Totally unnecessary over-analysis of what is or isn't politics deleted (David - seriously - step away from the keyboard )

99.9% of the people here understand and follow this very very simple rule.

That one or two people feel unable is down to them, and nothing else.

If anyone really can not figure it out - if they have to resort to a dictionary to figure out what a ban on political discussion is - then sorry, UMSF is not for them.

Of COURSE.... I've heard a Meteosat signal, about 15 years ago at school. Sounded like a fax machine (infact, that's basically what it was)

You know how people can have folders of links on their shortcuts bar ( I have one for space news, one for IT news, one for UMSF hosting stuff ) - and then for the important stuff, you can have just a straight link (I have one for UMSF, UMSF Admin, BBC News )

Well - the other 'important stuff' straight link I have..... is http://icanhascheezburger.com/
I have two of my own on there http://mine.icanhascheezburger.com/view.aspx?ciid=1473487 and http://mine.icanhascheezburger.com/view.aspx?ciid=1473478

as a result - I am on first-name terms with both ceilingkitteh and buhket theft.

Doug

Random thought. I was just sent an interesting movie, which was a composite of various space stills, with some plasma/wave sounds in the background and a generic 'beep beep' spacecraft noise on top.

But what do spacecraft actually sound like when transmitting - has anyone heard the 'feed' from a DSN dish be deconstructed into an audible wav? Is it like a dial up modem or something else. Do spacecraft at 288kbps sound different to those at 120bps etc? I'm not talking about the spooky interpretations of mag/fields/waves/particles etc that we are treated to - but the actual downlink itself. The only example I can think of is the MEX cannister mode listening to PHX during EDL - but that actually ended up like a plasma/wave observation because of the massive doppler involved!

I remember the BBC 'The Planets' series ( very good, spectacular visuals, but now very out-dated ) - and every time a spacecraft flew past the camera, it made a beautifully doppler shifted 'beep beep beep' sound.

Doug

That series of 10s exposures showing the thing 'speeding up' as it were - that's one of those rare astronomical observations that puts the Earth, the solar system, and the things flying around it into sharp '3d' context.

Doug

The new system is working beautifully. Normal registration numbers, not a single spammer.

Despite quite clear rules, despite this very clear thread, despite very very direct and unquestionable instructions within the very thread in question, including

"If you can't discuss something without wandering into the fringes of politics - then don't discuss it here. "
and
"no politics means no politics"

Someone posted
"NASA is essentially operating under a 6 month continuing resolution to spring of next year (continuing at FY08 budget levels) until the new President submits a new budget, which may need to be approved through the legislative process. So this Friday's decision, if it is for continuation, may still be subject to political review."

For those that can not figure it out for themselves - that post contains politics. Do you get it now? This member has had that post deleted, and is now serving a 7 day suspension. I'm not sure what it is going to take to get people to follow the rules - let this serve as an example to that member, and everybody - that no politics means no politics.

If you're left thinking "But how can we talk about such-and-such without mentioning politics at all?" - the answer is that you shouldn't be talking about whatever it is that you somehow require politics to discuss.

I will repeat this once again

No politics, means no politics. No exceptions. Deletions, suspension, and bans will follow for those determined to ignore that rule and direct instructions from the admin/mod team.

OK - a post explicitly calling for a specific person to be fired has been deleted. Seriously - this isn't the place for comments like that.

I can't really imagine how - they're so close, and so very nearly parallel, they might as well just be one line. And even if they did - it would be a dynamic 'apparent' crossing, not a real one.

You've quoted what I've said - but you've clearly not read it.

If you can't discuss something without wandering into the fringes of politics - then don't discuss it here.

(for those who have not figured it out - the 'c' word is 'congress')

Doug

Had Spirit, for example, driven North, not south - then we might have an X - but we don't.

I think it's worth reminding people of the strict no politics rule for UMSF. The 'c' word has been used a few times. Yes - it's pedantic to take a rule that far - but no politics means no politics. Anyone thinking "How can we talk about something without mentioning politics" - then perhaps you shouldn't be using UMSF to talk about whatever it is you're unable to discuss without politics.

Also - a Venus vs Mars vs whatever debate - sounds about as constructive as a manned v unmanned debate - i.e. pointless, inevitably leading to heated argument and smashed opinions. Thats not what UMSF is for.

Doug

WOW - where do you get your projector bulbs from!! They're £100-£500 here!!!

Well - they've both travelled south - so a line between the two landers wouldn't cross a line between the two rovers. In your drawing, one goes up and one goes down. In reality - one's gone down, and one's gone down and right.

The distance covered by both rovers is noise compared to the distance between them. It's about 10,500 km between them. From Spirit's position - the total traverse of Opportunity, call it 7km, extends only 0.038 degrees.



"grabbing both rovers landing sites and drawing a straight line between these and then, taking their current locations, find where the intesection point is located" - this now makes sense - but now that it makes sense....it - errrr - doesn't make sense because they're both the same side of the line between them

This drawing doesn't have the scale - but relatively - it demonstrates how and why your two lines wouldn't cross one another.

Anaglyphs on screen are tricky ( had this discussion with Jim Bell in June ) - the red just doesn't work well - it's so strange. Look at a print out, and your eyes feel 'even'. Run the same image thru a projector - and the left eye feels very very dark. I spent a good hour trying to turn up the red side of an image once, with a projector to test it - and nothing changed, it's like the wavelength of red on a projector doesn't overlap perfectly with the red on the glasses.

Doug

The spacecraft doesn't start downlinking for several hours yet.

Then by all means collect them. However, they belong here in this thread - in the flow with other current Phoenix discussions.

There is no wrong-way-round for an anaglyph. One way around suggest closer, the other suggests further. In most Mars anaglyphs - you will find some rocks that look like that logo, and some that look the other way. There is nothing incorrect about that logo at all. You're never going to look at that with the glasses that come with it because they're built into the book itself.

But you know what - I think you might be right. It Does. Not. Matter.

One could certainly infer fallout under these clouds. It's what LIDAR is telling us.

Of course, I'm making the mistake in thinking of Mars as a sphere, which it isn't. Oblate spheroid and all that

Because that is the shortest.

If they were on EXACT opposite sides of the planet ( 0, 0 and 180, 0 ) - then yes, you could infact leave one in any direction and if travelling in a straight line - you would then hit the other. BUT - they're not.

That's simply half way around the great circle path between them. But you seemed to dismiss that - seriously - I don't know what you're trying to get at here. Half way between them, or something else. What does a rectangle have to do with it? Both being fairly close to the equator, a great circle route is fairly close to just a straight line on the map anyway.

Spirit is 14.5718 south, 175.4785 east
Opportunity is 1.94 south, 354.47 East

Thus - a point roughly between them is 8.256 south 264.97 east, which is the east end of Noctis Labyrinthus.

If that's not what you're after - then what are you after?

By the way, B2 is only roughly half way between them - if you go the long way around. There's only 2 degrees in it - but the 'shorter' route is to go West from Opportunity and down Valles Marineris - not East between Hellas and Isidis.

Doug

Yeah - new Macbooks I've heard. VERY excited by that, as I've always been somewhat disapointed by my Macbook Pro compared to my old Macbook.

Or - maybe there are streaks being created by these DD's - but - in the same way we couldn't see the heat-shield at first - the lumpy bumpy nature of the terrain hides them?

Channel 4 here in the UK had a WW2 veteran read it at the end of an episode of the archeology program 'Time Team' where they found and recovered a Spitfire. I was in floods of tears.