The XFree86 contributors should come off of their high horse and GPL the code while they are at it. The original contributions
of Keith Packard and the original X team dwarf
those of the Johnnie Come Lately "Core Team."
Might Xouvert.org become the preferred X branch
now that XFree86 has gone rogue?
Quite the opposite. STS-2 made a completely manual landing, hand flown from entry interface.
OK, I'll bite. Your nuts! Any human who tried to eye ball it or even tried to keep the shuttle on a computer designated path would be dead. A human simply cannot manage the energy of a large vehicle to the minute precision required. You don't know what you are talking about.
I'll agree that this has always been done by hand. There are many such critical events already managed by the flight control system - SRB sep bolt cutters, SRB sep motor ignition, ET umbilical door closure... The idea that gear deployment cannot be done by the flight control computer is absurd.
Buran still is the most advanced manned spacecraft that humans have made.
Somewhat debatable since the craft was unmanned on its only flight and supposedly relied
entirely on chemical battery power during flight.
The production version was able to take off, fly to orbit, orbit, de-burn and go through re-entry, land on a runway and come to a complete stop - entirely unmanned and on autopilot. (And it did exactly this on it's one and only flight).
The U.S. Space Shuttle has this capability and more. No humans needed. For some reason NASA feels the need to give the stick at the only point in the flight regime where a human can handle the task, landing. Can you imagine a pilot trying to control the ascent? I believe STS-2 actually made an automatic landing, the astronaunts twiddling their thumbs. I would like to see NASA launch the shuttle unmanned in its return to flight. We don't want any more meat comets over Texas.
The Hubble telescope is perhaps the most successful space science mission of all time. That said, most of the low hanging fruit has been picked. Its best days are behind it. In the next few years while this controversy rages on you can expect to see a steady stream of pretty pictures coming from STI with the purpose of swaying public opinion on this issue. A drop in the barrel you say? Maybe so, but a small leak can eventually sink a large ship.
...One says that the acid has been formed at the surface layer from oceanic salts reacting with the intense radiation from Jupiter, the other that sulphuric acid is coming directly from the ocean, with the water reacting with sulphur produced from undersea volcanos. Wilst reducing the chances of life on Europa, it is not ruling it out completely, as there are terrestrial extremophile bacteria which thrive in highly acid environments
The chemical composition of the Europan surface as revealed by earth-based spectrascopy may bear little resemblance to the bulk chemical makeup of the surface ice or ocean beneath. Photochemistry due to Jupiter's radiation environment only operates very close to the surface. How anyone can come to the conclusion that the result is "bad for Europan life" when such life may lie many kilometers beneath the surface is beyond me.
It is certainly another excellent result for Hubble. But even for results like this, is it really worth $700 million to service Hubble(the cost of a shuttle flight and new instrumentation)?
That is a fantastically large number. Now that the Bush administration has given NASA clear goals
I hope they stick to them and resist the pressure to service Hubble. The James Webb telescope is coming.
Why be so crude? Firefox has everything to do with the free software movement. It is proof that a group of talented and determined developers can out hack Micro$oft or any other commercial outfit for the benefit of all. It means the future of computing can be dominated by openness and understanding, not coersion and marketing. Let the war continue unabated. I would like to paraphrase a speech George C. Scott gave in the movie "Patton".
"We're going to hold onto them (Microsoft) by the nose and kick them in the ass. We're going to kick the hell out of them all the time and go through 'em like crap through a goose..."...Windows is the enemy! Wade into them. Spill their blood! Shoot them in the belly!" , figuratively speaking.
I mean, we can barely keep the ISS running, and our current space program is hurting significantly.
Very true. This is exactly why a change is in order. ISS/Shuttle is a white elephant. For the same money we can be doing far more real exploration.
So when my back is against a wall like that, i think i too would come out with crazy plans like this.
Bush's back isn't against a wall. These changes have been in the works for a long time. The Columbia disaster just forced a decision.
Unlike other administrations of the last 10 years, GDubya has the guts to make the decision.
Not to mention the costs that it would have, NASA budget doubled for like 5 years when the appolo missions were going on.
Clearly, such budget increases are not going to happen. However, the US does have new powerful and economical launchers (Atlas V, Delta IV) and the potential for rapidly developing Shuttle derived launchers. This is not a cold start like Apollo.
