fabiochiu/medium-articles huggingface dataset:
The letter to a son of The Man I love
By: Alexandra I.
Tags: Life Lessons, Relationships, Love, Family, Life

So Jude, let me write you my story, please let me explain how it was for me.

Photo by Anne Nygård on Unsplash

I never asked for that Love. I simply lived and thought I was happy. I had a great job, wonderful friends, and a loving family. I was not looking for more. But of course, I felt I was missing something.

I still remember the day I saw your father. It was a cold early morning. A gloomy unsmiling man opened the door of a minivan and entered my life. Did I already know that it is the man? My Man? Surely not. Though a strong unbreakable desire to make this man happy settled down in my heart.

Presently I question myself more and more: “Was it faith or a Mother Theresa’s complex?”

People who once desperately needed to be saved want to save others. I guess this is my case. But nevertheless, I hope that it is Love. Because if not, then everything wasn’t worth it — time was wasted, lives were ruined and the future is f… foggy.

Well Jude, I really don’t expect much understanding from you. Anyway, you are just a lost kid (what I was once), who doesn’t know a lot. You lived in your perfect fairy tale world your parents built for you; and when your father decided to step out from this world it caused shock, it caused anger, aggression, denial.

I saw a lot of your tears. Each time I was eager to help you. I even tried, but certainly, you didn’t accept it, you put your hand in the air showing — back off. And you will always do that. I understand. I accept.

What I can’t get is — why do you blame only your father? Responsibility is shared by two people to make a happy marriage.

I was married once and divorced. I blame both of us. We wbere not able to listen to each other’s words, to see each other’s souls, to fulfill each other’s wishes, to help each other’s dreams to become true. I was miserable in that marriage, though my ex-husband is a good man. Are you positive in the goodness of your mother? Was she a good wife? Do you know that?

Photo by Letizia Bordoni on Unsplash

The truth is we never know what happens in families behind closed doors. We see only a facade, but not real struggles and sacrifices. Too many times we expect too much, but reality can hit us badly. And even when the marriage is over some of us don’t want to accept it, especcialy when kids are involved. Parents don’t want to hurt their kids, so they build a fantasy around children hoping that everything will become better.

What did you see in your family? Was your father happy? Did you ask yourself these questions before starting your yelling and insulting?

You know Jude, life is pretty complicated but beautiful.

So breathe before talking, stop before acting, feel before watching.

I wish you all happiness in this world, wish you to meet a lovely girl and grow old with her, wish you to let only kind vibes into your soul, wish you to live in harmony with any creature on this beautiful planet.
Snake Game with JavaScript
By: Rabi Roshan
Tags: JavaScript, Web Development, Tutorial, Writeabyte, Games

Remember the snake game that kept us hooked, back in the old days? Here’s a simple JavaScript tutorial to help you build it! Take a sneak peak into the live demo of the game, before you begin!

This article is meant for those who are new to JavaScript. I’ve broken down the process of creating a snake — game into simple concise steps, which you can follow.

The explanation of the code is detailed in the comments in the code.

And wait! Already familiar with HTML and CSS? Skip to step 4 for the JavaScript code!

Step 1: Base file creation

Beginning the process, initially we would need to create the base files for the project. An HTML file as the foundation, a CSS file for the styling, and the JavaScript file with the code for the game!

1. index.html

2. snake_game.css

3. snake_game.js

Step 2: The HTML file

With HTML, alone you can create the simplest of websites. HTML is the markup language for web pages. To get a thorough idea of the different HTML elements, HTML tags and so on, check out: W3Schools for HTML.

Here, the different div elements we have chosen are:

1. “gameContainer”, as the base for the game board.

2. “scoreContainer”, to keep the scores.

3. “onScreenControllers”, with the navigation buttons for the mobile screen.

We’ve also linked our style-sheet — ‘snake_game.css’ and loaded our game logic through ‘snake_game.js’ in the html file.

Check out the comments in the code for a line-by-line explanation.

Code (HTML)

Add the following content to index.html:

HTML code

Step 3: The CSS file

CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) is used to decorate the otherwise plain HTML file. Without using CSS, the amount of designing we can do to the web page is extremely limited. To get a detailed idea about the different CSS tags, check out W3Schools for CSS.

Using snake_game.css we have styled every small and big element on our html file, from the game board, to the snake, it’s food, and the onscreen control buttons as well!

Check out the comments in the code for a line-by-line explanation.

Code (CSS)

Add the following content to snake_game.css:

(Play around to create different themes 😉)

Step 4: Game logic — Javascript file

This is the most important step, or where the game logic comes to play. Here we write code for the javascript file ‘snake_game.js’.

Initialize the score variables:

2. Code for the Game Board pixels:

3. Code for the Food:

4.Code for the Snake 🐍:

4.1. Code related to the Direction of the snake:

4.2. Code related to the Movement of the snake:

5. Code to start the game using the above logic:

The complete snake_game.js is here:

With this, you now have a perfect snake game! Try it out, and reach out to me if you have doubts, through my website rabiroshan.com!

Here you’ll find the complete project on my Github repository!

