Why does it matter where the "backscatter" energy comes from? It doesn't matter if the energy is "ambient" or specifically supplied it comes though the RF fields it is receiving. The device I described didn't care where the energy came from, it just took energy it found and charged up something so it could use it later. This "new" device is no different in principle, and certainly not that different in application to what I saw nearly 20 years ago now.
Heck, I remember back in the 80's listening to my EE power systems instructor showing us how you could get "free" power from the utility companies with a sufficient sized coil of wire and then calculating the amount of wire you would need. This is exactly the same physics (albeit at 60 Cycles and not RF so the wire you need is less) he was discussing way back then. This is NOT a new idea. The application is not new either...
Spying equipment has used backscatter power for even longer than toll tags. In one cold war situation, the US embassy was built by local contractors and riddled with passively powered listening devices. They where literally put everywhere. The Embassy was finished and occupied when the adversary decided it was time to crack up the RF and "power up" the microphones. The RF exposure in the building was pretty bad from then on and additional Faraday shielding was subsequently added to secure the building (at least until another one could be built).
I suppose it might seem new, being repackaged and smaller than before... But those toll tags where not much bigger than a credit card...
Actually, Key Card systems are not quite the same as what I described for the toll tags. Many of those systems actually require close coupling with the reader to get the data off them and are not really storing the energy transferred for later use. The card is magnetically coupled to the reader and the data on the card clocked out though the same link. The readers and the cards are much simpler (and thus cheaper) but is decidedly not the same thing,
Of course the principle of getting power without having to touch a device using Electromagnetic fields is decidedly not new or novel in any way. The patents on most of that technology expired nearly a hundred years ago now. Think Tesla, think Westinghouse, think transformer.
Getting power from an external RF source is not new. Being able to get it from ambient RF sources is not new either.
The tags I saw where charging whenever RF was available. The tag didn't know or care if the power came from the reader or not. The goal was to keep charged and "ready" for the data burst when the reader asked for it. Any RF source was suitable for charging and that the reader provided power was merely a matter of making sure there was enough power when needed. So for reliability sake you put some RF power out to charge the tag before you need it to transmit the data you want, but they still charged from anything else they picked up.
So what does it matter where the background RF comes from? Capturing energy from RF is certainly not new. Using such power to communicate is not new either.
Not exactly the same thing, but receiving RF without power has been done for about as long as RF has been received... Actually... Exactly as long as RF has been received. Crystal Radios where how this whole "Let's communicate by radio waves" thing got started...
Toll Tags and other RF-ID devices have been using "back scatter" techniques to capture energy to transmit with for decades. The reader device provides RF energy that is captured by the tag charging up a capacitor enough to send a short burst of data back to the reader. I saw this being done during a Job interview in Dallas sometime in the 90's and was impressed with the idea. I was even more impressed that it worked well enough to actually be in use on various tolling systems. Still remember the test rig they had with the tags mounted to the ceiling fan blades as being decidedly low tech, but wonderfully effective.
The application might be a bit different, but the technology is NOT new.
Up in Montana perhaps? Seriously, you cannot be suggesting that speed limits are unnecessary and you use the example of the 2nd amendment to justify your logic?
Wow... How far has the educational system in this country fallen... We used to know what our rights where and why we had them.. Apparently we don't teach that anymore.
Jamming RF communications is simply illegal and needs to be. The FCC takes a pretty dim view of the average citizen just deciding to disrupt licensed radio services for *any* reason they choose and this is how it SHOULD be. The FCC has authority over anything that puts off RF energy, either on purpose or incidentally and can (and will) require you to turn off equipment that is interfering with RF communications. If you don't obey, or they figure you are jamming on purpose, they can fine you, confiscate your equipment or otherwise get you off the air.
Sitting in a movie theater jamming cell phone service to keep folks from getting calls during your movie may sound like a good idea, but the problem is you just cannot know how far your jamming signal is going. As others have pointed out, jamming signals are pretty much the equivalent of putting a flashing light on the thing you are trying to protect, and makes it easy to find with very little problem. All you need is an antenna, A way to attenuate the signal and a receiver and you can find a hidden transmitter in fairly short order. Add a directional antenna and it gets even faster.
