Colleges and training providers have adapted in positive and innovative ways to continue learning and support the local community during the Covid-19 crisis.

Here, FE Week shares some examples, including hospital donations, virtual horticulture, cooking and mental health classes, as well as zumba!

Care apprentices in the Midlands have been deployed to care homes to alleviate pressure on nurses during the Covid-19 outbreak.

Two hundred and fifty health and social care apprentices from private provider GB Training, some of whom are fresh out of school, have been armed with face masks, more facilities for handwashing and sterilising, and updated infection control training, to take on even greater responsibilities.

At The Chimes Residential care home in Stoke-on-Trent, elderly people have been isolated to their rooms and professional visitors are not being allowed past reception, so level 3 lead adult care worker apprentices have had to carry out tasks usually fulfilled by district nurses, including taking diabetics blood sugar levels.

Taherabanu Rajabali, Level 2 Health and Social Care Apprentice, IHI Care Services, Birmingham

The homes care manager, Julie Davey, said how very proud she was of her team, especially the apprentices as they are stepping up to the bar and learning the necessary skills to keep giving the vital care that older people need.

The district nurses, she said, have given the apprentices an A* for all they have learned in these uncertain times.

Tracey Bradley, an apprentice working at a care home in Birmingham, said it had been very stressful, but they have no choice as the learners both know the people and care for them deeply.

That wed do all we can to help protect them goes without question, she said, adding it was rewarding to be using skills and training she had learned to protect people, particularly when they are some of those most at risk from this horrible disease.

At Awarding Care, 92-year-old resident Stella Powell has given her thanks to level 2 apprentices for your kindness and dedication. Not only now, but always.

Youve become more than carers youre friends to us too. Thank you doesnt seem enough.

But its not just the apprentices who are helping health services during this pandemic: a tutor at GB Training, Gemma Smith, has been contacted by a hospital she worked at for several years to request she join an emergency list in case of a lockdown in the UK.

The provider said despite the challenges and the anxieties, many of the apprentices are working overtime to cover fluctuating staff shortages, and morale remains high.

Managing director Lawrence Barton expressed his and his whole organisations pride in seeing the apprentices rise to the additional challenges placed upon them.

Our apprentices are serving on the front line in the struggle against this pandemic and helping to save lives. In a number of cases, they find themselves caring for and protecting some of the most vulnerable in our society, many of whom are the same age as their grandparents.

PICTURED ABOVE: GB Training Health and Social Care apprentices receive 90 bunches of flowers donated by Marks & Spencers for both residents and carers as a gesture of gratitude for their hard work

An independent training provider has donated more than 20,000 to an emergency coronavirus fund.

Learning Curve Group handed over the entirety of its charity foundations balance to help front-line community groups and local charities working to ease the pressure on those worst affected by the pandemic in County Durham.

Chief executive Brenda McLeish said: People are at the centre of everything we do, so weve made an important decision to change the pillars upon which our fund was established with the aim of supporting those who are in need of funds more than ever.

As changes are announced daily, we are committed to supporting the local community in whatever way we can.

The County Durham Community Foundation has set up the County Durham Covid-19 Response Fund to help community groups survive during this period, and the Learning Curve Group Charity Foundation was one of the funds founding supporters.

Learning Curve Group HQ

The money will be spent on a range of activities. For example, 5 will go towards a hot dinner for an older person self-isolating.

In addition, 10 may be spent on purchasing items for a food bank and 20 could buy fuel to help a volunteer deliver meals on wheels. Larger sums of 50 will support volunteers from groups based in village halls calling elderly people in self-isolation, while 100 could keep the lights on for a community group.

Chief executive of County Durham Community Foundation, Michelle Cooper, said: The situation is becoming more serious as each hour passes, and we cannot afford to wait around. We are devoting all of our time and energy into supporting our local grassroots groups, which in turn will bolster our communities.

Illness, isolation, loneliness and poverty are very real in County Durham and Darlington right now, and exasperated by the spread of Covid-19: but if we work together we can provide support to the life-changing local community services that will lessen the blow.

An independent training provider has drafted in a mental health and wellbeing coach to keep apprentices motivated in their studies during the crisis.

Amazing Apprenticeships have launched a series of webinars for employers and providers who are trying to support their apprentices while facing their own challenges.

Director Anna Morrison said: We have received an overwhelming response from the sector.

Were building a real sense of community and everyone is so positive about helping and supporting each other.

The provider has partnered with Gen Healthy Minds and one of its coaches, George Anderson, to provide content for the sessions. Anderson has 20 years experience in the fitness and wellbeing industry and his Facebook group On the wagon has more than 5,000 members.

He said: Never before has there been a more important time to teach resilience, wellbeing and mental health management techniques.

Im delighted to be delivering this series of online masterclasses to a group of individuals who have the potential to influence large numbers of apprentices.

Around 300 participants from across the country took part in the first webinar on Wednesday and 500 have registered for the next masterclass on Monday.

Mike Thompson, a managing partner at Gen Healthy Minds, said: Mental health and wellbeing of apprentices must be our number one priority right now and the team at Gen Healthy Minds will help employers and providers in whatever way we can.

Many of the providers participating in the webinars have been supporting apprentices in the NHS as well as those working in food production and distribution.

The programme is free to join and is being funded by Amazing Apprenticeships.

The provider has also set up a LinkedIn group to encourage sharing of best practice, ideas and support.

York College has donated almost 800 pieces of personal protective equipment to its local hospital to help battle against shortages brought on by the coronavirus pandemic.

A range of masks, gloves, overalls and safety glasses, which are usually in stock for use by construction, engineering and stonemasonry students, have been handed to the York Teaching Hospital Trust.

York College principal Lee Probert said: Since weve moved to online delivery only, we decided that these should be given to front-line staff in the NHS who are saving lives.

His colleges childcare students and staff have also been called upon to volunteer in some of the citys childcare centres that are stretched for staff, while other employees are being encouraged to join voluntary groups in the community if they wish to do so.

Probert added: Ive acknowledged that whilst were working in this brave new way not all staff will be able to work as productively at home as they could do if the college was open, and empowered people to sign up for the citys volunteering effort, if they feel able to do so.

York Colleges PPE donation

He also said that the college is going through its food stocks to donate goods due to expire in the coming weeks and months to food banks in the area.

These are items which we might have to write off if were not open in the traditional sense for a significant length of time.

We know that food bank stocks are becoming depleted and wed rather they had it to put to good use than it be wasted.

For its own students, York College is live-streaming interactive lessons in all curriculum areas every day.

Probert praised his staff for creating hundreds of online lessons and resources and working really hard to ensure students successes.

They have also been asked to stay in touch with learners to ensure they are not isolated and are in the best possible position to engage with whatever system for awarding qualifications emerges.

Daily remote enrichment programmes and quizzes are also being organised for the staff.

A college in Merseyside has been using technology to stream live cooking demos, host competitions and offer pastoral support as they adapt to teaching in isolation.

Level 1 hospitality students at Hugh Baird Colleges L20 Hotel School have been recreating dishes made by chef lecturers at home.

On Monday, level 1 students learned how to poach eggs as part of a remote breakfast lesson.

Steve Otty, curriculum co-ordinator, told FE Week the outbreak of Covid-19 has resulted in a rethink of delivering methods, with the hospitality team embracing online teaching.

He said: This has been a little challenging due to the very nature of vocational training. At college we have industry standard kitchens, a range of different ingredients and obviously were able to work more closely with learners.

But it has been great fun and the learners have enjoyed the experience.

L20 Hotel Schools learners have also taken part in an online student competition where they were challenged to upload a picture of the most unusual food item in their cupboards at home.

Nikolas Arnaudov, a 16-year-old who is studying for a level 1 VRQ Diploma in professional cooking, was victorious with Bulgarian pastries his mother had made while on lockdown.

Otty said the use of live group chats had resulted in positive student contributions and improved collaboration within groups.

He added: It has been key that we have continued to engage and communicate with learners.

I think that continuing with their course online has helped to lift their spirits and has kept their minds focused.

Andy Howard, one of the colleges directors, also devised a way for Microsoft Teams software to offer emotional support to students during this period.

A tiered framework has been introduced to enable check-ins on learners and prompt further engagement if there are any concerns.

He said: Planning the pastoral support is just as vital for our students as the academic delivery, if not more so.

Principal Rachael Hennigan added: I could not be prouder of all our staff at the college.

Their response to an unprecedented situation has been sensational.

A college with over 30,000 learners has not missed a step in moving services like horticulture lessons and mental health support online during the Covid-19 outbreak.

Weston College principal Paul Phillips commended his tremendous staff for their work in mobilising their digital strategy during the crisis, saying tutors have actually increased their interaction with students since the campus closed on Friday.

The college has developed a portfolio of courses, such as digital skills and mental health wellbeing, to upskill employees and members of the local community at home, and said it is continuing to get requests from employers who are looking to use the lockdown to help boost their workers skills while they are homeworking.

Emma Wilkinson, a digital marketing apprentice at Weston College

The team of digital educators and developers at the college have helped build a digital learning culture at the college over the past two years, with the help of 565,000 from the Department for Educations Flexible Learning Fund, which was used to train staff in techniques like video presentations.

Phillips says it was clear the digital strategy was not just about creating online learning, but also creating a strategy that would ensure the virtual classroom was outstanding and that social isolation is minimised, that motivation is maximised, and that mental health support is embedded holistically.

To that end, the college has also rolled out body and mind physical and wellbeing activities for groups of learners, as well as sessions like watching Netflix together and sharing a break for tea.

But it is not just students getting a digital helping hand during these times: Phillips is also running regular briefings over the internet with colleagues to keep morale high.

He has urged other principals to do the same, saying: Encourage staff to digitally innovate to keep students engaged in education and use their virtual community as a mechanism to reduce self-isolation and to improve mental health, and success will come from a ground-up approach.

The #myvirtualcollege hashtag has also been launched by Weston to capture best practice, ideas and suggestions for the future.

The coronavirus has not prevented East Durham College from caring for the livestock on its farm, with staff stepping in where students left off.

The college has a 24-horse yard, 200 sheep and an animal care unit which houses Wrinkles the giant tortoise as well as wallabies.

Its Houghall Campus is set in around 500 acres of arable, grazing and woodland. Lindsay Haggis, director of landbased studies, told FE Week: The farm is ticking away absolutely brilliantly.

I guess the disappointing thing is the learners would have been here to see it all and that is the opportunities that they are missing at the moment.

She said the equine lecturing team had pulled out all the stops the week before the college closed to ensure that learners had completed the practical assessments required to achieve their qualifications.

Staff have been using Facebook and Microsoft Teams to keep learners updated with what their favourite horses are up to as well as providing information on how Covid-19 is impacting the industry.

Yard manger Kate Lee and her team of four have been following a rota to take care of the horses and ensure they will be ready for when the students return.

