Interview with Innocent Watat, City Council candidate for Wards 3 & 4 in Brampton, Canada

Saturday, October 21, 2006

The upcoming 2006 Brampton municipal election, to be held November 13, features an array of candidates looking to represent their wards in city council or the council of the Peel Region.

Wikinews contributor Nick Moreau contacted many of the candidates, including Innocent Watat, asking them to answer common questions sent in an email. This ward’s incumbent is Bob Callahan; Balbir Babra, Manny Bianchi-Morfino, Dolly Khokhar, Maria Peart, Tim Turcott, and Sheila White.

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South Korean police battle striking workers

Wednesday, August 5, 2009

Police raided the SsangYong Motor Company‘s plant in South Korea today, in order to evict workers who have been occupying the plant since May in protest of proposed layoffs. Most of the workers were those who were previously fired for opposing layoffs.

100–400 police officers raided the auto plant south of Seoul at around 10:00 a.m. (local time). Police intended to evict some 600 striking workers who, according to a union representing the workers, “will fight to the death should police forcefully break up the occupation.” Workers at the plant are resisting police by attacking them with slingshots, metal pipes and molotov cocktails.

During the raid, two unnamed workers fell from the four story building while trying to stop the police from landing onto the roof from cargo containers dropped by helicopter. Both sustained injuries, with one in critical condition from the amount of blood he lost.

SsangYong Motor Company has been in court-approved bankruptcy since February and is planning on laying off a third of its workforce to stay in business. However, workers say the company should provide a better proposal regarding the layoffs as well as a more reasonable compensation package for workers being laid off. The situation has caused the company to lose more than US$184 million in output.

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US unveils revived space exploration program

Friday, April 16, 2010

US President Barack Obama unveiled on Thursday plans for the future of American space exploration, committing to sending American astronauts to Mars by the mid-2030s.

The president was speaking at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida during a speech to lay out his plans for the future of American space agency NASA. His comments included assurances that America was not abandoning space exploration, contrary to claims he was doing so after he announced the US’s budget for 2011, which would have ended most of NASA’s current projects, including the development of new heavy-launch rockets called the Constellation Program.

Our goal is the capacity for people to work and learn, operate and live safely beyond the Earth for extended periods of time, ultimately in ways that are more sustainable and even indefinite

Under Obama’s latest program, NASA would receive US $6 billion as supplementary funding over the next five years to develop new projects, which Obama emphasized, saying NASA was in the unusual position of having an expanded budget while other government agencies must comply to financial restrictions or cuts in efforts to reduce the US public debt. With the additional funding, NASA would extend the life of the International Space Station (ISS) by four years further, to at least 2020, design a new series of heavy-lift rockets by 2015, and continue development of the Orion crew capsule, a major part of the Constellation program. Initially, the capsule would serve only as a rescue vehicle for the ISS, but would later serve as the “technological foundation for advanced spacecraft to be used in future deep space missions.” The proposed project would also retain plans for private operators to service the ISS, despite criticism that such operators were not reliable enough for the task.

The centerpiece of the plan would be manned missions to the moon and beyond, beginning with missions to asteroids around 2025, with missions to Mars following within a decade. Initially, Mars missions would consist of sending humans to orbit Mars, with missions to land on the surface of the planet coming shortly after. Obama said that under the plan, “we will push the boundaries not only of where we can go but what we can do.”

Obama said that under his new plan, NASA would be able to achieve more in a shorter amount of time than it would have under the Constellation Program. He also said that, contrary to fears that changes in NASA would result in job losses in Florida, where most space missions are launched from, under his new plan, a total of 2,500 jobs would be created in the area.

The new plan would, according to Obama, lead to “major breakthroughs” in the US space program. He said that the goal of the new program would be “no longer just a destination to reach. Our goal is the capacity for people to work and learn, operate and live safely beyond the Earth for extended periods of time, ultimately in ways that are more sustainable and even indefinite.” The president also emphasized the need for continued innovation, saying that “we’ve got to do it [space exploration] in a smart way and we can’t just keep on doing the same old things we’ve been doing and thinking that’s going to get us where we want to go.”

