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Come one, come all! nycdevops does its first virtual meetup! All are invited!

• Speaker: Adarsh Shah
• Topic: "Continuous Delivery for Machine Learning"
• Time: Thursday, September 17, 2020, 5-630 PM
• Link: https://www.meetup.com/nycdevops/events/272914068/

Hope to see you there!

The Usenix LISA conference is no more. After 35 years, I have a lot of good (and some not good) memories of the conference. It was a big part of my career and I'm sad to see it go. However I'm proud of what LISA accomplished.

I wrote my personal reflections on the conference in a new article published on the Usenix website. Warning: this article includes some over-sharing.

Read it here: LISA made LISA obsolete (That's a compliment!)

Classic, buttery, whole wheat shortbread cookies. They're fragrant with rosewater, flecked with toasted nuts, and dried rose petals.

Continue reading Rose Shortbread Cookies on 101 Cookbooks

1. Automatisierte Bots auf X greifen in den US-Wahlkampf ein (zeit.de, Eva Wolfangel) “Die Sorge, dass das Internet von Bots zersetzt wird, gibt es schon lange. Jetzt gibt es erstmals klare Belege für solche KI-Accounts – manche machen Stimmung für Trump.” Eva Wolfangel gibt einen Einblick in die derzeitige Forschung zu Bot-Netzwerken. Weiterer Lesetipp: Elon […]

1. RSF verurteilt israelische Nachrichtenblockade (reporter-ohne-grenzen.de) Die Organisation Reporter ohne Grenzen (RSF) verurteilt den Umgang der israelischen Armee mit Medienschaffenden. “Aus dem Norden des Gazastreifens dringen immer weniger Informationen heraus, und gerade deshalb wird Journalismus immer wichtiger”, so RSF-Geschäftsführerin Anja Osterhaus: “Die israelischen Streitkräfte verhindern zunehmend Bilder und Stimmen von der Realität des Krieges und […]

The hepatitis E virus protein ORF1 contains a region that scientists have struggled to characterize, making the structure and function of this region the subject of much debate. Now, Princeton scientists show that this region of the protein does not behave as a protease, as has been previously suggested, but instead serves as a molecular scaffold to stabilize the rest of the ORF1 protein.

Getting hit with one hurricane is bad enough, but new research from Princeton Engineering shows that back-to-back versions may become common for many areas in coming decades.

A Princeton-led team of astrophysicists has measured a surprising value for the “clumpiness” of the universe’s dark matter.

Research by Princeton scholars at the Atacama Cosmology Telescope collaboration has culminated in a significant breakthrough in understanding the evolution of the universe.

National survey highlights vibrancy and growth of campus research

The National Science Foundation has awarded a $52.66 million grant to fund a major infrastructure upgrade to the Simons Observatory in the Atacama Desert of Chile. Upgrades are expected to take about five years; the resulting facility will be known as the Advanced Simons Observatory (ASO).

Amichai Feit had known Seema Jayachandran as a Twitter-famous development economist.  She became Feit’s senior thesis advisor for a policy-analysis project that included economic field research in India.

While we primarily think of viruses as targeting their attacks against us, they are also in constant competition with each other.

Princeton's 'extremely supportive' environment for new ideas laid the foundation for an aha moment about a toggle switch in the fruit fly brain. Do humans have one, too? 

This is the second round of Princeton Alliance for Collaborative Research (PACRI) projects partnering HBCU and Princeton researchers.

Two NASA telescopes helped an international team of astrophysicists peer far enough back in time to gain new insight on how black holes form.

New paper from Princeton team challenges the conventional wisdom of superconducting quantum transitions.

Princeton's first alumni affinity conference since 2019 welcomed more than 600 alumni and guests to campus Sept. 19-21, for “Every Voice: Honoring and Celebrating Princeton’s LGBTQ+ Alumni.” 

A new report led by Emily Carter and Elizabeth Zeitler *14 offers research and policy ideas, including carbon fiber replacements for rebar in construction and titanium in high-tech applications.

