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Most of this convo is TL;DR but form skimming, I think I get the idea.

Two ideas:

1. More customizations don't necessarily make software better. They make make it more aesthetic to you but most of the big companies are focused on making a product that works well for everyone and probably don't give much thought to individual users but instead the overall experience. They are solving a greater problem. I would actually counter your argument to say that if Windows Media Player had all the options of VLC that there would be someone else who would come along and say 'Options?! Screw options! We just make a player that plays stuff.' See book: The Design of Everyday Things and other design books. Simplicity is often overlooked.
   
   
2. Freeware has more customizations because there are less users. Open source lends itself to someone who wants the feature to add it. Essentially, for a large company, the ROI is not worth it and the complexity could jeopardize their hold on consumers who are not as tech savvy. Customizations and freeflow can greatly increase the codebase and the complexity of the software scales with the square of the codebase (ie. more options make the software less maintainable. More tests. More bugs).

Well this mouse is awesome. It already has the perfect functionality on openSUSE, it's just on Windows that I had problems (which are now solved). The hardware is great, it was a software deficiency.

> Fortran

ALL CAPS! FORmula TRANslation. Yeah, me and Bill Gates started coding around the same time. He was more successful than me. ;)

I'd question C# as your next big thing to learn. Python! This book might be right up your alley.

and ofc real monitors (there is no way to make a mp3 file sould better then a aiff or wma without going in and editing/master it, at at this point you're better off just buying a better quality file.)

You can download it from the microsoft website over here:
http://windows.microsoft.com/en-GB/windows-8/preview

But whilst we are on the subject of taking things out of context:
>where can I buy it?

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Stephen-Kings-DVD-Harry-Anderson/dp/B000FII3MY

They have some pretty good deals on "It".

>the best modern trackball.

The Kensington Expert Mouse?

Does your PC have trouble with insomnia? Windows lets you set your sleep settings already, and mine don't wake up unless I hit the power button. Hibernate mode will get you down to 0 watts used, sleep might not get it that low. I'd enable hibernation after 10 mins inactivity, and manually shut it off at night when you go to bed.

That ~$15 would be better spent on a Kill-o-watt power meter IMO, you can use that on any device that plugs in to see what power it's drawing, might point you in the right direction of how to save elsewhere too. Also you can use it on your PC to get a good reading of how much power it's using sleep vs hibernate.

I'm not aware of a consumer-level capture card that can capture audio over HDMI and a secondary input simultaneously. My recommendation is to switch the cable coming out of your Xbox360 from HDMI to HD Component, then plug the audio from the Xbox360 into a small mixer along with your mic. Then plug the output of the mixer and the HD video from the Xbox into a capture card like this one.

Now you can play the game and talk into the mic, using the mixer to control the levels of each. The whole shebang will then be recorded by your capture device.

no. You can buy a region free player and use them as they are. You can rip them and write them to new DVD-R (recordable) and either use media that will run through special printers, or use paper labels that you print and attach to the media

These three hammers also accomplish the same tasks. ...generally speaking.

Don't pick the wrong one.

If you're interested in learning more about how exploits are developed, I suggest this nook as a good primer...

http://www.amazon.com/Hacking-The-Art-Exploitation-Edition/dp/1593271441

I hope this helps.

Don't Make Me Think is a popular book on usability that I often see cited.

Joel Spolsky from Joel on Software also wrote a book, User Interface Design for Programmers

I think you are looking forsomething like this.

This is the knowledge required to create the kernel. It probably doesn't go into the UI.

A basic splitter should work fine in this case.

http://www.amazon.com/StarTech-com-MUY1MFF-6-Inch-Stereo-Splitter/dp/B0000DIESU

Is this what you're remembering? http://www.amazon.com/MTV-Music-Generator-Playstation/dp/B00001QER3

Network+ Guide to Networks https://www.amazon.com/dp/133756933X?ref=ppx_pop_mob_ap_share

Most operating systems are written in a combination of ASM (Assembly, which is machine code for x86/x86-64 processors), and C or C++.

If you're really serious about it, there is a book that walks through a basic operating system called MINIX (a minimal *nix OS). See: https://www.amazon.com/Operating-Systems-Design-Implementation-3rd/dp/0131429388/

Nowadays, modern operating systems are much more complex, though.

There are roughly a million things wrong with this, I don't even know where to start.

