Fax and voicemail have been around for a very long time. The earliest patents for fascimile machines are only slightly newer than those of teletypes. (19th century). You could even get cheap machines as WW2 surplus, many ham radio operators played with the technogy in the 50's and 60's. It was a niche technogy (mostly used by the newspaper photo distribution services) until the Japanese wanted a way to send documents to each other electronically. An ASR-33 doesn't cut it when you have a page of kanji to transmit. Until then the west was happy to send each other telex messages.
Voicemail is otherwise known as an answering machine. I admit I had email before I owned an answering machine, but in the days before Bell allowed "foreign" devices to connect to their lines, answering machines were fairly uncommon.
Certainly once you could get a magnetic wire recorder, you could do an answering machine. The oldest unit I have heard of, dates from the late 30's. (I am sure someone tried it with phonograph technology, but I don't think it was commercially viable.)
If you are looking for a business practice changing technology that is newer than email, try FEDEX.
One question I proposed for the Nerd Purity tests (the long ones with the possibility of >500 point scores). 2 points for having an email address in high school. If you are class of '85 or earlier, add 2 points for each year. Class of '75 or earlier, add 5 points per year.
As to the + vs @ nomenclature: I remember in 1977 spending 10 minutes explaining to a business card printer just what that blob was (at sign didn't cut it, he needed "commercial at" before he got it. There wasn't a typewriter handy so I could point.), and that "DP@MIT-ML" was correct, and "DP @ MIT-ML" wasn't.
Oh yea, as to the UPPER CASE, the commonly available terminals of the day didn't provide it.
Yes, some modern autopilots can land the plane, but I prefer a much simpler soultion. Whats wrong with a wall? Just put a bulletproof bulkhead betweeen cabin and cockpit. Give the pilots their own entrance, bathroom and coffeepot.
Not revolutionary at all. Apparently El Al has two sets of doors to the flight deck on all of its planes.
Of course we can expect them to do something very different in the next attack. If nothing else, passengers and crew will not sit quietly should someone take control of the plane.
In the late 80's, a cartoonist named Steven Johnson did some peices for the Sacremento Bee. Those (and a lot of others) were collected in a book called "Public Therapy Buses". One cartoon, adressed the issue of hijacking and aircraft bombing.
The plane towed a flying wing holding the luggage. The passengers had to remove all clothing, and don pocketless (paper?) clothing.
Long enough ago that it was the AI winter rather than the dotcom bubble, a company I worked for had a big press demo/debut - invited several hundred of the technology press to the UCLA faculty club, fed them lunch, etc.
Being the AI glory days, we used specalist hardware, in this case a TI explorer. Someone at TI had the bright idea of using fiber opitcs between the box and the head end (tube,keyboard,rat), and jacketed them in plastic. It also had one of the earliest high resolution displays, which meant a one-of-a-kind 175lb projector, and a specially hacked display board to feed it, one which featured coaxial cables soldered to the board, and minimal strain relief.
So I fire the thing up, and no display. So I put in my spare board. Now the regular display is working, but the projector isn't. Out comes the soldering iron, and the cracked joint gets fixed. Ok, we are up and running. The machine finishes booting, and I get the demo loaded and ready. (the process made "easier" by having the keyboard/etc up at the podium, and the box and projector at the back of the hall.) A bit of cardboard in front of the projector, and its time for the fourth estate to get fed.
I am chilling out at the back of the hall, when I hear the squall of a Maxtor 140 doing its power-on init. Some helpful person had "borrowed" an outlet for his luggable, and popped the breaker on the outlet strip. Oh well, it will auto start the application, and Phill will just have to load the data... Word gets passed to warn him.
Lunch is over, and on cue, I pull the "shutter" away from the projector. Up there is the "self test (keyboard) failed". Pop the box's rear door open, pull the fiber cable out of the special connector, and do the "wave" test. Seems someone parked a chair on the cable, and the layer of duct tape wasn't sufficent protection. Out comes the spare cable, and the company president makes comic relief as I back my way thru the tables, unspooling cable.
Plug the new cable in, and get the machine booted, demo loaded, etc (the software was actually ready). The actual demo was an anti-climax. I was relieved of booth duty that afternoon, and taken to some very fancy place for drinks.
Watch my team build a steam race car on Sunday Aug 5. (TLC, 7PM et). Watch us cut a Land Rover in half in the Fireboat final round Monday Aug 6 (8 E/P) or Aug 12 (7 ET).
The originals are still running
on
Longitude
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· Score: 2
You can see the actual timepeices, IN OPERATION at the observatory in Greenwich. You can get there on the tube, or by taking one of the tourist boats along the river. They have all 4 of them, plus the first copies made.