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Akash Earth Movers In Gurgaon

Akash Earth Movers In Gurgaon

by

rohtash

JCB is a very large family business founded in 1945 by J. C. Bamford. The JCB name has become synonymous with engineering vehicles such as excavators and tractors, all of which are instantly recognisable from their black and yellow colour scheme.

Statistics

As a manufacturer on a global scale JCB employs over 8,000 people, has 17 factories, operations in 150 countries and has bases worldwide; enabling them to distribute over 300 products. JCB have 650 dealers worldwide and are widely recognised as market leaders in the industry.

JCB Products

The full range of JCB’s products spans such a wide area of engineering machinery that they cannot all be easily listed here. The more commonly used and better known machines however can be, as seen below.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hcAjZhWxrZk[/youtube]

Backhoe Loader

Since its invention by Joseph Bamford in 1953 the Backhoe Loader has been a highly successful and popular tool for a vast number of engineering tasks. Whilst being comprised of essentially a tractor with a front-mounted loading bucket and a rear mounted backhoe, the Backhoe Loader is never referred to as a tractor. By utilising both its digger bucket and backhoe, a loader is able to aid in a great many jobs including construction, excavating, landscaping and road paving.

JCB has a wide selection of backhoe loaders in their ‘CX’ range, varying in size and capability. Backhoes

A backhoe (a.k.a. rear actor or back actor) consists of a (nowadays hydraulically powered) articulated arm with an excavating bucket attached at the end. The digging bucket is typically smaller than front-mounted loading buckets, but due to the maneuverability provided by the arm it is much more versatile.

Excavators

Whilst Backhoe Loaders are ideal for use in small projects and confined spaces such as urban engineering projects, larger tasks require the presence of an excavator. An excavator consists of a pivoting cab mounted on a tracked undercarriage. Extending from the cab is an articulated arm akin to a backhoe, albeit in a larger size.

Mini-Diggers

Given the size and weight of some excavators, they are not very well suited to smaller scale tasks as backhoe loaders are. To remedy this mini-diggers have been introduced. At just 2 to 6 tonnes in weight and generally capable of rotating around a full 360 degrees on their tracked undercarriage these machines are ideally suited for projects in confined spaces such as digging trenches, ponds, and general landscaping where high mobility is required. Other advantages for using mini-diggers include lower rental and running costs, simpler controls and easier to change attachments and accessories.

Attachments

A large number of JCB’s products are capable of using interchangeable and replacement parts and as such in recent years many attachments have become available. This allows vehicles such as excavators to extend their capabilities away from just one task, becoming more versatile and economic. Attachment parts include breakers, grapples, hammers, compactors, drills, forks and even mowers.

JCB Parts

With such an amount of attachments and interchangeable parts, and despite JCB’s excellent reputation for high quality products and hard wearing components, it is inevitable that over time there may be a need for JCB replacement parts and spares. Fortunately the nature of these parts means that they are readily available and relatively easy to swap out.

For a wide selection of JCB Parts, Shropshire based company Digger Parts are located near all the major motorway networks, allowing them to distribute the highest quality JCB replacement parts worldwide.

Find out more info below this links

Akash Earth Movers in Gurgaon

earth movers in gurgaon: http://www.akashearthmovers.com/JCB Rental in Gurgaon: Earth Equipment in Gurgaon:Rakesh YadavAddress: Plot no. 719 sec53 Saras Wati kunj DLF Phase IVMobile no.981103827

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Local council in Australia rejects McDonald’s development plan

Wednesday, December 3, 2008

The development application for a McDonald’s restaurant at Minyama, on Queensland’s Sunshine Coast in Australia, has been rejected by the Sunshine Coast Regional Council.

