Traveller-digest     Tuesday, September 7 1999     Volume 1999 : Number 1070



(R)1996. Traveller is a registered trademark of FarFuture Enterprises.
All rights reserved.

The following topics are covered in this digest:

Re: the big Red Button
Weight of Metal
Re: Foundation of the Scouts
RE: Standards of Beauty
Jazz Music (was re: Acceptable Battle Losses)
Vintage Copy Of Snapshot
Re: Vintage Copy Of Snapshot
SciFi Becoming Science Fact:  Holodecks
Re: Jump Horizons of stars
Re: Jump Horizons of stars
RE: request for URLs with Traveller pictures
Re: Acceptable Battle Losses (was: Re: Safety of low berths)
Re: Weight of Metal
Re: Technology Demographics
Gamma World (was Re: The Big RED Button)
=?iso-8859-1?Q?Re:_Gamma_World_=28was_Re:_The_Big_RED_Button=29=7F?=
Re: The Big RED Button (was Re: The Big Button)
Re: Weight of Metal
Re: Some From The Vaults
Photographing starship miniatures
Re: Photographing starship miniatures
RE: Photographing starship miniatures
THUDDD 10
Re: Technology Demographics

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

Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 07:37:07 -0500
From: "John Majer" <jsmage@earthlink.net>
Subject: Re: the big Red Button

 
> What? Are they bringing out a *fourth* (or is it fifth?) edition of
> Gamma World?
> 
> - -- 
> Leonard Erickson (aka Shadow)
Haven't they already, or am I just getting my numbers wrong?  
- -J.S.

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

Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 08:43:24 -0400
From: "Alan R. Chambers" <alanross@bellsouth.net>
Subject: Weight of Metal

I am looking for the weights per cubic CM or inch for Steel,
Crystaliron,Superdense and Coherent Superdense. I know I seen the figures
somewhere, but I can't remember where.
Thank you for your time.
Alan

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

Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 15:08:03 +0200 (METDST)
From: Hans Rancke-Madsen <rancke@diku.dk>
Subject: Re: Foundation of the Scouts

>>...I am beginning to suspect a trend of historical revisionism, intent
>>on giving credit to Cleon I for having invented everything good in the
>>Imperium. Time was, it was generally held that the Imperial Interstellar
>>Scout Service was formed somewhere in the 600s when the Imperium started
>>to expand after the civil wars, and a need was seen for a specialized
>>service whose job was exploration and mapping beyond the frontier. Now
>>in the latest works(GT) we read about how the IISS actually developed
>>out of an equivalent Sylean service.
> 
David J. Golden writes:
>	Actually, I very distinctly recall an article in the JTAS (the
>original, not the IG abomination) which explicitly stated that the
>IISS evolved out of the Sylean Federation's scout service. If it is
>historical revisionism, it dates back to the days of the all-hallowed
>Little Books.

JTAS #6 it was, so it goes way back. I don't really think that can
qualify as revisionism...

>    Rome did not create a great empire by having meetings, they 
>    did it by killing all those who opposed them.
 
Actually, they did it by coopting a lot of other people (and had THEM
kill all who opposed them).


      Hans Rancke
University of Copenhagen
     rancke@diku.dk
- ------------
- - "You don't like the Goths?"
- -  "No! Not with the persecution we have to put up with!"
- -  "Persecution?"
- -  "Religious persecution. We wont stand for it forever."
- -  "I thought the Goths let everybody worship as they pleased."
- -  "That's  just  it!  We Orthodox are forced to stand around and
   watch Arians  and Monophysites  and Nestorians  and Jews going
   about  their  business  unmolested,   as  if  they  owned  the
   country. If that isn't persecution, I'd like to know what is!"

                -Martin Padway and stranger in bar in
                         "Lest Darkness Fall"

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

Date: Tue, 07 Sep 1999 09:16:33 -0400
From: Ian Ferguson <ian@vax2.concordia.ca>
Subject: RE: Standards of Beauty

Thom Jones-Low writes:
>While Vargar may be more smell oriented than humans, they still have
>their visual requirements of beauty, like humans. I would think that the
>Vargar beauty standards would always be most healthy, thick fur, bright
>eyes, good teeth, etc. 

