I’ve dabbled in it, if you’re coming from a VB/Matlab background then it might be a bit of a jump but should be a useful skill to have. Have you tried working through the tutorial?
http://docs.python.org/tutorial/
I haven’t tried IDLE, but ipython is fairly similar to the Matlab command prompt.

List length:
: a=[1,4]
: len(a)
: 2

The in depth discussion on matters of great importance, like crown races. And planes on conveyor belts.

And in the real world if it’s the treadmill that acclerates to match but oppose the plane’s groundspeed, then it won’t get nearly fast enough to do either.

What gave you the idea we’re talking about the real world?

What if the treadmill was travelling at almost the speed of light?

Surely it also depends on the viscosity of air. If it was abnormally viscous then the conveyor would drag it backwards (or was it forwards?) which might or might not affect the air speed relative to the wing.

Howies responds! It’s like an STW slanging match.
http://brainfood.howies.co.uk/2011/10/the-f-word/

Am I unfairly using the pub’s fire/central heating?

Are you forcing an increase in the bill?

Yes. More energy will be consumed to evaporate the water on andrewh’s wet clothes. However this also means cold unhealthy overweight people will “consume” more of the pub’s heating than a fit thin person would, so thin people should obviously get a discount.

Exeter on Thursday morning. And if it’s sunny and I’m not busy I might cycle to see the finish in Exmouth.

A couple of photos taken from a train

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Two Medicine River[/url]

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Straight Line[/url]

statravel.co.uk normally works well if you’ve got dates and know which cities you want to fly from.

This guy managed the Dunwich Dynamo (120 miles overnight) with a dog.
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You should be able to fit a baby in there.

Howies bag with laptop, D-lock, and about a year’s worth of crap that never gets emptied. I prefer it to a backpack because you I can make an unplanned shopping trip and squeeze a surprising amount into it.

If you believe in the multiple universe theory then you could have an infinite number of year 1126s. That also means there’d be multiple universes in which crown races did or didn’t come with headsets.

You could try a spray, e.g. Beconase (there’s a generic version available). I’ve always found they work better than any tablets I’ve tried, and no side effects. Everyone’s different though.

Everyone chill out and admire some art.
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20 staff and 12 grand in cash? Did they not think to lock the door?
Not that this is anything other than a despicable act, but surely some nod towards security may have prevented it?

What would you recommend? According to the article it was an armed (taser) robbery. So presumably if the door was locked they’d ring the doorbell, wait patiently for someone to open it, then pull out their weapon. And for good measure threaten someone until the money was handed over or the safe unlocked.

As I said, fair play to them. But what sort of online mail order company has a website that becomes unusable due to traffic??

Name one online mail order company that hasn’t had an issue with their website going down at some point. Unless it’s a regular occurrence… then again if their website can’t cope with that many orders then their warehouse staff probably couldn’t either so maybe it’s a self limiting thing :)

Elfinsafety
I’m with RealBoy on this one. You got on a train full knowing you were required to buy a ticket, weren’t in possession of a valid ticket for your journey, then give it the biggun to some poor sod doing his job.

But earlier…

dazh
Man doesn’t pay for train ticket because the inspector at departure station waved him through the barrier so he didn’t miss the train. Man then gets pulled up at destination station by another inspector, admits not having a ticket, explains the situation.

Though I suppose it depends on whether the inspector waived you through knowing you didn’t have a ticket, or whether he assumed you already had one but didn’t bother to check so you wouldn’t miss the train.

the reaction of about 90% of drivers is to stamp on the brakes and point the car in towards the kerb?

I have noticed that 90% of the people that NOTICE there is an emergency vehicle behind them do that (stopping adjacent to traffic islands, on junctions, on roundabouts etc).

Even worse they’ll pull over to the kerb without looking. The first time I was knocked off my bike I heard a police car approaching, stopped on the kerb directly behind a parked car, idiot behind pulls over straight into me.

Sounds like a wobble bike with the middle bit missing
http://homepages.nildram.co.uk/~talizmar/xntrick/wobblebike.htm

Oh yeah… missed it.

Seeing as it’s Flickr why doesn’t someone create a STW Flickr group? Or has it already been done?

The results are out… this looks a bit insane

Stupid idea for a BBQ… you’ll need to wash it to get the smell of the smoke out.

