You don't have to write your entire application in the C preprocessor. Or in templates. Although if you are coming from a language like Perl I can see how they might be attractive.

Yeah, great idea, let's take a language whose roots are in the 1970s and break backwards compatibility to increase its appeal to young people with six digit slashdot IDs.

If C++ looks bloated to you, (a) define bloat and (b) name some languages you have used, that you consider not-bloated. Good answers are available to both questions; I want you know yours.

As a tourist from New Zealand, the toll booths are my overriding memory of Orlando. Well, that and the Kennedy Space Centre.

The really fun thing to do is drive from the wrong airport to the right one, running late for a direct flight to SF (and then across the Pacific, home - not a flight you want to miss). By the third or fourth toll booth I was flinging correct change at the attendants.

They were neat little machines. I was still using one in 2001, running Linux.

The easiest option is to use a null modem cable between the two PCs serial ports. For a file transfer app, I recommend Filelink which came with DR-DOS and therefore will be on the install disks for OpenDOS which you can download for free these days.

You only need it on one PC, it can bootstrap itself over the null modem cable.

The other option is to get a 2.5" IDE to USB adapter. You can get ones that do SATA too and will be useful in other situations in the future.

Google Fibre, like every other ISP, will at some point have to monitor some subscribers traffic to debug network faults and the like. They're being upfront about it, that's all. If you want an ISP who never runs tcpdump, good luck to you.

Totally agree. At some point your product needs to be built, your systems need to be administered, etc. If your product can only be built by the top 5% of talent, your hiring pool is much smaller. If you can't hire those people, your product won't be built. There is wisdom in trying to not be too clever.

Great idea (says me from not-the-USA). I suggest you massively slash your defence budget. This will solve your budget problems very quickly, and will probably improve your country's perception abroad.

In New Zealand, income from a job where you are an employee (most people) is handled by a system called PAYE (pay as you earn). It's automatically deducted from your pay.

Bank account interest is handled by RWT (residents witholding tax), automatically deducted from your interest. If you're not in the top tax bracket you need to tell your bank, or they will overtax you.

Every year you can, if you wish, ask for a "personal tax summary" which states income and tax. If you paid too much tax, e.g. if you took unpaid leave, said overpayment will automatically be refunded. If your RWT rate was wrong you can ask for a refund of that, too.

If you made donations you send in a form (1 page) with receipts, and get a refund.

If you're a small business/self employed/etc then yes, you have to work out how much tax you are supposed to pay. But most people aren't in that situation.

Isn't that what IT people do? Optimise for the common case?

I'm having trouble working out if you're being sarcastic or genuinely uninformed.

Silly question, but is a company which tries very hard to pay no tax on its profits a "legitimate business" or a leech on society?

Yes, I know they do neat stuff, as do many other companies. Yes, many other large companies legally avoid taxes. They're leeches too.

Yours sincerely, someone who likes his tax-funded healthcare and education systems. [can you guess I'm not in the US?]

In New Zealand most people don't need to file a tax return at all. If you ask the tax department they will send you a Personal Tax Summary which states what they think you earnt and paid in tax. If it says you paid too much they will automatically issue you with a refund.

The only paperwork I do for personal tax is to sent in my donation receipts to get a tax credit. I did this yesterday, took less than half an hour.

Price, availability, and community. What software (distros, etc) is available for this week's raspberry pi killer? What will be available in a year's time?

I have a similar experience, although there is some stuff I would like to do that's a pain:

* Photo managment with Shotwell -- not enough local storage
* Video editing with PiTiVi -- not enough local storage or horsepower (not that I've tried, don't think crouton/xephyr support video acceleration)

I was going to leave an old PC on to remote into for stuff like that, but it's deciding to be unreliable and I need a way to automatically suspend it to save power.

V6 to DNS/NAT: you mean NAT64? It's a thing. It works.

But what we'll probably end up with is Carrier Grade NAT for IPv4, hopefully dual-stacked with native IPv6. There are already ISPs selling CGN IPv4 connections with no IPv6 support, e.g. most cellular IP service.

All our [NZ] ISPs seem to be falling over themselves to offer uncapped service at the moment, often with no "fair use" clause.

Move here. It's not that hard. If you need an IT job, my employer is hiring.