Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Miscellaneous/2010 February 14

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February 14

Flowchart

my question is..How can I make a flowchart and algorithm about a system programming about a cash register that you can buy a product and you will have a change after you have tendered the product.! please answer of help me in my question..! thank you very much! —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jenno15 (talk • contribs) 07:09, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Homework question, right? The purpose of such an exercise is to get you to think logically, to think like a programmer. Think of the various steps involved and the flowchart will emerge from that process. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 07:43, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Yes, and "play dumb"; try thinking out the steps as if you were explaining them to a small child. Break the process down into the tiniest, easiest steps you can and then chain them together. Matt Deres (talk) 14:27, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

See the articles Use case, Use-case analysis and Use case diagram. Cuddlyable3 (talk) 23:17, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

Business process modeling might be of more use. --Tagishsimon (talk) 23:22, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

When I was studying programming, thirty years ago, I'm pretty sure I heard that "nobody uses flowcharts anymore." O tempora O mores! —Tamfang (talk) 21:05, 19 February 2010 (UTC)

UK drink licensing laws

Can my daughter (aged 16) and her friend (aged 17) go into a pub and order a soft drink and a meal? Topsella1 (talk) 12:15, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Nobody seems to know, including people that work in pubs! I've just tried to find out and have found several websites, all of which look reliable and all of which give different answers. The law seems to be that you can go into a pub and order soft drinks and food from age 14, but not all pubs know that (I've been asked for ID when I ordered a coke once - I was over 18 at the time, so it wasn't an issue, but had I been younger I think I would have had to stay thirsty). I suggest you phone the pub in question and ask them. --Tango (talk) 13:06, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

I should first state that Wikipedia cannot give legal information, and you would be advised to check any information you receive here at another source before taking any action. I think it depends on the type of licence the bar has. I may be wrong, but I think if the bar serves food and is considered a 'family pub' they can, if it is a bar that serves some food they can't. Large chains like Weatherspoons definitely don't seem to have an objection, and I think they have the right kind of licence. Finally, if in doubt they could always call the pub before hand and ask. Prokhorovka (talk) 13:07, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

We can, and do, give legal information. We don't give legal advice. There is a difference. --Tango (talk) 13:44, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Fair point. Prokhorovka (talk) 14:13, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Back to the point. Are you sure that this is a UK question? The "United" Kingdom is not quite united in several aspects. Back when I was in Edinburgh, Scotland had very different laws about pub opening (or rather closing) hours, for example. No "last orders, please" north of the border - or at least not at times I was awake (and I'm a night owl). --Stephan Schulz (talk) 19:20, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

It's perhaps also worth remembering that while the above answers are concentrating on the legal aspect, the pubs are likely ultimately entitled to deny service if they desire. I'm not sure if the UK has age discrimination laws but even if it does, these most likely won't stop them denying service based on age, they could easily argue there are legitimate reasons for their policy, e.g. to make it easy for their staff or for the benefit of their clientele, they may check ID at the door or automatically remove someone who is either underage or looks like they could be underage and doesn't have ID. Some may offer service but only when accompanied by an adult. Trying to argue with them in such cases is likely to be futile. Some may also be confused about whether they can offer service but even in such a case, most likely the person who you'll be arguing with lacks the authority to change their policy. To put it simply even if a pub can offer service, it doesn't mean they will. If you have a specific pub in mind, I would agree with Prokhorovka you should call first. Else my summary of the above is some can, some can't Nil Einne (talk) 19:36, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

I know it's probably a bit late, but Directgov might have your answer. I'm sure there are some subtleties, so it's probably best to ring the pub. Brammers (talk) 16:51, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

Code

KING=4221 QUEEN=21451 PRINCE=??????

