Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

DoD Dreams of Efficient Spectrum Usage

Posted by michael on from the spectrum-spectrum-everywhere-and-nary-a-drop-to-drink dept.

Unstrung writes "US Military research agency DARPA is sick of all those static-filled cellphone calls and dropped connections too. The shadowy eggheads are working on a way of using the bandwidth available today more efficiently."

6 of 135 comments (clear)

  1. this just in... by red_five_standing_by · · Score: 5, Funny

    DoD reports that they have fortified the radio spectrum with "stuff" for more "goodness." They declined further comment.

  2. Doubt it. by smittyoneeach · · Score: 5, Funny

    After ten years active duty, and one in the Reserves, I can attest that the DOD has few, if any, dreams of efficiency. Keep trying.

    --
    Get thee glass eyes, and, like a scurvy politician, seem to see things thou dost not.--King Lear
  3. Interference Problems by Detritus · · Score: 5, Funny

    Give me a couple of RDF (radio direction finding) stations and an 8" howitzer and I will eliminate all of your interference and congestion problems.

    --
    Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
  4. BUZZWORD ALERT! BUZZWORD ALERT! by Dthoma · · Score: 3, Funny
    "These demonstrations will include demonstrating a low power/wideband spectrum sensor, time/frequency agile waveforms, and dynamic spectrum access and control."

    For all we know, this project description might actually MEAN something.

    --

    Note to M1-ers: a curt but otherwise insightful message is not "Flamebait" or "Troll".

  5. Re:Isn't the military part of the problem? by nanoakron · · Score: 1, Funny

    Yeah, it's a good thing we've got you Americans fighting with us...I mean, who else is going to kill our troops?

    -Nano.

  6. Re:DOD, DARPA and Inovation by craw · · Score: 4, Funny

    The role that DARPA played in the "early" days of computing is often overlooked. DARPA funded the initial prototype development of something called the Stanford University Network workstation. IIRC, a guy by the name of Joy at UCB also received DARPA funding to enhance some of the capabilites of a "new" OS called UNIX. Eventually, the two efforts joined forces and produced a commercial product.

    RISC technology was pushed forward by DARPA. One effort eventually led to MIPS. Another effort led to the development of the RISC I and RISC II. This technology was licenced to Sun Microsystems, and eventually evolved into a more scalable architecture. I believe that this had some modest commercial success.

    Warp and the Connection Machine were the result of DARPA funded efforts to push forward and test the capabilites of massively parallel computers. These were technnological wonders, but did not achieve commercial success. At least, one of these was featured in a very successful motion picture. Furthermore, thanks to MIPS, probably the geekiest line in motion picture history was spoken, "This is a UNIX system. I know this."

    I would also have to speculate that a there are numerous computer industry leaders that had RA's in grad school via DARPA funding.