Wrinkles, the giant sulcata tortoise

Most agriculture, animal management and foundation learners had the opportunity to get involved with the lambing season before closure but the colleges suckler herd of native cattle have just started calving, with three born so far and another 27 on the way.

Haggis said: Luckily the farm staff always take the time to take a snap or two so we can share these events with the learners.

Similarly, level 3 agriculture students had managed to complete their ploughing assessments before classes ended.

Haggis added: While its a shame the learners didnt get to follow this up with drilling, they will see the fruits of their labours when they return for year two and get on with harvest.

The director also stressed it is very much business as usual in the animal care unit, with senior animal care technician Imogen Wright training giant sulcata tortoise Wrinkles as well as looking after the rest of the animals, which include wallabies and raccoons.

A college senior leader by day and dance instructor by night is running free online classes to keep her colleagues active during Covid-19.

See more here:

How the FE sector is adapting to the coronavirus crisis - FE Week

Half-Life: Alyx has been available for a few days now and, although its quite a lengthy adventure, no doubt a lot of avid fans have already reached the mind-bending ending.

So, what the heck, huh?

After we completed Alyx we had the chance to sit down with Valve to talk about a lot of different aspects of Alyx. Well have the full interview up later in the week, but we couldnt not ask the company about the games big ending. If you dont know what were talking about, we laid out the ending here (obviously it sort of spoils everything).

Valves Greg Coomer had some interesting contributions about the different aspects of the ending and what it means for the future. Weve got our excerpts of those questions below. If you dont want to know what happens then check back here after finishing the game.

FULL SPOILERS FOR HALF-LIFE ALYX ENDING BELOW

Upload: So Im glad I finished the game because I would be remiss if I couldnt talk about the end with you guys. To me, that ending seemed like a bold, definitive statement that the next Half-Life game will be in VR.

GC: Valve is not quite ready to say that. We havent made actually any plans about medium [VR]. So I think weve obviously we get that question from many people. Also like, what exactly is coming next for VR? Also whats coming next for Half-Life? We really weve been working on this for four years and were really excited because the reception before the game is out seems to be really quite positive, so far. I know our playtesting is good.

But really the entire team and the company is in a mode where we really want to see what the reaction to this title is before we make plans about what exactly we will do next.

Upload: Having said that, the decision to have this ending in the game is undoubtedly a confidence thing. When did you feel you had the confidence to put this ending in the game? Was it always going to be there or was there a point where you said I think we can do this?

GC: It was definitely an ending Im not on the writing team but its definitely an ending that has been a core part of the plan for most of the development of the game. So it wasnt like we built the game as youve now experienced it and then thought hard about what should we tack on to the end. It definitely was something that was integral in the thing about how you get there and what the earlier stages of the product are.

Upload: Does Alyx remember the last moments of the game in Half-Life 2 through to Episode 2?

GC: We definitely get why youre asking the questions, but thats one of the things that the ending is really designed to leave unanswered, I believe.

Upload: Theres an interesting idea to Gordon picking up the crowbar at the end of the game. That could go down as a very iconic moment. And its interesting you decided to do that having not used melee weapons in the rest of the game. And so I wonder if theres any kind of notion of what youll be able to do going forward in that handing of the crowbar or passing of the torch, if you will.

Its like, This is what we can do with VR tech today, by the time maybe another game rolls around Im not asking you to say theres going to be an Index 2 but the industry is obviously naturally going to progress on and it feels like you guys are already thinking about the kind of designs that will go along with it.

GC: We definitely are. You could look at I mean a lot of the development of Alyx was done in concert with the team that was simultaneously building the Index. And I wouldnt say, though, that the ending of the game was done deeply in concert with the people who are thinking about next-gen VR, but you could say that the Alyx team is issuing a challenge to the part of Valve which is working on next-gen VR solution to say This is what we want from you, give us solutions that will let us build something like this.

I havent heard someone else say that, but your question sort of made me think of the ending to our game in a different light.

So there you have it.

See the original post:

Valve Talks Half-Life: Alyxs Big Ending: You Could Say The Team Is Issuing A Challenge - UploadVR

Thanks to the novel coronavirus, we're at a pivotal moment in the history of the internet. People need it more than ever because they're stuck at home, but it might not be fast enough to meet everyone's daily needs.

Multiple studies released over the past week have shown that home internet is slowing down in parts of the U.S. In some cases, adequate internet isn't available at all. We don't know what your personal internet situation is, but we do know roughly how much speed you need to do common tasks.

Below is a rundown of how fast your internet should be in order to do things like stream videos, play online multiplayer games, and work remotely. All you have to do to test your internet is go to Speedtest, which we must disclose is owned by Mashable's parent company, J2. For most cases, the download speed (measured in megabits per second, or Mbps), is the golden number. That's the rate at which your network can bring data to you.

If you're able to work remotely during our de facto quarantine, your daily routine is probably going to involve lots of emailing, Slacking, and maybe video calling depending on what you do. We'll address video calls a little later, but for everything else included in this category, you don't need to ride the bleeding edge of internet speeds to get by.

BroadbandNow has some basic guidelines for things like this and they recommend a minimum of 1Mbps to 5Mbps for web browsing and checking your email. You might not have the best time doing either of those things if your speed is that low, but you should be able to get things done...eventually. At the risk of editorializing, in my experience, it's tough to accomplish much of anything if your download speed isn't at least 10Mbps.

Other factors can come into play here, as well. Your WiFi signal strength might not be able to deliver ideal speeds because your router is old or needs to be moved, for example. You'll get better results over WiFi if your router is in a central location, there are no walls interrupting the signal, and you make sure there aren't too many devices connected at once.

Regarding that last point, it should be noted that these recommended minimums will probably only work if there isn't much network traffic. If there are multiple people trying to use the same network at once, single-digit download speeds likely won't cut it. That goes for all online activity, not just web browsing.

You need all the megabits you can get to watch 'Tiger King' on Netflix.

Image: Courtesy of NETFLIX

Everyone who's cooped up inside needs a way to pass the time. It's reasonable to assume every major streaming service is going to get a workout over the next several months, so you should make sure your internet is good enough to stream movies and TV shows at a watchable level of quality.

Each service has its own guidelines for this, but generally speaking, you don't need super fast internet to stream video. Netflix and Amazon Prime Video both recommend a minimum of 5Mbps for HD content, while Hulu has a blanket 3Mbps minimum for all non-live content. Obviously, you could still experience buffering or quality drops if you're streaming with speeds that low, which might be why BroadbandNow recommends at least 15Mbps to 25Mbps instead.

Coincidentally, that's about the range Netflix, Amazon, and Hulu recommend for 4K content. Hulu says 16Mbps is required, while Netflix and Hulu suggest 25Mbps. BroadbandNow, however, recommends at least 40Mbps for 4K viewing. And depending on where you are, Ultra HD streaming might not even be possible right now anyway.

So far, we've relied exclusively on download speed because it's the most important factor for web browsing and streaming. Online gaming is another matter, though. Whether you're visiting your friends' islands in Animal Crossing or battling for supremacy in Call of Duty, you need to get acquainted with a little something called "ping." It's one of the other metrics in a Speedtest result.

In the context of online gaming, ping is a measurement of how long it takes for your inputs to register with the game's server. It's typically measured in milliseconds and PC Gamer recommends a ping of 100ms or less for an optimal gaming experience. You can probably get away with up to 150ms depending on the game, but high a ping will create lag that makes online games nigh-unplayable.

Don't forget about download speed, though. You might want to pair your low ping with a download speed of at least 40 to 50 Mbps for games to feel right. We recommend using ethernet cables for gaming, if possible.

Socializing in the time of social distancing.

Image: Jim Craigmyle / getty images

Since people can't see their friends in person, more and more folks are turning to Google Hangouts, Zoom, FaceTime, and other forms of video chat to socialize. The good news is you don't need supersonic internet speeds to make these work.

Zoom, for example, only asks for 1.8Mbps to send and receive 1080p video in a 1-on-1 video call. That goes up to 2.5Mbps to 3Mbps for group calls. Of course, by now it should go without saying that you should do whatever you can to be in a faster network than that while video calling. If you can get at least 10Mbps to 20Mbps, you'll deal with a lot less stuttering and dropped calls.

Google Hangouts has similarly low network requirements, though it notes that the burden goes up as more people are on a call. Video calling is going to be more important than ever in the coming months, so it's somewhat comforting to know that it can be done without screamingly fast internet.

Anyone who wants to become an amateur filmmaker during quarantine will need to understand how upload speed works. While download speed is a measurement of how fast your network pulls information to you, upload speed measures how fast you can send information to the network.

If you tried out Speedtest on our recommendation, you probably noticed that your upload speed is much lower than your download speed. This is by design. Residential ISPs tend to cap upload speed at a lower number than download speed because, well, most people don't have a need for it; it doesn't really come into play for most daily tasks.

With all that in mind, there isn't necessarily a hard minimum upload speed required to put things on YouTube. It'll help to have double-digit upload speeds, for sure, but a number lower than that can still work for you. It just might take a long time to upload a lengthy HD video.

We hope your internet is able to meet (or ideally far exceed) all of the figures listed above during your time at home. You can't go anywhere, so it would sure be a bummer if you couldn't browse the web, play online games, or stream movies, too.

Link:

How fast does your internet need to be to survive quarantine life? - Mashable

The coronavirus may have you thinking about your mortality. At the end of the day, humans only have one life on this planet. Even more so, we are pretty fragile, prone to disease, destructive, and a bit stubborn. Since the beginning of time, humans have longed for eternal life," - the ability to extend ones life and youth far beyond its current limits. Nevertheless, you have to give humans their props for increasing their species life expectancy across the board over the last 200 years.

For the uninitiated, life expectancy is the expected number of years of life remaining at a particular age. Yet, as you are probably already wondering, how long can humans live? According to Our World in Data, the average life expectancy is 72.6 years. Yet as you are probably aware, there are select groups of people across the world, especially in wealthier nations, that have well exceeded this number. Some people have gone on to live 100 years, 110 years, and even beyond, with Jeane Calment of France living 122 years and 164 days.

But can humans live even longer? If you could, how long would you want to live? 200 years? 500 years? Maybe a full millennium? Though this might seem like a bit of science fiction, technology could advance to the point where humans could live forever. In fact, some futurists argue that if you make it to 2050, you are probably not going to die. So, stay inside, please.

Futurist Dr. Ian Pearson has gone on to argue that by using the power of technology, humanity might be able to merge our minds with machines, making our bodies obsolete. You could end up attending your own body funeral. Pearson paints the picture of this future,stating, One day, your body dies, and with it, your brain stops, but no big problem, because 99% of your mind is still fine, running happily on IT, in the cloud. Assuming you saved enough and prepared well, you connect to an android to use as your body from now on, attend your funeral, and then carry on as before, still you, just with a younger, highly upgraded body.