	I certainly see Vargr having visual standards of beauty, but
	IMTU their smell is much more important.  For example, they
	may not even distinguish male from female by sight.

>Uncle Thom's tips for Merchants: When hiring Vargar as crew, make sure
>your health plan include Dental coverage. 

	:-)

>Another odd though. Because of the presence of odd alien proteins and
>differing concentrations of minerals or metals, there would be worlds
>where you would get some odd combinations like orange skin or green hair
>or yellow eyes. And given the nobility's quest for the new standard of
>beauty, wouldn't this introduce some strange dietary habits. Not that
>aren't such strange diets already.

	Very cool.  There would probably be custom dyes that tend
	to collect in certain tissues, available at appropriate TL.

Peez

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

Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 09:22:06 -0400
From: Walter Smith <SmithW@HARTWICK.EDU>
Subject: Jazz Music (was re: Acceptable Battle Losses)

Rupert Boleyn wrote:
>>>>>>>>>
> I believe some Ju88s were even equipped with cannon in the dorsal fuselage
> pointing directly upward so they could fly under the belly of a bomber and
> deliver a devestating zero-deflection blast at short range.

Actually they were angled about 30 degrees forward. This mount was 
called 'Jazz Music' for reasons I forget, and its big abvantage was 
that it was a lot safer and faster than coming up from behind the 
bomber, as the british bombers had no underbelly guns.
>>>>>>>>>>
There was a popular late 1930's/early 1940's  jazz musician,  John Birks
(aka Dizzy Gillespie) in the USA whose trumpet bell was usually
angled upwards about 30 degrees or so. Supposedly it was bent in
a mishap right before he went on stage one day and he didn't have
time to fix it, it became something of a trademark.

Walt Smith

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

Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 07:52:01 -0700
From: "Mike Linsenmayer" <mlinsenmayer@symantec.com>
Subject: Vintage Copy Of Snapshot

Well, about 15 or more years ago... thats al blurry ;)  I bought a copy of
SNAPSHOT, I used it once then thought I lost it somewhre.... My parents are
moving after 23 years and said to me "I have one of your old games here, do you
want it?" I looked... My eyes wide... In mint condidtion, The book still smells
new, is that copy SNAPSHOT.... Anybody out there have any ideas what it is
worth?

Thanks
Mike

****************************************************
Mike Linsenmayer
QA MANAGER
SYMANTEC
Peter Norton Antivirus Group
1(310)449-4902
mlinsenmayer@symantec.com
****************************************************

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

Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 11:19:52 -0400
From: "Sword Worlder" <swordworlder@clinic.net>
Subject: Re: Vintage Copy Of Snapshot

- ----- Original Message -----
From: Mike Linsenmayer <mlinsenmayer@symantec.com>
> Well, about 15 or more years ago... thats al blurry ;)  I bought a copy of
> SNAPSHOT, I used it once then thought I lost it somewhre.... My parents
are
> moving after 23 years and said to me "I have one of your old games here,
do you
> want it?" I looked... My eyes wide... In mint condidtion, The book still
smells
> new, is that copy SNAPSHOT.... Anybody out there have any ideas what it is
> worth?

About $10 to 15 in the real world, maybe $22.50 on eBay ;-)

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
The TRAVELLER Domain
http://www.downport.com
Colin Michael, WebDev

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

Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 10:34:23 -0500 
From: "Smart, David J (David)" <dasmart@lucent.com>
Subject: SciFi Becoming Science Fact:  Holodecks

Greetings, all

Once again, technology is blurring the boundary between
science fiction and fact. A very crude prototype of the
Holodeck has been developed by the University of Illinois.
Check out the story at:

http://www.discover.com/sep_99/gthere.html?article=future.html

BTW, I'd appreciate it if any Star Trek fans would cross-post
this to any favorite ST mail lists/groups.