“We knocked back a Hungry Jack’s on Nicklin Way because of the nuisance code,” said divisional councilor Chris Thompson. “We already have a 24-hour McDonald’s at Mooloolaba, only one kilometre away, and there are already [anti-social] issues at that site.”

Local residents previously vowed to fight any McDonald’s development at the proposed site due to the risk of anti-social behavior. Protest group spokesman John Meyer-Gleaves was “over the moon”.

“It’s not often you knock Maccas [McDonald’s] over,” he said.

Mayor Bob Abbot said Minyama was in some ways more suitable than Mooloolaba. However, he was concerned about the proximity to a residential estate.

The rejection is expected to be ratified at an ordinary meeting of the council on Thursday.

“It needs to be endorsed or ratified by council at its ordinary meeting on Thursday and then it will become a statutory decision of council,” Chris Thompson said. “I’m reasonably pleased with the outcome.”

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Computer professionals celebrate 10th birthday of A.L.I.C.E.

Wednesday, November 30, 2005File:Turing1.jpg

More than 50 programmers, scientists, students, hobbyists and fans of the A.L.I.C.E. chat robot gathered in Guildford, U.K. on Friday to celebrate the tenth birthday of the award winning A.I. On hand was the founder the Loebner Prize, an annual Turing Test, designed to pick out the world’s most human computer according to an experiment laid out by the famous British mathematician Alan Turing more then 50 years ago. Along with A.L.I.C.E.’s chief programmer Dr. Richard S. Wallace, two other Loebner prize winners, Robby Garner and this year’s winner, Rollo Carpenter, also gave presentations, as did other finalists.

The University of Surrey venue was chosen, according to Dr. Wallace, not only because it was outside the U.S. (A.L.I.C.E.’s birthday fell on the Thanksgiving Day weekend holiday there, so he expected few people would attend a conference in America), but also because of its recently erected statue of Alan Turing, who posed the famous A. I. experiment which inspired much of the work on bots like A.L.I.C.E. University of Surrey Digital World Research Centre organizers Lynn and David Hamill were pleased to host the event because it encourages multi-disciplinary interaction, and because of the Centre’s interest in interaction between humans and computers.File:ALICE Birthday Cake.jpg

Dr. Wallace gave a keynote address outlining the history of A.L.I.C.E. and AIML. Many people commented on the fact the he seemed to have moved around a lot in the last ten years, having lived in New York, Pennsylvania, San Francisco, Maine, Amsterdam and Philadelphia, while working on the Alicebot project. The A.L.I.C.E. and AIML software is popular among chat robot enthusiats primarily because of its distribution under the GNU free software license. One of Dr. Wallace’s PowerPoint slides asked the question, “How do you make money from free software?” His answer: memberships, subscriptions, books, directories, syndicated ads, consulting, teaching, and something called the Superbot.

Rollo Carpenter gave a fascinating presentation on his learning bot Jabberwacky, reading from several sample conversations wherein the bot seemed amazingly humanlike. Unlike the free A.L.I.C.E. software, Carpenter uses a proprietary learning approach so that the bot actually mimics the personality of each individual chatter. The more people who chat with Jabberwacky, the better it becomes at this kind of mimicry.

In another interesting presentation, Dr. Hamill related present-day research on chat robots to earlier work on dialog analysis in telephone conversations. Phone calls have many similarities to the one-on-one chats that bots encounter on the web and in IM. Dr. Hamill also related our social expectations of bots to social class structure and how servants were expected to behave in Victorian England. He cited the famous Microsoft paperclip as the most egregius example of a bot that violated all the rules of a good servant’s behavior.