A leader in her field with over 35 years of experience, Shroff has transformed Princeton’s audit and compliance functions during her more than 17 years at the University.

An international team of researchers and gamers, led by Princeton’s Mala Murthy and Sebastian Seung, mapped every neuron and every synaptic connection in an adult fruit fly's brain, building a comprehensive “connectome” that represents a massive step toward understanding the human brain.

Craig B. Arnold has been named Princeton’s first University Innovation Officer and heads the new office.

The program, now in its fifth year, recognizes and supports outstanding scholars primed to make important contributions in their fields. The 2024 cohort includes disciplines spanning the humanities, engineering, the sciences and the social sciences.

In the Class of 2028, 71.5% of students qualify for financial aid and 21.7% of the class are lower-income students eligible for federal Pell grants.

Princeton engineers and industry leaders have squelched a threat that had lurked for years in the internet’s encryption system.

The conference has been scheduled for Oct. 9-11, 2025. All Princeton alumni are invited back to campus for the gathering. 

The 9 a.m. service on Monday, Nov. 11, will also be livestreamed.

First, welcome to a bunch of new subscribers! Subscriptions are free, and you receive an email whenever I publish something On a computer or tablet, you will see the sign-up box in the right-hand sidebar. On a smartphone, you have … Continue reading →

Register here for the live cast I am not a Pagan teacher, Witchcraft influencer, or anything like that. Usually i see myself as the person approaching a panelist at an American Academy of Religion session, saying, “Would you consider turning … Continue reading →

Do you remember that one fanfic that kept you reading until dawn for the very first time? Or the fan art or video that led you to dig out all the works its creator shared? Have you ever tried to look into the stories of the authors who wrote fics before you were even born? You can find all this and more on Fanlore - the wiki for fanworks, fan creators, and fannish history!

Fanlore is a project run by the Organization for Transformative Works (OTW) with the goal of providing fans a place to record and share their histories, experiences and traditions. Fanlore records both the history and current state of our fan communities – fan works, fan activities, fan terminology, individual fans and fannish-related events. You can read about what fandoms were like in the olden days and document memorable events in your own fandoms, all on Fanlore! Check out the wiki’s New User Portal or join the Fanlore Discord server to connect with other editors and users.

We would not be able to preserve these cherished pieces of fandom history without the generous donations of our fellow fans and volunteers who work tirelessly behind the scenes to keep all our projects running. As always, we have some shiny new donation gifts!

You can choose to display your love for fandom with some of our new thank-you gifts. For a US$40 donation, we have a new sticker set featuring popular AO3 tags. You can show off a bumper sticker saying "my other car is a ship" for a donation of US$50. For a donation of US$75 or more, you could carry home your groceries with a white and red shopping bag or you can announce your love for AO3 with our rainbow kudos pin.

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A donation of US$10 or more will also allow you to become a member of the OTW. OTW members can vote for the Board of Directors – the OTW’s governing board. Donating now and checking the “I wish to be a member” box will make you eligible to vote in the 2025 OTW Board Election.

We hope that many of you will take this opportunity to donate and become a member to support projects like Fanlore, Open Doors, Legal Advocacy, Transformative Works and Cultures, and the Archive of Our Own. Your contributions help keep our projects successful for new and long-time fans alike!

In order to make AO3's rules clearer to our users, we intend to update the AO3 Terms of Service (TOS) in mid-November 2024. Once this occurs, all users will need to agree to the updated TOS to continue using AO3. The full text has been posted for public review, as well as a detailed explanation of what has (and hasn't) changed:

• AO3 Terms of Service: 2024 Update Guide
• AO3 Terms of Service: 2024 Draft
• AO3 Terms of Service FAQ: 2024 Draft

Summary of changes

As part of reorganizing the TOS for better clarity, the new TOS is structured differently than the old one. A detailed explanation of what was changed and why is available in the update guide. These are the highlights:

