I just don't want the boss to be disrespectful to me when the estimate is not accurate. Get us some estimation training or something. Don't give me a lecture. I'm too old for lectures.

you forgot to order the right Compaq IDE laptop header adapter. Whichever one it is for this model...

Suddenly a Laplink cable and a VirtualBox running DOS with a detachable D: doesn't seem so awful bad. Move the image from the XP box via flash drive or network, mount it loopback and profit before lunch.

http://www.pcxt-micro.com/dos-...

That's a bad example because that's almost never my criteria. I could write my own framework almost as quickly as I could suss out the quirks of someone else's, and that's usually a teensy part of the overall project lifetime anyway. Instead, I judge on things like "do I want to spend the rest of my time here maintaining this thing?" and "who's going to own security updates?" and "will it be easier to hire people with experience on this one or on the one I haven't written yet?". Sometimes there's no good framework A to use, or maybe framework A exists and is popular but is unfit for this specific purpose, so we write something in-house. Either way, notice that "time to get started" is a trivial or nonexistent part of the equation.

All of your "potential" scenarios are so fucking crazy, either from a technical or business standpoint I gotta ask you for the number of your drug dealer. That's some good shit.

Save me a seat at the table. I think these screenshots look like a nice update. This is timely to me because I was stuck in a meeting this week and looking at the presenter's projected Windows 7 desktop, and thinking of how ugly and unhelpful the current icon set is. Have you ever actually looked at the Outlook icon? It's a big "O" and a faint envelope in orange on a yellow background. Unless you've used it enough to associate that with Outlook, you wouldn't make the connection. The Mac Outlook icon is a lot simpler, nicer, and more visually obvious. The rest of his toolbar icons were the same: shapeless, indistinct, and unappealing. I like these new ones a lot more.

To the "change for change's sake!" Luddites: this isn't that. The Windows 8 Metro desktop abomination is that. This is a company updating its visual components to meet the expectations of the day. Everyone does this. Food labels change. Magazine layouts change. Car styling changes. Furniture colors change. Clothes change. Why do you think Windows icons should look the same for eternity? And spare me the "it's confusing!" whining - a file folder is still instantly recognizable as a file folder. Its look has evolved, but it's still the same basic shape and color.

Mark today on a calendar: I defended Windows's visual appearance. I never thought that would happen.

When Linux has a worthy Office competitor.

Libre Office not good enough for you?

That's some grade A word salad there.

Hey, Liberals are nazis now, so transparency being fascism is perfectly cromulent in this worldview.

Add that to the long list of other things you don't know.

LOL. Care to make it interesting? Unlike most assholes here, I don't just say shit to make myself feel good, I'll back it up with cash. Care to wager some money that the GOP will take the White House in 2 years?

Black matter, dark matter, dyslexia is awesome...

"Alternately-bright matter" is the preferred nomenclature, Dude.

"Neither of those professions require specialized drivers licenses"

No, they don't spend "just as many hours on the road." Both involve trips ancillary to the principal occupation, so the amount of driving is less. Neither of them involve the carriage of strangers for money.

Would you suggest that other forms of commercial driver's license are also unnecessary, such as those required for driving a passenger bus or hauling hazardous materials?

The Internet is the content (data/message/letter). The network is the transport (medium/postal service).

Someday, you may understand the difference.

And, there's a difference between "internet" and "Internet."