The Water Cooler

jmac

08:34

How does this question have no close votes at all? Mind-boggling:

29

I've been programming for around 3 years now, I love everything about building software and programming since the day I started till now. I work on side projects and write about topics I find interesting on my blog. I love what I do. Recently I was sick of my corporate job, more like sick of the...

You left a corporate job, and went with a startup. Now, after 4 weeks, it isn't what you imagined it would be. So what is your question? — Joe Strazzere yesterday

CMW

09:24

@greuze We don't mean to discriminate against particular users, but rather seek to inform new users, so they can in turn help improve the overall community. Please take this as encouragement to leave similar comments on other posts or flag them so that mods will take a look. I'd also like to invite you to The Water Cooler if you've got questions or you're looking for a chat. — CMW 8 secs ago

CMW

10:52

Actually, from "help center": "I need advice on...", "What should I do?", or "Which job should I take?" Questions looking for opinions on what to do but with no specific problem are suited for discussion boards (not a question/answer site) and generally will be closed on The Workplace as "primarily opinion-based." For information on how to write a good subjective question see here. Remember a real question has an answer, not just opinions or ideas. — CMW 1 min ago

gnat

@jmac that's micromanagement! my Maslow hierarchy is shaken! :)

jmac

11:08

The question quality since graduation has taken a plunge. I can't help but think that the hit to privileges, plus the additional load on moderators has really reduced the amount of community moderation we can muster, and it shows. Fewer useful comments, fewer good edits, more really bad questions with far too many answers... What can we do to fix it?

Vinothbabu

Hello Guys

jmac

Howdy @Vino

Jim G.

11:55

The expression "pick your battles" comes to mind. You only get so many complaints to your manager before you get written off as unsatisfiable; is this really where you want to spend one of your limited number of complaints? — Eric Lippert 13 hours ago

^^^ I'm nominating this for the TWP comments hall of fame.

You should pay less attention to his strict face and words of bitterness and more attention to his happy pectorals and farts of generosity. — John Craven 41 mins ago

^^^^ YMMV.

CMW

we should definitely start a hall of fame for those

gnat

12:37

@jmac we need to elect moderators ASAP, at least 4 of them. I think part of the problem is we are like regular SE community, but we don't yet have enough guys with explicit community mandate to evaluate content in accordance with community norms and lead/follow/enforce respective meta discussions and decisions. Pressure from hot list remains the same as prior to graduation (curses to SE team) but moderating power hasn't been recovered yet

jmac

@gnat I sincerely doubt we will get 4 new moderators.

gnat

@jmac we need 4 total. If these are going to be two new guys, along with be jmort and Jim, that will be okay

jmac

@gnat We have 4, theoretically speaking I think. Nick C is a mod, right? As is Oded? Or do they not count?

gnat

@jmac Oded does not count in any way, he does a similar garbage collection at Programmers, using privileges of SE dev (and his knowledge of site topics), but he is not an elected moderator, neither here nor there

he's actually a great help in this regard, we (and Programmers) are just lucky to have an extra guy at our side

13

Q: Moderators Pro Tempore, just like mamma used to make 'em

Throughout the beta, we need members from the site whose focus is to engage the community, both in community-building issues and site management. That's why we select a few members from each community to act as temporary, provisional Moderators. You can read about the program here: Moderators Pro...

discussion moderation moderators

if memory serves pro-tem mods need to go through elections after graduation

whatever, I think we need 4 fully-involved, elected moderators, enabled by a community "vote" to evaluate content per site community norms, not just slavishly apply bland generic network-wide recipes (that actually work well only on Stack Overflow)

need mods like those at Programmers, who clearly and strongly play by site community rules

Hugo Rocha

12:57

Good morning! Oh my, I went away from one night and you guys goes wild? :P

jmac

I wonder who it will end up being. I do hope to see jmort back again, I wonder who else will be running.