And this is just the beginning, beyond 2050, there could be many different ways you may be able to preserve your mind and consciousness. Humans might just switch to different humanoid bodies after a certain period the same way you might buy a new car with new features. Or thanks to projects like Neuralink, your mind may just be a few simple clicks away from downloading yourself into a computer or robotic body. Maybe thousands of years from now, all of humanity may decide it is better for humans to live in a massive megastructure that practically generates our own reality.

Today that is what we are going to explore. There is plenty of technology out there that could potentially change the entire direction of humanity, posing the question; will humans eventually be able to live forever?

Like most of the things on this list, this sounds like something out of a science fiction film. Yet people like University of Southern Californias Theodore Berger, Duke Universitys Mikhail Lebedev, and Alexander Kaplan of Moscow University, all believe its possible. There are already companies out there working on ways to link our minds to machines. At the moment, there are more practical reasons for this. like offering those who have mobility disabilities the ability to live more normal and fulfilling lives.

However, it can go even further than that. The mind will be in the cloud, and be able to use any android that you feel like to inhabit the real world,says Pearson. It could get to a point in which you can hire an android body for the day. Rather than travel to Jamaica, just upload your brain to an android stationed in Jamaica. Or maybe there is a great concert that you want to see, but the band is in another city thousands of miles away. You may be able to simply upload yourself to experience the show. The result of this is that humans may never need a fleshy body again.

3D printing has come a long way, virtually impacting almost every major industry across the world, including healthcare. Just in the past couple of years, researchers from separate organizations and private institutions have found ways to 3D print organs. A team of researchers from Tel Aviv University in Israel unveiled a 3D printed heart with human tissue and vessels just last year.

Companies like Skorpio Medical have gone as far as to begin research in the realms of 3D printed limbs. In the near future, you may be able to simply renew a body part when it goes bad. Your body gets more and more limited as you get older. Advances in biotechnologies could put an end to this. Even more so, genetic engineering could eventually prevent the aging of cells or completely reverse it altogether. Lose a finger? Simply print a new one? Need a new arm? Call up a doctor and have them reinstall one.

Cryogenic freezing has its fair share of skeptics, but over the years, the scientific community has slowly embraced the idea. Now, you cannot freeze yourself yet and wake up, but there could be a future in which you simply put your body on ice for extended periods of time to be awakened on a given date or time.

This could come in handy during trips to distant planets hundreds of light-years away. Nevertheless, cryogenic freezing is simply an option for people who want to freeze their bodies when they pass away with the aims of bringing them back during a time period where science makes it possible. However, there is some research that centers around using cryonics to slow tissue aging.

You have probably heard it before, but we are probably living in a virtual world, at least that is one people who buy into simulation theory believe. However, in the coming age of electronic immortality, living in the virtual world may become an alternative to living in the current one. Think of it like that episode of San Junipero from the popular Netflix series Black Mirror. Perhaps in the future, androids are extremely expensive, but the cheaper alternative is to have some humans uploaded into a cloud-based virtual reality system, a place where you could spend all eternity living in peace with an avatar of your choosing. Most people already live on the internet, so in most cases, it is just a matter of time?

But, what could come after creating a virtual world? Though this could happen far beyond 2050, we are talking thousands of years; it could be possible. In short, humanity might be able to simulate reality on a universal scale using what is known as a matrioshka brain. Based on the Dyson sphere, a matrioshka brain is a hypothetical megastructure proposed by Robert J. Bradbury. The idea was proposed when imagining the type of highly advanced civilizations that are out there in the universe as this would be an impressive Class B stellar engine, employing the entire energy output of a star to drive computer systems.

Our entire species could be uploaded on this computer system able to simulate reality and remake the universe as we know it. Though this idea may seem far from reality, the idea of uploading the mind to a computer seemed like a distant fantasy at some point.

One of the lesser-known projects that Elon Musk is working on centers around the star-up Neuralink. The company has ambitious plans to directly link brains and computers using a simple, noninvasive device that we can install in our brains. The current fascination with brain-computer interface centers around helping those with neurological mobility issues. However, Musks project extends far beyond that. The eventual goal is to create a "digital superintelligence layer" to link humans with artificial intelligence. As stated in the Neuralink San Francisco presentation, "Ultimately, we can do a full brain-machine interface where we can achieve a sort of symbiosis with AI."

But why stop there? Developments in robotics and prosthetics could open the gates to human-robot hybrids. You may be able to simply go in for a procedure to get bionic eyes, a robotic arm, new legs, etc., all with features that suit your needs and wildest dreams. Just like a toolbox, you could be able to switch out different arms, fingers, and legs for different activities.

Do you think it will be possible for humans to live forever? Share your opinion in the comment section.

Read more from the original source:

How Long Do You Want to Live? This Technology Could Potentially Help People Live Forever - Interesting Engineering

Spoiler alert for 'Star Trek: Picard' Season 1 Episode 9

In 'Star Trek: Nemesis,' Data (Brent Spiner) attempts to upload his mind to a less sophisticated version of himself, named B-4. He was unsuccessful, as we find out in the pilot episode of 'Star Trek: Picard,' but now Jean-Luc Picard (Patrick Stewart) is attempting to do the same thing himself- bringing the entire show around in interesting ways.

The very first moments of 'Star Trek: Picard' open with 'Blue Skies' playing in the background - the very song Data sung at the beginning of 'Star Trek: Nemesis,' was meant to tease the idea that he had successfully been uploaded into B-4's body. The last time Picard saw Data, of course, was when Data had sacrificed himself to save Picard in 'Star Trek: Nemesis,' and Picard's been carrying that survivor's guilt ever since.

It's that guilt that drives him throughout the season, as he attempts to find Data's daughter, Soji (Isa Briones) from the Zhat Vhash, but the story is bigger than that. As Dr Agnes Jurati (Alison Pill) explained, Data was the first real synthetic being to ever be created, and the news of that is what had Commodore Oh (Tamlyn Tomita) infiltrate Starfleet in the first place, setting the events of 'Star Trek: Picard' off. Data's legacy is that of all artificially created life, and whether or not humanity can allow them to exist.

When Picard and his crew find the community of synthetic beings, they discover living among them is Dr Olton Inego Soong, played by Brent Spiner himself. It's a legacy role, as Olton's father was none other than Dr Noonien Soong, the man who created Data in the first place. Given that Brent Spiner plays both roles, it's obvious that Noonien created Data in his biological son's image, making Olton and Data brothers, of a sort, which extends to B-4.

This episode brings up two things of significance, though it doesn't connect them - it reminds the audience of Picard's brain abnormality and it's the fatal diagnosis, and the golem created by Olton Soong. The golem is a synthetic body - but it's a blank slate, meant to be occupied by the mind of an organic being. Soong hasn't perfected it yet, but if he does, it may be Picard's last hope. If successful, Picard will be able to upload his mind to another body - much in the way Data failed to do in 'Star Trek: Nemesis.'

The implications of that might be what brings peace between organic life and synthetics, as a person raised as an organic being, but now alive in a synthetic body, Picard would truly be a bridge between two worlds. He would be a new sort of life form, the missing link between man and machine and finally make up for his failure in stopping the banning of synthetic life, 14 years ago, causing his retirement from Starfleet.

It's all coming together, on several levels, and the connections are fascinating. There's a lot riding on whether or not Picard finds new life in the season finale, setting up a grand moment with decades of history behind it.

The next episode of 'Star Trek: Picard' airs March 27, on CBS All Access.

See the original post here:

'Star Trek: Picard': Jean-Luc Picard may upload his mind to a synthesized being, bringing the show full circle - MEAWW

Following his military discharge, Jo Kwon has shared his experience in the army and his future plans.

After enlisting in August 2018, Jo Kwonwas discharged from the military on March 24 due to their COVID-19 protocol and personally announced his return with a letter.

In an interview with OSEN, Jo Kwon shared, I still cant believe it. I still feel like Ill have to return every evening. When I open my eyes in the morning, I feel restless, and my memories as a soldier run through my mind all day. I had only imagined the day of my discharge, so it feels like a dream, and I am so happy. For awhile, I think Ill have the post-discharge blues.

Although on a break from promotions while enlisted, Jo Kwonperformed in musicals Shinheung Military Academy and Return: The Promise of the Day (literal title). He commented, The military is a place where a really diverse group of people gatherand create a special bond. Thats why the memories I have with soldiers I met while participating in musicals Shinheung Military Academy and Return: The Promise of the Day are most memorable.

He continued, If not now, I wonder when I would ever get to eat, sleep, and train with Lee Jin Ki (SHINees Onew), Yoon Ji Sung, Cha Hak Yeon (VIXXs N), Kim Sunggyu, Kim Min Seok (EXOs Xiumin), actor Kim Min Seok, Go Eun Sung, Lee Jae Kyoon, Lee Sungyeol, Kim Min Ho, Kang Ha Neul, and Ji Chang Wook. With that in mind,I remember encouragingeach another throughout our service.

Despite being newly discharged, Jo Kwon is ready to jump right back into promotions. He is already scheduled to appear on JTBCs Ask Us Anything alongside 2PMs Wooyoung, Block Bs P.O, and WINNERs Song Mino.

When asked whathe wants to do first following his discharge, Jo Kwon answered, The thing I wanted to do most was communicate often with my fans through social media. I am glad I can now upload content in real-time. Starting from this morning, I gave all my unit executives a phone call and have been spending each day busily, with interviews and V Live broadcasts. Im going to leave my hairstyle until today and plan to transform my style tomorrow.

Source (1)

Top Photo Credit: Xportsnews

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2AM's Jo Kwon Talks About How Musicals With EXO's Xiumin, Yoon Ji Sung, And More Helped Him During Military Service + His Future Plans - soompi

The COVID-19 (coronavirus) pandemic has forced several countries into lockdown, imposing remote working, or work from home, for millions of us. And by now, you must have realised how isolating and monotonous working from home can get.

So weve listed a few tried and tested apps that will help break the monotony and bring out your hidden talents.

(Source: Shutterstock)

Snacking much? Work from home does that to you. But with little else to do, you can surely explore cooking as an activity for yourself. Even Zomato suggests, kabhi kabhi ghar ka khana kha lena chahiye (you should cook and eat at home sometimes).

Enter Recipe Book, a recipe discovery app that curates recipes across cuisines like Indian, Korean, Italian, Mexican, Thai, Malaysian, Arabian and German. While recipe apps have been around for a while, Recipe Book was listed on Googles Editors Choice apps for its search facility, which lets you find Indian and global recipes, as well as save them for offline and online use.

It has the provision of following international chefs, food critics and food blogs via curated feeds using Follow your interests feature.

You can also upload your recipes for regular contests announced on the app. Recipe Book is also available in Hindi, making it accessible to large parts of India.

The biggest issue while working from home and staying indoors for long periods is that you start slouching, gaining weight, start having sleep issues, and dont do enough workout. So if you want to start with yoga, then you can download the Down Dog app.

Down Dog was started by two developers, Ben Simon and Carlos Ormachea, who share a passion for yoga. Ben and Carlos met in college, and in February 2015, quit their jobs to work full-time on building the app in Seattle. They eventually launched the iOS version of the app in August 2015 and the Android version in March 2016.

