It's not worth the risk of hooking it up, so I'm glad that I had an up-to-date backup.

I'm so glad you didn't have to learn that the hard way. Sooooooooooo many people learn that the hard way.

uh, sorry but I don't get it. why?

You're welcome to move it to some other format if you like, but I'm content leaving it in this forum as documentation.

So what's the deal with that 'what's the deal with airline food' joke? It seems everyone's aware of the notion that it's supposed to be a terrible non-joke, but then again, nobody except nobody actually understands where the humor supposedly comes from.

See, there's three kinds of people who respond to the phrase "What's the deal with airline food?":

1) "Ugh, boooo! Get off the stage!"
2) "I don't get it. What's so funny about that?"
3) "That's just it. It's NOT funny! Hahahaha!"

Of the three, only number 2 is showing any sense, because 1 and 3 aren't even thinking about it. Be careful about replying to this, since you'll probably just wind up in group 3. (-: Think about it, have you ever heard anyone explain why it's supposed to be funny? Of all the people you've ever talked to who supposedly "get it", have they ever elaborated on it? I've seen my fair share of "But when someone explained it to me, I sure felt silly!", but not a one ever went into detail. The closest thing I've ever found to an explanation is "airline food is terrible", which... isn't a joke.

I set out to find the hidden meaning of "airline food" and, much to my amusement, found that nobody knows why everyone thinks it's a joke. Because, as it turns out, it's not a joke or even a non-joke. It was a segue between bits during a performance by one Jerry Seinfeld, where he was telling jokes about the airplane travel experience. It was simply a way to transition into jokes about the food served on airplanes; the line itself was never meant to be humorous. The fullest context of how it gained its current status as a lame joke may have been lost to time, but it's always linked to lousy comics ripping off other people's acts. It would be like someone saying "in other news" and the audience groaning.

Aaaaaaaanyhoo, seeing as how this is a thread about actual jokes, I present you with two subtle variations that actually do genuinely include humorous intent:

1) So what's up with airline food?
2) So what's the deal with Monty Hall?

Except it's Sony, so I expect the worst. I predict microtransactions and achievements at the very least. (-:

For C++ under Windows, I've used MinGW, it's free software. Hunt around the web for that, I recall that one needs to install several things from their site.

It works just fine with just the mingw-get-setup.exe file linked to on their SourceForge page. I think what you have in mind is MSYS, which is an additional package that contains a Windows version of the make utility among other things.

I'd go with MinGW, möbius. It exposes the gcc and g++ commands to the Windows command prompt, and it's what you're most likely to run into out there in the real world (at least, the real world that isn't married to Microsoft).

If you need to use Windows for whatever reason, you can set up a VM using VirtualBox, which is probably part of your official Linux repository. If you need a copy of Windows to install on it, well, let's just say I know a Guy who can help you out.

I will never write code that is bound to 2 players max. I just plan to have a 2-player version that works well before [...]

Always always always always always design for n players, or n whatevers. It's much easier to restrict an n-player system to 2 players than to try to modify a 2-player system to some number greater than 2. And then, down the line, that number to some yet greater number.