Bots have advanced a long way since philanthropist Hugh Loebner launched his controversial contest 15 years ago. His Turing Test contest, which offers an award of $100,000 for the first program to pass an “audio-visual” version of the game, also awards a bronze medal and $2000 every year for the “most human computer” according to a panel of judges. Huma Shah of the University of Westminster presented examples of bots used by large corporations to help sell furniture, provide the latest information about automotive products, and help customers open bank accounts. Several companies in the U.S. and Europe offer customized bot personalities for corporate web sites.

Even though Turing’s Test remains controversial, this group of enthusiastic developers seems determined to carry on the tradition and try to develop more and more human like chat bots.Hugh Loebner is dedicated to carry on his contest for the rest of his life, in spite of his critics. He hopes that a large enough constituency of winners will exist to keep the competition going well beyond his own lifetime. Dr. Wallace says, “Nobody has gotten rich from chat robots yet, but that doesn’t stop people from trying. There is such a thing as ‘bot fever’. For some people who meet a bot for the first time, it can pass the Turing Test for them, and they get very excited.”

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Microsoft 70 333 Deploying Enterprise Voice With Skype For Business 2015 (Beta) Training Materials}

Submitted by: Chung Crissler

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Share some MCSE 70-333 exam questions and answers below.

You need to configure the trunks defined in the Skype for Business topology based on the requirements. Which two actions should you perform? Each correct answer presents part of the solution.

A. Enable media bypass.

B. Enable centralized media processing.

C. Set Encryption Support Level to required.

D. Disable REFER support.

Answer: A,D

You need to recommend a solution that will improve voice quality for Skype for Business clients. What should you recommend?

A. Change the Voice802lp value to 46.

B. Ensure that VoiceDiffservtag values are set to 46 for all Skype for Business Phone Edition devices at all sites.

C. Configure an Audio and Video Quality of Service (QoS) to use a DSCP value of 40 and a port range of 57501:65535.

D. Configure a Domain Group Policy object (GPO) configuring Quality of Service (QoS) and set it to Enforced for all Windows 7 clients.

Answer: B

You need to estimate the future volume of Skype for Business traffic in the Vancouver office. Which two employee totals should you use for the estimate? Each correct answer presents part of the solution.

A. 300 employees at Contoso, Ltd.

B. 80 employees at Litware, Inc.

C. 40 employees at Litware, Inc.

D. 35 hybrid users at Contoso, Ltd.

Answer: A,C

Remote users report that they fail to access their voice mail by using the Call Voice Mail option in the Skype tor Business client. Remote users can access voice mail by using the subscriber access number. Internal users do not report any issues accessing voice mail. You need to enable voice mail access without manually dialing the subscriber number. Which two sets of ports should you open? Each correct answer presents part of the solution.

A. TCP 443 and UDP 3478 on the external firewall

B. TCP 5062 and 8057 on the internal firewall. TCP 5062 and 8057 on the external firewall

C. TCP 443 and UDP 3478 on the internal firewall

D. UDP 50,000 to 59,999 on the internal firewall

E. UDP 50,000 to 59,999 on the external firewall

Answer: A,D

You need to configure the Skype for Business Server 2015 environment to meet the technical requirements for push notifications to mobile users. Which two actions should you perform? Each correct answer presents part of the solution.

A. Open port 23457 on the Enterprise Wi-Fi network.

B. Open port 5223 on the Enterprise Wi-Fi network.

C. Configure NAME redirection over HTTPS for the acquired domain.

D. Configure a web publishing rule for port 80 on the reverse proxy for the acquired domain.

Answer: B,C

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Share some MCSE 70-333 exam questions and answers below.

You need to recommend a solution to test users ability to schedule, join, and conduct an audio/video (A/V) conference. What should you do?

A. Run the Test-CsAVConference Skype for Business Management Shell cmdlet and then analyze the trace call flow in Snooper.

B. Run the Test-CsMcxConference Skype for Business Management Shell cmdlet and save the results. View the results by using the Skype for Business Server 2015 Logging Tool.