Don't be stupid... Leave the jamming equipment at home with your IR Camera killers and flashing device that changes red lights to green.
And rightly so. Running around jamming GPS signals is a *serious* problem for a lot of things these days. Fines from the FCC *should* be quickly metered out for such foolishness. Glad to see that they are.
Trying to hide one's location from your employer when on duty is possibly a bad idea too. One would assume that the employer had a valid interest in knowing where their equipment was and had installed the GPS based equipment for that purpose. The driver's attempts to mask his location was inexcusable and leads to a whole lot of "so where where you exactly?" questions that he likely could not answer truthfully and keep his job. Return all company equipment, fired with cause, no unemployment, don't pass go, don't collect $200, we will mail your last check and don't let he door hit you on the way out.
Still, Sully had not landed an airliner in a river, ever before. My point is that you don't have to have to practice a specific flying task to be proficient enough to do it, you just need to be able to know what the proper way to do something is. That Sully was a glider pilot, was great, but how many dead stick (no engines) had he done in a airliner? (I dare say none..) Yet all pilots practice this.. over and over... In my flight training my instructor used to pull the mixture and make me land without power from time to time, it's part of training. So I don't think Sully's skills where unique in the industry, or that he was the only one up there that could manage what he did. When you get to ATP level, you have a LOT of experience and get regular recurring training in type.
No.. I don't think Red Hat will see that much, some, but most folks will be heading to Cent-OS if they are Red Hat shops and start feeling the cost pinch too much. My guess is that ALL Linux distributions and vendors will see an uptick in their server installs, starting with the ones that have the latest SAMBA version on the install media.
Where I do like Red Hat's support, it is wildly expensive and overkill for most low end shops who are not trying to push the envelop of the bleeding edge. Cent-OS is by definition the same thing as Red Hat offerings, minus the up-line's copyrighted graphics and trademarks and a whole lot of subscription fees. You might have to wait days, weeks or even months for the latest release, but they eventually come.
The guys that really should be jacking up the prices are the training houses that get paid to convert Windows admins into Linux Admins. THAT'S where the money will be made when Micro$oft starts turning the thumb screws to hard.
Actually... I'm betting Micro$oft has studied this and figures that the increase in fees will offset any defections to Linux they may see going forward. I'd figure that they are likely pretty close to being right and should they see too many folks defecting, they will quickly change the price or do some rebate deal to stop it. Micro$oft won't loose on this deal.. Trust me.
Mars is certainly NOT a very nice place to visit and unsuited for setting up a self contained, self supporting human colony. The amount of technology required will simply not be possible to maintain using the resources of Mars alone but will require constant resupply from Earth. Even on a warm day it is COLD there and the radiation exposure on the surface over long terms would be a serious problem for human life.
Other locations you mention are either too hot or way to cold and ALL of them lack breathable atmospheres. Many would provide even less shielding and ALL would require continued dependance on resupply from earth...
On the travel time... This is EXACTLY the issue. It takes a LONG time to get just about anywhere outside the solar system. The radiation exposure in space is survivable for short terms, but when you have that kind of exposure for YEARS, it's going to kill a significant percentage of the crew. They will suffer increased rates of fatal cancers and birth defects will be rampant. A 10+ year trip to our next door neighbor would pretty much mean death for all on board just because of radiation exposure. So, to make this work, we are going to have to travel faster than light, something that seems to be difficult to accomplish.
Oh great idea... Let's add a nuclear explosive device to the mix of radiation sources we have to shield from. Question is how fast can it get you going?
If you manage to get to the speed of light, it's going to take some 15 years just to make it to the nearest star... Human life is NOT going to survive the radiation exposure over that length of time. The other issues of weightlessness and providing life support (food, water, air) pale in comparison to the radiation exposure issue. Those we could solve... But the Radiation exposure and the times involved in the trip, not so much.