They are incredibly complex. I would love to buy a set of drawings, but I doubt I could ever find the time to actually build one, there must be several thousand separate parts in the things.
We won the submarine challenge. Watch us build a coal fired steam race car December 20.
-dp-
Scrapheap has subtly different meaning in this country. Scrapheap has an implication that there is nothing that can be done with the stuff tossed on it. Junkyard implies that things will get picked over for re-usable stuff. Old cars are sent to the junkyard, not the scrapheap in american english. Bad political ideas get tossed on the scrap heap of history.
As to War vs Challenge, I guess challenge wasn't exciting enough for the WWF crowd they wanted to lure.
Personally, I like the UK name better, and if it needed translation, I would have been happier with "junkyard challenge". (besides junkyard wars pulls up to many star wars sites when you go ego surfing.)
I expect Crash to chime in at some point. This is extreme sports for nerds. Hell thats what we named the team...
Especially modern computing gear, there isn't a lot of room for semi-skilled modification. The clocks run to fast, there is too much circutry in private label single purpose packages, etc.
Want to be joined by a participant? (my place is too much of a mess to have folks over) When they start repeating, I have some tapes of stuff that won't otherwise get shown here...
First off: it helps to understand the purpose of the show -- its stealth science education - tricking 10 year old kids into watching an explanation of how a wing works. They sit thru the mini-lectures because they get rewarded afterwards with someone making precision adjustments with sledgehammers. When chosing challenges, its the education that drives the choice. The competition is partly to make it addicting, and partly to give the kids the idea that actually designing and building something might be a lot of fun.
Yes, this is a "rich" junkyard. There are all sorts of neat things to find. And unlike some, there is a lot of stuff that isn't metallic. (usually its construction debris -- the plywood we found had clearly been a concrete form in a prior life) -- Its mostly what you get, when you don't have the yard workers picking over the good bits. The set was a corner of a real working scrap yard. On the other side of the wall, there are cockneys in hydraulic claw loaders, tossing cars thru the air. You have to wear a hard hat when you go to the bathroom. (its out by the truck scales). When stocking the yard between episodes, the random lumps of steel plate is just dumped over the wall from what they have sitting around. But yes, they will add extra stuff to make it possible to complete building a machine.
The basic rule for seeding: If its not possible to safely improvise a part with the time and tools provided, they will provide something that can be pressed into service. It will require some ingenuity to make it work. If there are specific safety regulations, the relavant parts will always be provided. For example, things like safety valves, regulators, and gas tanks will be planted, and will have their certification paperwork sitting in the directors briefcase. (and if we happen to find such a part that isn't one of the known good ones, they don't let us use it)
But: Just because they give you a part, that doesn't mean its clear sailing. For example the wheels you mentioned. Sure they were there, but none of the differentials in the yard came close to fitting the bolt circle. If you wanted to use them, you had to make it work.
And this brings up another point: That same helpfull crew that hides essential parts, can just as easily remove them. They made sure that there wern't matching differentials for those wheels. In the fire fighting boat episode, there wasn't a pump to be had. Both teams had to make a pump. And not just a wimpy one, the burning shed was supposed to be 50 feet away.
As to engines, yes, there is sample bias. What happens in a conventional junkyard, is that if a car comes in with a running engine, the engine is pulled and sold. Only dead engines are put out into the yard. As a junkyard owner, you don't want someone wrecking a $200 engine to get a $2 part. In this yard the teams are those yard employee's that have the job of pulling the good ones out. Teams get their engines from the same places people that sell used engines get them -- from cars whose owner has decided to artfully customize his vehicle with the help of a tree, broadside.
Yes, this is TV, and they do have to make sure they have two machines, with at least one of them likely to complete the course, and the other at least able to fail in an instructive way. The shows cost close to half a million dollars per episode to make, and the producer is betting that money on half a dozen amateurs. But they do have a surprisingly light touch. We did have ample opportunity to open fire at both feet.
The time limit is pretty real. You get an hour tools down for lunch, and credit for the time that the hosts spend disturbing you. If nothing else, a second day of a film crew adds a lot to the price. And they may only have the test site for a specific day, so you really do have to finish on something like on time.
I can assure you its not scripted, what happens is up to the contestants. The teams really did find out what they had to build that morning, on camera. The producer has been very suprised at what the teams made sometimes.
Now perhaps if I hadn't found the 'heap first, I might have given battlebots some thought. But its not the same kind of challenge -- The problem solved is the same one each time. If you need a part (except during the match) you can just order one, and it will arrive in a couple of days. You have as much time as your advance planning allows.
