Abstract: A conical needle includes a hollow needle body has a distal end and a proximal end. The needle body has a substantially consistent cross-sectional diameter along the entire length of a central longitudinal axis of the needle body between the proximal end and the distal end of the needle body. The interior of the needle body defines a fluid pathway extending along the longitudinal axis. A conical portion is located at the distal end of the needle body. The conical portion has a sidewall, a distal end, and a proximal end. The conical portion forms a sharp tip located at the distal end of the conical portion. A lateral opening is located fully within the sidewall of the conical portion. The lateral opening is in fluid communication with the fluid pathway.

Abstract: A conical needle includes a hollow needle body has a distal end and a proximal end. The needle body has a substantially consistent cross-sectional diameter along the entire length of a central longitudinal axis of the needle body between the proximal end and the distal end of the needle body. The interior of the needle body defines a fluid pathway extending along the longitudinal axis. A conical portion is located at the distal end of the needle body. The conical portion has a sidewall, a distal end, and a proximal end. The conical portion forms a sharp tip located at the distal end of the conical portion. A lateral opening is located fully within the sidewall of the conical portion. The lateral opening is in fluid communication with the fluid pathway.

Abstract: A system for generating computer programs includes physical carriers of information that have a rectangular contrasting marker associated with an element of the computer program and a description text and/or a graphical symbol. The carriers may form the computer program when they are sequentially arranged along a first axis and at least one carrier may receive another carrier of information on its right side, along a second axis. The system also includes image capturing device for capturing a digital image of an arrangement of the carriers forming the computer program. A computer device has a display screen and is configured to process the image; recognize the carriers on the image; determine the arrangement of the carriers with respect to each other; superimpose on the image a graphical icon above the marker of each recognized carrier; output the combined digital image and convert the determined arrangement to the computer program.

Abstract: Systems and methods are disclosed herein for performing a failover operation between a first distributed database cluster and a second distributed database cluster. In one aspect, the method includes blocking a plurality of software processes from making any new access requests to the first distributed database cluster and completing a current access request to the first distributed database cluster that was initiated by one of the plurality of software processes before the failover operation was initiated, waiting for data to replicate from the first distributed database cluster to the second distributed database cluster, wherein replicating includes any changes to the data from the current access request, and allowing the plurality of software processes to make the new access requests to the second distributed database cluster once the replicating has completed.