Reference Library Archives

Bullet Points and Numbered Lists

Foreword

This post describes Bullet Points and Numbered Lists as used in this blog.

Continue reading “Bullet Points and Numbered Lists”

Woodscrews and Bolts

A collection of facts about Wood Screws and Bolts

This article on woodscrews and bolts is very basic at the moment but may get improved with time.

Woodscrew Chart by W. L. Fuller

Woodscrews Which Don’t Split Wood

This link goes to Titan Metal Werks, Inc of Ilinois, USA a company which makes SplitStop screws which they claim won’t split the wood they are screwed into. Designed for fixing decking they appear to drill themselves in and make a countersunk hole to boot.

See their example video which I have embedded below. It shows how an ordinary screw splits the wood when it is screwed in. Then it shows how their screws can be screwed in around it, very close to the edge, without splitting the wood:

This is what TITAN have to say about their products:

“Experience the ability to place woodscrews within 1/8″ of the edge of a board without splitting the wood. Install deck boards and railing balusters with little fear of splitting! Penetrate knots without shearing-off screw heads! Countersink effortlessly, even in Oak! All without predrilling!” — Titan

How A Toilet Silent Fill Valve Works

Introduction

This article is in effect an addendum to the post Toilet Silent Fill Valve Repair which explains how to access and dismantle such a valve and inspect or change the diaphragm that sits in the valve. That post also explains what is, and is not, silent about a Silent Fill Valve. This is now complemented by the post Replacing A Toilet Fill Valve.

In order to satisfy the requirements of Internet SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) the valve is referred to, in this article, specifically as a Toilet Silent Fill Valve or more generally Silent Fill Valve but its full title is a Silent Fill Toilet Cistern Inlet Valve since it is:

A Valve.
An Inlet Valve.
A Cistern Inlet Valve.
A Toilet Cistern Inlet Valve.
A Silent Fill Toilet Cistern Inlet Valve.

This type of valve is complex and deploys a built-in mechanism which uses the inherent water pressure in the Mains Water to drive the valve from the closed to open position and then from the open to closed position. The mechanism is controlled by a much smaller valve in the form of a stopper covering a pinhole which requires a much smaller effort to operate it than the main valve.

The article endeavours to explain to the reader how the complete valve works so that they understand the order in which physical processes take place and why they follow on from each other as they do. The theory behind the workings of the valve are developed from the basic principles of forces and pressures acting on the individual parts but without the detail of too many mathematical formulae. Continue reading “How A Toilet Silent Fill Valve Works”

Kuiper and Oort Objects

Here is a poster of Kuiper and Oort Objects

This poster/wall chart was produced by SPACE.COM as a quick guide to Kuiper and Oort Objects.

Knowledge of the Kuiper Belt and the Oort Cloud is sparse but it is known that some objects have very eccentric orbits. I think we can expect many more objects to be discovered in this area in coming years.

Reference

Poster source: Space.com: All about our solar system, outer space and exploration.

Dwarf Planets In The Solar System

There is a new class of objects in the Solar System – Dwarf Planets – which now includes Pluto.

Source Space.com: All about our solar system, outer space and exploration

Cosmic Inflation and Expansion of The Universe

This Chart Describes Cosmic Inflation and Expansion of The Universe

I’m sure we’re a long way from hearing the last on Cosmic Inflation and Expansion of The Universe, but here is a SPACE.COM chart briefly explaining it.

On 30^th January 2015 Space.com announced: Inflation is not proven to have occurred as previously suspected in March 2014. The evidence for it has been discredited. Check it out at Space.com where Evidence for Cosmic Inflation Theory Bites the (Space) Dust.

Source: Space.com – All about our solar system, outer space and exploration.

On 24th May 2018 I attempted to get GDPR compliant and added a Privacy Policy. Mmmm – needs further work I suspect.

As of 26th February 2018 I have installed a badge on my site just to indicate to visitors that I protect my site with the free Wordfence Security Plugin. Wordfence give me a firewall and perform some scans. Visitors selecting the badge will be directed to the Wordfence web site where they can find out for themselves what Wordfence do. I am not paying for their Premium service yet but I am contemplating it.

It’s 23rd February 2018 and I just realised I haven’t got a GravityScan badge. Not because I’m on a blacklist this time, but because GravityScan is no more. They had to wind up their business due to insufficient take up. There is obviously a lot of educating to do among thousands of WP bloggers if they don’t grasp some of the basics of security. This badge was free. Now we’ll just have to go and pay for one. They probably haven’t converted their sites to https either.

