secs

 For-Loop # 1 | Lgth-Gain Ratio      6.0x | #-0's :              24. |  0.000036 secs (cum.)
 For-Loop # 2 | Lgth-Gain Ratio     26.0x | #-0's :             624. |  0.000050 secs (cum.)
 For-Loop # 3 | Lgth-Gain Ratio    626.0x | #-0's :         390,624. |  0.000175 secs (cum.)
 For-Loop # 4 | Lgth-Gain Ratio 390626.0x | #-0's : 152,587,890,624. | 21.485092 secs (cum.)

( mawk2 ; )
 4.38s user 13.69s system 81% cpu 22.226 total

( python3 -c 'print(len("0"*(5**4**2-1)))'; )
 4.34s user 17.32s system 71% cpu 30.291 total

152587890624

% ( time ( mawk2 '

    function comma(_,__,___,____,_____) {

        if(length(sprintf("%+.f",_))<=(\
          __*=__+=__=__~__)) {
          return \
             index(_,".") ?_:_"."
        }
         ____=CONVFMT;CONVFMT="%.1000g";___=_
         _____="[0-9]"
        gsub("^|$",_____,_____)
         sub("^[^.]+","",___)
         sub("("(_____)")+([.]|$)",",&",_)
        gsub(_____,"&,",_)
         sub("([,]*[.].*)?$",___,_)
         sub("[,]+$",".",_)
         sub("^[ \t]*[+-]?[,]+",\
             substr("-",__==__,_~"^[ \t]*[-]"),_)
      CONVFMT=____;
      return _ }

   function printProgress(_____) {

      print sprintf(" For-Loop "\
           "# %d | Lgth-Gain Ratio %8.1fx | "\
           "#-0\47s : %16s | %9s secs (cum.)",
            ++_-_____+!—_,
            (___^-!!___)*(___=length(__)),
            comma(___),timer())
      return fflush() }

   function timer(_,__,___) {

      return sprintf("%.*s%.*s%*.*f",
        !(_+=_+=(_=(_=__=___="")~_)+_),
         srand(),
        !(__+=__=--_),___=int((__^=++_)*\
                     +substr(srand(),++_)),
         __%(++_-+-++_),_+=_=(++_+--_)%—_,
        !_TIME0_?(_TIME0_=___)*!__\
            :(___-_TIME0_)/__)
 } BEGIN {
        ____=__+=__*=___=__^=(__+=++__)^__;
          gsub("",__,__)
        gsub(".",!__,__)

        print ORS,"Starting point :: length = ",
           ___=length(__=substr(__,__~__,_=4)),
              " < \42"(__)"\42 > | time = " ,
                       timer(), "secs", ORS;

        for(_____=_;_____;_____--) {
                  gsub("",__,__)
            printProgress(_____) } }' )) ;`

    sleep 2;

     ( time (python3 -c 'print(len("0"*(5**4**2-1)))' ))|lgp3;

UPDATE 1 : generic version of it
depending on which variant of awk, it automatically switches to BAU binary doubler, and for the squarer, the speed gains are so immense it's actually faster to square, then substring than trying to be pin-drop accurate at each level, which inherently slows it down. _mN is the binary double, genZeros is the exp-sqr one
mawk2 '
function _mN(__,____,_,___,_____,______){
    return \
    (_=_~_)<+__?(_____=_mN((__-(\
    ______=__%(_+=_)))/_,____,___))___\
    (_____)(______?(___)____:""):__<_?"":____

}
function genZeros(_,__,___,____) {
    if (+_<=+((__=___=____="")<__)) {
        return \
        (-_<+_) ? +__:___;
    } else if (FLG1*(_~"...")) {
        return _mN(_,_<_)
    }
    ____=__+=__*=___=__^=(__+=++__)^__;
    gsub("",__,__)-gsub(".",!__,__)
    if (_<__){ return \
        substr((__)__,_~_,_)
    }; ___=(___=__)___;__="";
    __+=++__+__;
    _-=__*(__=int((_/__)^(--__)^-!!_))*__;
    ___=(__<length(___))\
            ? substr(___,__~__,__) \
       : sprintf("%"(+"")"*.f",__,!__)
           gsub(".",(___)(___)___,___)
    return \
    !_?___:FLG2?\
    sprintf("%"(_<_)"*.f",+_,_)___:_mN(+_,_<_)

} BEGIN { CONVFMT=\
             OFMT="%.20g"
             FLG1=(+sprintf("%o",-1)<"0x1")
             FLG2=!(sprintf("%d",3E10)%2)
} {
    print length(genZeros(3^18)),3^18 }'

387420489 387420489

=================================
Doubling each loop is too slow. To get even better performance, you need exponential squaring. how about 88 milli-seconds :
 echo; ( time (gawk -v n=100000000 -Sbe 'BEGIN {

 CONVFMT=OFMT="%.20g"

 __="x";____="."
  _=10^((___=3)*___)
     gsub(____,__,_)

  while(___--){
      gsub(____,_,_)
  }
  print length(_) }' ) ) | lgp3

( gawk -v n=100000000 -Sbe ; )

0.07s user 0.01s system 95% cpu 0.088 total
100000000

And that's only for gawk. For mawk-2, it's an unearthly 32 msecs
echo; ( time ( mawk2 -v n=100000000 'BEGIN { CONVFMT=OFMT="%.20g"

