One Problem Solved, Two More Added

Have reformatted the GC Tutor panel insert accessed either from the navigation bar of the Grammar Captive mainpage, or from https://tutor.grammarcaptive.com.

Although, there is still a problem in the scrolling of the page, a solution does appear around the corner.

The new problems associated with the search engine and word clouds have yet to be resolved. Further exploration is required. They truly are a mystery for the moment.

Roddy

GC Tutor

The GC Tutor webpage has undergone a minor transformation that leads to a much bigger transformation, if you follow its link. Soon the included flier will be posted around the UW campus and elsewhere.

Development requires sacrifice, but one must also maintain oneself until launch and somewhat beyond.

What makes the marketplace work so well is that doing good for others means doing good for you. Now, if we good only get the government to understand the concept!

Roddy

A Long Week

Most languages are written from left to right. Arabic is written from right to left. Working with terms that are bidirectional — i.e., they can run in both directions in the same line of text — is a largely unexplored area on the internet. Alas, I have learned much, but am still unable to solve the problem of coordinating Matomo and Wordcloud2.js in a bidirectional text environment. And, I once thought it would be very easy ….

In preparation for the summer term at the University of Washington Grammar Captive has prepared a new flier to advertise GC Tutor. What is more, the GC subdomain and webpage are undergoing a face lift. Good progress has been made, and all is nearly ready to publish

Roddy

nodejs10, npm, and xregexp

Grammar Captive has just made its first software installation with its newly installed node and npm software. The honored, hopefully permanent guest is xregexp@4.2.4.

xregexp.js will be used to help overcome some of the newly discovered problems brought about by the introduction of bidirectional text — in this case, Arabic and English — and the recently discovered spamming of Grammar Captive’s word clouds.

Roddy

Grammar Captive Is Under Attack

It could be said that one without enemies is a nemesis to none, but of little value to anyone. For, one does not bring new value to a competitive market place without drawing the attention of the one away from another. This loss of attention for the other, if sustained, can lead to unexpected loss for same. For a poor loser, this loss can create animosity and spark vengeful retaliation.

Then too, there are those who are simply malicious by nature, and who seek to raise their self-esteem by taking advantage of the weaknesses of others or by teaching them a lesson that makes themselves feel superior.

And finally, there are those who are wicked, do not want that their crimes are exposed, and seek to defeat any and all who would dare expose them.

To which of the above Grammar Captive has become a victim it is difficult to say, for the internet is a jungle filled with invisible evil.

In any case, Grammar Captive’s custom search engine is being maliciously exploited, and the evidence is clear; one only has to view Grammar Captive’s word clouds to see that no preference is shown. This is because the number of searches is exorbitantly large, and the search entries themselves are heavily redundant. In short, someone is spamming Grammar Captive’s data base.

Fortunately, this discovery has been made before Grammar Captive’s production launch. Unfortunately, further work on Grammar Captive’s word clouds will be delayed indefinitely until the spamming has been brought to a halt.

Roddy

Word Cloud Renovation

The target and matched Word Clouds under the Visitor Profile menu item are undergoing renovation and are likely to appear missing for the next several days.

The goal is to bring the clouds up-to-date with the newly created Matomo storage table and thus eliminate the long loading delays.

Hang on. At Grammar Captive things are getting better still again.

Roddy

Missing Dates Recovered

Several days have passed during which the Graphs & Charts and World Map panels under the Visitor Profile menu item have not been updating. This problem was brought about by an ever increasing amount of accumulated data. There were two ways to resolve the problem: increase the size limit or limit the number of observations retrieved at any one time. The latter more efficient course was chosen and acted upon.

Hopefully, the Graphs & Charts and World Map sections will once again begin updating automatically.

Roddy

Persistence Pays

It has been a long time in coming, but what was before a line and bar chart that was largely inaccurate for 100 values, and then an accurate bar chart for all values since the beginning of the year, is now a line and bar chart with full accuracy for all values since the beginning of the year.

The Arab translation of the first edition of the Seven Gates newsletter is still undergoing revision, but the Eid holiday has past, and it is likely that the final revision will appear soon.

Roddy