How to generate unlimited string from keyboard
How do I compare strings in Java?
Ban "What have you tried?" links in comments Recently on SO, I've been noticing a lot of link-only comments on (admittedly bad) questions.  The typical comment looks like this:        Now, my first instinct is to flag the comment as "not constructive" or "too chatty", but the fact is that the blog post linked to is actually good advice.  On the whole though, the way it is being wielded like a blunt instrument comes across as—at best—lazy arrogance in my opinion and is not adding anything to the network.  Can we ban "What have you tried?" links like we did with ?  An example:    To be clear, I'm not proposing that we stop people asking for clarification or expecting askers to explain themselves properly. I just don't think comments like these are particularly constructive. How to create a bootable USB stick? I am looking at this:    I need to create a boot disk to test Ubuntu to make sure it will run on a PC (Compaq Mini CQ10-120LA) I was given. I can create the boot disk off of a Mac (in English) or Windows (but Windows is in Spanish and foreign to me).   Questions:     What format do I choose for the USB stick? (I wish the instructions stated this). What is Dash? (Will I know when I run the installer?) Can I do this from a Mac or Windows computer? Or only from Ubuntu? Prove that $Au\cdot v = u\cdot A^Tv$ Let A be an $n$ x $n$ matrix and let $u$,$v$ $\in$ $\mathbb{R^n}$. Prove that $$Au\cdot v = u\cdot A^Tv$$  I tried using the fact that $A^Tu=A\cdot u$. However, I cannot seem to get to this result. Could anyone please help me out? I have a set of 10 tables and each has an extra column that I don't want. Specifically, these tables are descriptions of database tables exported by phpMyAdmin, and they all have a "MIME" column that I would like to remove. Is there a way to do this other than using string manipulation / find and replace?   I have tried setting the column to p{0in}, but the column title still remains. Data Recovery - How to Restore Deleted / Formatted Files on HD Micro SD Card Background:    I put in a friend's SD Card to format it because it was having problems. Then I put mine back in and I think my phone formatted my SD Card. I had a ton of pictures on there that are now gone! I put the card into the computer and there's only 2mb of cache files on there and none of the original directories.   I already tried the following freeware recovery applications:         Neither of them were able to retrieve any files. Undelete took 1minute to scan for files and came up with 0 files.  Recuva took 10 minutes for their "deep scan" which doesn't seem thorough enough at all for this 8GB SD Card. I need something that's a lot more heavy duty.  I don't mind paying for an application to get the data back if necessary...   Questions:     Which application can I use to recover my deleted picture files from my 8GB HD Micro SD Card?   Why did Anroid format my SD card?   How can I tell if it's a phone problem, data problem, or SD Card problem? How can I serialize an object to JSON in JavaScript? I don't need a recommendation or a list but my knowledge of GPS and "navi"s and the differences between them is an utter mystery to me.  But often I'm lost in backstreets in random countries where access to something like a live Google Maps would be awesome. I absolutely cannot afford a smartphone with worldwide roaming though.  Can GPS's do what I want or am I barking up the wrong tree? If they can is it only high end ones than can? MySQL 5.5.16 allows anonymous connections Apparently, I can connect to MySQL (at least from my localhost) without having to provide any username or password. I can even put anything as username, as long as the password is empty. I have access to the information_schema and test databases. I can create tables. If I run SELECT USER() it returns the proper value randomstring@localhost, where the random string is whatever I used for username when I connected.  The mysql.user table contains root@localhost, root@127.0.0.1, @localhost and pma@localhost. I manually set encrypted passwords to all the records (UPDATE user SET password=...) and only root has any privileges, the other two records have "N" for all privileges. That record with the empty username looks suspicious, but I don't think it has anything to do with this and I think it was there from the beginning.  To make matters worse, if I add a user with a password, I can only connect using empty string as password (just like if I put anything as username). If I try to connect using the username I created and password I supplied when creating it (CREATE USER .. IDENTIFIED BY ..) it doesn't work.  Does anyone know what is wrong and how I can fix this?  Note: I am using MySQL 5.5.16 for Windows, provided by the XAMPP package. Applying Zorn's Lemma to natural numbers Zorn's Lemma states that if every chain $C$ in a partially ordered set $X$ has an upper bound then there is at least one maximal element in $X$.  Let $n\in \mathbb{N}$, $C_n \subset \mathbb{N}$ be the set containing the natural numbers $\{1,\dots,n\}$. Then if $k\le n$, $C_k\subset C_n$, so $C_n$ is a chain. Also, $C_n$ has an upper bound, such as $n+1$. But what is the maximal element of $\mathbb{N}$?  There's something I don't get in Zorn's Lemma statement. Requires installation of untrusted packages? I tried installing VLC Player yesterday, and I got the Requires installation of untrusted packages error.  I searched for hours for a solution to this problem, and finally came upon a suggestion that said to change servers for downloading updates from.  I did this, and it gave me a 404 error when I clicked on "Check" in the Update Manager.  