Hugo Rocha

@RhysW www.youtube.com/watch?v=xhrBDcQq2DM‎

gnat

@jmac I wouldn't mind to have a quartet of J&M. JMort, JiM, JcMeloni, JMac

my "short list" includes few other guys, but they don't have magic J&M in user names :)

jmort253

13:45

Hello, I put this on hold because Workplace SE is a Q&A site, and it's most important that posts contain an actual question beyond just "What should I do?". It's also attracted some very low quality answers, which is typical of discussion-oriented questions with no clear question. However, it may be possible to edit this to focus more on a specific question. Such edits may invalidate some answers below. If anyone is going to edit, please see How to Ask and about for more details. — jmort253 ♦ 24 secs ago

jmac

@gnat jcmeloni said she won't be running. And I am on the fence as to whether or not I want to commit that much time to it (I know I commit a lot of time now, but that is on a voluntary basis without much obligation for when I take a 2 week vacation overseas, or a quiet weekend, etc.)

@jmort253 Thanks. I was so amazed when I saw the question, the quality of answers, and the complete lack of close votes.

I have been busy in the queues, so I'm not so good at browsing the front page when I have an hour of reviewing or the like to sift through.

jmort253

It's not a bad question, actually.... it's just way too discussion-y as worded.

I don't have time right now to look at it much deeper, but it may be possible to edit it by looking at the top answers and seeing what question they read into.

jmac

@jmort253 As-is, it's a rant followed by a very blanket, "What should I do?" with no clear question.

jmort253

I tend to think of rants as being a bit more... breathless.... and less thought through.

jmac

Even I can't think of a way to edit it without completely changing the entire content of the question from, "My job isn't working out the way it is" to "How do you establish order as the sole expert in a start-up?"

jmort253

13:58

This person clearly can write well, the problem is he's treating Workplace SE like an advice column rather than Q&A.

A common mistake, and one where even early comments listing some of our resources may be helpful.

jmac

I think that when it's software related, a large portion of our community wears blinders as to the real quality of the content. If the same question was asked by a welder, I don't think it would get anywhere near the same reception.

jmort253

We have a Pro forma comment list for answers, maybe we need one for questions too.

jmac

I still can't figure out the whole user script thing. I just type by hand. Maybe it's worthwhile to figure out how to do it, but I browse the site on 3 different devices with three different OS and I don't want to cause headaches for myself.

jmort253

You might be right..... I suspect it slipped through because most folks just read into what they thought the question was. I admit it didn't fire off any alarms in my head at first...

@jmac -

223

Q: AutoReviewComments - Pro-forma comments for SE

No more re-typing the same comments over and over! This script adds a little 'auto' link next to all comments boxes. When you click the link, you see a popup with 6 configurable auto-comments (canned responses), which you can easily click to insert. This script was inspired by answers to thi...

script

At the bottom of this "question" are links to install into Chrome or Firefox.

Google has tried to really dumb things down lately, which actually does the opposite effect of making it difficult for people to install add-ons.

jmac

I didn't read it because:
a) It had a ton of views/votes, so I figured if it was THAT bad, it'd be in the queue
b) I rarely find that I have anything to add on developer questions
c) I figured there was little point to putting time in to a question with a dozen answers already

jmort253

14:02

So you may end up downloading the script and seeing a yellow "Sorry but you can't installl apps" type message.

Afterwards, in Chrome, go to Tools->Extensions and then just drag and drop the script right into the window, then it will be installed.

jmac

But after I had 3 answers in the queues, and then 3 answers in the flag list, I took a look, and hoo boy Joe's comment hit the nail on the head -- there isn't a single question mark there...

jmort253

Once installed, you get that extra "auto" link beside every comment.

jmac

Yeah, that works great for my mac at home.

But then I have Firefox at the office on a PC

jmort253

It's invaluable.... I'd be lost without it.

jmac

and iOS on my phone

jmort253

14:03

lol.... too many choices :)

anyhow, gotta run have a great day! :)

jmac

Enjoy.

CMW

@CMW: I was typing such a big answer, and you guys just closed it. — Vinothbabu 47 secs ago

@Vinothbabu It's @Chad's fault :D

Chad

I protected:

8

Q: My supervisor treats me and my team as a "resource"

I've been reading some e-mails from my supervisor and I've noticed that he always call me and my teammates "resources". For example, answering a manager's demand, he answered At the moment I don't have any resource available for completing this assignment. How can I approach him and tell ...

management terminology

It has a few bad answers and 8 decent answers already and I suspect its going to be on the hot list a bit

CMW

good catch

jmac

14:26

@Chad With 44 votes on the top answer, my guess is that it's already on the hot list. It also isn't a great question (but looks like an editable one). As-is it's unclear what's being asked. Why can't you just talk to your boss after all? But asking why he calls them resources, or explaining why he feels uncomfortable approaching his boss about it and asking how to get around that issue would be okay...

