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๐ --All You Zombies--
"โ'โAll You Zombiesโ'โ" is a science fiction short story by American writer Robert A. Heinlein. It was written in one day, July 11, 1958, and first published in the March 1959 issue of Fantasy and Science Fiction magazine after being rejected by Playboy.
The story involves a number of paradoxes caused by time travel. In 1980, it was nominated for the Balrog Award for short fiction.
"'โAll You Zombiesโ'" further develops themes explored by the author in a previous work: "By His Bootstraps", published some 18 years earlier. Some of the same elements also appear later in The Cat Who Walks Through Walls (1985), including the Circle of Ouroboros and the Temporal Corps.
The unusual title of the story, which includes both the quotation marks and dashes shown above, is a quotation from a sentence near the end of the story; the quotation is taken from the middle of the sentence, hence the dashes indicating edited text before and after the title.
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- "All You Zombies" | 2022-02-25 | 111 Upvotes 51 Comments
- "--All You Zombies--" | 2009-12-19 | 30 Upvotes 13 Comments
- "All You Zombiesโ The most craziest of the time travel paradoxes" | 2008-10-10 | 42 Upvotes 21 Comments
๐ Stellar Wind (code name)
"Stellar Wind" (or "Stellarwind") was the code name of a warrantless surveillance program begun under the George W. Bush administration's President's Surveillance Program (PSP). The National Security Agency (NSA) program was approved by President Bush shortly after the September 11, 2001 attacks and was revealed by Thomas Tamm to The New York Times in 2004. Stellar Wind was a prelude to new legal structures that allowed President Bush and President Barack Obama to reproduce each of those programs and expand their reach.
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- "Stellar Wind (code name)" | 2013-06-06 | 404 Upvotes 167 Comments
๐ List of screw drives
A screw drive is a system used to turn a screw. At a minimum, it is a set of shaped cavities and protrusions on the screw head that allows torque to be applied to it. Usually, it also involves a mating tool, such as a screwdriver, that is used to turn it. The following heads are categorized based on commonality, with some of the less-common drives being classified as "tamper-resistant".
Most heads come in a range of sizes, typically distinguished by a number, such as "Phillips #00". These sizes do not necessarily describe a particular dimension of the drive shape, but rather are arbitrary designations.
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- "List of screw drives" | 2018-05-07 | 303 Upvotes 255 Comments
๐ Ghoti
Ghoti is a creative respelling of the word fish, used to illustrate irregularities in English spelling and pronunciation.
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- "Ghoti" | 2020-06-20 | 317 Upvotes 239 Comments
๐ Geneva drive
The Geneva drive or Maltese cross is a gear mechanism that translates a continuous rotation movement into intermittent rotary motion.
The rotating drive wheel is usually equipped with a pin that reaches into a slot located in the other wheel (driven wheel) that advances it by one step at a time. The drive wheel also has an elevated circular blocking disc that "locks" the rotating driven wheel in position between steps.
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- "Geneva drive" | 2013-12-17 | 481 Upvotes 71 Comments
๐ SoftICE
SoftICE is a kernel mode debugger for DOS and Windows up to Windows XP. Crucially, it is designed to run underneath Windows such that the operating system is unaware of its presence. Unlike an application debugger, SoftICE is capable of suspending all operations in Windows when instructed. For driver debugging this is critical due to how hardware is accessed and the kernel of the operating system functions. Because of its low-level capabilities, SoftICE is also popular as a software cracking tool.
Microsoft offers two kernel-mode debuggers, WinDbg and KD, for no charge. However, the full capabilities of WinDbg and KD are available only when two interlinked computers are used. SoftICE therefore is an exceptionally useful tool for difficult driver related development. The last released version was for Windows XP.
Older versions exist for DOS and compatible operating systems. SoftICE was originally produced by a company called NuMega, and was subsequently acquired by Compuware in 1997, which in turn sold the property to Micro Focus in 2009. Currently, Micro Focus owns the source code and patents, but is not actively maintaining SoftICE.
Discussed on
- "SoftICE" | 2020-01-19 | 168 Upvotes 82 Comments
- "SoftICE: a kernel mode debugger for Windows" | 2015-09-12 | 106 Upvotes 44 Comments
๐ Guanxi
Guanxi (simplified Chinese: ๅ ณ็ณป; traditional Chinese: ้ไฟ; pinyin: guฤnxi) defines the fundamental dynamic in personalized social networks of power, and is a crucial system of beliefs in Chinese culture. In Western media, the pinyin romanization of this Chinese word is becoming more widely used instead of the two common translations of itโ"connections" and "relationships"โas neither of those terms sufficiently reflects the wide cultural implications that guanxi describes.
Guanxi plays a fundamental role within the Confucian doctrine, which sees the individual as part of a community and a set of family, hierarchical and friendly relationships. In particular, there is a focus on tacit mutual commitments, reciprocity, and trust, which are the grounds of guanxi and guanxi networks.
Guanxi also has a major influence on the management of businesses based in Mainland China, and businesses owned by Overseas Chinese in Southeast Asia (the latter is known as the bamboo network).
Closely related concepts include that of ganqing, a measure which reflects the depth of feeling within an interpersonal relationship, renqing (ไบบๆ rรฉnqรญng/jen-ch'ing), the moral obligation to maintain a relationship, and the idea of "face" (้ขๅญ, miร nzi/mien-tzu), which refers to social status, propriety, prestige, or a combination of all three. Other related concepts include wu-lune, which supports the idea of a long term, developing relationship between a business and its client, and yi-ren and ren, which respectively support reciprocity and empathy.
๐ Boustrophedon
Boustrophedon (Ancient Greek: ฮฒฮฟฯ ฯฯฯฮฟฯฮทฮดฯฮฝ, boustrophฤdรณn "ox-turning" from ฮฒฮฟแฟฆฯ, bous, "ox", ฯฯฯฮฟฯฮฎ, strophฤ, "turn" and the adverbial suffix -ฮดฯฮฝ, "like, in the manner of"; that is, turning like oxen in ploughing) is a type of bi-directional text, mostly seen in ancient manuscripts and other inscriptions. Alternate lines of writing are flipped, or reversed, with reversed letters. Rather than going left-to-right as in modern European languages, or right-to-left as in Arabic and Hebrew, alternate lines in boustrophedon must be read in opposite directions. Also, the individual characters are reversed, or mirrored. It was a common way of writing in stone in Ancient Greece.
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- "Boustrophedon" | 2023-04-22 | 60 Upvotes 23 Comments
- "Boustrophedon" | 2017-10-24 | 82 Upvotes 59 Comments
- "Boustrophedon Order" | 2010-07-26 | 24 Upvotes 12 Comments
๐ Ship's cat
The ship's cat has been a common feature on many trading, exploration, and naval ships dating to ancient times. Cats have been carried on ships for many reasons, most importantly to control rodents. Vermin aboard a ship can cause damage to ropes, woodwork, and more recently, electrical wiring. Also, rodents threaten ships' stores, devour crews' foodstuff, and could cause economic damage to ships' cargo such as grain. They are also a source of disease, which is dangerous for ships that are at sea for long periods of time. Rat fleas are carriers of plague, and rats on ships were believed to be a primary vector of the Black Death.
Cats naturally attack and kill rodents, and their natural ability to adapt to new surroundings made them suitable for service on a ship. In addition, they offer companionship and a sense of home, security and camaraderie to sailors away from home.
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- "Ship's cat" | 2014-03-03 | 277 Upvotes 72 Comments
๐ Wikipedia Turns 15
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- "Wikipedia Turns 15" | 2016-01-15 | 441 Upvotes 109 Comments