But: The thing that really annoys me about battlebots, is the attitude of the hosts when discussing something technical. The clear message presented is: "you aren't expected to understand this". Junkyard has the exact opposite purpose.
Anyhow, my web page has a lot more detail about the shows, the other teams, etc. For those that watched it in July, there will be 4 new to the US shows. (the two second season shows that they skipped this summer, land yachts, and mileage marathon, and the first two of the third year, Demolition and bombers) If you watch no other, watch the demolition show. Three Yorkshiremen with accents so thick they need power tools to cut, build an articulated claw that eats brick walls. (thats at 8pm)
Our shows aren't part of the Marathon, but they will be shown in December. Monday we had 300 MIT community members in 10-250 for a sneak preview of the Steam Race car show. Much mirth was in evidence, and the reaction to my presenting the hosts a copy of the Hackers Dictionary, bordered on deafening. We had to call questions at 45 minutes.
Instead of thinking about "that was planted", work on your welding chops, and think about two others that would be a good balance to your skills. Its great fun to watch, but if you think that you have what it takes to compete, DO IT. Everyone I have talked to that has done a show, with without any hesitation, accept an offer to do another. If they called me today, my reply would be "is there room on tommorow mornings flight?"
Well the case on that small independent computer costs as much as the circut board (populated). And that wall wart power supply has a mtbf measured in months. Hopefully it dies in a way that doesn't take the machine with it. If you want a 1u case and ps, figure it will be $200 extra at retail. (rule of thumb for consumer electronics: the whole is 6 times the cost of the parts)
Having said all that, I set my father up with one of the Linksys boxes. (middle brother is in the computer surplus biz, I could get a fine mini desktop case p75 that was easily the master of the job, for free, some assembly required)
The dedicated box was cheap, and a lot less work than putting together, and more importantly keeping running, a linux box 40 miles from home. I promised the father-in-law the same when he is ready to get a cable connect. (he is 300 miles away. They get software maintence and consumer electronics repair for christmas each year)
Junkyard Wars Marathon TLC Nov 24 noon->3 AM
MIT Junkyard Wars sneak preview Nov 20. Email for an invatation.
Its also silent, so I don't have to worry about it getting shut off (wasting electricity) with the computer, and him having to wait while fsck grovels the disk before he could use it.
You can get the LinkSys dedicated box for under $200 (around $100 if you only want a single port on the home side), another $20 for an ethernet card for your box.
Too bad, this could have been interesting.
The board is also joe users ethernet card, which they would also have to buy along with the separate box.
If they price it "correctly" it should be somewhere between the price of a plain old ethernet card, and the separate box.
For those that haven't designed consumer electronics before, the case and any switches are the most expensive part of the thing, usually about half the total budget. So by being a parasite off another box, you can save significant amounts of money. And as bad as they are, a PC power supply is going to be a whole lot more reliable than the typical wall wart that poweres the tiny boxes.
As to "when they reboot", as long as they don't actually power cycle the machine, the card should be fine. Only the host ethernet part has to notice that RESET got asserted. The part doing actual routing (which only depends on the box for a couple of watts of power) won't care that someone applied the defibrilator. I am sure the configuration paramaters are in some form of non-volatile RAM.
I agree that a good place for this is inside the DSL or cable box. (the cable boxes already have most of it, as they include packet filtering, to deter the amateur packet sniffers).
For that matter, why duplicate so much hardware and software?. Perhaps there is a niche for ISP's that provide firewall service. If I wasn't running a server, or didn't have the skills to do it myself, I would pay an extra buck a month to have someone full time looking after a best-available-technology-with-current-patches firewall on the othe side of the DSLAM from my wire. While they are at it, a realtime blackhole spam filter would also be nice.
-dp-
Junkyard Wars Marathon Nov 24th TLC noon->3AM.
MIT Sneak Preview Nov 20. Email for invatation.
Encryption won't help in "pen recording" mode -- While they would like to have what was said, police are almost as happy if they can show that a communication occurred.
The reason this is significant: Getting permission to get pen records (telephone slang, a list off all calls made by a particular phone) is a whole lot easier. IANALawyer, but I think they may be able to just supoena them, no inconvienent judge that has to be talked into issuing a warrant.
I know of at least one case where pen records (telephone) played a big role -- The investigators of a series of arson fires in the (near to the slashdot home) city of Lawrence, used analyis of calling patterns to identify the central figures.
So use that encrypted VPN, and when you aren't using it, send random data back and forth over the link so you won't face someone in the witness box pointing at an anacapa timeline, and saying: "mail was sent on tuesday, 12 hours before the bomb went off, and a reply was sent 15 minutes after detonation"...