I tried switching my server back to the main one (and after that, several other ones), but I am now still getting a 404 error:   And the other error I get when downloading or updating:   Edit: Output of cat /etc/apt/sources.list:  deb-src http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise main restricted #Added by software-properties  # See http://help.ubuntu.com/community/UpgradeNotes for how to upgrade to # newer versions of the distribution. deb http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise main restricted multiverse deb-src http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise multiverse universe #Added by software-properties  ## Major bug fix updates produced after the final release of the ## distribution. deb http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise-updates main restricted multiverse deb-src http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise-updates restricted main multiverse universe #Added by software-properties  ## N.B. software from this repository is ENTIRELY UNSUPPORTED by the Ubuntu ## team. Also, please note that software in universe WILL NOT receive any ## review or updates from the Ubuntu security team. deb http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise universe deb http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise-updates universe  ## N.B. software from this repository is ENTIRELY UNSUPPORTED by the Ubuntu  ## team, and may not be under a free licence. Please satisfy yourself as to  ## your rights to use the software. Also, please note that software in  ## multiverse WILL NOT receive any review or updates from the Ubuntu ## security team.  ## N.B. software from this repository may not have been tested as ## extensively as that contained in the main release, although it includes ## newer versions of some applications which may provide useful features. ## Also, please note that software in backports WILL NOT receive any review ## or updates from the Ubuntu security team. deb http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise-backports main restricted universe multiverse deb-src http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise-backports main restricted universe multiverse #Added by software-properties  deb http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise-security main restricted multiverse deb-src http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise-security restricted main multiverse universe #Added by software-properties deb http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise-security universe  ## Uncomment the following two lines to add software from Canonical's ## 'partner' repository. ## This software is not part of Ubuntu, but is offered by Canonical and the ## respective vendors as a service to Ubuntu users. deb http://archive.canonical.com/ubuntu precise partner deb-src http://archive.canonical.com/ubuntu precise partner  ## This software is not part of Ubuntu, but is offered by third-party ## developers who want to ship their latest software. The current process for self-deletion of a user account has several problematic aspects, both in the process itself and in the end result. Some of these issues are:   The process requires manual intervention of a mod or SE employee, leading to delays and sometimes mistakes. It is more complicated than it has to be, which can lead to the impression that SE is imposing some rather arbitrary-looking restrictions and steps one has to take. This can give the impression that the user isn't really in control of his private data at SE. It is irreversible once the account is deleted, although an account can be partially reconstructed with a lot of manual effort from an SE developer. There is no real protection against mod/SE employee errors, if an account is deleted in error, there is no easy way to undo the damage. Because it is manual, it consumes the time of SE employees that have to deal with it  (unless  is used), removing useful voting information and annoying users that lose reputation that way.   I'm proposing an alternative way of handling self-deletion that would be automated, and also reversible to some extent, while still being pretty much a hard-delete (and not a soft-delete that would be problematic with respect to user privacy). The process would work roughly like this:   The user clicks a "delete profile" button in his profile. There should be a way to indicate if you want to delete all profiles on all SE sites, only on this site and a way to select multiple sites from a list where the profile should be deleted. It is verified that the user has true access to the account in some way (confirmation mail?) and not just someone that found the unlocked computer of the user. A countdown until deletion is started (I'd go with 48h, but that could be different). The timer shouldn't be too long, but long enough to correct mistakes and leave users a bit of time to reconsider. Alternative options would be to enable users to override the countdown if they really want to nuke their account immediately. Another option would be to soft-delete the account immediately, and make the countdown only for hard-deletion of the user data. Upon deletion, the posts of the user and his votes are transferred to a newly created blank account, the original account itself is hard-deleted with all the remaining data it contains. The dummy account that holds the user's data should be flagged in some way as deleted, so that the profile links will be disabled, the profile won't be accessible and it won't appear in any user lists.  The user receives a private code that can be used to claim ownership of the account. Other ways are not possible as all private information is removed about the account. This allows for an automatic way of reclaiming most of the important parts of a deleted account. The ability to restore a deleted account might have to be somewhat restricted to avoid misusing it to get rid of the account history. It is more meant as an additional safeguard so that account reconstruction is more easily possible in rare cases. Such additional safeguards might be necessary as the deletion itself would be automatic and without oversight from SE or moderators.   