You get very good GPS as you can see a large number of the GSP satellites. I had a friend who worked on the GPS for the STS (Shuttle) back in the 1990's. The number of data points from seeing so many sattelites overwhelmed the Integrator software in the GPS unit and it had to be rewritten to use more data points. Apprently getting TOO MUCH data could hurt the older generation GPS, I don't know if that is a problem now. If you can't measure distance accurately how can you measure the closing speed/distance of the two vessels so the supply mission knows when to slow down and use the radar to dock. The only reason the ISS went to GPS is the new Progress ships use it, there had been no docking problems with the old systems except the one time the Russian cosmonaut tried to hand fly to Progess to the dock and came in a bit too hot.
Use of such "dictionary" words as you posted is perfectly acceptable in some circles but not in others. I wouldn't speak to someone from "down home" in Lower Alabama with words like that, I'd say "Sorry I'm late Ya'll, there was a big Sale down at Wal-Mart and I had to get some stuff before it went off Sale". If I said "Pardon my lack of timely arrival however I was unavoidably detained by the fact of I had to take advantage of the opportunity to procure some merchandise at a massive discount at the local retail emporium" I'd be laughed out of town. Understanding when it is OK to show your intelligence and grasp of a foreign language and when you should just use the local color to blend in is very hard for non-natives. As long as someone communicates the point I don't hold using local terms against them. But I SO hate the abuse of "You know", that'll set me off very quickly you know?;)
Exactly! He can't be trusted to follow the LEGAL rules, which brings up the question can he be trusted to follow any company rules? Loose cannons like this can really damage a company. While he may have a degree from NCSU (a fine school) obviously the don't teach Ethics to the CS students. In my hiring I look for those who like what they do but also have other interests outside technology. It just seems they are better fits in a team environment.
I wonder if some of the "dialects" of English such as those found in various Regions of the United States contribute to the mastery problem? I have found that European langauages and Slavic language speakers seem to take to English very well. Of course since English is kind of a "melting pot" lanaguage at least a few words should be familiar to almost any foreign language!
The poster requested a BBC shortwave signal in NORTH AMERICA, i.e. United States and Canada. You know the former colonies from way back when? We kinda like the BBC to see how the folks "back home" are doing!;)
Re:Bush, Steroids and smokescreens
on
Juiced
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· Score: 1
You can't get a NOC if you are not a citizen, are a felon, or have financial problems. In some cases I have seen since it is a NOC, they don't even do the paperwork, just check for outstanding warrants. I still think this is all made up and if not some clerk in the White House Security Office needs to be fired. Of course since clerks are lifetime civil servants you can't hardly fire them even if they skipped this guy on purpose to make GWB (or one of his staff) look bad. It's been known to happen.
A 5 Mod? No way..Tell me what new car company have you seen in the last 25 years? DeLorean was the only one and it went under. And I didn't realize cars were ever a "highly exploitable technology" even in the Model T days. How about computers? IBM went down a bit, Dell, Gateway, HP and others crept in but there have been NO new serious players in over 10 years. As for CPUs there hasn't been any new CPU chips mfgs in quite a while, speciality chips like DSPs and ASICs is where the new entries have been. Dot com's are too easy, anyone can start one these days. So, it's not a fair comparison with your other businesses. Dot coms can be started on a few thousands of dollars, computers and cars take millions. Which is one BIG reason why you don't see new entrants. The cost along with firmly entrenched competition creates an enormous barrier to entry. You are all over the place with your arguments versus your examples. I don't dispute that new technlogies can spawn new business opportunities, its just that cars, computers and dot coms are not good examples.
Re:Bush, Steroids and smokescreens
on
Juiced
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· Score: 1
The press does NOT hold Security Clearances as they are NOT exposed to Classifed information. If you have no need to know you have no need for a clearance.
Halliburton had a contract to sell things to Iraq. Perfectly legal. No US Companies are allowed to do business with Iran. This crap was started by the liberals, a bi-partisan Congressional Committee looked at things and found nada wrong. The "overcharges" everyone screams about were perfectly legal in most casse and in a few others there were paperwork screwups. Having worked for Gov't contractors for many years I know how much peperwork there is and how confusing it is.
Re:Bush, Steroids and smokescreens
on
Juiced
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· Score: 0
1) You don't need a Security Clearance to go to the White House and meet the President. At least GWB isn't leasing out the Lincoln bedroom!
2) My heart bleeds, the media is still so left wing it is amazing. I KNOW there are paid shills (anyone at CNN) for the liberals. Tit for tat..no foul.
