The Union of the Crowns happened in 1603, even before the Act of Union of 1707. Even if they gain independence, I believe the plan is for Scotland to keep the current monarchy.

Yes, I don't get a say (as in voting in the referendum) on this, and I accept that as right and proper. The decision whether to become independent or not is being rightly left to the voters of Scotland. I don't need to be referred to an article by Roger Scruton to "educate" myself on this! Actually, What I was trying to point out is that the voters of Scotland haven't as yet has a say on this themselves - they will do in September - so to indicate that they have already come to a decision (and that the decision was for 'moral' reasons) is incorrect.

Yes, I'm sure the rUK could vote in a Labour government on it's own. That was not the point I was trying to make. What I was pointing out was that the phrase "Successive Tory governments" seems to ignore the existence of the last Labour government (1997 to 2010), a government where much of the 'top brass' was Scottish.

(Talking of governments and parties, the McCrone report, although commissioned by a Conservative Government, was suppressed by the Labour Government under Harold Wilson!)

Finally, if Scotland does vote to become an independent country, then I shall wish it well, and hope for ongoing friendship between Scotland and the rUK. If Scotland votes to remain in the UK, then I hope we all continue to strive to make the UK work well for all its citizens.

http://www.scottish-hockey.org.uk/international-teams.aspx

Maybe, but it really pisses off the Scots!

Oh, has the referendum happened? I thought it was due in September.

Or are we talking only about those (in Scotland) who so far have expressed a preference for independence. Although substantial, I don't believe this is (yet) a majority of those eligible to vote. And we won't know for certain until September.

As to "Successive Tory governments", from 1997 to 2010 we (the UK - I'm rUK) had a Labour government, with two Scottish Chancellors (Brown and Darling), a Scottish Prime Minister (Brown) and a Prime Minister, who if not Scottish, was educated at one of Scotland's top Public Schools (Blair, went to Fettes, in Edinburgh).

Actually you fought to get away from Great Britain, not (just) England. The Union was in place when America declared it's independence (I assume you're US-American).

Other people aren't voting in the referendum, only Scots. So what other people think doesn't matter.

"England" (or more correctly the rest of the UK, or "rUK" as it's become known - there's Wales and Northern Ireland as well) don't have a say in the decision. The decision either to become an independent country (or not) will be made by the voters of Scotland, and the voters of Scotland alone.

As someone in the rUK all I can do is sit back and accept whatever they decide. That said, I cannot help feeling that if the decision for independence will somehow be influenced on how Scotland looks in the BBC weather map, somewhere the plot has been lost!

As to beer, try Theakston's Old Peculier. Ace!

Thanks. Yes, there is the possibility of bypassing the clipboard (assuming some integration). Where there isn't, KeePass (for instance) clears the clipboard after a specified period (default12 seconds).

Thanks. I don't think #a is particularly problematic these days - the modern versions of LibreOffice (and OpenOffice?) use AES-256. Good points with #b.

OK, why not?

(Truly curious as to why a password manager is considered better than an encrypted spreadsheet, using the same password or pass phrase).

I don't think this is unique to Java; the same thing has happened here with Ubuntu/Canonical. Love can easily turn to hate whereas indifference rarely does.

Concerning Java, I don't think it is Java per se that is the cause of the 'hatred', it is more (1) the insecurity of the browser plug-in, (2) the attempt to install the ask.com toolbar when installing the JRE and (3) a general distrust of Oracle.

I don't have a problem with any of these. For #1 this can be disabled, for #2 I just download the JDK .tar.gz for Linux and just unpack it to install, and for #3 there is always OpenJDK in the background to keep Oracle on the straight an narrow.

The only real alternative to Java is .NET, which for me (using Linux) would mean using Mono. Interestingly, open-source Mono seems to generate more hatred here on Slashdot than the closed-source and proprietary .NET does.

I run Windows XP under VirtualBox (host system - LMDE XFCE). Why? For those few times when I need to use IE (for sites that don't work with Firefox or Chrome), or I need to use Office (for documents I cannot amend with LibreOffice, i.e. Office macros).

As I have an old retail license for XP, it fits the bill. It still works - rather like the 25+ year old fountain pen I used when at university. And it's legitimate. OK when XP goes out of support I may have to fork out 100+ GBP for Windows 8.1 (you can't get a retail license for Windows 7 any more) - but I'll object to doing so.

Unfortunately I can't (yet) ditch Windows completely. The sites that need IE or the Office documents with macros are usually sites or documents linked to the company I work for.

I did wonder about this. How does any code get into the release branch of any project (Open Source or not) without some form of code review or understanding of the functionality behind it? How is it tested? (I assume it is tested!). This is not a problem of Open Source, this is a problem of poor Configuration Management!

To compare - I expect nothing gets into the Linux kernel main branch (as maintained by Linus Torvalds) without being discussed, agreed, reviewed by someone, tested, and signed off.

Afghanistan does have the right to tax the goods resulting from that transaction in London as they enter into Afghanistan.

If States (as you say) are independent, then why shouldn't New York have the right to tax goods resulting from any transaction made in Oregon as they enter into New York?

Of course, rather than New York set up physical checkpoints (and have the tax paid at the border as goods enter into New York), they could make a "logical" one by requiring that the tax be paid at the point of purchase for any goods that will enter New York.

(It would make my life easier if Amazon US collected any VAT likely to be due for goods shipped to the UK and passed the collected payment it to the UK government, rather than me having to go the the Post Office to pay it. However I could see Amazon US objecting to this!)