Dont get me wrong I am not anti-NASA, I am just anti-mars right now. We could use that money for more important things.
China and India have slowed down the Japanese economy, and now they're banging on your door guys. Time to get used to 10+% unemployment, like the rest of us.
How ridiculous. Japan has had slow growth for
12 years because it took a very long time to resolve the banking crisis brought on by a the 1990's real estate market bubble. This has nothing to do with India or China. You have 10% unemployment in Europe because the high levels of business taxation, regulation, and social spending keep entrepreneurship and job growth low. The US jettesoned that baggage when Reagan was elected and the conservatives came to power. Your domestic consumption is also relatively low. You don't buy lots of cars and TV's. You don't have high rates of immigration.
We had 6% unemployment in the U.S. at the depths of a resession. Not great for those who are out of work, but not bad by historical comparison.
As China and India emerge economically there are bound to be employment
pressures due to low wages. Manufacturing is being wrecked, and white collar workers are being displaced. The flip side is
lower prices for those who earn a paycheck, and
greater profits for U.S. companies (and stockholders). The hardcore unemployed will
gradually shift to new occupations. Painful, yes.
We are the United Fucking States, we will not be down for long.
The core of my argument remains in tact. ISS life sciences research does not justify its monster budget. That is not waffling, that is a direct assertion that you do not seem to be able to refute. Hurl all of the insults you want. I will look elsewhere for an intelligent debate.
The United States will launch a re-focused research effort on board the International Space Station
You are obtuse if you don't read this as the end of the Space Station as the center piece of NASA's effort. How do you expect the administration to state this? They do not want to offend the affected constituencies unnecessarily. Instead of "re-focused" read "reduced"! It is a message to our 15 partners that after 2010 the gratuitous taxi service to IIS is over and they are on their own.
I am a huge fan of NASA and my opinions on space research are non-political. I think NASA's unmanned missions are of tremendous scientific and technical benefit to all. It makes the lavish funding of life sciences research all the more baffling. For too long the practitioners of this "science" have dotted their i's and crossed their t's when it comes to proposing, documenting, and publishing their research. They watched the cash roll in, while other worthy space endeavors went begging. I am also sure that the astronauts are working like busy little bees. What I am saying is that for the meager benefit we all get from it, life sciences space research is vastly overfunded.
The simple fact that the crew is on the station for extended periods of time is providing the necessary science for prolonged spaceflight...
This kind of pablum got the station funded in the first place. Necessary science is not being done, no science is being done. We already know that muscles atrophy in zero G. We already know about space sickness. The expensive and perpetual status quo cannot go on. If you want to vent about Mr. Bush, be my guest. But it hardly constitutes a lucid argument.
How would you suggest we get to Mars without the experience we are gaining there? Should we just "wing it?"
Experience? That's a good one. The poor spacestation crew are just a couple of marooned campers trying desperately to keep the lights on and the air in. There is no science going on and certainly no exploration. Mr. Bush understands
this. He is well advised.
No, it doesn't take a lot more energy to take the space shuttle to a 50 deg orbit
Yes, it does. At 50 degrees inclination there is a lesser component of earth's rotation to assist the shuttle in reaching orbital velocity than at 30 deg. That energy has to come from somewhere. As you say, it comes from an emptier shuttle.
And did you know that to accomodate the Russians, the space station is in an orbit that makes it almost useless as a jumping off point to anywhere?
The station is in an inclined orbit of 50 degrees, because Baikonur, the Russians launch site, lies at about that latitude. It takes a lot more energy to launch a shuttle to that inclination than its normal 30 degrees. There are also fewer launch opportunities. One benefit of having the station at a high inclination is for earth observation. It flies over a lot of ground. But it is an expensive way to take pictures isn't it? The station was a bad idea pursued to the bitter end. Credit George W. Bush for changing NASA's focus on it.
I hope Europe does start a manned program. To trail the U.S., Russia, and China in space technology makes no sense at all. Europe already possesses a suitable launcher in the Ariane V. You would think that they could begin a program quickly.
