However, I can't shake the feeling that NASA simply doesn't have faith in there own repair techniques. It would make me very nervous if there was a warning label on a repair kit that said, "Last Resort Warning: Only use if you're pretty sure you're gonna die anyway."
That pretty much sums up how I feel about any disaster recovery plan. It sorta hits close to home in a way for me, too, actually. We (well, I...) had to do that over the past weekend: we had a production server for a small business (read: too cheap for hardware redundancy) that I help consult for, die. Hard. The raid went out too. Had to recreate the raid from scratch and the data from backup tape.
Worked fine in the end, but the only way we could actually be sure that it would work is if we either had a spare server (which was obviously not in the budget) or if we took down the production box.
We monitor the backups, we watch the raid integrity, but in the end, it's just prayin to the FSM if the excrement hits the fan.
Think how many, and how much more advanced, unmanned systems could have been deployed if the Shuttle program hadn't gobbled up NASA funding.
Like the Hubble? Oh wait
I blame the ISS more than the shuttle. We could've had more Hubble-like devices out there if we didn't lock ourselves into dedicating all shuttle hours to that boondoggle of Skylab 2 out there.
To properly explore space you can't rely on one thing. Sure, we've got unmanned probes to do amazing things (we being mankind; Japan's asteroid mission was incredible) but there's also a benefit to having high powered satellites within orbit that we can maintain.
Plus shuttle missions have the added benefit of being able to observe the effects of outer space on people, and what limitations they have. You know...something that might be important for when the tourists go up...
How many astronauts have we had work on the underside of the shuttle, within arm's reach of tiles that are made of 10% material and 90% void, and the material's just 1-2mm fibre strands of silica, standing on the end of a wobbily robotic arm?
As far as 'afraid to let them out the door,' you do realize these guys are putting the ISS together on spacewalks, and they've lost parts on those excursions as well. Also, suits have been damaged (gash through two layers of glove). You know why we haven't lost anyone on a spacewalk? Because at the first hint of any trouble, they're back in the shuttle.
Here's a physics question for you:
Astronaut standing on robotic arm underneath shuttle. Arm wobbles towards shuttle, then down, away from shuttle. What direction does the 200lb astronaut with 200lb gear go?
That's right. Toward the shuttle. Toward tiles that are 90% nothing. But this risk is worth trying out a complex repair maneuver? And you want the space program to continue?
The HRSI tiles are made of a low-density, high-purity silica 99.8-percent amorphous fiber (fibers derived from common sand, 1 to 2 mils thick) insulation that is made rigid by ceramic bonding. Because 90 percent of the tile is void and the remaining 10 percent is material, the tile weighs approximately 9 pounds per cubic foot.
My structural physics knowledge is a bit lacking, but something made of 10% rigid fibre 1-2mm thick and 90% void doesn't sound like the sturdiest structure to be applying force to.
I'm trying to think of a similar, down to earth item that mimics that structure...but best I can come up with would be like packing peanuts. Close, but it's not rigid enough.
It has been *tested.* What you're suggesting is akin to taking down the company servers. The live servers. The servers that run the company. Not backups of the servers, not test boxes, THE servers. The ones that make you piss your pants on a simple restart no matter how redundant they are.
NASA's tested applying the goop on practice tiles on the end of the arm. Here's the thing: the arm wobbles. the underbelly of the shuttle is fragile. Astronauts on an EVA don't exactly have the same forces available that we do to react instantly. Stuff floats out there, inertia, all that stuff. One wrong hiccup and that 400-500 pound weight is crashing into the shuttle and there's no way to stop it.
That's why the don't want to do a repair: the risks outweigh the benefits. And what do you think the media would say if the tiles were damaged further during a repair? I shudder to think...
Who cared about the space program after Apollo 11 other than nerds?
Spirit and Opportunity have entered year three, well past their 90 day expected life span, yet I'd wager the lost Polar Lander and crashed Climate Orbiter got more press than the little rovers that could ever will.
What's that mantra we IT folks keep repeating?... If it ain't broke, don't fix it.