   __="x";____=".";
   _=10^((___=3)*___)
         gsub(____,__,_)
   while(___--) {
      gsub(____,_,_) }

   print length(_) }' ) ) | lgp3

( mawk2 -v n=100000000 ; )
0.01s user 0.02s system 84% cpu 0.032 total
100000000

404 msecs is all it takes to go from just 1 single copy of "x", to nearly 4.3 billion copies of it :
 ( time ( mawk2 '
   BEGIN {
       ___=(_+=_+=++_)^(_*_)
        __=length(_=(_="x")(_)_);++___

       while(__*__<___) {
           gsub("",_,_)
               __*=++__
           print --__
       }
       print ORS,length(_),ORS  }' ) )

15
255
65535
4294967295

 4294967295

 0.09s user 0.25s system 84% cpu 0.404 total

UPDATE :
benchmarking generating 25.7 billion zeros — at this size level, python3's built-in repeater is being left in the dust
  echo; (fg && fg && fg ) 2>/dev/null;
  echo;
  ( time ( mawk2 '
          BEGIN {   _=_<_
                   __= 4
           while(__—) {
               gsub("",(_)(_)_,_)
           }
           print _ }'
       ) \
         | pvE9 | LC_ALL=C gwc -lc ) | ggXy3 | ecp
 sleep 1.5
 echo
 ( time ( python3 -c 'print("0"*25710762175)'
         ) \
 | pvE9 | LC_ALL=C gwc -lc ) | ggXy3 | ecp ; echo

     out9: 23.9GiB 0:00:08 [2.85GiB/s] [2.85GiB/s] [ <=> ]

  ( mawk2 'BEGIN { _=_<_;__=4; while(__--){ gsub("",(_)(_)_,_) };  print _ }'; )  0.79s user 4.72s system 63% cpu 8.729 total
  pvE 0.1 out9  0.54s user 2.93s system 41% cpu 8.435 total
  LC_ALL=C gwc -lc  2.03s user 1.46s system 41% cpu 8.434 total

      1 25710762176

     out9: 23.9GiB 0:00:11 [2.17GiB/s] [2.17GiB/s] [ <=> ]
   ( python3 -c 'print("0"*25710762175)'; )  1.24s user 6.84s system 72% cpu 11.076 total
   pvE 0.1 out9  0.56s user 2.80s system 30% cpu 11.075 total
   LC_ALL=C gwc -lc  2.03s user 1.46s system 31% cpu 11.074 total

      1 25710762176

UPDATE 2 : (partially unrelated, but to illustrate my thought process)
Once you realize there's a predictable and deterministic pattern to how the pop-count string appears and repeats, you can create the full pop-count string for all 256-bytes sequentially using only 4-cycles of the do-while loop,
without using hardware instructions, or having to go through every byte one-by-one, either in decimal integer bit-string form, in order to create a pop-count string. The one thing that's crucial though, is setting a CONVFMT value large enough to avoid scientific notation truncation, since the essence of the function is performing multiple 16-digit integer adds (getting near 2^53 but never exceeding) ::
 <<<''  mawk '

  function initPopCountStr(_,__,
          ___,____,_____,______) {
          # No.# of set:bits per:byte
          #
     __=_=(_<_)(______=___=_~_)
     ______+=++______;
     do {_=\
       (__=_)(__+(___=(___)___))
     } while (--______)
     return \
     (((_=(_)(____=(__+___)(___+__+___))\
     ____)(_____=((__+(___+=______=___)))\
                    (___+=__+______)))____\
              (_____)_____)(___)(______+___)
 } BEGIN {
     CONVFMT="%.20g"
 } {
     print initPopCountStr() }' \
                                 \
 | gsed -zE 's/(.{16})(.{16})/\1:\2\n/g' |nonEmpty|gcat -n|lgp3 4

     1  0112122312232334:1223233423343445
     2  1223233423343445:2334344534454556
     3  1223233423343445:2334344534454556
     4  2334344534454556:3445455645565667

     5  1223233423343445:2334344534454556
     6  2334344534454556:3445455645565667
     7  2334344534454556:3445455645565667
     8  3445455645565667:4556566756676778

Or if you prefer no loops at all, and have everything folded in into one fell swoop :
 function initPopCountStr(_,__,
         ___,____,_____,______) {
        # No.# of set:bits per:byte
       #
 return \
         \
  (((_=(_=(__=(_=(__=(_=(__=(_=(__=_=(_<_)(______=___=_~_))\
        (__+(___=(___)___)) ))(__+(___=(___)___))))\
        (__+(___=(___)___))))\
        (__+(___=(___)___)))(____=(__+___)(___+__+___))____)\
    (_____=((__+(___+=______=___)))(___+=__+______)))\
             (____)(_____)_____)(___)(______+___)
}

even the ultra lazy method is only 0.791 secs :
 out9: 95.4MiB 0:00:00 [ 129MiB/s] [ 129MiB/s] [<=> ]

( mawk2 -F= 'NF=+$_+(OFS=$_=$NF)' ORS= <<< '100000000=x'; )

0.59s user 0.16s system 95% cpu 0.791 total

And the fast method is 16 milli seconds
fg;fg; ( time ( <<< '100000000=x' mawk2 -F= '{