Feel free to use the code!
Ancient Knowledge of the Trees
By: Breanna Lowman
Tags: Poetry, Poetry On Medium, Reflections, Poem, Nature

Ancient Knowledge of the Trees

Fascination with the rotting pine

Photo by Bradley Brister on Unsplash

The earth spoke to me

Before I had realization

With fascination

Of the rotting pine

Fallen trees

I could not help but notice

Messages

From the divine



Whispers through splinters

Words cutting to the heart

Revelation speaking in

Windy prose of art

Do you yet understand

The ancient knowledge of the trees

How death proceeds new life

In a cycle of infinity



Have you yet known

The secret to resurrection power

How death is the fertilizer

From which everything re-flowers

You may have fallen

You may be broken

But your life is not done

Just watch what you become.
The Pleasure of Their Company
By: Jenine Bsharah Baines
Tags: Poetry, Joy, Poetry On Medium, Writing Prompt Response, Guilty Pleasure

The Pleasure of Their Company

A poem prompted by guilt

Image by Aline Ponce from Pixabay

Park blocks away.

Enter through the back door

into a darkened hallway.

Turn right into a storeroom

with a makeshift chair.

She pulls up a stool;

her partner retrieves a bowl

of water.

Hot water may well be

what all of us find all of our selves in –

not merely my feet — if we’re caught

breaking lockdown or, my God,

catch the virus.

I confess,

my inner Eve is addicted

to this forbidden fruit.

Willingly I risk Reality’s stern consequences

for my silliness

as upward I reach,

already tasting the joy

of my pretty fingertips and toes.

©Jenine Bsharah Baines 2020

I sat down to the computer, totally intending to edit a poem on “guilty pleasures” scribbled the evening before. But then Lien, my manicurist, texted: today? noon? Yes! I texted back. For nearly nine months, Lien has let me know when to show up…and show up I do. The salon for my nails and the nursery to buy stuff that will dirty them: my two essential tasks. Plants I can justify; mani-pedis are — what can I say? A guilty pleasure. A reach to rival Eve’s to justify during a pandemic. Oh well.

What’s your silliness?

Do consider sharing it.

Thank you, Dennett, for the prompt. Thank you, dear readers, for your support on my poetic quest.
The Case for Giving Up the Search for Definitive Answers
By: Jenna Lee
Tags: Justice, Mercy, Sacrifice, Love, Forgiveness

Photo by Greg Rakozy on Unsplash

I used to want to be certain about everything in life. I thought that as long as I had the right answer, everything would be okay.

Until my mom told me something revolutionary.

As we were arguing within the family, as we sometimes do, she told me:

“Being right doesn’t matter to me.”

Now, out of context, that’s hard to understand. Of course, we’ve all heard that we should learn to be wrong for the sake of the relationship, but she meant it a different way. She meant it in a more profound way.

She meant, that even if someone does wrong, and I know I’m right and they’re wrong, and what they’re doing is wrong, it doesn’t ultimately matter. Being morally right, even, is not important. She will set her boundaries, but she doesn’t quibble about moral rightness.

Because a person who does wrong will get their comeuppance anyway, even without her anger, even without her censure. She doesn’t have to intervene.

The trust encompassed in her phrase, the mercy, shook me.

This was when I realized that it’s true that losing to others for the sake of the relationship is worth it, every time. And if you feel resentful about it, that’s because you don’t yet fully understand that losing is worth it.

This was the moment that I understood that man has laws because he is weak. Here is the order, from least to best:

Law, Love, Mercy, Sacrifice.

And what I had thought was so weak in my mother was actually what made her a great businesswoman. It was what made her incredibly strong.

Justice holds scales, but love keeps no records.

Remember that, the next time you feel angry and resentful. The strongest thing you can do, and the best thing you can do for yourself, is to forgive.

Let God do the measuring.
by Martino Pietropoli
By: Martino Pietropoli
Tags: Watercolor, Art, Drawing, Sunday, Illustration

First thing in the morning: a glass of water and a cartoon by The Fluxus.

Follow
Traits of a Distinguished Software Engineer
By: Indrek Lasn
Tags: Programming, Software Development, Technology, Web Development, JavaScript

Traits of a Distinguished Software Engineer

How do you measure a great software engineer?

Software engineering is the art of finding elegant solutions to complex problems. Software engineers are code crafters who create art with their minds. This conjures the question: What makes someone good at their craft?

What makes a good software engineer? There are no wrong answers here. It’s subjective — up for anyone to interpret. But there are some qualities we collectively appreciate in an engineer.

Here are my personal views on what makes someone an excellent engineer and a great person to work with.

I welcome any additional qualities you love to see in engineers in the comments.
Tapping into massive markets: it’s only a matter of time
Tags: Cryptocurrency, Blockchain, China

Blockchain technology offers many great advantages over traditional trading mechanics. One of its most important advantages? Global interaction.

The inherent nature of blockchain’s limitless capacity to be applied and traded anywhere is of key importance in its global advancement. Unlike locally-created legacy products that require a myriad of supports in terms of infrastructure, licencing, and production, blockchain technology is borderless and can not be contained or limited by any particular agency.