• We've clarified the Content Policy, but we haven't changed what works are or are not allowed. If your fanwork was allowed on AO3 before, then it is still allowed.
• The TOS has been split into three pages (General Principles, Content Policy, and Privacy Policy). This should make it easier to find what you're looking for when you want to know about a specific part of the TOS.
• We've simplified the language throughout the TOS and removed redundant or overly specific phrases and passages. When longer explanations would help to provide clarity, we've added new questions to the TOS FAQ instead.
• We've updated the descriptions of how we and our subprocessors collect and process user information (including personal information) in the Privacy Policy.
• The Abuse Policy has been generalized to provide the AO3 Policy & Abuse committee with greater flexibility to determine how to address TOS violations, while still providing protections for fanworks in accordance with AO3's mission.
• The "Underage" Archive Warning, which is used for works that depict or describe underage sex, is being renamed to "Underage Sex". This does not change the meaning of this warning or how it is enforced. When the TOS update occurs, all works with the "Underage" Archive Warning will be recategorized automatically to display the new "Underage Sex" Archive Warning label instead. If you have a work that carries the "Underage" warning and you don't want it to display the "Underage Sex" label, you can replace it with the "Creator Chose Not to Use Archive Warnings" label at any time.

You can read the proposed changes and comment here on this news post with any questions, suggestions, or feedback you might have about the new TOS or TOS FAQ. Comments will remain open until November 18th, 2024. After comments close, the Board of Directors for the OTW (the Organization for Transformative Works, which is AO3's parent organization) will vote on the proposed changes to the Terms of Service. If the Board votes in favor, the Terms of Service will be updated and all users will be required to agree to the new TOS to continue using AO3.

To make your opinion heard prior to the Board vote, make sure to submit your comments here before November 18th.

---

ETA: We appreciate that all of you have many ideas, but please keep in mind that the Policy & Abuse committee handles AO3 rules, not AO3 features. If you have ideas for a feature (for example, improvements you want to see to Search and Filtering), please contact the Support committee about them instead. We won't be responding to feature requests on this news post.

Making Dorset buttons is addictive!!! With endless possibilities for both design and use, these sweet creations keep my mind spinning, my hands busy, and my heart pulsating!

Made with a few simple materials - thread or yarn, a metal or plastic ring, and a needle - Dorset buttons can be plain, like this one on a replica of a Victorian chemise.

Dorset buttons can include beads, like the center button and the two on the right below.

Dorset buttons can be fancy like these, which I designed to suggest snowflakes.

Dorset buttons can be light or airy, like the ones above, or they can have a bit more visual weight like the one below, which is actually the same size (1 inch diameter) as the two above.

Dorset buttons can be multi-colored. I designed this one to suggest a poinsettia. Hmmm... maybe I should try again?

Dorset buttons can be made to resemble something, such as a tree.

Dorset buttons have many uses. Here is a Christmas ornament I recently made. It looks much prettier hanging (off the card) on a tree.

And here are a few ideas for using Dorset buttons that I found on the web:




It was easy to learn the basics from an online tutorial. After that, it was just a matter of searching images for "Dorset buttons" online, experimenting until I figured out how to make different patterns, and then starting to create some designs of my own.

One thing that took me a while to figure out, was how to make the button shank. I only add a shank if I intend the button to be used as a button, and then only if I want the button to "stand apart a bit from the surface" like for use on a sweater. For purposes like the Victorian chemise at the top of this post, the traditional method of attaching the button would have been simply to sew through the central woven area of the button.

The hardest part was, and still is, finding suitable rings. Most of mine are made on plastic cafe curtain rings, available at Jo-Ann's or hardware stores. The rings must not have a gap, so if they are metal, they need to be soldered. Metal rings made with 16ga. wire would be perfect, but to get them custom made and soldered neatly, would probably be expensive. They would have to be made with a metal that would not tarnish or rust, if the buttons were to last and stay nice looking. Recommendations, anyone?