O'Keefe is obviously being pressured by Hubble's political constituency. He needs validation of his controversial (but in my mind correct) decision to quell the disent. Who better than Adm. Hal Gehman who effectively put severe limitations on the further use of the Space Shuttle without being completely specific about its future use. I think it is very clever on O'Keefe's part. NASA had to swallow all of the recommendations of Gehman's board of review, whether they made sense or not. O'Keefe just wants to put responsibility on Gehman if an orbiter is stranded servicing Hubble. It is against O'Keefe's better judgement.
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I agree. I just call it the GNU System.
The XFree86 contributors should come off of their high horse and GPL the code while they are at it. The original contributions of Keith Packard and the original X team dwarf those of the Johnnie Come Lately "Core Team."
Might Xouvert.org become the preferred X branch now that XFree86 has gone rogue?
OK, I'll bite. Your nuts! Any human who tried to eye ball it or even tried to keep the shuttle on a computer designated path would be dead. A human simply cannot manage the energy of a large vehicle to the minute precision required. You don't know what you are talking about.
I'll agree that this has always been done by hand. There are many such critical events already managed by the flight control system - SRB sep bolt cutters, SRB sep motor ignition, ET umbilical door closure... The idea that gear deployment cannot be done by the flight control computer is absurd.
Somewhat debatable since the craft was unmanned on its only flight and supposedly relied entirely on chemical battery power during flight.
The production version was able to take off, fly to orbit, orbit, de-burn and go through re-entry, land on a runway and come to a complete stop - entirely unmanned and on autopilot. (And it did exactly this on it's one and only flight).The U.S. Space Shuttle has this capability and more. No humans needed. For some reason NASA feels the need to give the stick at the only point in the flight regime where a human can handle the task, landing. Can you imagine a pilot trying to control the ascent? I believe STS-2 actually made an automatic landing, the astronaunts twiddling their thumbs. I would like to see NASA launch the shuttle unmanned in its return to flight. We don't want any more meat comets over Texas.
I have found variations of the Hopi rain dance to be effective in solving many PC hardware problems. Tibetan chanting also work well.
I think Stallman would remind he foresaw this situation many years ago:
The X Windows Trap
If people like you weren't so busy misrepresenting his views you'd see that.
The Hubble telescope is perhaps the most successful space science mission of all time. That said, most of the low hanging fruit has been picked. Its best days are behind it. In the next few years while this controversy rages on you can expect to see a steady stream of pretty pictures coming from STI with the purpose of swaying public opinion on this issue. A drop in the barrel you say? Maybe so, but a small leak can eventually sink a large ship.
The chemical composition of the Europan surface as revealed by earth-based spectrascopy may bear little resemblance to the bulk chemical makeup of the surface ice or ocean beneath. Photochemistry due to Jupiter's radiation environment only operates very close to the surface. How anyone can come to the conclusion that the result is "bad for Europan life" when such life may lie many kilometers beneath the surface is beyond me.
It is certainly another excellent result for Hubble. But even for results like this, is it really worth $700 million to service Hubble(the cost of a shuttle flight and new instrumentation)? That is a fantastically large number. Now that the Bush administration has given NASA clear goals I hope they stick to them and resist the pressure to service Hubble. The James Webb telescope is coming.
Why be so crude? Firefox has everything to do with the free software movement. It is proof that a group of talented and determined developers can out hack Micro$oft or any other commercial outfit for the benefit of all. It means the future of computing can be dominated by openness and understanding, not coersion and marketing. Let the war continue unabated. I would like to paraphrase a speech George C. Scott gave in the movie "Patton".
"We're going to hold onto them (Microsoft) by the nose and kick them in the ass. We're going to kick the hell out of them all the time and go through 'em like crap through a goose..."Very true. This is exactly why a change is in order. ISS/Shuttle is a white elephant. For the same money we can be doing far more real exploration.
So when my back is against a wall like that, i think i too would come out with crazy plans like this.
Bush's back isn't against a wall. These changes have been in the works for a long time. The Columbia disaster just forced a decision. Unlike other administrations of the last 10 years, GDubya has the guts to make the decision.
Not to mention the costs that it would have, NASA budget doubled for like 5 years when the appolo missions were going on.Clearly, such budget increases are not going to happen. However, the US does have new powerful and economical launchers (Atlas V, Delta IV) and the potential for rapidly developing Shuttle derived launchers. This is not a cold start like Apollo.
