Good morning. Welcome to the last day of the conference. My name is Lukas and I'll be talking about a performance compiler and how, and my journey of integrating a Ruby on-res application with performance compiler. So I'll explain a little bit of what the performance compiler is and then I'll dive into the integration. So this is more talk about lesson learn, the lessons learned about, during the integration and with the PCP. So the object, the subject of the talk is the foreman, which is the, I like to say server for, sorry, software for server management. It has a lot of features. It's open source project. It's, as I've said, written on Ruby on Rails. We do have a booth there in the main hall. So stop by if you're interested. I want to go into the details. And my motivation was Red Hat Sales Satellite 6 product, which is based on the foreman, except it's in red color and all with all the documentation and stuff. And my project was to improve performance monitoring of satellites. And so I was sticking for some solution, something simple that customers can install, which is not complex to deploy. And PCP looks like a great tool for the job. So what is a performance compiler or PCP? It is, I like to say, different monitoring software. It is a different in a way that in standard monitoring solutions you have managed nodes or monitored nodes. And then the software itself and then some kind of database, which is completely separate entity. So most of the software uses non-relation databases or although some of them do use RDBMS, but this is the design. So the problem is the database is tightly coupled to the software and you can't get away from it. And you need to deploy and manage both, which can be challenging. If we want to go after a performance issue, I don't want to tell the customer to install Nagios or install Prometheus or install something very complex. I don't just want to have something, some tool that is available on the server, which can be used. And that is actually PCP case. PCP does not have any kind of database. It does have a demon that does the monitoring and there is another demon that if you opt in, you can actually store the metrics, the readings of the monitoring in what's called archive files. So these are just similar to log files, but these are binary files. And then you can easily take the archive and send it over email or whatever and we can take a look, which is great. So in short, PCP is an open-source framework, basically, or toolkit, I should say, for monitoring and analyzing performance data. It has a lot of features. I just keep pointing it to you. It's very lightweight, which I really like. It's just four megabytes RPM, probably, or any kind of packages, very small. And distributed, you can basically, when it's single in node, multiple nodes, you can deploy various strategies. You can opt in collecting archives or on all hosts or several hosts, depends on your setup. And it's in all range of distributions and you don't need any kind of external database, which is great. It provides basic metrics type, which all the monitoring solutions do provide. But it also includes units, which is pretty nice, because I've seen many times that you have some graph and you see millions of units and you don't know if these are IOS per second, kilobytes, megabytes, you're not sure. And PCP has this in the metadata, so it shows you correctly if that's bytes per second or kilobytes per second, megabytes, it will recalculate that for you, which is great. You can do live on historical data, obviously. It is a very high resolution. So there's one upstream user who uses PCP, which is Netflix, and they are doing a lot of, I guess, high resolution live monitoring. So it scales pretty well, I guess. One of the nice features is hot port monitoring. You can opt in some processes, which are your most interested in. For example, a process that utilizes IO a little bit or CPU, and then PCP can gather more data from those processes. So you don't need to gather them all. That would be too much of data. You can export and integrate with third parties. There's a couple of command line tools, or I should say many command line tools for analysis and stuff, which I really like because I don't need to install anything on my PC or laptop to analyze the data. I don't need to install database or something. You just run the tool and see the results. And a couple of graphical tools I'll show some screenshots. Agents, of course, plus 100 packages or engines in Fedora, and good documentation. And it's actually pretty old.  It roots in SGI, which is still a company that does a lot of HPC computing. And the overall design is pretty simple. You have the main demon, which is called PMCD, collecting demons, stands for the collecting demons in CD. And then you have a couple of agents, which are running usually as sub-processes. The PMCD manages them all. So they do the actual performance collecting. And then you have consumers, which are usually utilities. So PM chart, PM stat, PM logger. PM logger especially, it's actually a demon. And if you run it, if you enable it, it starts collecting the metrics you configure to archive files. So you don't need to gather metrics into archive files if you don't want to. That's completely optional. And then all the same tools, which is great, let's say PM stat is one of the command line tools, can work alive, connecting to the PMCD, local or remote, or you can also load the archive file, which is great. Good morning. So here's a triple example of such a PMD agent. As you can see, it's pretty much simple. It's very similar to any other monitoring software. You just do some initialization and just then you have a callback. So the callback is called every second, every 10 minutes. And that's the place where you do the collecting data. And notes the block metric here are the units. So in this case, it's counter. I'm selling the PCB that this is a counter and I'm counting, you know, in the second units. Here's an example of a tool. PCP comes with a variety of command line tools, which I really prefer, but if we're into graphical tools, PM Trot, PM Trot, I think it's the tool. This is a cute application. It runs on Linux. It runs on, it should run on MEC, I guess. It doesn't run on Windows, I guess. And you can easily correlate stuff. Works pretty well. There's this play, pause, rewind, set of buttons you can use. So if you have an archive file, which you gathered from running instance, you can load it up into PCP chart and just, you know, go back in time and, you know, rewind and stuff. It's very, very nice. And then PCP itself comes with a couple of graphical dashboards, I should say. Those come with in separate packages. So the PCP package is called PCP on both Fedora and Debian systems. And if you want one of those, you need to install web API demon and then the web app Grafana vector. Those are the two. I think there's one, one, another. I'm not sure. I've only used these two. And just enable the demon and it runs on a weird port, of course. Just open a firewall and then what you're getting is if you go to slash Grafana, if you know Grafana is a JavaScript framework for doing a lot of graphs, you know, doing graphing. And the way it works is the PM WebD demon emulates Grafana API. So basically Grafana JSON, sorry, Grafana JavaScript thinks it's talking to Grafana API, but it's actually talking to PCP. And PCP provides the data. So you can easily have the data. And the way it works is for Grafana, it's actually reading those historical data from archive files. You can go back in, you know, like one year or something and just, you know, see, see the disadvantage of this approach is you're not getting the live data like past seconds, past 10 seconds. It appears here after a minute or two, after the PM logger actually writes data into the archive files, which is, you know, which is fine. If you want actually the live data, there's this another tool called Vector. This is provided by Netflix, which is actually one of the major users of PCP. And this is actually the opposite. It doesn't read any data from archive files or archive files, something like database, but PCP uses archive files, something like log files, but binary. This is actually connecting to the PMCD and reading the values from there. So it can only show, it won't show any historical data. Just once you connect there, it starts, you know, you know, plotting the numbers and just you need to wait 15 minutes until you get something like that, something like this. So that's vector. All right. Okay, go ahead. Is Vector only used for live data or can also somehow get data from some store venue and you can use it as an interface for historical data? No, you actually can't. They are very opinionated about this. They want to see live data only. So you need to use Grafana for that. Or of course, command line tools, which I'm going to show you, because very much here. Can you read it? So the PMCD is the demon you run. Again, PCP is very live fight. That's what I like it. And also it's included in rel 7 and 6 by default, which is great because it's in base repositories. It has a couple of packages in optional. But if you use CentOS or Fedora, it's there if you use DBN or any kind of DBN distribution. So any major distribution is there. So you need to start the PMCD and that's it. As you can see, it's also spawned several agents, which you can configure, you know, by default, it spawns a couple of agents there.  