I use tapestry needles, because the blunt point is perfect for "weaving" the button center (or "rounding" as it is more properly called). So far, I've experimented only with pearl cotton thread, size 12 and 8. Next I'm going to try Danish Flower Thread, which has a matte finish. I can think of many possibilities for using beads too. Some of the designs I've seen on the web are so heavily beaded, that the thread is not even visible, which doesn't quite "work" for me. I like the idea of making the buttons with finger-weight yarn (or any yarn) as closures for knitted sweaters, or as decorations for knitted caps and mittens.

Dorset buttons, first made in the early 1600's in England, were popular for a couple of centuries, until the mid 1800's. You can read more about the history here.  Some of these buttons, such as the ones above, now over 200 years old, are cherished (and occasionally sold) by button collectors.

If I don't post again for a while, I'm either making Dorset buttons or stitching hexies... you know how it is when obsessions take over!

Oh dear, I'm sorry to have neglected posting here for so long. Although many suitable topics and photos have passed through my mind and camera, there just hasn't seemed to be a nice chunk of time available for putting it all together. Today is the day to begin again!

Inspired by Alice, by Marilyn Lidstrom Larson of Willow City, ND (detail of border)

For the past two months, it's been all about quilts and quilting for me, with beading taking a bit of a back seat for a while. My quilt and travel buddy, Lunnette, and I flew to Ontario, California for The Road to California, which is a ginormous quilt show with more than 1,000 quilts on exhibition and over 200 vendors. We gawked (and spent all of our allotted budget) for 3 whole days, barely noticing our fatigue and sore footies.

There are several intriguing subjects to cover, inspired by our experiences there. Today's post is about traditional applique and machine quilting.

Inspired by Alice, by Marilyn Lidstrom Larson of Willow City, ND photo credit (for this photo only): Road 2 CA

Inspired by Alice, by Marilyn Lidstrom Larson, detail showing back

Inspired by Alice, by Marilyn Lidstrom Larson, detail of center

Inspired by Alice, by Marilyn Lidstrom Larson, detail of center quilting

Inspired by Alice, shown in the photos above, won the first prize of $1,000 in the Traditional, Wall, Applique category of the main (judged) exhibit! Take a moment to study the pictures, click on them to enlarge them, notice the way the applique and machine quilting compliment each other. Also think about what this might have looked like if the maker, Marilyn Lidstrom Larson, had hand-quilted her work the way Alice, her grandmother (and inspiration for the central portion of the quilt), would have done. I love this quilt, totally love it, and believe it deserved the award it received.

At the same time, it saddens me that in all the juried/judged shows I've seen (and entered) recently, there is no category specifically for hand sewn quilts... quilts which are hand-pieced, hand-appliqued, hand-embroidered, and/or hand-embellished, and finished with hand-quilting. Nope, hand-sewn quilts are judged right along with machine-sewn quilts. In my observation, machine-quilted pieces are the ones that win almost all the prizes, even in the traditional categories. Why is that? Is hand-quilting considered passe, a thing of our grandmothers' time? Is it because machine-quilting has more pizzazz in the viewers' and makers' eyes? Is it because the machine manufacturers are huge financial supporters of these shows and providers of much of the prize money? Is it because the machine manufacturers run the training programs for judges?

OK, let's look into this subject a bit more. Later, I'll tackle the subject of the influence of the machine manufacturers. For now let's consider this question:

Does machine-quilting enhance quilts that are otherwise hand-sewn?

Last November an odd, rather hard, bump suddenly appeared in the palm of my right hand. A few weeks later, in a routine physical exam, I asked my Dr. what the lump might be. She thought it was a harmless, ganglion cyst. In January, suddenly two more lumps appeared in the same area of my palm, about 1.5 inches below my little and ring fingers. Feeling some concern about this, I made an appointment with a hand specialist, a surgeon, who told me with absolute certainty that I had Dupuytren’s Disease.

