I have to say that those lists are among the coolest things that I've seen from the military. Can you imagine having the job of just sitting around and brainstorming that stuff up all day?
That said, some of the items on those lists are really whack: - SB031-006 Virtual Soldier Scan (wtf is this?) - SB031-019 Distributed Electronics (you mean a WAN?) - AF03-009 Spatially Modulated Reflective Membranes for High-Dynamic-Range Wavefront Control (a what?) - AF03-265 Reduction of Arsenic in Water (what do they want that for?)
I know I could scroll down and find the full briefing for each of these, but reading the list itself takes enough time...
I can't imagine that they would be stupid enough to make all of the coatings controllable by radio RC. Rather, they would make the paint controlled by hard-wired circuitry in the tank. Granted, it would be nice for HQ to be able to issue one command as a convoy moved from grass to sand (or a similar situation) but the potential for disaster would be unbelievable. A simple human control selected by the driver should be far more effective.
What I'd be looking forward to is when they mount cameras on the bottom of the tank, then switch the nano paint on the roof to match. Voila! your vehical just became completely invisible from the air.
Actually, here in Canada, our police forces have abandoned radar-gun technology in favour of laser range-finding devices. Not only are these undetectable (very narrow beam), they are far more accurate. I know that I got my last ticket from one of these goddamn machines...
I am so tired that when I first read the article, I thought they interviewed a lithium about the subject. I was really starting to wonder what was wrong until I realized the researcher's name was Li...
Assuming that the attackers knew this (which is a rather large assumption in itself), it would seem then that this attack was not designed to cause any damage. Rather, to test their attack system (and perhaps tweak its performance). After all, from the article I get the idea that the attack was called off, not caught and nullified.
Should we be expecting another, more major one of these attacks soon? If so, I hope they catch the script-kiddies that are likely behind this attack before then...
my point was that he didn't need 4 points to triangulate in 3D space, only three. And he did say that you need three points to triangulate on a flat plane, which is wrong. You see, I DID read before I posted...
Go take a look at the photo at the top of the page linked to in the/. summary (ESA's launch page)
Is it just me or does the thrust coming from the bottom of that rocket look suspiciosly clean + straight? They have other pictures that look fairly normal, but that looks like it's straight out of some CG computer game or something...
Yes, but if you are in range of ONE of the triangulating antennas, but out of range of the other two, they cant triangulate you position and YOU CAN CONNECT!
mind you, if you were going to use the triangulation thing as a security measure, restrict access only to those people who are within range of >=3 APs, but AFAIAC this is a waste of the APs (supposedly limited) range.
Two known points is all that is needed to biangulate(?) on a flat plane. This is basic grade 8 trigonometry. You just take two known points, their angle to the unknown point, and draw 2 lines in the direction of the unknown point. The unknown point is where the lines cross. Adding a third known point can let you determine loction in the third dimension. Any points beyond that will only serve to increase your resolution (not a bad thing), but are ultimatly redundant.
Why does it have to get the researchers back to earth? couldn't it just eject out into space, then the astronauts all take sleeping pills (to reduce boredom, anxiety, oxygen consumption) and slide into little compartments. If you could get a system that could support 3 mostly-sleeping humans for 5 days, surely that would be enough to launch an emergency rescue-mission by either a shuttle or a Soyuz?
This only doesn't work when you have empires. For example, An empire can have a center, and then a number of colonies around the globe. If you wanted to draw all of these colonies in the same colour as your empire you could need more than 4 colours...
o, and btw, even if 4 countries meet at a single point, the 4 colour conjecture is still valid because though two opposite countries technically border each other, for all practical intents and purposes they can be the same colour.
No, you can't. This is because a tile on one side of a pentagon can be the same colour as a tile on the other side, because they don't touch each other...
Has there been any investigation into the application of microwave feed horns as weapons? Just think about the possibilities if you could blind all of the enemy's forces from long range with a fairly common piece of equipment.
I suppose it'd probably be a MAJOR violation of the geneva convention to ever use any such weapon, but the geneva convention hasn't stopped Dubya yet...
This is ridiculous. The drilling method they described is very short range (not to mention too slow for a bullet) and thus would be completely ineffective in allowing a missile/RPG to inflict more damage.
I thing that the best thing this could be used for is some sort of small smart patch that could be thrown/stuck/launched at a tank. It would then stick to the tank. Then by using some simple robotics it would move across the tank and position itself to slowly drill into the engine block (or the magazine for even more fun!)
" In reality, one only has to achieve slightly more than 9.8m/s^2 acceleration and maintain that for the duration of the trip to space.