     _ = sprintf("%*s",__=int((____=+$(_=\
                     +(___="."))) ^ +(++_/(++_*_))),"")
         gsub(___,$NF,_)
    do { gsub(___,_,_)

    } while((__*=__)<____)

   print length(_),substr(_,1,31) }' ) ) | gcat -n | lgp3

   fg: no current job
   fg: no current job

( mawk2 -F=  <<< '100000000=x'; )

0.00s user 0.01s system 87% cpu 0.016 total
     1  100000000 xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

UPDATE : making 3,486,784,401 copies of "x" in 0.323 secs
 fg;fg; ( time ( <<< '43046721=x' mawk2 -F= '
        {
          ________=substr("",+srand()) +substr(srand(),7)
                 _=sprintf("%*s",__=int((___=+$(_=+\
                          (_____=".")))^(++_/(++_*_))),"")
                gsub(_____,$NF,_)
           do { gsub(_____, _, _) } while((__*=__)<___)

        print sprintf(" %15.8f GiB | %20.13f",
                     (__=length(_))/8^10,
                     ((substr("",+srand())+substr(srand(),7))-\
                     (___=________))/(1+4^-24))

        print substr(_,1,33)
        CONVFMT=OFMT="%.14g"
                ____=9
        while(--____){
          sub(".+","&&&&&&&&&",_)

          print sprintf(" %15.8f GiB | %20.13f",
                length(_)/8^10,((substr("",+srand()) +\
                substr(srand(),7))-___)/(1+4^-24)); fflush() } }' ) )

fg: no current job
fg: no current job

      0.04009038 GiB |      0.0077791213989
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

      0.36081345 GiB |      0.0445649623871
      3.24732103 GiB |      0.3233759403229
     29.22588923 GiB |      3.5619049072266
    263.03300306 GiB |     58.9802551269529

Grow it at a different rate and we get :

*

*103 billion copies of "x" just shy of 17 seconds
=
      0.04304672 x 10^9 |      0.0111348628998
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
    0.3013270470 x 10^9 (        301327047)|      0.0563540458679
    2.1092893290 x 10^9 (       2109289329)|      0.2259490489960
   14.7650253030 x 10^9 (      14765025303)|      1.4351949691773
  103.3551771210 x 10^9 (     103355177121)|     16.9313509464274

And relatively trivial to adjust it for arbitrary sizes :
{m,g}awk '{             # the timer bit is for mawk-2
     CONVFMT = "%.25g"
        OFMT = "%.13f"
    ________ =  substr("", +srand()) + substr(srand(), 7)
           _ = sprintf("%*s", __=int((___= +$(_=\
                     +(_____="."))^ (++_/(++_*_))),"")
    gsub(_____, $NF, _)
    do {
    print ___, gsub(_____, _, _),
              ((substr("",+srand()) +
                substr(srand(), 7)) -________)/(1-4^-25)

    } while ((__*=__)<___ && __<4^8)
    print ".", length(_)
    print \
    sprintf("\n----------------\n%42.f .%20.13f",
           (__=length(_))==___ ?__: (__=length(_= sprintf("%.*s",
            ___-__,_)(_))),((substr("", +srand()\
           )+substr(srand(),7))-________) / (1-4^-25))

    print substr(_, 1, 19)
}'

|
( mawk2 -F=  <<< '3987654321=x'; )

0.20s user 0.55s system 94% cpu 0.799 total

3987654321               251  0.0000970363617
3987654321             63001  0.3465299606323
.                 3969126001
----------------
3987654321        .           0.7496919631958

A: Is there a better way to repeat a char n times and assign the result to a variable?
I propose following solution limited to case where n is equal to 2^x and x is integer equal or greater 1. For example to get x repeated 32 i.e. 2^5 times
awk 'BEGIN{s="x";for(i=1;i<=5;i+=1)s=s s;print s}' emptyfile.txt

output
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

(tested in gawk 4.2.1)


text:
"define metadata";
({
    "dependencies": {
        "gritter": "0.0.0"
    },
    "provides": [
        {
            "ep": "notificationHandler",
            "name": "gritter",
            "description": "Produces Growl-like notifications using the jQuery Gritter plugin.",
            "level": "info",
            "pointer": "#gritter"
        }
    ]
});
"end";

var $ = require('jquery').$;
require('gritter');

exports.gritter = function(message) {
    var title = message.title || ' ';
    $.gritter.add({
        title: title,
        text: message.body
    });
};

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


text: Q: Is there a react-native-chartkit alternative that supports windows? I am looking for a working alternative to react-native-chartkit that supports react-native-windows. From what I understand react-native-svg doesn't support windows yet which is a dependency for a lot of these packages. I am trying to build a yearly activity graph for a windows app, was wondering if there are any packages for that may have went under my radar. Thanks in advance!


text:
<?php echo Form::open(array( "class"=>"form-horizontal"), $hidden = array('user_id' => $user_id)); ?>

	<fieldset>

			<?php echo Form::label('Feedback', 'feedback', array('class'=>'control-label')); ?>

				<?php echo Form::textarea('feedback', Input::post('feedback', isset($feedback) ? $feedback->feedback : ''), array('class' => 'col-md-8 form-control', 'rows' => 8, 'placeholder'=>'Feedback')); ?>

