The International Earth Rotation and Reference Systems Service the International Earth Rotation Service, is the body responsible for maintaining global time and reference frame standards, notably through its Earth Orientation Parameter and International Celestial Reference System groups. The IERS was established in its present form in 1987 by the International Astronomical Union and the International Union of Geodesy and Geophysics, replacing the earlier International Polar Motion Service and the Earth rotation section of the Bureau International de l'Heure; the service began operation on January 1, 1988. Since its inception, the IERS has established new bureaus including the GPS Coordinating Centre in 1990, the DORIS Coordinating Centre in 1994 and the GGF Coordinating Centre in 1998; the organization was known as International Earth Rotation Service until 2003 when it formally changed its name to its present form, in which the organization chose to retain the acronym IERS. The IERS has various components located in the United States and Australia.

Among its other functions, the IERS is responsible for announcing leap seconds. The Sub-bureau for Rapid Service and Predictions of Earth Orientation Parameters of the IERS, located at the United States Naval Observatory, monitors the Earth's rotation. Part of its mission involves the determination of a time scale based on the current rate of the rotation of the Earth. Other services of IERS are at the Paris Observatory. UT1 is the non-uniform time defined based on the Earth's rotation, it defined the IERS Reference Meridian, the International Terrestrial Reference System, subsequent International Terrestrial Reference Frames. Related coordinate systems are used by satellite navigation systems like GPS and Galileo: WGS84 and GTRF; the definitions and relationships among ITRF, ICRF and EOP are established by IERS conventions standards. As of 2018, the most recent convention is the IERS Conventions. A mission of the IERS is to provide earth orientation information to the greater geodesy community in the form of bulletins: Bulletin A provides a rapid turnaround service for providing current EOP and a prediction model for EOP up to a year in the future.

It is released weekly. Bulletin B is released monthly. Bulletin C provides announcements of leap seconds Bulletin D provides DUT1 = to a 0.1 second precision. Astrometry International Atomic Time Coordinated Universal Time International Celestial Reference Frame Earth rotation, ΔT IERS Reference Meridian Altamimi, Zuheir. Gupta, Harsh K. Encyclopedia of Solid Earth Geophysics Springer ISBN 904818701X, pg 128. McCarthy, Dennis D.. Kenneth Time: From Earth Rotation to Atomic Physics John Wiley & Sons ISBN 3527627952, pg 290. Official website Earth Orientation Center of the IERS: data and interactive analysis International Celestial Reference Frame of the IERS

Personal finance software can be used to track spending, create budgets, plan for future expenses. Some software differs by feature support, software code and development transparency, mobile app features, import methods, Monetization model and data storage practices; the use of expense tracking and other personal finance software carries some risk, most notably is due to the disclosure of a username, password, or other account credentials used to automatically synchronize banking information with an expense tracking application. Another significant area of risk is due to sensitive personal information, stored anytime data is digitized; this risk may be compounded based on the security the software vendor has implemented as well as the availability of the data and where it is stored. An overlooked form of risk is due to the monetization model and privacy practices of the vendor or software provider, whether the application is "free" or fee based. Open source software is one way of minimizing the risks of privacy and monetization related risks of data exposure.

The following is a list of personal financial management software. The first section is devoted to free and open-source software, the second is for proprietary software. Comparison of accounting software List of free and open-source software packages List of project management software

Picromerus bidens, the spiny shieldbug or spiked shieldbug, is a carnivorous species of shield bug in the family Pentatomidae. This species has a wide distribution in the Palaearctic, from 64°N to North Africa and from the British Isles to China, it has been introduced more than once, to North America, where it has been recorded from more than 180 sites. These bugs prefer deciduous and mixed forests, gardens, chalk downland and damp flower-rich meadows. Picromerus bidens is a distinctive predatory shieldbug, it shows a thick rostrum directed away from head. Body colour is quite variable light to dark brown or bluish, with red-brown antennae and legs and two unmistakable thorn-like brown projections on the sides of the pronotum. Front femurs are armed with a ventral spine distally; the early instar nymphs are reddish, while the final instar nymphs are greyish black, with banded antennae and legs. Both adults and nymphs of the spiny shieldbugs are predatory, feeding on the larvae of other insects on leaf bugs, beetles and caterpillars.