And if PCP is running or not, and then agents, which are enabled. PCP organizes the metrics in a tree in our hierarchy, separated by dots. PMInfo is one of the main commands you use to list all the metrics. You can actually read and plot. I'm gripping actually everything that starts with contains these partitions. So as you can see, it's pretty obvious what these mean, I guess. You can see a little bit more of information as upset PCP maintains in the meta data units, I mean, units and data type and units. So it can actually show you nicely formatted output like in kilobytes, megabytes, you know, human readable output actually. And if I provide a little bit more information, PCP is using this technique called instances. It's nothing new, many other monitoring software justice. It's obviously partitions, we have multiple partitions, so you don't want to create a metric for each individual partition, which this can change a lot. So every metric can have multiple partitions, sorry, multiple instances, which you refer by numbers or strings. So here we have two partitions on this server. The same goes for, for example, this is kernel or load, which is obviously a load, and we have one, five and 15 minutes. And here is an example of how you can read, actually, some data. So I'm doing a PMval command and I'm telling it which metric I want to see, and optionally I can specify partitions, I mean instances, and it will do until I do control C. I specified I want to see five seconds, five examples, it gathers one, you know, by, each second, by default, PCP, if you connect life. So PMval is nice, but PMstat is, if you know VMstat, Unix command, it's a very similar interface. So if you're familiar with VMstat, you need to just quickly show what's going on. PMstat is the tool of choice, and it works the same way. As I've said, all the tools you see here can actually work with archive files too. So if you downloaded an archive file from, or your customer sent you an archive file from yesterday, you can actually specify dash ale and archive file and you can go back in time and, you know, seek, which is great, you know, this is pretty unique, I like that. If you know IOSstat, obviously, there's another tool, and I like this approach, PCP, that kind of don't reinvent the wheel, and if you're familiar with Unix tools, they will provide you the PCP versions of them. So VMstat, IOSstat, it's pretty similar. It's not the same, they do not aim for the total compatibility, but it works. So I have an archive file, recorded like a couple of days ago, so this is how archive file looks like, just a binary blob with some metadata. And I'll tell this another tool, which is PMlock summary, which is able to calculate you summaries, calculate the average values and stuff. So I'm telling it, okay, from 9 to 9.15 in the morning, calculate me some, you know, general average values for this partitions with bytes. So this is actually my workstation, so I have a couple of partitions here. So from here I can tell that it was, like, this is my main part. On average it was, is that writing or reading, I'm not sure, reading 14, 15 megabytes per second on average within this time frame. Now if you're familiar with Atop, look on this. This is Atop, basically running and asking the PCP, actually it's not Atop, it's a rewritten Atop, and you can do this again, go back in time and, you know, seek. So if you have an archive file, this is great, you can see which processes are actually, you know, doing some stuff. As you can see, I don't see details, you know, all the processes collecting that would be, would generate a lot of data. But you can opt in, there is this, there is a way to do this, to actually tell PCP together either all of the processes or some of the processes. So this is the same, but actually I'm, sorry, the previous example was live, this is actually from the archive file. So here, here I missed the list of processes. I can specify I want to see all the processes which consumes more than one gigabyte of memory, and PCP will gather the data for me.  So I would see the details in the, in the Atop. I don't have a root here, so anyone, anyone, anyone. And you can, of course, this is dynamic configuration. You, you want to put this into configuration file to have this persistent. And then if you know SAR, obviously there's another tool called Atop SAR, which provides you some data in SAR fashion. And there's a couple of other tools, there is a new tool as well that, you know, shows you a lot of data in a nice, nice format of the way, but I want you to go into details. PCP.io is the main website, go there and see yourself. So, quickly, where is it? All right. So, I said Ruby, yeah. So I, we had this, we have this nice open source project called Forman, which is Ruby on Rails application. Now, PCP, you can write agents in pretty much every single language except Ruby, of course, all right. So I was thinking like, okay, how do you approach this? Because I wanted to, you know, see the data in PCP. So there are a couple of options. Writing an agent, obviously the hardest way, instrumenting and then tracing. So there is a small, small agent called trace. And it provides a very simple API. It's meant to be like for cron jobs. You can, you know, send some metrics from cron jobs and stuff. So obviously, obviously I made a PCP trace gem, Ruby gem, which fulfills this API. You just need to install a couple of dependencies because it's native. And this is how you use it. Obviously, this didn't work well, you know. The, you know, announced a new project, of course, not a single day, announced a new open source project. But the PCP, they've told me, this API is actually being depreciated. So it was not good, you know, try. So instrumenting is another way of gathering data from applications. So there's a memory map value API kind of, you can create a memory web file. And then the PCP, there's a MMV agent, which reached those values. It's pretty fast. And I was thinking like it's a good fit. Again, Ruby don't have any library. So I was thinking like writing, writing native MMV Ruby, but then I found that there is a goal line library called speed, which was Google sum of project two years ago. And it provides me everything I need. So actually, I wrote, and I was thinking like, since the PCP tool mechanism, and we have for Ruby, you obviously need to spawn multiple processes because Ruby doesn't work well with multi-threaded. Actually, the libraries are not safe. Thread safe. So I was thinking like pushing those data from the Ruby application as soon as possible. And I found this UDP protocol, which is StatsD. It's just a UDP packet, text space. You just send a metric number and the type. MS stands for milliseconds, like time, duration, gauge, and counter. And then that was the idea. To write a library, which I called, or it's a demo on PCP, which is table name, I know. But it works. It listens to UDP packets from StatsD and it's kind of using the MMV API to push them into a PCP. And this is how Forman is integrated today. So you need to run another demon and PCP and demon and Forman. And you can get those internal, I say, telemetry, very internal numbers from the application, like what is performing well and what does not. So again, hey, new project. But the PCP Devs. Okay, MMV is not probably the best way. It was meant to do the instrumentation of actually applications in CC++ and Java and go. So I thought this is a temporary solution. So finally, I'm able to announce that I'm mentoring Diploma Thesis at Pascal University as students implementing a fully featured PMDA agent, which will be PMDA StatsD, probably its name, and will be high-performance C-coded, multi-threaded, pluggable, which HDID histogram supports. So if you're working with count, if you're working with time data, you need to obviously aggregate the data and do some, usually histograms is the answer in monitoring. And it will replace both Trace API, which is appreciated now, and the MMV StatsD demon, which I wrote. And hopefully the next year will have, or this year will have a nice agent to do monitoring of Forman. Second PCP will have StatsD agent, which is not available today, which is great. And everybody can profit. It's not just for the Ruby world. Basically, you can send the StatsD packets from anything, like using Netskites from a shell skip, right? You can easily send the crown job, how the crown job is actually performing, or how long it takes, which is great. So yeah, that's it. They told me to put in some numbers. So I was thinking one is good number. This was one lesson for me. Evolution is still better than the revolution. I learned a lot along the way, and finally I got there. Hopefully we'll get there. Questions? How much time do we have? Five minutes? No, one minute. So this talk is already available on this. I've pre-recorded the demo, like my dry run is there, and also the slides should be available somewhere on my, I'll put it on my blog. Thanks for coming and enjoy the last day of the conference. Thank you.


