These days, we have high quality software already made, And the open source revolution has shown us that it is poppycock, the claim that you need the proceeds of extortionate licensing fees in order to build high quality software.

That's true, but I don't know of a way of doing any better. Last I check battery packs are sealed, and the cells are inherently integrated with the packaging of the battery, so there isn't an easy way for me to separate individual cells and swap cells out with fresh ones to repurpose or keep using the pack.

I also can't imagine it being affordable to break apart sealed battery packs on a large scale.

These are also Lithium ION batteries; Lithium will catch fire and react explosively if exposed to moisture, even that contained in normal air is enough, so it is also inherently dangerous to even attempt to access and electrically disconnect a bad cell from the battery.

Hell, that one has to type "configure terminal" when you're SSHed in to a switch and obviously trying to configure it from the terminal is silly.

Correct... but just as with other APIs; renaming the command is a breaking change. It doesn't matter whether it's a software program or a human interfacing with it, the command configure terminal has to place the device in configuration mode, if you want interoperability with templates and procedures that users developed to configure their network when they were running Cisco equipment.

You understand right, that IOS is a programming language... and if a competitor makes the 'configure terminal' command not work in their CLI, then users cannot take the work put into designing and developing the templates they built/programmed with many engineering man hours for deploying their Cisco gear and use the template to configure the competitor's gear?

Of course Cisco would like to use the CLI as a burden against people switching, since they will have to rebuild their developed templates from scratch then.

Just like Microsoft would like to force you to write all your documents over again if you switch from Microsoft Word to Office; this is basically anticompetitive behavior in the form of covertly tricking your users into using non-standardized file formats, and then attempting to abuse intellectual property laws to support your vendor lock-in.

Competitors should be allowed to reverse-engineer or use the publicly available knowledge about your file formats, however, otherwise, you indeed have an unfair monopoly protection.

Why couldn't they have written their own manual and command line structure?

Because the command line structure is an industry-standard software API/human interface to well-understood network device behaviors.

This would be like BSD authors suing Linux developers for copyright infringemenet, for copying the /etc/fstab file format.

I think they offer parking as a perk for being a Nobel Laureate; so it wouldn't follow the medal.

I'm not sure a carry-on laptop bag is an appropriate method of transportation for a $4 million+ piece of metal.

Banks must have some high-security methods of insured secure courier for precious specie; one of those would be more appropriate.

If you're discarding laptop batteries while they can still hold a charge

You are likely to discard the battery as soon as it can no longer hold a satisfactory capacity for your application. The battery is no longer effective for your use at that point, and you're wasting electricity time and $$$ and not getting the portability you want.

Based on the IBM study:

Fig. 2 shows the charge capacity as a percentage of designed capacity for the investigated laptop battery packs. We found that although there was a significant variation in the residual capacities, the mean value was 64% while the median was 73%.

The mean value corresponds to more than 50 Wh of capacity for the batteries tested, which is sufficient to power a 3 W LED light bulb, a 6 W DC fan and a 3.5 W mobile phone charger simultaneously, for around 4 hours

Therefore, discarded laptop batteries appear to have satisfactory potential for reuse as backup energy sources to power low energy DC devices

But for IT; overtime should be defined differently from number of hours worked.

What about On-call time or "Standby for call, but sleeping" time?

I believe either On-Call time should be required to be included in hours worked first, or employers should be required to define a consistent workday for employees, such as 9 am to 5pm; they must define a standard 40 hour work schedule.

And any work out of the defined work schedule is overtime. Even if there are less than 40 hours total.

Next up....

Strict prohibition against with life jail term or execution for: calling out hoaxes, creating hoaxes, pointing out lies by government or powerful companies, Hyperbole, Toilet humor, and Sarcasm.

It is confidential, and disclosure by the employer may violate state laws, but the HIPAA privacy rule does not apply to an employer, even with records related to a FMLA claim. HIPAA privacy rule applies to the health care provider, and group health plan administrator (the insurance company) as covered entities, but not the employer.

The information is confidential and it should nevertheless be stored separately in a confidential file for the employee. It should be physically secured and not scanned into a digital representation.

Just because the employer is not covered by HIPAA, does not mean there is no liability, or that the employee won't sue them over damages resulting from negligent treatment of confidential records.

Sony is not a covered entity under HIPAA, unless there's a new Sony medical clinic, hospital, or Sony administered health plan I hadn't heard of?

Even if you are a covered entity under HIPAA, employee records are exempt from the privacy rule, as long as the reason the record is there is because they are an employee and the record is not used to provide medical treatment or health services.

SONY would have to patent everything within a year in the US; I am not sure that you even have that grace period everywhere else.

No..... 1 year following lawful disclosure.

The unlawful disclosure of confidential information by criminals is subject to adjudication by the courts.

The unlawfully disclosed material may very well be deemed to be a condition that allows Sony to continue to pursue the patents, and publications made from unlawfully disclosed materials may be excluded from valid prior art.

Anything that can't be answered in two sentences gets an email. Anything too laborious to email works better face to face in a meeting or conference call

I had to work with a higher-up IT manager who "never reads e-mail" and works at a remote site; also, whenever I do send an e-mail, the reply is always "Call to discuss; I don't use e-mail".

He doesn't do video conferencing either; in fact, it's impossible to schedule a meeting, because he either has no time available for that, or he misses the meeting appointment --- he never setup his voicemail box, says he doesn't use voicemail -- and it's sometimes difficult to get him on the phone as well.

Also, if any work doesn't get done for their location, the central IT workers always gets scolded.

He often makes crap up that he claims he asked us to do, and if we try to e-mail him anything he always ignores it or says "NO, call me to discuss.".

Sometimes Not using the Phone is not an option.

You wouldn’t charge a five-year old with disturbing the peace for throwing a tantrum in public.

Oh really? Tell that to St. Petersburg school officials calling police and officers who arrested 5yr old gold for tantrum, and Salecia Johnson arrested and charged with battery and criminal property destruction for actions during Temper tantrum in 2012.

Anyways.... people who are of diminished capacity and a danger to themselves and others get locked up, just the same as any criminal.