C. Run the Test-CsUcwaConference Skype for Business Management Shell cmdlet.

D. Run the Test-CsAudioConferencingProvider Skype for Business Management Shell cmdlet and save the results. View the results by using the Central Logging Service.

Answer: A

You need to configure the Skype for Business Server 2015 environment to meet the technical requirements for push notifications to mobile users. Which two actions should you perform? Each correct answer presents part of the solution.

A. Open port 23457 on the Enterprise Wi-Fi network.

B. Open port 5223 on the Enterprise Wi-Fi network.

C. Configure NAME redirection over HTTPS for the acquired domain.

D. Configure a web publishing rule for port 80 on the reverse proxy for the acquired domain.

Answer: B,C

You need to recommend a solution that will improve voice quality for Skype for Business clients. What should you recommend?

A. Change the Voice802lp value to 46.

B. Ensure that VoiceDiffservtag values are set to 46 for all Skype for Business Phone Edition devices at all sites.

C. Configure an Audio and Video Quality of Service (QoS) to use a DSCP value of 40 and a port range of 57501:65535.

D. Configure a Domain Group Policy object (GPO) configuring Quality of Service (QoS) and set it to Enforced for all Windows 7 clients.

Answer: B

You need to plan a solution to allow masking of a calling number.How can a calling number of a Skype for Business user be changed to match the main number of the company?

A. Create a new normalization rule and add it to the global dial plan.

B. Use the Skype for Business control panel to mask the calling number.

C. Create a trunk translation rule that masks the called number.

D. Use the voice gateway to mask the called number.

Answer: B

You need to solve the Enterprise Voice issue experienced by Sydney users. Which normalization rule should you use for mobile numbers?

A. ^0[45]((d8))$

B. ^0([45]d{6})$

C. ^0[45]d({8})$

D. ^0([45]d{8})$

Answer: D

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Surgeons reattach boy’s three severed limbs

Tuesday, March 29, 2005A team of Australian surgeons yesterday reattached both hands and one foot to 10-year-old Perth boy, Terry Vo, after a brick wall which collapsed during a game of basketball fell on him, severing the limbs. The wall gave way while Terry performed a slam-dunk, during a game at a friend’s birthday party.

The boy was today awake and smiling, still in some pain but in good spirits and expected to make a full recovery, according to plastic surgeon, Mr Robert Love.

“What we have is parts that are very much alive so the reattached limbs are certainly pink, well perfused and are indeed moving,” Mr Love told reporters today.

“The fact that he is moving his fingers, and of course when he wakes up he will move both fingers and toes, is not a surprise,” Mr Love had said yesterday.

“The question is more the sensory return that he will get in the hand itself and the fine movements he will have in the fingers and the toes, and that will come with time, hopefully. We will assess that over the next 18 months to two years.

“I’m sure that he’ll enjoy a game of basketball in the future.”

The weight and force of the collapse, and the sharp brick edges, resulted in the three limbs being cut through about 7cm above the wrists and ankle.

Terry’s father Tan said of his only child, the injuries were terrible, “I was scared to look at him, a horrible thing.”

The hands and foot were placed in an ice-filled Esky and rushed to hospital with the boy, where three teams of medical experts were assembled, and he was given a blood transfusion after experiencing massive blood loss. Eight hours of complex micro-surgery on Saturday night were followed by a further two hours of skin grafts yesterday.

“What he will lose because it was such a large zone of traumatised skin and muscle and so on, he will lose some of the skin so he’ll certainly require lots of further surgery regardless of whether the skin survives,” said Mr Love said today.

The boy was kept unconscious under anaesthetic between the two procedures. In an interview yesterday, Mr Love explained why:

“He could have actually been woken up the next day. Because we were intending to take him back to theatre for a second look, to look at the traumatised skin flaps, to close more of his wounds and to do split skin grafting, it was felt the best thing to do would be to keep him stable and to keep him anaesthetised.”

