The Raspberry Pi version isn't released yet, but it's likely to bear some similarities to the Intel Galileo version that has had a preview release of the OS, since they're being released under the same "Internet of Things" development program. On that platform, it's serial-only with no graphics output. In the preview version, it's mostly just a host for C/C++ projects using a Wiring-style library to access the GPIO on that board (although I think that support for .Net and "universal apps" is planned for the official release).

I could be wrong, but I don't see the RasPi2 version of Windows 10 being remotely similar to the PC release of the OS. The evidence implies that it won't be.

I see that repeated over and over, but I've never had trouble finding a job. I've worked (remotely) with contractors from Slovenia, China, and India, and the pattern that I've seen is that they generate more work for me fixing their broken code than they take away from me by doing the initial implementation. I'll worry when I stop seeing a coder with 10 years of experience making mistakes that I learned to avoid while I was still in school. Until that time, I can successfully compete on quality.

Because hardware manufacturers are going to go after the largest part of the market possible, not cater to the fussy long tail of malcontents that need uncommon features like the ability to load their own OS. We've finally gotten to the point where I don't need to be incredibly picky over the hardware that I buy to ensure that it'll run Linux acceptably. I don't want to have to research through user forums for anecdotal evidence that some particular piece of hardware was mislabeled as not being locked down, and I don't really want hardware that I might have to break the warranty on to do something that I do with all of my hardware as a matter of course (shrink the Windows partition and throw Linux on the sucker). That is why I care about what the unconcerned masses are running.

As a last resort? OK, if it's the only way to get the hardware that I need. As a first choice of solution? I'd rather not.

I'll admit that the culture is puritanical and backwards in some ways. In some parts of the country, there's a higher rate of religious zealotry than I see out here in California. However, my wife goes out and alone uncovered and without fear. I can go into a sex shop and buy a strap-on, riding crop, and cock rings. I can go out in public and yell "Jesus Christ sucks Satan's cock and is a son of a whore! God doesn't exist, and the prophets were dangerously deranged madmen!" What will happen? Nothing.

All that isn't denying the fact that I'd feel unsafe taking my wife and mixed-race son into some parts of the South, but that doesn't have much to do with puritanism or religion.

Common? No. Possible? Well....maybe, if the planets align properly and you buy some clunky Clevo case?

I've got a number of commercially-produced games with Linux versions. They work beautifully =) However, I've also got the other 85% of my games catalog, which will only run on Windows, assuming that I don't want to spend the time fiddling with Wine to get them working. I *have* in the past...but I've got less time now than I used to, and streaming from Steam on my Windows computer over to Steam on my Linux laptop works pretty well.

It isn't, obviously. The point is to act as a deterrent for the same behavior happening again, without ruining someone's life. The solution doesn't have to be based on money, as you've noted. Requiring driving school would be an appropriate consequence, in at least some situations.

The death penalty can only be applied once; it's not going to act as a deterrent to the individual in the future. And, again, it depends on what kind of equality you're going for. Equality of deterrence sounds like a better idea to me than a strict numerical equality.

If X is enough to ruin one person's life, but not another's, then what is equal about that outcome? It sounds like something worthy of a legal system, but not of a justice system.

It depends on how you measure "differently". Maybe for me, a $100 fine is no problem, but for my friend a $100 fine means that they aren't going to be able to make their rent payment on time this month. So, I get mildly inconvenienced (gotta transfer $100 into my checking account), but my friend gets evicted. I think there's something fundamentally wrong with that outcome.

The only positive is that it's a 64-node cluster cheaply. The Pi's USB and ethernet implementations are absolute shit, requiring constant handling from the CPU to function. There've always been problems with dropped network and USB packets when the CPU is under heavy load. A Hardkernel ODroid-C1 uses the ARMv7 architecture instead of v6 (and has a quad-core CPU, to boot), has better ethernet, better USB, faster storage options, and costs the same as the Raspberry Pi. It beats out the RPi 2 in every way.

So, there's a better computer for the same price, which wouldn't have the unusually-strong requirement to avoid inter-node communication. The Pi's fine as a beginner's learning tool, but it's a bad model for scaling up to PC-type hardware that a "real" cluster would probably be built out of.

NES and SNES systems used virtually the same method to communicate with their controllers (reset strobe signal, then bit-by-bit serial read of the button states). If I were building custom hardware to feed data into the system anyhow, I think that I'd implement it as a custom memory-mapper, where a write into a read-only address on the cartridge would fill the PPU's (Picture Processing Unit/GPU) memory space with the next frame of video, and the CPU's memory with the next chunk of digital audio (the NES was capable of 7-bit PCM audio samples, at up to 16KHz sample rate, although no games would actually spend that much memory on audio).

Khronos Group is a consortium that creates open graphics and media standards. As an example, it's the current developer of OpenGL, which is one of the two main 3D graphics APIs. Vulkan is being designed as a next-generation replacement for OpenGL and OpenGL ES (the mobile device version of OpenGL). Part of its purpose is to unify the two APIs.

DirectX is a collection of APIs by Microsoft, which provide functions that are useful for graphics and audio applications (especially games) on Windows and in other Microsoft products.

OpenGL has been around since about 1992, and DirectX since about 1995. Your age probably isn't a factor here. More likely, you haven't had a remote interest in graphics programming in the last two decades and also haven't had close exposure to computer games, CAD, or other graphics-heavy applications within that time period.

Pseudonym posted this earlier in the thread, and I think that some of the ideas in the interview are what they're referring to.

The TV, ISP, and phone companies provide ongoing services. I could maybe see paying for ongoing security updates, but not for access to use the software on my own hardware, assuming I was fine with running it without updates.

That's a different situation, though. Imagine that your hardware was functional, but the company that rents you your software declares it obsolete, requires you to buy new hardware when you're happy with the current kit, and basically turns your hardware into a nice, black paperweight. There's no upside.

In the situation you described, your current hardware has a relatively easily repairable failure. You have the option of repairing it (yourself or professionally), and you have the option of replacing it. In the former situation, there's no choice; there's a requirement imposed on you by the outside. In the latter, you have options.