3) Get off the Halliburton case. It's over.
4) I am puzzled by Karen Hughes at State. She is a good poltical agent but I think she isn't cut out for that job. Sometimes GWBs personal loyalty goes a bit far. However, I don't think Hughes can do any harm at State, it's already one screwed up place with career civil servants running the place.
5) Karl Rove and GWB didn't even know each other that long ago when Jose was playing base-e-ball.
Therefore, it seems prudent to ask what happens to whatever it is SCOX has, and maybe keep an eye on it lest it end up in the hands of someone who's bought into McBrides version of things and this ends up being an ongoing problem.
That's right. I want this settled not some out of court agreement. I think IBM will not settle until Linux and thier good name are both cleared. I fear SCOX pulling some sort of shady bankruptcy deal and leaving Linux hanging in regards to whether UNIX "contamination" is present.
SCOX is Caldera but it's not the same mindset as Caldera was. Caldera actually produced a product, and the remains of that company still do make a Citrix like product that some say is quite good. SCOX produces lots of BS and legal work for Boise Schiller.
I think AT&T did "give up". They made a corporate decision to sell the UNIX business, as they didn't see any profit in it and they weren't sure what they owned. Rather than fight they sold. In hindsight it was probably a good business decision but it did lead to a proliferation of UNIX "flavors" which fragmented the market and introduced incompatabilities. UNIX was no longer Sys V or BSD, it was HP-UX, Solaris, SGI-IRIX, IBM AIX, etc.
OK, so how do you detect a fireball that occurs this fast? Caninstruments even measure to that level of detail? Or is all this theoretical both in creation and time? I don't want to subscribe to RTFA.
How extremely short lived? From the Wikipedia article you linked..
So, for instance, a 1 second-lived black hole has a mass of 2.28 × 10E5 kg = 2.05 × 10E22 J = 5 × 10E6 megatons of TNT. The initial power is 6.84 × 10E21 W.
In the experiement those holes the create must have lifetimes on the order of fractions of a femtosecond as the mass they are using is on the scale of atomic particles which is a whole lot less tha 10E5 kg. Not to mention the decay energy they give up would be awesome. Hmmm..
Step 1 : Create black holes in Lab
Step 2: Take the decay energy, convert to electricity
Step 3: PROFIT!:)
I'll have to look at the Math. I bet it is based on standard words in a dictionary not slang or made up items. Did you find the URL, I'd like to look at the mathematical model? As long as you remember it it does'nt matter what the phrase is, it could be complete nonsense such as "the slithy toves did gyre and gimbal and "all mimsy were the borogroves":)
Time in nanoseconds is available on most CPUs, to clock at the GHz range the system clock has to be that accurate. I don't know if Windoze can read it to that level but I know I can in Unix and most embedded OSes.
I disagree. Passphrases just like passwords don't have to use real words. Take PGP for instance, I can have a pass phrase of a complete sentence with all sorts of special chars and capitalization or punctuation as well. I can use "the quick Brown Fox jumped over the lazy dog" and it will not be the same as "the Quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog.". Subtle differences that a dictionary attack would take a LOT longer. If you use the pass phrase as seed to encrypt with something like the system clock time in nanoseconds then it gets even better.
I've been around UNIX 25 yrs, since the days BEFORE BSD and System V. I wrote code on Xenix the old MS flavor of UNIX derived from Sys III. We are saying the SAME thing, that SCO has crap to claim they own Linux. The Unix "tree" is full of leaks of code into the public domain, so much so that AT&T simply gave up a lot of rights in Sys V BEFORE Novell/Caldera/SCO ever got into the loop. I think a lot of folks (Novell/Caldera/SCOX) who thought they own UNIX are holding a mostly empty bag. If you don't protect your copyrights you can lose them. SCO has dropped the claims regarding Linux as a whole and seems to now be focusing on a "contract dispute" that code from Project Monterey made it into AIX and then into Linux. And SCO has NEVER produced anything to say they got the UNIX copyrights from Caldera. If SCO DID own the copyrights why did they have to pass 90% plus of any revenues from Sales on to Novell?
The history of UNIX is so damn convoluted and full of things no one would do today with IP that I'm not sure anyone involved can prove what they own and don't own.
I know the facts, you seem to read a lot into posts that are not there. Typical for this place. At least on Groklaw you don't get jumped for things but it gets explained.