Professor Wayne Morrison, director of the respected Bernard O’Brien Institute of Microsurgery and head of plastic and hand surgery at Melbourne’s St Vincent’s Hospital, said he believed the operation to be a world first.

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Gastric bypass surgery performed by remote control

Sunday, August 21, 2005

A robotic system at Stanford Medical Center was used to perform a laparoscopic gastric bypass surgery successfully with a theoretically similar rate of complications to that seen in standard operations. However, as there were only 10 people in the experimental group (and another 10 in the control group), this is not a statistically significant sample.

If this surgical procedure is as successful in large-scale studies, it may lead the way for the use of robotic surgery in even more delicate procedures, such as heart surgery. Note that this is not a fully automated system, as a human doctor controls the operation via remote control. Laparoscopic gastric bypass surgery is a treatment for obesity.

There were concerns that doctors, in the future, might only be trained in the remote control procedure. Ronald G. Latimer, M.D., of Santa Barbara, CA, warned “The fact that surgeons may have to open the patient or might actually need to revert to standard laparoscopic techniques demands that this basic training be a requirement before a robot is purchased. Robots do malfunction, so a backup system is imperative. We should not be seduced to buy this instrument to train surgeons if they are not able to do the primary operations themselves.”

There are precedents for just such a problem occurring. A previous “new technology”, the electrocardiogram (ECG), has lead to a lack of basic education on the older technology, the stethoscope. As a result, many heart conditions now go undiagnosed, especially in children and others who rarely undergo an ECG procedure.

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Best Way To Finance A Commercial Solar Energy Project

Best Way to Finance a Commercial Solar Energy Project

by

Lizel Tyson

Many industries are discovering the benefits of installing solar power systems to save money on energy while offering protection to our fragile environment. Solar power has benefitted schools, government and municipal clients, corporations, water districts, housing developments and commercial real estate endeavors, utilities and more. Since switching to a solar powered energy represents a large capital outlay for most businesses, it is important to choose a financing vehicle that allows your business to maximize incentives and rebates while protecting resources and managing risk. Power Purchase Agreements (PPAs) and integrated financing represents one of the best ways to do this.

What is a Power Purchase Agreement?

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PfCeknwkG4M[/youtube]

Technically, a Power Purchase Agreement (PPA) is a contract that defines terms of sale of electricity between a buyer and a seller. These can last anywhere from five to 20 years and they are subject to regulation as the state and federal level depending on the project site and the nature of the PPA. In the case of solar power, the provider of the PPA absorbs the costs associated with the project, such as design, construction, O&M and more. Customers can watch their utility bills fall immediately since they are purchasing clean energy as a substitute for on-the-grid power. The provider receives any rebates and tax incentives associated with the production of clean energy, but these savings are passed on to the customer in the form of lowered bills.

Why is an Integrated PPA the Best Choice?

An integrated PPA occurs when the PPA provider and installer are one and the same. In a standard PPA, the provider is looking to increase return on investment, but the installer is also interested in lowering the costs of design, supply and project build costs. If the installer and the provider are the same, their interests are joined to provide the highest quality project that will produce an appropriate return on investment.

What benefits can an integrated PPA offer your business?

Besides the obvious energy savings, an integrated PPA offers commercial businesses significant savings over traditional financing options. For one thing, they will not experience any increase in energy rates over the life of the project, despite predicted hikes in power costs due to increasing global growth and environmental regulation. As an investment, it is a win-win: if the project does not perform according to predictions, the onus falls upon the PPA provider to absorb the cost of failure. There are no operation or maintenance costs as these are paid for by the PPA provider and not having to finance the cost of a megawatt solar power project up front allows the business owner to use his capital for other investments. Finally, making the switch to clean energy provides a business with a plethora of marketing tools that can help generate positive PR for his business.

Borrego Solar is a commercial solar power installer in the United States. Please visit their website at

borregosolar.com

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ArticleRich.com