The choice of the prey depend on the availability of food. However both adults and nymphs suck sap from plants; the female leaves. In the spring the larvae hatch. Nymphs become adults by July or August and adults can be found until November; this species overwinters as eggs and less as nymphs. Dmitry L. Musolin, Aida H. Saulich: Summer dormancy ensures univoltinism in the predatory bug Picromerus bidens. Entomologia Experimentalis et Applicata, 95, 3, S. 259–267, 2000 doi:10.1046/j.1570-7458.2000.00665.x Kamran Mahdian, Luc Tirry & Patrick De Clercq: Development of the predatory pentatomid Picromerus bidens at various constant temperatures. Belg. J. Zool. 138, 2, S. 135–139, 2008 Kamran Mahdian, Luc Tirry & Patrick De Clercq: Functional response of Picromerus bidens: effects of host plant. Journal of Applied Entomology, 131, 3, S. 160–164, 2007 doi:10.1111/j.1439-0418.2006.01124.x Kamran Mahdian, Thomas Van Leeuwen, Luc Tirry and Patrick De Clercq: Susceptibility of the predatory stinkbug Picromerus bidens to selected insecticides.

BioControl, 52, 6, S. 765–774, 2007 doi:10.1007/s10526-007-9075-3 Martin Konvicka, Vladimir Hula und Zdenek Fric: Picromerus bidens as predator of the Checkerspot Euphydryas aurinia. Entomologica Fennica, 16, S. 233–236, 2005 PDF T. R. E. Southwood und D. Leston: Land and Water Bugs of the British Isles. Frederick Warne & Co. Ltd. 1959 Larvae at Treknature Natur-in-nrw

Jossy Mehsen Mansur was the editor of the Papiamento-language newspaper Diario in Aruba. He wrote a history of Aruba among other books. Mansur was a descendant of a family which came from Lebanon and settled on the island of Aruba; the Mansur family made its fortune in the import-export business. With a licence of Philip Morris, they were the major suppliers of Marlboro in the Caribbean basin for many years; the Mansurs sponsored the Marlboro Red Tigers baseball team as well as the Aruban People's Party of former Prime Minister Henny Eman. The family owns their own bank, the Interbank, the biggest hotel and time-sharing complex, La Cabana, the Royal Cabana casino, they have import-export businesses in the Free Trade Zone. US President Bill Clinton in 1996 publicly identified Aruba "as a major drug-transit country" and noted that "a substantial portion of the free-zone's businesses in Aruba are owned and operated by members of the Mansur family, who have been indicted in the United States on charges of conspiracy to launder trafficking proceeds."

In the late 1980s, an investigator for Senator John Kerry's committee investigating the Iran-Contra Affair, interviewing drug traffickers in a West Miami prison kept hearing about the Mansurs. "Who are the Mansurs?" he would ask. Answer: "The big family in Aruba we used for laundering money and moving cocaine." The Mansur family was involved in cigarette smuggling from Aruba to Colombia. For over 50 years, Philip Morris' main distributor in Latin America was the Mansur Free Zone Trading Company, NV. Cigarettes were shipped to Aruba or Panamanian free trade zones operated by the Mansurs and into Colombia's special customs zone, just across the border from Venezuela. One of Philip Morris main distributors within Colombia was Samuel Santander Lopesierra, at one time a senator in the Liberal Party. Dubbed "the Marlboro Man" by the Colombian media, in reference to his alleged cigarette smuggling activities, Lopesierra is named in a U. S. federal court affidavit filed in conjunction with the Mansur money-laundering indictment.

According to a report of the Venezuelan intelligence agency, the DISIP, "in Venezuela the Mansurs are implicated in money laundering with Lopesierra. Every month Lopesierra're-invested' 20 million dollars'with the help of a well-known entrepreneur called Mansur'." Lopesierra is named in a U. S. federal court affidavit filed in conjunction with the Mansur money-laundering indictment. In that affidavit, an FBI agent working undercover says he was told by one of the original defendants in the Mansur indictment, that Lopesierra was part of a scheme to convert narco dollars into shipments of goods bound for Colombia. Lopesierra was arrested for drug trafficking in October 2002 and extradited to the US in August 2003, he was convicted for conspiring to unlawfully import cocaine into the United States. Lopesierra and his group were responsible for smuggling shipments of hundreds of kilograms of cocaine into the United States, for laundering the proceeds so they could be repatriated through Puerto Rico, New York, Miami back to Colombia.

