Script that starts a video upon boot and then loops said video
Playing a video in full screen after startup
Robot tank run amok, its trainer trapped in cave on the Moon Another dim memory from my sci-fi reading binges in the 1980s... this one almost definitely in one of the big hardback collections full of late Golden Age short stories.  The story is told from the perspective of a robot (maybe cyborg?) tank that has stopped responding to control signals and is aggressively "defending" some portion of the Moon, to which it was previously assigned. Maybe a war had ended, or maybe it became confused about an exercise that it thought was real?  There was a person trapped in a cave trying to communicate with the tank. The tank mostly ignores him, so the main purpose of what he says is exposition for the reader. I think this person was an expert on this type of robot/cyborg sent to "talk it down", but the tank had attacked, and this guy was the only survivor. The expert was badly wounded -- I think he mentions his suit had to amputate his leg to seal a hole -- or maybe flood it with water which would freeze to seal the hole but mean that his leg had to be amputated later. He keeps trying to convince the tank to stand down, at one point saying that he knew it "back when it was just a two-wheeler an autocyber in boot camp" or something along that line. (Edit: I must have been reading too fast and/or distracted back then, since per the quote below I seem to have misread "motorcycle" for "autocyber"!)  One detail of the attack stands out -- the tank was low on ammunition, I think, so it used a kind of bomb with an electric/magnetic "catapult" (aka "magnapult") to hit the expert's transport. The tank was proud of itself for figuring out a way to hit it far out of the normal range by 1) using its own top speed to add velocity to the projectile, and 2) building up the catapult's energy past its normal operating range, which caused it pain but made the bomb go much further. It catches the transport by surprise, since they thought they were safely out of range of the armaments it had left.  The premise sounds a lot like a Keith Laumer "Bolo" story, but I'm fairly sure that it's not actually one of them. It had a somewhat grimmer feel to it. I could be wrong, though, since it's been 30 years. My laptop which had Windows 7 on it crashed today. Being unable to access any file kept within, I found about the LiveCD. So I created a LiveUSB with Ubuntu in it, and managed to access my Windows desktop. I'm now backing up files important to me, but I have a question:  Now I'm cutting and pasting the files I want to save, using Ubuntu. Are these files being moved in Windows as well, or do the alterations I make through Ubuntu not affect the Windows state?   So let's say,if I cut and paste all of the D drive, and then format C and reboot with Windows, would the files in D have been gone (since they were cut and not copied) or still be there?  Thanks. How to align content of a div to the bottom I am planning to visit Moscow this winter as a solo tourist. I am a Hungarian citizen. I booked airplane tickets myself. I was informed that I will need an invitation letter, and I think I will go this way: (), but now the tourist visa application online form asks:    the options are: None, Travel company. I think I will need to select travel company because the description says:     In the case of a tourist visa select "Travel company" from the list and give the name and address of the travel company. In the case of   business visa select "Organization" from the list and enter in the   "Name of organization" name of the host organization, enter the   address of the organization and TIN in the appropriate fields. In   the case of private visa select “Individual” from the list and enter   the name, birth date and home address of the host. In the case of   transit, select "None" from the list.  Reference number: printed on   the bottom line of approval of a foreign tourist "Референс №». It is   necessary to introduce whole number with leading zeros.       Confirmation number: printed on the top line of confirmation of a   foreign tourist. The number can contain only numbers or numbers with   letters. You should only enter the numbers.   However I do not have a travel company.   What do I do?   Select "None" from the drop down so that I don't have to fill in travel company(this seems to be against the description that says select travel company for tourist visa) Select Travel company and the Invitation letter company will be my travel company and they will provide appropriate details? as in () Apply at some additional travel company, because there is no other way?  Some other option?   