This idea is NUTS right now. The closest planet we *might* be able to make a go of is Mars. It's pretty cold there and there is little water or other resources we could easily make use of. It's just not practical to think that we could do anything useful on Mars. But, we could go outside the Solar System right? Not so fast...
The radiation in space is pretty much going to kill anybody or living thing that tries to exit the solar system. Providing enough shielding to make a 10 year (one way) trip to some close earth like planet is going to take a HUGE amount of mass and then you have to come up with a way to get all that mass moving in the right direction, and stop it when you get to the destination. This is obviously not possible.
Now if you want to go figure out how to make some star trek hyper-drives and transporters, go for it.. You are going to need technology like that if you are going to do what you suggest... But it's not happening in your lifetime..
So what'd be "encrypted email" for? Horny partners? Surprise birthday parties?
I am really curious what they think about it.
Really? You do understand that 99.9% of email traffic is sent unencrypted over the internet. Everybody that handles network packets transporting E-mail can easily capture them and read them. This is roughly equivalent to everybody being forced to use post cards instead of envelopes. Imagine trying to do business on post cards only? You would not want to send bills and checks as post cards.
So encrypted E-mail is equivalent to sending letters in opaque envelopes (roughly) With all the same security advantages over post cards. So in that way you can have a certain level of security in your communications.
The judge said that he was *treating* Bitcoin like currency because the investors where buying BitCoin with money to make the investment. He was treating BitCoin the same as currency, because it was being used like currency. Thus the duck analogy I used. This is not tantamount to the judge declaring BitCoin legal tender and creating a slot for it on the world's official currency exchanges. Though he did make it clear that if you use it like currency, you are subject to the standard set of laws governing your activity.
Think about it. Lets say I invented some scheme where you purchased some kind of "token" then used that token to "invest" in the investment I'm hawking. The investment is dogy and the SEC becomes aware of my activity. Well, guess what, I operate in the US and the SEC rules apply to me. I cannot turn around and thumb my nose at the SEC and get out of jail free just because I only accepted tokens and paid out tokens not money. Substitute "token" for anything, IOU notes, checks, Promissory notes, yen, gold bars, Euros, ammunition for your.45 and the same rules would apply. (Well... Mostly anyway.. There are some exceptions for some kinds of things..)
BitCoin as it's just the token in my hypothetical above and the judge wasn't claiming it was somehow now more legal than it was before. It's just a token that was used to transfer money (value) around.
In this case the judge is saying that even though the investors used BitCoin, the activities of the investment where essentially the same as investing dollars so the argument that BitCoin isn't a currency didn't apply. If it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck, acts like a duck and looks like a duck, it's a DUCK.
So.. Even if you make somebody trade in some kind of voucher to invest in your scheme, if you live in the US and are operating in a way that looks the same as something the SEC regulates, you are subject to the regulations.
So the judge is NOT saying BitCoin is a currency, but that the guy was operating an investment scheme that was illegal and is not shielded from the SEC because he used BitCoins.
Oh but they do sell the individual parts. Of course they are "replacement" parts and they are extremely expensive compared to just buying a whole new laptop. This doesn't stop you from making modifications though. Changing the memory and hard drive is easy and I've changed CPU's and altered wireless adapters too. Laptops are somewhat upgradeable, sometimes anyway.
What you *really* want is a standard "form factor" for the parts that fit in standard laptop cases. Then you could buy a gutless case and buy parts to build a full machine from there. However, don't hold your breath. The problem for manufacturers is that they are trying to cram as much stuff into your latest laptop as cheaply as possible, which leads to a single "mother" board that has the CPU and display adapter components built on. It needs to all survive at least some rough handling. All this requires complex engineering and integration testing and many manufacturers don't like to share.
So, where I would applaud an effort to make laptops more generic, I don't think you are going to get a major manufacture to offer up their designs or sell parts for this. What you are going to need is a base platform design for the case, while at the same time providing a set of "guts" (Processing, display, Keyboard, wireless) which are all available and free, pretty much all ready at the same time. Until then, keep wishing..