			<?php echo Form::submit('submit', 'Save', array('class' => 'btn btn-primary')); ?>

	</fieldset>
<?php echo Form::close(); ?>


During Lady Gaga's headlining Coachella performance this past weekend, she debuted "The Cure." But even though the breezy song is now out from under wraps ("I've been trying to keep it a secret for so long," she told the festival crowd), much about the collective that produced it remains shrouded in mystery.
Longtime Gaga collaborator DJ White Shadow (real name Paul Blair) — who co-wrote "The Cure" with Nick Monson ("Applause"), Lukas Nelson, Mark Nilan, and the Lady herself — recently denied speculation that, despite having worked on hits like "Born This Way" and "The Edge of Glory" in the past, he'd also produced the catchy tune, instead noting Monson had crafted its radio-friendly sound alongside a relatively unknown outfit called Detroit City.
Gaga will be back to perform at the festival next weekend and by then, we're sure everyone will be able to sing along.


text:
Review: Water at the New Blood Theatre, Fringe HQ
By Bella Thompson
Appropriately opening to the public on the 105th anniversary of his execution in 1914, "Water" is the story of Carl Hans Lody – tour guide, green grocer, spy.
From his life as an orphan child to his work in a green grocer, his near death experience with typhoid fever and his "brief and anxious career as a spy" during the First World War, German spy Carl Hans Lody ('Hans' to both his friends and enemies) narrates his own story and confides in the audience as a diary through his increasingly precarious vocation.
Written and directed by Mark Langham (who also features in the cast) "Water" reads similarly to a first person novel, the audience following the perspective of Lody and offered insight to his nervous and overly eager disposition in frequent asides. Langham's direction is somewhat inconsistent within the playing of different characters – those in the ensemble acting as one dimensional cartoons with little depth, while Lody (played by Stephen Lloyd-Coombs) is able to develop as the story progresses, and comes off as earnest and authentic.
The cast hopped skillfully through a myriad of characters – with the three ensemble members playing over twelve different people over the course of the one act play, where each new character we were introduced to was more of a caricature than the last. Aiding in the somewhat stereotyped characterizations were countless accents that were largely quite impressive (although there was one purposefully shrill and painful French that we can ignore). Praise must be given to all for their efforts on that front but particularly so to Lloyd-Coombs who managed to step effortlessly back and forth through stiff and proper English and the strongly generic General American.
Lib Campbell's pleasant and strong-willed Ida McClyment made a congenial but fleetingly short-lived match with Lody after his near exposure on a train journey. Campbell's Ida, as well as her elderly and aggressively Scottish land-lady Mrs McCready, delivered some of the funniest lines f the show (that famous Scottish wit shining through dead-pan sarcastic remarks) – no small feat in a play that had the audience shouting with laughter in almost every scene.
Sophie Pekbilimli's stop/start lighting cutting between scenes like photo slides certainly wasn't the prettiest of lighting designs but it did the job and was well matched to the equally sudden transitions between each location. Being lurched through what felt like an average of five locations in as many minutes (and back and forth through two main lighting states to accompany each section) induced a bit of motion sickness and failed to do any more than make it very clear that we were indeed speeding through Lody's life without much time left to catch our breath.
A few lovely intimate moments where Lody steps to the edge and off the stage were, however, particularly well lit; a spotlight casting a sepia toned filter over the stage, which matched the vintage mood and the aged newspapers that served as wallpaper for the largely bare set. Though short, the sections of monologue in this state concealed the ensemble and allowed the audience to have a private moment with Lody before being thrown back into the narrative.
Stephen Lloyd-Coombs is utterly endearing as the German spy Carl Hans Lody, the charm and polite manner to everyone he encounters (including when being led to his execution) manage to balance the slightly pathetic awkwardness of the man we were allowed to see when not undercover. The nuanced facial expressions of Lloyd-Coombs – tiny blips where we can see everything happening in the mind of the man behind the spy – were perfectly matched for the incredibly intimate venue, where the audience was able to pick up every micro-expression. Such subtle intricacies would never have been able to carry through in a larger theatre – let alone add so much to our understanding of the purpose and honor Lody was so desperate for.
Through a highly amusing show that had everyone chuckling in their seats, there was complete silence for the final moments where we were forced to say goodbye to the man who floundered his way through the war and into our affections. The dramatic shift in tone was something I wasn't prepared for and had me on the edge of my seat hoping for a deus ex machina to appear and save Lody – Hans, if I may - from his inevitable end.
The show itself feels as though it is still somewhat in development – another workshop to clean up the progression of the narrative could only make it better. Even so, overall this is a highly enjoyable show, with a lovable fool at its heart. Though he was "not the usual type one associates with espionage," the audience clearly liked him, and as Langham says himself in his Director's note: "How could you not?"
image Supplied


text:
Q: WireMockEducation:test: Could not find com.github.JensPiegsa:wiremock-extension:0.4.0 I tried to add the wiremock-extension to the project, but Gradle can't find the needed repository.