ObTrav: This could be the beginning of the CT TL15 "virtual
presence" systems described in some the the works by DGP.
Can't remember the exact publications though; possibly the
Imperial Encyclopedia?

David

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

Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 09:20:57 -0700 (PDT)
From: Anthony Jackson <ajackson@molly.iii.com>
Subject: Re: Jump Horizons of stars

GypsyComet@aol.com writes:

>  I ran that set of numbers using Book 6 (for the Stellar Radii table) and 
> found *in general* that K and M stars' jump horizon is beyond the habitable
>  orbit, G stars are a tossup, and the younger stars (O,B,A & F) rarely if
> ever  reach the habitable orbit. This generalization applies best to Type V
> stars,  but can be used for nearly any of them in a pinch...

Actually, it should be true for all stars; the life zone is at a constant radiant energy density.  That density is (constant for temperature) * (surface area of star) / (surface area of sphere at orbital radius).  If you have a 10x larger star with the same surface temperature, the life zone will be 10x further out.

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

Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 09:20:57 -0700 (PDT)
From: Anthony Jackson <ajackson@molly.iii.com>
Subject: Re: Jump Horizons of stars

GypsyComet@aol.com writes:

>  I ran that set of numbers using Book 6 (for the Stellar Radii table) and 
> found *in general* that K and M stars' jump horizon is beyond the habitable
>  orbit, G stars are a tossup, and the younger stars (O,B,A & F) rarely if
> ever  reach the habitable orbit. This generalization applies best to Type V
> stars,  but can be used for nearly any of them in a pinch...

Actually, it should be true for all stars; the life zone is at a constant radiant energy density.  That density is (constant for temperature) * (surface area of star) / (surface area of sphere at orbital radius).  If you have a 10x larger star with the same surface temperature, the life zone will be 10x further out.

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

Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 09:45:06 -0700
From: "Jesse DeGraff" <fenris@slip.net>
Subject: RE: request for URLs with Traveller pictures

You *had* to be difficult, didn't you Leonard?  :)  OK, I'll add that rez to
the list.

Jesse



> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-traveller@lists.imagiconline.com
> [mailto:owner-traveller@lists.imagiconline.com]On Behalf Of Leonard
> Erickson
> Sent: Tuesday, September 07, 1999 3:34 AM
> To: traveller@lists.imagiconline.com
> Subject: Re: request for URLs with Traveller pictures
>
>
> In mail you write:
>
> > Sorry to push your limits :)  Anyway, the future will see
> versions of the
> > pics at approx 800x600, 1024x768, and 1152x864.  Don't see much call for
> > beyond that.
>
> Please do 1280x1024. It's my "preferred" resolution. Partly because
> when I get back to writing software, I'll have a 1kx1k graphics window,
> with a 256x1k window next to it for text, legend, whatever. :-)
>
> Using an 8x8 font, the 256x1k window is a *mere* 64 chars by 128 lines.
>
> --
> Leonard Erickson (aka Shadow)
>  shadow@krypton.rain.com        <--preferred
> leonard@qiclab.scn.rain.com     <--last resort
>

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

Date: Mon, 6 Sep 1999 18:23:07 +0100
From: "Nick Bradbeer" <nickb@ndirect.co.uk>
Subject: Re: Acceptable Battle Losses (was: Re: Safety of low berths)

>Actually they were angled about 30 degrees forward. This mount was
called 'Jazz Music' for reasons I forget, and its big abvantage was
that it was a lot safer and faster than coming up from behind the
bomber, as the british bombers had no underbelly guns.


I stand corrected. <g>

(Incidentally, wasn't there a late-war Lancaster variant with a belly
turret? I seem to remember seeing that once.)

Nick

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

Date: Mon, 6 Sep 1999 18:34:36 +0100
From: "Nick Bradbeer" <nickb@ndirect.co.uk>
Subject: Re: Weight of Metal

>I am looking for the weights per cubic CM or inch for Steel,
>Crystaliron,Superdense and Coherent Superdense. I know I seen the figures
>somewhere, but I can't remember where.
>Thank you for your time.
>Alan


According to FFS1, densities for the above are 10, 15 and 15 tonnes per
cubic metre, respectively.