I'd argue it's better to wait until the shuttle's really busted before trying out complex repair maneuvers. In that case, the shuttle's already a writeoff; if the astronaut crashes into the tiles or they're otherwise damaged, it won't matter.
I take it you're the type that pushes out service packs day one throughout a corporate network too.
What if the astronaut crashes into the tiles? What if the arm locks up? What if the repairs cause more damage to the tiles? NASA's a very conservative organization. They already take risks that'd make most people white, they're not keen to take on more than they have to.
If a shuttle gets damaged to the point where repairs are required, it won't matter if the situation is made worse because it's already destined to be a flaming comet. But to take a structurally sound machine and risk making it worse is a height of folly.
We need beautiful documents more than we need beautiful interfaces...
The unwashed masses tend to confuse beautiful with lots of clipart, font styles and colors, bolding and italicizing rather than functional and effective though.
Never heard of tiles coming off the Mercury, Gemini or Apollo capsules either.
There's something to be said for that whole 'protecting the heat shield on launch' design. Don't get me wrong, I love the shuttle, and I'm sure they meant very well when it was designed (hell, I'd've gone for it) but now that they've been stuck with it the flaws really start to stand out. Clipper ship in space is right; beautiful lines...but who uses clipper ships anymore?
Astronauts have balls of steel to begin with. Two sets. You're sitting, surrounded by just how much in explosive fuel? Blasted into one of the most uninhabitable climates for human survival. (Ranks up there with volcano caldera and bottom of ocean...) Then set on a 100 mile free fall course to the Earth, the same trip many meteors take, and burn up well before hitting the ground most of the time.
They tend to be the exception more than the rule though. I've had wines that vary from $2 to $100 a bottle. While hardly a wide range, that $100 was freakin outstanding. However, I can get by perfectly fine regularly on bottles going for $6-7. (Two buck Chuck doesn't cut it for me, thanks...I've had too many bottles that should rather go on a salad than in a wine glass...)
Plus, FWIW, comparing Scotch and burboun are apples and oranges. Scotch uses barley, burboun requires at least 51% corn. However, within classes, I'd agree that after a certain price point, there's little reason to go higher for casual drinking. (Johnnie Black is perfectly fine compared to 12 yr. Glenmorangie, IMO. Sure, the Glen's better...but not enough so to bother doubling the price on a regular basis)
You will notice a major difference in a finely prepared, high quality bottle (note the omittion of the word 'expensive' though) as opposed to the mass produced everyday fare.
John Cleese did this in Wine for the Confused. Although his test subjects weren't exactly sommaliers, there was a test between 6 different bottles ranging from $5 to $300...someone picked the $5 as their personal fav.
This is assuming that rental prices went up since the introduction of this service, which hasn't happened. The prices are the same now as they were before, so technically, they're not paying for it.
If you can only view 6 hours a month, you only pay Netflix $6/month. I'm on the 4-disc plan, pay $24 a month, and get 24 hours of streaming time.
Personally, I'm not sure why one would bother breaking the streaming DRM anyway; the quality is pretty bad considering. If you want to store it for a long term, just rent the DVD and rip it from there.
I don't mind not being able to save for posterity.
Most of these things I'm only going to watch once. I mean, as nice as having my own copy of all the Doctor Who episodes out on DVD would be (which are what I'm currently going through on Netflix streaming)...there doesn't exist enough time in my life to watch all the things I plan to twice.
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However, I can't shake the feeling that NASA simply doesn't have faith in there own repair techniques. It would make me very nervous if there was a warning label on a repair kit that said, "Last Resort Warning: Only use if you're pretty sure you're gonna die anyway."
That pretty much sums up how I feel about any disaster recovery plan. It sorta hits close to home in a way for me, too, actually. We (well, I...) had to do that over the past weekend: we had a production server for a small business (read: too cheap for hardware redundancy) that I help consult for, die. Hard. The raid went out too. Had to recreate the raid from scratch and the data from backup tape.
