Thank you for the link to the gear test, which is extremly thorough and instructive!

During all those years I've been sitting at desks I had one spell of about a year where I had back pain, but rather in the upper part. At that time I started to switch position very often while seated, like reclining now and then or repositioning against the back rest and do some stretching. I also get up and walk a few steps like making coffee for the gang. Outside the office I ride my bike every day, which is said to have an especially beneficial effect on the muscles that support the lower spine, and go dancing twice a week. I have never had back pain ever since and hope it will stay that way.

Here in Germany this type of laying battery office is also popular with companies that like to save money. One (time honoured*) way of reducing noise is available as a product called "Oropax". It consists of small beads of wax mixed with cotton which you plug in your ear. You can use these for several days before they become uncomfortable to wear. You could wear them in addition to headsets to improve noise reduction Good luck in your crusade against noise pollution! *) Ulysses used wax to block out the Sirens song so that his crew would not be seduced by them...;-)

Thanks for sharing this one, I had a really good laugh and he who has never used an ugly hack shall throw the first stone...;-) By the way it reminds me of the old programmer's joke where someone sifts through innumerable lines of very old, very badly written code and the only comment line he ever finds reads:"This is where the tricky part begins"

Thanks for the hint! I had never heard the term "abandonware" before but you're right, the program is out there on many sites. I hope I'll get around to giving it a try some time, would be cool to be in command of an interplanetary space ship. The math you need might be something I could handle but it would definitely take a real effort, so this is probably a project for the time when I'm retired. After all life isn't life without dreams...;-)

Back in the 1980ies Microsoft had a space game which I only saw one single time and alas I don't remember the name. Our local library had a copy but unfortunately one of the 3.5" floppies had a virus so I never installed it. In the manual (printed, on paper, just imagine) I read that one of the tasks you would do was to calculate a Hohman trajectory to get from one orbit to another. I remember thinking back then something like "Gosh, what's the target group of this one..????.... seems like the tech afficionado in Bill Gates has gone rampant". Wonder if some lines from that old one have crept into the 21st century...;-) PS: Thanks for sharing this one!

Cheers, Juergen Il semble que la perfection soit atteinte non quand il n'y a plus rien a ajouter, mais quand il n'y a plus rien a retrancher. - Antoine de Saint-Exupèry -