The French had a very reliable launch vehicle, the Arianne IV, which they decided to "upgrade" with the Arianne V. After failing on 4 of the first 13 missions, they introduced an upgraded version with an extended nozzle. The failure of that launch led to the (highly justified) delay of the Rosetta launch on a similar Arianne V because of the failure investigation. Turns out that the nozzle had a design flaw which led to the failure.
ESA did pretty well on their 1st trip to Mars, as the Mars Express is an unqualified success, but the Beagle II didn't work for whatever reason. All this is just to reiterate that space is hard, and there will be successes and failures. No one's at 100% (Russians have a worse track record on Mars than anyone, and NASA lost Contour--not a JPL mission-- last year due to an obvious design flaw).
Whenever a new technique is tried in space for the 1st time, the odds increase. That Pathfinder worked on its first attempt at a bouncy landing, and Sojourner roved Mars without a hitch speaks to the talent & luck of the JPL crew. Hopefully the Europeans will do as well with their harpoon, and hopefully they haven't made obvious mistakes like those made by NASA and the APL did in the Contour comet mission.
Hmm, I find it interesting that no one is fighting this. It seems a bit absurd that you can't call an event by its actual name without committing copyright infringement; has this type of thing been challenged before? Has the NFL enforced its "rights" to prevent the use of terms like AFC, NFC, Super Bowl and NFL over the past 35 years, which would enable them to continue to do?
I don't think the NFL can prohibit anyone from displaying the game and charging admission to the event, as long as the broadcast is not altered. After all, this is being publicly broadcast on our airwaves, and the NFL has no right to tell us where, why or how we can watch the game.
On the other hand, the casinos could just go ahead with their party, cease referring to them as Super Bowl events, broadcast the game and charge whatever they want. I don't think the NFL would have a case if they ceased using these copyrighted terms from the date of notice onward.
On the third hand, this is Vegas reaping what it sows after aggressively running ads encouraging people to come to Vegas for the Super Bowl. This is the sound of the other shoe dropping.
I think all SCO wants out of this is to get the US Government to pay SCO for licenses (and fund its lawsuits). This would provide a tremendous influx of revenue, and could pressure private companies into doing the same. Lemme quote,
As part of the effort to protect our intellectual property rights, The SCO Group has met with several U.S. government agencies. We have been encouraged to see that, unique among the organizations with which we've met, most government agencies understand the implications of SCO's case
(we can be thankful for that at least!). Government agency leaders readily understand the value of copyrights, and they do not want to be in violation. This is in contrast to many corporations, who seem to have a "don't ask, don't tell" policy when it comes to understanding the source of the software they are using.
Essentially they are butt-kissing and asking congress to force agencies to pay SCO for using Linux. I have no doubt they will fail miserably in that regard, but I'm more worried about the administration issuing an edict which would require agencies to pay SCO's blackmail. Stay tuned.
This may ruin my streak of karma-generating posts (only post early about stuff I have specific knowledge of), but here it goes:
I work as an analyst at an engineering company. I've had interactions with my management all the way from my boss to the CEO of my compant (~3000 employees). Here's one "trick" that works really well: be completely honest, don't be defensive, and state facts as facts and make clear when you're giving your opinion on a subject.
Executives are often demonized and ridiculed, but in general they are very smart, perceptive and adaptive. They can apply critical thinking skills, and often they do see solutions that you didn't, or couldn't (due to not knowing the problem). Granted, IT is a different creature, and maybe this is a trick. If that's the case and they want to cut heads, they'll do it anyways.
Realistically, if they want to find stuff out, they will ask questions. Answer these questions truthfully, and don't state opinion as fact.
For example, if the CEO asks, "What went wrong with the network last week," I suggest you answer, "The D-Link 'NeverDown' router went down and our backup was off-line.'" Do not answer, "We don't get enough money, so the tech who was supposed to prepare the back-up router had to cover for someone else and it wasn't ready. Plus, we were too cheap to buy Cisco and this is why that was a bad idea...." The CEO is smart. He'll ask why the backup was off-line, if you would have been better off with a different brand, etc. Have faith that you're not dealing with idiots and things will turn out OK.
A lot of these schemes (such as activation) described in the article are nothing more than good ole' fashioned copy-protection. I think in the early 80's, software makers saw copy-protection as the holy-grail, and would go to great lengths to make there wares hard to copy-- even for backup purposes. For a while, I think many folks thought it was against the law to copy a make a copy of your own VCR tape.
