punctuation marks matters!

...................................
woman without her man is a savage

woman without her, man is a savage

woman, withou her man, is a savage
..................................




source: personal archives,
(the book: laughters; vol. (..?..), by abdul ntilla 1990).

Entertainment Awards Diary, 2009

Entertainment Awards 2009
February 2009:
1. BAFTA: British Academy of Film and Television Arts
2. Brit Awards: (The Brits) -2nd weekend of Feb?
3. Oscars Academy awards; last Sunday of February.
4. RTS: Royal Television Society -Last wednesday of Feb?

March 2009:
1. TRIC - The Television and Radio Industries Club.
Held in March 10 (2nd Tuesdat of March?). Founded 1931.
The TRIC Awards have honoured stars and celebrities each year for three decades.
2. Empire Awards, held 29/03/2009

Business Ideas(?)

-Business is about spotting a gap in the market and filling it better than anyone else.

-Business is about a simple formula. Make more than you spend. Keep business simple and it works.


source: Reading Midweek (newspaper powered by Reading Chronicle),
Wed. March 25, 2009 page3

Premiership Grounds (A-Z): 2008/09

Stadiums (Home of Premier League Clubs) + crowd capacity:

Anfield - Liverpool (L/pool, Merseyside); capacity: 45,276
Brittania Stadium - Stoke City; 27,300
City of Manchester Stadium - Manchester City; 47,726
Craven Cottage - Fulham FC (London); 26,600
Emirates - Arsenal 60,361

Ewood Park - Blackburn Rovers; 31,154
Fratton Park - Portsmouth (South); 20,709
Goodison Park - Everton (Liverpool, Merseyside); 40,157
JJB Stadium - Wigan Athletics; 25,135
Kingston Communications (KC) Stadium - Hull City; 25,504

Old Trafford - Manchester United; 76,180
Reebok Stadium - Bolton (Greater Manchester); 28,101
Riverside Stadium - Middlesborough (North east); 34,998
Stadium of Light - Sunderland (North East); 49,000
Stamford Bridge - Chelsea 40,000+ (London); 41,841

St James' Park - Newcastle United (North East); 52,407
The Hawthorns - West Bromwich Albion (Birmingham); 27,000
Upton Park (Boleyn Groun) - West Ham United (London); 35,300
Villa Park - Aston Villa (Birmingham); 42,640
White Hart Lane - Tottenham Hotspur (London); 36,237

Quiz

What is 'altimeter'

-it is an instrument to measure change in altitude.


source: sky-news 04/march/2009

Saint Patrick's Day

Saint Patrick's Day (Irish: Lá ’le Pádraig or Lá Fhéile Pádraig), colloquially St. Paddy's Day or Paddy's Day, is an annual feast day which celebrates Saint Patrick (circa AD 385–461), one of the patron saints of Ireland, and is generally celebrated on March 17.

The day is the national holiday of Ireland. It is a bank holiday in Northern Ireland and a public holiday in the Republic of Ireland and Montserrat. In Canada, Great Britain, Australia, the United States, and New Zealand, it is widely celebrated but is not an official holiday.

St. Patrick's feast day was placed on the universal liturgical calendar in the Catholic Church due to the influence of the Waterford-born Franciscan scholar Luke Wadding in the early part of the 17th century, although the feast day was celebrated in the local Irish church from a much earlier date. St. Patrick's Day is a holy day of obligation for Roman Catholics in Ireland. The feast day usually falls during Lent; if it falls on a Friday of Lent (unless it is Good Friday), the obligation to abstain from eating meat can be lifted by the local bishop. The church calendar avoids the observance of saints' feasts during certain solemnities, moving the saint's day to a time outside those periods. St. Patricks Day is very occasionally affected by this requirement. Thus when March 17 falls during Holy Week, as in 1940 when St. Patrick's Day was observed on April 3 in order to avoid it coinciding with Palm Sunday, and again in 2008, having been observed on 15 March.


(From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia)

Political Parties (UK)

This page lists the political parties with sites which have Parliamentary representatives from the United Kingdom. As not all political parties have websites, and links often change, we would be grateful if updates could be sent to keep the list as complete and accurate as possible. Contact us using the feedback form.
The Prime Minister’s Office is not responsible for the content of other websites.

United Kingdom Parliament
The Labour Party
The Conservative Party
The Liberal Democrats
The Scottish National Party
The Scottish Labour Party
Plaid Cymru
Green Party of England and Wales
The Social Democratic and Labour Party
The Democratic Unionist Party
Sinn Fein
The Ulster Unionist Party

Scottish Parliament
The Conservative Party (Scotland)
The Green Party (Scotland)
The Labour Party (Scotland)
The Liberal Democrats (Scotland)
The Scottish National Party
The Scottish Socialist Party

National Assembly for Wales
The Conservative Party (Wales)
The Labour Party (Wales)
The Liberal Democrats (Wales)
Plaid Cymru
Green Party of England and Wales

The Northern Ireland Assembly
The Alliance Party
The Democratic Unionist Party
TheSocal Democratic and Labour Party
The UK Unionist Party
Sinn Fein
The Ulster Unionist Party