Worked fine in the end, but the only way we could actually be sure that it would work is if we either had a spare server (which was obviously not in the budget) or if we took down the production box.
We monitor the backups, we watch the raid integrity, but in the end, it's just prayin to the FSM if the excrement hits the fan.
Think how many, and how much more advanced, unmanned systems could have been deployed if the Shuttle program hadn't gobbled up NASA funding.
Like the Hubble? Oh wait
I blame the ISS more than the shuttle. We could've had more Hubble-like devices out there if we didn't lock ourselves into dedicating all shuttle hours to that boondoggle of Skylab 2 out there.
To properly explore space you can't rely on one thing. Sure, we've got unmanned probes to do amazing things (we being mankind; Japan's asteroid mission was incredible) but there's also a benefit to having high powered satellites within orbit that we can maintain.
Plus shuttle missions have the added benefit of being able to observe the effects of outer space on people, and what limitations they have. You know...something that might be important for when the tourists go up...
How many astronauts have we had work on the underside of the shuttle, within arm's reach of tiles that are made of 10% material and 90% void, and the material's just 1-2mm fibre strands of silica, standing on the end of a wobbily robotic arm?
s -newsref/sts_sys.html for details on tile composition)
( http://science.ksc.nasa.gov/shuttle/technology/st
As far as 'afraid to let them out the door,' you do realize these guys are putting the ISS together on spacewalks, and they've lost parts on those excursions as well. Also, suits have been damaged (gash through two layers of glove). You know why we haven't lost anyone on a spacewalk? Because at the first hint of any trouble, they're back in the shuttle.
Here's a physics question for you:
Astronaut standing on robotic arm underneath shuttle.
Arm wobbles towards shuttle, then down, away from shuttle.
What direction does the 200lb astronaut with 200lb gear go?
That's right. Toward the shuttle. Toward tiles that are 90% nothing. But this risk is worth trying out a complex repair maneuver? And you want the space program to continue?
The HRSI tiles are made of a low-density, high-purity silica 99.8-percent amorphous fiber (fibers derived from common sand, 1 to 2 mils thick) insulation that is made rigid by ceramic bonding. Because 90 percent of the tile is void and the remaining 10 percent is material, the tile weighs approximately 9 pounds per cubic foot.
s -newsref/sts_sys.html
http://science.ksc.nasa.gov/shuttle/technology/st
My structural physics knowledge is a bit lacking, but something made of 10% rigid fibre 1-2mm thick and 90% void doesn't sound like the sturdiest structure to be applying force to.
I'm trying to think of a similar, down to earth item that mimics that structure...but best I can come up with would be like packing peanuts. Close, but it's not rigid enough.
Do you also ask why they can't make planes out of the materials the black boxes are made of?
It has been *tested.* What you're suggesting is akin to taking down the company servers. The live servers. The servers that run the company. Not backups of the servers, not test boxes, THE servers. The ones that make you piss your pants on a simple restart no matter how redundant they are.
NASA's tested applying the goop on practice tiles on the end of the arm. Here's the thing: the arm wobbles. the underbelly of the shuttle is fragile. Astronauts on an EVA don't exactly have the same forces available that we do to react instantly. Stuff floats out there, inertia, all that stuff. One wrong hiccup and that 400-500 pound weight is crashing into the shuttle and there's no way to stop it.
That's why the don't want to do a repair: the risks outweigh the benefits. And what do you think the media would say if the tiles were damaged further during a repair? I shudder to think...
Who cared about the space program after Apollo 11 other than nerds?
Spirit and Opportunity have entered year three, well past their 90 day expected life span, yet I'd wager the lost Polar Lander and crashed Climate Orbiter got more press than the little rovers that could ever will.
What's that mantra we IT folks keep repeating?... If it ain't broke, don't fix it.
I'd argue it's better to wait until the shuttle's really busted before trying out complex repair maneuvers. In that case, the shuttle's already a writeoff; if the astronaut crashes into the tiles or they're otherwise damaged, it won't matter.