Well it hasn't gotten significant airtime in the US yet. (it's only shown as "specials", three nights in mid summer). They are about to fix that. Some embargo's have lifted, so I can say a bit more.
First: a better alternative to battles at the mall: A marathon showing of Junkyard on 24 November -- All the second UK season episodes, and a couple from season 3. Then on Wed Nights in December, they will run 3 episodes a night to get thru the rest of the 3rd UK season. (Our shows included). Then in January, the version they commisioned: Same junk, comparable challenges, all American teams. No Kryten.
For those in the Boston area, make a note of 8 Nov. All the details aren't set in stone yet, but there should be a Sneak Preview show that night. (email me for more details)
As to robot wars/battle bots chronology, Here is heresay from someone who wasn't even close to the original action. Someone who was around for part of all this told me that it started with this thing happening in the bay area. They called it Robot Wars. It ran as an annual event for several years. As it got bigger, it attracted some media attention. Somehow a TV deal happened. Things went variously contractual. The guy who was the original force behind the live event got squeezed out, as part of bringing the show over to the UK.
The guy that got squeezed out, formed a rival organization, and that organization is the one behind Battlebots.
As to duplication/licensing, the TV universe is not a rational place. And there are far more people in the business that aren't creative enough to think up a show on their own, so they see what made money for one network, and do a me-to, in hopes that some of the money will rub off on them instead.
The whole "Junkyard Wars/Scrapheap Challenge" separation is supposedly because "people loved the show, but couldn't decode the accents". They went to the far greater expense of commisioning the same production company to make a US version of it, on the same British scrap pile. (which the UK network that did the British version is going to show. They even did a winner of british series vs winner of US series. special...)
Remember, they are trying to get half a season of 1/2 hour shows out of a one day event.
They were able to go back and interview a couple of the particpants, it is too bad that they don't ask about the details. But they sent the sportscasters, not Nye. They must have only had him for the competition day. (not that they give him noticiable air time)
In fact, the thing I most dislike about the spin they put on the tech stuff is the "You aren't expected to understand this" attitude.
As another poster noted, there isn't computation involved. Its mostly beefed up radio control gear. Some of them might have something pneumatic to operate a weapon, nothing particularly exotic...
Personally, I think they are missing a bet with all the exotic stuff. If I were going to build something, I would give real consideration to cast iron (likely one of the annealed forms for the extra ductility) And an IC engine for motive power, its hard to beat one for energy density. (anything that can chemically store significant electrical energy makes a good anchor) I would spend my weight budget on armor and weaponry. Brute Force and Ignorance can be hard to beat...
(I won't be building, I expect to do another season of Scrapheap/Junkyard. Given a choice between Las Vegas, and London, I will take London every time. I also like the variety, and surprise of the show format. Suiting up not knowing what Robert is going to ask you to build is a lot of fun.)
They don't all get build stuff shows - One of them is a host of YA reality tv show. Its called "Jailbreak". Some number of people, in a replica medium security prison. Guards even. First one to escape gets GBP 100,000 (divided if its an escape committie). Later escapes get less money.
I can just see it now: if the ratings sag, they issue the guards live ammo.
Oh yea, Robert (aka Kryten) only does the british version (Scrapheap) The american version (Junkyard) used a comic by the name of George Gray.
On the scrapheap alumni list, someone suggested giving "Kryten" a sledgehammer, and entering him in the middleweight division.
They have a mailing list called REUSE. Got something you don't need, just put it in a public place, and send mail to the list. Hordes of uber-jawa will descend on it, and haul it away.
Its not just computer gear that gets posted -- it gets very busy with household stuff in May, and catered excess when companies are on campus recruiting.
Also offered up are office supplies, (even the lowly packing peanut) random scrap metal (I scored a bunch of 1" pipe for bike frame jigs), and old lab equipment (tektronix scope plugins, and even an 10x12 foot surface plate, that used to hold lazer gear)
Obviously the MIT list works because of physical proximity, with shipping, a free couch is no bargain. Computer gear is light enough that I hope this works.
I do urge other comparable communities to setup such an arrangement. (not just universities, I can see a company campus setting up the same sort of thing)
Slashdot Mirror
Fax and voicemail have been around for a very long time. The earliest patents for fascimile machines are only slightly newer than those of teletypes. (19th century). You could even get cheap machines as WW2 surplus, many ham radio operators played with the technogy in the 50's and 60's. It was a niche technogy (mostly used by the newspaper photo distribution services) until the Japanese wanted a way to send documents to each other electronically. An ASR-33 doesn't cut it when you have a page of kanji to transmit. Until then the west was happy to send each other telex messages.
Voicemail is otherwise known as an answering machine. I admit I had email before I owned an answering machine, but in the days before Bell allowed "foreign" devices to connect to their lines, answering machines were fairly uncommon.