Actually, any positive acceleration no matter how small will do - though the higher the more efficient the launch will be. This means you have to generate a force of at least 9.8 N per kg of rocket at the surface though. "
Well, ok. Technically you are right. But in order to obtain a positive acceleration, one must first overcome the -9.8m/s^2 acceleration. (assuming you are using a vector pointing up into space and not down into the earth). Thus, for all intents and purposes, one must still achieve 9.8m/s^2 in order to lift off. Once one obtains 9.8m/s^2 acceleration, one only needs a tiny impulse to float all the way up into earth orbit.
There's some northern parts of Australia that are fairly close. And Singapore is pretty stable too. Though its infrastucture isn't the best, Malaysia isn't a half-bad option either. India also fits that description too.
The 9,000 mph figure you're quoting is the escape velocity - an instantaneous velocity at the surface of the earth which, without any external acceleration save that of gravity, should theoretically get you into orbit.
However, this is as ridiculously simplistic as it is stupid. In reality, one only has to achieve slightly more than 9.8m/s^2 acceleration and maintain that for the duration of the trip to space. Granted, the shuttle uses a LOT more than just 9.8 m/s^2 acceleration, but it still never reached speeds of 9,000 mph.
I believe that this guy has made a crucial point but not emphasized it enough: PLUGINS PLUGINS PLUGINS!
And when I say plugins, i don't neccesarily mean simple stuff. I'm talking about engineering your modeler modularly so that you can actually have a hope of finishing useful components on a reasonable timeline. A good example is a friend of mine who is really interested in modelling. So much so that he's coding his own rendering engine. While he's undertaken this project solely in his spare time, he's devoted quite a bit to it and has spent the last two years working on it. By now he's actually getting something that is working decently and it's really coming together.
So, if you want to undertake a project like this, screw the framework at the beginning. Other than a REALLY rough sketch, get straight into the design and coding of the major components.
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I have to say that those lists are among the coolest things that I've seen from the military. Can you imagine having the job of just sitting around and brainstorming that stuff up all day?
That said, some of the items on those lists are really whack:
- SB031-006 Virtual Soldier Scan (wtf is this?)
- SB031-019 Distributed Electronics (you mean a WAN?)
- AF03-009 Spatially Modulated Reflective Membranes for High-Dynamic-Range Wavefront Control (a what?)
- AF03-265 Reduction of Arsenic in Water (what do they want that for?)
I know I could scroll down and find the full briefing for each of these, but reading the list itself takes enough time...
I can't imagine that they would be stupid enough to make all of the coatings controllable by radio RC. Rather, they would make the paint controlled by hard-wired circuitry in the tank. Granted, it would be nice for HQ to be able to issue one command as a convoy moved from grass to sand (or a similar situation) but the potential for disaster would be unbelievable. A simple human control selected by the driver should be far more effective.
What I'd be looking forward to is when they mount cameras on the bottom of the tank, then switch the nano paint on the roof to match. Voila! your vehical just became completely invisible from the air.
Actually, here in Canada, our police forces have abandoned radar-gun technology in favour of laser range-finding devices. Not only are these undetectable (very narrow beam), they are far more accurate. I know that I got my last ticket from one of these goddamn machines...
I am so tired that when I first read the article, I thought they interviewed a lithium about the subject. I was really starting to wonder what was wrong until I realized the researcher's name was Li...
Assuming that the attackers knew this (which is a rather large assumption in itself), it would seem then that this attack was not designed to cause any damage. Rather, to test their attack system (and perhaps tweak its performance). After all, from the article I get the idea that the attack was called off, not caught and nullified.
Should we be expecting another, more major one of these attacks soon? If so, I hope they catch the script-kiddies that are likely behind this attack before then...
my point was that he didn't need 4 points to triangulate in 3D space, only three. And he did say that you need three points to triangulate on a flat plane, which is wrong. You see, I DID read before I posted...
Go take a look at the photo at the top of the page linked to in the /. summary (ESA's launch page)
Is it just me or does the thrust coming from the bottom of that rocket look suspiciosly clean + straight? They have other pictures that look fairly normal, but that looks like it's straight out of some CG computer game or something...
Yes, but if you are in range of ONE of the triangulating antennas, but out of range of the other two, they cant triangulate you position and YOU CAN CONNECT!
mind you, if you were going to use the triangulation thing as a security measure, restrict access only to those people who are within range of >=3 APs, but AFAIAC this is a waste of the APs (supposedly limited) range.
Wtf are you on?!