I'm just not able to agree with you. I get your point, but I don't think the situation is quite as dire as you indicate.
Normal flights may be flown on autopilot for efficiency (operating costs) and safety reasons, but like my flight instructor always told me. All flights start and end visually. I would extend this to *most* flights start and end manually, with only a few CAT2 or CAT3 approaches being the exception. Airplanes do not take off and land themselves, even the commercial grade aircraft are manually controlled during take off and landing. But your point is that normal flight is decidedly uneventful and when you automate parts of that pilots skill levels go down.
Not so fast. Pilots spend literally HOURS in simulators hand flying their aircraft though demanding situations. It's part of their recurring training requirements to stay current in type. As a private pilot, I spent hours practicing simulated emergencies, stalls, approaches, landings and short field techniques. One must practice these things so you are proficient, so we simulate them. My Stall recovery practice has saved my life at least once. ATP pilots do a lot of this in simulators and they do it multiple times a year. They practice all the things I did plus handling all sorts of system failures, single engine departures, autopilot failures and emergencies that make me shutter to think about.
So where they may not have "actual in the air" experience with engine failures, they have experience with such situations and have the skills to deal with them. Remember the flight that landed in the Hudson river a few years ago? How many engine out water landings do you suppose the pilots had actually flown? I'm guessing, few, even in the simulator. But they knew their aircraft and how to fly it in that situation. These guys know what they are doing.
I think we agree.. But folks need to understand what the police have a right to do and what they don't. An officer can legally lie to you, but he cannot search your car without probable cause, a warrant or your permission.
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Why does it matter where the "backscatter" energy comes from? It doesn't matter if the energy is "ambient" or specifically supplied it comes though the RF fields it is receiving. The device I described didn't care where the energy came from, it just took energy it found and charged up something so it could use it later. This "new" device is no different in principle, and certainly not that different in application to what I saw nearly 20 years ago now.
Heck, I remember back in the 80's listening to my EE power systems instructor showing us how you could get "free" power from the utility companies with a sufficient sized coil of wire and then calculating the amount of wire you would need. This is exactly the same physics (albeit at 60 Cycles and not RF so the wire you need is less) he was discussing way back then. This is NOT a new idea. The application is not new either...
Spying equipment has used backscatter power for even longer than toll tags. In one cold war situation, the US embassy was built by local contractors and riddled with passively powered listening devices. They where literally put everywhere. The Embassy was finished and occupied when the adversary decided it was time to crack up the RF and "power up" the microphones. The RF exposure in the building was pretty bad from then on and additional Faraday shielding was subsequently added to secure the building (at least until another one could be built).
I suppose it might seem new, being repackaged and smaller than before... But those toll tags where not much bigger than a credit card...
Actually, Key Card systems are not quite the same as what I described for the toll tags. Many of those systems actually require close coupling with the reader to get the data off them and are not really storing the energy transferred for later use. The card is magnetically coupled to the reader and the data on the card clocked out though the same link. The readers and the cards are much simpler (and thus cheaper) but is decidedly not the same thing,
Of course the principle of getting power without having to touch a device using Electromagnetic fields is decidedly not new or novel in any way. The patents on most of that technology expired nearly a hundred years ago now. Think Tesla, think Westinghouse, think transformer.
Getting power from an external RF source is not new. Being able to get it from ambient RF sources is not new either.
The tags I saw where charging whenever RF was available. The tag didn't know or care if the power came from the reader or not. The goal was to keep charged and "ready" for the data burst when the reader asked for it. Any RF source was suitable for charging and that the reader provided power was merely a matter of making sure there was enough power when needed. So for reliability sake you put some RF power out to charge the tag before you need it to transmit the data you want, but they still charged from anything else they picked up.
So what does it matter where the background RF comes from? Capturing energy from RF is certainly not new. Using such power to communicate is not new either.