Dont get me wrong I am not anti-NASA, I am just anti-mars right now. We could use that money for more important things.Like what? Social spending?
Indian consultants are learning to play the game in the US. Find a single willing shill, preferably from a Washington think-tank, quote them widely.
How ridiculous. Japan has had slow growth for 12 years because it took a very long time to resolve the banking crisis brought on by a the 1990's real estate market bubble. This has nothing to do with India or China. You have 10% unemployment in Europe because the high levels of business taxation, regulation, and social spending keep entrepreneurship and job growth low. The US jettesoned that baggage when Reagan was elected and the conservatives came to power. Your domestic consumption is also relatively low. You don't buy lots of cars and TV's. You don't have high rates of immigration.
We had 6% unemployment in the U.S. at the depths of a resession. Not great for those who are out of work, but not bad by historical comparison.
As China and India emerge economically there are bound to be employment pressures due to low wages. Manufacturing is being wrecked, and white collar workers are being displaced. The flip side is lower prices for those who earn a paycheck, and greater profits for U.S. companies (and stockholders). The hardcore unemployed will gradually shift to new occupations. Painful, yes. We are the United Fucking States, we will not be down for long.
The core of my argument remains in tact. ISS life sciences research does not justify its monster budget. That is not waffling, that is a direct assertion that you do not seem to be able to refute. Hurl all of the insults you want. I will look elsewhere for an intelligent debate.
You are obtuse if you don't read this as the end of the Space Station as the center piece of NASA's effort. How do you expect the administration to state this? They do not want to offend the affected constituencies unnecessarily. Instead of "re-focused" read "reduced"! It is a message to our 15 partners that after 2010 the gratuitous taxi service to IIS is over and they are on their own.
I am a huge fan of NASA and my opinions on space research are non-political. I think NASA's unmanned missions are of tremendous scientific and technical benefit to all. It makes the lavish funding of life sciences research all the more baffling. For too long the practitioners of this "science" have dotted their i's and crossed their t's when it comes to proposing, documenting, and publishing their research. They watched the cash roll in, while other worthy space endeavors went begging. I am also sure that the astronauts are working like busy little bees. What I am saying is that for the meager benefit we all get from it, life sciences space research is vastly overfunded.
This kind of pablum got the station funded in the first place. Necessary science is not being done, no science is being done. We already know that muscles atrophy in zero G. We already know about space sickness. The expensive and perpetual status quo cannot go on. If you want to vent about Mr. Bush, be my guest. But it hardly constitutes a lucid argument.
Experience? That's a good one. The poor spacestation crew are just a couple of marooned campers trying desperately to keep the lights on and the air in. There is no science going on and certainly no exploration. Mr. Bush understands this. He is well advised.
Yes, it does. At 50 degrees inclination there is a lesser component of earth's rotation to assist the shuttle in reaching orbital velocity than at 30 deg. That energy has to come from somewhere. As you say, it comes from an emptier shuttle.
I said, "Credit George W. Bush for changing NASA's focus on it."
I meant that as a compliment to President Bush.
The station is in an inclined orbit of 50 degrees, because Baikonur, the Russians launch site, lies at about that latitude. It takes a lot more energy to launch a shuttle to that inclination than its normal 30 degrees. There are also fewer launch opportunities. One benefit of having the station at a high inclination is for earth observation. It flies over a lot of ground. But it is an expensive way to take pictures isn't it? The station was a bad idea pursued to the bitter end. Credit George W. Bush for changing NASA's focus on it.
I hope Europe does start a manned program. To trail the U.S., Russia, and China in space technology makes no sense at all. Europe already possesses a suitable launcher in the Ariane V. You would think that they could begin a program quickly.
This also vindicates a longstanding principle of government procurement: why buy one when you can buy two at twice the price!
O'Keefe is obviously being pressured by Hubble's political constituency. He needs validation of his controversial (but in my mind correct) decision to quell the disent. Who better than Adm. Hal Gehman who effectively put severe limitations on the further use of the Space Shuttle without being completely specific about its future use. I think it is very clever on O'Keefe's part. NASA had to swallow all of the recommendations of Gehman's board of review, whether they made sense or not. O'Keefe just wants to put responsibility on Gehman if an orbiter is stranded servicing Hubble. It is against O'Keefe's better judgement.