A good story with Avengers tension, mutant vs hero tension, mutant vs mutant tension and a great "Mageneto's Family" suffering for Magneto's sins storyline.
I would reccomend it.
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This book is unusual in that it's not so much about how to chagne your employees as it is about helping them embrace change for good reasons that they already have though may not be fully aware of. (Echos of Deming's belief that workers really do want to produce quality products if they can only be enabled.)
The approach that the authors use may seem a little on the lighthearted side, but it is probably as effective a way as any for getting the points across. It's the kind of book you could safely give associates as a "light read" without making them feel that they are being lectured to.
I have read Kliem and Luden's other book, The Noah Project, and this book, while similar in some ways, is better done. All in all, it's a worthwhile contribution to the HR side of management.
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Secondly, Frank Conforti who writes the Microstation portions of the book, frequently says, "this is easy in Microstation." I get tired of not only the bias but also the oversimplification of the operations.
Thirdly, a great deal of the book covers the company histories of Autodesk and Bentley. The writers expressed the value of this to help understand the different philosophies behind the two packages. While I found it interesting, it didn't help me one whit to make me a better user of either program.
Fourth, the book deals primarily with the similarities of the two programs. While this is good for a beginner, it leaves unexplained the true power of each system because most tasks can be accomplished in several different ways. The book usually explains the way that is most similar in each program rather than the most efficient way to get something done in each program. The book doesn't cover the tremendous rendering capabilities of Microstation at all, since this is not something that AutoCAD does.
Since I think this is a book that would be most helpful to people who are just making the switch (not me who switched four months ago, 90% of what I would consider useful information I've learned on my own or from my fellow workers), it ought to have a chapter about first timers pitfalls.
One specific first-timer pitfall is the behaviour of the right mouse button. In AutoCAD the right mouse button is equivalent to hitting enter. It completes every command and restarts the command. In Microstation it is completely opposite; it behaves like AutoCAD's esc key. So the experienced AutoCAD user practically without thinking hits the right mouse button to complete a command, but he will discover to his dismay that nothing happens because he just cancelled the command. This just takes some getting used to.
Another thing that everyone tells the new user is there are keyin commands like AutoCAD's command line. Well, hardly. With AutoCAD to create a line all one had to do was type "l" and hit enter. To get microstation to do the same command from its key-in window, first you have to click with the mouse in the key-in window they type "place line" which can be abbreviated to "pl l". This is much more work than simply clicking the line tool from the toolbar.
It has two particularly useful chapters that each take a fairly simple project and go step-by-step through the process of creating the project using each CAD package.
It also has an excellent chapter on translating from one to the other. It points out the pitfalls and incompatibilities as well as explaining when you should and shouldn't translate.
If I've sounded critical its because I was really wanting a book that teaches more advanced features of Microstation. This isn't it.
If you want a nice history of computer aided design, this is a good book. Or if it is your first time using Mircostation this would be pretty handy (though it needs the chapter I described above)
I was hoping for a book that shows how to do each Autocad command in Microstation. This book does not do this very completely. The index of the book does not list all of the command sets of either program, so you are not getting a lot of coverage on most topics. Trying to find answers to everyday problems is not possible for the most part with this book.
My suggestion to anyone who truly wants to learn the other program whether it be Microstation or AutoCad is get a good book on either subject. The most accomplished Microstation user I know swears by Frank Conforti's books on Microstation.
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The "stuff" of this book, which is the so-called "f-ratio" is explained on about ten pages. You can understand it, although it is not a clear explanation. Better probably to read it where the author got it in the first place. It is difficult to say if f-ratio has much practical importance because of assumption of indefinite divisibility of trading contracts.
Most of all this book reminded me a project done overnight for a school or college class where you put a little stuff in the middle and then pad it for volume with anything you can come up with because you need to satisfy the minimum length requirement.
This book will keep your interest, in fact, if it was'nt for having to stop to eat or work, I would have read it in one sitting. If you only read a handful of books this year, I would certainly include this one. It is one of those rare books, that when I finished reading it, I mulled it over in my mind a day or two afterwards, as it's message was so powerful. To me, the only flaw in this novel was that the ending seemed to be a trifle rushed.
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At times the book is a bit hard to follow. Set exclusively at the University of Notre Dame, the book is so detailed in this regard that anyone unfamiliar with the campus may feel like an outsider reading the book. The book is formulaic, a bit predictable, and McInerny has the habit of assuming that his readers are schooled in foreign languages as he frequently tosses in Latin and French expressions that the lay reader may find frustrating.
However,the book offers an insightful and witty look at tenure and the politics of a university campus, and takes some shots at the "political correctness" found on campuses. The author of more than 20 books, including the Father Dowling mysteries, McInerny does know how to tell a tale.
Those familiar with the University of Notre Dame, fans of McInerney's mysteries, or fans of G.K. Chesterton will find this mystery particularly enjoyable.
IRISH TENURE is more like Malcolm Bradbury than Agatha Christie. McInerny shows the dark side of academic life (even at so august an institution an Notre Dame): the catfight for tenure. The structure is loose and seems at first rambling and discursive, but McInerny winds it all together eventually. Until then, he gives subtle character studies of the sorts of people who drift into academia: those intelligent enough to be professors but somehow haven't managed into the tenure track; those who are tenured and probably shouldn't be; those who need and or deserve to be tenured; the evil necessity to publish or perish . . .