" There is no such think as completely secure."..Well there is "think" but there isn't "thing":)
Two factor is not better than one unless that second factor is also very hard to break. Combine something like a PIN and RSA key Fob with Digital Certificates (OK, that's three factors but two come from the user) and you are very secure. With a unique digital certificate issued by the bank that is verified by a special plug-in for your browser that adds security. Also what about using a pass PHRASE instead of a password, that adds complexity and makes things harder to crack. The good Dr. S has a point but I think the examples he gave are not good illustrations. If you run a good Spyware/Malware/AV check you'll catch the Trojans. With those tools becomes integrated into the OS and working behind the scences it's getting less likely you will be phished by a Trojan.
SCO is trying to say UNIX code THEY OWN made it into Linux, they couldn't find any so now they want to go with the crazy theory that AIX violates thier copyright on UNIX. ALL SCO got from Novell was the right to distribute System V and to make a version of UNIX based on that. If SCO v Novell was over, there would be no need for SCO v IBM.
Unless he has signed over the copyright on the original code he wrote, his company has violated his copyright by claiming it. And if it is patentable then it is HIS to patent not thiers. If it included GPL code from Company X then it has to be released under the GPL and Company X holds the copyrights still. The employer is inviting trouble, the verbal agreements do NOT supercede copyrights and contract law. Mr D should first inform his employer what the possible liabilities are, and if they continue he should protect his a** (and rights) and get a lawyer, file a copyright infringement suit and ask for the company to be restrained from distributing the product until the suit is settled. Oh, and notify IBM and others that thier copyrights are being infringed upon too.
Yes, it can be de-orbited with not mission IF IF IF they do it before the control gyro's go completely dead. That point is predicted to occur in the next 3-4 years. If they wait till there are not enough good gyros, it will eventually de-orbit on it's own but as far as I know there is not a prediction of where it might land. There are just too many variables to predict with any accuracy the re-entry with zero control.
My point is sending a "de-orbit mission" has certain fixed costs, so why not fix it AND also prepare it for de-orbit at some point in the future should the need arise. That way they can wring all the science out of it until they lose too many gyros and then they can direct the re-entry. That solution gives you a win-win situation and makes the politicians happy too.
No disagreement here. A minor point that the 2nd Shuttle could standby loaded for a Mission but it would have to be unloaded for Rescue, or vice versa. It's really not a good option at all.
You haven't read my posts on this topic over the past couple years have you? And one yesterday as well. Why risk lives and a STS to DE-ORBIT HST? It costs just as much to go there to fix or de-orbit and the new devices are ready. Point me to an article by a credible source that backs your claim. I know what I worked on when I was at NASA. Want the name of my supervisor and co-workers? I know at least one of them comes around here once in a while.
IIRC there is only 1 pad at KSC they can use for HST launches and they have a couple weeks R&R after each launch to get ready for the next one. A 30 day turnaround is about the minumum. And KSC does NOT have the manpower to get TWO STS missions ready at one time. The RTF commission looked at this option and decided it was not feasible. Also, if there was a problem on Shuttle A then there is a strong likliehood it will also occur on Shuttle B (rescue mission) thus you just lost TWO Shuttles. Until you know what went wrong on Shuttle A it is insane to launch a rescue mission!
I worked on COS and WFC3. The instrument hardware could be reused but they would require extensive software mods which I suspect he didn't include in his costs. Also, unless they want to cripple the "new" HST with old systems hardware there will need to be some redesign done on things like power supplies, gyroscopes,wiring, interfaces, etc. Not to mention any possible systems upgrade as STSI. I see this as a bit of self presevation for STSI because without HST they would have to cut back on staff.
I think $1B is WAY too low, like I said in a post the other day NASA Scientists ALWAYS underestimate time and money by at least a factor of 2. Then add NASA BS and finance inefficiencies on top of that and I'd be surprised if it cost less than $4B in the end.
Horseshit is about right. ALL your points are wrong.
I worked on Hubble.
The next generation instruments have BEEN ready they are stored in Dry Nitrogen now at GSFC.
HST will deorbit just fine, UNLESS we let it get down to less than two good gyros then it's iffy. With three good gyros we can get it to come down just about anywhere.
Fixing HST is expensive, but its not the costs of the HST parts it's the $1B plus STS mission. As of right now the Return To Flight rules say STS can't go to HST because they require a visual checkout of the orbiter prior to de-orbiting and that means a visit to ISS. Also ISS is the "sanctuary" in case something did go wrong. The STS can't carrry enough on-board fuel to reach HST and ISS on the same mission. The launch profile for each destination is much different since they are each in different orbits altitudes and types.