At risk of stating the obvious, have you tried phoning them up and politely explaining your situation? The rules might just be there to stop people fitting and riding them, then trying to return them. Maybe ask for a credit voucher if they’re unhappy.

I thought they only pay your return postage if it’s their mistake (tyre not as described, or wrong item).

http://www.blazingsaddles.com/
I was there last month, cycled over the Golden Gate bridge with a vague aim of heading up into the Marin Headlands but decided not to due to torrential rain.
I only hired a hybrid but they’ve got full sus bikes too, and I found a $10 discount leaflet from my hostel.

I think we’ve got a nuclear power vs crown race race for longest thread. Neck and neck at the moment with 1125 posts.

Unfortunately in the AV system some people only get to vote once and others more than once and yet you will tell me it is unfair their later extra votes dont count- they have already voted so they did count.

Everyone gets the same number of effective votes. Think of it in terms of multiple rounds of voting, with each round eliminating one candidate. It’s just that people who voted for a candidate still in the running are (not unreasonably) assumed to vote the same way in subsequent rounds until they’re eliminated.

Just had a call from the fraud dept of my bank… no dodgy transactions but they said a whole range of card numbers is at risk of fraud including mine and they’re going to replace it. Last CRC order was 11th Feb.

Media in over-sensationalised story shocker. At least he hasn’t actually been demonised for something he didn’t do, unlike Chris Jefferies.

Payment: If you’re a small/new shop go with one of the main payment processors like WorldPay, make it clear from the start so users know your payment processing should be secure. Also an option not to register with the site is nice, if I get good service the first time I’ll probably return and register voluntarily.

Range: Doesn’t matter how big/small, as long as it’s not a random mix of items. E.g. If you’re going to sell chainring spacers then non-standard length chainring bolts would be nice too.

Their facebook ads always suggest free pizza, bagels, etc. Whenever I click through it’s usually a spa treatment, teeth whitening or a pub meal in the middle of nowhere.

Hire a canal boat (or two), cruise to a pub, cruise back.

If men are 80% more likely to have a crash than women for the same miles driven, then that’s a pretty significant risk.

But if there’s some underlying factor which causes men to present a greater risk than women it’s fairer to use that factor.

If the perpetrator of a robbery is 6% more likely to be Liverpudlian or black, that’s barely outside the margin of error.

Shouldn’t the margin of error depend on the sample size?

I think it depends on how whether the factor you’re using to assess risk has a causal relationship, or if it’s a proxy. E.g. Years of experience should be a valid factor whereas pure age might not be so, though you could argue that humans are inherently more likely to be involved in risky behaviour below a certain age. Similarly if you can show that there is a causative link between being male/female or white/black/asian/green then I think it would be valid to use that for assessing insurance risk, but if it just “comes out of the stats” then we should be looking at what the underlying factors are.

I don’t see anything wrong with that, and would argue that the current system is more fair overall than one without the gender distinction, because it’s more fair on average

What you should be comparing is the current system vs. the system without gender discrimination but with the addition of other factors which aren’t currently taken into account. You might be right in thinking it’ll be more unfair, OTOH insurers might be using it as an excuse to unfairly increase premiums for men, and that this will force them to reconsider how they assess risk.

You have to draw the line somewhere on what factors it’s acceptable to use. E.g. You can’t discriminate on the basis of race irrespective of whether there’s a correlation with higher/lower risk. Now that gender has come up there’s a big fuss about it because it involves change, but if in 10 years time someone were to suggest bringing back different premiums purely on the basis of gender I bet there’d be big opposition to it.

Broke my fibula a year ago, luckily nothing complicated. A couple of weeks after having the cast removed the physio said gentle cycling would be a good thing for building the muscles back up, as it’s lower impact than walking. He did suggest starting on an exercise bike though, mostly to avoid any putting-the-wrong-foot-down-and-screaming-in-pain incidents.

National Rail Conditions of Carriage Appendix B:
http://www.nationalrail.co.uk/system/galleries/download/misc/NRCOC.pdf
has limits on the maximum dimensions of luggage, though I guess if you get a bike reservation and stuff the box in the bike space they won’t care.

You did understand that in this country people mostly ride their bikes all year round, right? and that if you build a trail centre, people will ride it? Could you not have thought of this when you built them?

And what do you propose they do? More importantly who’s going to pay for it or provide the labour? I’ve ridden there a few times (my first ever visit to a MTB trail), and I really appreciate the work that Chase Trails volunteers have done.