Rise of the Chromebook indeed. I think we will be seeing A LOT of these being used by software engineers. For $250, you get a very capable Haswell-equipped notebook with 8 hours of battery life and can easily accept a Ubuntu installation (ChromeOS is built on the Ubuntu core, so technically you can dual-boot and never even uninstall ChromeOS.)

In fact, I've done just this with the new Acer C720 machine. While I use a Macbook Air as my main machine, the Acer with Ubuntu fills the "beater" role very nicely and is really more than is needed.

This is a godsend for developing nations.

Also makes you wonder when you hear people talking about "bootstrapping" and you see them using new Macbook Airs...