I take it you're the type that pushes out service packs day one throughout a corporate network too.
What if the astronaut crashes into the tiles? What if the arm locks up? What if the repairs cause more damage to the tiles? NASA's a very conservative organization. They already take risks that'd make most people white, they're not keen to take on more than they have to.
If a shuttle gets damaged to the point where repairs are required, it won't matter if the situation is made worse because it's already destined to be a flaming comet. But to take a structurally sound machine and risk making it worse is a height of folly.
...Microsoft's lawyers will have magically found what those 235 patents actually are.
We need beautiful documents more than we need beautiful interfaces...
The unwashed masses tend to confuse beautiful with lots of clipart, font styles and colors, bolding and italicizing rather than functional and effective though.
...wasn't that Buscemi's character from Armageddon?
Never heard of tiles coming off the Mercury, Gemini or Apollo capsules either.
There's something to be said for that whole 'protecting the heat shield on launch' design. Don't get me wrong, I love the shuttle, and I'm sure they meant very well when it was designed (hell, I'd've gone for it) but now that they've been stuck with it the flaws really start to stand out. Clipper ship in space is right; beautiful lines...but who uses clipper ships anymore?
Astronauts have balls of steel to begin with. Two sets. You're sitting, surrounded by just how much in explosive fuel? Blasted into one of the most uninhabitable climates for human survival. (Ranks up there with volcano caldera and bottom of ocean...) Then set on a 100 mile free fall course to the Earth, the same trip many meteors take, and burn up well before hitting the ground most of the time.
And yet I so want to do it for myself...
Jon Stewart can be very serious as well. Should check out his appearance on Crossfire. It's brutal.
They tend to be the exception more than the rule though. I've had wines that vary from $2 to $100 a bottle. While hardly a wide range, that $100 was freakin outstanding. However, I can get by perfectly fine regularly on bottles going for $6-7. (Two buck Chuck doesn't cut it for me, thanks...I've had too many bottles that should rather go on a salad than in a wine glass...)
Plus, FWIW, comparing Scotch and burboun are apples and oranges. Scotch uses barley, burboun requires at least 51% corn. However, within classes, I'd agree that after a certain price point, there's little reason to go higher for casual drinking. (Johnnie Black is perfectly fine compared to 12 yr. Glenmorangie, IMO. Sure, the Glen's better...but not enough so to bother doubling the price on a regular basis)
You will notice a major difference in a finely prepared, high quality bottle (note the omittion of the word 'expensive' though) as opposed to the mass produced everyday fare.
John Cleese did this in Wine for the Confused. Although his test subjects weren't exactly sommaliers, there was a test between 6 different bottles ranging from $5 to $300...someone picked the $5 as their personal fav.
Well, Bob Nardelli got work CEOing Chrystler after he tanked Home Depot. Carly Fiorina still gets work on director's boards.
There doesn't seem to be a thing CXOs can do and not get work on other company's boards.
Well, the expected operational life of a shuttle was only 10 years, so Challenger, yes, but Columbia, no.
I was supposed to learn it in classes, not on my own time.
I hope you pointed it out to them that homework is done on student's time, and by that logic, homework should not be given.
Not that teachers are logical, of course...
I suppose "because it's there" is too cliché?
This is assuming that rental prices went up since the introduction of this service, which hasn't happened. The prices are the same now as they were before, so technically, they're not paying for it.
Sort of like putting DVD-ROM content on DVDs then, isn't it...
If you can only view 6 hours a month, you only pay Netflix $6/month. I'm on the 4-disc plan, pay $24 a month, and get 24 hours of streaming time.
Personally, I'm not sure why one would bother breaking the streaming DRM anyway; the quality is pretty bad considering. If you want to store it for a long term, just rent the DVD and rip it from there.
I don't mind not being able to save for posterity.
Most of these things I'm only going to watch once. I mean, as nice as having my own copy of all the Doctor Who episodes out on DVD would be (which are what I'm currently going through on Netflix streaming)...there doesn't exist enough time in my life to watch all the things I plan to twice.