At some point you have to cut off and say "right - we wont make it across this terrain, it's too uncertain and the time isnt there to guarentee getting onto the slope beyond" and then make for smaller good slopes, the sort that we disregarded before the FR wheel packed up as being too limiting w.r.t continued exploration during winter.

I don't know if that point has passed, but the ammount of imaging they've done of the slope at the SE edge of HP would suggest that they might camp there - there's a few M of exposed outcrop to explore, a 360 degree pan to be had etc etc.

I guess we'll find out sooner or later if that decision has been taken or not.

Doug

The graph is a bit small, but whatever the values are, they go from between 5-10 as a baseline, to around 50 a few days later. Nothing particularly ambiguous about that.

Doug

Thank you, but I already have it

Doug

No they're not. You use basic common sense. If I have to hold peoples hands over what words are and are not acceptable in day to day public useage, they're not welcome here. I have intentionally left out such a rule for that very reason.

Doug

Sadly - that sub-frame doesnt have a wedge I looked for a Navcam wedge post-rat, but nothing doing either

I'll see if there's a FHAZ wedge to make up for it

Doug

Was Pilbara that one at Fram?

Doug

The main camera isn't - but the last minute, rushed, bolted on the side SRC is.

Doug

I was hoping you would mention that Emily - I didn't want to pimp it (not my forum) but currently it's a quiet, but well maintained place and I'm sure some great discussion could kick off over there!

And frankly, if you're not a TPS member - then you should be ashamed

Doug

I'd be happy for there to be a spin-off forum for things outside the remit of what UMSF has always been about (going places and doing science basically) - I'm not sure if it's easy to do, but I'm sure there's a way to export a subforum or set of posts to transfer them over if using Invision board elsewhere. It's not something I could do - UMSF already limits what spare time I have, there are so many things I want to do (mosaics, 3d anims, maps, the book ) but they all have to move to a back burner when it comes to maintaining this place (and that means basically reading every single post that gets made). I'd be happy to advise and give guidence if someone wants to start a 'spin out' for Observational Astronomy or Cosmology, Astrophysics that sort of thing.

This place started with a very very specific focus - MER imaging. It spread to other Mars spacecraft, and then to Cassini, and now to where it is today - which I consider too broad. However - it is totally impossible to have simple guidelines that dictate what can and can not be discussed - and it's always going to be a case by case basis on the 'edge' of the cut off. One can go on and on about it, get anal to the n'th degree - but it's simply going to be a judgement call by me at the end of the day. Seti, Astrobiology, they're the subject most likely to attract the sort of person I simply do not want here. There are about 15, 20 posters here who make up the very core of this place. For it to retain the quality it must, then UMSF must be the perfect forum for those few people - not everyone - just a few.

Just because this is a forum with a good SNR, that doesnt immediately make it a home for topics for which people can not find somewhere else . To justify the discussion of SETI here because the SNR is good isn't going to cut it - one might as well say "well - there's a forum for Man Utd, but it's really noisy - let's talk about it here!" - No - this place was founded with a specific group of people in mind, a specific type of discussion at its heart - and whilst it's grown beyond that - it's not going to cover anything and everything. Ask yourself why there are no high SNR boards about SETI and astrobiology...then imagine bringing that sort of discussion here...and you can see why it's just not going to happen. I will not let the scope of this place grow to the detriment of it's core subjects and values - that's going to dissapoint some people, it's going to turn some people away, but I'm afraid that's 100% OK in my opinion to maintain the UMSF that is considered with high regard by professional scientists and engineers.

Chris has it about right - this forum is about those mission that go to explore, the things they do, the data they collect, and the magic people can work with that data. It's not a catch all for space science and astronomy, and it never will be. It is small and focused, and because of that it produces great things. If it becomes big, fat and bloated, it's achievments will be lost in the noise.


Doug

Does it remind you of Meridiani

Info here - http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4877028.stm

Doug

Same rule applies - there are places to talk about SETI, in any incarnation, this isn't one.

Doug

Where are the impactors for all the secondaries at Gusev?

Doug

Their focus, however ,is on observational astronomy and physics - which don't relaly fit under the UMSF banner at all - but then nor do the Hubble images of Mars that I've been playing with. It's a difficult call, and will probably be made on a case by case basis, depending on where the thread is going.

Seti, yes, that thread is not to continue. It's not UMSF in any way shape or form, unquestionably. There are other places to talk about it.