However, many of these copy-protection schemes. USB dongles, codes that had to be typed in with each boot-up (remember SimCity?), or extra discs that had to be kept in a 2nd drive. Most of these schemes failed because mostly what they did was make it difficult for the owners (or licensees, whatever) of the software to use it. So instead of selling 100,000 copies and having 20,000 pirated, they'd sell 80,000 and have zero pirated versions. Seems hardly worth the bother, eh? This is most recently evidenced by the TurboTax fiasco of 2003.
Right now, this push is most evident in the world of digital music sales, which are grossly restricted compared to regular CDs. I think at one point a major label will decide it's pointless to sell copy-protected (I hate the term DRM) tunes when the pirates will never pay for them anyway and can get them from other services.
Will video-game rentals and re-sales go the way of the Dodo bird? It will start to look that way for a while, then a really good game will come out with any restrictions and sales will be tremendous, despite (because of?) the casual piracy that is sure to ensue. Publishers will then remember this: organized piracy=bad, casual piracy=both good & bad, copy-protection does nothing to stop the first and may in fact encourage it, while doing a great deal to hinder the latter. They'll then ask "what's the point again?" and will use the business model that works the best for their particular game instead of trying to restrict everything to the nth degree.
Canceling Hubble might be a good idea in the long run, but I think it's a shame that it's being done in the name of safety. NASA is basically saying that Shuttle is not reliable enough to return people from orbit. But it will be a long time before any other vehicle approaches a 99% success rate (Russian capsules excluded).
I think a lot of the changes being made in wake of Columbia make sense, such as inspections at the station and using our much-improved imaging capabilities to inspect STS. These changes basically looked at the whole program history, and asked, "What can we do to make shuttle better & more reliable based upon advances in technology." On the other hand, bagging non-ISS trips entirely (or setting such high hurdles that they are no longer feasible) seems short-sighted and a little bit cowardly.
If it's no longer cost-effective to run Hubble, then let it come down. Otherwise, let's not put unreasonable requirements on shuttle and keep Hubble running. The shuttle had dozens of flights before ISS was built, and it's safer now than it was then.
Just when you thought they'd run out of silly patents to sue over, here comes another one. According to the good folks at News.com, a couple of Nizzas (the name of their company) have sued Network Solutions and Register.com. As Marguerite Reardon so eloquently puts it, "Two Internet entrepreneurs are suing Network Solutions and Register.com for allegedly infringing on their e-mail and domain naming patent." I take issue with the term entrepeneurs, as scum-sucking bottom feeders seems more appropriate, but you get the idea. Basically, they patented the method of assigning an email address of fake@name.com to the guy with the website fake.name.com. This might be the lamest excuse for a patent ever granted; a 2-year old could have come up with this idea.
These nuclear-blast fueled ships are generally not designed for launch into orbit (or into space); rather, they are designed for propulsion once the vehicle has already left earth orbit (or at least earth itself).
As a proud Treo 600 owner, the press release that got my attention was this one that describes the availability of Real tunes on Treo. This could be really cool if I can actually access the Real store from my Treo 600. Then I could be anywhere in the country, buy a song, download it and listen to it on the spot. Could come in real handy on road trips.
Anyone know if this will be the case, or will it just support playback on the Treo after you buy them on your PC?
Re:This could put ISS on ice
on
ISS May Have A Leak
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· Score: 4, Interesting
Hmm... shoulda Googles before making that post. Anyways, here's the #1 hit for "ISS Leak" on Google. Fairly on-topic stuff.
Well, if they can't seal the leak, they'll need to send the astronauts home until Shuttle is back in service, which could be 2 years plus. Hopefully, they'll find the leak and fix it.
One possible cause of the leak is from a meteorite impact. I have a tiny bit of experience with this from my grad school days. During the design stage of the American module, there was some concern about what would happen if there was an impact from debris. Tests showed that if the impact object was the right size, the entire damaged section could "unzip" and the and essentially blow up, likely killing the astronauts and disabling ISS. The design was tweaked, and it was showed that the section would not unzip, instead it would leak (probably not as slow as what is described, though-- think hours to reach vacuum, not months or seconds).
I have no idea if that's what happened-- it might be a completely unrelated issue. But just wanted to point out that a tremendous variety of possible events are considered, and NASA really wants to assure that none of these could result in a catastrophic event.