• Obviously this thing is ripe for abuse by just about anyone. Did you piss of your neighbor because your lawn isn't mowed to their standards? Be ready to be flagged.
  
  
• Encouraging people to fuck about with their cellphones while driving can't reasonably be said to be endorsing safe driving practices.
  
  
• What DMV is ever going to even accept this information? And if they do, what are they going to do with it? It's not like they could ticket somebody.
  
  
• What police department is going to respond to this? Same issue as above.
  
  
• The article hints towards this issue - insurance companies are heavily regulated in regards to how they set their rates. There have been court battles all over the country fighting insurance companies utilizing credit scores as a factor in individual driver policy rates. This thing will send consumer protection groups through the roof.
  
  
• There almost certainly won't be enough users of this app to chance a single driver from ever being tagged twice, leaving absolutely no room for a statistically significant analysis of individual driver behavior.
  
  
• Voice recognition is laughably bad on even the best devices. How is this thing going to get the tagged plates right - every time?
  
  This exact sort of solution to driver behavior modification has been suggested (and implemented) before. In Tom Vanderbuilt's book Traffic: Why We Drive the Way We Do (and What It Says About Us), this type of solution is discussed in brief. Here's an excerpt:
  
  > What if there was an eBay-like system of "reputation management" for traffic? This idea was raised in a provocative paper by Lior J. Strahilevitz, a law professor at the University of Chicago. "A modern, urban freeway is a lot like eBay, without reputation scores," he wrote. "Most drivers on the freeway are reasonably skilled and willing to cooperate conditionally with fellow drivers, but there is a sizeable minority that imposes substantial costs on other drivers, in the form of accidents, delays, stress, incivility, and rising insurance premiums." 15
  
  > Inspired by the HOW'S MY DRIVING stickers used by commercial fleets, the idea is that drivers, when witnessing an act of dangerous or illegal driving, could phone a call center and lodge a complaint, using mandatory identification numbers posted on every driver's bumper or license plate. Calls could also be made to reward good drivers. An account would be kept and, at the end of each month, drivers would receive a "bill" tallying the positive or negative comments called in. Drivers exceeding a certain threshold could be punished in some way, such as by higher insurance premiums or a suspension of their license. Strahilevitz argues that this system would be more effective than sporadic law enforcement, which can monitor only a fraction of the traffic stream. The police are usually limited to issuing tickets based on obvious violations (like speeding) and are essentially powerless to do anything about the more subtle rude and dangerous moments we encounter—how often have you wished in vain for a police car to be there to catch someone doing something dangerous, like tailgating or texting on their BlackBerry? It would help insurance companies more effectively set rates, not to mention giving frustrated drivers a safer and more useful outlet to express their disapproval, and gain a sense of justice—than by responding in kind with acts of aggressive driving.
  
  > But what about false or biased feedback? What if your next-door neighbor who's mad at you for your barking dog phones in a report saying you were acting crazy on the turnpike? As Strahilevitz points out, eBay-style software can sniff out suspicious activity—"outliers" like one negative comment among many positives, or repeated negative comments from the same person. What about privacy concerns? Well, that's exactly the point: People are free to terrorize others on the road because their identity is largely protected. The road is not a private place, and speeding is not a private act. As Strahilevitz argues, "We should protect privacy if, and only if, doing so promotes social welfare."
  
  > Less ambitious and official versions of this have been tried. 16 The Web site Platewire.com , which was begun, in the words of its founder, "to make people more accountable for their actions on the roadways in one forum or another," gives drivers a place to lodge complaints about bad drivers, along with the offenders' license plate numbers; posts chastise "Too Busy Brushing Her Hair" in California and "Audi A-hole" in New Jersey. Much less frequently, users give kudos to good drivers.
  
  > However noble the effort, the shortcomings of such sites are obvious. For one, Platewire, at the time of this writing, has a bit over sixty thousand members, representing only a minuscule fraction of the driving public. Platewire complaints are falling on few ears. For another, given the sheer randomness of driving, the chances are remote that I would ever come across the owner of New Jersey license plate VR347N—more remote even than the chance that they're reading this book—and, moreover, I'm unlikely to remember that they were the one a Platewire member had tagged for "reading the newspaper" while driving! Lastly, Platewire lacks real consequences beyond the anonymous shame of a small, disparate number of readers.