I'm way too old to be a hipster. And the mission critical software run on Apache was part of a large ISP operation.

My post, unlike yours, had some genuine content, citing specific industry experience.

Maybe, maybe not. If you have a truly mission-critical application that requires Windows, it's clear what you're going to do.

I'm not so sure about the whole support thing, though. How good is most commercial support, really? Not so great, and that's true for a lot of "big name" things like ERP packages, databases, etc. Sure, you pay for support. Generally you pay a lot. Do you get a lot? My own experience (decades in the industry) is quite mixed, but a "big name" and a big fee don't necessarily correlate with quality support.

A lot of the free stuff that you deride is actually supported better, for free, in online forums. Now, that's not the type of guarantee that corporate types want to see. But the idea that paid support is solid support is not necessarily true. I remember some years ago being pushed by management to move from Apache to Microsoft Internet Server (or whatever it was called) so we could get "support." That would not have been such a great idea, because --- get this --- the servers were mission critical and the FOSS solution worked better and was better supported.

So I'm saying there's no one answer. Commercial software is not a guarantee of anything. You do what you have to do to run your business. Sometimes it's one way, sometimes the other. I've done everything I've needed to do for many years using mostly free open source software. It meets my needs. If I had some real specialty application, that might not hold true. To each his own.

And "what about the children"

Come on, you left out global warming and save the whales.

What's changed over the generations?

I submit that people are people and fundamentally haven't changed.

Culture has changed, though, and that makes quite a difference. The older generation comes from a different culture than the younger generation, but when us 'oldsters" were "younguns" the "oldsters" of our day thought we were pretty worthless, too. And so on back through the years.

Different cultures, different life experiences. Not different people at the fundamental level.

I do a lot of fiction writing (no, I'm not talking about earnings reports) and I do three things to focus.

1. I don't work at home. There are too many distractions. (I realize this isn't relevant to office workers, generally.) I prefer a place like the University library where it's quiet and there are study carrels.

2. I use a distraction-free writing environment. (I created one for EMACS but there are things like FocusWriter etc.) This is similar to the close-all-tabs idea, I suppose.

3. I use the Pomodoro technique (you can look it up if interested) with 25 minutes on, 5 minutes off, for 3 cycles, then 20 minutes off before restarting. It may be my working style, but I've found this amazingly effective. I can make myself focus for 25 minutes knowing I'll have 5 (or 20) minutes to "scratch the itch" of email etc. Or even better, just close my eyes, or better yet, walk around a little.

Sorry but it isn't PC to use the word "cool" in a discussion about global warming.

Seriously, though, I wish the noise would go away and we could look at nothing but honest science. Can putting zillions of tons of CO2 into the atmosphere fail to have an effect? It seems illogical to assume that it's neutral.

But what's really going to happen? If we could just get rid of all the politicians and special interests and DO SCIENCE we might actually get a clear answer.

The irony is, I actually think the real science is out there, but how can we cut through all the nonsense and get to an objective bottom line?

Here's proof that we are capable of great civilian technology achievements when we have the will and the desire to invest in science and engineering instead of yet another boondoggle.

The thing is, HR departments don't understand that learning a new language, if you already are good with a few, is no big deal. HR people ask for things like 10 years of experience in Language X and they don't listen to reason, even if Language X has only been around for 2 years.

You know what? You ("you" in the sense of "everyone out there") can use anything you want, anything you like, anything that works for you. It doesn't affect me all that much. I'll continue with Linux, LibreOffice, LaTeX, EMACS, Gimp, TaskJuggler, and all the other freeware that works just fine for me. There's symmetry here: That doesn't affect you all that much, either.

There's room in computerland for all of us. We don't need religious wars, we can all just worship in the manner of our choosing.

I would love to see science just be ... you know, science. And I would accept any conclusions drawn therefrom, whether I liked them or not. (For instance, I may not "like" the law of gravity, because it means I can't fly off tall buildings, but I have no choice but to accept it.)

Science tainted with politics or political correctness is harder to trust. By the way, I mean this from any angle. In the specific instance of climate change, there are agendas on both sides.

In fact the problem is that there shouldn't be sides, there should just be objective science, accepted as such, and acted on as such.

It's wonderful to see what happens when someone drinks the Kool Aid, so to speak. I mean, it's fun to show contempt for anyone who doesn't meet the definition of politically correct. The contempt is, after all, what's important.

I'm waiting for someone to blame this latest on global climate change, GMO crops, the evil Americans, etc., instead of realizing that species have come and gone since the earliest days of life on earth.

1) Pa`i`ai kind of literally means "slapped food" or "beaten food" which refers to the pounding process to make poi. Poi is pounded taro diluted with water. Pa`i`ai is not diluted. This is interesting, and they'll ship pa`i`ai to you.

http://www.guavarose.com/2013/...

2) Poi is great with the right foods. Mixed with lomi lomi salmon --- `ono! (delicious).

3) As to judging a protest by uninformed members, no, it doesn't invalidate it, but when a large percentage of the protesters are there because the profs told them to go or because they get 'extra credit' or the like, it does raise some questions. Do they oppose the telescope because they were told they should, or because they understand the issue and took a stand?

4) Bear with me here. Understanding Hawai`i is not so easy. It is very different from the mainland. I like to describe it this way. If you consider the cultural differences between Manhattan and say, a small town in rural Mississippi, the gap is considerable but I describe the type of differences as being along the x-axis. The differences between New York and Tokyo are great, too, but those differences are of another type, and I describe them as being on the y-axis.

People come from the mainland to Hawai`i and expect cultural differences, of course, but they think that they're all on the x-axis. But they aren't. There are definite y-axis differences, too, and a lot of people don't get that. They are the ones who have trouble getting along or understanding the issues. Perhaps I had less trouble adapting because I've been married to an Asian for over 30 years, and I've dealt with y-axis differences. But I've watched people from the mainland come and later go, saying they just couldn't get along in a place like this.

Hawai`i is a very complex place, and there are no easy answers. The postings in this thread, I think, reinforce that opinion.

Poi is, um, an acquired taste.

This whole discussion only serves to reinforce my feeling that there are no simple answers to complex issues.

But about the telescope--- I happened to be on the University of Hawai`i campus when one of the early protest demonstrations was starting up. I had to walk down Dole Street to get to where I was going and that meant traversing long lines of (very orderly and well-behaved) protesters.

Most of them were of course students. And listening to them a little, it seemed that quite a few of them weren't exactly informed on the issue. They were there because the Hawaiian Studies faculty told their students to go.

Something to be said on both sides of this issue, too.