European Parliament
The Conservatives in Europe
The European Parliamentary Labour Party
The Liberal Democrats (Europe)
The UK Independence Party
The Green Party (Europe)
The Scottish National Party (Europe)
Plaid Cymru (Europe)
The Democratic Unionist Party (Europe)
The Social Democratic Labour Party
The Ulster Unionist Party (Europe)

Youth Political Organisations
Conservative Future
Liberal Democrat Youth and Students
Young Scots for Independence
Scottish Young Labour
Young Greens
SDLP Youth


source: www.number10.gov.uk/page205
Last Edited: Monday 17 December 2001

Entertainment: Awards Diary 2009

February:
1. BAFTA: British Academy of Film and Television Arts
2. Brit Awards: (The Brits) -2nd weekend of Feb?
3. Oscars Academy awards; last Sunday of February.
4. RTS: Royal Television Society) -Last wednesday of Feb?

March 2009:
1. TRIC - The Television and Radio Industries Club.
Held in March 10 (2nd Tuesdat of March?). Founded 1931.
The TRIC Awards have honoured stars and celebrities each year for three decades.

Saint David's Day

Saint David's Day (Welsh: Dydd Gŵyl Dewi) is the feast day of Saint David, the patron saint of Wales, and falls on 1 March each year. The date of March 1st was chosen in remembrance of the death of Saint David on that day in 589, and has been celebrated by followers since then. The date was declared a national day of celebration within Wales in the 18th century.

In 2006 Saint David's Day was officially celebrated on 28 February by Roman Catholics and on 2 March by the Anglican Church in Wales, because 1 March 2006 was Ash Wednesday, which is a day of penitence on which feast days are not celebrated.

A poll conducted for Saint David's Day in 2006 found that 87% of the Welsh wanted it to be a bank holiday, with 65% prepared to sacrifice a different bank holiday to ensure this. A petition in 2007 to make St. David's Day a bank holiday was rejected by the then British Prime Minister Tony Blair.


(From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia)

Tujihadhari na Nyama nyekundu

Utafiti umeonyesha kuwa nyama ya ng'ombe, kondoo, nguruwe n.k. husababisha magaonjwa ya saratani ya; matiti, ... (prostate) na tumbo. Pia nyama hizo ambazo hujulikana kama red meat zikiwa na mafutamafuta husababisha magonjwa ya moyo na kiharusi. Tunapotumia nyama ni vizuri kuondoa tabaka la mafuta ili kujiepusha na madhara hayo kiafya.

Sio vibaya kula nyama, ila tunachoshauriwa ni kuwa isiwe kila siku na kila mlo (kula nyama mara 2 kwa wiki sio vibaya).

Wataalamu wa afya na vyakula wanatushauri kutumia nyama za kuku na samaki kwa wingi huku tukipunguza matumizi ya nyama nyekundu.

Pia tunashauriwa kutumia matunda na mboga za majani ili kujikinga na saratani na magonjwa ya moyo.


Habari hii ni kwa mujibu wa gazeti la daily-express la J'nne Februari 17, 2009 ukurasa wa 7.

February 06, 1958 (03:04pm GMT)

The darkest day: Feb 6th 1958
February 6th will forever be circled on the calendars of everyone connected with Manchester United.

On that day in 1958, the darkest day in United's history, 23 people - including eight players and three members of the club's staff - suffered fatal injuries in the Munich air crash.

Flying back from a European Cup tie against Red Star Belgrade, the team plane stopped in Germany to refuel. The first two attempts to take off from Munich airport were aborted; following a third attempt, the plane crashed.

source: www.manutd.com

Apprenticeship

Apprenticeship is a system of training a new generation of practitioners of a skill. Apprentices (or in early modern usage "prentices") or protégés build their careers from apprenticeships. Most of their training is done on the job while working for an employer who helps the apprentices learn their trade, in exchange for their continuing labour for an agreed period after they become skilled. Theoretical education may also be involved, informally via the workplace and/or by attending vocational schools while still being paid by the employer.

Development
A medieval baker with his apprentice. The Bodleian Library, Oxford.The system of apprenticeship first developed in the later Middle Ages and came to be supervised by craft guilds and town governments. A master craftsman was entitled to employ young people as an inexpensive form of labor in exchange for providing formal training in the craft. Most apprentices were males, but female apprentices were found in a number of crafts associated with embroidery, silk-weaving etc. Apprentices were young (usually about fourteen to twenty-one years of age), married and would live in the master craftsman's household. Most apprentices aspired to becoming master craftsmen themselves on completion of their contract (usually a term of seven years), but some would spend time as a journeyman and a significant proportion would never acquire their own workshop.

Subsequently governmental regulation and the licensing of polytechnics and vocational education formalised and bureaucratised the details of apprenticeship.

Modern analogs
The modern concept of an internship is similar to an apprenticeship. Universities still use apprenticeship schemes in their production of scholars: bachelors are promoted to masters and then produce a thesis under the oversight of a supervisor before the corporate body of the university recognises the achievement of the standard of a doctorate. Another view of this system is of graduate students in the role of apprentices, post-docs as journeymen, and professors as masters.

Also similar to apprenticeships are the professional development arrangements for new graduates in the professions of accountancy and the law a British example was training contracts known as 'articles of clerkship'. The learning curve in modern professional service firms, such as law firms or accountancies, generally resembles the traditional master-apprentice model: the newcomer to the firm is assigned to one or several more experienced colleagues (ideally partners in the firm) and learns his skills on the job.