This app focusses on modern Vinyasa yoga, a style of yoga characterised by stringing postures together so that you transition from one to the other seamlessly. This is also known as flow yoga. The app has more than 30,000 configurations to ensure that you never repeat the same workout flow or get bored.

It also lets you personalise your yoga routine in impressive ways. You can choose the duration from five minutes to 90 minutes. You can also set difficulty level introductory, beginner, or advanced along with type, pace, relaxation period etc.

The app also has amazing music playlists and clear vocal instruction with high-quality video. If this doesnt encourage you to practice yoga, nothing will.

With leaving home becoming a luxury, the longing for socialising and travelling is an all-time high. If you have the wanderlust bug, Ablo is for you. Ablo is a chat app that lets you connect, discover, and have one-on-one conversations with users from around the world, with a real-time translation for text as well as video chats.

A social networking app, Ablo lets people connect through a complementary user interface (UI) that ensures you feel like you are virtually globetrotting for friends. It welcomed us with 125 miles (miles is a metric the app uses to rank a user).

It also shows your location on the world map and indicates where it is taking you on the map itself. The app is unique as it simulates a feel of travelling without leaving your home or device. If making friends from across the world is something that excites you, you will find great value in Ablo, which is free for use.

At least eight out of 10 friends have told me that the stay-at-home lifestyle has caused them anxiety, stress and restlessness. This is the time to practice meditation. Insight Timer, a free meditation app, promises to calm your mind, reduce anxiety, manage stress, enhance deep sleep, and improve happiness.

The app offers around 24,000 free meditation routines to choose from under categories like guided and unguided meditations, calming music, talks, sleep, beginners, stress etc. It has a large free library of guided meditations by top meditation and mindfulness experts, neuroscientists, psychologists, and teachers from Stanford, Harvard, the University of Oxford and more.

It features music tracks from renowned artists and also has talks by Sadhguru. On the App Store, Insight Timer says it adds more than 100 free guided meditations every day.

We used a host of meditation apps, but found such expansive customisation available only on Insight Timer. The app has courses such as how to restore sound sleep, and getting over overeating. While the app is free for basic courses, a Rs 5,000-per-year subscription unlocks a special catalogue of courses and will allow you to download meditation routines offline.

Whats common among Netflix The Kissing Booth, Hulus Light as a Feather, and Anna Todds New York Times best-selling series After? All these stories were discovered on social storytelling platform Wattpad. With a community of more than 80 million people who spend over 22 billion minutes a month, Wattpad also made it to theEditor's Choice list in the Play Store because of the stories and community feedback being its backbone.

Wattpad has over four million writers, who post an average of 300,000 pieces a day. The app has a vast range of categories, including fanfiction, romance, teen fiction, fantasy, and others.

It has partnerships with publishers such as Penguin Random House India, Macmillan Publishers, Anvil Publishing, and others. So, a user can read author-generated stories as well as books and stories by these publishers.

The best part? You can see your works momentum building as you write, which is hugely motivating for a writer.

Apart from being a great launchpad for writers, Wattpad is also extremely reader-friendly. There are a variety of books and stories, albeit, without being well proofread.

Interestingly, Wattpad helps users turn their stories into books, films, TV shows, and digital projects. Alongside, it works with production houses to discover untapped, unsigned, and talented writers. The company works with partners such as Sony Pictures, Syfy, Hulu, and others. It also has entertainment partners across Asia, including a 26-film deal with Iflix.

Wattpad makes you a member of an international community of storytellers and story lovers. You can even create reading lists, share your library, and read with your friends. The app is the perfect way for authors to connect directly and instantly with readers.

Amazon, one of the worlds Big Four tech companies, launched Audible Suno, created exclusively for Indian listeners, in December last year. The free streaming service gives you unlimited access to Audible's exclusive audio entertainment.

The app streams hundreds of hours of entertainment and learning sessions featuring many of Indias celebrities such as Amitabh Bachchan, Katrina Kaif, Karan Johar, Anil Kapoor, Farhan Akhtar, Mouni Roy, Anurag Kashyap, Tabu, Nawazuddin Siddiqui, Diljit Dosanjh, Vir Das, and Vicky Kaushal.

At a time when most of us have no idea of how many accounts we have across multiple apps, Audible Suno offers a huge advantage: it lets you use the app without any account. Just download, and immediately start using it. It does not have any ads (so far), is free, and features exclusive content. The content on Audible Suno is spread across categories such as romance, thriller, comedy, talk shows, self-help, spirituality, drama, business, and others.

The range of fiction series includes romance and relationships (Matrimonial Anonymous and Piya Milan Chowk), suspense (Thriller Factory), horror (Amitabh Bachchan in Kaali Awaazein), and comedy (The Unexperts by Abish Mathew). The non-fiction series showcase intimate interviews with some of the countrys biggest stars (Kissa Khwabon Ka, Picture Ke Peechhe with Katrina Kaif and Karan Johar), and socially relevant series that explore topics like mental health, sex education, and LGBTQ rights (Azaad Awaaz, SentiMental).

(Edited by Kanishk Singh)

How has the coronavirus outbreak disrupted your life? and how are you dealing with it? Write to us or send us a video with subject line 'Coronavirus Disruption' to editorial@yourstory.com

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Coronavirus making you work from home? We tried these 6 free apps to break the monotony - YourStory

In the darker times of our lives we often seek out the comfort of loved ones who are reassuringly familiar and within reach, but what can we do when were discouraged from social interaction?

Losing a job and financial hardship are considered some of the most stressful life events.

In this period of uncertainty and heightened stress it is crucial to stay connected to your social circle.

Enforced isolation, voluntary social distancing and community lockdowns, though proven to reduce the spread of coronavirus, can impact your mental health, causing feelings of loneliness and depression.

Thankfully, in the world of modern technology there are still ways to virtually stay connected to family, friends and loved ones during this period.

Social media, phone calls, Skype, Google Hangouts and FaceTime are tried and true methods of staying connected but there are a few new and innovative ways to catch up and have fun together.

Read the original here:

The Best Ways to Virtually Stay in Touch During the COVID-19 Pandemic - Training.com.au

For decades now, the biggest-budget games have striven to capture the masterful blocking and choreography of action cinema at its best. From the gritty, artless fisticuffs of The Last of Us to the superpowered clashes between literal deities in 2018s God of War, the people who make video games have become quite adept at casting acts of sudden violence as spectacles unto themselves, particularly in cutscenes and button-mashing quick-time events. Once you actually wrest control back from the game, however, your flailing attempts to vanquish your foes pale in comparison to the pinpoint timing and perfect accuracy your protagonist flaunts when theyre unmoored from your sweaty fingers. Its hard enough to beat the Big Bad Monstrosity in the first place, let alone to get it done with grace and verve.

Thats what makes Sunjeev SunhiLegend Kumars work so impressive. If youve spent any time in online gaming spaces in the past few years, youve probably scrolled past one of his creations, perhaps without even knowing its author. Kumar specializes in crafting short snippets of visually appealing gameplay, usually from titles that feature ornate combat systems, like Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance, Devil May Cry, or God of War, and crunching them into GIF files that can be easily shared on social media. And despite some of the obvious limitations of the forma lack of audio, for onehis output has garnered quite a lot of attention on social media, including personalized responses from some of the developers who make the games that he loves to show off.

Of course, high-level players have loved to flaunt their stuff to an audience before the advent of online videothere are notable Devil May Cry 3 combo videos that are more than a decade old at this pointbut Kumar brings a level of precision and production quality that makes his work stand out even in meme-choked gaming subreddits. From the position of the camera to the exact sequence of moves, his work exudes the same sense of authorship of a well-directed fight scene, of two or more actors practicing the same steps over and over until they get the perfect take. In Kumars case, however, that can mean wrestling with the troublesome AI of a dragon who wont quite do the right attack pattern in Monster Hunter World, or reinputting a dropped combo in a Platinum game.

Kumar first learned how to make GIFs a decade ago, when he bought a PS3 to play Gran Turismo 5. At first, he would cut segments from YouTube videos and compress them in GIF form. Over time, however, he became frustrated with the quality of the footage on offer. Since he wanted to control both the player vehicle and the lighting himself, as well as remove the pesky HUD from the screen, he eventually decided to buy his own capture card and take the directors chair for himself. From there, he discovered that creating footage that lived up to his standards could be quite difficult at times, but ultimately very fulfilling.

Over the years, Kumars process has grown more elaborate, but also much more consistent. Early on, he said, he would go days without posting anything, then record 10 GIFs of random gameplay and upload them all at once. Today, he tries to stick to a more regimented schedule, while still keeping up what he calls a certain standard of quality. When he first played Horizon: Zero Dawn, he began to experiment with its robust photo mode to create more dynamic camera angles. Though he was initially concerned that the process of entering photo mode would cause the footage to lose frames, over time, he began to use the photo modes of games like Spider-Man and God of War to create unexpected juxtapositions, or as a transition to cut from clip to clip.

Every now and then I do try to come up with something new that I havent done before, Kumar said. A lot of the time it just doesnt work for me, but when its something I like the look of, I keep it in mind, so I can go back to it when needed.

Kumar said that the amount of time he has to invest to make a single GIF varies wildly from project to project. For example, in Devil May Cry 5, he told me he sometimes spends two to three hours practicing a combo, and then a few more hours trying to capture the mayhem with the right lighting and camera angles. But in a game like Monster Hunter: World, where enemy behavior varies heavily due to randomization, hell often have to fight the same monster six or seven times for the right capturethough hes learned to spread the clashes out over a week or two so he doesnt grow frustrated in the process. Every now and then, however, hell play a game normally and luck into some great raw footage. It all just depends on the day.

That said, Kumar noted that game developers could institute a few small tweaks that would make his life a lot easier. For example, since he often has to replay the same sections of games over and over for the perfect takewithout a HUD, mind youhe wishes that hardware manufacturers would make it easier to make backup saves on consoles. And although this is less of a concern on PC, some devs on that platform still take great pains to hide the save files from crafty players. (Looking at you, FromSoftware.) Kumar also sometimes uses cheats to enhance his footage, such as infinite ammo or slow motion, and when developers dont give him those options, hell rely on mods created by the fans instead. Most of Kumars clips are enhanced by filters and special effects that he achieves through editing software, but he said having more raw options in-game is always helpful.

Kumars work has triggered other GIF makers to come to the fore, such as fellow Sony fan Much118x. According to Much, Kumar not only served as his inspiration, but also personally instructed him in the process of making GIFs in the first place. Much has become well-known for crafting GIFs that feature several different scenes or games by utilizing match cuts to achieve smooth transitions. Much credited his steady improvement to Kumars guidance and his own simple perseverance, along with the inspiration he derives from cinematic forerunners like Quentin Tarantino. Muchs work tends towards Sony games, especially God of War and Horizon Zero Dawn, and he cited their detailed animation work as a definite advantage, along with the simple fact that theyre his favorite games to play. These are the games that I typically love the most too, mainly for the narratives they tell, and so it essentially becomes inherently enjoyable just to make something creative for a game you love, he said.