Not exactly the same thing, but receiving RF without power has been done for about as long as RF has been received... Actually... Exactly as long as RF has been received. Crystal Radios where how this whole "Let's communicate by radio waves" thing got started...
Yes, and it mostly comes from non-man made sources... Let the sun shine... Let the sun shine in....
This is not new technology.
Toll Tags and other RF-ID devices have been using "back scatter" techniques to capture energy to transmit with for decades. The reader device provides RF energy that is captured by the tag charging up a capacitor enough to send a short burst of data back to the reader. I saw this being done during a Job interview in Dallas sometime in the 90's and was impressed with the idea. I was even more impressed that it worked well enough to actually be in use on various tolling systems. Still remember the test rig they had with the tags mounted to the ceiling fan blades as being decidedly low tech, but wonderfully effective.
The application might be a bit different, but the technology is NOT new.
Up in Montana perhaps? Seriously, you cannot be suggesting that speed limits are unnecessary and you use the example of the 2nd amendment to justify your logic?
Wow... How far has the educational system in this country fallen... We used to know what our rights where and why we had them.. Apparently we don't teach that anymore.
Jamming RF communications is simply illegal and needs to be. The FCC takes a pretty dim view of the average citizen just deciding to disrupt licensed radio services for *any* reason they choose and this is how it SHOULD be. The FCC has authority over anything that puts off RF energy, either on purpose or incidentally and can (and will) require you to turn off equipment that is interfering with RF communications. If you don't obey, or they figure you are jamming on purpose, they can fine you, confiscate your equipment or otherwise get you off the air.
Sitting in a movie theater jamming cell phone service to keep folks from getting calls during your movie may sound like a good idea, but the problem is you just cannot know how far your jamming signal is going. As others have pointed out, jamming signals are pretty much the equivalent of putting a flashing light on the thing you are trying to protect, and makes it easy to find with very little problem. All you need is an antenna, A way to attenuate the signal and a receiver and you can find a hidden transmitter in fairly short order. Add a directional antenna and it gets even faster.
Don't be stupid... Leave the jamming equipment at home with your IR Camera killers and flashing device that changes red lights to green.
And rightly so. Running around jamming GPS signals is a *serious* problem for a lot of things these days. Fines from the FCC *should* be quickly metered out for such foolishness. Glad to see that they are.
Trying to hide one's location from your employer when on duty is possibly a bad idea too. One would assume that the employer had a valid interest in knowing where their equipment was and had installed the GPS based equipment for that purpose. The driver's attempts to mask his location was inexcusable and leads to a whole lot of "so where where you exactly?" questions that he likely could not answer truthfully and keep his job. Return all company equipment, fired with cause, no unemployment, don't pass go, don't collect $200, we will mail your last check and don't let he door hit you on the way out.
If you aren't doing anything wrong, you have nothing to worry about.
Unless of course it LOOKS like you are doing something wrong, even when you are not, then you DO have something to worry about.
There are many... 1. Don't speed.... 2. Don't go near them when you do.... Etc..
Still, Sully had not landed an airliner in a river, ever before. My point is that you don't have to have to practice a specific flying task to be proficient enough to do it, you just need to be able to know what the proper way to do something is. That Sully was a glider pilot, was great, but how many dead stick (no engines) had he done in a airliner? (I dare say none..) Yet all pilots practice this.. over and over... In my flight training my instructor used to pull the mixture and make me land without power from time to time, it's part of training. So I don't think Sully's skills where unique in the industry, or that he was the only one up there that could manage what he did. When you get to ATP level, you have a LOT of experience and get regular recurring training in type.
No.. I don't think Red Hat will see that much, some, but most folks will be heading to Cent-OS if they are Red Hat shops and start feeling the cost pinch too much. My guess is that ALL Linux distributions and vendors will see an uptick in their server installs, starting with the ones that have the latest SAMBA version on the install media.
Where I do like Red Hat's support, it is wildly expensive and overkill for most low end shops who are not trying to push the envelop of the bleeding edge. Cent-OS is by definition the same thing as Red Hat offerings, minus the up-line's copyrighted graphics and trademarks and a whole lot of subscription fees. You might have to wait days, weeks or even months for the latest release, but they eventually come.