(From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia)

EDISON: The Great Thinker

"Genius is one percent inspiration, ninety-nine percent perspiration."

Thomas Alva Edison (February 11, 1847 – October 18, 1931) was an American inventor and businessman who developed many devices that greatly influenced life around the world, including the phonograph and the long-lasting, practical electric light bulb. Dubbed "The Wizard of Menlo Park" by a newspaper reporter, he was one of the first inventors to apply the principles of mass production and large teamwork to the process of invention, and therefore is often credited with the creation of the first industrial research laboratory.

Edison is considered one of the most prolific inventors in history, holding 1,093 U.S. patents in his name, as well as many patents in the United Kingdom, France and Germany. He is credited with numerous inventions that contributed to mass communication and, in particular, telecommunications. His advanced work in these fields was an outgrowth of his early career as a telegraph operator. Edison originated the concept and implementation of electric-power generation and distribution to homes, businesses, and factories - a crucial development in the modern industrialized world. His first power plant was on Manhattan Island, New York.
(From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia)

Postcodes: Alternative views

This is the personal view from the reader.
............................................................

The complexity of the UK postcode system has sent ... The complexity of the UK postcode system has sent the Irish Government and its advisors around in circles for 4 years now trying to devise a Post Code for Ireland that fills all the gaps and ticks all the boxes. Nothing has been agreed yet and probably will not for quite some time. However, there are those who say that for sorting letters a PostCode is no longer required as OCR and a good address database will do the job. However, the more significant requirement for a Code nowadays is for navigation and routing (Logistics and Emergency services etc)

The fact that with postal deregulation in Europe including in Ireland commenicing in 2009, mail delivery will be done by courier type opeartions with a larger need for routing than actual sorting also increases the need for a dedicated code. It is for this reason that a navigation Code has now been published in Ireland - referred to as PON Codes;- they express a location geographically to an accuracy of +/- 6 meters and can be determined by anyone for anywhere..... see http://www.irishpostcodes.ie for more details. PON Codes have been tested by Garmin and GPS Ireland intends releasing a full version of the system early in 2009.
The PON Code system can already be used in Northern Ireland - eliminating the problems arising with the Royal Mail system in Fermanagh as mentioned in your article. PON Codes can be customised for any country.
(by: garydubh)

UK's postcodes at 50th anniversary

Note from Mosonga:
I heard this morning (30/12/2008 via Talksport Radio) that today(?) is the anniversary of the prestigious British postcode system! I'm not sure if they meant it is exactly today or maybe sometime next year, as I have come to learn that the system was started in 1959 (in Norwich), which means that the anniversay is supposed to be next year!
...............................................


The Postcode
The postcode, in its present form as a mixture of six letters and digits, was first used in Norwich in October, 1959. This was the world's first experiment with postal address codes, designed to allow sorting by machine. By 1974, the postcode system covered Britain.

The earliest form of postcode was introduced in London in 1857. Sir Rowland Hill, the inventor of the penny post, divided London into districts denoted by compass points, 'N' for north, 'S' for south and so on. The first provincial city to be divided into postal districts was Liverpool in 1864.

Numbers were added to the London postal districts to divide them up more specifically into NW1, SW2, etc during the First World War, in 1916.
(source; bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/A1082558)

Postal codes in the United Kingdom
UK postal codes are known as postcodes.

UK postcodes are alphanumeric. These codes were introduced by the Royal Mail over a 15-year period from 1959 to 1974 — the full list is now available electronically from the Royal Mail as the Postcode Address File. They have been widely adopted not just for their original purpose of automating the sorting of mail but for many other purposes such as insurance premium calculations and as a way to describe United Kingdom locations to route planning software, and as the lowest level of aggregation in census enumeration.

However, as the format of the codes does not achieve its objective of primarily identifying the main sorting office and sub-office they have been supplemented by a newer system of five-digit codes called Mailsort — but only for mailings of 'a minimum of 4,000 letter-sized items'. Mail users who can deliver mail to the post office sorted by Mailsort code receive discounts but [bulk] delivery by postcode provides no such incentive.

Postcode history
The major cities of the UK have much older postcodes, now incorporated into the current system, than other areas. In the mid-19th century, central London postal districts were divided between east central (EC) and west central (WC); broadly speaking the City and the West End, while the perimeter of inner London were split into N, NW, NE, S, SW, SE, W, and E. This first system of ten London postal districts was devised by Sir Rowland Hill and introduced in 1857 and 1858. S and NE were later dropped and are now used for Sheffield and Newcastle. The numbered subdivisions (W1, W2 etc) were a war-time measure and date from 1917. The 1917 subdivisions remain important, because they form the first part of the two-part modern postcode (so N1 1AA is an address in the old N1 district), and because they continue to be used by Londoners to refer to their districts.

The Post Office experimented with electromechanical sorting machines in the late 1950s. These devices would present an envelope to an operator, who would press a button indicating which bin to sort the letter into. Postcodes were suggested to increase the efficiency of this process, by removing the need for the sorter to remember the correct sorting for as many places.