I own a TiVo, and I understand the benefits of skipping ads. However, I don't think this is what DVRs so compelling. Time shifting a show (watching a football almost live from the start after missing the 1st quarter) and season passes (TiVo: Record all new Simpsons episodes and save them all until I delete them. And start the recording a minute early & end it a minute late) are much more useful. When I'm watching something intently, skipping ads is great; when I'm watching TV while doing something else, it sometimes is more of a pain than its worth-- sometimes I fell like I *have* to skip ads.
Commercial skipping is nice nonetheless, although I'm not sure how useful automatic skipping is; I'e never tried it. TiVo also has the ability to skip 30-second chunks of shows. Just start playing something from "Now Playing." Press Select-Play-Select-3-0-Select. You'll hear 3 "dings." Now when you press the "jump-to-live" button, you'll skip 30 seconds at a time. You have to repeat this procedure if the TiVo gets rebooted.
Boy, these guys have a lot of nerve. The guy at VoteHere claims that the break in might be politically motivated. ("We feel that it may have been politically motivated,"Adler said.) But when asked to elaborate, he defers and says he doesn't want to politicize the situation. ( "I don't want to necessarily politicize this," he said. "This is just a crime.")
Waaa??
So he impugns activists pointing out flaws in his system, then claims to be taking the moral high ground. And the cowardly reporters don't even question him about this blatant double-talk. Shame on VoteHere. Shame on MSNBC. Shame all around. When people lie, they need to be called to the mat for it.
OK, I found a reference to this at the BBC website. Sounds like they tested them to some degree, but maybe not as much as they would have liked. If that's the case, they probably figured the airbags would work and assigned it a risk rating (baseline/low/low-medium/medium) and continued. Since Mars missions have a very narrow launch window, they likely needed to make a decision whether to delay the mission for 2+ years, or to launch without a complete testing regimen. If that's what happened, it's a tough call, not necessarily an indictment of the program management.
Sounds like a pretty strong claim, but I don't understand why anyone should accept it on face value. Is there any reference for this claim? Or is he an insider that is smuggling out this info? But from reading that comment, I don't see any reason why it should be believed. Any more info?
Well, this episode goes to show you why space programs cost so much. As a prior poster pointed, Beagle was much cheaper that Viking landers. The quote I saw was $1 billion for Viking and $62 million for Beagle, although that $62 million is a bit fictitious since it piggybacked a ride to Mars on Mars Express, so the real cost may have been higher.
But let's say it cost $200 million. Let's say the Brits managed to send 5 identical models 1 year apart, and 2 worked fine. Would anyone be celebrating 2 successful landers for the price of 1 Viking? Nope, instead there would be an outcry about how the space program wastes money by destroying 3 $200 million missions.
So what do the managers do? Well, NASA had a couple high-profile disasters and a couple resounding successes. Pathfinder got a lot of ink, but NASA was held up to a lot of ridicule for its failure of the failed trips. After skipping the 2001 window for flights to Mars, in 2003 NASA & JPL sent 2 very expensive (think $400-600 million each) landers to Mars. Hopefully, both will be successful. If both fail, it may indicate that they just got lucky with Pathfinder and airbags aren't the way to go.
Oh, why did they cost so much more than Pathfinder & Beagle (keeping in mind that $400-600 million includes launch, the trip to Mars, the craft itself & the management of the program)? I'm sure it's because things were checked more thoroughly, the JPL managers were more conservative, and every problem that came up was fully addressed.
On the other hand, APL seemed to have a fairly poor approach to system architecture, as can be seen by reading the NASA inquiry into the Contour mishap. The APL investigation fixed blame quickly without making a thorough investigation. The full report dug into the cause a lot more thoroughly & made a much more likely assessment,
The CONTOUR Board concludes that the probable proximate cause for loss of the CONTOUR spacecraft was overheating of the forward-end of the spacecraft due to base heating from the SRM exhaust plume. The CONTOUR SRM nozzle was embedded within the spacecraft to a greater degree than is typical (Fig. 3), and the resultant near-field effect of exhaust plume heating was not adequately accounted for in the design. Overheating may have caused substantial material weakening and structural degradation, which could have led to catastrophic dynamic instability.
So why is space expensive? Almost every spacecraft (as opposed to satellites or launch vehicle) is essentially designed for 1 or 2 time use, and all the parts need to work, and, as highlighted above, need to work well together. That requires real engineering work involving analysis, research, testing and comparison to heritage programs. If you want to go from 50% to 90% reliability, you probably triple your costs (at least).