No one's gonna watch that walkthrough There's a lot of people who watched all of the death walkthrough just saying myself Probably Never mind Probably all whiz kids. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I understand considering it's a whole bunch of videos on whiz Yeah, I'm gonna speak whiz kids to watch that, you know Just saying stardew valley kids What do I start you valley kids? You mean the six stardew valley kids? Thank you guys very much No, you need us to carry you through the stale areas we do. Oh, I got stark waves hat I got it. I got his balance that Congrats it actually is balanced brim, but oh no, no, it's his way There's also another word for a balanced wave You gotta wake up and have a healthy balanced way in the morning. Well, it's a well a balanced wave You know, it's like a it's like a healthy diet, but a healthy wave Exactly Understandable have a nice day. Oh, I'll put the car amount to some can all match except for rows. Oh I It's okay She has a charity Mount. She she she gave to charity. She out. She she out to dust.  Exactly, I should have edited him into playing again after six thousand year break It was only six months 6,000 million years exactly. I'm gonna back out of the last the last second by the way fine. We got Roses better than you.  So if you bought them, I just like to say that's a lot of that's a lot of pressure Did you like my blade? Yeah, thanks. I give it to Finn all the time Thanks, friend. No, yes, I do Me too. I give you that exact blade all the time because I use it when I'm Giving us blades to people. Yeah, I thought he liked receiving blades So likes giving them though. It's his preferable blade choice would be giving blades He's not a beta. He's an alpha Pretty go away. We don't need you. Don't worry. Yeah, he's not in the battle I'm not now. No, you're just gonna floss. Yeah He's like he's more moonwalking. Oh, no, he's flossing. Good work. I'm just letting him balance a bit kid. He's doing an exercise Pretty hot Don't get crabs kids. Don't get crabs. Hey, look, you're you're fizzling like brent when he tries to heal Yeah, wow Okay Hey, tiley, you'll be proud of me now. I have a zero percent chance of um fizzling Um healing spells. Thank god. Except pigsy except pigsy, but I don't have it So it's not worth it.  My gith would have killed one shot.  My gith would have one shot with lulu No, it wouldn't have Your death can't do six thousand damage with a with a non-bladed lulu Oh, it was non-bladed. I thought you've been here for a while. Why did you not blade? I had to prism him He's myth. No, you don't instead Or you could just get good.  I do have peers. I have a lot of peers like five that didn't even kill. Good job You're really just bullying tyler and I don't think he's bullying me.  I'm sorry What goes around comes around I'm just saying you sound like an actual job. He started it I am a 12 year old. Thanks. Thanks for noticing finally god friend. You're bad Brent, you're the one who you're the one who had to come beg me and rose to come help you guys Because you can't do the solarium with two people I mean me and finn made a deal But we're just too lazy finn said you talk to tyler and I'll talk to rose that's what he said I'm like fine. Yeah, we do that. I was like, let's get the troops and the troops have been gathered finn wanted up not me I didn't necessarily want it.  What was funny. He was I'm doing it Let's go. He was he was vaping to the sound of um to the sound of forest lord earlier No joke. Yeah, I was I was actually really funny Messed up I thought you're in the puzzle. Why would you mess it up? You're never finishing this puzzle I don't care Wow, what great content This is so You know what's funny? He was the one calling me a 12 year old just before True just saying But this is my puzzle you mess with my puzzle you get Bad puzzles and you were calling me a 12 year old just before just saying dude. He looks like an angry squidward from spot So true It looks like he looks like he's mildly disappointed with his life and he's like I'm just gonna be an angry squidward for the rest of it And Brent kind of looks like an angry squidward Thanks. What? Yeah, what about the dabbing squidward? That's Brent's If I could describe if I could if I could describe Brent in two words, it would be dabbing squidward Describe me in two words Dabbing squidward You guys should get to uh, you guys should get to chrysalis today Yeah, y'all should just get me the rest of the way through chrysalis if you want Yeah, road to 100 with rose getting her to the end of chrysalis I can hope on my death if you want rose if you want I don't actually need help really. That's it's I'll let you kill the boss.  Is that a deal?  Yep. Dang done already done already done that done that On it on it, right? Yeah, did that in the first fight? Yeah, you gotta give her the good heal. Okay. Oh friend did that We good. We good. We good. Yep. Yep. Yes. I'm stuck in the in the star of solist. Yeah This is like more broken up than one of my stories So three You got it. You got to farm with her until she gets that good gear. Okay. Yep. Okay. Yeah, understandable Four you always got to compliment her pet. Yep. What a nice pair you've got rose. It's very important.  Yeah, number six bonus bonus tip makes make floss your bonus tip bonus tip there bonus step We've done all of those and still don't have a whiz babe make floss your make floss your victory dancing gg Gg for days No whiz babe can resist. I moved them into afk. I hope you enjoyed that Thank you rose for helping you were great. I appreciate it and also nice pet by the way Oh my god my heart Next time we head into the floating land Thank you for watching remember to like and subscribe and if you've already subscribed press the little bell So you know exactly when I post another video and remember craft outside the box outside the box Bye guys


Okay. So, we would begin as far as 19th 2015. This is an interview with Chuck Edwards, taking place in Saskatoon. The interviewer is Eric Wydenhammer. If you could start by giving us your name and age to begin with. My name is Chuck Edwards and I'm 71.  And where were you born? I was born in Arbita. It's on the Sagina River. I was born there because my father worked for Alkan. Did your father work for Alkan? My mother did. My mother, after she got married, was a mother. But she did have a master's degree in chemistry. What did you do as a child to pass the time? When I was young, I played. I grew up in St. Lambert. It was a small town. It was right across the river from Montreal, across the Victoria Bridge. It's where the first lock is. When I was there, it was about 10,000 people. There was a lot of empty space. There were open fields. It was a great swamp for you to play in. My parents didn't know about it. So yeah, growing up, I played sports. I liked to swim and ran around. Was it a very common community? When I was there, about 50-50. It was interesting. They were a separate community. We went to different schools. We went to different churches. Not so much in Greece, but we went to high schools. We started playing organized sports. It was bilingual because we were all well-informed. They used whatever language was handy at the time. Football, hockey, there was nobody trying to make sure it was in English half the time or French half the time. Whatever it was, they just used it. Later, when I worked here in the federal government, they wanted me to go to language training. I went to the first session in a room like this. I said, I don't really need this. I grew up speaking French. So I talked to him for a while. He says, where did you learn that? I said, playing hockey. He says, I know what you mean, but it's not polite. Did you find you had an early passion for science or engineering or metallurgy in particular? I had a passion for science. I like science and math. My father had a Ph.D. in chemistry. He probably wouldn't have been better off in his life than a professor, instead of working for an Alcantara company like that. I got a lot of chemistry lectures over dinner. I was actually in second-year university before I learned any chemistry from anybody but my father. What I didn't know was what I wanted to be. I knew what I wanted to do just generally.  Somewhere I was four. We built what I would call a fort. We basically wouldn't lean against the house. I can remember building it myself, but obviously I didn't. My mother says while my father was building it, my brother was there with a hammer, which is dangerous because he's not good with tools. I spent my time with a notebook in my eyes. So she built it. I was actually in grade 10. We didn't have much in the way. We had no career training at all. We had a sort of career day once a year, some people couldn't even talk to you for a while. Well, until I was in grade 10, I figured I'd be a mountain because they had the best outfit. But the guy came out in grade 10. When I was in grade 10, I started talking about what I was doing. And I said, that's what I want to do. What do you do? He said, why am I an engineer? I said, all right. That was it. I was lucky you showed up. Could you tell us a little bit more about your education and the university? Well, I went to grade school in high school in St. Lambert. With Schomblin County High School, I think their name is changed now. But St. Lambert was a fairly affluent town city. And our school was very, very academically oriented. For most of this, it was an assumption running on a university. So the question was, what's the meaning of the study? And in a high school graduate class, when I graduated, I don't remember anybody who didn't go to university. So it was that kind of school. But I decided I wanted to go to Queens. So I spent another year in high school in Montreal, getting my grade 12. So we went to Queens. What classes did you enjoy when you were at university? I liked pretty much everything except organic chemistry, which it really just was. I mean, I understood it. I liked the physical chemistry. I was lucky. I took a course that may have disappeared from Queens, but it was called engineering chemistry. And you were taught in the chemistry department mostly. But then you also took the basic course that engineering did. So first year in the field school, in the survey, you did some civil, some mechanical geology, that kind of thing. So as I said, it was filled your time. I remember in my first year, I had one spare, one one spare in a whole week. So it kind of resented. Because there were a whole bunch of people in most of my chemistry classes who were in arts and science chemistry. And they had like 12 spares. But hey, I didn't, it was a, it was a very, very good. It was initially designed to produce chemists for not research chemists, but VSE chemists that work in industry. But it had drifted a lot, a lot since I was there. A number of us went to law school. A number of us went on to graduate school. There were a few of us that actually went like that, who went to work in industry instead of as chemists. So what made you, how did you become interested in mining and metallurgy? Well, it was an accident. The actual, when I went back to grad school, I actually thought I would be a professor. But a few years in grad school indicated to me that I didn't want to spend the rest of my life in a university.  