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The US Naval Observatory has 11 photographic plates from the last transit of venus in 1882. As well, there are photographs from the various expeditions it sent out to take measurements for the purpose of calculating the AU, the distance of earth from the sun. These can be found here. There's also more fun to be had.

Sounds like APRS

You are not special. You do not get to be an exception to the rules.

I'm not, I'm following them. You can too! :-)

AND, IIRC, the US Navy is moving to PPC/Linux.

But you recall wrong. The Navy is moving to Microsoft Windows. The NMCI is all Microsoft.

The correct links for the US-administered GPS satellite constellation, known as NAVSTAR:

NAVSTAR GPS Joint Program Office - responsible for operational maintenance of NAVSTAR GPS equipment, services, and infrastructure

Interagency GPS Executive Board - executive management of NAVSTAR GPS

GPS fact sheet - US Air Force facts about NAVSTAR GPS

US Naval Observatory NAVSTAR GPS home page

Further information:

FAS GPS background info

Global Security GPS background info

A flight line is certainly a far more hazardous place than a gas station. That is more of a mitigating risk based on the environment kind of thing. I wouldn't use any electronic device if I were, say, soaked in gasoline, regardless of how "safe" or "approved" it was.

I did find an official Navy response. (Yeah, not Air Force, I know, but should be similar.) Their conclusion? It could be possible to start a fire using a cellphone. However, their hypothetical solution to generate the correct voltage and spark requires dropping the phone, and having a spark generate when the battery pops off. Anyway, until we have one proven case where a cellphone has caused a fuel fire, I am going to continue to chalk it up to an urban legend.

Getting in and out of your car during refueling is much more dangerous, and that is not just MHO, but fact. How so? According to the Petroleum Equipment Institute, they do not have a single known case of a cell phone causing a fire. They have an entire page devoted to static electricity. (Of course, it is only fair to mention that ALL refueling fires are extremely rare to begin with, regardless of ignition source.)

That would be the Navajo Code Talkers. It was definitely of the obscurity variety of encryption.

This is not to be confused with the Codetalkers which might be considered obscure, but despite the connection with Col. Bruce Hampton, have little military or encryption relevance, but can be quite cool to listen to.

I think they chose that particular language because it had unique properties that made de-cyphering the language almost impossible. I'm not sure if they applied any additional encryption

The Navajo Code Talkers. They didn't apply additional encryption per say but they had an interesting encoding scheme:

When a Navajo code talker received a message, what he heard was a string of seemingly unrelated Navajo words. The code talker first had to translate each Navajo word into its English equivalent. Then he used only the first letter of the English equivalent in spelling an English word. Thus, the Navajo words "wol-la-chee" (ant), "be-la-sana" (apple) and "tse-nill" (axe) all stood for the letter "a." One way to say the word "Navy" in Navajo code would be "tsah (needle) wol-la-chee (ant) ah-keh-di- glini (victor) tsah-ah-dzoh (yucca)."

Most letters had more than one Navajo word representing them. Not all words had to be spelled out letter by letter. The developers of the original code assigned Navajo words to represent about 450 frequently used military terms that did not exist in the Navajo language. Several examples: "besh- lo" (iron fish) meant "submarine," "dah-he- tih-hi" (hummingbird) meant "fighter plane" and "debeh-li-zine" (black street) meant "squad."

You can also assume that they encoded the messages using standard military/common-sense methods -- i.e: referring to waypoints on a map that your enemy doesn't have access to. If he knows that you are going to attack at "Point Echo" but he doesn't know where that is the information is of limited use to him -- by the time he figures out where Point Echo is the information is out of date and it doesn't matter that he knows it.

In any case the code talkers are an interesting (often ignored) fact of WW2, the recent movie notwithstanding. An interesting subject to read up on sometime.

Earlier, in World War I, the US Army utilized members of the Choctaw tribe as operators near the end of the war. This, however, was due to a decision in the field (a captain noted that he had several members of the tribe in his battalion), rather than a formal program.

