Odd, I had bolded the part about "major OS release" from the FAQ; didn't come through. But to answer your question: no, I'm not retarded, and I would fully expect an architecture change to break MacPorts. But as you should've been able to glean from the context of my post, I was referring exclusively to the issue of OS upgrades and how apt-get wouldn't break. Perhaps it is you who's lacking in basic cognitive/inductive reasoning abilities?

Hmm, still requires xcode and for Snow Leopard/Lion, requires compilation as no binary available. So besides syntax, not seeing how this is much of an improvement over MacPorts.

Fink could be interesting, thanks. Again, would probably not rely on that for production/client work, but could be useful for other utilities.

This isn't anti-Apple bullshit, it's the truth: from the MacPorts FAQ:

Ubuntu:

do-release-upgrade

...

apt-get install $package

There's a 99% chance that will Just Work (tm). The other 1%, well, likely something's not right to begin with (wrong apt sources, etc.) or it's an edge case.

Look, I love my Macbook, but I choose to run VirtualBox with Windows 7 and Ubuntu because I feel that while it does a great job of some things, it's poor at best at other things in comparison to other OSs. One of those things is having a core, reliable package management system: when it's time to release some new code and/or configuration changes for a client, I don't want to get burnt by a 3rd-party package system not working as expected.

Never found MacPorts to be nearly as friendly/comprehensive as a good ol' Ubuntu apt repository. It's also 3rd-party and at the mercy of Apple and requires a bunch of prerequisites.

Because nothing beats Linux for package management. Miss not having a repo of open source at my disposal; the App Store will never touch it.

...longer than a search query in Google. And then you reach for your terrible Bluetooth keyboard/dock with it's equally-terrible leatherette cover and try to juggle the thing on your lap, all the while wondering why you didn't just get a thin laptop or a netbook.

get a $2.99 a month VPS running whatever flavour of *nix you want. I have two of them. I use one for a proxy (for hulu.com access; I'm in Canada) and my personal websites. The other is for friends and family websites; both are from different providers, both run MaraDNS for redundancy (ns1 and ns2).

Matrix has been re-releasing the games at full pop ($49!) with minor-to-moderate bug fixes and a few enhancements. I can see how that can fly with newer games in expansion packs (with arguably more work in creating new assets, campaigns, etc.), but 10-15 year old games? They should just release the source code and stop milking cash out of an ancient game series.

And as if that's enough money to shut them up too. They'll be zero-day'ed before the check clears.

I know this is an obvious troll but you really have no idea what you're talking about. For a consultant, you're at the mercy of the billable hour, of which there's a finite amount in any given week. What this means is that there's a real opportunity cost associated with every job you take on, and it has to be profitable for the business to function, just like any business, and that means margins: you need to bill out enough to cover your own salary, other people's salaries (we have bosses and accountants too), expenses (who do you think picks up the tab at lunch?), plus have enough leftover to turn a profit. Some consultancies turn more profits than others, like any other business, but a consultant's billable rate != consultant's hourly salary.

A friend of a mine recently left RIM. He was high-up/involved enough to know that RIM's losing all their big accounts because a) nobody's buying Blackberries on their own; everyone's buying an iPhone or an Android phone b) executives know this, so it's cheaper for them to have their staff buy the phone they want, and expense a percentage of their data/voice plans to the company instead.
I will say that from a stability/security/durability perspective, you can't beat Blackberries: being able to remotely brick a phone, knowing that their phones have been built with security in mind, and having personally dropped various Blackberries I've owned down flights of stairs, backed over it with my car, and stepped on it, only to have cracked the screen once, is proof of this, IMO.

*whooosh*

I buy business machines from a local, privately-owned retailer: I get the same 3-year next day warranty that big boys give, quality Intel motherboards/CPUs with Kingston RAM; quality StarTech PSUs and cases, assembled by knowledgeable technicians.

If/when there's a hardware issue, I drop it off, they handle the RTM and have in-stock spares to get the machine up-and-running again quickly. Sure beats going through the usual scripted interrogation with a Dell rep on the other end of the line or having to ship it back.

Best of all, no bloatware.

Why not just grab a fit-PC2? http://www.fit-pc.com/web/