What about all the cycles compiling and debugging C++ code? Or all the trees torn down for C++ books? Or the environmental impact of C++ developers? I mean, have you ever had to share a cube with one of them? Pheewww.

...but I'd prefer to be able to buy something assembled

Slashdot, news for nerds. So sad, I remember when nerds built their own systems.

I have graduate degrees in both Computer Science and Economics and this commonality was so obvious to me over a decade ago that it wouldn't have seemed worth writing about. Hell, you even study Von Neumann in both of these fields at the undergraduate level.

Especially if stem cells get added into the mix.

Schools are putting out bids for cat 5e cable knit sweaters and kneesocks

They were all mainframe guys at insurance and automotive-related manufacturing companies, white short-sleeve shirts and pocket protectors. In 1978 I'm sure PCs and the Internet were way beyond their imagination.

At age 15 my college plan was to major in computer science. This was in 1978. My father had me meet with some people who worked in the field. They all told me to find another interest, that by the time I graduated from college there would be nothing to do... all the computer programs would be written, all maintenance would be automated, etc. Lucky for me I snicker at crusty old fuckers, ie. anybody 20 years older than my current age.

... then ask them to call it, heads or tails?

There are plenty of humans, the last thing we need is unproductive ones breeding. In the US we get a tax break for each kid which just encourages breeding in this country... and that's just the start once you throw in welfare benefits that pay you to have kids and not work.

Heat kills drives so avoiding it is a big plus. I've had friends buy neat looking cases that didn't have proper drive cooling and the hard disk died. At three separate employers we had weekend air conditioning failures and each time hard drives died not just over the weekend but the following weeks as well.

My machines are in 4U server cases with a dust filter on the front, a 120mm fan in front blowing on the drive cage, and two 80mm fans in back pulling air through. Temps in the case stay low.

The other key is quality power supplies. A poor p/s can kill your drives or the motherboard with that on-board "RAID" functionality.

Make backups and take steps to avoid hard drive abuse through heat or unstable power. That should be good enough

Imagine a blogger that submits its link to slashdot, but once it appears there, that blog can no longer serve pages.

Do you like fishsticks?

Do you like to put fishsticks in your mouth?

The 1990s called... they want their "automated convert Xxxx to Java" idea back.

This looks like a cute toy that will auto-generate some bloated code. No way big iron financial systems are moving to Java, especially auto-generated Java that will perform like crap and be harder to maintain than the COBOL it replaced.

Another casualty of the recession's downturn in business travel

When this economy turns around, I hope some sanity remains regarding what business travel is necessary vs. wasteful. So much of the time these business meetings could have been conducted by phone or over the internet.