*

*I take the repo from the official maven repo:

https://mvnrepository.com/artifact/com.github.JensPiegsa/wiremock-extension/0.4.0

*

*build.gradle:

plugins {
    id "java"
}

....

repositories{
    mavenCentral()
    maven {
        url "https://repository.mulesoft.org/nexus/content/repositories/public/"
    }
}

dependencies {
...
    //wiremock
    testImplementation "com.github.tomakehurst:wiremock-jre8-standalone:2.24.1"
    testImplementation group: 'com.github.JensPiegsa', name: 'wiremock-extension', version: '0.4.0'
}

The error I received:

WireMockEducation:test: Could not find com.github.JensPiegsa:wiremock-extension:0.4.0.
Searched in the following locations:
  - https://repo.maven.apache.org/maven2/com/github/JensPiegsa/wiremock-extension/0.4.0/wiremock-extension-0.4.0.pom
  - https://repository.mulesoft.org/nexus/content/repositories/public/com/github/JensPiegsa/wiremock-extension/0.4.0/wiremock-extension-0.4.0.pom

A: First of all, mvnrepository isn't an "official repo". Rather, it is a site that aggregates information from multiple "real" maven repositories, and it might not contain the latest information.
If you look at the actual Mulesoft repository, you will find that the module is indeed not there anymore (except for some metadata):
Index of /repositories/public/com/github/JensPiegsa/wiremock-extension
Name    Last Modified   Size    Description
Parent Directory
maven-metadata.xml.md5  Mon Sep 13 04:55:04 UTC 2021    33
maven-metadata.xml.sha-256  Mon Sep 13 04:55:04 UTC 2021    65
maven-metadata.xml.sha-512  Mon Sep 13 04:55:04 UTC 2021    129
maven-metadata.xml.sha1 Mon Sep 13 04:55:04 UTC 2021    41

But from the project documentation, you can see that you should use the Jitpack repository instead of Mulesoft:
repositories {
     mavenCentral()
     maven { url "https://jitpack.io" }
}
dependencies {
    testImplementation "com.github.tomakehurst:wiremock-jre8-standalone:2.24.1"
    testImplementation "com.github.JensPiegsa:wiremock-extension:0.4.0"
}