I can't remember how many inches in a metre to more than one sig fig, so I
won't screw the numbers by posting a rough conversion.

Nick

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

Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 12:40:38 -0500 ()
From: "Joseph R. Dietrich" <yikes@evansville.net>
Subject: Re: Technology Demographics

>> "Jesse DeGraff" <fenris@slip.net> started:
>>
>>Well, if you're going to start collecting the demographics ;)

I'm not quite sure what this has to do with Traveller, but:

Home: Intel Celeron 500, 128 Mb SDRAM, 19" monitor, Win'98 2nd
      AMD K-6 233, 128 Mb EDO RAM, no monitor, Win'98
      Intel Pentium 133, 32 Mb RAM, 15" monitor (given to papa), Win'95
Work: Power Macintosh G3 300, 128 Mb RAM, 20" and 15" monitor, Mac OS 8.1
      Power Computing 604e, 64 Mb RAM, 20" monitor, Mac OS 8.1

I suppose if you put them all together, you'd get a Model 1 or 2 Traveller
computer.

I wouldn't trust any of them to operate equipment where lives might be at
stake, however. Applications that crash on the Mac OS tend to take down the
whole system, and now -- in a marketing and technology triumph -- the same
seems to be the case with Windows 98 2nd edition (woo hoo!). This could be
a bad thing in, say, a combat situation, a docking situation, a landing
situation, etc.

OTOH, I have very little trouble with cross-platform compatability issues
anymore, especially in the major applications that I use (QuarkXpress, the
Adobe graphics suite, and MS Office).

In a Traveller sense (and I know this has been debated endlessly before) I
would want a easy-to-use, self-programmable system that could be customized
on-the-fly by non-computer-savvy crewmembers for specific tasks. It would
be helpful if system components would be clearly labled, so that the ones
that are vital to life-support operations could be identified and avoided
(in addition to simply be hiding or locking the components in memory).

I suppose there is a Imperial Buerau of Computing Standards (IBCS)
somewhere. I also suppose that by the era of Traveller, the programming
language used by Imperial computers would be ubiquitous and virtually
failsafe, which hundred to thousands of years of testing and
error-correction to it's credit. Even if there are several languages, each
specialized to take care of certain tasks, any cross-platform problems
would have been ironed out long ago (at least by the era of the CT setting).

Ciao,

Joseph R. Dietrich
yikes@evansville.net

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

Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 13:43:58 EDT
From: GypsyComet@aol.com
Subject: Gamma World (was Re: The Big RED Button)

shadow@krypton.rain.com (Leonard Erickson)
 asks:


>
What? Are they bringing out a *fourth* (or is it fifth?) edition of

>Gamma World?


 Depend on how you count these things. The versions of TSRs supermutants 
games are as follows:

  -Metamorphosis Alpha. Book from MANY years ago. very like D&D mechanically. 
No modules ever published.
  -Gamma World 1st Ed. Cheesy box art, blue cover rulebook; also very like 
D&D. Modules include Legion of Gold and Famine At Far-Go.
  -Gamma World 2nd Ed. Red box, better layout, still like D&D. Half-dozen 
modules whose names I can't remember.
  -Gamma World 3rd Ed. Red box again. Mechanics based on Marvel SuperHeroes 
RPG. Little support, died quickly.
  -Gamma World 4th Ed. Perfectbound paperback. Bad class-based system. Combat 
similar to what we hear about 3rd Ed. D&D. Deadliest radiation rules yet. 
Several modules and supplements.
  -Metamorphosis Alpha to Omega. Perfectbound paperback. Metamorphosis Alpha 
revisited, using the Amazing Engine rules. No support, as Amazing Engine (and 
TSR) died very shortly thereafter.

 I've heard no plans for a (counts on fingers) 7th try as yet, but TSR/WotC 
have surprised me before...

