Except that today, China is very much an ally of Russia (or maybe even vice versa). That famous Sino-Soviet split of the 60s is long over - one country is no longer communist, and the other is no longer ruled by Communists. Russia currently doesn't have geopolitical interests - it's just gathering all the allies that it can find. It's a pity that they aren't more discriminating about it, and even giving support to countries like Iran, Syria and North Korea.
Similarly, China was once a major ally of Pakistan, but due to Uyghar jihadis getting their support in Afghanistan and even in Pakistan, that friendship has become lukewarm. Even though Pakistan remains a major market for Huawei outside China
I sort of hope the passport itself doesn't get replaced, though--you can't see the visa stamps on a chip or mag stripe.
Part of what I suggested above is that they scan the card, which would give them your name, ID number (SSN# for the US), and then you'd by scanning the tickets enter the date they're leaving/entering the continent/country and their source/destinations. All that goes into an online record, which any police official in any country can run up if that person goes on to later blow up a dock in Oakland, or lands up in Syria in ISIS rags and is shown on TV beheading some Infidels.
What's even worse is the idea of using Driver Licenses - that's why you have the problem in some border states of proposals of wanting to issue DLs to illegals so that they don't compound the crime of being here illegally with doing hit and runs, since any discovery would require their instant deportation. But I digress.
Right now, that ship has sailed - social security is already used as identification, but since it doesn't have a photograph, one is required to show a passport or a driving license in addition to the social security card (which is still required if you're say, applying for a job, which will need it sooner or later for doing your I9 forms.) This is annoying. Just make the changes I suggested above - nobody's asking the US to be EU - and use only the social security card for official ID purposes. Get rid of the practice of requiring DLs for that, and even for passports, have them electronically linked so that one's whereabouts, if one is travelling abroad, is known. (Yeah, yeah, I hear all the screams of 'Snowden, NSA, privacy, blah blah blah, but like it or not, as Scott McNealy once noted, privacy is dead)
Conservatives don't like national ID cards because of a mistrust of big government. Liberals don't like them for similar reasons. However, fact remains that in today's world, like it or not, they are needed. Put it all in ONE place, and let other things be restricted to their domains - like one's driving record tied only to one's DL (unless any manslaughter cases are involved).
It's not a failed experiment.
'Success' does not need to mean, "Everyone universally enjoys this XXXX".
I'm a Windows Phone user as well as a Windows 8 user. I like both of them. I like that they've combined them. It works very well for me.
The interface needs to be refined in order to appeal to more people, but that does not mean it is a failure. It just means that Windows 8 was the first iteration of something that could/should/can be very, very good.
Taking the first steps toward a goal is not failure- it's building a foundation.
I own a Windows Phone as well. Right now, a Lumia 929 - the one from Verizon. It's great, as was the 520 when I had that.
Windows 8 on my Dell laptop, OTOH, was a pain. While typing, when the cursor would get near the right end of the screen, the charms bar would prop up, and there was no turning that off - even if I went into the desktop. Also, once I hit Start, I'd see the icons, but to discover all the installed apps that weren't showing up in the 'home' screen, I had to go south - something I accidentally discovered. I did try tweaking that thing, installing Classic Shell and so on, but the whole experience was really annoying. Finally, once I figured out how to install PC-BSD on it, I did it, wiping out Windows 8 from the whole thing altogether. After a few initial hiccups, PC-BSD now purrs like a kitten.
Another beef I had with that system - the native apps were something you now got from the app store, as opposed to the good old downloading it from a web site or inserting a DVD. This just felt too retarded. The other issue I had - if you have a Metro screen, why not have the possibility of multiple virtual desktops, particularly since the apps now insist on going fullscreen? That just didn't make sense - even in Classic shell, I'd be running, say IE, but if I went into Metro and invoked IE, it would go back there.
My point - the same interface on a touchless laptop and a phone and a tablet never made sense. On a phone, Windows 8 is just perfect, and the only thing lacking are some apps that I could use there, like ADP and Vonage. I don't mind games missing - I use that phone only for work. On a tablet too, Windows 8 is fine. On a touch laptop, it's at least usable, if less than ideal. If I have a 16" screen in front of me, the last thing I wanna do is touch it: even for my phone & tablet, I've put screen guards. But for touchless laptops, it absolutely sucks!
I am glad that Microsoft is finally bringing back the Windows 7 interface, at least in laptop mode. Windows 10 should ideally not take much time - they should just take Windows 8.0 (not 8.1), combine it with Windows 7 UI and give USERS the option of which interface they want when they start. Make the Windows 7 the default on laptops if users know no better, and make Windows 8 the default on tablets. And it's okay to have cute features like switching from one to the other, but allow people to turn that off if they like only one interface for everything.
Whichever it is
PA-RISC? If those chips were dinosaur bones, one could be drilling for oil in Ft Collins, CO by now. It's been that long. Only choice for today's HP/UX users is the Itanic, until the OS gets ported to the x64.
But if one has an x64 based PC/server and wants to go w/ a POSIX based OS, why select that? Even if one wants to shun Linux, there are still the BSDs - FreeBSD in particular, OpenIndiana (which ironically doesn't support the SPARC), and even Xinios UNIXWARE. So why would anyone go out of their way for HP/UX, except for people who already are tied to it?
E = MC ** 2 +- 3db