Chad

@jmac Yeah its a passable question and if it were not on the hot list it would not be a problem. Too bad that hot list isnt something that we get to flag for inclusion instead of just what the lemmings decide to drive over the cliff

CMW

@jmac should we get it closed for being unclear?

Vinothbabu

@CMW : I guess the question was different than what @Chad has pointed above

jmac

I think that a kind user should direct the author to changing it without our assistance and without closure. But of course, adding close votes as it isn't good as-is.

CMW

@Vinothbabu Yeah, what chad posted was totally unrelated

jmac

14:31

Hey @Vino, what brought you to The Workplace? I'd love to know what brought you here, and how you find it, if you don't mind sharing

CMW

@jmac Some people in that lengthy comment stream already tried

Vinothbabu

I find it great, as the quality of answers are awesome and people are more friendly than in Meta. I don't remember how i got into workplace, i guess i liked some questions and answers which brought some interest

@jmac

Its been three days, i am here in the workplace

jmac

@CMW I don't think anyone tried to help, they tried to answer in the comments, but it doesn't look like there's any clear direction about how to improve it, or that it's a serious problem.

Vinothbabu

I am more of stackoverflow guy

jmac

@Vinothbabu Glad to have you here. Feel free to pop in anytime, and people will be helpful if you have questions. As you may have seen, our site is a bit different from SO

Because of the topics we cover, the questions are a lot 'softer' and so our guidelines to maintain quality can be...difficult...to understand at times

CMW

14:35

@jmac Yeah, kinda sorta not really. They just asked for what the real problem was or what exactly was bothering OP

jmac

Thankfully we have great members of our community in here who are available to help out if you have any questions. Like @CMW here, or @Chad. Or the many others who pop in from time to time.

2

What exactly is your issue here? Are you new to the workforce? The term "resource" in this regard is rather widely used. I'd be cautious in taking a stand here when this is probably a non-issue. — Hi pals 14 hours ago

That is the only comment that kind of points out there's a problem, but no close vote/flag to close was issued

Vinothbabu

The help people get from here are career/life changing points. Some answers were so super cool, i learnt a lot

from those points on how to deal such situations

jmac

@Vinothbabu After a while in the workplace, you too will start being able to provide wisdom based on your experiences. Many of our frequent answerers have decades of work experience which gives them a lot of wisdom to share.

Chad

@jmac OMGZ The pressure... why would you do that to me?

CMW

@jmac Looking at it I'm actually starting to doubt that question is more than an elaborate rant. The OP keeps acknowledging that it's common to be treated that way but keeps complaining about it in comments

Vinothbabu

14:45

@CMW: Which thread?

Chad

@jmac Just because the issue seems easy to some people that does not mean that it is to everyone.

CMW

10

Q: My supervisor treats me and my team as a "resource"

I've been reading some e-mails from my supervisor and I've noticed that he always call me and my teammates "resources". For example, answering a manager's demand, he answered At the moment I don't have any resource available for completing this assignment. How can I approach him and tell ...

management terminology

Chad

The question could be improved I agree but I don't think it warrants closure. I think there are a few good answers there already that pretty much cover the explanations I would want.

Vinothbabu

I guess he is fighting for self respect

Chad

BTW Lemmings Attack:

17

Q: And you can avoid to use free()... wait, what?

I'm studying computer engineering, and I have some electronics courses. I heard, from two of my professors (of these courses) that it is possible to avoid using the free method (after malloc, calloc...) because they said that the memory spaces allocated hardly can be used again to allocate other ...

c++ c memory-management memory-leaks heap

CMW

14:50

@Vinothbabu Is he? Or is he just complaining about a word that's being used and the manager/co-worker is treating them quite fine in every other respect and they just don't like each other

I can't tell

mainly because the OP won't say

Vinothbabu

@CMW: I agree with you, even in case of doctors they would refer the patient either "Case" or "Patient" or "Gentlemen" than their names. I guess, his situation around the workplace may be different. What is he expecting from us?

