Indeed they do. ATC discover the plane's location using radar (airplane id is confirmed by it reflecting a unique code with a transponder)

So can you give a example of an extreme case where metaprogramming (i.e. dynamically generating code) has an advantage over just using a good old-fashioned precompiled abstraction? (Does it really only work in extreme cases?)

That's simple - just google it and use the phrase which returns the most hits.

Well, nobody forced you to buy a Mercedes! If you ever do any advanced driving courses, you'll learn about correct use of the hand/parking brake (not using it on a hill will soon get you failed).

It's also essential to secure the car against accidental movement while stationary. Example: you're stopped at a pedestrian crossing and somebody shunts you up the rear, you don't want to be ploughing into the pedestrians because your foot slipped off the brake.

That's a bad technique that can only work if the engine idle is set too high. The handbrake start is the correct and safest way to operate a manual on a hill. Indeed, you should have the parking brake engaged whenever the car is stationary (as taught in the UK when I learned to drive).

You don't need three feet. In most cars there's a brake you can operate with your hand that's precisely designed for use when the car is stationary. Any rollback at all in a manual car with a handbrake is just unskilled driving.

Ever heard of the handbrake? Once you learn the skill on a manual car it makes for perfect hill starts (no rollback at all).

Is that a patent? Surely a patent describes how an apparatus is made, not what the desired outcome should be.

It's like patenting TV as 'a box which show moving pictures captured by another box with a lens' rather than 'apparatus for modulating an electron beam in rectangular matrix...'.

You put the waste into a fast-breeder reactor. BTW, do you know how much coal (and therefore radioactive emissions) Germany uses to generate electricity?

That's happening right now. I'm seeing the same performance from a virtualized 4-CPU 16GB machine as a real one. (Didn't use to be like that).

Your code should be a narrative. How about checkParamaters(...); setupConnection(...); submitQueries(...); checkReturnValues(...);

I'm no electrician

Thank goodness for that!

Try this: Would any of the currently proposed net neutrality laws prevent Cablevision from charging other people for cable tv that it gives to its own ISP customers for free? Or is this considered an acceptable competitive practice?

It's not a tax. It is a toll for a service.

The 68000 didn't have virtual memory so can't be compared with the (later) 80386. The 68010 (which I programmed on in the 80s in a Torch XXX) had virtual memory and was the 'mainframe on a chip'. Also I question this idea of IBM considering the 68000 for the IBM PC. The 68k had a 16-bit data bus so would have meant a more expensive mainboard design than the (8-bit bus) 8088. The Motorola chip to compare with the 8088 is the 68008 (Sinclair QL anybody?).