It was the Navajo language. Now that would be a great language to learn for the future ;)

The US Navy still has one non-nuclear aircraft carrier in active use, the USS Kitty Hawk.

For a full list of the Navy's current aircraft carriers, go here.

The US Navy still has one non-nuclear aircraft carrier in active use, the USS Kitty Hawk.

For a full list of the Navy's current aircraft carriers, go here.

One word: SM-2 MR.

Your OTH launch platform was just shot down by a Block III SM-2 MR, since it needed to get within 65 km - meanwhile the SM-2 MR shot it down while it was still 100km out.

Start talking about AS-6 and you might be closer to the mark, though the SM-2 MR will shoot down that missile as easily as it toasted your launch platform just now.

You need to conduct a massive attack on an AEGIS platform if you expect to take it out.

He slashed defense and ran away from every armed conflict around the world. He gave no response to bombings of the USS Cole, the World Trade Center (yes it was previously bombed in an attempt to take it down), Somalia, the US Barracks in Kenya etc, which taught the terrorists they could kill us without response, which of course landed us with September 11.

• USS Cole - The attack was Oct. 12, 2000. This bombing was staged by suicide bombers, so it is a tad bit difficult to find them after they blow themselves into fish bait. There has been an investigation and arrest of someone who may have been involved in planning of the attack. Also, George W. could have done something about this in Jan 2001 when he took over.
• World Trade Center Bombing - there was something called a TRIAL and conviction that took place. They are meant to determine innocence or guilt. It is part of what makes America a great place to live. Ask Bush about Guantanamo. BTW, the trial was only on the news about every day for a year, so I don't blame you for not knowing this.
• Somalia - Dude, didn't you watch Blackhawk Down?
• US Barracks in Kenya (I'm assuming you meant US embassies) - Again, there was a trial and conviction.
• which taught the terrorists they could kill us without response, which of course landed us with September 11 - Since there WAS a response to every single action you listed, I'll simply address your "of course landed us with Sep 11" as more stupidity. How can you singly blame a single individual who wasn't even in office for 9 months when the act occurred? The acts of Sep 11 were committed by TERRORISTS and we (America) didn't stop it.

He took a great economy handed to him and tanked it in his final 2 years. Pahleease. Don't you remember the recession were we in when George Bush Sr. was in office? Presidents don't affect the economy as much as people give them credit for.

Now let me address the last point, about the prisoner abuse and beheading of Nick Berg. I watched the video of Nick Berg being beheaded. It was slow and brutal. It was an innocent man being beheaded by other selfish men who used him as a pawn in their game. The beheading was meant to be horrible and cause terror. It was much worse than the prisoner abuse we have seen. HOWEVER, the people who beheaded Nick Berg were terrorists and we are a country that advocates life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. We have a constitution that forbids cruel and unusual punishment. We cannot use the actions of terrorists as justification for our mistakes. The terrorists do not set our moral standards. We do not live by their moral standards. The Iraqi prisoners were not even convicted yet. And, if they had been, they should still have not been treated like they were. Even if you don't agree the treatment was cruel it was certainly unusual. US Soldiers vow to uphold the constitution. The soldiers, commanders, and govt. officials who let this happen on their watch are just as bad as the terrorists who beheaded Nick Berg, because their job is to protect others. Terrorists kill others, so for them to behead someone is in their character.

Again, the beheading of Nick Berg was much more horrible than any prisoner abuse we have seen, but it is no excuse for our treatment of Iraqi prisoners.

I suppose that you have some theory as to why we took over Iraq (a secular non-terrorist country) in response to Osama and some other Saudis attacked us?

You proceed from false assumptions. Iraq may well have been a secular country, but it was hardly "non-terrorist." Would a "non-terrorist" country provide safe harbor to terrorists such as Abu Abbas (matermind of the Achille Lauro hijacking) and Abu Nidal (a Palestinian terrorist with a lengthy rap sheet)? Would a "non-terrorist" country have its intelligence agents communicating and coordinating with 9/11 planner Mohammed Atta? Would the leader of a "non-terrorist" country ante up $25k for each family of each Palestinian homicide bomber who carried out his mission of murder? Read this and this and get your facts straight.