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You get very good GPS as you can see a large number of the GSP satellites. I had a friend who worked on the GPS for the STS (Shuttle) back in the 1990's. The number of data points from seeing so many sattelites overwhelmed the Integrator software in the GPS unit and it had to be rewritten to use more data points. Apprently getting TOO MUCH data could hurt the older generation GPS, I don't know if that is a problem now. If you can't measure distance accurately how can you measure the closing speed/distance of the two vessels so the supply mission knows when to slow down and use the radar to dock. The only reason the ISS went to GPS is the new Progress ships use it, there had been no docking problems with the old systems except the one time the Russian cosmonaut tried to hand fly to Progess to the dock and came in a bit too hot.
Use of such "dictionary" words as you posted is perfectly acceptable in some circles but not in others. I wouldn't speak to someone from "down home" in Lower Alabama with words like that, I'd say "Sorry I'm late Ya'll, there was a big Sale down at Wal-Mart and I had to get some stuff before it went off Sale". If I said "Pardon my lack of timely arrival however I was unavoidably detained by the fact of I had to take advantage of the opportunity to procure some merchandise at a massive discount at the local retail emporium" I'd be laughed out of town. Understanding when it is OK to show your intelligence and grasp of a foreign language and when you should just use the local color to blend in is very hard for non-natives. As long as someone communicates the point I don't hold using local terms against them. But I SO hate the abuse of "You know", that'll set me off very quickly you know? ;)
Exactly! He can't be trusted to follow the LEGAL rules, which brings up the question can he be trusted to follow any company rules? Loose cannons like this can really damage a company. While he may have a degree from NCSU (a fine school) obviously the don't teach Ethics to the CS students. In my hiring I look for those who like what they do but also have other interests outside technology. It just seems they are better fits in a team environment.
I wonder if some of the "dialects" of English such as those found in various Regions of the United States contribute to the mastery problem? I have found that European langauages and Slavic language speakers seem to take to English very well. Of course since English is kind of a "melting pot" lanaguage at least a few words should be familiar to almost any foreign language!
The poster requested a BBC shortwave signal in NORTH AMERICA, i.e. United States and Canada. You know the former colonies from way back when? We kinda like the BBC to see how the folks "back home" are doing! ;)
You can't get a NOC if you are not a citizen, are a felon, or have financial problems. In some cases I have seen since it is a NOC, they don't even do the paperwork, just check for outstanding warrants. I still think this is all made up and if not some clerk in the White House Security Office needs to be fired. Of course since clerks are lifetime civil servants you can't hardly fire them even if they skipped this guy on purpose to make GWB (or one of his staff) look bad. It's been known to happen.
Good point, go read about the "South Sea Bubble" that occured in France (and England). And see how uncanny the resemblance is to the "dot com" bubble.
A 5 Mod? No way..Tell me what new car company have you seen in the last 25 years? DeLorean was the only one and it went under. And I didn't realize cars were ever a "highly exploitable technology" even in the Model T days. How about computers? IBM went down a bit, Dell, Gateway, HP and others crept in but there have been NO new serious players in over 10 years. As for CPUs there hasn't been any new CPU chips mfgs in quite a while, speciality chips like DSPs and ASICs is where the new entries have been. Dot com's are too easy, anyone can start one these days. So, it's not a fair comparison with your other businesses. Dot coms can be started on a few thousands of dollars, computers and cars take millions. Which is one BIG reason why you don't see new entrants. The cost along with firmly entrenched competition creates an enormous barrier to entry. You are all over the place with your arguments versus your examples. I don't dispute that new technlogies can spawn new business opportunities, its just that cars, computers and dot coms are not good examples.
The press does NOT hold Security Clearances as they are NOT exposed to Classifed information. If you have no need to know you have no need for a clearance. Halliburton had a contract to sell things to Iraq. Perfectly legal. No US Companies are allowed to do business with Iran. This crap was started by the liberals, a bi-partisan Congressional Committee looked at things and found nada wrong. The "overcharges" everyone screams about were perfectly legal in most casse and in a few others there were paperwork screwups. Having worked for Gov't contractors for many years I know how much peperwork there is and how confusing it is.