He also takes long overdue pot-shots, sometimes poignant and sometimes hilarious, at political correctness, especially regarding draconian modern ideas of sexual harrassment.
The plot, such as it is, is centered on the discovery of every Chestertonian's dream, a long-lost Father Brown story. IRISH TENURE will prove a joy for fans of G.K. Chesterton, for most of the main characters live and breathe his works. For the uninitiated, therefore, the book will doubtlessly prove confusing. Chesterton enthusiasts will find piquant prose, and enjoy spending time with like-minded characters who have found that Chesterton adds zest to life.
The main disappointment is that there is no genuine long-lost story appended to the end of the tale; but that's just as well, for McInerny's work would've suffered in the comparison. And we can be thankful that McInerny didn't attempt a pastiche.
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For Kerenyi, the core of the mysteries was the message that 'a birth in death was possible', also for human beings. This message was 'shown' through the ancient myth of the search of Demeter for her ravished daughter Persephone. She finds Persephone under the earth, where she gives birth to Dionysos. The hope of life in death was symbolized through Demeter's offering of the grain, that will grow again. We can see this important hapenning on a stele in the Ancient museum of Athens.
The initiated had to fast and were given a drug (the kykeon) just before the procession.
Nearly all Roman emperors were initiated (with a special place for Marcus Aurelius).
One of the initiated was Plato, who speaks about it in his work 'Phaidoon'.
The influence on Christianity by the mysteries cannot be underestimated, for Plato's theory of the soul was adopted by the Church.
A compelling read.
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McLibel is a true tale of once upon a time, not so very long ago (1990 - 1997) when the Davids took on a Goliath (Ronald McDonald and his Big Bad Corporation) in not-so-Merry-Old England. Two unemployed activists had distributed leaflets, (which they neither wrote nor produced,) that had the audacity to criticize the corporate giant. The two, who were unable to afford attorneys, were put to a Kafka-esque Kangaroo (with apologies to residents of Australia) Court trial, the likes of which, were it to appear on Saturday Night Live, would be condemned as Theatre of the Absurd.
The author describes the protracted trial: "Like the interminable case of _Jarndyce v. Jarndyce_ in Charles Dickens' *Bleak House,* _McDonald's Corporation and McDonald's Restaurants Ltd. vs. Helen Marie Steel and David Morris_ (popularly known as the McLibel case) drone(d) on in claustrophobic isolation."
One of the most striking things about McLibel, to the American sensibility, is the arcane, archaic, bizarre, Byzantine Quagmire of British libel law. The book is sometimes difficult to digest. There are no footnotes, endnotes, annotations, or other direct attribution of sources. I was disappointed that the Writ and other pleadings (actual legal papers which are the foundation of a lawsuit,) were not included in the Appendix. A reproduction of the offending leaflet would also have been helpful. The author, British "Environmental Journalist" John Vidal (Hey! Is he related to Gore Vidal?) frequently plagues the reader with his own protracted political polemics. But it is, nonetheless, enriched food for thought.
Do you want fries with that? Here's an interesting bit of trivia included in the book: Ray Kroc, founding force behind McDonald's as we know it, was in the same World War I ambulance driving company as Walt Disney.
It was at this point that McDonalds made a serious legal error in making some allegations against the enviromentalists. This led to a counter suite for defamation which was run at the same time. The problem for McDonalds was that they had to lead evidence to prove their case. Normally in a defamation case it would be up to the defendant to do so. As the two enviromentalists were both broke they would not have been able to do so. However McDonalds by their tactical mistake forced themselves to provide evidence to back up their claims. The two enviromentalists were able to cross examine the various McDonalds witnesses to provide evidence for their claims.
As a result the case went on for so long that it became Britain's longest ever case. The two enviromentalists had a year to learn how to cross examine and were able to elicit some evidence that was unflattering McDonalds.
In these sorts of cases costs of litigation are nominally recoverable from the losing side. However as the two enviromentalists had no money any cost order against them was without value. This led to a incredibly long and expensive case which ended up bleeding McDonalds with the unfortunate side effect that the two enviromentalists were able to milk it for all it was worth to attack the reputation of McDonalds. From the point of view of the firm a total disaster... The decision to litigate had been a disaster.
The book is okay but leaden at times, the film that was released of the event is probably a bit more interesing.
This book offers an interesting British counterpoint to Harr's A Civil Action. Both books describe major legal struggles between the Haves and the Have-nots and in both cases the outcome represents less than a clear victory for either side. McLibel also offers an interesting critique of British libel law, the limitations on free speech in Britain, "ownership" of the law, manipulation of the legal system by the powerful, and the role of the judge.
It also offers Big Business a salutary lesson - not every apprent pushover is going to play dead the moment litigation is threatened. When it comes to counting the most costly legal mistakes ever, this case must rank somewhere near the top of the list. The case turned into a legal quagmire that McDonalds found it impossible to extricate itself from. Whatever consolation the company may have found in the verdict, this was a pyrrhic victory and an undoubted public relations disaster.