Please its a tricky question. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Amjukka (talk • contribs) 13:13, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Per a Google Search, it seems that Prince equals 25672. (The king and queen conceive a child from the DNA of both parents. Thus, 4221 + 21451 = 25672) Hope that helps. -^Avicenna_sis @ 17:45, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

I'm not really sure how that works. The price receives DNA from both parents, but only a haploid set of chromosomes and single set of genes from each parent. Even presuming these traits are perfectly/100% heritable (which was never specified), without knowing how many genes are involved in the 4221 and 21451 traits, whether these genes are linked (if there are multiple genes involved), how the genes and alleles interact and what alleles each parent has, (and probably other things I forget and excluding odd/very rare stuff happening like mutations) it's impossible to know how they will combine although most likely there will be several possibilities and it is unlikely the only possibility will be the 25672. In fact in many cases it won't even be possible. In the absence of anything else, I'd go with something in between as the most likely answer. In conclusion, the answerer of that question on answers.com might want to take more care before they go saying "u stupid idiot" Nil Einne (talk) 19:25, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Depending on how you interpert the question does vary the anwser. In humans, when two Gametes meet to form a Zygote, it takes roughly half of it's genetic material from either parent. (I think, but my biology may be rusty.) That being the case, if figured into the answer, you may use (4221+21451)/2 to get 12836 as your answer. ^Avicenna_sis @ 19:52, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

I don't see what the numbers have to do with DNA. This is presumably a code so I suggest you take this question to the Math Desk.--Shantavira|^{feed me} 20:08, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Avicennasis—did you even read the page that you linked to? It hardly looks like a very good answer. It is certainly not a reliable source in any sense of the term! Just putting things blindly into Google is not very helpful. --Mr.98 (talk) 22:49, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

_{I did indeed review it. From the search terms I used, it seemed the only probable result related to the query - and the answerer, while rude, seemed confident of the conclusion he reached. If nothing else, it was a start to understand the nature of this code, even if link has an incorrect answer. -^Avicennasis @ 01:13, 15 February 2010 (UTC)}

Surely it's some sort of code per letter? Not really much to work on - but only numbers up to 5 are used, N is encoded differently twice, but there are one per letter in the word. - Jarry1250 ^{[Humorous? Discuss.]} 08:49, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

"PRINCE=??????" gives one "?" per letter as well. 58.147.58.28 (talk) 11:10, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

Are you asking the right question? It is phrased completely differently on Wikianswers. The way it's expressed could be significant.--Shantavira|^{feed me} 16:05, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

OK Amjukka, it doesn't look as if we are comming up with an answer here. Can you give us a hint? 58.147.58.28 (talk) 08:49, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

Elonka is known for expertise in codes. Should we ask her opinion? --220.101.28.25 (talk) 17:09, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

Two possible thoughts here-King and Queen are both Toronto subway stations IIRC-could that have anything to do with it-I don't think there's one connected with Prince.

Also King_(band) and Queen(band) are both artists,as indeed is Prince_(musician) -perhaps something to do with chart positions? (as an aside,each of them,together with Princess had a UK top ten hit in 1985!) Lemon martini (talk) 03:38, 19 February 2010 (UTC)

The truth about Colonel Sanders

Does anyone know if there's any truth to the stories that Colonel Sanders (of KFC fame) was a Nazi sympathizer who lied about his military exploits in WWI and service record? I was told that some journalist pulled his records several years ago under freedom of information and that they showed that the guy had never actually been promoted above Private, spending less than a year in the army and never once being deployed overseas. I was also told that in the 1930s, he gave speeches and interviews in which he stated that he believed that the Nazi ideology could help America. Just heard this from a guy I was getting drunk with in a bar last night and I thought I'd come check it out. Thanks. --95.148.107.118 (talk) 14:12, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

I heard he puts an addictive chemical in his chicken that makes you crave it fortnightly. Was the guy in the bar, like Colonel Sanders, too drunk to taste his chicken? Adam Bishop (talk) 14:38, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Colonel Sanders was a private who served in Cuba; much later he was an honorary Kentucky colonel. ---— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk 14:52, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Thank you for the relevant link Gadget. Looked like this was going to spiral in fast. I was surprised that Bugs hasn't added his "lost in the sauce" 2 cents yet. John Zajc (talk) 15:03, 14 February 2010 (UTC)— John Zajc (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic. (Blocked as sock)