Of course, that ignores the fact that all of the major news services are either extremist right wing

Again, you're assuming "facts" not in evidence. Since when is Fox News the only game in town? (Even that assumes that Fox News is "extremist right wing," which you would realize is false if you had ever watched it. Making the same claim for CNN, MSNBC, ABC, NBC, CBS, PBS, the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, etc. is even more absurd. You would have to be to the left of Lenin to conjure up a claim like that.)

If all you're going to do is waste my (and others') time with logical fallacy after logical fallacy, then I see no point in continuing this discussion. Arguing with someone who substitutes errors, omissions, distortions, and lies for truth is pointless.

yea, now they have dolphin's with laser beams attached to their frickin heads!

To clarify: the USS Macon didn't dive bomb the Cruiser carrying FDR, rather a F9C-2 Sparrowhawk carried by the Macon did.

Both the Akron and the Macon were lost in crashes unfortunatly.

The Naval Research Labs has an answer for you (from their extensive 2002 report "Thermal and Nuclear Aspects of the Pd/D20 System")

... many "skeptics" rejected the anomalous behavior of the polarized Pd/D system as a matter of conviction, i.e. without analyzing the presented material and always asking "where are the neutrons?" Funding or research quickly dried up as anything related to "Cold Fusion" was portrayed as a hoax and not worthy of funding. The term "Cold Fusion" took on a new definition much as the Ford Edsel had done years earlier.

...

We do not know if Cold Fusion will be the answer to future energy needs, but we do know the existence of Cold Fusion phenomenon through repeated observations by scientists throughout the world. It is time that this phenomenon be investigated so that we can reap whatever benefits accrue from additional scientific understanding. It is time for government funding organizations to invest in this research.

The central debate here is about how to best use F/OSS development resources (people and code). The assumption seems to be that everyone who cares about F/OSS should come together on a single strategy for dealing with Microsoft. But a monoculture within the F/OSS community is exactly what we're fighting against in Microsoft! Must we become the enemy to defeat the enemy?

Most F/OSS developers want to see GNU/Linux succeed in the sense of becoming a widespread desktop alternative. Those who bother thinking about why they want this are most likely to come up with a fundamental reason: choice.

Survival for GNU/Linux is a question of the niches it is able to successfully occupy. For the moment these niches include the desktops of F/OSS developers and Internet server farms. The problem with the general user desktop niche is first that it's not really a niche per se, but more importantly, it's completely dominated by Microsoft. GNU/Linux is like a small mammal running around near the end of the age of dinosaurs. What it has going for it is adaptibility. Rather than give up adaptibility and become just another dinosaur, GNU/Linux needs to find another way to occupy the general desktop niche.

What I'd like to suggest is that the desktop niche really needs to be bifurcated in such a way that GNU/Linux can survive there as a small mammal, without needing to become a dinosaur. That is, it needs a place on the desktop where it can run without necessarily displacing Windows. One way this could be done is though a Windows port of User Mode Linux, but that's not really going far enough in my opinion.

What is really needed is an OSS virtual machine monitor (VMM) for PCs, under control of which both Windows and GNU/Linux (and any other OS!) could run separately and equally. Vmware shows what this might look like, but with Vmware the host operating system runs along side the VMM rather than on top of it. It sort of achieves "separate" but not "equal".

The problem with current approaches to PC VMMs is that they suffer from certain architectural limitations in virtualizing the CPU. These limitations probably could have been eliminated several hardware generations ago, were it not for the unholy alliance of Microsoft and Intel. But there is some hope that that alliance could be broken, if AMD would implement virtualizability in its CPUs and/or IBM would apply carrots and sticks to Intel on behalf of GNU/Linux.