1) You don't need a Security Clearance to go to the White House and meet the President. At least GWB isn't leasing out the Lincoln bedroom! 2) My heart bleeds, the media is still so left wing it is amazing. I KNOW there are paid shills (anyone at CNN) for the liberals. Tit for tat..no foul. 3) Get off the Halliburton case. It's over. 4) I am puzzled by Karen Hughes at State. She is a good poltical agent but I think she isn't cut out for that job. Sometimes GWBs personal loyalty goes a bit far. However, I don't think Hughes can do any harm at State, it's already one screwed up place with career civil servants running the place. 5) Karl Rove and GWB didn't even know each other that long ago when Jose was playing base-e-ball.
Therefore, it seems prudent to ask what happens to whatever it is SCOX has, and maybe keep an eye on it lest it end up in the hands of someone who's bought into McBrides version of things and this ends up being an ongoing problem. That's right. I want this settled not some out of court agreement. I think IBM will not settle until Linux and thier good name are both cleared. I fear SCOX pulling some sort of shady bankruptcy deal and leaving Linux hanging in regards to whether UNIX "contamination" is present. SCOX is Caldera but it's not the same mindset as Caldera was. Caldera actually produced a product, and the remains of that company still do make a Citrix like product that some say is quite good. SCOX produces lots of BS and legal work for Boise Schiller. I think AT&T did "give up". They made a corporate decision to sell the UNIX business, as they didn't see any profit in it and they weren't sure what they owned. Rather than fight they sold. In hindsight it was probably a good business decision but it did lead to a proliferation of UNIX "flavors" which fragmented the market and introduced incompatabilities. UNIX was no longer Sys V or BSD, it was HP-UX, Solaris, SGI-IRIX, IBM AIX, etc.
OK, so how do you detect a fireball that occurs this fast? Caninstruments even measure to that level of detail? Or is all this theoretical both in creation and time? I don't want to subscribe to RTFA.
How extremely short lived? From the Wikipedia article you linked.. So, for instance, a 1 second-lived black hole has a mass of 2.28 × 10E5 kg = 2.05 × 10E22 J = 5 × 10E6 megatons of TNT. The initial power is 6.84 × 10E21 W. In the experiement those holes the create must have lifetimes on the order of fractions of a femtosecond as the mass they are using is on the scale of atomic particles which is a whole lot less tha 10E5 kg. Not to mention the decay energy they give up would be awesome. Hmmm.. Step 1 : Create black holes in Lab Step 2: Take the decay energy, convert to electricity Step 3: PROFIT! :)
I'll have to look at the Math. I bet it is based on standard words in a dictionary not slang or made up items. Did you find the URL, I'd like to look at the mathematical model? As long as you remember it it does'nt matter what the phrase is, it could be complete nonsense such as "the slithy toves did gyre and gimbal and "all mimsy were the borogroves" :)
Time in nanoseconds is available on most CPUs, to clock at the GHz range the system clock has to be that accurate. I don't know if Windoze can read it to that level but I know I can in Unix and most embedded OSes.
I disagree. Passphrases just like passwords don't have to use real words. Take PGP for instance, I can have a pass phrase of a complete sentence with all sorts of special chars and capitalization or punctuation as well. I can use "the quick Brown Fox jumped over the lazy dog" and it will not be the same as "the Quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog.". Subtle differences that a dictionary attack would take a LOT longer. If you use the pass phrase as seed to encrypt with something like the system clock time in nanoseconds then it gets even better.
I've been around UNIX 25 yrs, since the days BEFORE BSD and System V. I wrote code on Xenix the old MS flavor of UNIX derived from Sys III. We are saying the SAME thing, that SCO has crap to claim they own Linux. The Unix "tree" is full of leaks of code into the public domain, so much so that AT&T simply gave up a lot of rights in Sys V BEFORE Novell/Caldera/SCO ever got into the loop. I think a lot of folks (Novell/Caldera/SCOX) who thought they own UNIX are holding a mostly empty bag. If you don't protect your copyrights you can lose them. SCO has dropped the claims regarding Linux as a whole and seems to now be focusing on a "contract dispute" that code from Project Monterey made it into AIX and then into Linux. And SCO has NEVER produced anything to say they got the UNIX copyrights from Caldera. If SCO DID own the copyrights why did they have to pass 90% plus of any revenues from Sales on to Novell? The history of UNIX is so damn convoluted and full of things no one would do today with IP that I'm not sure anyone involved can prove what they own and don't own. I know the facts, you seem to read a lot into posts that are not there. Typical for this place. At least on Groklaw you don't get jumped for things but it gets explained.