(EC) To put it a different way, there doesn't seem to be any dispute that he was never promoted above Private. Therefore, any 'revelation' that includes this fact as something special is automatically suspect Nil Einne (talk) 15:11, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

(edit conflicted)So the guy never actually claimed to be a US Army Colonel? In this conversation (the man I was talking to is ex-British Army) was saying that Col. Sanders was the olden days equivalent to one of those guys who says he was a POW in Vietnam, who killed his guards and escaped after walking hundreds of miles through enemy territory and was awarded the Medal of Honor for it - or the Navy SEAL Black Ops guy who brags of his Rambo-style assassination missions (i.e. lying scumbags). --95.148.107.118 (talk) 15:12, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

The granting of the honorary title of "Colonel" for Mr. Harland Sanders can be found on this page. I cannot find any reliable source that suggests he ever claimed to me a military officer. 108.110.18.230 (talk) 16:03, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

This Snopes article talks about rumors about Sanders and the KKK. Maybe this is what you're drunk bar buddy was referring to. Dismas|^(talk) 16:31, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Pfft. I'm an honorary Alabama Colonel, and have the certificate to prove it. All I had to do was to write to the Governor's office and ask for one. Woogee (talk) 23:12, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

wow - do people still use the term 'Nazi sympathizer'? next you're going to start in with something about 'stopping the Hun' or maybe 'remember the Maine!'. (sad that I have to link those, but I don't think most people will get it if I don't)--Ludwigs2 18:01, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

You mean people have actually forgotten about the Maine? For shame, for shame! What would our President think? _{He probably wouldn't give even half a damn for one thing.}--WaltCip (talk) 18:32, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

I hadn't forgotten it, because I'd never heard of it. In fact, I'd never heard of the Spanish–American War. Thanks, fascinating reading. In gratitude, I offer you some European history to read: worm-eating. --Dweller (talk) 11:24, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

Guess someone has been reading his Uncyclopedia article. Many folks in the 1930s thought the Nazis were the good guys since— among other things —they opposed the Communists. For views of Communism in the US before WWII, see First Red Scare. ---— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk 18:31, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Charles Lindbergh was a prominent public figure who felt that way. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 05:15, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

Erm... surely it would be possible to oppose both the Nazis and the Communists for the terrors that both acting regimes in WW2 committed?--WaltCip (talk) 05:23, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

The enemy of your enemy is your friend. At least until they turn on you. --antilived^{T | C | G} 06:07, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

Lindbergh's view was that it was better for Europe to be overrun by the Nazis than by the Communists. A lot of folks modified their views once the US entered WWII. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 06:10, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

What most people forget is that Nazism in the early years had a lot of appeal as a political philosophy. It presented itself as a populist, moralist approach that privileged liberal ethics over corrupt, decadent, violent ideologies. The Nazi (fascist) promise was that citizens bound together behind a 'pure' nation would be stronger than citizens acting alone, and that all would reap the benefits of that strength. It wasn't until later that the 'pure state' officially morphed into the 'pure race' and the collective empowerment turned into a de facto form of oppression (and it was that transformation that lead all the later atrocities). --Ludwigs2 06:40, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

There has been endless strife and war resulting from taking a seemingly benign philosophy and perverting it. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 06:52, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, that's pretty much Neitzche's point at the beginning of Thus Spoke Zarathustra: There's just no point in having smart ideas if you only have stupid people to tell them to. --Ludwigs2 07:05, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

Statism doesn't need any perverting to become harmful. —Tamfang (talk) 21:08, 19 February 2010 (UTC)