The ultimate goal is freedom to innovate from the lowest levels of software on up. This can only be truely achieved by a complete OSS platform, as access to the source is what enables the kind of innovation that does not require reinventing the wheel when something at a lower level doesn't work the way you want it to. On the other hand, some F/OSS developers may be perfectly happy developing on top of Windows or some OS-independent application platform. Indeed, there's no reason to believe that .NET isn't "good enough" for some of them.

I do not think the US feels the need to replace them, they (with numerous incremental updates) are still the quietest thing at sea and perfectly suitable for their mission. Of course we have far more than we need with the massive scale back in the Russian fleet (and lack of any other crediable threat above or below the sea), so they are decommisioning the older Ohio's and not replacing. But there are plans to retro fit some of the Ohio's for a more convential problem domain.

I never said that the things that I postulated are true but I do think that they are conclusive. Also a spokesperson for a military contractor that is a private citizen can be under the same disclosure restrictions as a person in the military. The fact that this press release came from a private reporter is no indication of the quality of the disclosure by the US military or its contractors.

If you look at speed of ships on the US Navy Site you will find that the Aircraft carriers are not the fastest ocean going fleet ships, but they can outrun anything in their carrier group. The Navy didn't tell me that.

The US military denied existence of the SR-71 for decades even after people had captured phtographic evidence.

Now given the empirical evidence that everything that the military says is not true, it is important to use conjecture to understand the possiblity that what the military (or its agents and contractors) say today also may not be true or the whole truth or a complete answer to a given question. It is simply credibility. The US military jepardized their credibility . . . perhaps for good reasons of national security etc. but they jepardized it nonetheless. If you believe everything that they tell you in the face of their lack of credibility, then perhaps you would believe me when I offer to sell you a Pentium 12 12e8 Ghz.

This really isn't all that new. The U.S. Naval Postgraduate School has been
sending their Infosec students to play Capture the Flag at Defcon for the last couple years as well as
this year's Interz0ne conference. In
fact, there was only one team (Anomaly - and they won ironically) that didn't
have government personnel or contractors on their team.

Also, Immunix, a DARPA funded hardened Linux version has also
been put under fire during CTF for the last couple year. (Their team placed a
solid second both times).

The Feds have learned over the last couple years that they
are behind the ball in terms of normal unclassified security training for their
personnel. These conferences have been really good at given them some real
world training that they normally don't get.

It's nice to see my tax dollars being put to a good use for
a change. Plus it makes the "Spot
the Fed" game MUCH easier.

Quick! Tell the military. If cell-phones cause radars to glitch, they could attach phones to fighter-planes!

Reed-Solomon codes are also what does error correction in Compact Discs

Anyone interested in the virtualization problems in the x86 architecture should read "Analysis of the Intel Pentium's Ability to Support a Secure Virtual Machine Monitor". Interesting, but I don't think the situation is as dire as minus_273 seems to think.

Compare sending a robotic probe to the bottom of the Marianas trench vs. a Manned one (the latter we haven't been able to do yet).

Uh, Jacques Piccard might disagree with you there.

What might that navigation system be?

• I can't make out the logo under the navigation display screen. A wave, followed by "ware"?
• ECDIS-N seems to be the Navy paperless navigation design. Electronic charts (maps) exist for navigation of federal vessels with ECDIS-N.
• Navy is using two navigation systems: USCG COMDAC INS and Litton Marine's (now Sperry Marine) IBS (VMS). The Swift seems to use a new IBS, thus it is using Litton's VMS.
• Sperry Marine makes Navy's ECDIS-N: In a separate effort to extend the open-architecture concept, PEO IWS in late 2003 awarded a contract to Northrop Grumman Sperry Marine in Charlottesville, Va., to act as the Navy's sole supplier of electronic charting, display, and information systems, called ECDIS-N, in a competition that rejected two Navy-developed systems. Confirmed.
• Search for ECDIS-N on Sperry Marine produces only the Military IBS page. Apparently ECDIS-N might be there. Sperry Marine products
• Apparently ECDIS-N systems must follow DII COE for the operating environment. POSIX is also involved.
• LynxOS might be involved in real time situations: LynxOS(R) was selected as the reference RTOS implementation for the DII COE configurable RT kernel.
• Thus there may be Unix influences in those designs for the navigation system.