The Mansur family has gained international prominence for alleged money laundering. Two family members, the cousins Eric and Alex Mansur, have been indicted by the U. S. attorney in Puerto Rico. They funneled US$500,000 in campaign cash to Colombian President Ernesto Samper through the wife of a jailed Cali cartel boss during the 1994 election campaign. Mr. Samper denied it; the Mansurs subsequently were awarded a monopoly for Colombian gambling, canceled in 1997 by a government watchdog agency that smelled impropriety. Philip Morris International broke its contract with the Mansurs at the end of 1998 "for business reasons." A source close to the family said the two sides agreed to a $422 million settlement and that the Mansurs continue to work with Philip Morris' non-tobacco product lines. In 1999 Jossy Mansur and his brother Luis Mansur and sister Lisa Thomson Mansur sued the Netherlands government before the United Nations Human Rights Committee for disseminating what the Aruban government termed a top secret report that claimed that the Mansurs were involved in organized crime.

The report by the Dutch Internal Security Service describes security in Aruba, saying that foreign organizations fighting crime in the region are unanimous in their view of the Aruban business community as providing services for regional drug cartels. The report mentions the Mansurs by name and portrays them as criminals who were associated with criminal organizations involved in drugs trafficking, gun trafficking and laundering money obtained from criminal activities. Despite the fact that the report was classified as top secret, it was leaked to the press and its contents became public; the suit was dismissed on procedural grounds for failure to exhaust Mansur's civil remedies in the Netherlands courts. Mansur was known for his weekly editorials which are critical of the local government of Prime Minister Nelson Oduber; the ongoing disagreement between Mansur and Oduber dates back many years. During the election campaign in 2001 Oduber's party had stickers made stating "Don’t believe Diario."Mansur advocated a point of view in the cases of Eduardo Mathew and Natalee Holloway.

He appeared on Fox News and Nancy Grace's Headline News show commenting on the disappearance of Natalee Holloway on Aruba in 2005. Mansur formed his own "investigative team" and his newspaper published new leads. According to some observers, Mansur jumped on the bandwagon as part of his own feud with the Aruban government. Jossy Mansu

Michael Kugel is a Ukrainian viola player and composer. Born in Kharkiv, USSR, he studied at the Beethoven School of Music, at the Music College in Kharkiv and at the Leningrad Conservatory. In 1975 he won First Prize at the International Viola Competition in Budapest. During years 1975-1990 Michael Kugel was the soloist of the Moscow Philharmonic Organisation, violist of the Beethoven Quartet and professor at the Moscow Conservatory. From 1990 till 1996 Michael Kugel was a professor at the Jerusalem Rubin Academy of Dance. In 1996 he settled in Belgium and now he is a professor at the Ghent Conservatory and at the Conservatorium Maastricht in the Netherlands. Michael Kugel appeared as a soloist with many major symphony orchestras in the world and appeared as a conductor with many orchestras, he has taken part in Festivals in Schleswig-Holstein, Lille, Passau, Rizor, Krems, Menton, Mürzzuschlag, Festival van Vlaanderen, Cincinnati, etc. Michael Kugel was a member of jury for International competitions in England, Israel, USA, Belgium, Germany and CIS: V Lionel Tertis International Viola Competition and World Viola Congress, 1994 First International Viola Competition in Vienna,1998 Primrose Memorial Viola Competition, 1999 IX Lionel Tertis International Viola competition and Workshop, 2006 etc.

