Autechre - Gantz Graf Trasher myself. But this works for me!

meshuggah FTW. Ok a predictable choice, but damn!

Excellent! Then they`ll get a lesser employee `caus I have a friend they don`t like. Save me working for a bunch of jerks. (P.S. not a FB user anyway)

Or rather - Energy exactly why we need to find a replacement. It`s just too useful to burn.

Good God! Is the Slimelight still going? Not far from the Angel tube, yes? Haven`t been there in YEARS.

ok. but why?

Err... ok... how exactly are you equating the H1N1 "swine" flu with pigs flying? did you want me to label it independently-ambulatory true porcine gravitational counteraction resulting in the significant unassisted elevation and movement of Suinae Sus?
Errr Swine flu - Swine flew....? It`s a crap pun, granted, but a pun none the less.

Do you know, every time I see something like this, a little shiver runs up my spine!
They`ve thought of everything, cli programmers FTW every time.
If you can`t do it from a UNIX command line, it probably isn`t worth doing.
Just wish I had the time to learn / remember all the magic incantations :).

The only things I regularly print are large scale route maps for hiking. Can`t have dead batteries!
A colour Kindle type thing would be a real tempter for the mountains, with it`s very low power requirements..
Any suggestions?

Well, you know, I`d never thought of that.....
The boys each had machines (had they wanted it, they could have had half a dozen each, the entire network is dumpster derived). I encourage tinkering. I still don`t want to have to re-install the pc every time somebody else fubes it.Mainly because I deal with this sh1t all day at work (not my kids problem, I know, but still a practical issue). Now we have the option of bootable usb sticks and VMs, but that wasn`t an option when my kids were young (get off my lawn etc)
What tool doesn`t back up their data? There`s still the practical problem of "AARRRhhhggggg, again?" type of frustration.
When you went to school, college, uni, did some body just give you a pc, the complete works of Shakespeare or samples of every rock type on earth and tell you to get on with it? No, because that`s the slowest, hardest, least productive way of doing it. Sit with an interested child as you would with a student (as I said before, you`ll know if they`re interested) and teach, show and demonstrate. It`s not formal education, so let the kid lead in any direction interesting to them.Yes they have to investigate the machines on their own, and they`ll make mistakes (good!) but build up to it. A hard crash and a system restore is unlikely to encourage experimentation. Having bite size pieces explained and opened up as curiosity leads IS much more conducive to experimentation.
`course all this means that you have to like computers and kids :)

"Except that that the boy scouts won't prepare you for being gay...."
Errrr. How do I put this? The back of the scout, rugby or football bus is an excellent place to learn about being gay.....
Most learn that they`re not. A valuable lesson. Some learn that they are, equally valuable.
Good luck with the kids... boy scouts or not :)

Errr. It`s a practical thing. I don`t want to have to re-install the damn thing every week. Nobody, not even my normal user has admin rights - and I`m a network admin for a living! (I just typed loving!!!) You`ll know if they`re into computers (neither of mine are, they`re both just users) and can show them, teach them and learn with them, when you have ascertained that they have the skillz needed not to destroy the family photo album / mp3 collection / video archive, then give them gradually expanding sudo access until they can help you manage the the damn thing not cause ever more trouble. No different to keys to the front door. Or giving them a tool kit to maintain the car. Or wood working tools. Welshmnt

"It will happen for genetic and social reasons you describe. It will happen whether you claim you intend it to happen or not." Well of course it will. I just don`t think it`s healthy to try to second guess this. However, I could not disagree more with your last comment. I intend very little. I try as much as I can just to be and do. (Yes, this is intent, clearly) I didn`t intend to have children, it`s what happens when mammals do not try to not have offspring. You could - validly - claim that I`m selling myself or my children short here. But I have have had (so far) a rich and varied life experience, my children are busy doing the same thing - in their own way. Given that there is only one life (mine, yours, my kids) surely that must be your highest goal? Life is for living - not thinking about. Think about it on your death bed. Did you do it? Or did you did you think about it and decide not to 'cause it was sub optimal? Again, not personal, it`s interesting discussing this with somebody who appears to have a very different approach to life. I`ll end by saying that you`ll have go a long way to find a better set of father - son relationships than we`ve ended up with. (Damn that sounds so smug. But is is both true and relevant to the thread. And when I see some of the train wreck families that try SO HARD, I can`t help feeling just a little pleased.)

I actually do this, I swear! I haven`t had an alarm clock for years now. I MAY be ten to fifteen minutes late waking up once or twice a year - tops. This includes odd times for holidays and awaydays etc.

I can`t be the only one surely ("you are - and don`t call me Shirley").

Oh yeah. Happy new year, everybody.

True, but only with a hundred years worth of iteration, a truly MASSIVE user base to test with and (until recently) a large amount of competition. In the process they killed hundreds of thousands (millions?) and STILL manage to produce some real howlers even these days. Though it is true to say that they don`t explode in a ball of flame and kill the passengers very often now, a wheel felling off due to incorrect maintainance whilst joining a motorway (think re-entry) is still going to cause a problem.... All the things you mention are produced by the million at least, launch vehicles are not going to be in that range until we`ve come up with some seriously new physics. Which is a shame, `cause I`d love my corpse to be cremated in a SunDive (tm Douglas Adams).