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text:
December 23, 2019 December 23, 2019 M. Noonan
Not quite sure how the impeachment thing plays out, now. There are polls which show support for it dropping, others showing that everyone wants Trump gone yesterday…OTOH, the RNC has seven times the money of the DNC. Democrat candidates still can't draw flies while Trump gets massive, enthusiastic crowds at the drop of a hat.
The Democrat claim that they want a "fair" trial is garbage, of course. What they want is a long series of witnesses called for their side while no one is allowed to even mention Biden's name. The purpose of Democrat getting witnesses is to have a daily drama – with carefully served up bits on the news – of "the walls are closing in on Trump". The hope there is that it will eventually cause a break in Trump's support – though they know that is highly unlikely. Failing that, they just want Trump tied up with impeachment while they sort out which loser gets to face him in November. I highly doubt that McConnell will accommodate the Democrats and even wets like Romney are going to be wary of doing anything which appears to give the Democrats anything.
The real action is now with Barr, anyway: what he does will determine the long-term affect of all this. If he winds up with some toothless report deploring "mistakes", then he's been a waste of time…if he brings indictments, then the whole thing could become a catastrophe for the Democrats. Lots of people are saying it is for sure one or the other – but no one actually knows; unlike the Mueller investigation, Barr's troops are keeping things close to the vest. Which is right and proper…but irritating in we'd all like to know what's coming.
Rep. Van Drew, who switched to the GOP, says he had to because he was essentially ordered to vote in favor of impeachment. The Democrats claim they didn't whip votes for it, but I'm pretty confident they promised no money and possible primary challenges to anyone who didn't toe the line. Van Drew is just trying to save his career, naturally: he's in a Trump district and this is his chance to stay in office. But it still is astonishing that a person will switch to the minority party…this should have got a lot more play, but the MSM was clearly ordered by the DNC to ignore it.
Meanwhile, Trump and McConnell are remaking the courts – especially the infamous 9th Circuit. Now, before you pop the corks, remember that if the Democrats ever control the White House and Congress again, they will simply change the courts as necessary to either remove them from the equation or remake them as liberal. People forget that the number of Justices and the number of federal courts is set by Congress. They can expand the Supreme Court to 15 and the federal courts to any number they think convenient. They could make, say, a Conservative 9th in charge of Utah and Idaho and just make an entirely new one for CA, WA and OR. Also, the Democrats, back in that much power, wouldn't have the least compunction against just ignoring the law. It is good that we're changing the courts because this will allow us to prevail on the legal merits far more often than not…but we can't go to sleep on this. We have to keep the liberals out of power.
Johnson won big in Britain and now he's got a chance to remake British politics as much as Trump is remaking ours. The key for both the Tories and the GOP is to wed populism to conservatism…to make the right the party of the people. Brits, by and large, are far more liberal than Americans, of course, so its not a one for one comparison…but your basic Brit still does share many notions with your basic American. We like things fair and square; we like to have our opportunities and to keep our rewards; we like our own countries and don't really care too much about foreign nations; we like to stand up to international bullies, but we aren't interested in looking for crusades. We don't have any problem with giving a poor person a hand, but we don't like multigenerational welfare families – eventually, you gotta go to work; we're very tolerant, but tolerance cuts both ways – we'll tolerate the weirdos, but they have to tolerate us, too. If Trump and Johnson can pull it off, we might be in for a generation of center/right governance in both countries.
California is going after HAM radio operators – and it may just be another example of California's government being stupid, but I wonder: is it really an effort to shut down a mode of communications the government has no control over? If your long term plan is to set up an oppressive regime – and that is the Left's long term plan – then you can't afford to leave the people with an unrestricted means of sharing news.
Open ThreadBoris Johnson, Courts, Impeachment
Previous Article Open Thread
Next Article Merry Christmas!
15 thoughts on "Open Thread"
Amazona December 23, 2019 / 12:00 pm
Barr said, of the effort to recast the mistakes made by the FBI as just "'oops" mistakes, …I think there are episodes there that simply cannot be squared with innocent mistakes. And I think people have to come to terms with that.
He also said, later in his interview with Martha MacCallum, …I think that the one of the problems with what happened was precisely that they pulled the investigation up to the executive floors, and it was run and bird dogged by a very small group of very high level officials. And the idea that this was seven layers below him (Comey) is simply not true.
It will be interesting to see just how far up those "executive floors" ago, as Comey's boss was Barack Obama.
https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2019/12/20/barr_unexplained_misconduct_that_may_involve_bad_motive_cannot_be_squared_with_innocent_mistakes.html
This has been my perception from the very beginning, and the basis for my observation that Trump's reference to Crowdstrike in his phone call was the spark that lit the fuse of the impeachment effort. I have been saying all along that I believe there was a decision made at the highest levels of the Left that it would be worth losing the House to Republicans for a couple of election cycles if an impeachment melodrama would successfully divert attention away from the criminality, going all the way into the Oval Office, represented by the DNC/Clinton interaction with Ukraine, Christopher Steele and Crowdstrike.
WASHINGTON – Congressman Steve King (R-Iowa) argued that House Democrats impeached President Trump to "shield" themselves from the "reckoning that will come" after U.S. Attorney John Durham releases his final report on the establishment of the Russia investigation.
"Hillary Clinton and the Democrats hired a foreign interest to deal with the Russians to try to bring dirt from Russia back on Donald Trump," King said, referring to ex-MI6 agent Christopher Steele's dossier, on Wednesday before the House formally voted to impeach President Trump.
https://pjmedia.com/trending/congressman-dems-impeached-trump-to-shield-themselves-from-reckoning-that-will-come/
I think Pelosi tried valiantly to save the House by walking the tightrope presented to her, of creating a media circus sufficient to distract a gullible public and possibly have the corollary benefit of smearing Trump and maybe even swaying the election but with the very real risk of alienating so many voters the party will be crippled for years. We watched her trying to balance the blind howling hatred of the junior mob and the profoundly stupid in the House with her understanding of the downside of what they were trying to do and why they had to make the effort. As much as I despise her, she is smart and canny, and she was caught between the pathological lying and spotlight-mad Adam Schiff, the narcissistic ignorance of the AOC crowd, the racist element represented by Sheila Jackson Lee and her group and the harsh reality that their job was to spin straw into gold and convince the nation that they were acting to preserve the Constitution while blatantly trashing it. It was a thankless and impossible job, and it has crushed her.
And, more important, these people were always up against seriously smart people like Barr and Durham, backed by an equally canny President Trump, and they have managed to trash the Dem House while making no headway at all in distracting from the real dangers of the efforts, going back several years, to weaponize federal agencies to illegally spy on American political opponents and then to use the legal system to destroy them and anyone who supported them.
As a side benefit, they have simultaneously energized Republicans in Congress and shown what can happen when they stop playing defense. The Denver Broncos defense has scored a lot of points over the years, but in general it's hard to win if you insist on always playing defense. I think people like Nunes and his persistent scholarly approach to digging up and then laying out facts, and Jim Jordan and his in-your-face challenges, have been examples to Congressional Republicans, and the Left is now wondering if there are other sleeping giants lurking in the Senate ready to pick up the gauntlet once they have a chance. The Senate has been pretty quiet, letting Lindsey Graham be the spokesperson, but I have a feeling Ted Cruz has been laying out his attack strategy and is eager to be turned loose.
Retired Spook December 23, 2019 / 12:40 pm
As much as I despise her, she is smart and canny
Shrewd and canny with great political instincts, but I disagree on "smart." All you have to do is listen to her to realize that she's not all that intelligent.
I agree on Cruz. I've seen a couple interviews with him in recent days, and I fully expect him to play a major role in any Senate impeachment proceedings.
Amazona December 23, 2019 / 7:58 pm
I know what you mean about Nan coming across as stupid, but I think that is the effect of the incredible stress she has been under. Till the past couple fo years she has seemed to be pretty bright, at least in a political context. And even lately she has been smart enough to know impeachment is a short cut to Democrat misery: She's just been herded into what she knows is a mistake.