Michael Kugel has given masterclass in Germany, Italy, Austria, Mexico, France, Croatia, CIS, Canada etc. Michael Kugel has enriched the viola repertoire with many transcriptions and with his own compositions: Sonata-Poem for viola solo, Concerto for viola and orchestra, Suite in memoriam Shostakovich for viola and piano, sonatas etc, his compositions include a piano sonata, chamber symphony and chamber music among others. He has recorded about 20 discs and made numerous records as a viola d'amore player as well, he is the author of three books: The history of an era. An interpretation of two works for viola Viola Masterpieces of the Instrumental Music Musical EssayMichael Kugel is the founder and the President of the Belgian Viola Society. Michael Kugel's compositions are published by Alain Van Kerckhoven Editeur. Il Carnevale di Venezia for Viola and Piano Classical Preludes for Viola and Piano Sonata-Poem for Viola Solo Suite in Memoriam Shostakovich for Viola and Piano Michael Kugel's works are published by Nototeka Musical Essay Ostinato.

Sonata for pianoforte Nostalgia. Divertiento for viola and piano He has recorded about 20 discs and made numerous records as a viola d'amore player as well, he made them in the former Soviet Union but most of those records are unavailable. His recent recordings include: In Memoriam Shostakovich. Michael Kugel, Vesna Podrug, 1998, ASIN B000068VGR In Memoriam Shostakovich on iTunes The recorded viola. Volume IV. Pearl GEMS 0039, PhonCD R2448 reva v.4, 1998 Mark Kopytman, Beyond all this... The Israel Camerata, Avner Biron, Michael Kugel, 1999, IMI-CD-1929-03 Glinka, Bizet, Waxman. Michael Kugel Asir Rozenberg, 1999"The greatest Russian violists" -2009. "Michael Kugel - Boris Berezovsky" Michael Kugel plays Carmen Fantasie Some videos can be found here: Michael Kugel, History of an era. An interpretation of two works for viola, 2002, ISBN 978-2-87304-001-7 Masterpieces of the Instrumental Music, unpublished Musical Essay, 2014, ISMN 979-0-9007107-0-3 Budapest Philharmonic, Hall of fame First International Viola Competition in Vienna New Consonant Music, Composers A & E Vienna Limited, Michael Kugel bio University of Cincinnati, Bios Orford Arts Centre, teachers/interpreters Official web-site of Michael Kugel Michael Kugel at New Constant Music

Owen's Defence is an uncommon chess opening defined by the moves: 1. E4 b6By playing 1...b6, Black prepares to fianchetto the queen's bishop where it will participate in the battle for the centre. The downside of this plan is that White can occupy the centre with pawns and gain a spatial advantage. Moreover, 1...b6 does not prepare kingside castling as 1...g6 does, it is harder for Black to augment his pressure against the centre with...f5, which weakens the kingside, than it is to play the corresponding move...c5 after 1...g6. Owen's Defence accordingly has a dubious reputation; the move...b6 has been played on the first or second move by grandmasters Jonathan Speelman, Pavel Blatny, Tony Miles, Edvins Kengis, Normunds Miezis, International Masters Bricard and Filipovic. Instead of fianchettoing, Black can play his bishop to the a6–f1 diagonal. Owen's Defence is classified as code B00 by the Encyclopaedia of Chess Openings; the opening is named after the English vicar and strong 19th-century amateur chess player John Owen, an early exponent.

Howard Staunton wrote in 1847 that 1.e4 b6, "which the Italians call'Il Fianchetto di Donna,' although disapproved of by the earlier writers, may be made by the second player without harm, if followed speedily by and."Using his opening, Owen defeated Paul Morphy in an informal game in London, 1858. An additional game in the match featuring this opening, where Owen varied on move 5, was won by Morphy; the theory of Owen's Defence is less developed than that of other openings. This makes it attractive to some players, since their opponents will be ill-prepared for it and hence forced to think for themselves. GM Christian Bauer observes: To be honest, I don't think Black can equalise as with 1...b6 as he sometimes does in standard openings, he may suffer against a well-prepared opponent. Again, the well-prepared opponent is rare for such marginal variations as 1...b6, in any case, with reasonable play I'm sure White can't get more than a slight advantage from the opening – a risk everyone is running as Black, aren't they?

