I like how they spun those in the manual.

yes, that stuff has it's own needs category which neither tablets nor regular notebooks can cover.

I don't really like the way that Rowling is held up as an example of a rags to riches success against the odds. According to Wikipedia she completed her university education and gained a degree in French and Classics. She then travelled the world a bit, got married, had a kid and then got divorced. When she returned to the UK, she moved into a flat and had all of her bills paid by the state. She then lived the (expensive) coffee shop lifestyle while she was writing her book. At one point, she received a massive grant from an arts council.

It was cushy. I wish I'd had it as hard her when I was struggling to get my first bit of paid writing work.

Zip functionality is in the core System namespace with .NET.

Most apps don't require special native functionality.

Can you imagine the media frenzy of Bill Gates returning to helm Microsoft?

If it happens, I hope the theme is the imperial march.

That said, it'd probably do wonders for Microsoft. Bill Gates is kind of a bastard but he gets shit done

why would you buy a proprietary locked device just to unlock it? Seems like a lot of effort.

wrong. Tablets replace notebooks.

While surface isn't compelling (considering it's price is excessively high for what it offers), having a tablet completely replaces the need for a laptop. The tablet is the device bridging smartphone to desktop.

But the bottom line is that which is easier depends on which you know better

Actually, I've been using Windows twice as long as Linux, and knowing the interface makes Linux superior, since Microsoft changes everything around with every new version. If you'd cut your teeth on Windows 98 you'd be lost in Windows 7, but if you'd never used anything but 2002 Mandrake you would still be comfortable with kubuntu.

I never did like Gnome. ...and which is better depends on what you're doing with it.

Well, that is true. If you're an image professional you'll need Windows or Apple because there's no professional equivalent to Photoshop for Linux or BSD. But unless you absolutely need that $700 image editor, the price is a waste. And gamers still need Windows.

Maybe I have an advantage having worked with many different systems

Same here, started on a TS1000 that I learned assembly on, then a TRS-80, Apple IIe, DOS, JCL (I have no idea what hardware it was running on), then Windows, then Linux. From about 1995 unto; 2005 I did a lot of mostly database programming in NOMAD on the mainframe and dBase, Clipper, and FoxPro, with some javascript for my personal web pages around the turn of the century.

And over 5 years I had 2 failed desktop drives, one failed server drive (in a RAID array), 1 failed desktop power supply, and 1 failed server power supply. No OS or MS Office problems. Fully automated updates. After the install, only ever went to a desktop for the hardware failures I listed. I wouldn't want to try this with Linux.

No OS problems? No hangs or bluescreens with W95 or W98? That's unusual. As to hardware failures, I never had problems swapping hardware in either OS (except XP thought it was pirated after a few hardware changes and I had to call MS to fix the problem).

I discovered around 2004 that Linux was far more hardware-fault tolerant than XP. I had a dual-boot system with XP and Mandriva, and the Windows side got really flaky. Turned out the power supply had gotten flaky, Mandriva chugged along happily until it failed completely when the Windows side wouldn't even boot. Both were fine after I replaced the power supply.

BTW before you say the desktop is easier to use in Linux you may want to say which Linux and which GUI (plus add-ons) you're talking about.

Like I said, I never did like Gnome. Been happy with KDE (except 4, when I tried Gnome). That's the desktop I'd suggest to a Windows user.

A really good OS wouldn't even have a Control Panel.

Well, I don't agree with that but I will agree that text config files are really handy. Too bad neither Linux nor Windows use them any more, I miss them.

Why is it when I post with Chrome it takes out all my line feeds, guess I should use IE.

I wouldn't blame Chrome, I'd blame slashdot. I'm not having that problem with FireFox here but I'm having other problems with it.

Do you have it set to "plain old text?" If you have it set to HTML it will remove your line feeds, you'll need <br> and <p> unless it's plain old text.

You never did explain why if Windows 7 and 8 are less bloated and easier to use than Ubuntu and Mint my ten year old kubuntu tower has half the memory and half the processor speed as my Windows 7 notebook yet runs rings around it.