Space & Astronomy/Space and Astronomy (October 1993).iso/mac/TEXT_ZIP/spacedig/V09_5/V9_590.ZIP/V9_590

Internet Message Format | 1991-07-08 | 13KB

Return-path: <[e-mail]>
X-Andrew-Authenticated-as: 7997;andrew.cmu.edu;Ted Anderson
Received: from corsica.andrew.cmu.edu via trymail for +dist+/afs/andrew.cmu.edu/usr1/ota/space/[e-mail] (->+dist+/afs/andrew.cmu.edu/usr1/ota/space/space.dl) (->ota+space.digests)
          ID </afs/andrew.cmu.edu/usr1/ota/Mailbox/IYrd0B600UkVQ0iU4u>;
          Tue,  8 Aug 89 03:47:25 -0400 (EDT)
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Reply-To: [e-mail]
From: [e-mail]
To: [e-mail]
Date: Tue,  8 Aug 89 03:46:59 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: SPACE Digest V9 #590

SPACE Digest                                      Volume 9 : Issue 590

Today's Topics:
 Re: space news from June 19 AW&ST, and Apollo-anniversary editorial
              Re: Beyond Neptune
       Launch advisory:  Launch date set for STS-28 (Forwarded)
          Re: Space telescope - why only 1200 hours?
          Re: powering down old experiments
            Computers on the space station
          Re: Computers on the space station
               News of the Week, Jul 26
----------------------------------------------------------------------

Date: 26 Jul 89 17:19:58 GMT
From: meccts!viper![e-mail]  (David Messer)
Subject: Re: space news from June 19 AW&ST, and Apollo-anniversary editorial

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Henry Spencer) writes:
 >--
 >1961-1969: 8 years of Apollo.  |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
 >1969-1989: 20 years of nothing.| uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry [e-mail]
  ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

I think that is a little harsh.  It should be:
  1961-1972:  11 years of Apollo.
  1972-1989:  17 years of nothing.

Be fair Henry.  ;-)



--
Remember Tiananmen Square.           | David Messer       [e-mail] -or-
                                     | Lynx Data Systems  ...!bungia!viper!dave

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

Date: 26 Jul 89 13:58:32 GMT
From: philmtl!philabs!briar.philips.com![e-mail]  (Robert Casey;6282;3.57;$0201)
Subject: Re: Beyond Neptune

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Charles Daffinger) writes:
>
>My understanding is that after the Voyager II Neptune fly-by, Voyager
>will head out of the solar system.  What possibilities are there for a
>slingshot around Neptune to send the probe towards Pluto?

I remember seeing a question like this in Planetary Report.  The answer was
that, to get to Pluto, that Voyager would have to fly past Neptune so close to
its center of mass that it would hit Neptune's surface.  Not too practical.
They also said that the probe would stay in radio range for something like 20
years, and the probe would observe interplanetary space and maybe reach the
edge of the helieopause (sp).

------------------------------------------------------------------------------
hope China (and elsewhere) gets democracy soon

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

Date: 26 Jul 89 22:51:05 GMT
From: trident.arc.nasa.gov![e-mail]  (Peter E. Yee)
Subject: Launch advisory:  Launch date set for STS-28 (Forwarded)

Sarah Keegan
Headquarters, Washington, D.C.                      July 26, 1989


LAUNCH ADVISORY:  LAUNCH DATE SET FOR STS-28


     NASA officials, meeting at a Flight Readiness Review at
Kennedy Space Center, Fla., today set Aug. 8, 1989, as the launch
date for STS-28.  The launch period for the Department of
Defense-dedicated Space Shuttle mission will be from 7:30 to
11:30 a.m. EDT.  This schedule depends upon completion of work in
progress and cooperative weather allowing normal pad activities
to continue uninterrupted.

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

Date: 26 Jul 89 14:34:18 GMT
From: mailrus!uflorida!haven!aplcen![e-mail]  (Ken Arromdee)
Subject: Re: Space telescope - why only 1200 hours?

>even have a high low Earth orbit.

I understand what you mean, but somehow the phrase "high low Earth orbit" sounds
a bit strange...
--
"The fact is self evident from the text and requires no supporting argument."
  --Tim Maroney

Kenneth Arromdee (UUCP: ....!jhunix!ins_akaa; BITNET: g49i0188@jhuvm;
     INTERNET: [e-mail]) (please, no mail to arrom@aplcen)

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

Date: 26 Jul 89 19:41:20 GMT
From: usc!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!jpl-devvax![e-mail]  (Lee Mellinger)
Subject: Re: powering down old experiments

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Al Zantow) writes:
:>>APOLLO-11 LUNAR EXPERIMENT STILL USEFUL AFTER 20 YEARS
:>>
:>    And a whole bunch of the powered experiments might still be useful
:>if they hadn't been turned off in the 70's.  The same wonderful cost
:>effectiveness that nearly turned off the DSN for Voyager's Neptune
:>encounter.
:>--
:
:    I seem to recall that they shut down some of the Viking (?) or
:Mariner craft on Mars to "save money".

None of the Mariner or Viking spacecraft were turned off to save
money.  All of the Mariner and the Viking orbiters were turned off
when they ran out of attitude control propellant.  Viking lander I was
shut down for technical reasons I don't recall, and Viking lander II
was inadvertantly commanded to point its antenna the wrong direction
and was never recovered.