In January 1959 the Post Office analyzed the results of a survey on public attitudes towards the use of postal codes. The next step would be choosing a town in which to experiment with coded addresses. The envisaged format was to be a six character alphanumeric code with three letters designating the geographical area and three numbers to identify the individual address. On 28 July Ernest Marples, the Postmaster General, announced that Norwich had been selected, and that each of the 150,000 private and business addresses would receive a code by October. Norwich had been selected as it already had eight automatic mail sorting machines in use. The codes were in the form NOR followed by two digits and a letter.

When this modern postcode system was introduced for London in 1960s, the numerals were added such that the nearest areas in each direction were allocated the number “1” (W1, SW1, ect.). Afterwards, numbers were allocated alphabetically, not by geography, and with complete disregard to the boundaries of London’s boroughs.

In October 1965 it was confirmed that postal coding was to be extended to the rest of the country in the "next few years". On 1 May 1967 post codes were introduced in Croydon. The codes for central Croydon started with the letters CRO, and those of the surrounding post towns with CR2, CR3 and CR4. This was to be the beginning of a ten year plan, costing an estimated £24 million. Within two years it was expected that coding would be used in Aberdeen, Belfast, Brighton, Bristol, Bromley, Cardiff, Coventry, Manchester, Newcastle upon Tyne, Newport, Reading, Sheffield, Southampton and the western district of London. By 1967 codes had been introduced to Aberdeen, Southampton, Brighton and Derby. In 1970 codes were introduced to the Western and North West London areas. In December 1970 Christmas mail was franked with the message "Remember to use the Postcode", although codes were only used to sort mail in a handful of sorting offices.

During 1971 occupants of addresses began to receive notification of their postcode. Asked in the House of Commons about the completion of the coding exercise, the Postmaster General, Sir John Eden stated it was expected to be completed during 1972.

The scheme was finalised in 1974 when Norwich was completely re-coded but the scheme tested in Croydon was sufficiently close to the final design for it to be retained. Newport was originally allocated NPT, in a similar way to Norwich and Croydon, with the surrounding towns allocated NP1-NP8. This lasted into the mid 1980s when for operational reasons (NPT being non-standard, and too similar to NP7) it was recoded.

The legacy of the Croydon trial can still be seen today:

CR0 was the only postal district with a zero in that position: all others start with 1. This caused some of the Royal Mail's software to misbehave slightly. Subsequently, the "zeroth" district has been used in some other postcode areas, such as Bolton, Harrow, Slough, Chelmsford and Southend on Sea.
A separate postal "district", CR9 is used for large users and PO Box holders. This policy has been used elsewhere, with normal postcodes "growing" upwards from district 1 and large-user postcodes "growing" downwards from district 99.
The CR0 district contains far more addresses than any other postal district in the country.
CR1 has never been used — possibly left spare for rationalisation. (The other CR districts, CR2 etc. were coded later and conform to the general standards.)
There was at one point a movement to change all CR0 postcodes to CR1, but this was rejected.
CR0 is often incorrectly written as CRO, although in some type faces and handwriting the digit '0' and letter 'O' are identical -- the problem is exacerbated as it is often pronounced 'Sea Arr Oh' rather than 'Sea Arr Zero'.

Format
The format of UK postcodes is generally:

A9 9AA
A99 9AA
A9A 9AA
AA9 9AA
AA99 9AA
AA9A 9AA
where A signifies a letter and 9 a digit. It is a hierarchical system, working from left to right — the first letter or pair of letters represents the area, the following digit or digits represent the district within that area, and so on. Each postcode generally represents a street, part of a street, or a single premises. This feature makes the postcode useful to route planning software.

The part of the code before the space is the outward code or out code used to direct mail from one sorting office to the destination sorting office, while the part after the space is the inward code or in code used to sort the mail into individual delivery rounds. The outward code can be split further into the area part (letters identifying one of 124 postal areas) and the district part (usually numbers); similarly, the inward code is split into the sector part (number) and the unit part (letters). Each postcode identifies the address to within 100 properties (with an average of 15 properties per postcode), although a large business may have a single code

Name Location Component format for YO31 1EB Number of live codes Number of terminated codes. Other Codes
(GIR 0AA, SAN TA1, BX) [17] Total
postcode area out code YO 124 0 3 127
postcode district out code YO31 2,971 103 4 3,078
sector in code YO31 1 10,631 1,071 4 11,706
unit in code YO31 1EB 1,762,464[16] 650,417 4 2,412,885
Postcode Addresses approx. 27,000,000 [18]

The letters in the outward code may give some clue to its geographical location (but see London below). For example, L indicates Liverpool, EH indicates Edinburgh and AB indicates Aberdeen; see List of postcode areas in the United Kingdom for a full list. Although BT indicates Belfast, it covers the whole of Northern Ireland. The letters in the inward code, however, are restricted to the set ABDEFGHJLNPQRSTUWXYZ (excluding CIKMOV), which generally do not resemble digits or each other when hand-written.

There are at least two exceptions (other than the overseas territories) to this format:

the postcode for the formerly Post Office-owned Girobank is GIR 0AA.
the postcode for correctly addressed letters to Father Christmas is SAN TA1[19]
In addition to postcodes, Delivery Point Suffixes (DPS) have been developed to uniquely identify each delivery point (a letterbox) within a single postcode. A DPS is two-character (a digit and a letter) code optionally appended to postcode. Use of DPS codes is mandatory for Mailsort barcodes generation.