According to MCO-15, after 2. D4 Bb7 White gets the advantage with either: 3. Bd3 e6 4. Nf3 c5 5. C3 Nf6 6. Nbd2 Nc6 7. A3! d5 8. E5 Nfd7 9. B4 Be7 10. 0-0 0-0 11. Re1 "with a clear plus", or 3. Nc3 e6 4. Nf3 Bb4 5. Bd3 Nf6 6. Bg5 h6 7. Bxf6 Bxc3+ 8. Bxc3 Qxf6 9. 0-0 d6 10. Nd2 e5 11. F4 Qe7 12. Qg4, as in David–Bauer, France 2005. Black may be able to transpose into forms of the Hippopotamus Defence, by playing...g6 and... Bg7, attaining a double fianchetto formation; this approach was used by GM Boris Spassky in games 12 and 16 of his 1966 World Championship match against the World Champion Tigran Petrosian. It had been developed and played by the Slovakian International Master Maximilian Ujtelky a few years before this. Speelman vs. Basman, British Championship 1984:1. E4 e6 2. Nc3 b6 3. D4 Bb7 Transposing to a position more reached by 1.e4 b6 2.d4 Bb7 3. Nc3 e6. 4. Bd3 Nf6 5. Nge2 c5 6. D5! a6 6...exd5 7.exd5 Nxd5 8. Nxd5 Bxd5 9. Nf4 Bc6 10. Bc4! "gives White strong pressure". 7. A4 exd5 8. Exd5 Nxd5 9. Nxd5 Bxd5 10. Nf4 Be6 11.

Be4 Ra7 12. 0-0 Be7 Watson and Schiller give 12...g6 13.a5! as favoring White after 13...bxa5 14. Bd2 or 13...b5 14. Be3 d6 15.b4 Be7 16. Nxe6 fxe6 17. Qg4 Qc8 18.bxc5 dxc5 19. Bh6, intending Rad1, Rfe1, h4–h5 "with great pressure for just a pawn". 13. Ra3 0-0 14. Rg3 f5 15. Bd5 Rf6? Better is 15... Bxd5!? 16. Qxd5+ Rf7 17. Nh5 with a strong attack. 16. Re1 Bxd5 17. Qxd5+ Rf7 18. Nh5 g6 19. Bh6 Nc6 20. Rge3 1–0 White threatens 21. Nf6+! Bxf6 22. Re8+. On 20...gxh5, 21. Rg3+ wins. Bf8 21. Re8 gxh5 23. Bxf8!. Ra8 21. Rxe7! Nxe7 and now either 22. Rxe7 Qxe7 23. Qxa8+ or 22. Nf6+ Kh8 23. Qxf7 wins. A pitfall for Black in this opening, the Matovinsky Gambit, dates from a game by the 17th-century Italian chess player and writer Gioachino Greco. Greco–NN, 1619: 1. E4 b6 2. D4 Bb7 3. Bd3 f5? Bauer calls this move "simply suicidal". Black gravely weakens his kingside in an attempt to gain material, but White can win by falling into Black's "trap". Normal is 3...e6 or 3... Nf6. Possible is 3...g6 heading for a Hippopotamus Defence, when Martin considers 4.f4 f5!

Strong for Black. 4. Exf5! Bxg2 5. Qh5+ g6 6. Fxg6 Nf6?? 7. Gxh7+ Nxh5 8. Bg6# 1–0 A better try for Black is 6... Bg7! Staunton wrote in 1847 that White got the advantage with 7.gxh7+ Kf8 8.hxg8=Q+ Kxg8 9. Qg4 Bxh1 10.h4 e6 11.h5. Over 120 years Black improved on this analysis with both 10... Qf8 11.h5 Qf6 12.h6 Rxh6 13. Bxh6 Qxh6 Hendler–Radchenko, Kiev 1970 and 10... Bd5 11.h5 Be6 12. Qg2 Rxh5 Schmit–Vitolins, Latvia 1969, winning in both games. However, White is winning after 7. Qf5! Nf6 8. Bh6!! Bxh6 9.gxh7 and now: According to both Soltis and Kapitaniak, 7.gxh7+ Kf8 8. Nf3! is strong: Watson writes that although 7. Qf5! is the "traditional" refutation and does indeed win, "the analysis is complicated", Spinhoven's 8. Nf3! "is clearer". Instead of fianchettoing, Black can proceed differently by playing his queen's bishop to a6, the Guatemala Defence, so-named because the Guatemala Chess Club used the line in a 1949 correspondence game. Andrew Soltis writes that it ha