I hope they find Beagle. But landing a complex science instrument on a distant planet is difficult, and occasional failure is to be expected. If someone figures out a way to do it very well & very cheap, these missions may become as routine as a satellite launch. Maybe it'll be NASA or the ESA or some small entrepreneur. Good luck to them all!
Well, this is extremely good news. While I think that the file-sharing that occurs on networks such as Kazaa are largely copyright violations, I'm happy to see that the bar has been significantly raised for the RIAA to go after alleged violators.
This ruling will help re-establish anonymity on the internet, as users can worry much less about being identified by a vengeful 3rd party-- be it a record label cracking down on copytright violators, a corporation trying to stifle criticism or a politician trying to un-nerve his opposition. This is a beautiful ruling, and if it stands, its effect will reverberate fare part the file sharing arena.
Oh, I am really happy that I let AOL, " We may optimize your computer settings to enhance your Netscape experience. If you have any questions regarding your Netscape account, please call 1-866-541-8233." Wow. Happy to hear that AOL won't make any changes to my computer that will be to my detriment. Any guesses on what "enhancements" AOL will add? I'll start the guessing with some easy ones:
1) Change default email program. 2) Change default email account 3) Change default browser. 4) Change browser home page (all browsers) 5) Add a load of bookmarks to your current settings. 6) Add **at least** 10 shortcuts on the desktop, start bar and quick launch menu for various AOL crap.
What are the slimier things you think AOL will do? Would they dare add AOL to "safe-sites" for pop-up blockers?
'course, I'm just paranoid. I'm sure the only "optimization" they will make will be too automatically set-up your dial-in account.
Well, someone please send AOL a clue. When I see messages like, "The Macintosh operating system is not supported at this time," I feel like walking over to the code-monkey and smacking him upside the head. Why?
1) Hey, I might have Windows computer, but I'm at a Mac now and I want more info.
2) It's a friggin' ISP! Cripes, just tell me the dial-in number to use and I'll be OK.
3) The closing statement of "Please check back in the future for a Macintosh version of Netscape!" is MS-worthy in its FUD. Netscape certainly is available for Macs. Just b/c your proposed ISP doesn't "support" them, no reason to lead people to believe that Netscape is a Windows-only product.
Well, a better alternative for those using disposable cameras (digital or otherwise) at weddings or other parties. Some friends in the SF Bay area use a service from Big Day Snapshots. Instead of getting 10 cheap disposable cameras for about $15 developed, they got 10 Canon A60 cameras to use for the day-- for $15, "developed"! Afterwards, they were given a CD with all the images and their own password-protected website. Pretty cool, they were psyched to get digital pix so easily; some of the guests even made mini-movies! Highly recommended for anyone getting married in the Bay Area. Beats the crap out of these disposable digital cameras.
The responses to your take on this issue says more about those responding than with your position. Your post's point, while debatable, can scarcely be characterized as flamebait or a troll. In fact, it's one of the few posts I've seen supporting LA county. The group-think on Slashdot has never been more clear than while reading the responses to your posts.
I mostly wonder why 1000+ people feel the need to post on this topic when 99% of them have the exact same viewpoint, and the moment a counter-point comes up, it's dismissed with unfounded attacks. Slashdotters should think about the PC bull that goes on here before jumping down someone's throat for defending the PC stuff that goes on in the real world.
I don't think he's a vandal (or vandle), since he's disfiguring posters that Apple just throws up all over town, probably without a specific permit. He's just modifying it. Might be legal in some places but not in others; I don't think it's open-and-shut.
Not just directed at you, but: Earth to Slashdotters. This does not require electronic voting. Marking a piece of paper with an "x" would be perfectly valid. This simply requires electronic systems to work properly and to be audit-able. Bubble cards, etc. are still ok.
One nice advantage of electronic voting is it has the potential to be very easy/quick to set up an election; there are very many other positives. This decision addresses the one giant negative associated with the process.
Ok, I guess I was just thinking about chemical rockets & the difference in payload that ELVs can launch to low-earth orbit (LEO) vs. Geosynchronous transfer orbit (GTO). It seems that payload to LEO is about 1/2-1/3 of payload to GTO. I would imagine that to get Hubble to GTO and beyond, there would need to be fuel about equal to the mass of Hubble, assuming the use of chemical rockets. Does it cost a lot more to get 24,000 pounds of fuel to Hubble than 1000 pounds?
As some have pointed out, chemical rockets might not be the best solution. However, if this is the case, why isn't it standard procedure to get to LEO with chemical rockets then use more efficient designs to reach GTO? Does it have to do with development cost of the technology? Or does it have to do with orbital debris? Or something else?