CMW

exactly

Chad

@CMW And I think the answers that explain the term to the OP are the best answers. I hope this question and the answers helped the OP understand that he is not just a resource to his manage

CMW

I hope so, too

Vinothbabu

@Chad: He is adding too much of weight around his head for that term?. That's the real problem. I guess he is not going to end this until his managers calls them by their name on status calls.

Chad

15:10

@Vinothbabu Well usually if you can understand why someone is using the term that can help you get over that problem. If not that is a problem with narcissism

Vinothbabu

@Chad: I guess OP construes the terms meaning, his whole problem lies why does the manager not call by name?. The answers provide enough support, but i guess OP would not come out of it until or unless either Manager changes his style of communication or his Manager itself Changes.

Chad

@Vinothbabu No I think his problem is he feels his manager is trivializing their contributions by using that term. The truth is that is manager speak for I do not view either you or your project as a priority but I can not say that...

So I say I do not have the resources to dedicate to the project... could be developers, could be server space, could be brain cycles, could just be the project management

That reply has nothing to do with the OP and everything to do with the person doing the requesting or project being requested

It could be a good project that just takes more time than its worth.

Vinothbabu

0

Q: Using SWOT and other similar frameworks in real life

In business schools you tend to get taught that you should always use some sort of common frameworks such as SWOT-analysis, STEEPLE, Business Model Canvas (you can google these if you do not know what they are) to evaluate your business. My question: are these actually used in corporate environm...

management

CMW

This question appears to be off-topic because it is about project or business management methods and not about navigating the workplace as defined in the help center. — CMW 18 secs ago

gnat

15:38

@Chad great pick! :) A "backup" target, for case if this one gets closed is this one: stackoverflow.com/questions/22479162/… - reasonably high in hot list now, 7 answers make nice "investment" for upvotes

Chad

@gnat I am sure if I had taken time to read those answers they were worthy of the upvotes I gave them :p

gnat

@Chad so did I! Authentic users of hot list questions tend to reward every little bit of effort / fun that seems to be there (and yes, typing 30-50 chars is typically considered a solid effort:)

Chad

16:54

To the Lemming Machine Scooby!

10

Q: Difference between string str and string str=null

I want to know what exactly happens inside when we declare a variable, like this: string tr; string tr = null; While debugging, I noticed for both values that it was showing null only. But when using ref tr without initializing null it will give error while the second line doesn't. Please he...

c#

33

Q: Why does .NET behave so poorly when StackOverflowException is thrown?

I'm aware that StackOverflowExceptions in .NET can't be caught, take down their process, and have no stack trace. This is officially documented on MSDN. However, I'm wondering what the technical (or other) reasons are behind the behavior. All MSDN says is: In prior versions of the .NET Framew...

c# .net stackoverflowexception

WE have 4 hot list questions from SO right now good chance to really pound them

Chad

17:49

-2

Q: Not learning real world skill - should I leave?

I am a fresh graduate and currently working as a programmer under probation. The probation period is going to end this week. This is my first job in the software industry. I am thinking of leaving because: The company does not utilise any software development methodology. I feel the workload i...

software-industry

~~Kill with fire~~ Gently remind this user that this is a QA site not a forum... then incinerate with prejidice.

gnat

3

A: Why was my question edited/closed/downvoted?

It was asking for advice only useful to me I have had 5 years of experience as the Commander in Chief of the United States, 4 years as a US Senator for Illinois, 8 years of experience as a State Senator for Illinois, have a law degree from Harvard Law School, and a BA from Columbia University...

Vinothbabu

18:19

-2

Q: Not learning real world skill - should I leave?

I am a fresh graduate and currently working as a programmer under probation. The probation period is going to end this week. This is my first job in the software industry. I am thinking of leaving because: The company does not utilise any software development methodology. I feel the workload i...

software-industry

@Chad: I guess this question in one view seems to be valid, i think we cannot generalize too much for greater audience.

Chad

@Vinothbabu The problem with the question is not that it is too specific its asking for experiences and advice... that is not what we do here

We answer how to questions

Alex M.