The guys that really should be jacking up the prices are the training houses that get paid to convert Windows admins into Linux Admins. THAT'S where the money will be made when Micro$oft starts turning the thumb screws to hard.
Actually... I'm betting Micro$oft has studied this and figures that the increase in fees will offset any defections to Linux they may see going forward. I'd figure that they are likely pretty close to being right and should they see too many folks defecting, they will quickly change the price or do some rebate deal to stop it. Micro$oft won't loose on this deal.. Trust me.
Mars is certainly NOT a very nice place to visit and unsuited for setting up a self contained, self supporting human colony. The amount of technology required will simply not be possible to maintain using the resources of Mars alone but will require constant resupply from Earth. Even on a warm day it is COLD there and the radiation exposure on the surface over long terms would be a serious problem for human life.
Other locations you mention are either too hot or way to cold and ALL of them lack breathable atmospheres. Many would provide even less shielding and ALL would require continued dependance on resupply from earth...
On the travel time... This is EXACTLY the issue. It takes a LONG time to get just about anywhere outside the solar system. The radiation exposure in space is survivable for short terms, but when you have that kind of exposure for YEARS, it's going to kill a significant percentage of the crew. They will suffer increased rates of fatal cancers and birth defects will be rampant. A 10+ year trip to our next door neighbor would pretty much mean death for all on board just because of radiation exposure. So, to make this work, we are going to have to travel faster than light, something that seems to be difficult to accomplish.
Oh great idea... Let's add a nuclear explosive device to the mix of radiation sources we have to shield from. Question is how fast can it get you going?
If you manage to get to the speed of light, it's going to take some 15 years just to make it to the nearest star... Human life is NOT going to survive the radiation exposure over that length of time. The other issues of weightlessness and providing life support (food, water, air) pale in comparison to the radiation exposure issue. Those we could solve... But the Radiation exposure and the times involved in the trip, not so much.
Oh yea, here we go.
This idea is NUTS right now. The closest planet we *might* be able to make a go of is Mars. It's pretty cold there and there is little water or other resources we could easily make use of. It's just not practical to think that we could do anything useful on Mars. But, we could go outside the Solar System right? Not so fast...
The radiation in space is pretty much going to kill anybody or living thing that tries to exit the solar system. Providing enough shielding to make a 10 year (one way) trip to some close earth like planet is going to take a HUGE amount of mass and then you have to come up with a way to get all that mass moving in the right direction, and stop it when you get to the destination. This is obviously not possible.
Now if you want to go figure out how to make some star trek hyper-drives and transporters, go for it.. You are going to need technology like that if you are going to do what you suggest... But it's not happening in your lifetime..
So what'd be "encrypted email" for? Horny partners? Surprise birthday parties? I am really curious what they think about it.
Really? You do understand that 99.9% of email traffic is sent unencrypted over the internet. Everybody that handles network packets transporting E-mail can easily capture them and read them. This is roughly equivalent to everybody being forced to use post cards instead of envelopes. Imagine trying to do business on post cards only? You would not want to send bills and checks as post cards.
So encrypted E-mail is equivalent to sending letters in opaque envelopes (roughly) With all the same security advantages over post cards. So in that way you can have a certain level of security in your communications.
"Number 5 not just robot, Number 5, ALIVE!"
The judge said that he was *treating* Bitcoin like currency because the investors where buying BitCoin with money to make the investment. He was treating BitCoin the same as currency, because it was being used like currency. Thus the duck analogy I used. This is not tantamount to the judge declaring BitCoin legal tender and creating a slot for it on the world's official currency exchanges. Though he did make it clear that if you use it like currency, you are subject to the standard set of laws governing your activity.