If it's just a technology issue, I'm surprised then none of the major space agencies-- NASA, the USAF, the Russians or Europeans-- have developed this technology. Considering the hundreds of satellites in GEO (or near-GEO orbits to include GPS), it seems like this technology would already be in place. Why suddenly develop it for Hubble when it's not appropriate for other missions?
A nice idea, but not really an option. Hubble is in a low earth orbit right now. To get it up to even geosynchronous orbit would require an immense amount of fuel. I'm not *that* kind of rocket scientist, so I don't know how much fuel it would take (relative to it's size). I do know that it would take a lot more fuel (at least one order of magnitude, maybe several) than is required to de-orbit it. NASA would probably have to dig up an old Saturn V to get enough fuel up there to send it towards the moon.
Slashdot Mirror
The French had a very reliable launch vehicle, the Arianne IV, which they decided to "upgrade" with the Arianne V. After failing on 4 of the first 13 missions, they introduced an upgraded version with an extended nozzle. The failure of that launch led to the (highly justified) delay of the Rosetta launch on a similar Arianne V because of the failure investigation. Turns out that the nozzle had a design flaw which led to the failure.
ESA did pretty well on their 1st trip to Mars, as the Mars Express is an unqualified success, but the Beagle II didn't work for whatever reason. All this is just to reiterate that space is hard, and there will be successes and failures. No one's at 100% (Russians have a worse track record on Mars than anyone, and NASA lost Contour--not a JPL mission-- last year due to an obvious design flaw).
Whenever a new technique is tried in space for the 1st time, the odds increase. That Pathfinder worked on its first attempt at a bouncy landing, and Sojourner roved Mars without a hitch speaks to the talent & luck of the JPL crew. Hopefully the Europeans will do as well with their harpoon, and hopefully they haven't made obvious mistakes like those made by NASA and the APL did in the Contour comet mission.
Hmm, I find it interesting that no one is fighting this. It seems a bit absurd that you can't call an event by its actual name without committing copyright infringement; has this type of thing been challenged before? Has the NFL enforced its "rights" to prevent the use of terms like AFC, NFC, Super Bowl and NFL over the past 35 years, which would enable them to continue to do?
I don't think the NFL can prohibit anyone from displaying the game and charging admission to the event, as long as the broadcast is not altered. After all, this is being publicly broadcast on our airwaves, and the NFL has no right to tell us where, why or how we can watch the game.
On the other hand, the casinos could just go ahead with their party, cease referring to them as Super Bowl events, broadcast the game and charge whatever they want. I don't think the NFL would have a case if they ceased using these copyrighted terms from the date of notice onward.
On the third hand, this is Vegas reaping what it sows after aggressively running ads encouraging people to come to Vegas for the Super Bowl. This is the sound of the other shoe dropping.
This may ruin my streak of karma-generating posts (only post early about stuff I have specific knowledge of), but here it goes:
I work as an analyst at an engineering company. I've had interactions with my management all the way from my boss to the CEO of my compant (~3000 employees). Here's one "trick" that works really well: be completely honest, don't be defensive, and state facts as facts and make clear when you're giving your opinion on a subject.
Executives are often demonized and ridiculed, but in general they are very smart, perceptive and adaptive. They can apply critical thinking skills, and often they do see solutions that you didn't, or couldn't (due to not knowing the problem). Granted, IT is a different creature, and maybe this is a trick. If that's the case and they want to cut heads, they'll do it anyways.
Realistically, if they want to find stuff out, they will ask questions. Answer these questions truthfully, and don't state opinion as fact.
For example, if the CEO asks, "What went wrong with the network last week," I suggest you answer, "The D-Link 'NeverDown' router went down and our backup was off-line.'" Do not answer, "We don't get enough money, so the tech who was supposed to prepare the back-up router had to cover for someone else and it wasn't ready. Plus, we were too cheap to buy Cisco and this is why that was a bad idea...." The CEO is smart. He'll ask why the backup was off-line, if you would have been better off with a different brand, etc. Have faith that you're not dealing with idiots and things will turn out OK.
A lot of these schemes (such as activation) described in the article are nothing more than good ole' fashioned copy-protection. I think in the early 80's, software makers saw copy-protection as the holy-grail, and would go to great lengths to make there wares hard to copy-- even for backup purposes. For a while, I think many folks thought it was against the law to copy a make a copy of your own VCR tape.