And after I left school, I had a trouble getting a job for a while. And Hinkle offered me a job. He was just a temporary job at their research lab in Mississauga doing vocation research. Because I knew enough surface chemistry to do that. So I got on with Hinkle and I guess I did a good job because they kept me on and that was it. So I've been in mining and metallurgy ever since. And it's not, frankly, before I did that, when I was in grad school, I certainly wasn't preparing to be in the mining industry. But I wasn't preparing to be in any industry. I was just carrying on this fairly exotic research and we were going to see what happened afterwards. So in the end, it's all application of math, physics, chemistry, one way or the other. Do you remember anything, particularly about your first day on the job at Hinkle? Yes, I met a lot of people. And I had some difficulty in university the last few years I was there. So I made a cut of the fuss. But one of the fellows who had been in undergrad with me was over there in the lab. And the thing that startled me was, I guess he told some stories. But when people met me a couple of days later, they came back that most people had one of two comments. And one was, if you really did what I heard you did, you're crazy. And the other one was, you're not as big as we thought you'd be. So that's what I remember. I also remember that the lab we worked in, the Met Lab, was in the basement of the building. And it was, there were no windows in the basement. It was all gray. I mean, the counter did the laptop and gray in, so it was gray and the desk was gray. A couple of us, the first few weeks I was there, asked the thing, you know, tune it up, make it a little brighter. And what we got told us, oh, we're going to put up some nice pictures. So they did. And the pictures they put up were charcoal drawings of the cooperations. Oh, goodness. That's really nice. So it was a great place to work. How long did you work there? And where did you go afterwards? I was two years there, basically doing vocation research. And at the time, INCO had a mine in the Manitoba called Pipe Mine. It was an open pit. It was relatively cheap to mine, but the ore had a lot of asbestos in it. And it didn't process properly. It didn't be old processes. So I spent most of that two years looking at pipe ore, trying to figure out how to deal with it. And it actually made some really interesting discoveries. And after I've been there a couple of years, the barefoot worst, I went up to, set me up to Thompson to talk to the people there about processing pipe ore. And when I arrived, they'd been told ahead of time that I was the corporate expert on processing pipe ore, which was natural. And in fact, I'd been in the lab. I hadn't been in the industry before. So luckily, I arrived early in the day, and I had a couple of friends there already, and they toured me through the mill. So by the time I came to my talk in the afternoon, I could actually talk, but I couldn't see it. So that was, and then not long after that, I got asked to go to Thompson to set up part of the mill to actually run the pipe ore. So I did that. So your research ideas were implemented in processing the ore? Yeah, oh yeah. And they still are. I was in Thompson a few weeks ago on a job for a plastic wheeler here. And the basics of the process they're using dealing with these high magnies and oxide ores are basically who came out of my research back in the 70s. So it was nice to see it. It was actually useful research. So what was your, how did you proceed towards the uranium industry? Well, I worked for INCO and I was there a couple of years and things were slowing down. So I was looking for another job and there was a job open in Ottawa for the elder on the field. So I went down into the mill and they hired me there. So that was my first, I'd been aware of uranium and nuclear power and so on beforehand. But my father graduated his PhD. He was in the States. And his professors say he had a job for him but he had to stay in the States for and it was very hush hush and he wanted. And my father said he wanted to go back to Canada so he went to our writer for help. And the job he turned down was with the Manhattan Brooklyn. So I'd been aware of giving uranium and daily. Del Dorado was a good place for me. It was a lot of fun. How did you eventually become involved with Amac Foster Wheeler? I've been here for almost seven years now. So I'd known that the job I had before this was chemical. And I was there. The director of engineering projects. So I did a lot of hiring of consultants when I was there. And when I decided it was chemical I aimed it for the wind and debris so that I knew from working with Amac people that it would be a good place to work for so long so I came here. And then returning to Amac Foster Wheeler for a while. So what sort of research was done at Camico? Camico originally had a... Well, I was in the research lab in Ottawa and we were doing a lot of research. There were discovered, you know, in the drug orgy who cast in the city of the... What they were finding in exploration was processable. We did a lot of work on trying to improve operations. At the time, Del Dorado owned... When I was there, owned the big uranium mine. They owned those give-or-much. We did a lot of work there on improving the operation. And I was lucky because in my fourth year an undergrad at Queens took a course in the computer program. So that would have been 1964-65. That was the first year Queens took a computer program. So for most people my age, I was sort of ahead of the curve on using computers. And when I was at Del Dorado we were having a lot of trouble with some of the leaching and give-or-much. So we actually, we had, before I arrived there we developed really nice little apparatus that had the superbly nubic, the leaching equipment and the give-or-much over a tank like this was a thousand times smaller than the equipment. But we did a factorial design test. And it turned out that the way we thought the process, the leaching process, what affected the leaching process, they were highly confounded. And we hadn't realized that before. So the result of that was we got the platforming and your best ever did. So that was the last fact. This was an application of computers? Well, it was an application of, it's a factorial design. It's a statistical way to design experiments so you get the most information on the least work. And you don't do the variables one variable at a time. They're all packed at the same time so you can find out how they're confounded. So that was, that was interesting. And one of the projects we bought at the time was a key like federal government that changed the rules so that a foreign company couldn't own 100% of the uranium operation. Elder Addo got part of the key leak projects. And our co-partner on that didn't have much experience in uranium processing. So Elder Addo carried the load there. And I was assigned to come here to Saskatoon for subunions and also other places where the actual testing was big too. I actually, I still have it because I found it later but they wrote a little four page memo playing back to auto one time and said basically this is not going very well. The test work is not well planned and we'll manage. And we better put somebody who knows what they're doing on this job or we're going to lose our shirt. But I found it. Nothing happened. A fellow who grabbed a lab came into my office and said, you know, we've got to go downtown. They want to see it. So we went down there. What are their VP operations in big, big, big deaths and nothing on it except mine done well.  I'm in trouble. And he said, we've read your memo and we agree and you're it. What do you mean? I mean, you're taking charge for us. I'm all out of testing. So I ended up, I was telling the truth. I was slightly out of my depth.  And so I ended up being one of the two design engineers for Keelik. So, which was fine. Could you describe some of the technologies involved in finding Keelik? Well, Keelik, Keelik at the time. The average grade of your bodies there was two and a half, three, three and a half percent. Which by today's at the best standard is not my grade. Today's at the best of my high grade is 20 percent. But at three and a half percent was the highest grade anybody's seen at the time. And still by global standards it's very high. So there was a lot of worry about how to process the high grade organ. And also the organ had nickel in it. Which some of the at the best, so that complicated things. So we did a lot of work on looking at various reaching systems. And we ended up with auto-plays. Which worked very well. Great machines. We had a lot of work on designing the blending system. So we kept it because with a high grade or everybody like that there's some very high grade spots. It's a real overage spot. So we had them blend them to get a steady feed to a nuke. We had a lot of discussions at the time whether we'd use a SAG mill.  Today they're standard stuff. But they were unproven at the time. And we ended up going with a SAG mill after the startup. And again, it worked like a charm. And one of the discussions was whether to recover the nickel. Fortunately it got pushed aside and nickel wasn't recovered. But there was a lot of work to make sure that you could extract virtually all the uranium and have virtually none of the nickel end up in your product. So it was a, the unit operations were not much different from the past. But we did a lot of new work because of the high grade. And in the end, at the time the mill happened to start up about the time uranium prices were high. So it made a ton of money. Still is. So do you travel much for your work? Did you work in other countries? I have. I haven't traveled much recently than last year or two, but since I've, well since I've worked for AEMEC I've been in Africa several times. I've been in Australia half a dozen times. I've stayed several times in a South American place. So it's so... The part of this job is in the consulting staff that we're willing to travel. I must admit I've been traveling much fun anymore. The first time I flew I went from Montreal down to New York City. When I landed in New York City coming in from the ocean all the lights out I was just so excited. Now I got on a plane. It's long enough to get me there on time so I asked for it. But what I do find is going to those other places meeting the new people being in that environment that's wonderful. So it's just traveling back and forth. So did you do any insights on the particular characteristics of business or engineering culture in Canada? I think the engineering culture in Canada is pretty south. Especially in the uranium industry one thing that surprised me is that I found that there is a there's a Canadian way of doing things there's an American way of doing things that are pretty close. There's an Australian way of doing things which is quite different. And then there's Eurasian way of doing things which is quite different. And it's just all those industries the uranium industry isn't very fake. But it's just all those those different areas where they're called different universes and all those things. And I read some when I was a chemical I would do diligence on a property that they were thinking about and I saw the test work and the test work was just they said well it works we're over here. But they didn't read the literature from Canada. So one of the things I've been doing here at Amon Foster Wheeler is preparing our uranium move to basically be able to say no matter where you are we can bring to your project the best available global technology. Not the best available local technology tailored for you. I think we're in a position to do that now. And I find that really satisfying. I've been very frustrated looking at something and