When you look at compilations of both Kumar and Muchs work, one thing in particular stands out: the sheer volume of slicing, stabbing, and shooting on display. Though Much noted that hes dabbled in non-violent GIFs in the past, he personally thinks that video is a better medium to convey the distinct and expansive atmospheres of less-combat-driven games like Death Stranding, especially given the role that ambient music plays in stirring those moods. Still, Much said that he primarily makes GIFs to show off the superior fluidity of animation that some triple-A games exhibit, and that primarily comes in the form of their combat, with only a few notable exceptions. In that sense, hes just capturing what excites him about these games.

Though theres no doubt that these GIFs are a new form of art created by and for video game players, for Kumar, theyre also a way to highlight a games high points or bombastic moments, similar to the sizzle reel that might accompany a teaser trailer for an upcoming game. Much offered a slightly different rationale: For him, making GIFs is just a way to spend more time with a game that he loves, soaking up the scenery, and enjoying the particulars of its soundtrack.

I believe that I enjoy making content for these games simply just because I love the amount of clear dedication that the teams behind these games put into their work, in addition to how much I loved the games myself, Much says. To be recognized by people in the industry for making GIFs is nothing short of motivating and heartwarming.

Header image: Capcom

Link:

Meet the GIF Makers Who Craft Art out of Pinpoint Gameplay - EGMNOW

In all forms, grammatical errors are embarrassing. Be it a school essay, a letter, an email, or what have you, the desired end-result of any write-up is for it to come out error-free. With grammar and spellchecking tools, perfection in your writing vocabulary is easily achievable. In this post, we compare two brilliant grammar checkers (Grammarly and Ginger) to see which one does a better job.

Both Grammarly and Ginger are popular names in the spellchecking and grammar correction ecosystem. If you're looking to improve your writing, or you need a tool to 'catch' incorrect grammar and punctuation in your texts, but you're caught in between choosing Grammarly or Ginger, this guide should help you make a better decision.

Note: We are recommending apps only because these apps are better at picking up common grammatical errors quickly. These apps are not the absolute tools to fix grammar in text for grammar is quite subjective at times.

What devices would you be writing on the most? Is it a computer or on a mobile device? Also, what operating system do your devices run? The answer to these questions goes a long way in determining which of the grammar checker you should settle for.

For Grammarly, the tool is available as a keyboard app for Android and iOS devices.

Grammarly Keyboard for Android

Grammarly Keyboard for iOS

For PC, Grammarly currently has an app available for Windows devices.

Grammarly for Windows

Alternatively, you can use the Grammarly's grammar and spelling checking services on your Windows computer via web browsers. Grammarly has extensions for the following browsers: Google Chrome, Microsoft Edge, Safari, and Mozilla Firefox.

Get Grammarly Extension for Chrome

Get Grammarly Extension for Firefox

Get Grammarly Extension for Microsoft Edge

Get Grammarly Extension for Safari

If you aren't a fan of browser extensions, you can use the Grammarly web app to check and edit your writing.

Ginger has a dedicated keyboard app for Android devices that double as grammar and spell checker. There's no iOS version of the Ginger keyboard as the development of the app was discontinued in June 2015 and replaced with the Ginger Page app, which encompasses all of Ginger's writing and grammar checking tools. However, it is worth noting that Ginger Page (for iOS) is a paid app.

Install Ginger Keyboard App (Android)

Install Ginger Page App (iOS)

To use Ginger on a Windows computer, you can either rely on the dedicated app or use the service on the Chrome browser by installing the 'Grammar and Spelling checker by Ginger' extension.

Download Ginger for Windows App

You can only use Ginger's grammar checking services and features by installing its extension on your Chrome or Safari browser.

Install the Ginger Chrome Extension

Install the Ginger Safari Extension

Interestingly, like Grammarly, Ginger also has a dedicated web app/editor that can be used for quick grammar check without installing any app or extension on your computer.

As mentioned earlier, both Ginger and Grammarly have web apps that can be easily be accessed online via a web browser without having to install any app or extension on your device. We take a look at the web app of both platforms.

Note: The grammar and spellchecking functionalities of both Grammarly and Ginger require an internet connection. That applies to usage on mobile and PC.

I constructed some sentences and intentionally messed up punctuation to see which of the duo would identify and correct the errors.

Ginger was able to detect the incorrect capitalization and suggested a change of "WHy did you change your mind." to "Why did you change your mind." While this is decent, there's more that could have been done to make the sentence better. Check out Grammarly's correction for more context.

Grammarly was smart enough to detect both wrongs in the sentence: capitalization and punctuation errors. Grammarly editor suggested that I should change the "WHy" to "why", the grammar checking algorithm was also smart enough to detect that "Why did you change your mind." is a question and suggested that I changed the punctuation (full stop) at the end of the sentence to a question mark. It's the little details that matter, right?

One inadequacy I noticed with the Grammarly web editor is that it doesn't correct your document title. In the image below, I spelled "Article" wrongly in the document title and also punctuated wrongly, but Grammarly didn't pick these errors.

It seems as though Grammarly only checks and corrects the body (content) of your document, not the title.

Want to proofread or edit a previously-created document? Grammarly lets you upload a document you typed or created on other apps and edit within the web app. Supported file formats are .DOCX, .ODT, .RTF, and .TXT. Simply tap Upload file in the web app menu section and select the document you want to proofread from your computer.

When you are done, you can export the corrected document to your computer. Mind you, Grammarly can only export documents in the .DOCX format.

Presently, Ginger doesn't support document upload on its web app. You can only (manually) paste the content you want to proofread into the editor.

Note: To use the Ginger web editor, you need to have the extension installed in your browser. You can use Grammarly's web editor without installing the extension.

At the top-right corner of the Ginger editor, you'd find the Translation and Synonyms sections. If some part of the document you are working on isn't written in English, you can copy the foreign text, paste it in the translate box, and hit the green translate button. Ginger would auto-detect the language and provide the English translation in the second box.

Finding synonyms of words is also easy with Ginger. Tap the Synonyms section, enter a word, and its synonyms would be provided.

While Grammarly doesn't offer text translation services at the moment, it does let you check for word synonyms in a pretty cool way. When writing in the Grammarly app or on a web browser with the Grammarly extension, simply double-tap a word and its synonyms would be displayed.

One thing I noticed while using both grammar checkers is that Ginger's thesaurus provides a larger collection of synonyms than Grammarly.

Both Grammarly's and Ginger's mobile keyboard apps are decent and work just as they should. Ginger seems to be more featured-packed. Here's why.

Using the Grammarly keyboard, you can only type in English. It does let you choose/switch your language preference to different forms of English writing styles, though: American English, Australian English, British English, and Canadian English.

The Ginger keyboard app only lets you choose between two English writing styles (American and British English). Still, there are about 58 different languages that you can type in using the keyboard. Navigate to Settings > Keyboard settings > Languages, then proceed to select the language input options. You can choose multiple languages. To switch input languages when typing, tap, and hold the space button and select the new preferred language.

Note: The Ginger keyboard app spell checker detects incorrect spellings and other grammatical errors only when the language input is set to English.

The Ginger app also comes with a dedicated writer tab where you can compose or paste text for spellchecking and proofreading. When you select a word in the writer, Ginger lets you translate the word to another language, find its synonyms, or look up its meaning in the built-in Ginger dictionary.

The Grammarly mobile keyboard app doesn't have a dedicated writer.

Just like on its web editor, the Ginger mobile app also comes with a Translate and Synonyms section for, obviously, translating words from one language to another and finding the synonyms of words, respectively.

You cannot translate words or check synonyms with the Grammarly mobile app.

When you download the Ginger app on your Android device, you get a dictionary as a bonus. Launch the app, tap the hamburger menu icon at the top-left corner, and select Define. That launches the app's dictionary, where you can search for the definition(s) of English words.

The dictionary provides voice pronunciation of words and also lets you check for synonyms and related words.

Both Grammarly and Ginger are available for free but are limited in feature offerings. To access the whole (advanced) features of both grammar checkers, you'd have to subscribe/upgrade to paid premium plans.

Ginger offers its premium plans in three (3) tiers:

Some premium features of the Ginger grammar checker include sentence rephrase, error analysis, text reader, etc. You can learn more about Ginger's premium plans via the link below.

See Ginger Premium Plans

Grammarly premium plans are as follows:

There's also a premium Grammarly plan designed for teams and businesses with members ranging from 3 to 149. The Business plan costs $12.50/month for each team member and is billed annually.

Some features you'd gain access to as a premium Grammarly member include plagiarism detector, vocabulary enhancement suggestions, readability checker, genre-specific writing style checks, etc.

See Grammarly Premium Plans

Ginger's premium plans are cheaper than Grammarly's. However, Grammarly's plans are a lot better feature-wise and that justifies the price difference.

Next up:Grammarly and Gboard are two of the most used keyboard apps out there. Which one should you use? Check our comparison in the article linked below.

Visit link:

Grammarly vs Ginger: Which Is the Best Grammar Checker - Guiding Tech

Connections can uplift your career in the legal profession because you place yourself in the minds of potential employers. It is a way to ensure that your skills, strengths, and accomplishments will not be ignored.

In order to sustain a successful law practice, there are two main goals that have remained intact over the last decades: maintaining current clients by answering effectively to their concerns and acquiring new clients.Now, these objectives around how to develop a prosperous practice might not have changed, but the means and ways of getting there are a different matter. Heres where networking comes in.

Networking is

Networking is the process by which professional contacts are gained by interacting with people at business-related events, exchanging contact details according to common interests, and developing connections within existing networks. Networking is about building and managing relationships with the purpose of developing business and/or acquiring clients, either to your own practice or referring to someone elses.

This is not about using others. Its not gossiping. Its not a show off move or a bluff. Networking involves an honest and constant effort in helping others, in the hopes that maybe, but not necessarily, you might receive help as well.

Beyond legal practices and firms, networking is at the basis of any business development activity. Here, we can recognize it each time a lawyer looks for advice on a specific issue and in return offers their aid for any possible future concern that involves his field of expertise.

This article will take you through the meaningful qualities networking has to offer inside the legal industry and the steps that should be followed to display competent networking skills.

Networking Effectively, a Step-by-Step handbook

As we mentioned above, networking is about establishing and maintaining fruitful professional relationships and contacts. Imagine you meet someone with a given specialization and, later on, you realize that this persons knowledge and expertise can help someone else you know from your professional environment. All you need to do is connect both contacts to facilitate opportunities to obtain useful advising.

Lets bring this down to actionable items. Here are some footsteps that are suggested when it comes to starting your networking agenda:

Make a list of all those people:

Get in contact with them, to share experience and advice. They might actually suggest people from their network to reach out to. Consulting your universitys careers service is also a smart move (sometimes, you might even find seminars on how to network).