Certainly once you could get a magnetic wire recorder, you could do an answering machine. The oldest unit I have heard of, dates from the late 30's. (I am sure someone tried it with phonograph technology, but I don't think it was commercially viable.)
If you are looking for a business practice changing technology that is newer than email, try FEDEX.
One question I proposed for the Nerd Purity tests (the long ones with the possibility of >500 point scores). 2 points for having an email address in high school. If you are class of '85 or earlier, add 2 points for each year. Class of '75 or earlier, add 5 points per year.
As to the + vs @ nomenclature: I remember in 1977 spending 10 minutes explaining to a business card printer just what that blob was (at sign didn't cut it, he needed "commercial at" before he got it. There wasn't a typewriter handy so I could point.), and that "DP@MIT-ML" was correct, and "DP @ MIT-ML" wasn't.
Oh yea, as to the UPPER CASE, the commonly available terminals of the day didn't provide it.
-dp-
Yes, some modern autopilots can land the plane, but I prefer a much simpler soultion. Whats wrong with a wall? Just put a bulletproof bulkhead betweeen cabin and cockpit. Give the pilots their own entrance, bathroom and coffeepot.
Not revolutionary at all. Apparently El Al has two sets of doors to the flight deck on all of its planes.
Of course we can expect them to do something very different in the next attack. If nothing else, passengers and crew will not sit quietly should someone take control of the plane.
-dp-
In the late 80's, a cartoonist named Steven Johnson did some peices for the Sacremento Bee. Those (and a lot of others) were collected in a book called "Public Therapy Buses". One cartoon, adressed the issue of hijacking and aircraft bombing.
The plane towed a flying wing holding the luggage. The passengers had to remove all clothing, and don pocketless (paper?) clothing.
-dp-
Long enough ago that it was the AI winter rather than the dotcom bubble, a company I worked for had a big press demo/debut - invited several hundred of the technology press to the UCLA faculty club, fed them lunch, etc.
Being the AI glory days, we used specalist hardware, in this case a TI explorer. Someone at TI had the bright idea of using fiber opitcs between the box and the head end (tube,keyboard,rat), and jacketed them in plastic. It also had one of the earliest high resolution displays, which meant a one-of-a-kind 175lb projector, and a specially hacked display board to feed it, one which featured coaxial cables soldered to the board, and minimal strain relief.
So I fire the thing up, and no display. So I put in my spare board. Now the regular display is working, but the projector isn't. Out comes the soldering iron, and the cracked joint gets fixed. Ok, we are up and running. The machine finishes booting, and I get the demo loaded and ready. (the process made "easier" by having the keyboard/etc up at the podium, and the box and projector at the back of the hall.) A bit of cardboard in front of the projector, and its time for the fourth estate to get fed.
I am chilling out at the back of the hall, when I hear the squall of a Maxtor 140 doing its power-on init. Some helpful person had "borrowed" an outlet for his luggable, and popped the breaker on the outlet strip. Oh well, it will auto start the application, and Phill will just have to load the data... Word gets passed to warn him.
Lunch is over, and on cue, I pull the "shutter" away from the projector. Up there is the "self test (keyboard) failed". Pop the box's rear door open, pull the fiber cable out of the special connector, and do the "wave" test. Seems someone parked a chair on the cable, and the layer of duct tape wasn't sufficent protection. Out comes the spare cable, and the company president makes comic relief as I back my way thru the tables, unspooling cable.
Plug the new cable in, and get the machine booted, demo loaded, etc (the software was actually ready). The actual demo was an anti-climax. I was relieved of booth duty that afternoon, and taken to some very fancy place for drinks.
Watch my team build a steam race car on Sunday Aug 5. (TLC, 7PM et). Watch us cut a Land Rover in half in the Fireboat final round Monday Aug 6 (8 E/P) or Aug 12 (7 ET).
You can see the actual timepeices, IN OPERATION at the observatory in Greenwich. You can get there on the tube, or by taking one of the tourist boats along the river. They have all 4 of them, plus the first copies made.
They are incredibly complex. I would love to buy a set of drawings, but I doubt I could ever find the time to actually build one, there must be several thousand separate parts in the things.
We won the submarine challenge. Watch us build a coal fired steam race car December 20.
-dp-
But they made it on the same pile of junk that the British show used.
Scrapheap has subtly different meaning in this country. Scrapheap has an implication that there is nothing that can be done with the stuff tossed on it. Junkyard implies that things will get picked over for re-usable stuff. Old cars are sent to the junkyard, not the scrapheap in american english. Bad political ideas get tossed on the scrap heap of history.