Think about it. Lets say I invented some scheme where you purchased some kind of "token" then used that token to "invest" in the investment I'm hawking. The investment is dogy and the SEC becomes aware of my activity. Well, guess what, I operate in the US and the SEC rules apply to me. I cannot turn around and thumb my nose at the SEC and get out of jail free just because I only accepted tokens and paid out tokens not money. Substitute "token" for anything, IOU notes, checks, Promissory notes, yen, gold bars, Euros, ammunition for your .45 and the same rules would apply. (Well... Mostly anyway.. There are some exceptions for some kinds of things..)
BitCoin as it's just the token in my hypothetical above and the judge wasn't claiming it was somehow now more legal than it was before. It's just a token that was used to transfer money (value) around.
Shesh.. Not even close on this..
In this case the judge is saying that even though the investors used BitCoin, the activities of the investment where essentially the same as investing dollars so the argument that BitCoin isn't a currency didn't apply. If it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck, acts like a duck and looks like a duck, it's a DUCK.
So.. Even if you make somebody trade in some kind of voucher to invest in your scheme, if you live in the US and are operating in a way that looks the same as something the SEC regulates, you are subject to the regulations.
So the judge is NOT saying BitCoin is a currency, but that the guy was operating an investment scheme that was illegal and is not shielded from the SEC because he used BitCoins.
Making an open source very very low quality laptop is a waste of time.
Might I add... It's a waste of money too..
Oh but they do sell the individual parts. Of course they are "replacement" parts and they are extremely expensive compared to just buying a whole new laptop. This doesn't stop you from making modifications though. Changing the memory and hard drive is easy and I've changed CPU's and altered wireless adapters too. Laptops are somewhat upgradeable, sometimes anyway.
What you *really* want is a standard "form factor" for the parts that fit in standard laptop cases. Then you could buy a gutless case and buy parts to build a full machine from there. However, don't hold your breath. The problem for manufacturers is that they are trying to cram as much stuff into your latest laptop as cheaply as possible, which leads to a single "mother" board that has the CPU and display adapter components built on. It needs to all survive at least some rough handling. All this requires complex engineering and integration testing and many manufacturers don't like to share.
So, where I would applaud an effort to make laptops more generic, I don't think you are going to get a major manufacture to offer up their designs or sell parts for this. What you are going to need is a base platform design for the case, while at the same time providing a set of "guts" (Processing, display, Keyboard, wireless) which are all available and free, pretty much all ready at the same time. Until then, keep wishing..
I snicker at the term "Moor's law" myself....
It's really more of a guideline and an old adage which is generally true but it is far from a "law".
I'm just not able to agree with you. I get your point, but I don't think the situation is quite as dire as you indicate.
Normal flights may be flown on autopilot for efficiency (operating costs) and safety reasons, but like my flight instructor always told me. All flights start and end visually. I would extend this to *most* flights start and end manually, with only a few CAT2 or CAT3 approaches being the exception. Airplanes do not take off and land themselves, even the commercial grade aircraft are manually controlled during take off and landing. But your point is that normal flight is decidedly uneventful and when you automate parts of that pilots skill levels go down.
Not so fast. Pilots spend literally HOURS in simulators hand flying their aircraft though demanding situations. It's part of their recurring training requirements to stay current in type. As a private pilot, I spent hours practicing simulated emergencies, stalls, approaches, landings and short field techniques. One must practice these things so you are proficient, so we simulate them. My Stall recovery practice has saved my life at least once. ATP pilots do a lot of this in simulators and they do it multiple times a year. They practice all the things I did plus handling all sorts of system failures, single engine departures, autopilot failures and emergencies that make me shutter to think about.
So where they may not have "actual in the air" experience with engine failures, they have experience with such situations and have the skills to deal with them. Remember the flight that landed in the Hudson river a few years ago? How many engine out water landings do you suppose the pilots had actually flown? I'm guessing, few, even in the simulator. But they knew their aircraft and how to fly it in that situation. These guys know what they are doing.
I think we agree.. But folks need to understand what the police have a right to do and what they don't. An officer can legally lie to you, but he cannot search your car without probable cause, a warrant or your permission.