The phrase Joint Interoperable Mission Planning and Rehearsal System is found by Google only in this document. There is a Joint En-route Mission Planning and Rehearsal System (JEMPRS), but no hints of its platform.

The COMBATSS site doesn't have much info. Another site mentions an HP Unix workstation with COMBATSS. And the COMBATSS Platform Equipment doesn't sound like a description of MS-Windows. Using Mozilla as an interface is mentioned in the original article, which doesn't reduce the possibilities much.

What might that navigation system be?

• I can't make out the logo under the navigation display screen. A wave, followed by "ware"?
• ECDIS-N seems to be the Navy paperless navigation design. Electronic charts (maps) exist for navigation of federal vessels with ECDIS-N.
• Navy is using two navigation systems: USCG COMDAC INS and Litton Marine's (now Sperry Marine) IBS (VMS). The Swift seems to use a new IBS, thus it is using Litton's VMS.
• Sperry Marine makes Navy's ECDIS-N: In a separate effort to extend the open-architecture concept, PEO IWS in late 2003 awarded a contract to Northrop Grumman Sperry Marine in Charlottesville, Va., to act as the Navy's sole supplier of electronic charting, display, and information systems, called ECDIS-N, in a competition that rejected two Navy-developed systems. Confirmed.
• Search for ECDIS-N on Sperry Marine produces only the Military IBS page. Apparently ECDIS-N might be there. Sperry Marine products
• Apparently ECDIS-N systems must follow DII COE for the operating environment. POSIX is also involved.
• LynxOS might be involved in real time situations: LynxOS(R) was selected as the reference RTOS implementation for the DII COE configurable RT kernel.
• Thus there may be Unix influences in those designs for the navigation system.

The phrase Joint Interoperable Mission Planning and Rehearsal System is found by Google only in this document. There is a Joint En-route Mission Planning and Rehearsal System (JEMPRS), but no hints of its platform.

The COMBATSS site doesn't have much info. Another site mentions an HP Unix workstation with COMBATSS. And the COMBATSS Platform Equipment doesn't sound like a description of MS-Windows. Using Mozilla as an interface is mentioned in the original article, which doesn't reduce the possibilities much.

What might that navigation system be?

• I can't make out the logo under the navigation display screen. A wave, followed by "ware"?
• ECDIS-N seems to be the Navy paperless navigation design. Electronic charts (maps) exist for navigation of federal vessels with ECDIS-N.
• Navy is using two navigation systems: USCG COMDAC INS and Litton Marine's (now Sperry Marine) IBS (VMS). The Swift seems to use a new IBS, thus it is using Litton's VMS.
• Sperry Marine makes Navy's ECDIS-N: In a separate effort to extend the open-architecture concept, PEO IWS in late 2003 awarded a contract to Northrop Grumman Sperry Marine in Charlottesville, Va., to act as the Navy's sole supplier of electronic charting, display, and information systems, called ECDIS-N, in a competition that rejected two Navy-developed systems. Confirmed.
• Search for ECDIS-N on Sperry Marine produces only the Military IBS page. Apparently ECDIS-N might be there. Sperry Marine products
• Apparently ECDIS-N systems must follow DII COE for the operating environment. POSIX is also involved.
• LynxOS might be involved in real time situations: LynxOS(R) was selected as the reference RTOS implementation for the DII COE configurable RT kernel.
• Thus there may be Unix influences in those designs for the navigation system.

The phrase Joint Interoperable Mission Planning and Rehearsal System is found by Google only in this document. There is a Joint En-route Mission Planning and Rehearsal System (JEMPRS), but no hints of its platform.