saying well they turned that down and I know it works because they were Australian and the operation was in Canada. So let's say Amon Foster Wheeler's role in the uranium industry with service? Well Amon Foster Wheeler's big company now are 40,000 people. And for the uranium especially I think it's important to be on the ground where you're going to build operations. And we are, we have offices basically in every uranium active area in the world. And we can provide essentially create a concept to close it. So if you're an exploration company we can help in designing and analyzing your drill program. We can take your drill results and test work and design a mill for you and tailings handling and pull a treatment to our metal protection. Then we can design a mill for you and we can help you commission it and we can help you fix it up or optimize it as you're running and when time comes to decommissioning we can do that too. So the part I had to do was mill design. So it'll be the company can do that essentially. And AMAC owns a certain series of technologies and a certain mill setup? No, we don't own the technology. We're aware of it. And parts of it we're experts in. But no, we don't. AMAC doesn't develop. We sometimes we recently did test work to develop innovative flow sheets or innovative operations. Could you describe your involvement with CIM? I've been involved with CIM pretty continuously since I started in 1974. And one thing I found with CIM is that the more involved you are the more fun it is. It's a great organization. Wonderful people. You make friends for life. And in CIM I've had most positions that exist in a chair of a local branch in three different places. I'm the chair of a local branch here now because nobody else wants to do it. I've been a district vice president the chair of the community of processors and I was president of CIM a few years back. So very fulfilling. It's just wonderful. Are you involved with any other professional organizations? Not really. I'm a professional engineer but I'm not involved in the committees or the management. So I'm involved, I belong to a car club. But not professionally. Professionally it's been CIM and especially in CIM the Canadian river flow sensors. You've been described as a public advocate for nuclear power. Can you describe how the conversation around nuclear power has changed over time? Well the nuclear power I think it's unfortunate that nuclear industry is born out of a ball rather than a ball. But I do think that nuclear power is the answer. You'll see up to two issues. It's also on a on a lifetime basis because it's as clean as wind and so. So I had the opportunity because I was a Syria distinguished lecturer. The title of my talk was the role of uranium and nuclear power in combating over time to change. And I gave that talk 30 or 40 times. So it's a there's some places that had a lot of opposition in other places people just sort of odd because I tried to make the case. So that I've been in an adequate position like that for decades now. So I don't give that talk much anymore. But every now and then somebody wants it so I'll do it again. You find that public attitudes have changed over time? Public attitudes what most people know about nuclear power is the accidents. So you know what you know what we're pushing. But the fact that you have those are both very bad accidents.  So it's the same argument for no automobiles. Stop using cars because they kill people and make the same response. So it's the same argument for no automobiles. Part of the nuclear part of the part of the opposition to nuclear not just nuclear power but the whole nuclear industry is not rational. It's not based on fact it's always emotional. So it's religious. Which are you know much argument there. So I guess human factors and safety culture these are all big issues in the sort of industry. Yeah given the number of reactors there are on the planet and the number of hours they can run it the safety performance is pretty good. Chernobyl was caught by a batch of Soviet Army people and went in and shut down the computer and tried to run the planet outside the design parameters and Fukushima essentially the earthquake shook the plant and the plant shut down exactly the way they're supposed to be. It was the tsunami that took them out and the tsunami caused it took out their backup power. That's what caused the real damage. If there hadn't been a tsunami they would have been shut down and restarted. How has the global demand for mined uranium affected your field over time? The more demand there is the more projects there are. If you're working for a company like Chernobyl then the more demand there is the more company the more cash the company has to build on new projects and developments and so on. So essentially then like all design engineers consulting groups and operating you know it's a metal place goes up and down and your fortune goes up and down. What do you think the prospects are for the industry in the near term? I think the price will go up. It's beginning to, one of the things that's kept it down the last a while was the after she and Japan shut down all its reactors. They're beginning to restart those reactors. That doesn't mean much in the global supply and demand but it means a lot emotionally. So just the perception. And given the number of reactors that are running and the reactors being built there's going to have to be more uranium production fairly soon. So I'll expect the price to come up because the price where it is is too low to get new operators into operation. How present or absent were women in your workplace throughout your career? Fairly absent. I mean the mining industry is fairly conservative in that regard. It's not as bad as it used to be. I mean when I started to start at first year in Queens you have your orientation and so on. And the guys I was in science 65 so these guys in science 64 were talking about one of the things they were proudest of was that they had a woman in their class the year before. And a batch of them decided they didn't want a woman. So what they told us is they dated her out. They just bothered her so much. Let's go to coffee and some movie and stuff like that. They made sure she failed her exams at Christmas that she was bought. And they were proud of it. And even then I was appalled. But an engineering agenda in the four years I was Queens we had no women in our class. I had a class, a graduating class, about 200. None. That's changed. I got it. And the mining industry is concerned as it is and is sort of behind behind the curve. When I worked in when I worked in Tom's I was in what we call Mill Cross's technology that I was considering like to get into operations. So I went to talk to the mill superintendent and he said I couldn't get a job in operations because I didn't weigh enough. He said oh that's a rule. So I went and asked one of the guys who didn't want to tell me he says well the purpose of the rule is to keep women out of the workforce. So and that's there are still and are still places where it's considered unlucky to have a woman to go under from. I've seen that. So that's going. It's disappeared. But it hasn't gone away totally. I have every sense of this. I have five daughters and when they were growing up I was told you can do anything you feel like. Women are not tough enough they don't understand math.  Did any of your daughters come to engineering? No. Have you ever worked in a particularly dysfunctional job or organization anything memorable? Well one plus that worked they had a large manual of ethics and but it wasn't and there were times when people would violate you turn to page 32 right and there's a violation and nothing happened. I found that very disturbing because it meant that just you know the ethics was fine the way I was but the fact that it was ignored and violated I thought that was bad. One other operation was that I took some leadership training and my group was trying to I tried to run it like a family and I got some of the other managers especially senior people they said you can't do that you can't be friendly you got to be friendly I said no I saw the way I don't tell people what to do because it's engineering I'm not competent in those disciplines so what I try to do is you make sure you find the best student you can for a job make sure that everybody understands what the goals are and how we're going to accomplish them together and then you make sure that they have everything they need to do their job but basically you know how then you get to hell out of the way and I had a lot of pushback and I said no no no you've got to be the boss so I I had to say it out loud so I was very frustrated So what are some of the other challenges that you faced over your career? Um you have to learn new things if you change jobs not so much discipline but change the part of the industry you're in I went from Ottawa working in the engineering industry where the tonnages at your mill are in the range of say 100 tons an hour I went from there to Montgomery and I was working in an oil science coaching where we were designing 15,000 tons an hour so here it but again as long as you've got the basics the chemistry, the physics and the math it's a different scale, it's a different commodity it's a different chemistry so that's one thing suppose all industries are like that but as long as you've got that sound grounding you can do pretty well that's one of the things I've talked to I speak a lot to university students recently here and especially in inventory and I tell them in your early years don't fence yourself off at one point I was looking for a job I was looking for a job a science project and I was told that a company in BC was looking for a hydro metallurgist so I phoned them up and said what do you think a hydro metallurgist does and what do you think a hydro metallurgist knows so they told me oh I'm a hydro metallurgist so I applied for the job so I had never called myself hydro metallurgist so that's one thing to tell people so I actually got that fundamental fundamentals behind it don't cut yourself off because you don't think you're a hydro metallurgist what's the most difficult project you've worked on in your life MacArthur River it was also the most fun MacArthur River is the first of those really high grade mine average grade in your early years 20% through 8 the global average is about 100 it's astonishingly high grade but because it was so high grade it had to be handled differently and mined differently then denotivated that so I was with chemical we basically had to invent everything the best kind of projects I think for engineers are the ones that nobody's ever done before they're all good so we had to invent a mining system it's raised bore mine they'll raise cores that existed before but if we used to mine ore before we had to invent the way to handle the ore after it was mined we had to because we couldn't figure out a way to shape the hoist the ore as rock we had to process it partly underground so we invented a way to handle that ore underground to grind it which I think is still the world's smallest sag mill to handle it underground we had to get it up to surface we invented ways to blend it underground to store it there were pumps available and so we we invented the Stagralla Coisting System that pumps the ore to surface as a slurry not to the pumps that never been used before but those pumps never been used for ad abacation before and we had to get the ore from the MacArthur River to Key Lake 80 kilometers away so we had to build a road between