Absolutely not, unless you know someone who can give you the hardware for your FreeNAS box. If you have an extra computer laying around, chances are it doesn't have what you'd need for one. I recently looked into what would be required to setup a FreeNAS box, but I don't have the available funds to build a decent one. I have an old computer using rsync to avoid catastrophic hdd failure, but the hardware is all too old for FreeNAS.

Wow, thanks for educating me. I guess the pronunciation is what convinced me I was right, but as you point out, if you think about it, it doesn't make much sense. +2 for the Pink Floyd reference.

Sorry, but it's desserts. Think of it this way... you would actually want two desserts, but who wants two deserts?

I had a similar experience with Doom, about the same time, '94-'95. We'd play it on our high school token ring network, during our "computer science" class (which pretty much amounted to learning how to program in some variant of Basic). The teacher got so annoyed, catching the 3 or 4 of us playing during her lectures that she eventually would allow us to play after we finished our in-class work. Needless to say, those of us interested in playing became pretty decent at coding Basic quickly.

The sad part is that a lot of people said "OK".

I try not to judge anyone's methods of parenting because I'm fully aware that it's never as easy as it may seem, even when a child is screaming in public while both parents continue to ignore them. I don't know the circumstances that lead up to that situation, and try to remind myself of that before I start cursing them under my breath.

Thanks for elaborating. If I ever have kids, I hope I can retain the clarity it seems you have when those special times arise.

Disclaimer: I'm not a parent. I have spent a lot of time with one niece and several nephews, and have witnessed a lot of parenting of younger children.

From my point of view, it seems that a lot of parents often forget that children can be very different, even at the same age. It's easy to say "yes, of course the same thing won't work with every child!", but it seems that often people will stop right there, and not consider the reason that some children are different and that the answer "just try Y instead of X" isn't always an option.

I think you're missing one very important distinction there... YOU. I'd guess he's outside because young kids love to emulate and *gasp* spend interactive time with their parents. The fact that you think he's choosing outside over technology, even implying he may be better than the other kids staring at screens, is very telling... he's outside to be with you.

When I was a kid (I'm 35), TV time was very limited, especially during the day when there were other things we could do. When we finally got a computer, time on it was limited as well. I even remember wanting to be outside with my Dad over watching daytime cartoons or whatever. It's not choosing the great outdoors over technology, and I hope you realize this.

He/she didn't, and no one else is. It's being a called a smart watch. Just like your smart phone isn't just a phone, like the rotary kind that used to sit on your (grand)parents' night stand.

I cringe at my own faux pas.

Wrong, unless you're only talking about these yet-to-be-released smart watches. Anyone with a Pebble or Metawatch can knows what they do.

I finally got my pebble about 3 months ago, so let me give you my $0.02 worth.

I don't use my phone a whole lot. It's a personal phone, so I don't use it for work, except when I'm away from the office I will occasionally check and respond to email. I purchased a pebble because I thought it sounded like a cool idea, and I could use a new, decent-looking watch (I already had a couple of standard watches that I'd use when camping, hiking, or doing other things outdoors where the watch may be subject to minor abuse). At the $150 price-point, it was not a big leap, even for someone who isn't using their phone non-stop.

I not only thought the pebble looked good, but I also liked the idea of being able to have any number of customized watch faces and having the ability to create my own (with their SDK).

I liked the idea of keeping my phone on silent, in my pocket, checking texts and incoming phone calls by glancing at my wrist when it vibrates. Being able to receive all notifications you would receive on your cell phone on the watch itself, without having to take my phone out of my pocket (or laptop bag, etc) was enough to sell me on it.

And I think it's enough for there to be a market for these smart/dumb watches. This isn't even to mention the many "apps" out there being created for the pebble. One that I've actually used is the FreeCaddie app that uses your phone's GPS to send yardage information to your watch while playing golf. It may seem impractical in that most golfers I know don't want to keep their phone in their pocket, or a watch on their wrist, while playing, but strapping my watch to the golf cart and keeping the phone in my bag is a really convenient way to get GPS on the course, without spending $300 on another device.

I think the fact that I'm not a hardcore hardware geek, only having used my pebble fairly lightly, and I still find it worth the money and useful is (albeit anecdotal) evidence that smart watches do have a market and I believe it's here to stay. The key will be getting the buyers to take that initial leap since, on the surface, they seem superfluous when you're already carrying around a smart phone.

You may be right in that it could take a big player like Apple, or Samsung, to enter the market before we know if the general public will bite. However, since Pebble has hit Best Buy, we just might know before Apple does anything.

Living in Kentucky all my life (now in Louisville) and traveling to rural areas quite often for camping, hiking, and the like, I've been able to see some pretty clear skies and some impressive displays of galactic splendor.

But nothing has compared to what I saw when camping in the Canyonlands of Utah in March. It was a nice clear and crisp night and the amount of light from the stars was almost overwhelming. I doubt I'll ever see anything as impressive again as it relates to the night sky. I only wish I had more than my mediocre digital camera with me.

And if it continues as such, it will most certainly become a finite loop.

While you have a good point...

...it's still conjecture. But to be fair, so was my statement. Without any good stats on who can afford the car they're driving, we're all speculating based on our own experience and point of view. I almost regret posting now, thanks! ;-P

Yeah, but if you're that opposed to how the TSA operates, there'll be sacrifices in applying your principles. Either shorter vacationing time (between travel to and from) or fewer vacations (since they would take longer).

Yes. Usually I'll use a rental car and we pass that cost and the cost of gas onto our customers (we're a small software shop, and when we travel it's at the request of our customers) as long as we keep it within "reasonable" travel expenses. The cost of a rental + gas is almost always way cheaper than flying.