Doug

I think a link to the rules, once properly sorted and made final, will go into the 'welcome to' email to all new members - I can sort that no problem.

Doug

http://www.unmannedspaceflight.com/doug_im...pe_1024x520.wmv

Just a little bit of fun with MaxSt's excellet VST to OBJ convertor. This is a bit of an odd one, I wanted to find some wedges of the pancam images, but there wasnt one - so I found an appropriate Navcam wedge, and composited the appropriate pancam frames onto its texture instead. It's tempting to think "wow - that's big"- until you consider the actual size of a rat hole (not much bigger than the circule you can make with your thumb and forefinger ) and the distance between the two rat holes, and this whole thing is about 1.5m across.

Enjoy

I'm trying to do similar work with areas on interest. The heatshield impact site at Meridiani ( a bit hard ) - Burns Cliff, Eagle Crater, Fram Crater etc.

Doug

I had no idea on the flood control - perhaps us admin's don't experience it. I've set the normal member flood control time out to 10 seconds - I hope that's not too bad. It helps keep the SQL load under control, or something...

I'm not too keen on FAQ's. There are 1001 places to go and learn about a mission, a planet, an instrument etc. This isn't an encyclopedia, it's a discussion forum. I do agree on the 'questions and answers' sort of sub forum though. People are always going to ask the more simple question and if they're going to do so, it would make sense for there to be a home for it, perhaps a 'Beginners Forum' - for the more basic questions.

However - this isn't a forum for 'everyone' - I don't think it's fair to ask people to consider the layman in every post, it's just inappropriate. To have a thread tackle something from the ground up in the 'beginners forum' would make sense.

Doug

Steve is aware and will sort of when he get's a chance, and he's v.v.v.busy at the moment, but will try and get an update done as soon as he can.

Doug

Actually, as I clicked post I thought "oops - forgot about the whole zodiacal light effect" - but having never seen it, I have no idea how spectacular or easy to see it is

Doug

laymans guestimate of implications....

DI spotted a lot of dusty material, and less water than was expected - but ground based obs show lots of water over time following the impact.

So - perhaps what we have is an object that was once a comparatively even mix of dust and ice, but the ice in the upper layers of the body slowly sublimes away under the influence of the warmth of the sun. However, the deeper the ice, the slower it can escape. This leaves the comet being more dust rich near the surface, and more ice rich toward the centre.

You whack it hard, and out flies a huge ammount of the dust, but what you also do is expose some of the more water rich material under the upper layers - so you get an initial outbusrt of dust, and then over the hours and days that follow, the exposed area returns to the dust rich balance near the surface as the sun warms the newly exposed material, forcing the higher water content to sublime out.

Maybe I'm a million miles from the mark, but it would seem to add up.

Doug

The density of matter within things such as the Asteroid belt, Kuiper belt or Oort cloud is so very very low that you can't see the 'belt' or 'cloud' - only discreet members of it.

Doug

Two stage Mongoose Estes effort for me was a highlight - some proper altitude on that.

Also - did a summer space school as a teenager and made a sort of hang-glider type affair that sat on the side of a fairly simply rocket, and deployed with the nose cone. Sadly - the rocket took off - turned 90 degrees and deployed at about 10ft, but it deployed perfectly and flew gently to the ground

Doug

That's an excellent idea. It's harsh to refer to that particular occurance as a 'problem' - but it did add a bit of noise to those who were already well up on the basics. You hit the nail on the head quite well on some other points - it's a hard balance to make, but we've done very well in the past and I think with a bit of work, we can get to the same place we were at about 6 months ago.

The new guidelines are still a bit 'under review' - but once we're happy, they'll live in that forum rules section, and I'll send an email to every member letting them know what we've done

Doug

Not that I've found - we try to keep track of them as and when they are mentioned, but day to day figures are not even at the PDS, they seem be mentioned as more of an anecdotal figure than one of genuine scientific value.

Doug

That's priceless - I love it

Doug

I must admit, I often struggle with it. The alternative is this....

go to Google, and search for

callisto ganymede site:unmannedspaceflight.com

That will search just here, for those keywords. Because quite a lot of people link to UMSF, Google keeps a healthy eye on us and catalogues most of the content, so it's usually quite succesfull in finding things. It always links to the 'lo-fi' version, i.e. sans-graphics, but you can always then click back through to the pretty version once you know where you've got to go

Meanwhile, I'm going to have a look into improving the sites search tool anyway - see if any other invision users have advice about getting it working a little better.

Doug