The COMBATSS site doesn't have much info. Another site mentions an HP Unix workstation with COMBATSS. And the COMBATSS Platform Equipment doesn't sound like a description of MS-Windows. Using Mozilla as an interface is mentioned in the original article, which doesn't reduce the possibilities much.

What might that navigation system be?

• I can't make out the logo under the navigation display screen. A wave, followed by "ware"?
• ECDIS-N seems to be the Navy paperless navigation design. Electronic charts (maps) exist for navigation of federal vessels with ECDIS-N.
• Navy is using two navigation systems: USCG COMDAC INS and Litton Marine's (now Sperry Marine) IBS (VMS). The Swift seems to use a new IBS, thus it is using Litton's VMS.
• Sperry Marine makes Navy's ECDIS-N: In a separate effort to extend the open-architecture concept, PEO IWS in late 2003 awarded a contract to Northrop Grumman Sperry Marine in Charlottesville, Va., to act as the Navy's sole supplier of electronic charting, display, and information systems, called ECDIS-N, in a competition that rejected two Navy-developed systems. Confirmed.
• Search for ECDIS-N on Sperry Marine produces only the Military IBS page. Apparently ECDIS-N might be there. Sperry Marine products
• Apparently ECDIS-N systems must follow DII COE for the operating environment. POSIX is also involved.
• LynxOS might be involved in real time situations: LynxOS(R) was selected as the reference RTOS implementation for the DII COE configurable RT kernel.
• Thus there may be Unix influences in those designs for the navigation system.

The phrase Joint Interoperable Mission Planning and Rehearsal System is found by Google only in this document. There is a Joint En-route Mission Planning and Rehearsal System (JEMPRS), but no hints of its platform.

The COMBATSS site doesn't have much info. Another site mentions an HP Unix workstation with COMBATSS. And the COMBATSS Platform Equipment doesn't sound like a description of MS-Windows. Using Mozilla as an interface is mentioned in the original article, which doesn't reduce the possibilities much.

As this specific ship is a research platform, I'm not sure what they have in the way of "standard issue" gear. But on the AEGIS cruiser I was on, the quartermasters all routinely performed "old style" navigation skills using sextants, etc. (obviously as backups to the electronic systems)...

Here's a list of the QMs responsibilities (note - I was a "lowly" snipe, but did earn my Surface Warefare pin, so I had to spend a fair amount of time hanging around with the "top siders" and learning all about what they did...)

The US Navy was (re)created because in the 1794 the Barbary pirates were abusing US shipping.

Read more about it and my favorite warship. For a 200 year old design, she has some suprisingly modern features, like stealth and excellent fuel economy.

Absolute and total bollocks.

Take the number of modern-navy ships sunk by battle damage post-Vietnam. Now take the number damaged post-Vietnam. The latter is considerably greater than the former. I'll work backwards a bit here, but I might get a few transposed.

USS Cole: Kamikaze floating bomb. Sealifted home, repaired.

USS Princeton: Mine impact, with sympathetic detonation of a second nearby mine. Severe structural damage, fires, cracked superstructure, flooded magazine. Ship was capable of conducting air action within two hours, stayed on station as local AAW command vessel for an additional 30 hours until relieved.

USS Samuel B. Roberts: Mine impact. Sealifted home and repaired.

USS Stark: Two Exocet strikes, with one missile detonation. Sailed home under her own power, and repaired.

Damage control is the difference between the Stark, which took two Exocets and sailed home, and the HMS Sheffield, which took a single dud Exocet, burned from stem to stern, and sunk under tow. It is taken *exteremely* seriously by the US Navy, and while we don't plate ships with inches of steel armor any more, rest assured that a lot of money is spent on redundant systems, DC training, shock-hardening, and "armor of form" to allow ships to continue fighting after they get hit, and to make it home for repairs. Even if we're not talking about combat, there are all sorts of Bad Things that can happen to ships. Take a look at the Belknap(collided with the Kennedy, fuel spill, fire, basically burned down to the waterline), the Forrestal, or the Enterprise for examples.