" There is no such think as completely secure."..Well there is "think" but there isn't "thing" :)
Two factor is not better than one unless that second factor is also very hard to break. Combine something like a PIN and RSA key Fob with Digital Certificates (OK, that's three factors but two come from the user) and you are very secure. With a unique digital certificate issued by the bank that is verified by a special plug-in for your browser that adds security. Also what about using a pass PHRASE instead of a password, that adds complexity and makes things harder to crack. The good Dr. S has a point but I think the examples he gave are not good illustrations. If you run a good Spyware/Malware/AV check you'll catch the Trojans. With those tools becomes integrated into the OS and working behind the scences it's getting less likely you will be phished by a Trojan.
SCO is trying to say UNIX code THEY OWN made it into Linux, they couldn't find any so now they want to go with the crazy theory that AIX violates thier copyright on UNIX. ALL SCO got from Novell was the right to distribute System V and to make a version of UNIX based on that. If SCO v Novell was over, there would be no need for SCO v IBM.
Unless he has signed over the copyright on the original code he wrote, his company has violated his copyright by claiming it. And if it is patentable then it is HIS to patent not thiers. If it included GPL code from Company X then it has to be released under the GPL and Company X holds the copyrights still. The employer is inviting trouble, the verbal agreements do NOT supercede copyrights and contract law. Mr D should first inform his employer what the possible liabilities are, and if they continue he should protect his a** (and rights) and get a lawyer, file a copyright infringement suit and ask for the company to be restrained from distributing the product until the suit is settled. Oh, and notify IBM and others that thier copyrights are being infringed upon too.
Yes, it can be de-orbited with not mission IF IF IF they do it before the control gyro's go completely dead. That point is predicted to occur in the next 3-4 years. If they wait till there are not enough good gyros, it will eventually de-orbit on it's own but as far as I know there is not a prediction of where it might land. There are just too many variables to predict with any accuracy the re-entry with zero control. My point is sending a "de-orbit mission" has certain fixed costs, so why not fix it AND also prepare it for de-orbit at some point in the future should the need arise. That way they can wring all the science out of it until they lose too many gyros and then they can direct the re-entry. That solution gives you a win-win situation and makes the politicians happy too.
No disagreement here. A minor point that the 2nd Shuttle could standby loaded for a Mission but it would have to be unloaded for Rescue, or vice versa. It's really not a good option at all.
You haven't read my posts on this topic over the past couple years have you? And one yesterday as well. Why risk lives and a STS to DE-ORBIT HST? It costs just as much to go there to fix or de-orbit and the new devices are ready. Point me to an article by a credible source that backs your claim. I know what I worked on when I was at NASA. Want the name of my supervisor and co-workers? I know at least one of them comes around here once in a while.
IIRC there is only 1 pad at KSC they can use for HST launches and they have a couple weeks R&R after each launch to get ready for the next one. A 30 day turnaround is about the minumum. And KSC does NOT have the manpower to get TWO STS missions ready at one time. The RTF commission looked at this option and decided it was not feasible. Also, if there was a problem on Shuttle A then there is a strong likliehood it will also occur on Shuttle B (rescue mission) thus you just lost TWO Shuttles. Until you know what went wrong on Shuttle A it is insane to launch a rescue mission!
I worked on COS and WFC3. The instrument hardware could be reused but they would require extensive software mods which I suspect he didn't include in his costs. Also, unless they want to cripple the "new" HST with old systems hardware there will need to be some redesign done on things like power supplies, gyroscopes,wiring, interfaces, etc. Not to mention any possible systems upgrade as STSI. I see this as a bit of self presevation for STSI because without HST they would have to cut back on staff. I think $1B is WAY too low, like I said in a post the other day NASA Scientists ALWAYS underestimate time and money by at least a factor of 2. Then add NASA BS and finance inefficiencies on top of that and I'd be surprised if it cost less than $4B in the end.
Horseshit is about right. ALL your points are wrong. I worked on Hubble. The next generation instruments have BEEN ready they are stored in Dry Nitrogen now at GSFC. HST will deorbit just fine, UNLESS we let it get down to less than two good gyros then it's iffy. With three good gyros we can get it to come down just about anywhere. Fixing HST is expensive, but its not the costs of the HST parts it's the $1B plus STS mission. As of right now the Return To Flight rules say STS can't go to HST because they require a visual checkout of the orbiter prior to de-orbiting and that means a visit to ISS. Also ISS is the "sanctuary" in case something did go wrong. The STS can't carrry enough on-board fuel to reach HST and ISS on the same mission. The launch profile for each destination is much different since they are each in different orbits altitudes and types.