However, many of these copy-protection schemes. USB dongles, codes that had to be typed in with each boot-up (remember SimCity?), or extra discs that had to be kept in a 2nd drive. Most of these schemes failed because mostly what they did was make it difficult for the owners (or licensees, whatever) of the software to use it. So instead of selling 100,000 copies and having 20,000 pirated, they'd sell 80,000 and have zero pirated versions. Seems hardly worth the bother, eh? This is most recently evidenced by the TurboTax fiasco of 2003.
Right now, this push is most evident in the world of digital music sales, which are grossly restricted compared to regular CDs. I think at one point a major label will decide it's pointless to sell copy-protected (I hate the term DRM) tunes when the pirates will never pay for them anyway and can get them from other services.
Will video-game rentals and re-sales go the way of the Dodo bird? It will start to look that way for a while, then a really good game will come out with any restrictions and sales will be tremendous, despite (because of?) the casual piracy that is sure to ensue. Publishers will then remember this: organized piracy=bad, casual piracy=both good & bad, copy-protection does nothing to stop the first and may in fact encourage it, while doing a great deal to hinder the latter. They'll then ask "what's the point again?" and will use the business model that works the best for their particular game instead of trying to restrict everything to the nth degree.
Canceling Hubble might be a good idea in the long run, but I think it's a shame that it's being done in the name of safety. NASA is basically saying that Shuttle is not reliable enough to return people from orbit. But it will be a long time before any other vehicle approaches a 99% success rate (Russian capsules excluded).
I think a lot of the changes being made in wake of Columbia make sense, such as inspections at the station and using our much-improved imaging capabilities to inspect STS. These changes basically looked at the whole program history, and asked, "What can we do to make shuttle better & more reliable based upon advances in technology." On the other hand, bagging non-ISS trips entirely (or setting such high hurdles that they are no longer feasible) seems short-sighted and a little bit cowardly.
If it's no longer cost-effective to run Hubble, then let it come down. Otherwise, let's not put unreasonable requirements on shuttle and keep Hubble running. The shuttle had dozens of flights before ISS was built, and it's safer now than it was then.
Just when you thought they'd run out of silly patents to sue over, here comes another one. According to the good folks at News.com, a couple of Nizzas (the name of their company) have sued Network Solutions and Register.com. As Marguerite Reardon so eloquently puts it, "Two Internet entrepreneurs are suing Network Solutions and Register.com for allegedly infringing on their e-mail and domain naming patent." I take issue with the term entrepeneurs, as scum-sucking bottom feeders seems more appropriate, but you get the idea. Basically, they patented the method of assigning an email address of fake@name.com to the guy with the website fake.name.com. This might be the lamest excuse for a patent ever granted; a 2-year old could have come up with this idea.
These nuclear-blast fueled ships are generally not designed for launch into orbit (or into space); rather, they are designed for propulsion once the vehicle has already left earth orbit (or at least earth itself).
As a proud Treo 600 owner, the press release that got my attention was this one that describes the availability of Real tunes on Treo. This could be really cool if I can actually access the Real store from my Treo 600. Then I could be anywhere in the country, buy a song, download it and listen to it on the spot. Could come in real handy on road trips.
Anyone know if this will be the case, or will it just support playback on the Treo after you buy them on your PC?
Hmm... shoulda Googles before making that post. Anyways, here's the #1 hit for "ISS Leak" on Google. Fairly on-topic stuff.
Well, if they can't seal the leak, they'll need to send the astronauts home until Shuttle is back in service, which could be 2 years plus. Hopefully, they'll find the leak and fix it.
One possible cause of the leak is from a meteorite impact. I have a tiny bit of experience with this from my grad school days. During the design stage of the American module, there was some concern about what would happen if there was an impact from debris. Tests showed that if the impact object was the right size, the entire damaged section could "unzip" and the and essentially blow up, likely killing the astronauts and disabling ISS. The design was tweaked, and it was showed that the section would not unzip, instead it would leak (probably not as slow as what is described, though-- think hours to reach vacuum, not months or seconds).
I have no idea if that's what happened-- it might be a completely unrelated issue. But just wanted to point out that a tremendous variety of possible events are considered, and NASA really wants to assure that none of these could result in a catastrophic event.