It's accidents like those that drove home how unbelieveably important damage control is. Yes, if a Mach 2+ SS-N-19 delivers its 750 kilogram warhead successfully, the ship's a definite mission-kill at the least. But there are a whole host of less-destructive situations that can result in disaster with bad DC, so DC is considered somewhat...important. No, damage control isn't what it was in WW2: It's a helluva lot better.

Also, I hope these servers are protected against EMP (Electro Magnetic Pulse) bomb

With everything being "off the shelf" hardware, how much emp it can take is a good question. There are test facilities.

I can understand mil-rad hardened transistors surviving, but all that stuff clearly has to use low voltage CMOS that can be blown if there is a nearby lightning strike.

I think most worrisome is a computer glitch (not to mention a bullet) hitting the right server at the right place to cause the ship to be dead in the water because engine/navigation controls don't work.

If it could bring down an Osprey helicopter, one has to wonder about ships also.

Being the military, they probably (or should) have taken such things into account when deploying the systems.

You also have to wonder how much time they spend patching all the software.

You can see the ship from the outside here and here

If your going to start quoting things from the history books that happened decades then I'll do the same to you.

1954 is later than the war you used in your initial arguement, you fucking retard.

You may want to contact US Navy to correct the errors on their history website. They seem to believe The United States, which had important political and economic interests in East Asia, was alarmed by these Japanese moves, see Pearl Harbor Attack.

Incidently I suppose that a pact signed in Berlin, September 27, 1940 had fuck all to do with Japan attacking the US forces

I'd stack my countries history against any European nation any day of the week.

Go on then, I'll choose Ireland, you stupid cunt

Why don't we stick to current events -- you'll be better off that way.

The why did you bring up the war? You are without a doubt the stupidest fucker I've encountered during my many visits to Slashdot

This place NSWC Crane used to design such systems. Don't know if they do anymore......

Not to mention that it is unlikely that Hopper ever claimed to find the first "bug".

The comment next to the moth taped in the logbook seems to indicate that the word had been in use for some time, and Hopper was making a bit of a joke.

h96566k.jpg

Yes, I'm aware than an AC beat me to it, but he's at -1 right now, so I'm posting this because it's more visible.

Ooh! Ooh! Ooh! 01101000 00111001 00110110 00110101 00110110 00110110 01101011 00101110 01101010 01110000 01100111

It's not ambiguous though: this is the 50th GPS satellite, and it's being launched.

Actually, it's not even the 50th GPS satellite up there; prior to this launch, there were only 28 operational satellites. None of the original 11 are still in service, and one of the other 38 blew up on the launchpad.

So, while this is the 50th GPS satellite, it's only the 49th launch.

It's not ambiguous though: this is the 50th GPS satellite, and it's being launched.

Actually, it's not even the 50th GPS satellite up there; prior to this launch, there were only 28 operational satellites. None of the original 11 are still in service, and one of the other 38 blew up on the launchpad.

So, while this is the 50th GPS satellite, it's only the 49th launch.

It's not ambiguous though: this is the 50th GPS satellite, and it's being launched.

Actually, it's not even the 50th GPS satellite up there; prior to this launch, there were only 28 operational satellites. None of the original 11 are still in service, and one of the other 38 blew up on the launchpad.

So, while this is the 50th GPS satellite, it's only the 49th launch.

IIRC, there are only 26 operating satellites, give or take.

I Googled and found that there are currently 28. Thanks for the correction!

That means $105m * 50 over the entire life of the GPS project.

We shouldn't assume we can multiply 50 by $105 million, because the earlier GPS satellites were different and probably cost more. And I don't have any data at all on R&D costs, which you could add to the price tag. I was just interested in the costs of keeping the current system going, and how many launches per year.