and we had to invent a way to get the ore there safely and we invented a system that holds it in tanks on the back of the truck that takes it down, fills it in the car or empties it in the Key Lake all of that all of that was random, nobody ever done it so it was difficult it was very difficult and there was a certain resistance to things because they were new but it worked like a charm so it was difficult but it was a lot of fun and really very satisfying What's the fondest memory that plays to your work? Seeing the operations that help design start up and run successfully that I got a huge charge I mean, I love this job I got a huge charge out of it and it starts with a scratch not a back problem, just a paper and you have a basic full diagram and when you see that go all the way in the process and be something like Key Lake on MacArthur River, I like that What sorts of social activities were you involved with with your co-workers after work? Oh, I played hockey hockey, softball, that kind of thing either company team or town league bowling was funny, when we were in Thompson bowling was really important bowling is one of the big things in Thompson because it's so damn cold out and we were in a mixed league, mostly married people and my wife's not very athletic and so you bowl your first game and you get your score counted and she got pregnant at the time and amazingly enough the more pregnant she got, the better she pulled so at the internet season she had to be we want to bowling throw people back tall so that was and people were just standing around saying so that was fun that's especially in remote towns like that we do a lot of things like that you're very tight town and too far to go Were there any social problems like drugs or alcohol that were particularly apparent in your amount of work? Well there, all the places I worked with dealt with a lot but it can be a problem and when I was at we had one of the chiefs nearby came in and talked to me and said you know the people who work here they earn more than most of the other people they're drinking alcohol so you've got to stop them drinking alcohol and I said I can't do that I know your problem but I can't we certainly handle it here on the site you'll have to handle it in your moment we have the same problem with people moving it's a schedule people get a job they start earning on money or more money and some of them would move away from them to live in Prince Albert or Saskatoon and I had the same with another fellow chiefs and said you know you've got to stop them moving away I said I understand your problem I can't tell people who work here I can't tell them where they live especially when you're in a remote place like that the problems in the surrounding areas they don't become your problem you may not be able to slow them but you have to help because you can't ignore what's going on I interviewed Ingen Osberg the other day I think you've worked with him in the past do you believe that Canada is losing ground in terms of research and development especially private research and development compared to where it's been in the past do you have any opinions on that? I agree I think the Canadian industry is investing too little in R&D and I think the problem comes from focus on short term in R&D as long but you have to have to finance R&D you have to be convinced and have faith in the fact that what you're investing now will have a return in the future you can know exactly what that return is going to be or what the problem is going to be but I agree I agree that the corporate reef R&D in this country is not going to start it would be better if it was brought back up to staff can you identify some Canadian accomplishments within the field of uranium mining and allergy? I think the Canadian Uranium industry has a very very good safety record in Saskatchewan the Canadian uranium mining industry has been a leader in working with First Nations people employing and training in fact the operations in other Saskatchewan are essentially gold standard I know people from Africa, Australia and trying to find out how it works here and how to make it work back home there's a lot of fly in and fly out operations around the world now and the first one was here, the first one was rather late so not my design and that was a golf minerals at the time and golf minerals were intending to build another town I know that because I've seen the design for it rapidly and blessed our hearts the provincial government at the time saw that the beaver lodge mill that I talked about before was going to be closing down soon and they were going to have essentially a gold city in Goldstown and he said we don't want to do that anymore so they denied golf minerals right in Goldstown no so the golf minerals guys are saying what are you going to do now because it was golf minerals they were golf oil and they were at the golf oil office in New York City and they were in a meeting apparently morning about this and saying now what are we going to do where we're still one of the guys in the meetings said well not many people have you got on site we fly more in that people have to wear jewellery all the time so it is the fly in and fly out if you're already in the right kind of person the right kind of situation is superb because you don't have the town you don't have a Goldstown you don't have to build the schools and hostels and stuff like this you can build a really really nice residence very comfortable to live in with that and this food and you can live in Saskatoon so it's a it works so well that we're out of the lake there are dozens and dozens around the world now so that's one and that's one Canadian contribution to global mining that I think very very few people recognize making an uranium industry we handle very high grade ores very safely how to design and operate from the highest grade to the lowest grade because we've done it and I think the Canadian the least Canadian uranium mining industry has been very innovative not afraid to try and think so and we're fairly tenacious nobody give up keep going and going really just say something about the operation in Cigar Lake some of the technical achievements there well Cigar Lake is very difficult there are times when mother nature wins and Cigar Lake mine is one of the times when mother nature is a real struggle it's very difficult to mine because the ore is not really rock there isn't a clay land and if you bore into the clay then it closes out so that's why you have to freeze it has to be remote mining because the grade is so high the same as the remote mining method at Carthage the jet boring method that is developed I think is very very very clever and it works really well so there's another operation which they bore a lot of the things we developed in Carthage where they go to mining and so on but the mining system itself is a real unique a lot of people say it's so unique that's what unique means that's what unique means and Cigar Lake is so this was the first application of jet boring to uranium mining as far as I know it's the first application of jet boring to mining anything so let me just to finish up who would you say has been your greatest mentor or has had the greatest impact on your career I think the guy who ran the lab at Eldrata nuclear when I was studying at our national he was a wonderful guy he was a immigrant from Britain he was just up in Porto and he arrived in the current Porto case got a job and he went to his bachelor's master's while he was working he ended up as a vice president of Eldrata not long after when I worked at I really loved it and he was the guy who advocated to me to get that job and spent so much money at Keywood so when I left Eldrata I knew it was a good thing I had to do it and he knew I had to do it but it's the only time I ever went in by I was leaving and we both cried we went so I loved to cry and he was he said a standard for me and we were treating people we were very gentle for him I think there have been mothers learning overall he was the immigrant and I think that's true but do you believe to be your contribution to the world of metallurgy or mining well technically I think that I've been involved in designs for upgrading plants I've been lucky to be at the right place in the right time especially here in Saskatoon so about the uranium operations in North Saskatchewan I've been involved in design engineering for all of it so that's a kind of a legacy but I think also being part of CIM and one of the things I emphasized there was leadership and we developed the leadership training and leadership development operation in CIM which is so I think the part of the technical thing I think it's just a way of leading is I say you're not a boss you don't have to be big on your chest and scream people there's better ways to do it and do that myself and try to teach other people so we're some of the most important lessons that you feel you've learned in your career you never know as much as you think you do you never know everything you can always be surprised there's always things to learn and for me that's important if I'm at a job where I'm not learning anything I'm not happy I like the challenges learning new things stretching yourself you can do that forever some of those things when you're wrong you're just waiting when I first started working for Chemical the friend of mine was the super mill superthenic and he phoned and he said we're making hydrogen or autoclosers and he said oh we are we know it's hydrogen I said well then you reach the rubber lining and he said he's eating out your shells no it's not that so everybody I mean everybody I knew he talked and said no it can't be happening and it was so all the so-called experts on that point were wrong so we got it fixed and we we never did find out exactly what was happening but we got to manage but the university here is going to start teaching minimal processing and extract the metallurgy next month and I've submitted that hydrogen generation problem to them and said I'm going to master some PhD because I want to know what else is going on I kept saying wait for 20 years but yeah it is you always have to be ready to be told no you're wrong or you don't understand is there anything else you'd like to add before we finish up and into the record well I think the mining industry mining and milling and metal processing industry has tremendous number of facets how many metals are there and there's still a lot to learn in all areas one of the things I really like about the uranium industry is relatively you know we've been mining copper for what 5,000 years well we've been mining uranium on purpose so it's relatively young and because of that there's still an immense amount to learn and that's one of the things that attracted to me attracted to me in the first place it's like you haven't got thousands of years of experience of that like I think well thank you very much for agreeing to that to the interview thank you very flat or titular wanted to talk to me