This is what provides the EnergiToken with such massive potential. If we examine a single untapped market, such as China, we can quickly see where things could go in very short order.

China, despite all the anti-blockchain sentiment seen in the news over the past year, is witnessing rapid growth in the blockchain industry. In fact, a six-fold increase has taken place in Chinese companies with the term “blockchain” in their titles — and that’s just over the past half year. This increase has occurred during what has predominantly been considered a crypto-winter — an extremely bearish market that has experienced a severe downturn in capitalization throughout the industry.

In addition to this, as much as it may be a surprise to you, China is one of just a few nations on the forefront of moving toward significant improvements in energy efficiency. One area where China has prioritized energy efficiency? Residential power consumption. China is known for its efforts to establish energy-consumption standards in residential buildings, especially in regards to residential appliances and equipment. Industrial energy-efficiency in China, on the other hand, has a long way to go in terms of improvement.

This, of course, is just a singular example of one national market that is ripe and ready for the technology of the EnergiToken project. And that’s the point. There are so many untapped economies around the world where we envision a foothold — a place for EnergiToken to further spread and motivate genuine energy-efficiency efforts, motivated by free market principles and the ability to enjoy decentralized trade.

This is just the beginning for EnergiToken, and there is truly so, so much room to grow in time. We will continue this growth as we develop more partnerships and enter more markets throughout the world. As we do so, we will spread the advantages of blockchain technology, enabling revolutionary methods for the creation, trade, and consumption of energy.

For more information about EnergiToken and its energy-saving reward scheme, please visit www.energitoken.com, follow on Twitter at @EnergiMine or join the EnergiToken Telegram group.
All About iOS Animations (Part 1)
By: Arjun Baru
Tags: Mobile, iOS, Swift, UX, Programming

Implementing Show Button:

We will do the following things on tap of dotButton —

We will animate top , middle and bottom view from right to left side. We will rotate out dotButton , decrease its alpha from 1 to 0, and finally hide it. We will un-hide, rotate and increase alpha with the crossButton placed on top of dotButton .

Add a target function to dotButton like below:

@objc func onTapOfDotButton() {

showOptions()

}

Now, let’s implement the showOptions function. Implement the following code:

Let’s understand the points mentioned above.

//1 We unhide the crossButton which has an alpha of 0 at this point.

//2 We have an animateKeyframes method which will produce the animation of 0.5 seconds and with 0 delay.

//3 we add our first set of chained animations via the addKeyframe method. Let’s look at its parameters:

withRelativeStartTime : We gave it to 0/0.5 , this is the way of saying this internal animation should start just at the beginning of the total duration of animation we have.

relativeDuration : We gave it 0.3/0.5 , this is the way of saying that to what extend our block should animate with respect to the total time available with us.

animations : Inside this block, we transformed our bottomView to its initial position (to what we gave constraints, fixing it to bottom right).

//4 & //5 We followed the same steps as what we did for bottomView explained in step //3 . The only change is in //4 startTime is 0.1/0.5 and //5 startTime is 0.2/0.5 which gives a delay of 0.1 seconds for both the views to animate, thus helping to create the desired effect.
StackOverflow Application
By: Adhikansh Mittal
Tags: JavaScript, Mongodb, Expressjs, Projects, Nodejs

As in last blog we come to know How to make the login and Signup API and create the user session. And also learn how to create a route a Public route or a Private route. (Please refer this: https://medium.com/code-to-express/login-and-signup-page-4a65fec162f1). Now In this blog I am going to explain about the Mongoose models as well as routes which we required in our application.

So we go step by step

Create a user Post a Question Post an Answer to the existing question Clap on the answer(upvote) Authentication and Role-based Access to the Stack Holders

For creating the user we already signup but here are also going to make a profile of the user and mongoose model for which is shown below

Here in this model, I mentioned different data types like String, Date.now() which are direct to understand but there is one more data type which is Schema.Types.ObjectId This data type is nothing but just referring to the Object of other models. So when a mongoose document saves in the database the value contained by this attribute will same as the Object Id of the document saved in other mongoose model.

Now I am going to make the model for the Question

Here we created answer array so there can be more than one answer to a single question. The same thing done with the upvotes where more than one user can give upvotes but the same user can not give more than one upvote.

Now for Creating the question we create routes

So here we make different routes which are written below:

routes for profile

Now I am going to make routes for the Questions

So here we make different routes which are shown below:

routes for questions with description

Here the routes I mentioned are necessary routes apart from this you can add your own routes also.

If you face any problem in creating public or private routes then Please read my Login and Signup blog.
Tell the true story of progress with SDK:Analyze
By: Emily Tunggala
Tags: Nonprofit, Global Health, Data Visualization, Data Analysis, Data Management

Part of why we love what we do so much at Secure Data Kit is being able to play a small role in the incredible work our customers are doing around the world. We’ve found a niche in the world of neglected tropical diseases, and some of the largest (and smallest!) global health organizations and nonprofits are using SDK to collect data on how those diseases are impacting individuals in low-resource communities. Secure Data Kit had become the tool of choice to collect data, but we weren’t satisfied.