GC

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

Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 14:01:42 -0400
From: "Jory Earl" <j-man@iname.com>
Subject: =?iso-8859-1?Q?Re:_Gamma_World_=28was_Re:_The_Big_RED_Button=29=7F?=

TSR announced a couple months ago that it was bringing out a "Gamma world"
setting for its new Alternity game.
___________________________________________________________
 J-Man
 ICQ# 2843475
 New Hampshire - U.S.A.
 Email : j-man@iname.com
 Home Page : http://www.geocities.com/~jman037/
___________________________________________________________

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

Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 13:08:09 -0500 ()
From: "Joseph R. Dietrich" <yikes@evansville.net>
Subject: Re: The Big RED Button (was Re: The Big Button)

Leonard Erickson inquired:

>What? Are they bringing out a *fourth* (or is it fifth?) edition of
>Gamma World?

IIRC, Jim Butler has written on one of the Gamma World lists that WoC is
going to do a Gamma World sourcebook the Alternity game. This would be the
fifth edition.

Ciao,

Joseph R. Dietrich
yikes@evansville.net

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

Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 11:13:14 -0700 (PDT)
From: Anthony Jackson <ajackson@molly.iii.com>
Subject: Re: Weight of Metal

Nick Bradbeer writes:
> 
> According to FFS1, densities for the above are 10, 15 and 15 tonnes per
> cubic metre, respectively.

Though I have never seen a good explanation for why crystaliron is higher
density than normal steel....
> 

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

Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 14:22:11 -0400
From: "Jory Earl" <j-man@iname.com>
Subject: Re: Some From The Vaults

>Well, I have to confess that we haven't gotten a laser rifle yet. We
>are using stuff like SKS rifles on them. Though we've discussed trying
>to build a rifle sized "rail gun".

I made some crude plans for that once but didn't know if I was making a gun
or a large potential atomic bomb.
I had figured a cycling chamber like a cyclotron with an alternate pathway
leading out a barrel when threshold velocity was reached, all controlled by
onboard microprocessor.  So you drop some ferric mass in a small ammo-chute
and the cyclotron accelerates it to near-c velocity and expels the mass of
highly charged 'particles' out the barrel.

Would my idea work or blow up?  :)


___________________________________________________________
 J-Man
 ICQ# 2843475
 New Hampshire - U.S.A.
 Email : j-man@iname.com
 Home Page : http://www.geocities.com/~jman037/
___________________________________________________________

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

Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 14:33:07 -0400
From: Glenn Myers <glenn.myers@ansys.com>
Subject: Photographing starship miniatures

Hi all,

Well, the painting bug bit me recently and I recently completed painting
4 TNE starship miniatures. They include 2 patrol cruisers (painted in US
state trooper type colors) and 2 far traders (one painted in homage to
Jesse DeGraff's Marava and they other painted like a Keith covor for the
MT Journal #4.)

I would like to photograph these miniatures and others and put them on
my web page but I have little camera experience. I've got a point and
shoot Olympus 105 zoom 35mm camera which gave me several out of focus,
poorly framed shots. I can likely borrow a old manual Pentax 35mm
chassis for a while if I need to.

Has anybody out there done this before? It seems the new autofocus
cameras don't do a very good job at closeups.

Thanks,

Glenn

______________________________________________________

Glenn E. Myers
ANSYS Inc.                Email: glenn.myers@ansys.com
275 Technology Drive      Phone: (724) 514-2913
Canonsburg, PA 15317      Fax:   (724) 514-3118
______________________________________________________
 

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

Date: Tue, 07 Sep 1999 15:39:08 -0300
From: Michel Vaillancourt <misha@empire.atlantic-online.ns.ca>
Subject: Re: Photographing starship miniatures

At 02:33 PM 07/09/1999 -0400, you wrote:
>Hi all,
>
>Well, the painting bug bit me recently and I recently completed painting
>4 TNE starship miniatures. They include 2 patrol cruisers (painted in US
>state trooper type colors) and 2 far traders (one painted in homage to
>Jesse DeGraff's Marava and they other painted like a Keith covor for the
>MT Journal #4.)

