Condottiere
SOC-14 5K
It's how I imagine I'd pilot my yacht.
Type ST Transport Scout: 199Td, J4/2G (LBB2 2nd Ed.)
- Thread starter Grav_Moped
- Start date
Prior art: the B-Ark from The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.
More seriously, used as a g-compensating measure in a ship without artificial gravity --- but it would need a cover, at least.
Technical term for this is "The G-Tank".
Condottiere
SOC-14 5K
Jump bubbles come in many forms.
Note:
The drive bay should be 6m tall (or be two 3m-tall decks of the same area, depending). This will affect the aft end of the upper crawl-space. I knew that when I drew it up the first time, but missed it when patching the quickie version together.
I'm trying to decide whether to just move the air/raft hangar and cargo bay forward with only floor/roof access hatches for them, or do something cute involving combining their access corridors with maintenance access to the drives. The idea here is to make it as close to a Type S layout as practical for crew orientation reasons. The question is which of the two makes for a "closer to the type s" user experience...
Spinward Flow
SOC-14 5K
Explain how an air/raft berth with a dorsal exit bay door is inferior to an aft exit bay door.
Honestly, the best thing you could do would be to move the drives outboard to port/starboard and just continue the crew space of the main deck all the way back to the aft bulkhead. You put the air/raft berth in the center on the aft end of the main deck, combine it with the 3 ton cargo bay (so technically a 7 ton space, with a 4 ton occupant at the rear of it) and then move the "multipurpose lounge" onto the centerline as well between the common area and the air/raft berth. You then put the drives outboard of this centerline crew axis that runs the length of the main hull. You wind up with 2 drive bays and more widely spaced drives, but the access to them comes from the "multipurpose lounge" in between them. Reposition the landing gear forward of the drive bays on either side of the crew space. Turns the ship into a single deck, although the engines aren't quite so close to the centerline.
Dramatic chase-style rendezvouses (spellcheck allowed that?!) where you "drive into the garage".Explain how an air/raft berth with a dorsal exit bay door is inferior to an aft exit bay door.
Also, the idea is to keep the experience similar to a Type S, so having the garage door in the "wrong place" when it comes time to park the air/raft could be awkward. Really, not a big deal though.
Yeah, but probably not. Again, the core idea here is that this is trying to feel as much like a Type S as possible. You know, like the 737-MAX -- because there's no way this could go horribly wrong a few thousand years in the future? It's not like we're having General Products building them, right?
Right?
Please tell me we're not licensing these out to General Products.
[Seriously, this is one of the ones I'm figuring was from Collace Light Industries Yard #6. Maybe Yard #5. They used to be really good, once -- but then they got sabotaged by a leveraged buy-out and moved starship production off-world. Not that I'm bitter about that or anything. (Yes, it's IMTU and I wrote it up that way! Still...) ]
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«IMTU»Dramatic chase-style rendezvouses (spellcheck allowed that?!) where you "drive into the garage".
Also, the idea is to keep the experience similar to a Type S, so having the garage door in the "wrong place" when it comes time to park the air/raft could be awkward. Really, not a big deal though.
Yeah, but probably not. Again, the core idea here is that this is trying to feel as much like a Type S as possible. You know, like the 737-MAX -- because there's no way this could go horribly wrong a few thousand years in the future? It's not like we're having General Products building them, right?
Right?
Please tell me we're not licensing these out to General Products.
[Seriously, this is one of the ones I'm figuring was from Collace Light Industries Yard #6. Maybe Yard #5. They used to be really good, once -- but then they got sabotaged by a leveraged buy-out and moved starship production off-world. Not that I'm bitter about that or anything. (Yes, it's IMTU and I wrote it up that way! Still...) ]
Due to the standards Bureau, you can't stop GP,LIC, from making them, because they're on the nastiness of open source hardware due to having it validated against the S-Type standard.
«/IMTU»
Seriously, it's implied that the best fit designs get shared widely, and some form of royalties are likely involved... and are significantly cheaper than custom work...