Thanks for checking out this movie review video. This is for the 2013 film Evil Dead and yes it is the remake of the Evil Dead, which is probably why they left the off of it to kind of Differentiate there. So just so you know since it is from 2013 there will be spoilers in this review So if you've not seen this and you want to see it without spoilers go watch it Then you can come back to this now. This one was directed by Fede Alvarez. I'm sorry I'm sure I'm butchering the names and I apologize Fede Alvarez who did films don't breathe and the girl in the spiders web written by Alvarez and rhodo Saegas Saegas Once again, I'm sorry Who also wrote the script for don't breathe with Alvarez? And Diablo Cody actually ended up doing revisions to the script because apparently because the two original writers Were not didn't have English as their first language They wanted to make sure that things translated the best since the film was going to be in English So it kind of makes sense that Diablo Cody then kind of you know did a pass at it So that's good. This produced by Rob Tappert Sam Raimi and Bruce Campbell So yes the original people had buy-in on this they you know had input with it Which is a good thing, which is why I think you got a relatively good remake People do throw this in there when there's that You know debate that inevitably comes up in the horror community about are there even any good Horror movie remakes and yes, there obviously are ones like you know the thing the fly stuff like that but Evil Dead gets thrown in there a bunch and I don't know that I would say that it was it's like a great remake But it is a good remake. It's certainly you certainly don't watch it and be like oh man They definitely should not have made that film So that's yeah good for that. I had 17 million dollar budget and it ended up making 97.5 million dollars. So Cha-ching Worth the money I guess for the studio the shoot ended up being 70 days long because Alvarez chose Not to use CGI at all except just for some touch-ups here and there So this is this is one of the things I love about the film overall I like the film, but one of the things I love about the film is their Commitment to using practical effects and it just looks better. It always looks better. That's one of my soap boxes I like to get up on and say you should always use practical effects Especially in horror when you have the ability always go away from CGI because it's not going to hold up over time And even sometimes the year it comes out. It's not gonna look that good So it always looks more real because it is real when it's practical effects So I love Alvarez's commitment to doing that. Obviously it meant it was more expensive and it was a longer shoot But I think that's a big payoff with the film The theatrical release actually ended up getting cut down to our rating because it originally got an NC 17 So that's pretty nuts There was an idea at one point to have Alvarez and Syga's Do Evil Dead 2 and then at the same time Sam and Ivan Raimi do Army of Darkness 2 and then somehow come together in another film and weave The stories of Ash and Mia together which I would have been interested to see where that was gonna go Obviously, we're not gonna end up getting that that idea has been abandoned at this point But they did announce just this year that they will be doing another Evil Dead film called Evil Dead Rise Which is gonna be taking place in like a city So it's gonna be a very different setting for the film And I'm excited for that because as long as we're still getting entries that are done relatively well I mean at this point I've now gone through all the Evil Dead films Which I have reviews for on my channel and I may even made a playlist for all of it So they'll be there and there aren't any bad films So if they keep doing it and there aren't bad ones and this includes Ash versus Evil Dead the show I'm I'm for it And apparently for these this Evil Dead Rise at Sam Raimi's chosen Lee Cronin To be the director for it and he directed the film the hole in the ground that was an 824 film Which I haven't seen yet, but I hear visually. It's really good and story-wise. It's it's pretty solid So we'll see how that goes There will be no Ash apparently though in Evil Dead Rise which doesn't surprise me that much because Bruce Campbell Had said before he has retired from doing Ash Williams, which it's sad, but you know He's he's earned his his ability to retire and at some point it was gonna end so here we are So to the events of the film There's some confusion about who's good and who's bad initially with this film because of the way they started The way they started is basically Mia getting attacked by people in the woods and they seem like kind of like your hillbilly type people So it seems something menacing coming at her So it immediately puts you as an audience member in this viewpoint of oh something bad is happening to her But then she gets tied up and they have everyone around her and her father shows up And you start to question things because then they're talking about you know her having the evil in her You know, maybe being a dead. I they don't say dead. I at that point, but you know Knowing the storyline, you you know, that's what they're kind of getting at and then you just start questioning things You're like, oh, well, maybe she is bad maybe these are good people and they're trying to get rid of the dead I dinner and then but they do a good kind of back and forth of just really making you question up and tell the point and It's a really creepy and kind of scary point where Mia's or not Mia where the character says Makes the statement of what she say, I'll swallow your soul. I wrote it down there I'll rip your soul out is what she specifically says But she says it in such like a normal innocent way that it's more impactful when it hits you like that because Your brain has to process it like the the tone of how you initially hear it. You hear it is something very You know Blah, you know, it doesn't have impact But then once your brain is actually processed the words you're like, oh And the those things just don't match like the way it's being said and the message of the actual sentence Don't match and that's what's jarring about it and it's a great moment. So that's the point where you understand Okay, now I know really what's going on The shots of the woods in this look very very beautiful And the kind of journey that they take through it is great because it really helps to show you how secluded They are at that point even before the flooding happens and takes the road out You you understand that they really can't get away at that point And help will not be coming. That's the other thing so mention of me as previously failed sobriety attempt is a very important thing in this film because it gives a Real reason for their friends to not believe meal when things start to actually happen And also it lets the audience know that the objective is to make sure everyone stays there Especially when they can't believe that what's going on with her is actual, you know Deadite things going on because first of all, they don't know about that stuff They already think she's just losing it because she's getting off of drugs So they did a great job of creating a believable scenario for the characters where the audience isn't like Why wouldn't they do this? Why wouldn't they do this? There is a slight bit of that later on that I'll talk about but for the most part the way they set it up It's very believable what's going on and I thought they did a good job So I like that The scene of me a puking buckets directly into Olivia's face when she when Olivia's on the ground face up is an awesome Scene I think that's really fun. I love when there's like buckets of stuff, you know Like buckets of blood gushing or buckets of puke being spewed. I love scenes like that They're just fun and funny to me and I thought this played both ways. So I enjoyed it the shot pulling up from Olivia's body laying in the bathroom floor and the music that goes along with it is very over the top and That was a moment where I like it took me out of the film because of how over the top it was and this kind of Speaks to one of the issues in general that I have with the film, which is the music that soundtrack is too much It's very very heavy-handed. It hits you so hard. It gets loud. It gets overly dramatic all the time I'm more of a fan and I know this is very much just a personal thing But I'm more of a fan of really toning it down making it a lesser score And the way I look at the use of music in film is kind of the way I look at Certain ingredients that can be strong in food if you like it like you like that on its own But when you add it in with the film it needs to blend instead of standing out or overpowering it And when it's a situation where I really notice the score and it takes me out of the actual events of what's happening on screen Which happens in this film quite a few times in my opinion That's when I think the score is too much and it really needed to be toned down. Yes The music sounds great, but the level that they do it. It's just too much It's it's just overwhelming and not in a good way because it becomes distracting and once again It's like that food thing, you know If you put if you love pepper the flavor of pepper, but you put too much in with you know A chicken dish that you're making you're going to taste mainly just the pepper And that's what the music in this film does when the music gets crazy and heavy-handed You're mainly just hearing the music and focusing on the music at least I am and it takes me out of the events Of what's going on when those things just need to blend a lot better You should not notice the soundtrack until the film is over and you're thinking about it like thinking back like how was the soundtrack? You should never be taken out of it and been like and be like oh my gosh You know this this music is very strong and it's very loud So that's one of my biggest problems with the film. I think if the music was toned down a lot I think it would have been better for building tension. I think it would have been scarier I think there's a lot of power in allowing people to Have uncertainty because the music obviously Tells you what they want you to feel like what what what the events are supposed to be doing for you And I think there's a lot more power and ambiguity in how you can build tension with a horror film in particular through you know more dial-back music or silence even because the person's left with Confusion like how should I be feeling what's gonna go on right now? But when you have that auditory cue that's telling you exactly how things are supposed to go There's no Ability to really build tension because you already know what's going on There's no ability to kind of make people confused or I think it actually Does a disservice to jump scares as well.  