Slashdot Mirror
NASA Scientists Get Custom 24h39m-per-day Watches
blair1q writes "In order to more easily keep solar time on Mars, (or maybe just as a lark) JPL has ordered specially-modified mechanical watches for the Mars Exploration Rover Mission. One wonders why these literal rocket scientists didn't just get a software programmable Linux or PalmOS based wrist-computer and hack together a Mars-time display application into it?"
Being able to project the orbit of a decaying planet around a binary Pulsar-White Dwarf pair is not the same as writing a C++ program in an embedded enviroment. Albeit, I'm sure proficiency among the scientists in the programming languages are far higher than that of the general public, but it must be far simpler to just buy a mechanical watch that is nearly guaranteed to be flawless by nature, or work for days on making a bug free watch that is far more prone to failure.
And why did you staple the trout to the RAM?
"One wonders why these literal rocket scientists didn't just get a software programmable Linux or PalmOS based wrist-computer and hack together a Mars-time display application into it?"
because mechanical watches are much cooler and act as a souvenir of the project. next, why don't you go ask astronauts to trade in their mission patches for a linux box with the logo as the desktop background. don't expect to be popular with them.
Why must everything on Slashdot be Linux-based?! If they were going to make a watch on a different time system to normal then wouldnt it make more sense to just build a slightly different watch? Analogue you just add a few more teeth to the gears and digital shouldn't be too hard to alter. Putting Linux on a watch is just silly.
--Muzz
it is a difficult feat of engineering. Because a mechanical watch is a combination of skill, craftmanship and beauty. Because someone said it couldn't be done. Because it is a very geeky thing to do.
Some of the mechanical watches with complications, like a perpetual calendar (keeps track of day, date and even leap year so you never have to reset the date) that has a wheel that revolves once every four years, are truly engineering marvels. Then there are tourbillons, repeaters, etc...all great feats of skill. I would buy one of these watches just for the skill involved in designing and testing it.
I would think slashdotters would understand doing something fairly "out there" just for the sake of doing it. And these are very useful. Granted useful for a small number of users, but useful nonetheless.
Now, how about a Beowulf cluster of Timex Sinclairs?
One wonders why these literal rocket scientists didn't just get a software programmable Linux or PalmOS based wrist-computer and hack together a Mars-time display application into it?
Maybe it's because they've got better things to do with their time?
Um, we had to pay for these watches out of our own pocket. We even have to pay for our embroidered shirts with the mission name on them! Its not our tax $$.
--I wouldn't buy one, but understand the reasons for having them made rather than doing what the article poster suggested: ("One wonders why these literal rocket scientists didn't just get a software programmable Linux or PalmOS based wrist-computer and hack together a Mars-time display application into it?")
.2 release for the general public.
o These are collectible items available only to NASA Mars project members (for now)
o The creation of these watches took a lot of skull-sweat on the manufacturer's part and is a great accomplishment for him
o It's a team-building device
o It's a Neat Hack(TM) - RTFA.
--That said, I wonder how these watches will hold up over time (pun intended.) IANAWatch Expert but somehow I doubt the length of a Martian second is the same as ours. A more accurate way of keeping time IMHO would be to keep the length of the second the same, and add 39 minutes worth per 24h: an "extended" 12h +19:30m watch face if you like, maybe with a colored "pie slice" for the extra time period - instead of losing seconds. FTA: ( "Past the glass cases of what looks like an ordinary jewelry store is a workshop where watches are losing 39 minutes a day." )
--But like I said, *I* don't have the skill to do this in the 1st place, and maybe he will do a rev
.
== WolfriderV6 == I'm willing to admit that *I just might* be wrong... Are you??