There are different kinds of smart and you are right, what she is showing us now is a lack of any of them. But that can also be a symptom of her just not being able to find a way to say anything that will make this mess any less messy.
jdge1 December 23, 2019 / 1:15 pm
YCMTSU
"New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo has vetoed a non-controversial bipartisan bill that would have allowed all federal judges to officiate weddings in the state because some might have been nominated to the bench by President Donald Trump.
"I cannot in good conscience support legislation that would authorize such actions by federal judges who are appointed by this federal administration," Cuomo's veto message stated, the New York Post reported.
The legislation, sponsored by Democratic state Sen. Liz Krueger, passed the state Senate by a 61 to 1 vote. It passed the state Assembly by a 144 to 2 tally. Both the state Senate and Assembly are under Democratic control."
TDS anyone?
Now that is just plain stupid. Why disrespect the entire NY statehouse? Why put yourself in the position of having a veto overridden? And on such a brain-dead excuse? What next—disallowing marriages by clergy who represent religions he doesn't like?
What a moron. No wonder he is known as Fredo……
jdge1 December 23, 2019 / 11:18 pm
It really is beyond absurd. You can acquire an online certificate showing you're a minister of an unaffiliated religion simply by filling out a short questionnaire, and then officiate a wedding recognized by NY. That Cuomo has a problem with a federal judge only based on who appointed him or her, without any regards to their qualifications, shows just how unhinged the left really is.
I think a Senate focus on a Biden, either one of the Bidens, would be a mistake. Let the DOJ deal with them. They can do it better, in more detail, with subpoenas and professional investigators and the objectivity that would not exist in the context of an impeachment trial allegedly sparked by mention of a Biden. Let it go. Getting lured into the cheap thrills of trashing the Bidens would be, I think, like being thrown into the briar patch, benefiting the Dems. They know Joe is toast, and sacrificing him is fine with them, if it contributes to the distraction. And going after the Bidens would spark a hysteria firestorm that would be the distraction the Left wants.
The real danger to the House in this would be the revealing of the lies, machinations, manipulations and general dishonesty and criminality that let the hearing take place in the first place. I am afraid we will let them taunt us into addressing the wrong things here. The two charges are so subjective that people can argue about them forever and minds will not be changed, and we will be wasting an opportunity if we try. But the hard cold facts of the steps taken by Vindman, Ciaramella, Ciaramella's friend, Schiff and his staff and Atkinson is a clear path of corruption and criminality from Vindman all the way to the claim Ciaramella was a legitimate whistleblower
jdge1 December 24, 2019 / 12:19 am
Looks like Hunter is in deep doo-doo in more ways than one.
" Hunter Biden, he was a no-show at a hearing to determine child support for the baby he insisted wasn't his, and the judge had ordered him to furnish three years of tax returns. That paternity case keeps coming back to bite him in his behind, because the New York Post reports that, according to court documents filed Monday, Hunter Biden is the subject of multiple criminal investigations related to "fraud, money laundering, and a counterfeiting scheme."
It was revealed on Monday that House Democrats are considering adding additional articles of impeachment against President Donald Trump, Fox News reported.
https://townhall.com/tipsheet/bethbaumann/2019/12/23/house-democrats-are-contemplating-adding-new-articles-of-impeachment
I think the president should suggest that all Americans support this, because the last few months have shown us how much better off we are when the Democrats are putting all their energy into silly gamesmanship instead of getting in the way of governing the nation.
Imagine the heads exploding if he were to point out that the last three months or so have been some of the most productive in recent history, and this is clearly because the adults in Congress and the White House could get work done while the Dems entertained themselves and their lapdog media with their impeachment circus. But there is still a lot to do, so please, Dems, find another excuse to keep this charade going.
jdge1 December 24, 2019 / 9:08 am
Wishing everyone a very Merry Christmas and the Lord's blessing of peace.
Amazona December 24, 2019 / 10:36 am
emphasis mine: Another btatant effort to shove the demands of the Central Authority down t he throats of people who seem to think they have personal liberty to decided where and how they live:
Democrats in Virginia may override local zoning to bring high-density housing, including public housing, to every neighborhood statewide — whether residents want it or not.
"Single-family housing zones would become two-zoned," Samirah told the Daily Caller News Foundation. "Areas that would be impacted most would be the suburbs that have not done their part in helping out."
So some Leftist elites (1) identify a problem through their own prism; (2) decide what would solve the problem they have identified; (3) demand that others submit to their concept of how to resolve the problem and "do their part in helping out"; and (4) this is not optional because they are going to use the power of the State to enforce it.
And, of course, their argument is based on two of the reasons the Left gives for EVERYTHING—–racism and the environment.
But…..people in Virginia voted in a Democrat state government, and this is what you get. You can't vote for tyranny and then fret because you get…..tyranny. Perhaps the people of Virginia should demand that before any other neighborhoods be forcibly changed, high-density low-income housing be built next to the homes of those voting for this.
https://www.bizpacreview.com/2019/12/24/dems-seek-to-squash-suburban-single-family-house-zoning-calling-it-racist-bad-for-environment-
Retired Spook December 24, 2019 / 11:03 am
Since Trump was elected we've had several trolls question how, as Christians, we can morally support Trump. From the same site as Amazona's Virginia housing link is an excellent article by Dennis Prager responding to the pro-impeachment article in Christianity Today.
That IS a good article. There are some things I would add.
One is that the very core of Christian teaching is based on the concepts of forgiveness, salvation and redemption. The people Christ Himself chose as His closest and most beloved followers were sinners. He preached that any of us can overcome sin, if we so choose, and once we accept Him we are cleansed and saved.
Yet these pompous, super-pious "Christians" deny that this is possible to Donald Trump. That leads me to the question of why—-do they deny this concept in general, sentencing every sinner to scorn and rejection no matter how he or she may have changed and started to follow a new path? That is, do they simply reject and deny these basic teachings of Christ out of hand, in general? Or do they just deny that this is possible for Donald Trump, or has defined him over the past decade or so?
I think it is the latter, which is why I have such contempt for these psuedo-Christians who use profoundly un-Christian attitudes to condemn someone by pretending that their condemnation is based on their values and not on bigotry and hatred by actually basing those values ON bigotry and hatred.
Perhaps they will acknowledge that yes, they suppose this MIGHT be possible even for Trump—but that he has not gone through this process. That, of course, would mean relying on the same tea leaves, the same crystal balls, that guide other haters who have decided that they somehow have the ability to look beyond what is said and done to discern some hidden, secret but overriding motive and that this is what really counts. This is the kind of thing we have seen acted out on the national stage as rabid Dem haters have tried to remove a president based on hidden, unspoken but wholly attributed motives and intentions only they could find and correctly interpret.
In other words, this so-called "Christian" posturing is really just narcissism. It is really just the assertion that they, somehow, due to some no-doubt inherent superior qualities of intellect or morality, have the ability to sense a deep and underlying truth that overrides the actual words and actions of a man as well as the core concepts of the religion they claim to represent.
I just finished a very very long and complex book series which ended in some really interesting theology, similar in a way to the allegorical writing of C.S. Lewis, a story in which the deity who was the basis of the religion of most of the characters ended up appearing and acting in a very Christ-like manner, with messages of salvation and redemption. It was kind of a surprise.
One character is trying to convince another that his past sins do not necessarily define him for the rest of his life, that he has the ability to become a different person. He says:
Becoming a good man's easy. Act like one, even if it's an act. Some say 'Who you are is what you do'. They're wrong, but not all wrong. What you do forms who you are. Then who you are forms what you do. It's a vicious cycle, or a virtuous one, depending. One act doesn't undo all of who you are, but a thousand acts make you who you are. (Acknowledgement to Brent Weeks.)
It's a cheap trick to run through a movie of a man's life, stop it at some arbitrary point and then use that frame, or a few selected frames, to define him as everything he ever was, everything he is now, and everything he ever will be. It not only defies Christian teaching, it defies free will. But it meets the emotional needs of the narcissistic, who so often are rigidly judgmental.
Retired Spook December 24, 2019 / 6:17 pm
I can't think of a better way of saying Merry Christmas to all my friends at Blogs for Victory than with my favorite Christmas Carol.