Spinward Flow
SOC-14 5K
As I like to tell cashiers who laugh when I make a hand cranking motion at the credit card reader while waiting for the validation of the transaction ... "Entertainment is where you find it."
Reachback (side effect of looking for my notes on the IISS version of the A2):As I like to tell cashiers who laugh when I make a hand cranking motion at the credit card reader while waiting for the validation of the transaction ... "Entertainment is where you find it."
Credit cards don't have the raised numbers they used to, to save on production costs. You can't do the manual carbon-copy processing with them any longer.
("Cha-Chunk!")
I'm old.
(Image credit: user "south dakota boy" on Reddit's r/specializedtools )
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Spinward Flow
SOC-14 5K
Fun fact.
There was a "crackpot crank" fellow with more money than sense (go figure) ... who was absolutely convinced that there would be a breakdown in how credit card transactions "work" someday (SOON™), such that everyone would have to stop using computers and go back to using the "knucklebusters" for mechanical carbon copy paper sales slips to run all credit card transactions through.
Basically a variation on the conspiracy theory that you can't trust voting machines to tabulate votes "correctly" ... except applied to credit card transactions instead.
So this "crackpot crank" fellow was SO CONVINCED of his own crackpot theory that he started buying up all the "knucklebuster" credit card readers still in the wild (like the one that @Grav_Moped provided above) and storing them in warehouses. Everyone else was only too happy to ... unload ... their now obsolete "knucklebuster" machines onto this fool, who figured he could Corner The Market™ on these obsolete devices, so that "when the crash came" he could make out like a bandit because he would be the only one with a supply of them to sell.
Spoiler alert.
This Get RichQuick NEVER scheme didn't exactly work out the way that this fool expected it to. 
Instead of "The Collapse" happening, that he anticipated (and desperately wanted to take place) ... he just became the "sucker" who everyone could unload their unwanted (and now obsolete) "knucklebuster" machines onto. The machines had no surviving value, but he was buying them because he was betting they would need to come back into use. So ultimately, he paid out a lot of money for a product that no one wanted anymore ... and which the industry will not be returning to (because raised numbers/letters on credit cards is No Longer A Thing™). So this guy managed to "corner the market" on a product that was already obsolete and would not be coming back ... all because he drank his own Kool-Aid and believed his own conspiracy theory, putting his money where (what was left of) his brain was.
I think that pursuing this scheme actually managed to bankrupt the idiot, because he couldn't escape his own Sunk Cost Fallacy and went ALL IN on it, still believing that he was "right" and everyone else was wrong. In other words, it would have been more damaging to him to admit his mistake than it was to bankrupt himself through sheer idiocy.
Basically, something of a Darwin Award In Economics (so to speak).
But hey, somebody had to be THAT DUMB.
If it wasn't "that guy" it would have been someone else, equally as deluded, and unwilling to be swayed by evidence (or reality).
There was a "crackpot crank" fellow with more money than sense (go figure) ... who was absolutely convinced that there would be a breakdown in how credit card transactions "work" someday (SOON™), such that everyone would have to stop using computers and go back to using the "knucklebusters" for mechanical carbon copy paper sales slips to run all credit card transactions through.
Basically a variation on the conspiracy theory that you can't trust voting machines to tabulate votes "correctly" ... except applied to credit card transactions instead.
So this "crackpot crank" fellow was SO CONVINCED of his own crackpot theory that he started buying up all the "knucklebuster" credit card readers still in the wild (like the one that @Grav_Moped provided above) and storing them in warehouses. Everyone else was only too happy to ... unload ... their now obsolete "knucklebuster" machines onto this fool, who figured he could Corner The Market™ on these obsolete devices, so that "when the crash came" he could make out like a bandit because he would be the only one with a supply of them to sell.
Spoiler alert.