I didn't expect the visa application to be this complicated. I hope I get there. Can you construct a field with 4 elements? Can you construct a field with 4 elements? can you help me think of any examples? How to draw this P-V graph? How do I model the fighter's Great Weapon Fighting fighting style in Anydice? I was trying to create an AnyDice function to model the Great Weapon Fighting fighting style (which lets you reroll 1s and 2s), but I couldn't get it to work on any arbitrary dice.  I've found this one:  function: reroll R:n under N:n {    if R &lt; N { result: d12 } else {result: R} } output [reroll 1d12 under 3] named "greataxe weapon fighting"   And it works fine. But I don't know how to make the function generic so i don't need to change the d12 every time i want a different dice to reroll.  I've tried  function: reroll R:n under N:n {    if R &lt; N { result: d{1..R} } else {result: R} } output [reroll 1d12 under 3] named "greataxe weapon fighting"   but it is not giving the right probabilities. Maybe if I could fetch the die size inside the function... I'm brand new to jQuery and have some experience using Prototype. In Prototype, there is a method to "flash" an element &mdash; ie. briefly highlight it in another color and have it fade back to normal so that the user's eye is drawn to it. Is there such a method in jQuery? I see fadeIn, fadeOut, and animate, but I don't see anything like "flash". Perhaps one of these three can be used with appropriate inputs? Relative performance of std::vector vs. std::list vs. std::slist? In Star Trek (2009), Did the Original Timeline Survive? How to redirect a URL to a custom IP address? I have an Ubuntu machine that I'm using as my home Internet router.  It uses a USB mobile broadband modem as its Internet connection, and shares this with another router (via the router's "Internet" port) which I use as my LAN.  How do I redirect requests from within my LAN for a given URL to a custom IP address (ex have google.com redirect to x.x.x.x)? Proficiency with specific weapons vs 'simple and martial'? In the PHB on pg. 146 it states that there are two weapon categories in which the players can be proficient: simple and martial.  As per  answer to another question, being proficient in either category makes the players character proficient in using all weapons of the respective category.   However in the race descriptions the players are given proficiency for specific weapons. Dwarfs, for example, have the trait Dwarven Combat Training giving proficiency with battleaxes, handaxes, throwing hammers and warhammers.   How do the two types of proficiencies interact with each other? Show $\operatorname{rank}(A) + \operatorname{rank}(B) \ge \operatorname{rank}(A+B)$ How do I pipe terminal standard output (stdout) to the clipboard? For example,   Say I want to list the contents of a folder and directly paste them into a chat window for a friend to see.    I realize I could do ls &gt; filename.txt to create a file (filename.txt) with those contents; I'd then have to open or print the file and manually select and copy the text block (which can be annoying/tedious.)  I clearly could also select and copy the output of ls directly from within the terminal window.  It would be much faster/easier to simply pipe standard output to the clipboard.  What terminal command allows me to do this? Finding maximal sublist of linearly independent vectors Long boot delay on Ubuntu loading/splash screen following regular dist-upgrade on clean SSD install (18.04) I'be been running 18.04 since a clean SSD install on the day of it's official release, without issues. Power on to login was seconds (max 10)  Then, I did a regular upgrade this morning:  $ sudo apt update &amp;&amp; sudo apt dist-upgrade   The packages installed/upgraded were:  Install: linux-headers-4.15.0-24:amd64 (4.15.0-24.26, automatic), linux-headers-4.15.0-24-generic:amd64 (4.15.0-24.26, automatic), linux-modules-extra-4.15.0-24-generic:amd64 (4.15.0-24.26, automatic), linux-modules-4.15.0-24-generic:amd64 (4.15.0-24.26, automatic), linux-image-4.15.0-24-generic:amd64 (4.15.0-24.26, automatic) Upgrade: gnome-control-center-data:amd64 (1:3.28.1-0ubuntu1.18.04.1, 1:3.28.1-0ubuntu1.18.04.2), linux-headers-generic:amd64 (4.15.0.23.25, 4.15.0.24.26), gnome-control-center:amd64 (1:3.28.1-0ubuntu1.18.04.1, 1:3.28.1-0ubuntu1.18.04.2), linux-image-generic:amd64 (4.15.0.23.25, 4.15.0.24.26), linux-signed-generic:amd64 (4.15.0.23.25, 4.15.0.24.26), gnome-control-center-faces:amd64 (1:3.28.1-0ubuntu1.18.04.1, 1:3.28.1-0ubuntu1.18.04.2), linux-generic:amd64 (4.15.0.23.25, 4.15.0.24.26)   I rebooted once the upgrade had completed, and noted a 2-3 minute delay on the Ubuntu loading/splash screen (prior to login) (without any progress/activity indicated on the dots).  