Greater London postcodes
Main article: London postal district
In the London Postal Area postcodes are slightly different, being based on the 1856 system of Postal Districts which was refined in 1917 by numbering the 163 Sub-Districts; predating by many years the introduction of postcodes in the 1960s:

In parts of central London, WC and EC (West Central and East Central)
In the rest of the London Postal Area, N, NW, SW, SE, W and E.
The London postal districts rarely coincide with the boundaries of the London boroughs (even the former, smaller Metropolitan Boroughs). The numbering system appears arbitrary on the map: for example, NW1 is close to central London, but NW2 is a long way out. This is because, after starting with 1 for the area containing the main sorting office of the larger district, the numbers were allocated alphabetically according to the name of the smaller sorting office that formed each new sub-district's hub.

The area covered by the London postal districts was somewhat larger than the County of London, and included parts of Kent, Essex, Surrey, Middlesex and Hertfordshire. In 1965 the creation of Greater London caused this situation to be reversed as the boundaries of Greater London went beyond most of the existing London postal districts.

Those places not covered by the existing districts received postcodes as part of the national coding plan, so the postcode areas of "EN" Enfield, "KT" Kingston upon Thames, "HA" Harrow, "UB" Uxbridge", "TW" Twickenham, "SM" Sutton, "CR" Croydon, "DA" Dartford, "BR" Bromley, "RM" Romford and "IG" Ilford cross administrative boundaries and cover parts of neighbouring counties as well as parts of Greater London.

A further complication is that in some of the most central London areas, a further gradation has been necessary to produce enough postcodes, giving codes like EC1A 1AA.

While most postcodes are allocated by administrative convenience, a few are deliberately chosen. For example in Westminster:

SW1A 0AA - House of Commons
SW1A 0PW - House of Lords, Palace of Westminster
SW1A 1AA - Buckingham Palace
SW1A 2AA - 10 Downing Street, Prime Minister and First Lord of the Treasury
SW1A 2AB - 11 Downing Street, Chancellor of the Exchequer
SW1A 2HQ - HM Treasury headquarters
W1A 1AA - Broadcasting House
W1A 1AB - Selfridges
N81 1ER - Electoral Reform Society (the whole of N81 is reserved for the ERS)

Other areas' postcodes

Street name signs on Birdbrook Road, Great Barr, Birmingham, showing old "Birmingham 22" (top) and modern "B44" postcodes.Until the 1960s, Postal Areas such as Belfast, Birmingham, Bradford, Brighton, Bristol, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Hove, Leeds, Liverpool, Manchester, Salford, Newcastle upon Tyne and Sheffield were divided into numbered Postal Districts, e.g. Toxteth in Liverpool was Liverpool 8. When the national postcode system was introduced, these were incorporated into it, so that postcodes in Toxteth start with L8. A similar system is still used in the Republic of Ireland for Dublin's postal districts.

Some Birmingham codes were sub-divided, with a letter, such as Great Barr, Birmingham 22 or Birmingham 22a - as can still be seen on many older street-name signs.

A single numbering sequence was split between Manchester and Salford. Letters would be addressed to Manchester 1 or Salford 4. However in the 1960s, all the districts in both Manchester and Salford gained "M" postcodes, so "Salford 4" became M4, etc., much to the chagrin of Salfordians. The old coding lives on in a handful of street signs which are still embossed with "Salford 4" etc, at the bottom.

Glasgow shared with London a distinction from all other UK cities as it had compass postal districts due to its claimed status as the Second City of the British Empire, i.e., C, W, NW, N, E, S, SW, SE. When postcodes were introduced these were mapped into the new 'G' postcode area thus: C1 became G1, W1 became G11, N1 became G21, E1 became G31, S1 became G41, SW1 became G51, and so on.

Validation
The consequence of the complexity outlined above is that for almost every rule concerning UK postcodes, an exception can be found. Automatic validation of postcodes on the basis of pattern feasibility is therefore almost impossible to design, and the system contains no self-validating feature such as a check digit. Completely accurate validation is only possible by attempting to deliver mail to the address, and verifying with the recipient.

Validation is usually performed against a copy of the "Postcode Address File" (PAF), which is generated by the Royal Mail and contains about 27 million UK commercial and residential addresses. However, even the PAF cannot be relied on as it contains errors, and because new postcodes are occasionally created and used before copies of the PAF can be distributed to users.

It is possible to validate the format of a postcode using the rules described in British Standard BS 7666. In general, the format is one of "A9 9AA", "A99 9AA", "AA9 9AA", "AA99 9AA", "A9A 9AA" or "AA9A 9AA", where A is an alphabetic character and 9 is a numeric character. There are restrictions on the set of alphabetic characters dependent on the position they are in.

As can be seen, the first character is always alphabetical and the final three characters are always a numeric character followed by two alphabetic characters.

