In fact ... it is not free at all.

You need to have a Windows 7 to have Windows 8.1 with Bing, and Windows 7 was not free. Also, Win7 it is not very old. They are just copying what Apple did with Mavericks, but with restrictions.

What I see is that Microsoft is in trouble because their business model from the 80s is not working well today. Apple have no problems, because they are not selling Operating Systems now, they are selling devices (many of them) ... and Microsoft almost no one, and this is why they needed Nokia. The Operating Systems, as the old days of computing, are returning to be a complementary free part of the systems, as must be.

A side note : There is a mistake with what an O.S. is. When trying to catch the market, Microsoft put every imaginable piece of technology inside the O.S. ... but this is not really an O.S., this is a "distribution". The O.S. must be a small part of the system. Look at Linux, it is really "ONE" file ... this is why people can make distributions, can put Linux in appliances, to create Chrome OS or Android on top, etc. Microsoft must evaluate to do the same, a small free element and to ask for money on the complementary parts for particular purposes. Forget the UI, forget the Server edition. Make them independent products, who knows, maybe this work for them...

For Plasma they are using a containing magnetic field.

And this is more troublesome than radioactive material.

They have 37 years to find the way to create a strong-enough and stable magnetic enclosure that be able to surround all the infrastructure, to attach it to a rocket and to send it to the sun.

Because, I don't think that they be able to create a magnetic or any other type of enclosure that last several thousands years until the radioactivity disappear by itself.

The other option is to clean everything. I really don't know what is more difficult.

The Glass is a very obvious device. I suppose this is because they are selling the concept.

But what about a camera embedded in a pair of standard glasses?

You just turn the recording device (could be Bluetooth or stand alone) that even doesn't need to be with you, only in reachable distance, and record everything around. No wires, nothing delating what you are doing.

mm... I suppose this must be happening thousands of times just now. ... and for much less than $1500. ... Amazon, Fashion Listens Glasses Digital Video Glasses Hidden Eyewear DVR Camcorder Eyeglass $48.98

I don't think that the UI builders that create code, as a concept are bad.

The problem is not there, the problem is in the framework they are based to create the code.

In fact, if the framework is well ordered, efficient and trustworthy, they do almost nothing, very similar to create XML to run the user interface, but letting you to fill some gaps with more creative methods (when they won't destroy your own modifications when re-creating the source files).

On the other side, sometimes the UI builders really don't help you. Once I created a very complex and flexible database library directly using the VCL Delphi's framework without the usage of the UI Builder. The framework was wonderful, but the UI Builder just did't let you to go beyond some basic limit. And as I understand they never improved this, just made the particular libraries obsolete instead of trying to improve how they used them.

mm .. a "smart" phone without the operating system is basically ... nothing.

I think that there is a basic fundamental problem here.

There are characteristics and there are characteristics in a device that carry you to another place.

The first ones are classified as critical and it is important to invest all possible resources to make them to work. I know one car computer could cost $100 but to develop it cost millions of dollars, so there are resources to make them well.

The other characteristics, to attach an iPod, to control the temperature in your seat, to dim the internal light, they can have bugs, nobody will die because of them.

But, please, don't make bugs in the critical areas because you like to have the superficial characteristics at hand without using money, I will name that an irresponsible design behaviour.

At the end, what happened is that the current user-computing environments where not created to be in a connected world where resources were available through the Internet. This has been a very disordered and incomplete evolution where something must die in the improvement process.

You are the owner of your environment. But others can execute sensitive/powerful code without your permission. Must be a difference between "you" and the "others" for you to be really secure, a difference that disappear when the software is already in execution position. And this is the main problem.

This is like to have a car. If you let an unknown person to drive your car then you are doomed. You don't do that, you have keys, you have a safe place to store your car, and when other takes your car it is an abnormal behaviour. But current systems see with good eyes that other pieces of software are executed without enough control inside them, and this is their normal behaviour ... something is not logical in this equation.

To watch TV and to hear music is useless because they are oriented to commercial goals, they are not intended to teach anybody useful things. With clear exceptions (let me see ... BBC, BBC ... BBC ... ).

Right now I am hearing Arthur Honegger: "Une Cantate de Noël" in Youtube, and I suppose nobody knows this music because of standard TV or Radio ... even, I doubt people, in general, knows that Honegger even exist as a composer or that there is this option to find good modern music; let me see, 6801 people saw this including me. Another test ... Samuel Barber (a very important US composer) ... "Summer Music" ... 958 views ... and a last one ... Miley Cyrus - "Wrecking Ball" ... 523,997,788 views ....