As to War vs Challenge, I guess challenge wasn't exciting enough for the WWF crowd they wanted to lure.
Personally, I like the UK name better, and if it needed translation, I would have been happier with "junkyard challenge". (besides junkyard wars pulls up to many star wars sites when you go ego surfing.)
-dp-
They just have to cut out 6 minutes to make room for more commercials
You would understand the idea of getting up at the crack of noon.
I go to bed when the sun she rises, earlii in the morning...
-dp-
They changed the name for the US market. As to "always", this was the first season a US team competed. Last years final was bikers vs bikers.
The point of the show is education. That is best done when the parts are open for illustrative purposes.
Building is the fun part. The test is interesting, but very nerve wracking. Lots of "hurry up and wait". On build day, you are just too busy.
common vocabulary.
Besides bodging is a fine word, I think it fits nicely into the hack, tweak, etc continuim.
I expect Crash to chime in at some point. This is extreme sports for nerds. Hell thats what we named the team... Especially modern computing gear, there isn't a lot of room for semi-skilled modification. The clocks run to fast, there is too much circutry in private label single purpose packages, etc.
Want to be joined by a participant? (my place is too much of a mess to have folks over) When they start repeating, I have some tapes of stuff that won't otherwise get shown here...
Actually the crashed out plane was there as set dressing. They were suprised when the expert decided to use bits of it.
by someone who wouldn't miss an episode of Iron Chef
And if you liked that one, how about Survivor
-dp-
First off: it helps to understand the purpose of the show -- its stealth science education - tricking 10 year old kids into watching an explanation of how a wing works. They sit thru the mini-lectures because they get rewarded afterwards with someone making precision adjustments with sledgehammers. When chosing challenges, its the education that drives the choice. The competition is partly to make it addicting, and partly to give the kids the idea that actually designing and building something might be a lot of fun.
Yes, this is a "rich" junkyard. There are all sorts of neat things to find. And unlike some, there is a lot of stuff that isn't metallic. (usually its construction debris -- the plywood we found had clearly been a concrete form in a prior life) -- Its mostly what you get, when you don't have the yard workers picking over the good bits. The set was a corner of a real working scrap yard. On the other side of the wall, there are cockneys in hydraulic claw loaders, tossing cars thru the air. You have to wear a hard hat when you go to the bathroom. (its out by the truck scales). When stocking the yard between episodes, the random lumps of steel plate is just dumped over the wall from what they have sitting around. But yes, they will add extra stuff to make it possible to complete building a machine.
The basic rule for seeding: If its not possible to safely improvise a part with the time and tools provided, they will provide something that can be pressed into service. It will require some ingenuity to make it work. If there are specific safety regulations, the relavant parts will always be provided. For example, things like safety valves, regulators, and gas tanks will be planted, and will have their certification paperwork sitting in the directors briefcase. (and if we happen to find such a part that isn't one of the known good ones, they don't let us use it)
But: Just because they give you a part, that doesn't mean its clear sailing. For example the wheels you mentioned. Sure they were there, but none of the differentials in the yard came close to fitting the bolt circle. If you wanted to use them, you had to make it work.
And this brings up another point: That same helpfull crew that hides essential parts, can just as easily remove them. They made sure that there wern't matching differentials for those wheels. In the fire fighting boat episode, there wasn't a pump to be had. Both teams had to make a pump. And not just a wimpy one, the burning shed was supposed to be 50 feet away.
As to engines, yes, there is sample bias. What happens in a conventional junkyard, is that if a car comes in with a running engine, the engine is pulled and sold. Only dead engines are put out into the yard. As a junkyard owner, you don't want someone wrecking a $200 engine to get a $2 part. In this yard the teams are those yard employee's that have the job of pulling the good ones out. Teams get their engines from the same places people that sell used engines get them -- from cars whose owner has decided to artfully customize his vehicle with the help of a tree, broadside.
Yes, this is TV, and they do have to make sure they have two machines, with at least one of them likely to complete the course, and the other at least able to fail in an instructive way. The shows cost close to half a million dollars per episode to make, and the producer is betting that money on half a dozen amateurs. But they do have a surprisingly light touch. We did have ample opportunity to open fire at both feet.
The time limit is pretty real. You get an hour tools down for lunch, and credit for the time that the hosts spend disturbing you. If nothing else, a second day of a film crew adds a lot to the price. And they may only have the test site for a specific day, so you really do have to finish on something like on time.
I can assure you its not scripted, what happens is up to the contestants. The teams really did find out what they had to build that morning, on camera. The producer has been very suprised at what the teams made sometimes.