11

Q: My supervisor treats me and my team as a "resource"

I've been reading some e-mails from my supervisor and I've noticed that he always call me and my teammates "resources". For example, answering a manager's demand, he answered At the moment I don't have any resource available for completing this assignment. How can I approach him and tell ...

management terminology

I love how OP doesn't accept any answer because none of the answers blow sunshine up his ass

Alright. I know that it's a common approach. But me and my teammates are getting really annoyed with this kind of treatment. Like, "hey boss, my THINGS are busy right now and i can't allocate someone to solve your demand at the moment". That is rude. Thanks anyway! — Rodolfo Perottoni 17 hours ago

"thanks anyway" lol

Vinothbabu

@AlexM.: I guess sometime back here @Chad, @CMW and myself were discussing on the same topic.

Alex M.

sorry about that, I was away since yesterday

that kid just managed to piss me off big time through his attitude, 's all

Vinothbabu

@AlexM. Always have the I button in your life - Ignore. Value your time carefully.

gnat

18:34

0

A: declined flag gave a bad reason for declining

someone should delete 2 of them Who decides which two get randomly deleted since they were posted "close" to the same time and are so similar? This doesn't seem fair to whatever answers get deleted. You definitely have the option to downvote any or all of them and leave comments suggesting t...

^^^ SO tolerance to repetitive, brief, fastest gun style answers makes an interesting cultural clash when SO regulars land in sites having opposite culture...

19

Q: FAQ proposal: Back It Up and Don't Repeat Others

I'm considering adding the following clauses into the first bit of our FAQ: How should I answer? Make sure your answer adds helpful information and is a complete, stand-alone answer. Read other answers first and be sure not to completely restate information that has already been posted. ...

discussion status-completed faq faq-content

in regular questions, "host site" community is expected to have headroom to accommodate new users and smoothly introduce them to cultural differences. In hot questions this breaks, pressure seems to be too high

hot list audience consists mostly of SO users, by far the largest site in the network. From this perspective, smaller sites carry the same "exposure risks" as these at SO - but, while SO has 17 moderators, thousands of 20K/10Kers, tens thousands of 3K users with close votes, smaller sites do not have anything like that. To say that such an equality in exposure risks coupled with such a striking difference in abilities to protect from these is unfair, would be an understatement... — gnat yesterday

believe it or not, but MSO post I referred "defends" four answers all stating the same "use Bit DataType", give or take 2-3 more words. At Workplace, there would be a downvoting and flagging storm there, on all four of them

57

A: Is there Boolean data in sql server like mysql?

You could use the BIT datatype to represent boolean data (a BIT field's value is either 1 or 0)

-3

A: Is there Boolean data in sql server like mysql?

use bit datatype for save the logical values,in sql A bit datatype is an integer data type which can store either a 0 or 1 or null value.

1

A: Is there Boolean data in sql server like mysql?

You can use Bit DataType in sql server to store boolean data.

1

A: Is there Boolean data in sql server like mysql?

Use the Bit datatype. It has values 1 and 0 when dealing with it in native t-sql

2

A: Is there Boolean data in sql server like mysql?

SQL Server uses Bit

lovely isn't it?

Alex M.

Duplicate answer, I can see the others posting as duplicate because they were so close together, but you post a duplicate answer 3 years later. — Malachi Mar 14 at 15:50

lol what was he thinking

gnat

then these guys (all five of them) click hot question, land here and post in the same way they learned there, the way that brought them nice fine upvotes at SO.

funniest thing that Shog states hot questions are painful because sites like us are troublesome. What site is really troublesome?

20

A: What is the Goal of "Hot Network Questions"?

I actually have a slightly different opinion of what "hot" questions are good for: entertainment. When I'm bored, tired of doing actual work or waiting for something to finish running, they're almost always good for a quick - and ideally informative - diversion. This is what I've always used the ...

> Guess what: if your site is full of crappy questions, your site sucks - even if they're not highly-ranked by your own users, folks are finding them via Google, and that's where the vast majority of your readers are coming from. You can work to fix that - as painful as that process is - or you can bury your head in the sand and blame it on all of those stupid people from elsewhere.

> If you think "hot" questions are a serious problem for your site's quality, then you're already ignoring a much bigger problem.

sure his answer has been upvoted... by same horde of SO lemmings who believe 5xUseBitType answers are okay

Alex M.