Describe why networking is important to you.

Identify yourself. What are your goals? What are your areas of interest? Take awareness of where you stand out, where you perform best and the abilities you have to offer.

Defining possible contacts according to your networking purpose will take time and energy. Firms need to be specific about who theyd like to incorporate as new clients and list current and future network contacts.

Make a strategy to target those youre interested in meeting. List events that can help you reach those contacts. In college, its common for law students to come across some opportunities like conferences, workshops, research projects, and even publishing articles. The effects of this are twofold. First, it helps you improve your skills and knowledge. Second, it pushes you to get out there to receive credibility and recognition from people.

Develop a 30-second pitch on yourself, describing who you are and what area of law youve specialized in. Check the Twitter feed of law firms for posting events, as well as the national and local law society, and try to attend any events they arrange.

At all times, on any event, interview, or presentation, be kind. Complimenting others work and being considerate of their concerns is also fundamental for productive networking because its based on trust.

Additionally, its important to be an effective communicator. Speak calmly and clearly. Be confident in what you have to offer and listen. A good listener who lets the other person speak makes a good conversation too. Anyone talking to you will know youre interested in them and will feel comfortable.

You need to be reachable. The whole point of networking is making sure that youre accessible to others as a reliable contact. How? There are three elementary tools: blogging, social networking to stay connected (for instance, being active on Linkedin as a professional platform), and participating in internships. If youre interacting, youre networking. This includes school committee reunions or participating in nonprofit activities.

A distinctive habit would be that of having your own blog to regularly upload your understanding and appreciation of legal matters. This will open your network to those who share similar interests.

Plan annual meetings with clients, invite people to semi-annual luncheons or holiday parties, make regular phone calls to prospective clients, maintain one-on-one recognition, exchange business information in breakfast meetings, forward articles of interest and express your interest in learning more about your contactss business.

Doors are always open to finding additional networking opportunities, so keep this search in mind and dont worry if certain interactions didnt turn out to be as productive as you mightve expected. Keep going and look for new options.

The nuances of Networking

Networking has several indisputable benefits that other forms of presentation cant guarantee. Sure, your Curriculum Vitae will certainly include your experience, the period of time youve been committed to a project, the set of skills youve obtained, but thats still not your voice. The impression caused by your personality and the references made about you is what raises awareness of your expertise.

To most employers, a good recommendation coming from his closest circles of qualified professionals has a very compelling weight since they verify your integrity and competence. Networking is a way of marketing your professional profile.

The importance of networking today focuses on helping professionals in the legal industry to sustain a successful law practice through connections: the more related you get with different specialists, the wider your scope for potential clients gets. Plus, youll build your own name. Networking is a tool for differentiating your work from others in the competitive legal market.

Connections can uplift your career in the legal profession because you place yourself in the minds of potential employers. It is a way to ensure that your skills, strengths, and accomplishments will not be ignored.

Another reason for networking is that it keeps you updated. In order to build a lasting professional relationship, channels of communication like social media, videoconferencing, even publications in a professional blog, are vital.

This way, you can also find services you need thanks to networking. A perfect example can be legal interpreting. If youre in need of this service, knowing lawyers whove worked with a legal interpretation team will give you a reference for the qualification of their work, especially if those are contacts whose criteria you can rely on.

Lastly, if helping others is a big part of your vocation, networking will suit you just fine. As weve mentioned before, its not all about getting what you need from others. Youll engage people who have their own searches and needs and you can commit to helping others through a productive network.

Follow this link:

Why Networking is So Important in the Legal Industry - Legal Reader

The COVID-19 pandemic has affected every aspect of our lives, from how we spend our time, to how we run our business, to how we take care of daily tasks.

With most of Canadas population either social distancing, self-isolating, or quarantined, taking care of tasks that typically require an in-person or offline element have become increasingly difficult or even impossible, and it has highlighted the need for legal and regulatory change in order to support more online processes, primarily digital signatures.

The government is also recognizing the need for digital signatures during COVID-19.

As the CEO of estate planning startup Willful, which helps Canadians create wills and Power of Attorney (POA) documents online, the limitations in our business have always had nothing to do with technology, and everything to do with the law.

In 2020, you can buy a home using a digital signature, but you still have to print and sign your will/POA for good reason, many would argue, since the purpose of witnesses to your will is to ensure an individual created those legal documents in sound mind without duress. Thats hard to do with Docusign since its easy to forge a signature which is the larger issue with any digital signature, whether its on a will, contract, or any other legal documents. How do you verify that a specific person is really signing a specific document online?

The United States (US) is ahead of Canada when it comes to adopting digital signatures on wills, as profiled in a New York Times article last fall. Nonprofit organization Uniform Law Commission drafted the Uniform Electronic Wills Act, which can act as a model for individual states to adopt. Several states including Nevada and Indiana already allow e-signatures, with more expected to follow suit in 2020.

Trust & Will, a partner of ours based out of San Diego, executed the first digital will in the US in Nevada in January 2019.

Digital signatures are important not just for wills; think of any document that needs to be notarized, including real estate transaction documents or auto insurance claims. Right now going in-person to a notary is difficult if not impossible.

The US allows digital notarization of wills and other documents through Notarize, a Washington, DC-based company that has a distributed team of notaries who notarize through a series of steps. Users upload or take a photo of the document that needs to be notarized, enter the last four digits of their social security number, answer five identity verification questions within two minutes, and submit a photo of their photo ID. After being verified, users connect with a notary via video and they finish the process by adding their signature and stamp.

The Law Society of Ontario issued guidance about virtual commissioning for the first time.

Notarizes CEO Patrick Kinsel said on Twitter that COVID-19 has led to an explosion in their business, with 30 percent growth per day. He said theyre hiring hundreds of notaries across the country to meet demand.

Canadian companies like Vaultie are tackling identity verification for digital signatures by using a verified photo tied to your government-issued photo ID. Vaultie launched in January, and CEO Meyer Mechanic said the service is used for everything from digital notarization to rental agreements to legal documents. Due to the spread of COVID-19, theyve seen an increase in demand, and the Law Society of Ontario issued guidance about virtual commissioning for the first time. The Law Society still advises that in-person is best practice, but its a step in the right direction.

Documents signed with Vaultie are tied to a verified selfie using compliance grade facial recognition and government identification testing. Anchored on a blockchain, documents are tamper-proof and instantly verifiable by any third party, Mechanic said in an email. Using this method we can provide a higher level of fraud prevention by linking a physical person (instead of their account) to a digital document.

The government is also recognizing the need for digital signatures during COVID-19. In the Economic Response Plan unveiled last week, the CRA announced it would be recognizing digital signatures as having met the signature requirements of the Income Tax Act, specifically on T183 or T183CORP. The CRA state that its a temporary measure due to COVID-19, but this may also lead to lasting change.

While COVID-19 will have a lot of negative lasting effects on our lives, one positive change it could inspire is the adoption by lawmakers and regulatory bodies of digital signatures. Whether its because we have to or because we want to, Canadians should have the ability to easily sign documents online.

Image source Unsplash. Photo by Kelly Sikkema

More here:

How COVID-19 is highlighting the need for Canada to embrace digital signatures - BetaKit

Travelling right now is not possible as Malaysia announced a restriction of movement for the entire country from 18th March to 31st March 2020. With that being said, when travelling, roaming is definitely a thought that crosses the mind to stay connected. Of course, everyone wants the best deal for the most affordable price and of most importantly, a telco that provides the best data experience. Opensignal, a mobile networks analytics company, has revealed the best telco provider for Malaysian 4G users travelling to Singapore.

Out of the four largest operators in the country, Digi users apparently enjoyed the experience more as compared to the rest. Digi emerged as the winner on a few factors, download speed, upload speed and latency experience. They had also discovered key differences between mobile experience by Malaysian roamers in Singapore and domestic Singaporean users.

Malaysian service providers provide roaming services by having agreements with host networks. This will enable customers to stay connected abroad when they are connected to the their partner telco for that country. Digi and Maxis users roam on Singtel and StarHub whereas Celcom users roam on M1 and StarHub. Meanwhile, U Mobile users roam on StarHub and Singtel.

The most notable element of the graph is that Singaporean domestic users download speed is higher than the Malaysian roamers. U Mobile has the least ideal experience of the lot as the download speed was a mere 16.6 Mbps while Digi users experienced the highest download speed at 46.8Mbps when roaming in Singapore. Taking second place is Maxis at 33.5Mbps, followed by Celcom at 30.9Mbps.

The upload speed for domestic Singaporean users is somewhat the same for all the providers. Digi again had the highest upload speed at 13.5 Mbps and U Mobile is the lowest at 7.3 Mbps. Maxis and Celcom also continues to maintain 2nd and 3rd place respectively.

Latency is measured in milliseconds and is essentially the response time that it takes to send information. The longer the time, the bigger the delay which isnt ideal for applications like mobile gaming. From the graph above, Malaysian roamers experienced higher latencies than their Singaporean counterparts. Celcom observed the highest latency at 48.8ms which is almost double of what Singaporeans are getting, followed by Maxis at 42.2ms and U Mobile at 40.9ms. Digi has the lowest latency among the four at 36.4ms. This latest report was generated by Opensignal based on data obtained between 1st January to 31st December 2019.

Overall, it is evident that Digi offers the best experience for roaming in Singapore. On top of that, Digi has one of the most affordable roaming plans where you can get 2GB and 30 minutes of calls for RM25 for 3 days.

You can check out the full report here.

[IMAGE SOURCE]

Read more here:

Which Malaysian Telco provides the best roaming experience in Singapore? - SoyaCincau.com

If youve launched your business in recent years, you probably know this very well: Choosing a CRM is almost as difficult as choosing your industry, product and target market. Every developer with some free time seems to have built one, and as a result, there are now thousands of CRMs to choose from.

Instead of telling you which one to choose, lets do something better. Here are the main features that a great CRM needs to have before you consider it your sales tool of choice.

1. Interaction Tracking

The path from a cold lead to a repeat customer is not a straight line. In fact, it can take months before someone who found your product decides to buy. And unless you know each step they take before handing over their cash, you wont know how to improve your sales process.

A great CRM needs to have the option of tracking each interaction that a lead makes with your business. From the very first time they view your website, when they open your email and when they get a call from your reps, you need to be able to see which moves they make. That way, you can spot your weaknesses and hone your strengths.

On a different note, its also easier to see who handled what in your sales process. One rep could talk to a lead through email, and another one could pick up their inbound call. There is no way for the person receiving the call to know the previously exchanged information unless the interactions were tracked from the very start.

2. Document Management

It can be a nightmare to upload all of your sales documentation to the cloud. Things can get slow and messy and sorting through your most important documents can get complicated.