This Get Rich
Instead of "The Collapse" happening, that he anticipated (and desperately wanted to take place) ... he just became the "sucker" who everyone could unload their unwanted (and now obsolete) "knucklebuster" machines onto. The machines had no surviving value, but he was buying them because he was betting they would need to come back into use. So ultimately, he paid out a lot of money for a product that no one wanted anymore ... and which the industry will not be returning to (because raised numbers/letters on credit cards is No Longer A Thing™). So this guy managed to "corner the market" on a product that was already obsolete and would not be coming back ... all because he drank his own Kool-Aid and believed his own conspiracy theory, putting his money where (what was left of) his brain was.
I think that pursuing this scheme actually managed to bankrupt the idiot, because he couldn't escape his own Sunk Cost Fallacy and went ALL IN on it, still believing that he was "right" and everyone else was wrong. In other words, it would have been more damaging to him to admit his mistake than it was to bankrupt himself through sheer idiocy.
Basically, something of a Darwin Award In Economics (so to speak).
But hey, somebody had to be THAT DUMB.
If it wasn't "that guy" it would have been someone else, equally as deluded, and unwilling to be swayed by evidence (or reality).
Politics? Whatever!
https://xkcd.com/2030/ ("Voting Software"):
"Whatever they sold you, don't touch it."
"Bury it in the desert."
"Wear gloves."
I mean, yes, with hardcopy backups that are to be considered authoratiative*; and consistent auditing, it can be "good enough". There's still a lot of room for improvement in the systems that are out there now though.
[SPOILER="Boring details"]For me, the basic requirements are:
- the selections on the ballots (checked boxes, filled ovals, punched holes) have to be human-readable and verifiable by the voter
- those specific indications (boxes, ovals, holes) must be the only thing used to automatically tally votes, not separate summary barcodes printed on the ballot
- scanning and tallying the votes on completed ballots must be a physically separate process from filling out (and perhaps printing out) ballots
- random-sample manual audits must be conducted
- in all cases, the hardopy ballot is the authoritative record
(and probably a few other things, but it's early and I was up late.)
[/SPOILER]
----------------
*that is, if the machine count doesn't match the hand count, the physical ballots are the authoritative source of the count, not the machines.
In my imperfect world, we'd have an electronic ballot printing machine.
Nice display, big buttons, clear text with the issues and candidates. People vote electronically. At the end, they see a summary of their ballot, to which they hit "OK". Ballot information is recorded electronically, and also printed out. Person is given a receipt with their ballot id and a vote summary, and hands the printed ballot to the poll workers.
Votes are electronically tallied. When any audit needs to come up, there's the printed, "official" ballot that can be readily hand counted or machine scanned.
Meanwhile, the voter can look up their ballot id, see when/if the ballot was recorded, and that the recording matches the summary on their ticket.
In the end, the only "official" ballot is the printed ballot, everything else is a projection from that, but it leverages modern UX to make the actual voting process as clear as practical.
Nice display, big buttons, clear text with the issues and candidates. People vote electronically. At the end, they see a summary of their ballot, to which they hit "OK". Ballot information is recorded electronically, and also printed out. Person is given a receipt with their ballot id and a vote summary, and hands the printed ballot to the poll workers.
Votes are electronically tallied. When any audit needs to come up, there's the printed, "official" ballot that can be readily hand counted or machine scanned.
Meanwhile, the voter can look up their ballot id, see when/if the ballot was recorded, and that the recording matches the summary on their ticket.
In the end, the only "official" ballot is the printed ballot, everything else is a projection from that, but it leverages modern UX to make the actual voting process as clear as practical.
Don't make me break out the giant octopi...
My personal hero among American Presidents was William Howard Taft. [Just look at that MUSTACHE!]
He had a bathtub installed in the White House large enough to hold 4 men ... so he could fit in it!
A true GIANT among the lesser men that have held the sacred office.
He had a bathtub installed in the White House large enough to hold 4 men ... so he could fit in it!
A true GIANT among the lesser men that have held the sacred office.