You can skip this paragraph if you are not so interested in the disease in general. In the following paragraphs, I’ll tell you about my personal experience with it so far... Some other names for Dupuytren’s Disease are: claw hand, Viking disease, palmar fascia contracture, and flexion contracture. Because it often causes one or more fingers to curl inward toward the palm, it is sometimes confused with trigger finger, an entirely different affliction. It is linked to heredity, Northern European descent, diabetes and other auto-immune diseases. Men are more likely to have it than women, and its incidence increases in older (over 50) folks for both men and women. Often it is dormant until there is injury or trauma to the hand(s). There are currently four categories of treatment: radiation therapy (successful only in the very early developmental stage of the disease), needle aponeurotomy (generally considered for stage 1 or 2 of the disease with 6 to 90 degrees of deformation), collagenase injection (also stage 1 or 2), and surgery (advanced stages).

This is a copy-machine scan of my right hand in August, 2012. At that time, I probably had the disease, but there were no obvious signs of it.

This is a piece I created using the above scan. It celebrates the many blessings of my hand. Who knew that 4 years later it would be in jeopardy.

If you know me at all, you know that I love to stitch! Give me a needle and thread, a few beads or layered fabric that needs hand-quilting, and I am in heaven. If I couldn’t stitch, I’d be miserable. Already, I noticed (in January) that my right (dominant) hand was losing flexibility and strength. I dropped things all of the time because my grip was not as strong. And I could not spread my fingers or flex them backwards. The progression was alarmingly fast at that time, and affected my ability to hold and control a needle, scissors, etc.

To be honest with you, the past two months (Oct. and Nov.) have been miserable for me because of the election campaign and results. Now, finally, the cloak of despair, the fog of depression, is lifting a little.

One evening, as I noticed the challenge kit from the La Conner Quilt Museum on top of my quilting to-do pile, a flicker of an idea passed through my brain. Then, as I awoke the next morning, the flicker became a small flame, which in turn lead me to accept an invitation to spend an afternoon quilting with some friends, which (in order to have something to work on) got me rooting through my fabric stash.

Now, quilters, beaders, and artists of all types, will recognize the phenomenon caused by physically touching your materials, supplies, and tools. Suddenly your wearisome thoughts of the election (or whatever else got you down) are gone! You fondle your stuff lovingly, and with great anticipation, you make the first cuts, fanning the flame, turning it into a nice warm fire. Ah, saved from the chilly fog, at last!

My journey out of the fog began with this vintage block from a quilt that someone, somewhere, started long ago, but never finished. It, along with many others, was donated to the La Conner Quilt Museum. The Curator, Kathleen Kok, not knowing what she would do with all the vintage blocks donated over the years, just kept them in a corner waiting for an idea to form. And form it did!

Every year the Museum has a challenge as a fundraiser, showcasing the entries at the annual Quilt Festival. For 2017, the challenge theme is "Time" and the material provided in the kit is one of the vintage blocks from their collection. The block above is the one I picked. It is just so cheerful... how could I resist? Hand pieced, it wasn't perfectly sewn, but still I fell instantly in love with it. Mine for a $10 contribution!

Of course, it was just the block. In the photo above, I have already layered it with backing and batting, and then hand quilted it.

My idea is two-fold. (1) Since the "time" theme can be portrayed by a transition from these early fabrics to modern fabrics, I decided to repeat the block using Kaffe Fassett fabric scraps left over from my shimmer quilt. (2) Feeling powerless in the face of impending doom after the election, I had to find some ways to assert my beliefs, and this quilt was to be one of them. I've long been concerned about the ever-increasing world population, about all the small, yet constant ways overpopulation is damaging and destroying the natural systems of the planet. So the title will be: Under the Quilts, Time Flies, and Population GROWS. My idea is to illustrate this concept using both color and beads. You'll see.

First though, a few words about making the modern block. At first I tried to make a pattern for the "flower/star" by tracing one of the triangles from the back side. I hand-stitched the required 16 pieces together FOUR different times, varying the seam allowances each time, trying to get it to lie down flat. Obviously, I did not correctly copy the original, because when I finally sewed it so it was nice and flat, it was also too small. Grrr.

A smart quilt friend (thanks Tori) suggested I trace a section from the right side of the block and add 1/4 inch seam allowances all around. Good idea, but there were small differences between the sections... which one to trace? Trying to answer that question, looking at the block, I finally saw how the pattern was derived! (Light bulb!!!)