Two known points is all that is needed to biangulate(?) on a flat plane. This is basic grade 8 trigonometry. You just take two known points, their angle to the unknown point, and draw 2 lines in the direction of the unknown point. The unknown point is where the lines cross. Adding a third known point can let you determine loction in the third dimension. Any points beyond that will only serve to increase your resolution (not a bad thing), but are ultimatly redundant.
Please think before you post.
Not really, I've sat in a room completely full of C02 (you can't see the other side of the room) for >1 hour...
/., no?
I didn't feel any ill effects, and i'm still posting to
Why does it have to get the researchers back to earth? couldn't it just eject out into space, then the astronauts all take sleeping pills (to reduce boredom, anxiety, oxygen consumption) and slide into little compartments. If you could get a system that could support 3 mostly-sleeping humans for 5 days, surely that would be enough to launch an emergency rescue-mission by either a shuttle or a Soyuz?
This only doesn't work when you have empires. For example, An empire can have a center, and then a number of colonies around the globe. If you wanted to draw all of these colonies in the same colour as your empire you could need more than 4 colours...
o, and btw, even if 4 countries meet at a single point, the 4 colour conjecture is still valid because though two opposite countries technically border each other, for all practical intents and purposes they can be the same colour.
No, you can't. This is because a tile on one side of a pentagon can be the same colour as a tile on the other side, because they don't touch each other...
Why don't you try it out on a piece of paper...
Has there been any investigation into the application of microwave feed horns as weapons? Just think about the possibilities if you could blind all of the enemy's forces from long range with a fairly common piece of equipment.
I suppose it'd probably be a MAJOR violation of the geneva convention to ever use any such weapon, but the geneva convention hasn't stopped Dubya yet...
This is ridiculous. The drilling method they described is very short range (not to mention too slow for a bullet) and thus would be completely ineffective in allowing a missile/RPG to inflict more damage.
I thing that the best thing this could be used for is some sort of small smart patch that could be thrown/stuck/launched at a tank. It would then stick to the tank. Then by using some simple robotics it would move across the tank and position itself to slowly drill into the engine block (or the magazine for even more fun!)
Right beside the Nature article is a picture of a piece of aluminium that they drilled through using the microwave bit.
no, pennies are copper.
eat a nickel - they're plated with zinc.
It's much easier to just use a soldering iron (the pen kind works best). This is how my brother did it, and he's never had warts since...
it REALLY fucks up your accuracy.
"
In reality, one only has to achieve slightly more than 9.8m/s^2 acceleration and maintain that for the duration of the trip to space.
Actually, any positive acceleration no matter how small will do - though the higher the more efficient the launch will be. This means you have to generate a force of at least 9.8 N per kg of rocket at the surface though.
"
Well, ok. Technically you are right. But in order to obtain a positive acceleration, one must first overcome the -9.8m/s^2 acceleration. (assuming you are using a vector pointing up into space and not down into the earth). Thus, for all intents and purposes, one must still achieve 9.8m/s^2 in order to lift off. Once one obtains 9.8m/s^2 acceleration, one only needs a tiny impulse to float all the way up into earth orbit.
There's some northern parts of Australia that are fairly close. And Singapore is pretty stable too. Though its infrastucture isn't the best, Malaysia isn't a half-bad option either. India also fits that description too.
Not at all...
The 9,000 mph figure you're quoting is the escape velocity - an instantaneous velocity at the surface of the earth which, without any external acceleration save that of gravity, should theoretically get you into orbit.
However, this is as ridiculously simplistic as it is stupid. In reality, one only has to achieve slightly more than 9.8m/s^2 acceleration and maintain that for the duration of the trip to space. Granted, the shuttle uses a LOT more than just 9.8 m/s^2 acceleration, but it still never reached speeds of 9,000 mph.
Ya, they mean the same thing...
Just thought i'd add: October Sky (Rocket Boys) is a true story, and all the characters are real...
:-)
Just goes to show you that us canucks can do more than chop down trees and trap beavers.
I believe that this guy has made a crucial point but not emphasized it enough: PLUGINS PLUGINS PLUGINS!
And when I say plugins, i don't neccesarily mean simple stuff. I'm talking about engineering your modeler modularly so that you can actually have a hope of finishing useful components on a reasonable timeline. A good example is a friend of mine who is really interested in modelling. So much so that he's coding his own rendering engine. While he's undertaken this project solely in his spare time, he's devoted quite a bit to it and has spent the last two years working on it. By now he's actually getting something that is working decently and it's really coming together.
So, if you want to undertake a project like this, screw the framework at the beginning. Other than a REALLY rough sketch, get straight into the design and coding of the major components.