Space & Astronomy/Space and Astronomy (October 1993).iso/mac/TEXT/SPACEDIG/V09_5/V9_593.TXT

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Subject: SPACE Digest V9 #593

SPACE Digest                                      Volume 9 : Issue 593

Today's Topics:
            PAL format spaceflight videos
           Re: Don't Mess with NASA (afterburners)
              Re: S-Band Beacon on Moon
             Re: Henry's (not Weinhards)
        Re: Catch-A-Planet (was:Re:Curiosity)
              Re: Neil Armstrong
              Re: Apollo Ascent Modules
         Re: Space Activist Survey, Food for Thought
          Re: Computers on the space station
          Re: Does This Proposal Make Sense
----------------------------------------------------------------------

Date: 25 Jul 89 04:53:48 GMT
From: uhccux!munnari.oz.au!otc!metro!basser!usage!bio73![e-mail]  (Karl Redell )
Subject: PAL format spaceflight videos

An advert from Spaceflight Vol.31, April 1989 of interest to Australian
readers has just crossed my desk.  It is for PAL format spaceflight
videos.  Most are 54 to 60 minutes, but a few are shorter.  The videos
are $39 + $5 for airmail postage - payable in US dollars to AVD
767 St. Michaels Dr., Mitchellville, MD 20716 USA.  I have never
purchased one of these videos so can't comment on them.

Challenger Accident Investigation (30 min)
T1:    Mercury Redstones 1, 2, & 3
T2:    Friendship 7
T3:    Aurora 7 & Sigma 7
T4:    Faith 7 & Mercury Summary
T5:    Gemini 4,6, & 7
T6:    Gemini 8 & 10 (38 min)
T7:    Gemini 11 & 12 (44 min)
T8:    World was there (Mercury flights) + Legacy of Gemini
T9:    Apollo 4, 5, & 7 (45 min)
T10:    Apollo 8 & 9
T11:    Apollo 10 & 11
T12:    Apollo 12 & 13
T13:    Apollo 14 & 15
T14:    Apollo 16 & 17
T15:    Skylab 1 & 2
T16:    Skylab Summary & ASTP
T17:    STS 1 & 2 [Shuttle flights I assume]
T18:    STS 3 & 4 (44 min)
T19:    STS 5 & 6
T20:    STS 7 & 8 (72 min)
T21:    STS 9
T22:    STS 41B
T23:    STS 41C
T24:    STS 41D
T25:    STS 41G
T26:    STS 51A
T27:    STS 51C
T28:    STS 51D
T29:    STS 51B
T30:    STS 51G (42 min)
T31:    STS 51F
T32:    STS 51l
T33:    STS 51j
T34:    STS 61A
T35:    STS 61B
T36:    STS 61C (42 min)
T37:    STS 51L All TV Launch Angles Released
T38:    X-15 & Flying Machines
T39:    NASA 1st 25 years
T40:    New Frontiers (STS 1-4) & We Deliver (STS 5-8)

------------------------------

Date: 26 Jul 89 22:05:36 GMT
From: vsi1!daver!lynx![e-mail]  (Neal Woodall)
Subject: Re: Don't Mess with NASA (afterburners)

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Mary Shafer) writes:
>In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Patrik Andreasen) writes:

>>(Various postings about how you can't by a fighter as your own personal toy)

>>But howzabout a F-20 Tigershark? After all the USAF didn't want it, and
>>there are 3 (or two?) prototypes that Northrop built on their own money.

>One.  The other two were destroyed in crashes--one in Canada, one in
>Korea (I think)--during flight demonstrations.  Probably G-LOC, maybe
>the T-38/F-5 inverted pitch hang-up.

I thought the Pentagon had given permission to Nothrop to sell the F20 to
foreign cusomers, as long as the plane had a wimpy engine and no good
avionics.

What is the ture story if this is incorrect?




Neal

------------------------------

Date: 26 Jul 89 09:50:51 GMT
From: mcvax!ukc!inmos![e-mail]  (Conor O'Neill)
Subject: Re: S-Band Beacon on Moon

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Rusty Carruth) writes:
>In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (John Limpert) writes:
>->I started working at a NASA tracking station shortly after ALSEP was
>->shut down.  The story I heard was that NASA ran out of money to receive,
>->record and process the telemetry data....
>
>So, we shut down the transmitter so that NOBODY could recieve it.

I was at the Spaceport a couple of weeks ago and went on the tour.
They mentioned that they had shut down the beacons, but certainly
implied that they could be turned on again, though I don't remember
their actual wording. I remember thinking at the time
"So when there's more money they can be re-started".



--
Conor O'Neill, Software Group, INMOS Ltd. JANET:    [e-mail]
Disclaimer: All views are my own,         UUCP:     uunet!inmos-c!conor
            not those of INMOS.           INTERNET: @col.hp.com:conor@inmos-c

------------------------------

Date: 27 Jul 89 19:07:00 GMT
From: apollo![e-mail]  (Peter Nelson)
Subject: Re: Henry's (not Weinhards)


    [e-mail] (Eugene Miya) posts...