That’s why we launched SDK:Analyze, a suite of reporting and integration tools and services that allow our customers to leverage their data to transform lives. Now Secure Data Kit doesn’t stop after the data is collected, in fact… it’s just getting started. Once your data is inside SDK — whether it’s collected with our mobile app, via SMS or you’re pulling data from another system with our API — they’re immediately viewable in a way that makes decision making easy. Visual interactive dashboards help tell a compelling story backed by real numbers, and are updated in real time as new data are added to SDK.

In addition to the technology that makes all of this possible, we’re also now offering data management and analysis services. We’ll pair you with our team of data experts who will sit with you to understand your goals then advise on best practices, develop custom workflows and build tools that automate things like cleaning your data so that they can immediately populate beautiful visual dashboards and reports.

Now you don’t need to wait until your next annual report to update your leadership or donors, you can tell the true story of progress in real time, as change is happening.

If you’d like to learn more about how SDK:Analyze will work for your organization, contact me to set up a demo. You can also check out this blog which contains videos of SDK:Analyze in action.
All About IDOR Attacks
By: Vickie Li
Tags: Web Development, Software Development, Security, Cybersecurity, Programming

What Is IDOR?

IDOR stands for “Insecure Direct Object Reference.” Despite the long and intimidating name, IDOR is actually a straightforward vulnerability to understand. Essentially, IDOR is missing access control.

Let’s say example.com is a social media site that allows you to chat with other users. And when you signed up, you noticed that your user ID on the website is 1234. This website has a page that allows you to view all your messages with your friends. When you click on the “View Your Messages” button located on the homepage, you get redirected to this URL, where you can see all your chat messages with your friends on the website:

https://example.com/messages?user_id=1234

Now, what if you change the URL in the URL bar to this one?

https://example.com/messages?user_id=1233

You notice that you can now see all the private messages between another user, user 1233, and all their friends. What just happened? At this point, you have found an IDOR vulnerability.

You were able to see the messages of user 1233 because there is no identity check in place before the server returns the private info of users. The server was not verifying that you were, in fact, user 1233, or if you are an imposter. It simply returned the information, as you asked.

Photo by the author.

IDORs happen when access control is not properly implemented and when the references to data objects (like a file or a database entry) are predictable. In this case, it was easy to infer that you can retrieve the messages for users 1232 and user 1231 by accessing these URLs:

https://example.com/messages?user_id=1232

https://example.com/messages?user_id=1231

If the website were to use a unique, unpredictable key for each user, the website would not be vulnerable because there would be no way for an attacker to guess the value of user_key:

https://example.com/messages?user_key=6MT9EalV9F7r9pns0mK1eDAEW

Instead, the social media site implemented an insecure and direct object reference. These predictable “Direct Object References” expose the data hidden behind them to the internet, allowing anyone to grab the referenced information.
Too many terminal windows and can’t find what’s what, well use TERMINATOR
By: Chamara Madhushan Liyanage
Tags: Use Terminator, Ubuntu, Terminator, Terminal Windows, Terminal

If you are working in a Linux distribution or a mac you probably have run into the problem where you have opened too many terminals and can’t figure out what was doing what. That’s because you cant nicely split terminals as you want and you can’t name your terminal. I faced this problem when I had to work with several servers. I had to open more than 4 terminal windows to connect to different server instances and found out very difficult when switching among them. Also I had no way to rename my terminal windows to identify them.

Then I found out this solution and it’s really awesome and I want share it with you guys and I know it’ll be definite help for you as well.

It’s the TERMINATOR.

Yesss, the application name is terminator.

Ubuntu installation

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:gnome-terminator

sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get install terminator

Then search for Terminator app

Here is it’s magic

You can right click on terminator terminal and choose the option to split horizontally or vertically. Also you can double click on any terminal title bar and rename as you wish.

Hope this tiny information helps you guys in managing you terminals.

Cheers !!!!
11: An Invitation. Can’t say no to a party!
By: Adam Ellis
Tags: Comic, Delicious Bradley, Humor, Food

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Read “The Latest Thing” now @ Collective Unconscious!
By: Cecil Adkins
Tags: Fantasy, Short Story, Science Fiction

Photo by Rebecca Matthews on Unsplash

Our latest story at Collective Unconscious is titled, appropriately enough, “The Latest Thing.” Written by Max Hardman, this quirky piece explores how important timekeeping can really be!

Also new since last we spoke is “Empty Chair” by Cecil Adkins.

Read these and all our other great speculative fiction at COLLECTIVE UNCONSCIOUS!

Are you a writer with a Sci-Fi or fantasy piece you’d like us to include in Collective Unconscious? Join the fun by taking a look at our Submissions process here.

Until next time, have fun reading!

Cecil Adkins
I Let My Partner Dominate Me With Another Man
Tags: Sex, BDSM, Submission, Sexuality

Throughout the night I had these two men dominate me and set clear rules as to what I could do and couldn’t. Mostly this revolved around when I could climax and whether or not I could touch myself or one of them. Whenever I misbehaved or broke one of the rules, I would be punished. For example one of the things, that night was that I couldn’t climax until I was given permission while the two of them went down on me. As you may have already guessed I failed at this so my punishment was them edging me without allowing me to climax while they used my body.

