What about your new mom?

Sorry, had to!

Which distro / desktop is she using?

My point exactly: there are multiple. For most people, sadly, it's Microsoft Windows. No choices. Many (most?) don't even mess with the few customizations there are in Windows. But it's mostly consistent from computer to computer.

I know many semi-techies who talk about that they're using "Linux". I ask "which distribution?" I get deer in headlights. After more questions, or sometimes eyes-on, it very often turns out to be Ubuntu, but could be any of (too?) many.

A concern: non-techie person "A" uses Mint / Cinnamon. Non-techie "B" also has Linux, but Zorin running XFCE. Person "A" wants to use person "B"'s computer, or maybe just looks at it, but has no clue what is going on, gets confused, becomes disillusioned about Linux.

So, back to my original question: which distro (and window manager) is best for most non-tech people?

I have some machines 20 years old, working perfectly. I don't think an SSD is necessary. Most of mine run spinning rust and they're fine. Gotta be careful with swapfile: excess background tasks hogging up RAM causing swapping. Also defrag occasionally.

In a way I'm glad Microsoft is abandoning 10. It would be so so awesome if it triggered a large loss for Microsoft and exodus from Windows.

We techies should use it as an opportunity to help people upgrade to Linux. Not sure what distro I'd recommend though. (yes, we all have opinions on that...)

Also not a lawyer, but have been doing much legal research for other reasons.

In the US, the legal system adheres to "The American Rule" which means each litigant pays for their own lawyers. Obviously extremely unfair when a multi-billion corporation goes against a single non-wealthy person. You'd wish the lawmakers would do something about these insane unfair and unbalanced cases.

However, you can search "American Rule exceptions" and find out reasons you might be able to sue for and recover legal fees.

As with far too much of the legal system, there are many reasons and gray areas. Unreasonable delays, malicious prosecution, etc. As always you have to prove these things.

IMHO using extremely fast and possibly inaccurate AI is a bit unfair.

Also, background / clips should not count as infringement. If someone posts full and uninterrupted audio of a song, I can see where that might constitute a violation if the poster didn't get permission.

I don't do much video work, but some years ago a friend asked me to edit together a video from clips he made of a vacation home he owns and rents out. He wanted some background music. I did a quick search and found out that one of my all-time favorite groups, "Spyro Gyra", encourages people to use their music in videos, wherever / whatever. They deserve far more recognition and audience, but I suspect since they buck the big money machine, they don't get much air play.

Yeah I just remembered- the CD drive often (usually?) connected to a sound card. They often were sold together. IIRC some sound cards had 2 or 3 CD drive interface connectors, so could support most drives. Ugh.

I barely knew about them at the time and was unhappy when I learned about the many. Company I worked for at that time was doing all SCSI hard disks and CD drives. I got lucky and got an external NEC CD drive (on clearance) that has SCSI and it worked very well. Also got early Linux CDs including SLS, Yggdrasil, and I forget what else. I tried several, liked SLS which became Slackware, which is still my primary Linux distro. I used to boot from a pair of floppies, but fortunately never had to install from a pile. Did some Xenix installs from 5.25" floppies, but I think it's only like 7 or so. And then Windows 3.11- I think that was 10 or so?

And Lockheed, particularly the L-1011 which IIRC has a pretty good safety record.

> absolute language

I agree, and have noticed it seems to be getting worse. Maybe I'm just noticing it more. Some guesses involve people trying to be more concise, like in texts, and the result is less clear communication. Maybe add in, for whatever reason, people being stronger in their beliefs, and then more emphatic. I dunno.

The Air India Preliminary report specifically states "01" seconds.

Yes. I downloaded their preliminary report. I just searched it for "switch". There's a good pic showing the switches, right below the main throttle levers. The switches have fairly large bat handles. The investigators will need to dig into maintenance records to see if that plane had been checked for proper locks on the switches, but the preliminary report indicates they were not checked, as it was only an "advisory not mandatory".

IMHO, looking at the picture, they're not well protected, however it would be fairly clumsy to switch both of them off accidentally.

Interestingly I can't find anything in the report regarding whether the investigators found the switch locks installed, and/or functional. They look pretty ugly, not sure if they're too damaged to analyze the locks.

No? I see it clearly. For example, a timestamp of 09:15:01 - you don't see where someone could copy-paste the "01"?

Again, as posted elsewhere in this discussion, there was and is an FAA bulletin regarding those (and other) switches, that the locking feature might not work correctly (or at all). Where I work we use similar switches that go into products. The lockout tabs are tiny and could easily wear away and/or be broken off.

As I posted above, IMHO it's (obviously) too easy to inadvertently cut off the engine fuel. It needs to be made more difficult, including spring-loaded covers over the switches.

They took the timing from the master event log that lists H:M:S.

Thanks. Yeah, I'd vote to move them. I agree that they might be needed in an emergency, but life and engineering is full of compromises, including ergonomics and the constant quest for safety, which often involves working around human idiosyncrasies. Pilots are surrounded by lights, gauges, switches, and other controls. There are many they need to access in emergencies.

As I mentioned, it's very easy to become accustomed to pulling up on a switch to move the bat handle. Pilots would be very used to doing this without thinking. I always hate to state the very obvious, but obviously one of the Air India pilots in fact did toggle the switches. Again, maybe the lock feature was broken. We use similar switches where I work, including in products we make and ship. Of course including the side guards.

I hope it's not suicide, and I kind of doubt it because they might not have died quickly at those speeds. We'll probably never know for sure.

Another post here mentions an FAA bulletin that says to inspect, and replace if necessary, the fuel switches. Not sure if investigators have been able to determine the condition of the switches, and if the toggle locks were working, but that might be telling.

That said, we humans develop "muscle memory", and if you're used to pulling on a toggle bat handle then flipping it, that motion becomes subconscious.

I'm not sure where they are on a 787, but maybe they need to be moved to a less accessible location, and spring-loaded hinged covers added (at the very least).