If you want to connect your marketing and sales teams and have all your most important documents in one place, you need a CRM with a document management feature. This way, you can upload all the documents in a single location and avoid the potential information mismatch that could ruin your sales. Moreover, you can also upload documents for your customers, such as proposals, contracts, technical specifications and anything else that comes to mind.

3. A Mobile App

Lets be honest here you wont do any hardcore selling on your phone when youre out and about. However, a good CRM needs to have a mobile version of its app, especially if you have a strong outside sales team; a mobile app can be a game-changer for them. They could update their lead data on the go, view alerts and deal updates, and check up on everything they need without opening up their laptop.

4. Integrations Galore

The ultimate goal of any sales professional is to work smarter, not harder. That requires plenty of integrations and the ability to automate tasks. In other words, your CRM should play well with a variety of different tools if you want it to save you time and money.

Some examples include integrations with email marketing software, lead generation software, project management apps, and website and landing page builders. I would argue that an email marketing integration is the most crucial because you need to see each interaction you had with a lead (through email) when you pull up their file. Finally, its crucial to be able to receive payments through your CRM. Some customers prefer paying immediately instead of dealing with complex invoices and bank processes.

5. A Dialer

Perhaps your business doesnt rely heavily on outbound or inbound calls. However, the phone is still one of the primary ways to get in touch with the right decision-makers, especially in B2B. If you rely heavily on calls, its an absolute must to have a built-in dialer in your CRM app.

The benefits are numerous: From being able to call many more numbers than you could with a stand-alone phone app, to being able to add calls to your list of lead interactions, there are plenty of reasons a dialing feature should be a part of your CRM.

When you figure out the features you need in a CRM, the list of thousands of available apps shrinks down to just a handful of the best ones for you.

Read more here:

Five Features Your Next CRM Needs To Maximize Your Sales - Forbes

C

Anonymous, 11 hours agoSo whats the matter if google monopolize the app bussiness? They still give the best service t... moreHow you'll know it's the best service if they don't have any competition?

a292

Locking bootloaders is like forcing people to read the Bible only in Latin.

a292

Anonymous, 11 hours agoSo whats the matter if google monopolize the app bussiness? They still give the best service t... moreBecause freedom?

k17863

Anonymous, 11 hours agoGoogle didn't want to accept Chinese political censorship, which is the only right thing to do... moreI'm sorry, that is completely wrong. It is the US government banned Google from supplying Huawei. And the reason was to protect the sales of Apple and Qualcomm.The impact of coronavirus on the US economy could make them go even more protectionist, but then the US risks losing sales all around the world.

S

Anonymous, 11 hours agoGoogle didn't want to accept Chinese political censorship, which is the only right thing to do... moreGoogle WANT to continue the relation with huawei..its the USA (Trump )..who did the ban ..For god sake ..Google ask Trump if they Please have permission to continue the relation with Huawei.....read before you type something nitwit

b

Anonymous, 11 hours agoMaybe because if they unlock bootloader, people can enter their phones system and software and... moreNo its because Huawei will give us a open door to install GMS and maybe it goes against the US Ban ...

?

Anonymous, 11 hours agoSo whats the matter if google monopolize the app bussiness? They still give the best service t... more They are not monopolizing ........... huawei still can use android .

?

Anonymous, 14 hours agoAnd don't forget amazon store, it's good application store too. Google don't need to be the on... moreSo whats the matter if google monopolize the app bussiness? They still give the best service than other app stores. I dont mind about the monopoly of google as long i got best service i want and what i expected from them and i still satisfied with that

?

aeldor, 15 hours agoI bought a Oneplus (6t) to install a degoogled OS (LineageOS). I would have bought a Huawei if... moreMaybe because if they unlock bootloader, people can enter their phones system and software and eventually will find out their spyware that they put in their phone which of course they dont want that lol. Maybe....

?

Anonymous, 17 hours agoBut they didn't ban Google. Google didn't want to accept the terms which many other companies ... moreGoogle didn't want to accept Chinese political censorship, which is the only right thing to do. They gave up large potential profit, but showed that they have principles.

Good for Google. But I guess some people think authoritarianism and censorship are good....

?

First, it's crazy to trust your sensitive information to this.

Second, according to XDA Google is plugging the magisk exploit and no secure apps will work on any phones with Android 8 and up.

Why would anyone spend their money on a Huawei is beyond me.

e

great info gsmarena !

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Anonymous, 21 hours agoNo thanks, I would rather use Huawei appgallery or apkpure. And don't forget amazon store, it's good application store too. Google don't need to be the only application's store for Android otherwise it would monopolize the business.

?

Anonymous, 15 hours agoIt is the fact that these permissions are required by an unkown app, that has people wondering... moreChecking the "leakster" it seems more of a leak reposting twitter account and he found the third Google cloud link on a youtube video he also linked to, but the chain can be found in the video description as well

a292

I bought a Oneplus (6t) to install a degoogled OS (LineageOS). I would have bought a Huawei if they had an unlockable bootloader. But I'm glad I have the Oneplus now. A remarkable device too. Shame on you, Huawei. Why not be honest and make the bootloader unlockable ?

?

Not working. It keeps pushing for the play registration. Also, Mate30 Pro works just fine without Google Apps.

?

It is the fact that these permissions are required by an unkown app, that has people wondering where it is from, but let's focus on the origin. Besides the GMX cloud link that has no details, I have found Google cloud links from tgdd News, Nguyen Katie and Lm Ph Thingh (I do not know if the last are accounts by people named that, the first is listed by tgdd), uploaded on 10, 15 and 17 February respectively. It certainly is not centralized and doesn't seem like they recieved it on email but picked it from other sites and reuploaded it (to seem more legitimate?). The leakster that linked to the third one had sources, including tgdd, that listed to the other ones so it probably is kind of a chain, and said that Vietnamese stores use it to sell devices (tgdd has an article and also sells Mate 30 Pro, so it is plausible). It goes deeper than tdgg though. Tgdd itself used as a source the EMUI Vit Nam facebook page (doesn't seem official), that had two mediafire links, a regular uploaded 2 hours before tgdd and a lite 9.34MB version uploaded on 7 February, both uploaded from Vietnam. There was also a supposed Google Cloud backup link there, though with "(qc)" commented, that went you through 3 sites to lead you to an unrelated one. The website link on the description of the facebook page didn't work. There were some other branches along the way that didn't take somewhere, someone might be able to find an older upload, but that is where I got with just some simple browsing. So it seems like it probably originated from Vietnam, though who is the developer isn't obvious.

?

Come one man just forget about that headache and buy any Xiaomi phone.

?

Nick Tagataka, 19 hours agoSo GSMArena is essentially promoting this suspicious app to the readers as an "easy method" to... moreChat Partner fixes your phone by installing the Google Play Store. That's so hilarious.

?

wasox, 19 hours agoCCP banned google from entering china, that is ok, (for them of course), then, it is fair ... moreBut they didn't ban Google. Google didn't want to accept the terms which many other companies have done, so they withdrew from the Chinese market.

Read more:

Here's an easy method to install the Google Play Store on your Huawei phone - comments - GSMArena.com

The Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) has disrupted the worlds operations in drastic ways. We had never thought that all major cities of the world would become ghost towns. The doctors are suggesting people limit their social activities and remain at home. Educational institutions have also been closed across the world. The situation is not different in Karachi and around Pakistan. Students are at home and they must be guided and informed to lead a healthy, productive life even when the world in a state of lockdown. Here are a few ways students and professionals can remain productive, creative and active at home.

While learning a new skill can be a productive pastime, you must also spend time reading. The importance of reading cannot be emphasised enough. Read novels or newspapers. You can also download the PDF versions of your favourite books and read them on your smartphone. When reading, you can also go through the news and gain information pertaining to the world. The habit of reading will enhance your knowledge and give you a feeling of confidence, which is a psychological impact of reading.

Apart from learning a new skill, you can also learn a new language. With the world becoming a global village, you can never be too sure of where the future may lead you. As a student, you might pursue your higher studies in Europe, Canada or the USA. As a professional, you can land a job in Turkey, Japan or Egypt. Even if you stay in Pakistan, learning a new language will add value to your CV (resume). Where learning a skill is an activity that will help you at some point in life, learning in its essence must continue. You can learn how to do digital marketing and how to create designs in Photoshop. You can learn how to create objects from wood or learn how to paint. You can learn how to cook food or how to sew. The possibilities are endless if you have a vision of what you want to accomplish and have identified the areas of your interest.

When you are at home you can also pursue a freelance revenue-generation mechanism. You must find an activity of your interest and turn it to earn a profit. For instance, you can sell your services as a content writer, a translator (from English to Urdu and vice versa), or can perform other tasks including graphic designing, software development, website development, data analysis and reporting among others. You can create an account on Fiverr or Upwork, attract clients from across the world and complete their tasks to earn money.

Speaking of money, you can also create your YouTube channel and upload short videos where you share words of wisdom, personal experiences, product reviews or information that the viewers can benefit from. While the process of gaining subscribers to a point that you can start earning money from people viewing your video is a long and tedious one. However, you can begin creating videos and uploading them from today. All your need is a smartphone camera and the internet. However, the catch to create a successful YouTube Channel is to regularly upload videos. These videos must ideally be six to eleven minutes in duration.

Living in the confinement of your home will also make your lethargic. However, you must not come under the influence of being lazy. You must wake up early in the morning, take a bath, have a nutritious breakfast and begin your work at home. If you are a student, you can revise your syllabus and if you are a professional, you can work-from-home. Furthermore, you must keep a things-to-list to keep you active throughout the day.

You should also spare time to do exercise. You do not need to buy any exercising equipment. All you need is loose clothes. A t-shirt and a trouser will do. The exercises that you can do in your room include push-ups, jumping jacks, lunges, walkouts, plank, side lunges, single-leg deadlifts, sit-ups and squats. You have to keep your body in shape and your mind active to remain emotionally stable at a time when spending time at home is the wisest thing to do.

The writer is an independent researcher, author and columnist

See the rest here:

Learning must continue - Daily Times

The City of Cape Town has on Tuesday 17 March announced that the following facilities will no longer be in use due to the rapid spread of the coronavirus.

The city has noted the key containment and mitigation measures that are being implemented across the world and in South Africa in an effort to reduce the spread of the COVID-19. We have taken note of best practice from other affected countries and the success they have found in social distancing and improved hygiene practices, it said in a statement.

These facilities will be closed from Wednesday 18 March:

Furthermore, visits by the Citys Mobile Office have been suspended until further notice.

Library operating hours (including mobile services) will be reduced incrementally and these facilities will provide only basic services, namely, taking out and returning reading material. The number of persons allowed into the library will be controlled due to the rapid spread of coronavirus. Needless to say, this might change at short notice.

Cemeteries will remain open, although residents are advised upon making bookings to be mindful of the number of persons at the graveside during burial and to please stick to their allotted times. The Recreation and Parks Department is working to keep gravesites as far apart as possible to limit contact between mourners during burials.

The City also reminds the public that an announcement was made by the National Minister of Social Development that all Early Childhood Development Centres will close on Wednesday, 18 March 2020, in line with the schools.