It may sound degrading to you but it was anything but. I was able to let go of everything and put my safety and pleasure at the hands of these men. It was very liberating and allowed me to feel very close to my partner. I’ve never had to put my psychological safely in someone else’s hand and yet there I was relying on my partner to keep the scene from being too much for me. To help my body feel the most amount of pleasure it could handle.

Mostly this revolved around when I could climax and whether or not I could touch myself or one of them.

The most fascinating part of that night was the aftercare. Again as someone who is just delving into the world of BDSM, I wasn’t too familiar with this concept. After my body has been thoroughly used and every possible orgasm wrung out of me, my doms brought out a warm damp towel and wiped my body. They then wrapped me in a blanket and held me while I tried to slowly get a handle on reality. It was quite intimate, and this was also when our guest decided to leave.
Interview with Peter Girr, Founder of WISE
By: The Capital
Tags: Crypto, Wise, Bitcoin, Blockchain, Eth

Hey Peter Girr, founder of the Wise Token project! Happy to connect today and learn more about the Wise Token project! Can you tell us more about the founding of the project and what the problem is that you were addressing?

I’ve been a crypto investor for years and I got sick of the scams and greedy money-grabbing projects. Eventually, I created WISE, which is the perfect investment from the investor’s point of view, and that kind of thing doesn’t exist anywhere else.

Could you please give us a rundown of the most important things about the Wise Token project?

WISE is backed by ETH, meaning if ETH goes 5x in price and WISE goes 10x then you just got 50x. Use ETH to buy any other crypto and you have lost exposure to your ETH. The way WISE makes this possible is by creating a massive $70,000,000 pool of ownerless liquidity on Uniswap which is practically all the money received in the WISE presale. The reason you would want to buy WISE vs just holding ETH is because of the additional programming of the WISE contract. Investors can stake WISE over periods of time (up to 42 years) and earn interest over the duration. After the stake is complete, they can take their initial WISE principal + interest and swap it on Uniswap for more ETH than they started with. The price of ETH going up, and the price of WISE going up vs ETH from additional users multiplies these gains exponentially. The interest earning from WISE’s staking ecosystem is made possible through inflation (comparable to BTC’s rate of inflation), but BTC pays inflation to miners who dump it on the market, and WISE pays inflation to stakers who are locking up WISE over long periods of time, strengthening the system. These factors create a strong economy. WISE is: an immutable smart contract, free of amin (god-mode) keys, 100% decentralized end to end, fair token distribution (myself/devs did not get any tokens for free and all WISE is being bought from the contract at market prices), non profit, a unicorn.

So going forth into 2020 and beyond, how will your project make an impact in the crypto space, or on the world?

In 2 days we’re hitting Uniswap with more than $70 million in liquidity (that’s rank 8 on the biggest DEX in the world). From there I see us climbing to the #1 Uniswap liquidity pool in short order. I would not be surprised to see WISE at a $5 Billion market cap in 1 year.

Now, could you tell us about your accomplishments so far, and in the history of Wise Token, please tell us what you are most proud of.

I’m proud of our fair launch. Most people got in at the average price which is great for building a healthy ecosystem, I’m proud of raising over 55,000 ETH in a presale, and I’m proud of sparking the grassroots movement that brought in that much money.
What Does Diversity Look Like for the Academy — Now That We Have Parasite? An Oscars ‘Best Picture’ Visualisation
By: Anda Lupascu
Tags: Movies, Diversity, OscarsSoWhite, Oscars, Data Visualization

What Does Diversity Look Like for the Academy — Now That We Have Parasite? An Oscars ‘Best Picture’ Visualisation Anda Lupascu Follow Feb 7 · 6 min read

January and February are awards season. Like the rest of us with our New Year’s resolutions, the glitzy and glamorous of the entertainment industry also take this time to look back on all the work that was done the previous year — and to give praise where is praise is due.

However, if BAFTA’s recent pointed acceptance speeches from Joaqin Phoenix and Rebel Wilson are any indicator, the giving of praise is being called into stark question. This frustration has been stirring and rumbling below the surface for many years, and each year comes up anew, pointing to every list of nominees in their various categories.

The biggest and glitzy-est of them all is still to come this Sunday, either the most yawn- or controversy-worthy awards show of the season (depending on your personal preference): the Oscars.

In honour of the 92nd Academy Awards, I have put together a visualisation of all the films that have won Best Picture, from the first year in 1928, until now, 2019. (2020 is pending, of course — who do you think will win?)

It started with my own interest in “seeing” the metadata of the Oscar winners, and the metadata of my own movie watching. I wanted to know “how many of these Best Pictures have I seen?” With Rebel and Joaqin’s comments in mind, along with along with ongoing attention brought to Hollywood’s lack of diversity, I wanted to support diversity in film by making an effort to watch specific kinds of films. How about a film directed by a woman? That’s easy, only one female director has won Best Picture in the history of the Academy Awards so far (Kathryn Bigelow for The Hurt Locker in 2009).

What about movies directed by a person of colour, minority, or a gender-nonconforming person? I might want to watch a Best Picture with a female lead, or a female hero, not another damsel in distress. How many of these picks represent a non-mainstream, non-majority, non-dual world view that I could relate to?