On 3rd February 2018 I posted an article written entirely using the Gutenberg editor. I know we’re advised not to use it to edit real sites yet but I wanted to give it a go. I was so pleased with it that I’m well on the way with my next post using Gutenberg too. I can’t justify text to make it line up on the left and right margins, and the Text used for image titles doesn’t look correct because a different construct is being used to manipulate them. There is also a problem turning Comments on. I have to redo it using Quick Edit after each edit of a post.

Nearly 2018 (its 30th Dec 2017) and I haven’t had any further problems with Gravityscan since I got the badge back in September. I’m very pleased with it.

I’m also pleased that Wordfence is protecting my site adequately.

It’s 5th October 2017 and I have just asked 1and1 Internet (they run my server) about what Sitelock scans. I had a trial of their premium service running. That scans up to 500 subpages. I asked what constitutes a subpage. They gave me the impression that with WordPress each post is a subpage and each image (JPEG, PNG, etc.) that can be selected from a post and shown in its own page as an enlargement is also a subpage. If that’s the case then I must be near to the 500 subpage limit. They told me Sitelock can’t test more than 500 subpages. Logically I think there is something wrong here. There must be professional websites that need protecting with more pages than I have. I would expect Sitelock Premium could be sold to them. Anyway until I get more information I have removed my site from the Sitelock scheme before the end of the 30 day trial. I will continue with Gravityscan alone as it seems very good so far.

Tag Clouds are back (2nd October 2017). After probably 2 years, at least, tags can be seen in one place again. They went away when my tag plugin reacted badly with other plugins. They’re on the Posts & Tags menu. You will find them in groups. Mostly they are in alpha-numeric groups but some are more easily found in Places or People for example.

I am also trying to redirect links as a result of post title changes and picture name changes. With this I am having limited success. I have 8 yrs of problems to fix. The problems are not on this site they are caused by others saving links which are now out of date. I can observe 404 errors seen by others.

It’s 20th September 2017 and my Gravityscan Badge is back, after 8 days, as you can see. I’ve learnt a lot in the last week. I now understand that my IP address is shared so I take the rap for the actions of others. For now I’ll wait and see what the future holds. You may see the badge come and go as a consequence.

Well on 12th September 2017 I had a Gravityscan setback. My 1&1 server was found to be on a spamming blacklist. Why I don’t know. Gravityscan have not found malware on my site. I have now deployed Sitelock too and that hasn’t found a problem with my site either. I will automatically be removed from the blacklist after 7 days if there are no more spamming incidents in the meantime. Meanwhile I don’t have a Gravityscan Trust Badge but I do now have a Sitelock Badge.

I’m currently trying to improve older posts which have fallen foul of theme changes and don’t have satisfactory images.

To improve site security:

I consider the action I took on 13th August 2017 to harden my header against Cross-site Scripting, Cross-site Tracing, Clickjacking, MIME Sniffing and Directory Listing by sending messages to the server from my .htaccess file to be ineffective. I will try again.

I took on the benefits of Gravityscan as of 28th July 2017. It checks this site for malware every day as you can see from the Gravityscan Trust Badge in the page header. Gravityscan have changed the date display to an international format yyyy-mm-dd. Selecting (clicking on) this badge will take you to the Gravityscan website.

On 30th June 2017 I took the step of securing my server communication with browsers by using 1&1 Internet’s TLS and certificate services. So now my main URL is HTTPS://helpfulcolin.com. Readers will see a padlock in their browser as a consequence.

I have also taken two more domains onboard “helpfulcolin.co.uk” and “helpfulcolin.uk”. Connections to them use HTTP not HTTPS but security is maintained by them redirecting links to “HTTPS://helpfulcolin.com”.

The site helpfulcolin.com was originally built in September 2011 by Digitalog© using the Side Blog theme and handed over to Helpful Colin by his mentors (see their links below) in December 2011. It was changed to a ‘Twenty Fourteen’ child theme in February 2014 by Helpful Colin.

The latest major change took place in December 2015 when WordPress version 4.4 became active and Helpful Colin changed the theme to the ‘Twenty Sixteen’ theme which is designed to look good on all screen sizes. Although this may have improved the blog for mobile users it has removed some functionality available in ‘Twenty Fourteen’.