If the task in front of you is so revolutionary that it has never been done before, then you really are building a prototype. This belongs in the realm of R&D which has its own theories and methodologies for handling project scheduling. However, most software projects are built using a set of known technologies. If you properly decompose your system design, an experienced developer should be able to estimate the amount of time required to code each part with a reasonable margin of error. So you are not asking for the time to build the entire data entry screen, but how long to mockup the interface, then add the data validation, then server interaction, and then the middle ware component that writes the data to the database. So not all that different from most construction projects, which all have their own creative aspects such as architectural design elements, floor plans, and color pallet for the furnishings, along with the more mundane aspects like the amount of time required to weld the support structure, and let the concrete cure.

Here I am, brain the size of a planet, and they ask me to patrol the Microsoft visitor parking lot. Call that job satisfaction, because I don't.

My personal best is about 50 minutes, before I got bored with them. I told them I only had flaky dial-up service. I kept playing the modem connection sound, then tell them that their software was downloading. After waiting for 5 minutes, asking them rude personal questions in the interim, I tell them that I am at 90%, then shout a lot of expletives, saying that the connection went down, and need to reconnect. Once they passed me off to their tech support people because I told them the issue was on their end of the dial up connection.

Police station shootings happen quite frequently: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/tag/police-station-shooting/, http://ktla.com/2014/04/07/lapd-officer-wounded-in-shooting-at-police-station/, and http://www.nbcphiladelphia.com/news/local/West-Deptford-Police-Station-Shooting-270886191.html.

While I do agree that we may have gone too far to in disarming otherwise law-abiding citizens, I am not sure that arming every single teacher would do anything to solve the problem. In fact I can envision many scenarios where an armed teacher (or worse, a student) runs headlong into a situation where they have little to no training, likely complicating the efforts of the police to resolve the situation. The best place for that teacher to be is locked in the classroom with their students, making sure they follow the procedures proscribed for the situation.

I think the article eluded to this, that there would be some communication between the device and router before the charging began. I am a bit skeptical about putting this into large appliances like the fridge, however putting this into the base of a desk lamp might work well. That being said it would probably just be better mounted on the wall, or better yet, inside the wall out of view, hardwired into house power.

According to the summary, the radios passively send signals to the tower every few seconds, so you need not transmit a message to be detected. I do agree however that these are likely not useful for detecting speed traps, as you would likely detect officers on parallel side streets, generating a lot of false positives, especially in dense urban areas.

I am not sure about this. A Federal judge recently found that flashing your headlights to warn oncoming drivers of a speed trap, is protected speech under the First Amendment. You could make an argument that these are a group of concerned citizens tracking the activities of their local police, and publishing their findings.

If you are an enterprise shop, you likely have so many disks spread across so many servers that you probably have an admin team responsible for projecting utilization for the next 12 months, so that procurement and installation costs can budgeted.

For the home user, or a small business, 90% is still a good rule of thumb. I would hate to see some additional process running in the background constantly projecting when the disk will be full. Just throw a warning for the user when you reach 80-90% capacity, and let them figure it out. They are probably more likely to fill their thumb drives than they are the local media.

Some automated tools could be applied. For example, the audio could be scanned for gun shots, or other loud noises (signs of a struggle), which triggers an automatic hold on that video. The real trick is going to be dealing with the FOIA requests. I could see where the police would want to review and possibly redact sensitive video, such as a conversation with a confidential informant. That means if I make a request for all the video from an officer for the last 90 days, or all officers on duty during a 6 hour time, someone needs to review it all.

I have never used Uber, but I suspect that in an accident situation you start with the person driving the car you were in, regardless of who is at-fault, then let the insurance companies sort it all out. Your driver could be is a heap of trouble if they are involved in an at-fault accident while driving for one of these services, and it is found that they do not have a policy that covers for-hire services (most home/auto policies don't). You as the passenger could be left cover your own costs, since the drivers policy will likely refuse coverage. The upside for you is that your personal health insurance would pay your costs, then attempt to recover their costs from the driver (or his insurance, and possibly Uber) through subrogation. Your costs would likely be limited to the co-pays and deductibles of your health policy.

Something dealing with snowballs, hell, and a whole lot of pigs.

This is already happening in some jurisdictions. Still some issues to work out, but there is definitely movement in the right direction.

I am suspicious of this number too. There were a lot of facts and figures in the article, but I am not sure I found the direct link between vacation, sleep and the overall health of the economy. By some measures the European economies are still struggling, while the US has mostly recovered (technically speaking). I too want to see the US population get more rest, but if vacation and sleep are such a big benefit, why does Europe still lag?

Second this. There are a lot of state and federal laws to navigate here. It may not be necessary or appropriate for someone to use your passwords to access your financial information. You could land yourself in a heap of trouble if you access someones account after they die, even if you are entitled to the money.

Safe deposit boxes can get funny depending on state law. First don't ever put the will in the box. The executor will need that access the box later. Furthermore, it could take several day or weeks to get the authority to open the box after the person has died, so don't put anything in there that is time critical.