Lee

"I'm the NRA"

"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary
safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." -- Benjamin Franklin 1759

|Lee F. Mellinger                 Caltech/Jet Propulsion Laboratory - NASA
|4800 Oak Grove Drive, Pasadena, CA 91109 818/393-0516  FTS 977-0516
|{ames!cit-vax,}!elroy!jpl-devvax!leem  [e-mail]

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

Date: Wed, 26 Jul 89 08:40:34 CDT
From: [e-mail] (d. scott hess)
Subject: Computers on the space station

[QUOTE]
From: cs.utexas.edu!wasatch!uplherc!esunix![e-mail]  (Bob
 Pendleton)
Subject: Re: Procurement and future computers
>From article <[e-mail]>, by
 [e-mail] (John Roberts):
>
>>From: [e-mail]
>>    <spouting about his dream machine for a bit>
>    <asks a computer question>

The extra 8 bits can be used for a number of different things. Overlay
planes, for things like menus and cursors, underlay planes, for
backgrounds, window priority, how you interpret the rest of the bits
in the pixel... 8 bits really isn't enough. I'd like 16 bits just for
window IDs.

Anyway, for many applications 24 bits of color just isn't good enough
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.

A 24 bit true color frame buffer might impress computer people, like
me. But it doesn't cut it with artists. Or with scientist who are
trying to simulate reality.

            Bob P.

[ENDQUOTE]

Come now!  Nobody on Earth has that yet!  What do you want, holographic
thing-a-ma-jigs floating around!  Can steer by waving your hand around?
Most scientists ON THE GROUND would like to have this.  I don't think
its going to be there.

As a computer science student (and formerly physics), I'm well aware
that we are very happy with 24-bit color.  But do you think we'd not
like 128-bit color?  Probably.  We aren't hiding machines in our closets
just to spite you.  The problem is, 24-bit color is still
state-of-the-art,  while higher is in the works.  Don't think we've
given up here.  And don't whine about us being impressed.  I'm sure your
impressed every once and a while by new technology.  I think that
24-bits is now a fact of life.

I do have a question:  can YOU differentiat between 16,772,216 colors?
With 256 possible shadings (or hues, or whatnot) for each?  I'm pretty
sure I can't.

This stuff belongs in sci-fi, or a computer list.  Not here.

Rantings brought to you by:
Scott Hess
[e-mail]            << The only address which works.

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

Date: 26 Jul 89 20:28:17 GMT
From: b.gp.cs.cmu.edu![e-mail]  (Ralf Brown)
Subject: Re: Computers on the space station

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!

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....


--
{backbone}!cs.cmu.edu!ralf   ARPA: [e-mail]   FIDO: Ralf Brown 1:129/46
BITnet: RALF%CS.CMU.EDU@CMUCCVMA   AT&Tnet: [phone] (school)   FAX: ask
DISCLAIMER? | "Can you put my obfuscation into words?" -- Corky Cartwright
What's that?| "This is instantaneous, which is pretty fast." -- Dick Conway

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

Date: 26 Jul 89 21:25:22 GMT
From: frooz!cfa250![e-mail]  (Jonathan McDowell)
Subject: News of the Week, Jul 26


Jonathan's Space Report

Jul 26, 1989 (no. 20)

Twenty years on ...
---------------------------------------------------------------------

OV-102 Columbia is on the pad. The payload is a new imaging
recon satellite, presumably KH-12. (AvLeak, latest issue).
Mission STS-28 is due for early August.

One of the oldest satellites in orbit has reentered; the Sergeant rocket
used to launch Explorer VII in Oct 1959 burnt up on 16 July.  This is
the first time that a satellite of this vintage has reentered since 1982
(a fragment from Vanguard 3) and 1970 (Explorer I).  Still in orbit are
(from 1958) Vanguard I, its final stage rocket, and a separation clamp
which had connected them; and (from 1959) Vanguard 2, its final stage
rocket, and Explorer VII itself.  (In deep space, we also have the first
Luna AMS, its Blok-E final stage, the US Army Pioneer IV, and its
Sergeant final stage.)

The Japanese satellite Ohzora reentered on Jul 19 after 5 years in space;
and BP-26, a boilerplate Apollo spacecraft launched on a Saturn I test,
reentered on Jul 8.

Kosmos-2028 landed on Jul 6 after 20 days in orbit.  This is the first
time that a standard Vostok-type recon satellite has flown such a long
mission, although the same spacecraft type has flown 20-day missions in
the Resurs-F and biosatellite programs.

The Kosmos-2020 recon satellite reentered on Jul 15 after two months in
orbit.  It was replaced by Kosmos-2030 launched on Jul 12

Another Resurs-F remote sensing satellite was launched on Jul 18,
together with two Pion air density subsatellites.  This satellite seems
to be on a mission similar to the first Resurs-F, while the second
Resurs-F was a short duration flight which released no subsatellites.

Kosmos-2031, launched on Jul 18, is a recon satellite in an unusual 50.6
degree orbit.

Kosmos-2032 was launched on Jul 20 into a low altitude 82 degree polar
orbit.  Satellites in such an orbit are usually announced as being
operated by the Priroda remote sensing center, but there is about one
exception a year, and this is it.  It may be a military recon satellite
with a target in the far north.

Kosmos-2033 was launched on Jul 24.

 .----------------------------------------------------------------.
 |  Jonathan McDowell       |  phone : [phone]              |
 |  Center for Astrophysics | uucp: husc6!harvard!cfa200!mcdowell |
 |  60 Garden Street        | bitnet : [e-mail]        |
 |  Cambridge  MA 02138     |  inter : [e-mail]   |
 |  USA                     |   span : cfa::mcdowell              |
 |                          |  telex : 92148 SATELLITE CAM      |
 |                          |    FAX : [phone]              |
 '----------------------------------------------------------------'

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

End of SPACE Digest V9 #590
*******************