A regular expression is given in the comments of the schema, which implements full checking of all the stated BS 7666 postcode format rules. That regular expression can be restated as a "traditional" regular expression:

(GIR 0AA|[A-PR-UWYZ]([0-9]{1,2}|([A-HK-Y][0-9]|[A-HK-Y][0-9]([0-9]|[ABEHMNPRV-Y]))|[0-9][A-HJKS-UW]) [0-9][ABD-HJLNP-UW-Z]{2})
The BS 7666 rules do not match British Forces Post Office postcodes, which have the format "BFPO NNN" or "BFPO c/o NNN", where NNN is 1 to 4 numerical digits.

A regular expression to implement the BS 7666 rules:[22]

(GIR 0AA)|((([A-Z-[QVX]][0-9][0-9]?)|(([A-Z-[QVX]][A-Z-[IJZ]][0-9][0-9]?)|(([A-Z-[QVX]][0-9][A-HJKSTUW])|([A-Z-[QVX]][A-Z-[IJZ]][0-9][ABEHMNPRVWXY])))) [0-9][A-Z-[CIKMOV]]{2}){2}
Alternative short regular expression from BS7666 Schema is:

[A-Z]{1,2}[0-9R][0-9A-Z]? [0-9][A-Z-[CIKMOV]]{2}
However, it has error and modified expression can be used:

[A-Z]{1,2}[0-9R][0-9A-Z]? [0-9][A-Z]{2}

Non-geographic postcodes
Almost all postcodes map directly to a geographic area, but there are some which are used simply for routing, mostly for the purposes of direct marketing, and cannot be used for navigation or distance-finding applications.

These codes include BS98, BS99, BT58, E98, NE98, NE99 and WC99.

There is an additional entirely non-geographic outward code BX, from which postcodes can be allocated entirely independently of the geographic location of the recipient (and which can be retained in the event of the customer moving)

Within Royal Mail, outward codes beginning XY are used internally as routing codes to route mis-addressed mail, and to route international outbound mail.

Girobank's headquarters in Bootle used the non-geographic postcode GIR 0AA, which is still used today by Girobank's eventual owners, Alliance and Leicester (Note that Alliance and Leicester have now been taken over by Santander).

Application
The PAF is commercially licenseable and is often incorporated in address management software packages. The capabilities of such packages allow an address to be constructed solely from the postcode and house number for most addresses. By including the map references of postcodes in the address database, the postcode can be used automatically to pinpoint a postcode area on a map. See http://www.streetmap.co.uk for an example of this in practice. The PAF is constantly updated with around 4,000 postcodes added each month and 2,000 existing postcodes terminated.

Northern Ireland
Northern Ireland was the last part of the UK to be postcoded with all postcodes beginning BT, between 1970 and 1974. While Belfast was already divided into postal districts, rural areas known as townlands posed an additional problem, as (at the time) many roads were not named, and houses were not numbered. Consequently, many people living in such areas shared the same postal address, which still occurs in the Republic of Ireland. Today the majority of roads in Northern Ireland are named (notable exceptions are in Fermanagh) and most houses (even in rural areas) are allocated a number. Those that are not allocated numbers can be uniquely identified by a house name. (From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia)

"Hatusomi, hatudadisi!!!"

Watanzania hatusomi, hatudadisi
NILIPATA kusimulia kisa kifuatacho. Kuna wakati mwandishi wa safu moja ya gazeti nchini alipata kuambiwa na Profesa Seithy Chachage kuwa tatizo kubwa la wanafunzi wake, yaani wanafunzi wa Chachage, ni kutopenda kujisomea.

Jambo hili nilipata kuliandika huko nyuma. Lakini kwa vile bado ni tatizo kubwa, basi, tunahitaji kukumbushana. Chachage alisema wanafunzi hao wakiwa chuoni, husoma kwa ajili ya kufanya mitihani ili wavuke kwenda mwaka unaofuata. Kwamba mtindo wao wa kusoma ni wa madesa (vitini) tu na si vitabu.

Kwa mujibu wa mwandishi huyo, Chachage alilalamika kwamba wanafunzi walio wengi hushindwa kupambanua mambo kadhaa yanayowazunguka. Ni dhahiri, kwa anayefuatilia jamii yetu kwa sasa, hatapata taabu sana kukubaliana na maelezo ya Chachage kwa rafiki yake huyo.

Ni kweli kuwa Watanzania tulio wengi, na si wanafunzi pekee, tumepoteza utamaduni wa kusoma. Inafika mahala mwanafunzi au hata aliye nje ya shule anaangalia kwanza ukubwa wa kitabu na wingi wa kurasa kabla ya kuamua kuazima au kununua kitabu badala ya kuangalia maudhui ya kitabu husika. Imejitokeza hofu juu ya kurasa za kitabu, zisiwe nyingi sana, vinginevyo msomaji anatishika nacho.

Hakuna atakayebisha, kwamba nchi yetu haiwezi kupiga hatua zozote za maana kuelekea kwenye chochote kinachoitwa maendeleo kama watu wetu walio wengi hawatapenda kujisomea, kujiendeleza kimaarifa na hivyo basi, kujijengea uwezo wa kudadisi mambo.