        Nice!
        
>I would like to photograph these miniatures and others and put them on
>my web page but I have little camera experience. I've got a point and
>shoot Olympus 105 zoom 35mm camera which gave me several out of focus,
>poorly framed shots. I can likely borrow a old manual Pentax 35mm
>chassis for a while if I need to.
>
>Has anybody out there done this before? It seems the new autofocus
>cameras don't do a very good job at closeups.
>
>Thanks,
>
>Glenn
>
        Hi, Glenn!
        While hardly a professional 'trog, I did this sometime with a
Battletech tourneyfield.  If your P&S Olympus does not have a "macro" mode,
then go and get the Pentax.  Also vital is a *tripod*...  you can get some
3" tall ones that are *ideal* for this application.
        If the camera has a "macro" mode, then switch to it and that should
fix the out of focus issue.  Otherwise, you'll have to play with the Pentax
and get used to its settings.  With a camera like the Pentax, you will need
to experiment with what lenses you have available to you  for what gives you
the best up-close focus.

        --Michel

	-+=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=+-
	Michel R. Vaillancourt	misha@atlantic-online.ns.ca
				ICQ # 31172292
	-+=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=+-
	    NET-City Communications....
	         Providing "Solutions for the Common Company"
	-+=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=+-
	***REMEMBER - Always virus-check your emails ***
	-+=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=+-

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

Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 14:53:47 -0400
From: Glenn Myers <glenn.myers@ansys.com>
Subject: RE: Photographing starship miniatures

I should add that an Ent miniature which I photographed in my backyard
came out pretty good. SO I assume that this mainly is a lighting and
background issue. The tripod is a good idea, I'll get one!

The starships where photographed indoors under halogen lights with the
Brilliant Lances black hex maps as the background. I thought maybe the
black background made it hard for the autofocus to work correctly.

Like I said, the Ent came out OK - aside from having his head cut off
:-/

Glenn

______________________________________________________

Glenn E. Myers
ANSYS Inc.                Email: glenn.myers@ansys.com
275 Technology Drive      Phone: (724) 514-2913
Canonsburg, PA 15317      Fax:   (724) 514-3118
______________________________________________________
 

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

Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 12:12:12 -0700
From: "Jason T. Barnabas" <cybernaut@netzero.net>
Subject: THUDDD 10

Design: Lifeboat

Schedule:
    Monday    September 6:  RFP Release
    Wednesday September 22: Entry Deadline
    Wednesday September 29: Voting Begins
    Wednesday October 13:   Voting Ends
    Friday    October 15:   Results Announced

Specifications:
[From IN Press Release 0035-072-0906, Capital/Core]
A representative of the Imperial Safety Bureau (ISB), told 
this reporter that the Emperor has expressed concern 
about the safety of those who serve on Imperial vessels. 
This prompted the ISB to announce plans to establish a 
new Imperial Standard for lifeboats. The new standard 
will apply only to Imperial vessels; however, once adopted, 
these standards will strongly influence other ship owners 
as well. The ISB representative waxed eloquent in 
discussing the requirements for a proper lifeboat design. 
However, the gist of what he said is: A lifeboat is 
something that no one ever plans to use, so, it must be 
economical (with regard to space, mass and cost). 

There was also talk of retrofitting certain classes of 
vessels with lifeboats, so the wise design will include 
retrofitting cost estimates (if retro-fitting would be 
needed) as well as costs for incorporation in new 
vessels.




________________________________________________________
NetZero - We believe in a FREE Internet.  Shouldn't you?
Get your FREE Internet Access and Email at
http://www.netzero.net/download/index.html

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

Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 15:29:57 -0400
From: "Thom Harris" <thomharr@mediaone.net>
Subject: Re: Technology Demographics

I'm a "Consulting Technician" (their title, not mine) in an "Alpha" proto
type lab at Compaq (nee; Digital) and I have my own home based laptop
repair/sales business. Sssooooo..........