>My point is that the public has a very short memory, attention span.
>Alderin made a comments about that today on a visit.  We (people)
>have to be willing to engage in projects we may not see in our lifetimes,
>nor will directly involve us.  If it has to absolutely be YOU, who goes
>into orbit, then maybe, none of us goes.  The attention span problem
>(called "Crisis management" in some areas), is pervasive in other
>areas: education, business/manufacturing, urban problems, economic
>competitiveness.  We have to deal with this.  We have to be willing
>to elect people who think beyond their next election.

   But we also have to give those people a CLEAR message about what
   we want.

   The problem that we face in setting goals for space is part of
   a much broader problem that we face in our society at large.
   We are an extraordinarily diverse society.  We have an amazing
   range of beliefs, values, priorities, needs, expectations, and
   backgrounds.   For the last several decades we have been utterly
   plagued by an inability to reach consensus on important national
   issues.  We just don't have any good mechanism to do this.

   The Vietnam War was a fine example.  To say there was controversy
   about it understates the problem.  There weren't just two
   viewpoints, but in fact there were a *multitude* of opinions
   about why we were there, whether we should be there, what our
   goals were, how we should conduct ourselves, and by what metric
   we should measure our progress.   And we have the same problem
   with issues like drugs, poverty, the environment, the economy,
   defense, and of course, space policy.

   Typically, when confronted with this problem we either:

   1.   Make no decision at all.  ("let's study it some more")

   2.   Make a decision that is so watered-down by compromise
        as to be ineffective.

   3.   Make an ad-hoc political deal with a coalition which
        breaks down after the next election, before it can
        actually accomplish anything.

   Personally, I don't see any solution to this.   If things reach
   a real crisis (I mean a REAL crisis, not a "media crisis") in
   areas like defense or the environment then people may be forced
   to all agree on something, if only to deal with the crisis.
   But I can't imagine WHAT it would take to get agreement on
   space-policy.  (an alien invasion?  JAL stealing customers from
   US airlines by offering free flights to the moon?,  ??)

>projects (non-DOD) which go into the next Century [isn't it amazing
>how the DOD is able to do this?].

    One way the DoD does it is by taking the long-term projects off the
    books, which the Congress allows for national security.  The
    initial Stealth research was funded this way.  There are ample
    opportunities for abuse of this system and DoD has produced
    some real turkeys and wasted a lot of money in this manner, too.
    It's easy to avoid public controversy if you avoid public scrutiny.
    But a close look at those DoD projects that HAVE been in the
    public eye, such as MX/Midgetman, SDI, B2, and earlier, DIVAD,
    B1, and of course defense policy problems like Vietnam and more
    recently, the Marines in Lebanon, show that DoD's track record
    in consensus-building is little better than NASA's.

>Anyways, time to go do some real work.

    Yeah, like learning the kanji characters for 'orbiting factory',
    'planetary probe' and 'how much do we owe you?'.

                                                   ---Peter

------------------------------

Date: 25 Jul 89 15:51:35 GMT
From: [e-mail]  (David Palmer)
Subject: Re: Catch-A-Planet (was:Re:Curiosity)

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Clayton Cramer) writes:
>
>Sort of related subject.
>
>Some of the very oldest Egyptian writings refer to Sirius as being
>red -- which is clearly isn't.  I've seen the claim made that Sirius
>B may have been much larger and red giant in the past -- but not
>recently enough for the Egyptians to have seen Sirius as red, without
>a significant rewrite of astrophysics.
>
>Comments?
>

I myself have seen Sirius red many times during my last five years in L.A.
I have also seen Antares shine a brilliant yellow.
Before I came to LA I couldn't see colors in stars at all.  I guess smog
is good for the eyes.
>--
>Clayton E. Cramer {pyramid,pixar,tekbspa}!optilink!cramer
>Deng Xiaoping: why every home needs a rifle.

Ollie North: Why every jetliner needs defenses against SAMs

        David Palmer
        [e-mail]
        ...rutgers!cit-vax!tybalt.caltech.edu!palmer
    "Only 10% of the 4000 mile long coastline was affected."
        -Exxon's version of the oil spill as reported to stockholders

------------------------------

Date: 26 Jul 89 23:20:19 GMT
From: zephyr.ens.tek.com!tekgen!tekigm2![e-mail]  (John Obendorfer)
Subject: Re: Neil Armstrong

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Mary Shafer) writes:
>
>How many astronauts, other than shuttle mission or payload specialists, have
>there been who were never in the military?  I am using the strict definition
>of astronaut = someone who has been in space on a NASA mission.

   This is strictly from memory, so I could be mistaken in one of these
instances, but I believe one of the two moonwalkers on Apollo 17 was
a civilian geologist and that on at least one of the Skylab missions
a civilian physicist was in the crew.  These were, of course, the
pre-shuttle equivalent of mission specialists -- they did not fly
any of the vehicles involved.  Sorry, but names don't come to mind.