It's two overlapping squares of the same size, one on point and one not. All it took was to measure the sides of the squares on the original block (which averaged 8.5 inches), cut them out of paper, fold the diagonals and sides, put a pin through the centers to join them, rotate the top one until the folds lined up, tape the two together, and draw along the fold lines. Voila! Now, all I had to do was cut out one of the half-points, add my quarter-inch seam allowances, and there was the perfect pattern for my new block. The rest went quite quickly, and below you can see the quilted result. (Note: I added quarter-inch seam allowances to each of the pattern pieces shown above to get the final cutting pattern.)


You might be wondering why I've layered and quilted these blocks. How will they be joined to form the quilt? The answer is they won't be joined! Instead, they will be bound as separate little quilts (each 11 inches square), and then appliqued to a separate "background quilt."

Here is how they look with the binding.


Notice that the over-all color of the modern block is darker. This matches my concern about over-population of the planet. Time flies, and the population GROWS, making the world a darker place for me, as many species become stressed and obsolete, as the desert lands grow and the forests shrink, as potable water becomes polluted and scarce, as crowded people war with each other. You know. If you watch the documentaries and contribute to various environmental causes, you know. Darker.

Thus, the quilt also becomes darker as the eye travels from top to bottom. Here is how it looks with the two blocks on the background quilt, the transitioning colors from light to dark, representing about 70 years in time passing (estimating the date of the fabrics in the vintage block at approximately 1946). This is an extremely tiny period of world history, but one in which world population sky-rocketed from 2.3 billion to 7.4 billion.

You can probably see the little heart beads, but if you click to enlarge the photo, you'll see them more clearly. The pair at the top represents a couple. They dive under the quilt, have some fun, and produce four lovely children (between the two blocks). These four pair up, dive under the quilt, resulting in 16 children. Under the quilts, time flies, and the population GROWS. That's m' story, and I'm sticking to it.

Now, here's a question for you loyal readers who have come so far with me on this thing.  The quilt looks really pretty the way it is. But originally, I had planned to do more beading on it.  I planned to bead several vines circling the outer border of the quilt (not the binding). Across the top of the quilt, the vines would be light green, with many green leaves, bright-colored flowers, and some critter beads/charms (bees, birds, bears, fish). As the vines trailed down the sides, they would become darker, until at the bottom they would be beaded with dark brown, black, and darkest greens, with no critters, and only a few dark flowers. The visual message (I hope) would be, "this is what happens when we overpopulate the world." What do you think... leave it like it is now or bead the borders?

Global Population Information

Think of it this way. Every single month increasing world population adds another Los Angeles AND another Chicago to the planet. That's 24 gigantic cities worth of people added EVERY year; more than 240 giant cities every 10 years. Imagine how many cities full of people will be added in your life time. Crunch the numbers and see what you think.

Evidence of heavy population demand on resources is all around us. Global aquifers are being pumped 3.5 times faster than rainfall can naturally recharge them. Eventually they will run dry, perhaps as soon as 75 years. Topsoil is being lost 10-40 times faster than it is formed.  Feeding all 7+ billion of us is increasingly difficult, impossible actually.

There is no technology solution to accommodate the increasing demand of uncontrolled global population growth. The only solution is voluntary one child per couple for a couple of generations, on a Global participation level. If all countries followed the lead of countries with the lowest birth rates (Taiwan, Spain, Portugal, South Korea, and Poland), we could reach a more sustainable Global population of 3 billion by 2100!

Please, talk about this with your child-bearing-aged kids, grand kids, students, etc. We teach environmentally sound practices in most schools, write books and make documentary films about issues like clean water, over-fishing, fracking, etc. But rarely does the topic center on overpopulation. Be proactive. Make it happen.

If you are willing to read (or listen to an audio book) to learn more about Global population, Count Down is an excellent read.

Here is a link to the previous bead embroidery pieces (and poems) I've made concerning population growth.Thank you for reading all the way to the end, and for anything you can do to help people understand what we need to do.