When I see #OscarsSoWhite, I think, “OK then, I would like to support film-makers from underrepresented groups. If I hear #MeToo and #OscarsSoMale, then I want to support female filmmakers and watch more of their films, circumvent the mainstream, and get to the stuff that means something to me.

Assuming that the storyteller (a.k.a director) is the lens through which this point of view emerges, how may of these Best Pictures are points of view that I can also see through? There are certainly a few, and a slowly rising number, no doubt, but for the non-film-buff, just perusing the Academy Awards archive, what are the chances of encountering diversity in this pool of content?
[Portfolio Update]
By: Ken, Cypher Core
Tags: Wanchain, Irisnetwork, Portfolio Updates, Regen Network, Cyphercore

Regen Network’s Quarter One Update

With the holiday’s all said and done, New Year’s resolutions came and gone, the Regen Network team has set to it that this new year would continue to live up to all the excitement they’ve built up over the last year. With several pilot projects taking flight last year and delivering invaluable insight for future developments, the Regen team has been able to create a strong international presence and establish rapport within communities directly where it counts. With a hopeful mainnet launch before Q1’s end and several new pilot programs in the pipeline for the team, it’s easy to see that this year’s going to be one for the books. For a full breakdown on all of 2019’s developments and Q1’s projections check out Regen’s official post here.

Algradigon-1 is LIVE

After a successful incentivized testnet phase for Congo-1, active Regen validator participants have kicked off another exciting testnet phase with the launch of Algradigon-1. With Algradigon’s first upgrade came a close to perfect genesis launch, 46 active validators in set, and another upgrade in voting with hopes of being passed on January 29th. To get a firsthand experience within the Regen community on upcoming developments you can join Regen’s public telegram channel and stay up to date, or subscribe to their Dev announcements for all the latest technical updates.

IRIS Network’s Lunar Treat

With the lunar new year holiday amongst us, the IRIS Network team has enabled an all-new wallet feature allowing community members and users to interact in a new way right in time for the holiday. With Rainbow Wallet’s 2.9 release comes Red Packet, Hongbao, support allowing users to send Red Packet’s filled with IRIS to friends and family from anywhere in the world. This feature is really exciting and in celebration for the release, Cypher Core recently ran a trivial contest for our community and had the honors of sending our very own Hongbao to one of our community members! For more information on this release check out IRIS Network’s medium post highlighting the wallet’s update.

Wanchain 4.0 Has Landed!

Wanchain 4.0 is alive and well. With critical updates coming to the network with this new release we’ll now see interoperable features within the network reach new heights. With the release of the T-Bridge framework, Wanchain can now successfully transfer assets and data between heterogeneous public and private blockchains. This is one of many features Wanchain has highlighted within the networks recent update, with this being one of the crucial features when highlighting the ambitions of the project. 2020 is shaping up to be an exciting year for the Wanchain team, let’s see if they can build off this momentum throughout the coming months.

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Going to Yoga With Charlotte Brontë
By: Glynnis Fawkes
Tags: Yoga, Glynnis Fawkes, Comics, Jane Eyre, Charlotte Bronte

Spiralbound

Comics for life, brought to life by Edith Zimmerman.
Jornada Del Muerto
By: Immanuel R. Knight
Tags: War, Poetry, History, Nuclear Weapons, Nuclear

Tell Teller his wish came true

Ulam? Yes, inform him too

Fermi’s found, his neutrons lost

Bombarded down, Bert’s bunkers cost

Forever alert, Manhattan’s call

Those plastic people whose eyes never bawl

Observed at Berkeley our newer deal

A bigger bomb, a bigger steal

Groves has gained a gruesome gambit

Vannevar’s veneer is sure to vanish

Percival’s surely no knight for our age

Whose grail weeps blood, an atom-bound cage

Neumann knows not where Hell-angels shout

Wings stripped down in full, from trench to fallout

Cottonwood sands blown full into glass

Where might we gaze forth? “Thou shouldn’t look back”

And on the sixteenth day of a seven month’s sun

God wept for his children, “what have you become?”

One journey of a dead man through million degree sorrow

“Now I am become death…” replied a whisper of tomorrow
Regex UCR: Generating different Regex dialects
By: Olli Savolainen
Tags: Design Thinking, Usability, Regex, Programming, Data Visualization

How to keep Regex UCR’s UI simple, while supporting pretty much all the features Regex itself supports?

You might want to read Part 1 and Part 2 before this to understand what this is about.

Let’s get started with the simplest possible editing view.

Regex UCR has a default dialect called Simplified Regex, which is the smallest common denominator of all regex dialects.



When there is only stuff that works in all languages, we do not remind the user of the existence of dialects at all, allowing the user to concentrate on task at hand.

Editing existing regex

Ok, let’s say you already have a regex you want to edit. Say, you are identifying a decimal number in Python. Something like -3.53e4, a pretty small number.

Warning when selected dialect doesn’t support all features used

You paste it into the regex (text) area of Regex UCR. Your expression gets evaluated and translated automatically into the visual regex syntax.