The City realises that, due to the closure of sporting facilities, there will be an impact on community sporting culture and especially on the municipal facility management committees (MFMCs) who work with the City on the management and maintenance of the facilities. We plead for their understanding and request the support of MFMCs to ensure that all non-essential contact is avoided and that social distancing is strictly enforced to avoid the coronavirus.

Please note all public meetings and non-critical meetings, gatherings and site visits will also be postponed indefinitely unless an emergency meeting is called which we will communicate on. The situation is being assessed on a daily basis and is subject to frequent and rapid change, it said.

Offices that provide city services like cash offices, driving licence testing centres and housing and planning offices will remain open for now.

Residents are advised that all events at the citys nature reserves have been cancelled and staff are currently working on refunding affected stakeholders, we will provide a full refund for any bookings and also permits to Steenbras Gorge.

The city encourages account holders to make use of the citys online service offerings, where it is possible to do so, rather than visiting city customer centres for over the counter transactions.

Customer offices will remain open, however, strong precautions will be taken to ensure a heightened level of hygiene and customers are encouraged to rather conduct their business online or via telephone than over the counter if possible. The number of people going to the offices must be limited to limit the spread of coronavirus. Customers are reminded that accounts still need to be paid.

The city encourages account holders to use the citys online e-services portal to pay their accounts. Other payment options available to account holders include paying online using their banks website or via ATM, at Nedbank.

The city is already listed as a beneficiary with all major banks, so account holders do not need to load bank details when paying online. Account-holders can also register with http://www.paycity.co.za or http://www.easypay.co.za to pay accounts.

To pay via ATM, account holders can simply contact their bank to add the City as an ATM beneficiary.

If account holders have any questions related to their account, they can please call 0860 103 089 for more information. Account-holders should keep the reference number theyre provided with to track the progress of their query.

The Citys Motor Vehicle Renewal which includes motor vehicle licence renewals, vehicle registrations and licence payments can be done online. An online licence application takes approximately 14 days from the date of application to receiving it in the post, so residents must please bear this in mind and act in a timeous fashion.

Residents who would like to go this route can do so via the Citys online services portal (http://www.capetown.gov.za//Vehic/Pay-your-vehicle-licence).

Residents are reminded to take along their proof of address when renewing their motor vehicle licences. This must be done annually as per National Government requirements. It is very important for customers to have all of the required documentation with them when they apply for licence disc renewals to prevent any additional delays.

Driving License Testing Centres remain open; however, strong precautions have already been instituted to ensure a heightened level of hygiene. All eye testing equipment is sanitised after each user to slow the spread of coronavirus. Staff have been issued hand sanitisers, and gloves and masks are on order.

Additional sanitation of all work surfaces has been implemented. The number of occupants have been limited as per the queuing system. Notices have gone up at all DLTCs, advising the public of precautions to take to promote good hygiene and limit the spread of the virus.

One can pay traffic fines online via:

The following can be done via e-Services:

We know that this will prove inconvenient for some of our residents but in the interest of containing this highly contagious virus and for the protection of all our residents, we trust our residents will understand the need for these measures, it said.

Numerous resources have been made available to the public regarding the coronavirus. These include:

Read more from the original source:

City of Cape Town will shut down these facilities due to coronavirus - The South African

Complicated days are coming and new routines that are sure to alter our mood. We know it, yes, but the difficult thing is to go through it and leave unscathed along the route.

If you are already in quarantine, it is likely that one of these tips will help you survive gracefully. If you are not quarantined, what are you waiting for?

Today we dedicate 5 tips to managing your HomeOffice life without altering your chacras, your peace and above all, without losing the ability to enjoy it.

1. Organized snacking:

If you are tidy enough and planned well, your fridge and cupboard are full of delicious, non-perishable items available 24/7. Beautiful, but risky. Being at home all day can distort your usual anxiety and make you want to eat the entire refrigerator in a day, or the opposite, erase your natural metabolism agenda and go hours without eating. Neither option is a good plan.

Tip: Schedule a start and end time for work, lunch, dinner and breaks. It helps you plan necessary stops and also not to be working all day without stopping.

2. Sneaked:

Yes, working in pajamas and slippers is the dream of your life, we know it. The first day of quarantine seems like a gift: pajamas, washed face, slippers and in this city even the weather seems to fit, because not even a ray of sunlight came out.- Being isolated does not seem so bad at the end of the day-. Stop there, its a trap. The dream idea collapses a few hours after the start of the day, this moment sounds very nice but when we do it for several days, we fall into the sense of feeling completely abandoned and enter a vicious circle of ceasing to occupy ourselves for feeling good physically and mentally. (Also: how many pajamas do you have?).

Tip: Comfortable clothes and slippers are the allowed combination. Who tells you, you can even make a face mask while answering emails.

3. Loosen multitasking.

Youve started home office with an ultra productive energy and it is very tempting to put a washing machine and prepare the food, while you upload the file to drive and you have a work call (without camera, obviously). Yes, suddenly you see everything there is to do and fix at home, your brain works at 1000 miles/hour and you want to do everything in one day. Calm down sister, that energy does not last forever and its better to manage it throughout the week. Think about organizing the day as if you were in the office. It is great to feel motivated and inspired to do many things, but at the end of the day you can feel that you couldnt do everything that your mind processed very quickly but your body and the limited hours of the day did not cover. Frustration alert.

Tip: Get blocks for household chores outside of work. There is no need to collapse.

4. Cancel Bed-Office: Dont fall into the clutches of the bed, Dont fall into the clutches of the bed, Dont fall into the clutches of the bed.

Another mirage from afar pleasant and from a treacherous fence. The idea of working in bed is undoubtedly a fantasy that we have all had (or not?) But beware, after an hour, it becomes an octopus that catches you and makes you forget all the ideas and desires you had when you started the day. If it hasnt happened to you yet, get out just in time. If it happened to you and you fell asleep, activate a coffee, mate or tea, a shower, put some clean clothes and move to the dining room to continue the day.

Tip: If your work allows you to work from home, work in the living room, dining room, armchair, on the balcony or wherever you want, (at home, obviously ) but lets set the sheets free during the day.

5. Man does not live by stalking alone: You have been in quarantine since the weekend, you did an intensive social network scan, you already got all the emails for today and the tasks you had. You finished the plans, the blueprint, the design work, you sent quotes, you planned your content, you listened to beautiful music all day and you already took the daily tour of social networks. Great, congratulated 10. Buuuuut, how many people did you talk to today? Being isolated can have us several days without talking, and not necessarily with your coworkers, but without your friends and family. Think that someone may be alone or simply bored, in this quarantine, do not forget to interact.

Tip: Activate video calls with your groups and stay connected with your loved ones.

No one said that working from home was easy, but it has many benefits, and more if you know that it is for a short time.

Bonus: Get inspired in your house or in other houses, write down 1 thing you want to do per day and do it at your breaks. Oh and if you want to share it, upload it with the hashtag #ForMeMoment.

Here is the original post:

How to do home office without going crazy - Thrive Global

One of the most trending apps among teens is Tik Tok. If your kid is also a fan of Tik Tok then the post worth reading. Being a parent there are lots of things to consider and today we will discuss the Tik Tok negative impact on young generation.

Tik Tok is a lip-syncing video maker app that allows you to choose the background music track and mix your day to day activities with the music track. Tik Tok is good if you create videos for fun only but a wide array of teens and kids are becoming addicted to Tik Tok and busy creating Tik Tok videos. Boys, girls, adults and even old aged people used to spend their valuable hours making Tik Tok videos. Creating videos is not bad at all but creating vulgar and violent videos can spoil your kids future. He/she can become an ill-mind person. So not to avoid Tik Toks bad impacts on Youth and to understand how Tik Tok affecting youth just scroll down.

Before describing the Tik Tok negative impact on young generation lets check out what is Tik Tok and what makes it so addictive.

How to become popular on Tik Tok?

Tik Tok is a social media app where you can create 15 seconds short lip sync videos with the available background music. You can also watch other users videos on Tik Tok. Tik Tok is created for both Android and iOS users and like other social media platforms, you can make followers, follow others, comment and like others videos.

The app is created by the Bytedance and introduced in 2017. In a very short span of time, the Tik Tok secured its place in almost everyone smartphone. From funny to emotional you can create and upload every type of video on Tik Tok. Here are the few astonishing facts about Tik Tok:

As you know Tik Tok is massively trending and the sole motive is to create and upload different videos. When someone signs in for Tik Tok then their profile remains Public by default means anyone can watch what you uploaded. Apart from music and dancing videos, there are many themes which are suitable for 16+ age group and if your kid is under 16 and he/she is using those themes then what would happen!

If your kids account still public then there are higher chances that they will get messages from strangers. To ensure the security of your kid while using Tik Tok you need to keep an eye on:

How to restore deleted Instagram messages?

Because of the rising trend of Social media platforms, people are becoming less social in reality and more active on Facebook, Instagram, Tik Tok. Even young mids losing their interest in studies and used to show off via Tik Tok and other social channels. It is good to connect with other people through social platforms but if you use them to get popularity then they may risky. And such type of apps is Tik Tok where kids and teens trying to attract others attention with their videos.

Here are the Tik Tok bad effects that should not be ignored:

Tik Tok is a really good app if it is used in the right way but for kids and teens, it is not safe at all. Above we have discussed how Tik Tok affecting youth but with few precautions, we can make it better:

Tik Tok is one of the best platforms to post different videos including dance, funny, singing and many more. But videos that are full of vulgarity and violation can leave a negative effect on young minds. Thats the reason Tik Tok is risky for kids and teens and here we discussed the Tik Tok negative impact on young generation and solutions as well.

If your kid wants to use Tik Tok then you need to be alert and follow the certain instructions that we have described above. Monitor your kids activity and aware about the possible side effects of such apps.

Agree with me or not? Let me know below in the comment section. What are your views about Tik Tok? Should teens use it or not?

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How Tik Tok affecting Youth: Tik Tok Negative Impact On Young Generation - Tech Chums

Facebook has launched a feature where one can post 3D photos to the timeline, even with a single rear camera phone.

The social media gaint first introduced the 3D photo feature in October 2018 and was limited to smartphones having a dual or triple rear camera set up.

Previously, the tool relied on a depth map created by dual-camera phones and its own software tweaks which gave the 3D effect to the images.

The latest single-camera technique to create 3D images uses machine learning totransform a simple image into a 3D image.Facebook says that people can also use their front camera for capturing 3D selfies.

According to Facebook, users with iPhone 7 or higher or a recent midrange or better Android device, will be able to create 3D images through the Facebook app.

Facebook has not rolled out a specific list of supported devices; however, the feature is working on most of our iPhones and a few Android devices.

It appears that the feature will eventually roll out to a vast number of Android devices.

Read more here:

How To Upload 3D Photos In Facebook On Android, iOS and PC? - Fossbytes