   John

------------------------------

Date: 27 Jul 89 15:36:27 GMT
From: att!cbnewsh![e-mail]  (david.l.jacobowitz)
Subject: Re: Apollo Ascent Modules

> I believe the Apollo 10 LM AS (Snoopy) was sent into solar orbit after it
> was jettisoned; the descent stage was left in lunar orbit.
>
Are you sure the descent stage wasn't left in earth orbit?  :-) :-)
(On the moon).
--
Dave J.                                             This space for rent
usual disclaimer implied                               Call 555-3838

------------------------------

Date: 25 Jul 89 07:51:03 GMT
From: uhccux!munnari.oz.au!murtoa.cs.mu.oz.au!ditmela!yarra!melba!rattle![e-mail]  (Zev Sero)
Subject: Re: Space Activist Survey, Food for Thought

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (William Lewis) writes:

   In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (William Baxter) writes:
   >3.   Are you aware that less than half the population of Mexico was alive
                ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
   >at the time of the last Apollo moon landing?
   >William Baxter

      The other half was dead? Why did they include corpses in the population
   count?

Obviously, because they vote for the PRI.  See the description of
Californian democracy in `Friday'.
--
                Zev Sero  -  [e-mail]
"Men have no right to put the well-being of the present generation
wholly out of the question.  Perhaps the only moral trust with any
certainty in our hands is the care of our own time".
                        - Edmund Burke

------------------------------

Date: 27 Jul 89 08:47:18 GMT
From: sgi!shinobu!odin!sgi.com![e-mail]  (Scott Henry)
Subject: Re: Computers on the space station

Since it has been brought up:
In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (d. scott hess) writes:
}[QUOTE]
}From: cs.utexas.edu!wasatch!uplherc!esunix![e-mail]  (Bob
} Pendleton)
}9 bits of RGB is needed. For a true 3D display you also need something
}like a z buffer. 16 bits of z isn't always "good enough."  I've met
}people who will not be happy until they can get a 32 bit floating
}point z buffer. And of course, if you want stereo you need double
}buffering.
}
}Lets see, that's 27 bits of color, times 2 for stereo, plus 16 for
}window bits plus 24 for z is 94 bits per pixel. It doesn't look that
}hard to come up with a frame buffer design that uses more than 100
}bits per pixel.
}[ENDQUOTE]
}
}Come now!  Nobody on Earth has that yet!

[e-mail] (Ralf Brown) writes>
>That's right, YET.  My officemate programs a Silicon Graphics "Personal IRIS"
>workstation which has 56 bit planes (24-bit color, 24-bit Z, 8-bit control)
>with about 1200x900 resolution.  We're over halfway there already....

The Personal IRIS is the low-end of the product line. Typing in part of
the price book specs on the high-end system (specifically 4D220GTX):

1280x1024x48 bitplanes display memory for color (double-buffer 24 bits/pixel)
1280x1024x4  bitplanes display memory for overlays, underlays, user functions
1280x1024x4  bitplanes display memory for system use
1280x1024x24 bit Z-buffer for hidden surface removal
1280x1024x16 bit alpha buffer for alpha blending (double-buffer 8 bits/pixel)

Hmm, that totals 96 bitplanes. Window ID information is not kept in the
bitplane buffers. As far as I know, the only window-related information in
the bitplanes is single/double buffered, and RGB/color index mode.
Obviously, this only aaccounts for two of the system use bitplanes, I
think the other two are cursor.

I have been told that "if you don't know what alpha blending is, you don't
need it". I don't know what it is, I don't have it! (Of course, I don't
have a GTX, either...).

Just typing in published specs, guys...

---
      Scott Henry <[e-mail]>
#include <std_disclaimer.h>
--
      Scott Henry <[e-mail]>
#include <std_disclaimer.h>

------------------------------

Date: 25 Jul 89 06:43:47 GMT
From: uhccux!munnari.oz.au!otc!metro!basser!usage!bio73![e-mail]  (Karl Redell )
Subject: Re: Does This Proposal Make Sense

Despite the strong desires of many to experience space travel,

ONLY A SELECT FEW WILL EVER MAKE IT INTO SPACE.

Due to the extreme costs involved, no group of individuals,
or even a group of companies, can shoulder the expense.  It takes
GOVERNMENT FUNDING!  Only a government can tax millions of people
to generate the billions of dollars required.  Designing and building
a satellite, which can be done in any university physics lab, should
not be confused with building a launch vehicle.  If you have seen one
close up, you will realise that a launch vehicle can not be turned
out by your machinist working after hours.

Launch vehicle expense is not the result of contractors ripping of the
government.  It due to the fact that the entire design, test, and
construction costs and profits must be written off over the (on the
order of) 10 vehicles produced.  It is just not possible, unless you
have worked in the space industry, to realise how much time, effort,
coordination, raw materials, testing, etc. go into the manufacture
of something even as relatively simple as an ICBM.

And after the contract is completed, all the tools, test fixtures,
spare parts, and leftover materials are smashed and sold for scrap,
so you can't even ask the manufacturer to stamp you out another
rocket nozzle or whatever.

The answer, as I see it, is to let the government know what you want
(however you do that) and try to get that select few into space.

karl:bio73.unsw.oz

------------------------------

End of SPACE Digest V9 #593
*******************