We can’t handle named groups in the generic Simple Regex, so the editor

highlights unrecognized parts, and

asks you which dialect you would like to use now.

So you select Python in the dropdown.
Integrate YouTube’s IFrame Player API in Angular
By: Gourav Kajal
Tags: Programming, Angular, JavaScript, Nodejs, Web Development

Integrate YouTube’s IFrame Player API in Angular

A simple guide to add a YouTube IFrame Player in an Angular application

Photo by Szabo Victor on Unsplash

When it comes to integrating the YouTube IFrame Player API with component-based frameworks like Angular, it’s a bit difficult and tricky. Here, we’re going to see how we can implement this. I’ll try to discuss all of the problems and challenges I faced while integrating the YouTube IFrame Player API into my Angular application.

First, let’s just create a dummy Angular app using the following command. If you already have a running application, just skip this step.

ng new YTIFrameAPI-with-Angular

Once the app is ready, create a div with id="player" (or whatever you want) in your template file, like this:

Note: Of course, you can change the template as per your requirements. Just make sure the div has an id because the iframe (and video player) will replace this div.

Now, declare some useful variables and create an init function to initialize the YouTube IFrame API, like this :

The code in init() is used to load the API’s JavaScript code. As shown above, when the API is ready, we’re calling startVideo() . This method will define a global variable, "player" , which refers to the video player you’re embedding and the function then constructs the video player object.

Now, once the player is ready, onPlayerReady() will be called. In this example, we’re just playing the video once the player is ready, like this:

Using the API, we can track when the player changes its state. The API will call onPlayerStateChange() when the player’s state changes, which may indicate the player is playing, paused, finished, and so forth. It can be useful for you if you want to perform some actions when the player changes its state.

Note: In the following code snippet, we have two extra methods, cleanTime() and onPlayerError(event) . These methods are used to read and calculate the player’s current timestamp and record an error, respectively.

Now, simply use the component’s ngOnInit() method to initialize a video ID, and call the init() method.

Now if you run ng serve and go to the localhost URL, you’ll see the player is created, and a YouTube video is embedded in this.

In my case, it looks something like this:

Note: For the sake of this demo, I’m using a YouTube video from the Avenger’s Movie Clips YouTube channel.
3 Habits I Cultivated to Overcome My Fear of Failure
By: Rejoice Denhere
Tags: Self Improvement, Fear Of Failure, Success Tips, Vital World Online, Overcome Fear

3 Habits I Cultivated to Overcome My Fear of Failure

Failure is not the opposite of success but a part of success

Image by Stocksnap on Pixabay

I saw a poster about Mondays which made me smile. It went something like this:

If you are afraid of Mondays slowly move to the nearest Tuesday.

You may be wondering what this has to do with fear of failure?

The meaning assigned to a thing is what makes you afraid.

If Mondays were payday, if Mondays were actually the last day of the week, if they were your day off or the day you made the most money, Mondays would be your favourite day. You would love them. You should not fear or dread Mondays. Why? They’re just another day in the week.

The same applies to failure. Don’t dread or fear it. Once I learnt to assign a different meaning to failure I started to overcome my fears by cultivating these three habits.
New Year’s Resolution
By: Charlene Marron
Tags: Poetry, Fulfillment, Acrostic, Meaningful Work, New Year Resolution

New Year’s Resolution

An acrostic poem about finding a path forward

Photo by Aaron Burden on Unsplash

N ot the year that I expected

E choes of longing and regret

W inter soul searching

Y earning for real change

E xisting rather than living fully

A state of inertia week after week

R etrospective on another year gone

’

S tatus quo stagnation

R econnaissance mission under way

E xhaustively

S eeking true north;

O bsessed with

L iving like it matters;

U nfulfilling work has

T aken its toll;

I ntrospection reveals what was

O bvious if only I had been looking;

N ew perspective for the new year
Regarding Gumpaste and Gumbrushes
By: Luke Esterkyn
Tags: Teeth, Gumbrushes, Gumpaste

The dental industry needs to rebrand and make everything gum focused rather than tooth focused. Yes, having good teeth is important, but having healthy gums is equally or more important. We grow up being told to brush our teeth twice a day with our toothbrushes and our toothpaste. This sends the wrong signal and ingrains this tooth-centric attitude in us from a very young age. As we get older, we learn that it’s really all about the gums. Receding gums and gum disease are the issues that result in painful surgeries and other bad stuff.

Highlight this sentence if you think the dental industry should change their lingo and start calling toothbrushes “gumbrushes” and toothpaste “gumpaste” and that we should be telling our kids to “brush their gums.”

Highlight this sentence if you think I’m cuckoo.

Respond to this post if you actually know what you’re talking about or are a dentist.
Our DApp’s User Interface
Tags: Mybit, Blockchain, Cryptocurrency, Ethereum, Bitcoin

Our DApp’s User Interface

A sneak peek of our new look

This is our second UI blog and a lot has changed since our last one. Firstly a big shout out to the community and everyone who helped with the recent rebrand/token swap.

While the rebrand is now live. The MyBit Dapp has also had a refreshed and improved UI. Today I want to go over this update and explore the UI for the internal Alpha.