Wengi tumekuwa wavivu sana wa kusoma. Leo ni kawaida kumkuta kijana aliyemaliza kidato cha nne hata cha sita bila hata kusoma maandiko yeyote yale ya Shaaban Robert kwa kutoa mfano wa mwandishi mmoja. Itawezekana vipi kijana wa Kitanzania amalize miaka 20 shuleni bila kusoma hata kurasa tatu tu za maandiko ya Shaaban Robert ukiacha waandishi wengine mahiri wa nchi hii?! Hivi kijana huyu atajijua kweli kuwa yeye ni nani kwa maana ya utambulisho wake?

Katika Kenya hakuna kijana anayemaliza miaka 20 shuleni bila kumsoma Ngugi Wa Thiong'o. Nigeria hakuna kijana anayemaliza miaka 20 shuleni bila kumsoma Chinua Achebe au Wole Soyinka. Iweje katika nchi yetu vijana wamalize miaka 20 shuleni bila kusoma maandiko yaliyojaa hekima na yaliyosheheni utamaduni wetu kama yale ya Shaaban Robert? Maandiko kama: Adili Na Nduguze, Kusadikika, Utu Bora Mkulima na mengineyo.

Hadi hii leo,tunaamini, kuwa katika Afrika ya Mashariki nzima hajatokea mwandishi wa fasihi kwa lugha ya Kiswahili mfano wa Shaaban Robert. Si ajabu, kuwa marehemu Shaaban Robert alitokea kuwa mwandishi mzuri. Shaaban Robert alikuwa ni msomaji mzuri wa vitabu vya hadithi, mashairi na maarifa mengine.

Naam. Elimu juu ya maarifa mbalimbali humu duniani hupatikana kwa mtu kujiendeleza kielimu. Hatua ya kwanza na ya msingi kabisa katika kuelekea kwenye mapenzi na elimu ni ile hali ya mtu kupenda kujisomea vitabu hata vile ambavyo viko nje ya mitaala ya shule na vyuo.

Ni ukweli usiopingika, kuwa utamaduni wa kujisomea umedorora na unaendelea kudorora mno katika jamii yetu. Kudorora kwa utamaduni wa kujisomea kunachangiwa kwa kiasi kikubwa na kushuka kwa kiwango cha elimu nchini na pia mabadiliko ya kijamii yaliyojitokeza katika miaka ya karibuni.

Si ajabu siku hizi kwa watoto na hata wazazi kuchukua muda wao mwingi kuangalia televisheni na hivyo basi kutotilia maanani suala zima la kujisomea. Ni rahisi mno kukaa kwenye kiti na kuangalia televisheni badala ya kuchukua kitabu na kujisomea.

Watanzania pia wamepoteza utamaduni wao wa miaka mingi wa kusikiliza vipindi vya maarifa redioni. Wengi wanapendelea kusikiliza idhaa za redio zenye kupiga muziki kutwa kucha. Muziki unaoambatana na matangazo na vipindi vya kijamii visivyofanyiwa utafiti na wala maandalizi ya kutosha. Tunaamini, kuwa miaka ya nyuma Watanzania walikuwa na upeo mkubwa wa uelewa wa mambo yanayotokea ndani ya nchi na hata kimataifa.

Hili la kudumaa kwa utamaduni wa kujisomea limesababisha pia kudumaa na kushuka kwa viwango vya ubora wa uandishi, Uwe uandishi wa habari, hadithi na hata ripoti mbali mbali. Umefika wakati wa sisi wenyewe kuchukua hatua za makusudi kabisa za kujijengea utamaduni wa kujisomea. Tujijengee kiu ya kupenda kusoma.

Tukumbuke pia, kuwa kiu ya kusoma haiji hivi hivi tu, inajengwa utotoni na hata ukubwani. Katika hili Shaaban Robert alipata kuandika: " Bahati haiji yenyewe, hunyoshewa mkono au hufuatwa". Na ndivyo ilivyo kwa maarifa. Hayaji yenyewe bila kujibidisha kujisomea.

Tujitahidi kubadilika na kuondokana na mtazamo hasi juu ya vitabu. Baadhi yetu, tangu utotoni, shule na vitabu huwa ni kama uchungu wa lazima kuupitia. Ukishamaliza masomo, basi, huwa mwisho wa kusoma vitabu. Walio shuleni hawajengewi misingi imara ya kupenda kujisomea hata baada ya kumaliza masomo. Wanasoma ili wafaulu mitihani, wanakariri majawabu. Hatuwaandai watoto wetu wawe ni watu wenye kuuliza maswali, kudadisi na kuhoji ili waongeze zaidi maarifa yao.

Mwisho kabisa, kusoma ni burudani kama burudani nyingine. Ukisoma kitabu ukipendacho utafurahi, utacheka peke yako, utasikitika, utatokwa na machozi, utafarijika. Kwa kupitia vitabu unaweza kupata maarifa mbali mbali katika ulimwengu huu. Unaweza kusafiri katika maeneo ambayo hujapata kufika, na kujua jiografia ya sehemu hizo, yote haya kwa kupitia maandiko tu, vitabu. Wakati tukiumaliza mwaka huu jiulize; nimesoma vitabu vingapi mwaka huu?
(chanzo: Raia Mwema, Na Maggid Mjengwa Disemba 24, 2008 Simu: 0754 678 252
Barua-pepe: mjengwamaggid@gmail.com Blogu: mjengwa.blogspot.com)

Unemployment rising!

Next year could be the worst year for British jobs in two decades.