Now perhaps if I hadn't found the 'heap first, I might have given battlebots some thought. But its not the same kind of challenge -- The problem solved is the same one each time. If you need a part (except during the match) you can just order one, and it will arrive in a couple of days. You have as much time as your advance planning allows.
But: The thing that really annoys me about battlebots, is the attitude of the hosts when discussing something technical. The clear message presented is: "you aren't expected to understand this". Junkyard has the exact opposite purpose.
Anyhow, my web page has a lot more detail about the shows, the other teams, etc. For those that watched it in July, there will be 4 new to the US shows. (the two second season shows that they skipped this summer, land yachts, and mileage marathon, and the first two of the third year, Demolition and bombers) If you watch no other, watch the demolition show. Three Yorkshiremen with accents so thick they need power tools to cut, build an articulated claw that eats brick walls. (thats at 8pm)
The marathon schedule is here. This is the kickoff to regular weekly showings. The rest of the third season will run three shows a night on Wed in December. They will follow this up with an "americanized" version of the show in Jan/Feb. Yea all the accents (except for Cathy) are American, but they used the same crew, pile of scrap, and challenges. Didn't water it down at all. The only thing I will miss is Robert (aka Kryten) as host.
Our shows aren't part of the Marathon, but they will be shown in December. Monday we had 300 MIT community members in 10-250 for a sneak preview of the Steam Race car show. Much mirth was in evidence, and the reaction to my presenting the hosts a copy of the Hackers Dictionary, bordered on deafening. We had to call questions at 45 minutes.
Instead of thinking about "that was planted", work on your welding chops, and think about two others that would be a good balance to your skills. Its great fun to watch, but if you think that you have what it takes to compete, DO IT. Everyone I have talked to that has done a show, with without any hesitation, accept an offer to do another. If they called me today, my reply would be "is there room on tommorow mornings flight?"
-dp-
Well the case on that small independent computer costs as much as the circut board (populated). And that wall wart power supply has a mtbf measured in months. Hopefully it dies in a way that doesn't take the machine with it. If you want a 1u case and ps, figure it will be $200 extra at retail. (rule of thumb for consumer electronics: the whole is 6 times the cost of the parts)
Having said all that, I set my father up with one of the Linksys boxes. (middle brother is in the computer surplus biz, I could get a fine mini desktop case p75 that was easily the master of the job, for free, some assembly required)
The dedicated box was cheap, and a lot less work than putting together, and more importantly keeping running, a linux box 40 miles from home. I promised the father-in-law the same when he is ready to get a cable connect. (he is 300 miles away. They get software maintence and consumer electronics repair for christmas each year)
Junkyard Wars Marathon TLC Nov 24 noon->3 AM
MIT Junkyard Wars sneak preview Nov 20. Email for an invatation.
Its also silent, so I don't have to worry about it getting shut off (wasting electricity) with the computer, and him having to wait while fsck grovels the disk before he could use it.
You can get the LinkSys dedicated box for under $200 (around $100 if you only want a single port on the home side), another $20 for an ethernet card for your box. Too bad, this could have been interesting.
The board is also joe users ethernet card, which they would also have to buy along with the separate box.
If they price it "correctly" it should be somewhere between the price of a plain old ethernet card, and the separate box.
For those that haven't designed consumer electronics before, the case and any switches are the most expensive part of the thing, usually about half the total budget. So by being a parasite off another box, you can save significant amounts of money. And as bad as they are, a PC power supply is going to be a whole lot more reliable than the typical wall wart that poweres the tiny boxes.
As to "when they reboot", as long as they don't actually power cycle the machine, the card should be fine. Only the host ethernet part has to notice that RESET got asserted. The part doing actual routing (which only depends on the box for a couple of watts of power) won't care that someone applied the defibrilator. I am sure the configuration paramaters are in some form of non-volatile RAM.
I agree that a good place for this is inside the DSL or cable box. (the cable boxes already have most of it, as they include packet filtering, to deter the amateur packet sniffers).
For that matter, why duplicate so much hardware and software?. Perhaps there is a niche for ISP's that provide firewall service. If I wasn't running a server, or didn't have the skills to do it myself, I would pay an extra buck a month to have someone full time looking after a best-available-technology-with-current-patches firewall on the othe side of the DSLAM from my wire. While they are at it, a realtime blackhole spam filter would also be nice.
-dp-
Junkyard Wars Marathon Nov 24th TLC noon->3AM.
MIT Sneak Preview Nov 20. Email for invatation.
Encryption won't help in "pen recording" mode -- While they would like to have what was said, police are almost as happy if they can show that a communication occurred.
The reason this is significant: Getting permission to get pen records (telephone slang, a list off all calls made by a particular phone) is a whole lot easier. IANALawyer, but I think they may be able to just supoena them, no inconvienent judge that has to be talked into issuing a warrant.