I own a TiVo, and I understand the benefits of skipping ads. However, I don't think this is what DVRs so compelling. Time shifting a show (watching a football almost live from the start after missing the 1st quarter) and season passes (TiVo: Record all new Simpsons episodes and save them all until I delete them. And start the recording a minute early & end it a minute late) are much more useful. When I'm watching something intently, skipping ads is great; when I'm watching TV while doing something else, it sometimes is more of a pain than its worth-- sometimes I fell like I *have* to skip ads.
Commercial skipping is nice nonetheless, although I'm not sure how useful automatic skipping is; I'e never tried it. TiVo also has the ability to skip 30-second chunks of shows. Just start playing something from "Now Playing." Press Select-Play-Select-3-0-Select. You'll hear 3 "dings." Now when you press the "jump-to-live" button, you'll skip 30 seconds at a time. You have to repeat this procedure if the TiVo gets rebooted.
Boy, these guys have a lot of nerve. The guy at VoteHere claims that the break in might be politically motivated. ("We feel that it may have been politically motivated,"Adler said.) But when asked to elaborate, he defers and says he doesn't want to politicize the situation. ( "I don't want to necessarily politicize this," he said. "This is just a crime.")
Waaa??
So he impugns activists pointing out flaws in his system, then claims to be taking the moral high ground. And the cowardly reporters don't even question him about this blatant double-talk. Shame on VoteHere. Shame on MSNBC. Shame all around. When people lie, they need to be called to the mat for it.
OK, I found a reference to this at the BBC website. Sounds like they tested them to some degree, but maybe not as much as they would have liked. If that's the case, they probably figured the airbags would work and assigned it a risk rating (baseline/low/low-medium/medium) and continued. Since Mars missions have a very narrow launch window, they likely needed to make a decision whether to delay the mission for 2+ years, or to launch without a complete testing regimen. If that's what happened, it's a tough call, not necessarily an indictment of the program management.
Sounds like a pretty strong claim, but I don't understand why anyone should accept it on face value. Is there any reference for this claim? Or is he an insider that is smuggling out this info? But from reading that comment, I don't see any reason why it should be believed. Any more info?
But let's say it cost $200 million. Let's say the Brits managed to send 5 identical models 1 year apart, and 2 worked fine. Would anyone be celebrating 2 successful landers for the price of 1 Viking? Nope, instead there would be an outcry about how the space program wastes money by destroying 3 $200 million missions.
So what do the managers do? Well, NASA had a couple high-profile disasters and a couple resounding successes. Pathfinder got a lot of ink, but NASA was held up to a lot of ridicule for its failure of the failed trips. After skipping the 2001 window for flights to Mars, in 2003 NASA & JPL sent 2 very expensive (think $400-600 million each) landers to Mars. Hopefully, both will be successful. If both fail, it may indicate that they just got lucky with Pathfinder and airbags aren't the way to go.
Oh, why did they cost so much more than Pathfinder & Beagle (keeping in mind that $400-600 million includes launch, the trip to Mars, the craft itself & the management of the program)? I'm sure it's because things were checked more thoroughly, the JPL managers were more conservative, and every problem that came up was fully addressed.
On the other hand, APL seemed to have a fairly poor approach to system architecture, as can be seen by reading the NASA inquiry into the Contour mishap. The APL investigation fixed blame quickly without making a thorough investigation. The full report dug into the cause a lot more thoroughly & made a much more likely assessment, So why is space expensive? Almost every spacecraft (as opposed to satellites or launch vehicle) is essentially designed for 1 or 2 time use, and all the parts need to work, and, as highlighted above, need to work well together. That requires real engineering work involving analysis, research, testing and comparison to heritage programs. If you want to go from 50% to 90% reliability, you probably triple your costs (at least).
I hope they find Beagle. But landing a complex science instrument on a distant planet is difficult, and occasional failure is to be expected. If someone figures out a way to do it very well & very cheap, these missions may become as routine as a satellite launch. Maybe it'll be NASA or the ESA or some small entrepreneur. Good luck to them all!
Well, this is extremely good news. While I think that the file-sharing that occurs on networks such as Kazaa are largely copyright violations, I'm happy to see that the bar has been significantly raised for the RIAA to go after alleged violators.
This ruling will help re-establish anonymity on the internet, as users can worry much less about being identified by a vengeful 3rd party-- be it a record label cracking down on copytright violators, a corporation trying to stifle criticism or a politician trying to un-nerve his opposition. This is a beautiful ruling, and if it stands, its effect will reverberate fare part the file sharing arena.