A report predicts 600,000 people are facing redundancy and others will have their pay frozen.

The Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development is warning when the recession ends, more than a million jobs could have been lost in the UK.

The institute, which represents managers and personnel staff, forecast that unemployment will stop short of three million, but it warned that the period between New Year and Easter will be the worst for redundancies since 1991.

Chief economist John Philpott said: "This time last year, in the face of some scepticism, the CIPD warned that 2008 would be the UK's worst year for jobs in a decade.

"It was, but in retrospect it will be seen as merely the slow motion prelude to what will be the worst year for jobs in almost two decades."

He continued: "The CIPD's annual barometer forecast is that the UK economy will shed at least 600,000 jobs in 2009.

"Overall the 18-month period from the start of the recession in mid-2008 until the end of 2009 will witness the loss of around three quarters of a million jobs, equivalent to the total net rise in employment in the preceding three years.

"Assuming the economy bottoms out in the second half of 2009, job losses are likely to continue into 2010, in all probability taking the final toll of lost jobs to around one million.

"Our current expectation, based on available survey evidence and employer soundings, is that the number of redundancies will jump sharply in the early months of 2009, once employers take stock of the economic outlook."

A survey of 2,600 workers by the CIPD showed that more than one in four did not expect a pay rise next year, a similar number believed any wage increase will be lower than in 2008, while some feared a wage cut. (source: uk.news.yahoo.com)

Matokeo std VII: Tathmini yangu

Natofautiana na takwimu au maelezo yaliyotolewa na gazeti Alasiri, kwani zimepotosha picha halisi ya matokeo ya jumla.
Hapa ninanukuu aya kutoka gazeti Alasiri ambapo naona kuna dosari,
'Asilimia 80.73 ya watahiniwa wote waliofanya mtihani wa kuhitimu elimu ya msingi mwaka huu, wamechaguliwa kujiunga na shule za sekondari za Serikali nchini.'

Tathmini yangu (kulingana na mahesabu ya haraka haraka):

Watahiniwa wote jumla: 1,017,969

Waliofaulu mtihani jumla: 536,672 (=52.72% ya watahiniwa wote)

Waliochaguliwa kwenda sekondari za serikali jumla 433,260:
waliochaguliwa wasichana: 188,460 (=43.50% ya waliofaulu)
waliochaguliwa wavulana: 244,800 (=56.50% ya waliofaulu)
Jumla: 433,260 (hii ni sawa na 80.73% ya waliofaulu mtihani (536,672))

80.73% ya waliofaulu mtihani (536,672) ndio wamechaguliwa kujiunga na sekondari za serikali! Kwa hiyo, wanafunzi waliochaguliwa kujiunga na sekondari za serikali (433,260) ni sawa na 42.56% ya wanafunzi wote (1,017,969) waliofanya mtihani wa darasa la saba mwaka huu!!!

Na waliofaulu mtihani ni sawa na 52.72% ya watahiniwa wote.

Wanafunzi ambao wamefaulu lakini hawakuchaguliwa kujiunga na serikali za serikali ni 103,412 sawa na 19.27%

Walioshindwa mtihani jumla yao ni 481,193 (sawa na 47.27% ya watahiniwa wote). Kati yao wasichana ni 274,283 (sawa na 57.0% ya walioshindwa wote) na wavulana ni 206,910 (sawa na 43.0% ya walioshindwa wote)

NB
Tathmini hii inatokana na takwimu kutoka Alasiri na Nipashe hapo chini. Kama kuna mapungufu yoyote ktk mahesabu au ukokotoaji, hilo ni kosa langu binafsi ktk kutafsiri tarakimu.

Winter Solstice

Winter Solstice
Definition: Winter officially begins on the shortest day of the year December 21 (or December 22 in some years) the day of the solstice.

Solstice means the sun stands still. The winter solstice is the day when the midday sun is at its lowest point above the horizon.

Often celebrated with parties and winter customs.

Celebrated on December 21 [or 22] (source: kidsturncentral.com)

Winter solstice

Today Monday 22/12/2008, is The shortest day or the longest night of the year!
The winter solstice occurs at the instant when the Sun's position in the sky is at its greatest angular distance on the other side of the equatorial plane from the observers hemisphere. Depending on the shift of the calendar, the event of the winter solstice occurs some time between December 20 and December 23 each year in the northern hemisphere, and between June 20 and June 23 in the southern hemisphere, during either the shortest day or the longest night of the year, which is not to be confused with the darkest day or night or the day with the earliest sunset or latest sunrise.

The seasonal significance of the winter solstice is in the reversal of the gradually lengthening nights and shortening days. How cultures interpret this is varied, since it is sometimes said to astronomically mark either the beginning or middle of a hemisphere's winter. Winter is a subjective term, so there is no scientifically established beginning or middle of winter but the winter solstice itself is clearly calculated to within a second. Though the winter solstice lasts an instant, the term is also colloquially used to refer to the full 24-hour period of the day on which it occurs.

Worldwide, interpretation of the event has varied from culture to culture, but most cultures have held a recognition of rebirth, involving holidays, festivals, gatherings, rituals or other celebrations around that time.

The word solstice derives from Latin sol (sun) and sistere (to stand still).
(source: From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. 22/12/2008)