There is definitely a bubble in China from reports as they lack safe investments. Prices have risen so much that companies are starting to talk of relocating manufacturing back in the US. This is contrary to decades of manufacturing offshoring; it is not like the US has gotten cheaper in the meanwhile. The Chinese are investing in every non-China asset they can get. So popping the China bubble eliminates that trend. Less interest in US manufacturing re-homing. Lower interest in London Flats by foreign owners. Manufacturing in China is now cheap again.

Oil and Gas will struggle for profits because supply has not changed. At least until the major players agree to a new price fixing scheme. Then we all pay more for energy. This will be eroded by the fact we will be making investments in clean energy. Oil and gas will war with solar and wind on multiple fronts. There will be tremendous change in the automobile over the next decade or two. Investment will remain risky because of the huge capital costs involved. Success will occur in small niches that become models for the industry.

There are a swath of companies who are not in the black at the moment. Accounting gimmicks are at an all time high. The Apple, Google, and Microsoft are trying to break out of their traditional markets in search for growth. They are looking at watches, cars, and refrigerators as (high margin?) opportunities. Money is cheap right now but that is unlikely to last.

Its seems to me that you have a point and yet you do not get your own point. In technology our skills have a half life of five years. You sound like you know that part. You got grilled on 'CS theory' because 'in web development world, deep in-depth knowledge in anything will be outdated in few years' time'. The point is that we continually have to learn new skills that are of value in the market. The current market skills will be valued first as they are most relevant to the task at hand. All the other elements play a supporting and enhancing role to your job application. This does not mean that the best Java programmer will get that Java job. It will go to the best Java job candidate. If your general background compliments your Java skill set then you will shine brighter.

When applying to a Java job without / with less Java skills than the position requires I feel that person should earn less to compensate for the risk of the project's failure due to incompetence. In my opinion in 2015, if your applying to a Java job it will be by definition a job for a specialized niche work requiring advanced skill.

I don't have to print a lot and if I had a large job I would just go to the copy store. Generally, I just go to the store and buy the cheapest printer I can find. Prices seem to run between $40-$80. If its on sale then that is just great as between Christmas, the 4th of July, and back to school sales there is often a deal to be had. I go home with my new printer and print with it until I run out of toner. The starter toners are often small cases but some printer toners cases are bigger than others and Google can help with this. When I run out of toner I go out and buy a new printer. Its cheaper than buying toner refills. Plus, I don't have to replace parts that wear out on poorly designed machines. I can donate the 'old' printer for another win. I often get a lot of great features with the new printer. Yes, its a horrible waste but then you are probably aware that there are no good options from printer manufacturers.

Linux performance on laptops is just horrid. The only way to check this is to find a common platform for testing. I suggest taking one of the Hackentosh laptops from http://www.macbreaker.com/2012/03/four-best-hackintosh-laptops-for-2012.html and comparing Windows, Linux, and Mac OSX.

Publish your data to book. As a process it will force you to really consider what is valuable. Your photos and coorespondanes make the cut. It will push you to put more effort into your writing diaries or lettters. Your really sensitive information can be locked in a safe. Most of that stuff is is useless. If you had two minutes to evacuate you should be able to get what really matters. And I don't think it will be your tax returns!

So basically you still use Windows. Running apps in a VM or using WINE just puts you in this specialized niche of Windows users. Its still Windows. You still pay Microsoft. It's just you pay twice as much to do it.

'It has been a struggle at times...'. this I just don't get. Why should using a computer be a struggle? Your doing it wrong. It strikes me as a rigid brittle practice.

Windows is easy to use. I mostly run Linux as an application server and in a VM as a toolcrib. Linux has a lot of utility. At home I setup a Windows and Mac desktop side by side for general use and for the kids. The Windows box is more popular with my kids too. Kids 6 and 10 year olds don't lie or have vested interests. They use web apps. They are girls and not boys so it's not for the gaming because they are not interested in PC games.

I think that is real reason behind dropping mono. It a fight for control over the platform in the heart of the IT department. Rather than fixing performance issues the vendors want to make changes to keep the OS a vertical platform.

Then it's like you can not rely on it being there for scripting either.It takes ten years for something like mono to be widely available to begin considering it. The only reason Python is used for scripting is because its on most versions of Linux. Ever look at Python? Whitespace is used as a delimited! What a bone headed move. I'm going to create a language. Let's use an invisible delimiter so that when two people work on the same file it fails in really obscure ways. But you know what? It's everywhere. Its easier to work with and teach than bash and perl.