Meet Johnny Stormonth-Darling. Trained in biomedical engineering and nanofabrication with a penchant for drumming in his spare time, Johnny wants to see local food systems transform where our food comes from. He's also a passionate supporter of investing in the right things for the right reasons. He told us why.
Triodos Bank: Hey Johnny. Can you tell us a bit about yourself?
Johnny SD: So I'm a single guy in my early 30s who aspires to find, but hasn't quite landed upon, that awesome thing that he should be doing. I've sampled a fairly diverse range of careers and ultimately landed a PhD in Biomedical Engineering in the process. I recently left regular employment and am wanting to dig into something that addresses global challenges more immediately. At some point, I'm intending to start an urban farming business. Done poorly, urban farming is just growing overpriced lettuce, but done right, I think that it can have a real impact.
JSD: People tell me that I say "big picture" too much, but that's honestly what motivates me! I love being useful, but I'm not a natural carer, so I see my role as playing some behind-the-scenes part in improving the lives of as many people as possible. I'd like to exercise my technological chops to meet this end in a sustainable way.
TB: What is the most valuable lesson you have learnt?
JSD: Let me think about that… Never assume anything about someone, people always surprise you. Oh, and don't be afraid to ask stupid questions. Finally: take note if you find yourself being overly self-reflective when someone asks you a question like this!
TB: What's important to you when it comes to investing?
JSD: Essentially, it's about who's benefiting. Many investments won't even disclose where the money is going. I'm uncomfortable with the thought that I might be blindly investing in things like arms, fossil fuels or crazy financial schemes. I want to know what my investment is funding and I want it to fund things that promote sustainability and equality.
TB: Why did you choose to invest in a Triodos SRI fund?
JSD: I came into some money and wanted to invest it where I new it would do some real good. Things like positive technolgoies, responsible businesses and microfinance, where individuals in the developing world can be given a wee leg up for the benefit of themselves in a world that is geared towards exploiting them. I found out that Triodos as one of very few organisations set up to do this at a level comparable to traditional banks. Your investment criteria fully allayed any questions about where my money would go and what I might end up investing in. And the return on investment seemed equal or even better than the majority of traditional investment organisations. It was a win-win.
TB: How do you think finance can be a force for good?
JSD: By ensuring that ethical and environmentally conscious businesses have money to grow, it will be possible to improve the world in spite of the system we now have. By lending to the little guy, we can help to beat a path towards equality and sustainable development by empowering the least powerful.
TB: What's your best top tip?
JSD: Just like choosing where to invest, the more small things you can do to learn about the world, the better it is for you and for everybody else. Maybe one day you'll learn something that lets you do a big good thing that seems easy.
Triodos Bank is about helping real people use their money to make a real difference. As a Triodos customer, Johnny was featured in our recent Socially Responsible Investment campaign. You can find out more about the campaign on the Triodos Bank website.