CT4u8798

This +1. Should be in the guidelines for submissions. Tired of clicking on interesting threads only to find they target on specific platform.

I agree it's an automation, I don't agree with it being "smart".

What I like about my thermostat timer is that it's simple, local, and requires nothing else. No networking, no app, no maintenance over changing the timer for if I'm away, etc.

I definitely like the idea, and I do think it's cool. But I just can bothered with the complexity and the fact it needs to be maintained and networked, etc. Also yaml...

Timers are "smart" now? I just though they were timers. Does the timer on my cooker, so I don't need to set an external timer, make my cooker smart too? Is my outside light over my bins "smart" because it's connected to a light and motion sensor and come on automatically at night?

I've definitely no "fashionable allergy" to digital forms of automation. I simply don't want the massive complexity that comes with it.

I'm also not advocating against it, I just don't see the point it in.

I just either do that manually or, better yet, make them do it.

Beyond the "cool" factor I'm with you. I don't know what the benefits would be but I can definitely see it being a pain to maintain and the extra cost in both time and money for running these automation do not seem worth it. I would definitely like to be proven wrong, but I have not seen anything to date.

I've never got the reason for home automation over setting the heating to come on half hour before I get out of bed in the winter. I'm quite happy manually turning on lights, etc; and keeping things simple and off line. I also turn most stuff off, fridge/heating system excluded, before leaving the house or going to bed. I definitely don't see the point in smart lights and things like that.

No the laptops met my needs perfectly. They were cheap, and they ran fully up to date operating systems and the latest software. The issues with the university are issues with the university.

I am not a developer by trade but being technically capable I inherited a system once that I kept running beyond its real lifespan. Eventually it was to be replaced and an outside company was contracted to develop a new system. Despite multiple meetings in which I demonstrated the shortcomings of the current system and the workflow on which it was based, all this company did was replicated the old system in their chosen software stack (which also didn't really work because to old version was relational and theirs was no-sql). I got the impression that they already had an idea of what they were going to create and didn't listen at all. I've since moved on, but I hear the new system is worse than the old system.

TL;DR, I have direct experience of: “I don’t really care until we can start coding.”

I never buy new laptops, and I always put linux on the ones I do buy. My only issues have been running the more resource intensive applications I needed to run as a student, and the fact that the university expects you to be running windows. But as an everyday machine a used/refurbished laptop is the way to go.

I would imagine a bloody long time, knowing the human race...

I love SQL. I'm not a full-time developer but always use SQL over other abstractions, which I find extremely confusing and way more complicated that plain SQL.