I powered off and tried to boot again, but am getting this delay consistently now. Also close down is much slower too.  Update #1 (2018-07-03): Analysis on systemd:  $ sudo systemd-analyze blame 3min 53.073s plymouth-quit-wait.service     2min 20.699s snapd.seeded.service          49.949s snapd.service           6.186s NetworkManager-wait-online.service           1.148s dev-sda2.device           1.098s plymouth-start.service   Showing that plymouth-quit-wait.service (which I now believe is related to the Ubuntu loading/splash screen) and snapd.seeded.service were by far the longest running services to initiate. So I compared the times before the dist-upgrade and after:  $ journalctl -u plymouth-quit-wait.service --since today -- Logs begin at Fri 2018-04-27 13:01:30 BST, end at Tue 2018-07-03 12:38:05 BST. -- Jul 03 04:15:43 user-laptop systemd[1]: Starting Hold until boot process finishes up... Jul 03 04:15:46 user-laptop systemd[1]: Started Hold until boot process finishes up. -- Reboot -- Jul 03 04:21:17 user-laptop systemd[1]: Starting Hold until boot process finishes up... Jul 03 04:24:52 user-laptop systemd[1]: Started Hold until boot process finishes up.   Before the upgrade plymouth-quit-wait.service took 3 seconds. After the upgrade it took 3 minutes 35 seconds  $ journalctl -u snapd.seeded.service --since today -- Logs begin at Fri 2018-04-27 13:01:30 BST, end at Tue 2018-07-03 12:42:14 BST. -- Jul 03 04:15:43 user-laptop systemd[1]: Starting Wait until snapd is fully seeded... Jul 03 04:15:43 user-laptop systemd[1]: Started Wait until snapd is fully seeded. -- Reboot -- Jul 03 04:22:47 user-laptop systemd[1]: Starting Wait until snapd is fully seeded... Jul 03 04:24:49 user-laptop systemd[1]: Started Wait until snapd is fully seeded.   Before the upgrade snapd.seeded.service took 0 seconds. After the upgrade it took 2 minutes 2 seconds.  Update #2 (2018-07-06): This morning's boot saw the return of the delay. So I guess we're still waiting for the kernel/plymouth/snapd update.  Update #3 (2018-07-12): The problem seems to be resolved, but I didn't see any update to snap or plymouth, and I'm still running 4.15.0-24 kernel. So I'm not sure which package update fixed the problem, or if it just resolved itself somehow. Reading the bug updates on launchpad it's unclear to me what was done (or is being done) to what package/s. If anyone can clarify that would be very useful. What keeps mass from turning into energy? I'm attempting a mass update on Contacts via Execute Anonymous. My code gives me the following error:     System.LimitException: Apex CPU Time Limit Exceeded   Here's my code:  List &lt;Contact&gt; contactList = [select Id, Mass_Update_Checkbox__c from Contact Limit 1000];  for (Contact contact : contactList) {     contact.Mass_Update_Checkbox__c = TRUE;  }  update contactList; Is 3+1 spacetime as privileged as is claimed? I've often heard the argument that having 3 spatial dimensions is very special. Such arguments are invariably based on certain assumptions that do not appear to be justifiable at all, at least to me. There is a  on Wikipedia.  For example, a common argument for why >3 dimensions is too many is that the gravitational law cannot result in stable orbital motion. A common argument for &lt;3 dimensions being too few is that one cannot have a gastrointestinal tract, or more generally, a hole that doesn't split an organism into two.  Am I being overly skeptical in thinking that while the force of gravity may not be able to hold objects in stable orbits, there most certainly exist sets of physical laws in higher dimensions which result in formation of stable structures at all scales? It may be utterly different to our universe, but who said a 4D universe must be the same as ours with one extra dimension?  Similarly, isn't it very easy to conceive of a 2D universe in which organisms can feed despite not having any holes, or not falling apart despite having them? For example, being held together by attractive forces, or allowing certain fundamental objects of a universe to interpenetrate, and thus enter a region of the body in which they become utilized. Or, conceive of a universe so incomprehensibly different to ours that feeding is unnecessary, and self-aware structures form through completely different processes.  While I realise that this is sort of a metaphysical question, is 3+1 dimensions really widely acknowledged to be particularly privileged by respected physicists? I learned recently that when an object moves with a velocity comparable to the velocity of light the (relativistic) mass changes. How does this alteration take place?