P lease note that everything is still a work in progress and subject to change. Those of you who signed up for the internal Alpha testing this is what you’ll be seeing.

New UI for the ‘Explore’ page

On the top navigation bar you have the MYB/USD counter, Ethereum block counter and your account balance.

‘Asset Details’ page

When funding an asset this is the page you’ll be on, here you can enter the amount you wish to fund and it’ll show your ownership and estimated return on investment.

On the right an image of the asset, asset details and the user managing the asset.

Confirming your stake and sign the transaction via Meta mask.

And a quick sneak peak at what this all looks like on mobile.

MyBit mobile

While the Alpha will focus on the desktop version we’re working on a native mobile experience, the decentralised IoT exchange MYDAX (more news about this soon)and a mobile portfolio tracker basically blockfolio but for your IoT investments.

Now lets see a before and after.

Thanks for reading and hope you live the new look.

If you haven’t already, join the MyBit community on Discord and follow us on our social channels for the latest news.

Catch you next time.
The God-Man Fan Club vs. the Satire of… Clod-Man!
By: Ruben Bolling
Tags: Religion, Humor, God

Sign up for Taking Stock of COVID: New comics from The Nib

By The Nib

New comics from Matt Lubchansky, Keith Knight, and Niccolo Pizarro. Plus How Seniors Are Living With COVID-19. Take a look
The Largest Remittance Receiving Country Across The Globe | Daala
Tags: Currency, World, India, Remittances, Real Estate

India! Yes, India is the country which tops the charts of top 10 remittance receiving country in the world. India comes on the first position when it comes to receiving the remittance.

There are millions of expatriates who reside in various other parts of the world from India. These immigrants send a part of their earnings to their home back. This remittance is used by the receivers in India for various different purposes. From household expenses to education of their children, from renovation of their houses to investing in real estate. The reasons behind the consumption of the remittance received by indians depends on a various factors, like:

If the location is Rural/Urban

The main economies of the region

Who is receiving the remittance, the head of the family or a housewife

The age of the receiver

The financial status of the receiver

…and many more.

From all over the world, India received a total of US$65B in 2017, followed by China on rank 2 with a total received remittance of US$61B and Phillipines, Mexico, Nigeria, Pakistan, Egypt, Lebanon, Vietnam and Canada. These are the top ten countries (in decreasing order) receiving the inward remittance. India has 50% of the remittance coming from the gulf countries alone i.e. UAE, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Oman, further from which UAE is responsible for sending 30% of the remmitance to India.

The immigrants working in abroad are in a huge number, scattered in almost every part of the world, mailny from the states of South India (Kerela, Tamil Nadu, Orissa), the northern part (main cities of Punjab) and the western state (Gujarat). 25%-30% of the remittance is received by the southern part of the country.
Disaster Risk Governance — by Abimbola Abikoye #ItsAllAboutGovernance #DRRDay
By: Iccdi Africa
Tags: Disaster, Risk Management, Wash, Governance, Climate Change

“To reduce disaster risk is a prerequisite to achieve economic, national and sustainable development because it requires not only emergency management to risks but a risk reduction management plan embedded in national development strategies.” — Abimbola Abikoye.

Abimbola Abikoye — Programs Director ICCDI Africa at Rave TV Morning Rave on DRR Day.

Disaster risk generates from single hazards like floods and storms, and a systematic risk like zoonotic diseases, climate shocks and environmental breakdown. However, to mitigate disaster risk and create a “good disaster risk governance”, the risk management plan must save lives, reduce the number of affected people and reduce economic losses.

In 1989, the United Nation General Assembly (UNSGA) chose the 13th of October to annually celebrate and “promote the culture of risk-awareness and disaster risk reduction.” Later in 2015, the adoption of RES/69/283 detailing the seven target and thirty-eight indicators in the Sendai Framework has set the pace for nations to be accountable by tracking disaster losses, by collating data and upscale risk mitigation.

Yesterday, the world celebrates the International Day for Disaster Risk Reduction to mark the fifth year of the Sendai Framework, reviewing the “Priority Action two” — theme “Strengthening Disaster Risk Governance to Manage Risk.”

Ever since the Sendai Framework, it has provided measures to plan, rescue and restore lives, properties and infrastructure to minimalise disasters of all types and forms.

However, natural, biological and technological hazards have displaced over 2.8 billion people in many communities, while over 20,000 have died globally since the last three decades, and the figure keeps increasing.

While Nigeria has a record of over 50, 000 hectares’ loss of crops to flooding in the north, around 50,000 destroyed houses in Danbata and Rogo communities in Kano and Jigawa state, the outburst of the river Niger and Benue have caused more chaos in recent time, and many other casualties across the 36 states.

The occurrence of these many disasters in Nigeria over the past years and the operation of the Nigerian National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) has shown through evidence the capacity of the agency to prepare for and manage disaster risks.

It is pertinent to avoid disasters through adequate action plan not solely dependent on campaign, sensitisation and advocacy, but it is crucial to shift national thinking from a pre-disaster reaction towards pre-disaster action to build strong resilience to reduce disaster risks.