I laughed at there's too much of a serious tone For a comedic injection like that into the film and especially because that I smell your filthy soul line came in at like Halfway through the film and there was like really nothing that was intentionally funny up until that point And it felt like that line was supposed to be intentionally funny and it didn't jive It didn't match if you're gonna have comedy to it You need to introduce that very early to let people know this is how it's gonna be You can't just inject it later because it really takes people out of the film and makes them feel like it just doesn't it clashes It's like a speed bump on the road and you're just like wait what? The tongue bifurcation scene with the box cutter is something that people Sight all the time with this film. It is very iconic as far as this film goes and it's a gnarly scene It's really well done This is one of those moments that I would point out and say look practical effects so much better Than doing CGI for something like that That's not my favorite scene in the film, but it is a good scene. It's well done the electric meat cutter scene might be my favorite gore scene actually and The reason for that being it looks very real the way they shot it Also the sound design that they use with it when she gets down to the bone and you hear like that crack It is stress inducing. It's anxiety inducing. It is Gross out. I cringed when I see that like when you see a scene like that a gore scene like that and you Are like because you can kind of feel it It means it's done. Well, and so that for that reason That's one of my favorite gore scenes in the movie might be my favorite, but it's definitely one of my favorite After all that's been experienced It doesn't actually make sense that David would suggest that Mia just has some sort of mental illness manifesting There's this whole time where he's talking with Eric and he's just like, oh, maybe she's just you know My mother had mental illness and I worried all my life that that would pass on to me and you know, maybe it's in Mia But with all the events that they've been through it's not believable at all that he would bring that up at that point Like maybe it's this He's losing it moment and so he's in insane denial, but it just doesn't fit the character It doesn't fit the events of what went on that is another thing that kind of took me out of it I'm just like, why would he be bringing this up now because he clearly has seen that there's something else going on So it just didn't jive. I thought that should have been taken out and you don't need it. Like you don't need it at all So they should have taken that one out It is ridiculous that after all the physical trauma physical abuse that David and Eric Sustained they're at best just feeling uncomfortable. Well at worst Just feeling uncomfortable. Like the fact that they aren't in like insane pain and almost unable to do anything Or totally unable to do anything is very unrealistic with this film And this film seems to go for a lot of realism. So they go through so much They've been put through so much trauma yet. They just it just seems like oh man It's like I kind of sprained my ankle. That's basically it. They had nail shot through them I mean Eric in particular had his hand cut in half Or bashed in half. I think with the crowbar. I mean You would be in crippling pain. Both of them would be in crippling pain So the fact that that the way it's acted is that they're just like oh man, it kind of hurts is Another thing that doesn't make sense for what's going on. It takes you out of it or at least it does for me I do love the scene where David is burying Mia and the camera moves with the shovel As he's shoveling dirt in it's a really cool movement and motion of following Following it, but it makes it very impactful for the eventual reveal where you know, uh, there's a plastic bag over Mia's head as she's laying in there being buried And her eyes are closed and then it moves over you see her eyes closed and moves back Then it moves over again and you see that her eyes are open. That is such an awesome reveal. That's a great Uh trick that they do with with the camera movement and the shots. I Yeah, I really dig that moment. It works very very well Uh and after letting Mia down for so long David has finally Been there for her and in the biggest way possible So I do think that that aspect had good impact of the brother not being there for so long Which they worked on that aspect of the story slowly over the first like half of the film, I guess So it is a good payoff then because of all that all those breadcrumbs they left leading up to it It's a good payoff when he finally does the the biggest thing he can do Which is basically like I am going to die so you can get out of here like it's the ultimate love So it's impactful. It's good. It's it's a nice moment I do like Mia also ending up losing her hand in this just like ash But in a different way like it is She finds the chainsaw. That's like ash and then when she has it you're thinking. Oh, maybe You know, maybe if if someone told you she also will lose her hand someone may say oh, so they're gonna since it's a remake They're gonna do the same thing where she cuts her hand off to keep from you know the the dead item possession basically But I just like that it was You get the same end result of her having lost a hand, but it's done differently I just like that touch to it Jane levy who played Mia did an excellent job with this That is a demanding role a very demanding role and she did a very very good job with it She deserves applause She's been in other things like don't breathe and she was also in a bunch of episodes of castle rock Which is really good. I've only seen the first season, but I like what I saw there So overall lots of really good looking movements from the camera in general directing really good Cinematography really good. The acting is really good a lot of technical things. Obviously I already talked about the practical effects so good The gross dark and gritty look of it is extremely effective I like that they went for that angle with it. It looks good for that reason The use of light and shadows is very excellently done in this film They kind of hit that sweet spot of not fully showing things But enough for scares and gross outs to be really effective And there are those moments where you're just like You're For a moment You're not sure what you're seeing and then you finally have just enough light to see what's going on And it's either gross or disturbing or whatever like their use of lighting in this was very well done They obviously really had a grasp on that Already talked about the soundtrack thing, but I do want to reiterate the soundtrack was too much Uh and the last thing I have to say about it is there's clearly a metaphor for drug addiction here being like a possession As drugs end up making the user a person who they are not usually themselves So I thought that actually worked for the situation because if you think about it drug addiction alcohol abuse stuff like that Is very much like a possession, you know when someone's drinking when someone's high people say all the time That's not them. That's the drug. It is just like being possessed by deadites And so for that reason, I thought it was a smart choice to use that So yeah, I uh, I dig it. It was pretty good. So anyway, what am I going to rate this with an overall of five stars possible And half stars in play. It's not an outstanding film. It is well done Like I said, all the technical stuff is awesome You know, obviously soundtrack issues and some of the stuff that kind of took me out of the film, but It is quite good. Um, I'm gonna give it a three and a half stars total So that's a pretty good one. Um, but yeah, I'd love to hear other people's opinions down here You know, agree with me. Don't agree with me. Whatever. Let's talk about it. So put your comments down there But do me a quick favor if you could hit that subscribe button for me because that's your best way to repay me If you like any video that I've ever done on this channel, please hit that subscribe because I don't make money doing this or anything And legitimately when I see that a new person has subscribed it makes me very happy It gives me that feeling of validation where I'm just like, oh, someone actually enjoys what I'm doing They appreciate it, you know, someone received this video watched it and it meant at least something to them So I do appreciate that but also if you are going to subscribe make sure you hit the notification bell Because then you know, whenever I'm putting up a new review video or when I'm live streaming or you know, all that stuff But regardless, I appreciate you taking the time to watch this video and until next time keep it brutal


Bisphenol A, or BPA, is one of those synthetic chemicals that regularly hits the headlines. It's used in polycarbonate plastics, food can liners, thermal till receipts and other everyday objects, and most people have small amounts of it in their body. But are these levels safe, or do we have a problem? These are questions scientists the world over have been grappling with for some time, and just recently, the latest in a line of extensive expert reviews was published by the European Food Safety Agency, or EFSA. The review, which analyses and interprets the latest science on BPA and human health risks, is a whopping 500 pages long, so on the assumption that most people are more likely to use it as a doorstop than read every last word, here are the highlights. The review takes a weight of evidence approach to making sense of a large number of published studies. This is a bit like reconstructing a scene from a bunch of smartphone photos, some are crisp, some are blurry, some focus on minute details while others are so distant they lack any detail at all. You even have some selfies in there. None of them paint a complete picture, and on their own some can be downright misleading, but stitched together they give a good idea of what's going on. In the same way, a weight of evidence assessment helps construct the likely risks associated with a chemical-like BPA from a series of scientific snapshots. In this case, the review has found evidence for a number of health-related impacts following exposure to BPA, including potential impacts on the liver, kidneys and breasts. Many of these raised concerns, but the one that dominated all others at a given exposure level was kidney weight gain in mice. This was identified as the critical end point, the one that if dealt with would also mean that the other potential health impacts should be avoided. Using data from mice, the review has estimated that if an average person was exposed to 113 micrograms of BPA per day for every kilogram that they weighed, their health could be at risk. That's around 8mg of BPA per day for an adult. From here, the next step was to work out what an acceptably safe level would be in people. This is what's referred to as the Tolerable Daily Intake, or TDI. Accounting for differences between mice and people, as well as differences between individuals, the reviewers came up with a draft TDI of 5 micrograms per day per kilogram of body weight. From the available data, they concluded that at this level, no significant health effects would occur in most people, even accounting for uncertainty in the current state of science. This does of course leave a couple of questions. What levels of BPA are most people exposed to? And what if you're not most people? The first question was addressed in an earlier report from EFSA that looked at typical exposure levels. They found that teenagers seem to have the highest exposure to BPA, with an estimated upper level in this analysis of 1.3 micrograms per day per kilogram body weight. For comparison, this is four times lower than the proposed safe level. So for most people, everyday exposures to BPA are probably pretty safe. But what if you're not the same as most people? When adults, BPA is quickly converted into a relatively benign form and got rid of pretty fast. Researchers indicating though that embryos, fetuses and even young children don't handle BPA in the same way as grown adults. Which means that what is okay for most people may not be quite as okay for the very young and the unborn. These are some of the blurry bits in the BPA safety picture that are still being researched. That said, at least we do have a picture of BPA safety, imperfect though it may be. Which would seem to be better for making informed decisions than having no picture at all, which is where we are with some alternatives to not using BPA in products. If you have any thoughts on BPA's benefits and risks, please join the conversation in the comments and remember to check out the additional resources in the blurb below.