The above is very far from the truth. Anti-Semitism, racism and virulent nationalism were part of German Nazism from the start. Italian Fascism also included virulent nationalism from the start. Those "all" who would "reap the benefits of that strength" were limited to the nation (in an ethnic, and, for Nazism, racial sense). From the start, both ideologies were pronouncedly opposed to liberal democracy - or any kind of democracy for that matter - and advocated a dictatorship with iron discipline (even while they were also populist). It was egalitarian democracy and individual freedom that they viewed as "corrupt and decadent", as well as most other ideas stemming from the Enlightenment. At no point could their ideologies be described as "liberal ethics", they despised liberal democrats almost as much as they despised communists and regarded them as two sides of the same coin. I won't argue about this any further, but for evidence anyone can just search for the relevant words within an online edition of the Mein Kampf. (Mussolini's "Doctrine of Fascism" is also instructive in this regard.)--91.148.159.4 (talk) 15:05, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

The whole discussion of Nazism is tangential. The questioner asked whether Colonel Sanders was a Nazi sympathizer. I can find no reliable source indicating that he was or that this rumor is anything other than libel or slander. We don't want to reinforce this by discussing reasons why some Americans might have sympathized with Nazis, implying that this is somehow relevant to Colonel Sanders. Incidentally, 91.148.159.4 is quite right that Nazism was antiliberal and racist from its inception. Marco polo (talk) 15:55, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

Michelin stars

What, in 2007, became the first city to gain more Michelin stars than Paris.17:51, 14 February 2010 (UTC)17:51, 14 February 2010 (UTC)~ —Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.149.8.153 (talk)

Searching for yourself can be much quicker than waiting for others to do it for you Tokyo--Saalstin (talk) 22:05, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Tokyo in 2008 and in 2009 Cuddlyable3 (talk) 00:04, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

When Rabbit Howls by Truddi Chase

I have come across a listing entitled When Rabbit Howls: 2. Is this a sequel to When Rabbit Howls or is is just another edition?

Thank you,

Jo Neubauer —Preceding unsigned comment added by 97.114.136.45 (talk) 19:02, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

To the best of my searching, it's just another edition. --Tagishsimon (talk) 03:15, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

Sateliite phones in INDIA

1.What is the net worth of the satellite phone market in India, approximately?

2.What does the sales come up to including government and civilian subscribers?

3. Who are the current providers of network and handsets and what is the future of the demand?

4.What are the new technologies in that field that will make the product more user friendly and popular? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 59.183.0.180 (talk) 19:46, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Welcome to Wikipedia. Your question appears to be a homework question. I apologize if this is a misevaluation, but it is our policy here to not do people's homework for them, but to merely aid them in doing it themselves. Letting someone else do your homework does not help you learn how to solve such problems. Please attempt to solve the problem yourself first. If you need help with a specific part of your homework, feel free to tell us where you are stuck and ask for help. If you need help grasping the concept of a problem, by all means let us know. Intelligentsium 20:01, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Wikipedia has articles on Telecommunications Statistics in India and Communications_in_India#Growth_of_mobile_technology. Some mobile operators in India have their own articles: Reliance Communications, Mahanagar Telephone Nigam, Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited, Uninor (Telenor#India), Orange (India), Virgin_Mobile#Virgin_Mobile_India, MTS India, Idea Cellular and Olive telecommunications. Cuddlyable3 (talk) 23:48, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Old Yankee Stadium, The Bronx, New York 1972

Read everything on the Yankee Stadium. Am searching for the Greek family that had the rights to the concessions stands at the Old Yankee Stadium in 1972. I have a list of the vendors but they had concession stands, not the overall rights. Not sure how that worked. (e-mail addreess deleted Cuddlyable3 (talk) 23:30, 14 February 2010 (UTC))

Canada —Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.34.129.215 (talk) 20:48, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

This same question was posted about 5 days ago at this site:[1] Something about a "Marcell", although that doesn't sound very Greek. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 05:18, 15 February 2010 (UTC)