So, 28 satellites not 50. But that's not all. I also found that the current generation of GPS satellites (the "Block IIA" and Block IIR" satellites) have a design life of less than 8 years. The "Block II" satellites must have a longer design life, since the oldest working satellite (SVN 13) has a launch date of 1989-06-10.

Assuming all new GPS satellites are Block IIRs with a useful life of 7.8 years, and assuming we need to keep 26 GPS satellites in orbit, thats 3 to 4 launches per year to replace aging satellites, about $350 million per year.

Honestly though, do you believe the gov pays $105m for each satellite in orbit? There are plenty of ways for them to get their money back.

I don't understand this comment. "Get their money back"?

steveha

IIRC, there are only 26 operating satellites, give or take.

I Googled and found that there are currently 28. Thanks for the correction!

That means $105m * 50 over the entire life of the GPS project.

We shouldn't assume we can multiply 50 by $105 million, because the earlier GPS satellites were different and probably cost more. And I don't have any data at all on R&D costs, which you could add to the price tag. I was just interested in the costs of keeping the current system going, and how many launches per year.

So, 28 satellites not 50. But that's not all. I also found that the current generation of GPS satellites (the "Block IIA" and Block IIR" satellites) have a design life of less than 8 years. The "Block II" satellites must have a longer design life, since the oldest working satellite (SVN 13) has a launch date of 1989-06-10.

Assuming all new GPS satellites are Block IIRs with a useful life of 7.8 years, and assuming we need to keep 26 GPS satellites in orbit, thats 3 to 4 launches per year to replace aging satellites, about $350 million per year.

Honestly though, do you believe the gov pays $105m for each satellite in orbit? There are plenty of ways for them to get their money back.

I don't understand this comment. "Get their money back"?

steveha

[The T-60S] supposedly deployed secretly in 2003.

The phrase you're looking for is "originally intended to enter service in 2003", not "supposedly deployed secretly in 2003. But fair enough, if the T60-S does exist it would be interesting to get the details of its construction. However, it seems like it's been cancelled -- there's much speculation on this page.

[Topol-M and Sunburn] are only good for a direct confronation with the U.S.

Huh? The Topol-M i can sort-of understand but the Sunburn will destroy any ship it hits, no matter where the target was built.

I haven't heard of the U.S developing any cavitating torpeodes

Maybe you should check out This link then.

for which there are no effective countermeasures yet.

There seems to be no effective super-cavitating weapons deployed yet either, so countermeasures might be a moot point.

...but the "wind" part of "kamikaze" is unquestionably there. It's a bit of an insult, really, since the WW2 kamikaze had courage, but D'ohl only has chutzpah.

Speaking of kamikaze, is anyone to willing to attach an "I break penguins" bumper sticker to D'ohl's car? Logo featuring a chained-down, angry penguin as it tears the first of the staples out of the wall...

Check out where they plan on building these things. It's the old Goodyear-Zepplin Airdock in Akron, OH (now owned by Lockheed Martin - see their article on the HAA.)

A book I have (Published by Goodyear in 1923) lists this place as 1175ft x 200ft x 325ft. It even has a picture of it super-imposed over the American side of Niagara Falls (it's 75 longer). It's also mentions that it is so big that it often form clouds on the inside.

More links are here and here

• Grace Hopper : Girl Genius of Vassar
• Lt. Hopper of the U.S. Navy
• Grace Hopper and the Mystery of the Hollerith Code
• Grace Hopper Tames the MARK I
• Grace Hopper Defeats the NAZIs
• Grace Hopper vs the Pernicious Moth
• Grace Hopper Unravells Sputnik
• Grace Hopper vs the Commie Russians
• Grace Hopper Unleashes the Scourage of COBOL
• Grace Hopper Arm-Wrestles Hyman Rickover
• Cmdr. Grace Hopper : Recalled to Duty (special double issue)
• Cmdr. Grace Hopper Defeats the Commie Russians
• Grace Hopper CyberGrrrrrl

• And remember, (+1, Funnay) does nothing for karma!