I know of at least one case where pen records (telephone) played a big role -- The investigators of a series of arson fires in the (near to the slashdot home) city of Lawrence, used analyis of calling patterns to identify the central figures.
So use that encrypted VPN, and when you aren't using it, send random data back and forth over the link so you won't face someone in the witness box pointing at an anacapa timeline, and saying: "mail was sent on tuesday, 12 hours before the bomb went off, and a reply was sent 15 minutes after detonation"...
Well it hasn't gotten significant airtime in the US yet. (it's only shown as "specials", three nights in mid summer). They are about to fix that. Some embargo's have lifted, so I can say a bit more.
First: a better alternative to battles at the mall: A marathon showing of Junkyard on 24 November -- All the second UK season episodes, and a couple from season 3. Then on Wed Nights in December, they will run 3 episodes a night to get thru the rest of the 3rd UK season. (Our shows included). Then in January, the version they commisioned: Same junk, comparable challenges, all American teams. No Kryten.
For those in the Boston area, make a note of 8 Nov. All the details aren't set in stone yet, but there should be a Sneak Preview show that night. (email me for more details)
As to robot wars/battle bots chronology, Here is heresay from someone who wasn't even close to the original action. Someone who was around for part of all this told me that it started with this thing happening in the bay area. They called it Robot Wars. It ran as an annual event for several years. As it got bigger, it attracted some media attention. Somehow a TV deal happened. Things went variously contractual. The guy who was the original force behind the live event got squeezed out, as part of bringing the show over to the UK.
The guy that got squeezed out, formed a rival organization, and that organization is the one behind Battlebots.
As to duplication/licensing, the TV universe is not a rational place. And there are far more people in the business that aren't creative enough to think up a show on their own, so they see what made money for one network, and do a me-to, in hopes that some of the money will rub off on them instead.
The whole "Junkyard Wars/Scrapheap Challenge" separation is supposedly because "people loved the show, but couldn't decode the accents". They went to the far greater expense of commisioning the same production company to make a US version of it, on the same British scrap pile. (which the UK network that did the British version is going to show. They even did a winner of british series vs winner of US series. special...)
-dp-
Remember, they are trying to get half a season of 1/2 hour shows out of a one day event.
They were able to go back and interview a couple of the particpants, it is too bad that they don't ask about the details. But they sent the sportscasters, not Nye. They must have only had him for the competition day. (not that they give him noticiable air time)
In fact, the thing I most dislike about the spin they put on the tech stuff is the "You aren't expected to understand this" attitude.
As another poster noted, there isn't computation involved. Its mostly beefed up radio control gear. Some of them might have something pneumatic to operate a weapon, nothing particularly exotic...
Personally, I think they are missing a bet with all the exotic stuff. If I were going to build something, I would give real consideration to cast iron (likely one of the annealed forms for the extra ductility) And an IC engine for motive power, its hard to beat one for energy density. (anything that can chemically store significant electrical energy makes a good anchor) I would spend my weight budget on armor and weaponry. Brute Force and Ignorance can be hard to beat...
(I won't be building, I expect to do another season of Scrapheap/Junkyard. Given a choice between Las Vegas, and London, I will take London every time. I also like the variety, and surprise of the show format. Suiting up not knowing what Robert is going to ask you to build is a lot of fun.)
They don't all get build stuff shows - One of them is a host of YA reality tv show. Its called "Jailbreak". Some number of people, in a replica medium security prison. Guards even. First one to escape gets GBP 100,000 (divided if its an escape committie). Later escapes get less money. I can just see it now: if the ratings sag, they issue the guards live ammo. Oh yea, Robert (aka Kryten) only does the british version (Scrapheap) The american version (Junkyard) used a comic by the name of George Gray. On the scrapheap alumni list, someone suggested giving "Kryten" a sledgehammer, and entering him in the middleweight division.
They have a mailing list called REUSE. Got something you don't need, just put it in a public place, and send mail to the list. Hordes of uber-jawa will descend on it, and haul it away.
Its not just computer gear that gets posted -- it gets very busy with household stuff in May, and catered excess when companies are on campus recruiting.
Also offered up are office supplies, (even the lowly packing peanut) random scrap metal (I scored a bunch of 1" pipe for bike frame jigs), and old lab equipment (tektronix scope plugins, and even an 10x12 foot surface plate, that used to hold lazer gear)
Obviously the MIT list works because of physical proximity, with shipping, a free couch is no bargain. Computer gear is light enough that I hope this works.
I do urge other comparable communities to setup such an arrangement. (not just universities, I can see a company campus setting up the same sort of thing)