I think everything is said.

I use C++ every day and I understand you ... but in that case maybe what could be said is that C++ is bigger and, in that sense, more difficult to master.

In fact, you can do exactly the same you do with C++ with C, even object oriented programming. But ... and this is where things turn out, C becomes more complex tha C++ because you need to figure how to do the things with less language constructors.

At the end, returning to the original posting about education, what people needs to know is how to use effectively their computer and programming is a good way to have the maximum of such devices. What I don't see is everybody using C or C++ as daily basis because "both" are hard to use well. What the people need is to understand the concepts well and then, to use some language that permits them to have a flexible life with their devices without committing programming sins that later will take their eyes our of their orbits.

Calculus is important in the sense that Mathematics is the language of science.

And our computers are based on mathematics. Of course, you can create software without mathematical background, but when you do it with a careful design based on well stablished mathematical principles ... oh, what a difference!!

The modern Patterns based programming is ... a mathematical model. The object oriented programming follows rules that are crafted according with mathematical practice. How the cycles and conditions work inside the software flow describe mathematical considerations, and it is possible to anticipate how your software will behave using mathematical theory to save you a lot of time and "money".

The problem is not to learn "Calculus". The problem is to learn when to "apply" Calculus. As an example, I have many years learning english (spanish is my native language) ... my writing is not perfect, but I am improving it every day ... but as I don't use Mandarin for daily communications, my low Mandarin knowledge is rusted and disappearing. But this doesn't mean that to learn Mandarin is not important, talking fluent Mandarin could open me many doors that today are closed.

This is not true.

Both have advanced compilers, just that they are based on different principles.

You can create very complex things with C. An example are the UNIX like operating systems.

IE is a niche product in fact ... it is designed to work with Windows only.

When Windows decline, mainly because OSX and the mobile platforms (indirectly we see Linux because of Android here), IE must decline ... it is simple.

If Microsoft likes IE to grows, they need to increase their Windows sales, or they must go out their Windows bubble.

I am from Costa Rica, so my opinions are different because I am a compromised witness.

This sunday we have national elections to choose our president and our congress. But this time it is a complex issue that makes these Windows/Linux, GPL/Apache/BSD, etc., fights to be pale in comparison.

Instead of two main candidates, as usually happens in the U.S., we have 5 main candidates from 13 (around that quantity). And our people it is now very fragmented on their opinions, going from hard core communists to liberal oriented ones, with many "nuances" in the middle. Who will win? ... today it is very difficult to say even who will be in third place, and the Congress will be a complete salad of gray, oranges, blues, etc.

The "other option" in the Snowden case could be a healthy one. To try to label somebody only as good or bad not always seems to be the best option. Today, because of this, the NSA is becoming more careful about what they do, and the general population keep open eyes on them. Also, the "watergate" style problems are coming to the table again, I think, for the best. And Snowden, yes, he broke the rules, but was he trying to commit a crime?

Oh, CSound is not for Linux, it is multiplatform. In fact, it is a programming library, so you could seriously think on this if you like to make a synthesiser as an "offline" or "high quality sound rendering" option.

For example, you use the standard midi options with latency and whatever you find to work, but when you are satisfied, then you ask the software to render a sound file. This will work for a while, but would be independent of whatever limitation your hardware could have.

For notation you also can consider Lylipond (also multiplatform). It is a language and a compiler. The output is a PDF and MIDI. For some people, the PDF quality is even higher than Finale itself can do. It is based on the same philosophy as LaTEX and PS, but taking into consideration musical nuances.

So you see, you only need to find the way of making the creation of CSound and Lylipond scripts easier, and then to call the corresponding compilers. What I don't have at hand is an option for WYSIWYG music imput; I have been trying but no one solution (commercial or not) in the market is good enough for me :-)

Something to try in your free time, could be interesting.

I was trying CSound several years ago ... by concept, latency doesn't exist.

http://www.csounds.com/

The idea is to build the music algorithmically, so you only need a CPU, not even a Sound card ... and "if" latency exist working with MIDI software devices, that doesn't exist when creating audio files directly from mathematical definitions.

I need to return to this some day ... I was checking and they have been working to advance this technology continuously :-)