19:06

so, shog9 was the asshole there or something?

gnat

@AlexM. typical SO regular there, how you call them is up to you

^^^ @Chad I think i found a dupe,

possible duplicate of Is it reasonable to quiz the interviewer during technical interviews? "I want to make sure that I am moving to a company who values quality software and employs experienced engineers..." — gnat 1 min ago

workplace.stackexchange.com/questions/20758/…

Go ahead and adjust the question. If it is a dup someone will find it and link. It may not be a dup either. — Chad 48 mins ago

Chad

@gnat yeah not a bad dup there

gnat

@Chad yeah, and linked question there may be even better one:

2

Q: Reciprocating technical questions to interviewer

I would like to make sure that my future coworkers are as good of programmers as they are testing me to be, assuming that I have ascertained their technical background. So when they ask me if I have any questions, instead of B.S. type "what is the culture around here", I actually want to test th...

software-industry interviewing

Vinothbabu

19:36

My Supervisor treats me as a resource, what does the Workplace.stackexchange treats him? I bet he would get angry if treated as user.

-1

Q: How to become a coach, mentor, or something like it?

After 9 years in the "booming" brazilian IT business, working with Big Data and related techs, I have decided to take a long-term vacation by finding a government job. I will keep this job until I finish my PhD, then I'm back in the market. After three months of work, I was cornered and couldn't...

internship people-management mentoring

gnat

20:04

@codeMagic I wouldn't recommend using the "very low quality" flag for answers that actually answer the question and aren't complete gibberish (downvoted or not). We'll decline those flags if the answer is viable, even if it is wrong or there are better ones to the question asked. I don't think people want moderators going around and single-handedly deciding which answers are correct or not, and unilaterally deleting the bad ones. If someone's intentionally farming reputation by duplicating answers on three-year-old questions, sure we'll remove those (like I did here). — Brad Larson ♦ 1 hour ago

bwahahahahahaha

compared to SO standards (I have 1K+ helpful flags there, for the record), I would say we're using NAA/VLQ flags very incorrectly, but in the absence of adequate System for Dealing with Poor Answers this "incorrect" usage feels surprisingly fair — gnat Feb 27 at 18:59

Chad

20:48

@BradLarson - At the same time if you have 5-10 people flagging something low quality then you are not really single handedly or unilaterally doing anything. — Chad 1 min ago

CMW

21:37

4

Q: How to Resign in a Company That Doesn't Allow 2 Weeks Notice?

I'm in a situation where I must resign from a team that is in over their heads with a huge project. They're even currently looking to hire a couple of people to help distribute the work. What they don't know is that 2 of us are resigning soon. The problem comes in with the fact that we work on ...

professionalism resignation contracting

Do we want to keep this one open? It attracted 7 answers in under an our and most of those are opinions, which is to be expected, because that's what's being asked for.

Also danger of becoming lemminged, because it's actually in pole position on the hot list right now

the global hot list: stackexchange.com/questions?tab=hot

Chad

Thats funny one of the questions featured on Money is actually one that was migrated from the failed economics SE

@CMW Bring on the lemmings and my free rep :p

CMW

haha

protect it at least :D

and hand some over

Chad

Actually I hate to protect it, since there are no noob answers yet, and protecting it would actually be sort of self serving since people will be unable to answer are going to choose the best answer they read and mine being at the top will probably be one of the 2 or 3 they read

ill try to keep an eye on it tonight if it grabs a few noob answers then i wont feel bad protecting it

CMW

Is this an example of good subjective?

Chad

22:07

@CMW Id say so tending toward meh subjective but its definitely on topic and answerable. Obviously people are finding it interesting

CMW

@Chad :D I like the term 'meh subjective'

Chad

night

CMW

night

Chad

3

Q: Counteroffer after resigning

I work in a startup as a team lead, and I resigned yesterday after having accepted an offer somewhere else. My reasons for leaving were the following : 1) The codebase I inherited a year ago is a mess and I've never been given the OK to rewrite/refactor the problematic sections. Instead, we ...

new-job resignation

needs to be closed but I think it also could be saved

Alex M.

23:28

@gnat tbh he also started arguing pretty weakly against a suggestion that made sense not only to me but other moderators

didn't bother trying any harder, it felt like it wasn't worth it imo

point is, I don't like the guy at all

jmac

Ever get an upvote on an old answer, read it through, and think, "Boy, I really nailed/screwed up that one"? I had one of each today. Interesting stuff.

Alex M.

anything written by me that's old seems stupid by today's standards of mine, but other than that no

jmac

This was the 'nailed it' answer, and this is the 'meh' answer.

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