Oh, I am really happy that I let AOL, " We may optimize your computer settings to enhance your Netscape experience. If you have any questions regarding your Netscape account, please call 1-866-541-8233." Wow. Happy to hear that AOL won't make any changes to my computer that will be to my detriment. Any guesses on what "enhancements" AOL will add? I'll start the guessing with some easy ones:
1) Change default email program.
2) Change default email account
3) Change default browser.
4) Change browser home page (all browsers)
5) Add a load of bookmarks to your current settings.
6) Add **at least** 10 shortcuts on the desktop, start bar and quick launch menu for various AOL crap.
What are the slimier things you think AOL will do? Would they dare add AOL to "safe-sites" for pop-up blockers?
'course, I'm just paranoid. I'm sure the only "optimization" they will make will be too automatically set-up your dial-in account.
Well, someone please send AOL a clue. When I see messages like, "The Macintosh operating system is not supported at this time," I feel like walking over to the code-monkey and smacking him upside the head. Why?
1) Hey, I might have Windows computer, but I'm at a Mac now and I want more info.
2) It's a friggin' ISP! Cripes, just tell me the dial-in number to use and I'll be OK.
3) The closing statement of "Please check back in the future for a Macintosh version of Netscape!" is MS-worthy in its FUD. Netscape certainly is available for Macs. Just b/c your proposed ISP doesn't "support" them, no reason to lead people to believe that Netscape is a Windows-only product.
Well, a better alternative for those using disposable cameras (digital or otherwise) at weddings or other parties. Some friends in the SF Bay area use a service from Big Day Snapshots. Instead of getting 10 cheap disposable cameras for about $15 developed, they got 10 Canon A60 cameras to use for the day-- for $15, "developed"! Afterwards, they were given a CD with all the images and their own password-protected website. Pretty cool, they were psyched to get digital pix so easily; some of the guests even made mini-movies! Highly recommended for anyone getting married in the Bay Area. Beats the crap out of these disposable digital cameras.
Tom,
The responses to your take on this issue says more about those responding than with your position. Your post's point, while debatable, can scarcely be characterized as flamebait or a troll. In fact, it's one of the few posts I've seen supporting LA county. The group-think on Slashdot has never been more clear than while reading the responses to your posts.
I mostly wonder why 1000+ people feel the need to post on this topic when 99% of them have the exact same viewpoint, and the moment a counter-point comes up, it's dismissed with unfounded attacks. Slashdotters should think about the PC bull that goes on here before jumping down someone's throat for defending the PC stuff that goes on in the real world.
I don't think he's a vandal (or vandle), since he's disfiguring posters that Apple just throws up all over town, probably without a specific permit. He's just modifying it. Might be legal in some places but not in others; I don't think it's open-and-shut.
Not just directed at you, but: Earth to Slashdotters. This does not require electronic voting. Marking a piece of paper with an "x" would be perfectly valid. This simply requires electronic systems to work properly and to be audit-able. Bubble cards, etc. are still ok.
One nice advantage of electronic voting is it has the potential to be very easy/quick to set up an election; there are very many other positives. This decision addresses the one giant negative associated with the process.
Ok, I guess I was just thinking about chemical rockets & the difference in payload that ELVs can launch to low-earth orbit (LEO) vs. Geosynchronous transfer orbit (GTO). It seems that payload to LEO is about 1/2-1/3 of payload to GTO. I would imagine that to get Hubble to GTO and beyond, there would need to be fuel about equal to the mass of Hubble, assuming the use of chemical rockets. Does it cost a lot more to get 24,000 pounds of fuel to Hubble than 1000 pounds?
As some have pointed out, chemical rockets might not be the best solution. However, if this is the case, why isn't it standard procedure to get to LEO with chemical rockets then use more efficient designs to reach GTO? Does it have to do with development cost of the technology? Or does it have to do with orbital debris? Or something else?
If it's just a technology issue, I'm surprised then none of the major space agencies-- NASA, the USAF, the Russians or Europeans-- have developed this technology. Considering the hundreds of satellites in GEO (or near-GEO orbits to include GPS), it seems like this technology would already be in place. Why suddenly develop it for Hubble when it's not appropriate for other missions?
A nice idea, but not really an option. Hubble is in a low earth orbit right now. To get it up to even geosynchronous orbit would require an immense amount of fuel. I'm not *that* kind of rocket scientist, so I don't know how much fuel it would take (relative to it's size). I do know that it would take a lot more fuel (at least one order of magnitude, maybe several) than is required to de-orbit it. NASA would probably have to dig up an old Saturn V to get enough fuel up there to send it towards the moon.