I personally think that the information which posts and votes were connected to a (now anonymized) account is not sensitive enough that it would have to be removed on account deletion. My idea is that this would be close enough to a hard-delete that it satisfies any privacy concerns, but still allow reassociation of posts with a recovered account. The partial reversibility would alleviate concerns about removing the manual oversight by mods and SE employees over the account deletion process. Storing C++ template function definitions in a .CPP file I have some template code that I would prefer to have stored in a CPP file instead of inline in the header.  I know this can be done as long as you know which template types will be used.  For example:  .h file  class foo { public:     template &lt;typename T&gt;     void do(const T&amp; t); };   .cpp file  template &lt;typename T&gt; void foo::do(const T&amp; t) {     // Do something with t }  template void foo::do&lt;int&gt;(const int&amp;); template void foo::do&lt;std::string&gt;(const std::string&amp;);   Note the last two lines - the foo::do template function is only used with ints and std::strings, so those definitions mean the app will link.  My question is - is this a nasty hack or will this work with other compilers/linkers? I am only using this code with VS2008 at the moment but will be wanting to port to other environments. There has got to be the establishment of a universal auxiliary language.   Does the verb got add more to the context or is it there just for emphasis? Is it even grammatical?  Using Google-Ngrams I found a few similar versions as follow: . For example;   For many from the North, however, it has seemed difficult and there has seemed to be a problem. There has come to be a convolution between this become enmeshed concept of marriage as it exists in the sacred and how it exists in the secular. Most of the time since I have been here, there has appeared to be considerable feeling in the minds of a few. There has had to be some negotiation, obviously, but I think we provided what our soldiers need and what our country needs.   In general, I wanna know if 'have/has'+past-participle+'to be' is grammatical. Is there any difference between Present Perfect and Present Perfect Continuous? I changed my hostname, why is my bash PS1 prompt unchanged? What is the scientific name of this evergreen plant? This plant is found in India. It is an evergreen plant. Would love to know the scientific name. When running sudo apt-get update I get these following errors:  Err archive.ubuntu.com quantal InRelease Err archive.ubuntu.com quantal-updates InRelease Err archive.ubuntu.com quantal-backports InRelease Err archive.ubuntu.com quantal-security InRelease Err archive.ubuntu.com quantal Release.gpg   Unable to connect to archive.ubuntu.com:http: [IP: 91.189.92.177 80] Err archive.ubuntu.com quantal-updates Release.gpg   Unable to connect to archive.ubuntu.com:http: [IP: 91.189.92.177 80] Err archive.ubuntu.com quantal-backports Release.gpg   Unable to connect to archive.ubuntu.com:http: [IP: 91.189.92.177 80] Err archive.ubuntu.com quantal-security Release.gpg   Unable to connect to archive.ubuntu.com:http: [IP: 91.189.92.177 80] Reading package lists... Done W: Failed to fetch archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/dists/quantal/InRelease   W: Failed to fetch archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/dists/quantal-updates/InRelease   W: Failed to fetch archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/dists/quantal-backports/InRelease   W: Failed to fetch archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/dists/quantal-security/InRelease   W: Failed to fetch archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/dists/quantal/Release.gpg  Unable to connect to archive.ubuntu.com:http: [IP: 91.189.92.177 80] W: Failed to fetch archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/dists/quantal-updates/Release.gpg  Unable to connect to archive.ubuntu.com:http: [IP: 91.189.92.177 80] W: Failed to fetch archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/dists/quantal-backports/Release.gpg  Unable to connect to archive.ubuntu.com:http: [IP: 91.189.92.177 80] W: Failed to fetch archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/dists/quantal-security/Release.gpg  Unable to connect to archive.ubuntu.com:http: [IP: 91.189.92.177 80] W: Some index files failed to download. They have been ignored, or old ones used instead.   I am using Ubuntu 12.04. This is the command I used after installing Ubuntu from window installer. I am sure my laptop is connected to internet. What can I do now? Cyberpunk/Post-Apocalyptic Sci-Fi series from the 90s or 00s based in Manhattan Is there a general theorem stating why the restricted Lorentz group's exponential map is surjective? The exponential map for the restricted Lorentz group is surjective. An outline of why is shown on the wiki page .  Is there a more general theorem that states that for some class of Lie groups or Riemannian manifolds (which includes the restricted Lorentz group), the exponential map is surjective?  There is a theorem stating that compact, connected Lie groups have surjective exponential maps. But as the restricted Lorentz group is not compact, this isn't applicable. I am working with dimensionality reduction algorithms. Linear Discriminant Analysis (LDA) is a supervised algorithm that takes into account the class label (which is not the case of PCA for example). I am using Python to do a comparative study between some algorithms.  Why with two classes (k = 2), regardless of the data dimensionality, LDA gives one dimension, i.e. the new subspace is composed of only one dimension? For example if I try to project my dataset (of 100 attributes and 2 classes) to 10-dimensional space by using LDA(n_components=10) I only obtain 1 dimension?  For k&gt;2 I can obtain the number of discriminant vectors that I specified as n_components. How can I get n_components dimensions for k=2?