Work:
Dual Alpha EV-67; 883 MHZ (each); w/4 Gig of Ram;  4-18 Gig SCSI Wide HDD's;
20" Monitor (True64 Unix)
Alpha PC164LX; 600 MHZ; w/256 Meg of Ram; 2-4.5 Gig SCSI Wide HDD's; 20"
Monitor (WinNT-WS)

Home:
Alpha PC164LX; 600 MHZ; w/256 Meg of Ram; 3-9 Gig SCSI Wide HDD's
(Linux-RH/6.0) - Proxy/File Server*
AMD K6 II; 400 MHZ; w/192 Meg of Ram; 6-4.5 Gig SCSI Wide HDD's (Win98 R2) -
Mine*
AMD K6 II; 333 MHZ; w/192 Meg of Ram; 4-4.5 Gig SCSI Wide HDD's & 2 10.1 Gig
Ultra ATA's; 17" Monitor (Win98 R2) - The wife's
(She don't know she's acting as my file server.)
P-II; 233 MHZ; w/128 Meg of Ram; 1-2.5 Gig & 1-1.6 Gig Ultra ATA HDD's; 15"
Monitor (Win95 OSR2) - Daughter's
Pent; 133 MHZ; w/64 Meg of Ram; 1-2.1 Gig ATA HDD (Win95 OSR2) - Voice Mail
System; Printer & Fax Server*
Mac PowerPC 6500; 250 MHZ; 64 Meg of Ram; 4.? Ultra ATA HDD (OS 8.1) -
Mine/Business*
Compaq Armada 1560 Laptop; 166 MHZ MMX; 64 Meg of Ram; 3.1 Gig Ultra ATA HDD
(Win98 R2) - Mine
Digital HiNote VP 525 Laptop; 120 Mhz; 64 Meg of Ram; 3.1 Gig Ultra ATA HDD
(Win 95 OSR2) - Wife's
Digital HiNote CS450 Laptop; 486Dx2-50 MHZ; 20 Meg of Ram; 510 Meg ATA HDD
(Win95 OSR2) - Daughter's
* - Using one 20" Digital Monitor; one keyboard & one mouse on a Belkin
"Omni-View" PS/2 switcher

Plus another 20 low end Pentium's and 486's that I could put together with
all the parts laying around (not including monitors) and a half dozen or so
low end laptops....(Wife is threatening to leave me if I don't get rid of
some stuff soon.) Mmmuuuuuuuwwwwwaaaaaaahhhh

Thom

Subject: Re: Technology Demographics

> >> "Jesse DeGraff" <fenris@slip.net> started:
> >>
> >>Well, if you're going to start collecting the demographics ;)
>
> I'm not quite sure what this has to do with Traveller, but:
>
> Home: Intel Celeron 500, 128 Mb SDRAM, 19" monitor, Win'98 2nd
>       AMD K-6 233, 128 Mb EDO RAM, no monitor, Win'98
>       Intel Pentium 133, 32 Mb RAM, 15" monitor (given to papa), Win'95
> Work: Power Macintosh G3 300, 128 Mb RAM, 20" and 15" monitor, Mac OS 8.1
>       Power Computing 604e, 64 Mb RAM, 20" monitor, Mac OS 8.1
>
> I suppose if you put them all together, you'd get a Model 1 or 2 Traveller
> computer.
>
> I wouldn't trust any of them to operate equipment where lives might be at
> stake, however. Applications that crash on the Mac OS tend to take down
the
> whole system, and now -- in a marketing and technology triumph -- the same
> seems to be the case with Windows 98 2nd edition (woo hoo!). This could be
> a bad thing in, say, a combat situation, a docking situation, a landing
> situation, etc.
>
> OTOH, I have very little trouble with cross-platform compatability issues
> anymore, especially in the major applications that I use (QuarkXpress, the
> Adobe graphics suite, and MS Office).
>
> In a Traveller sense (and I know this has been debated endlessly before) I
> would want a easy-to-use, self-programmable system that could be
customized
> on-the-fly by non-computer-savvy crewmembers for specific tasks. It would
> be helpful if system components would be clearly labled, so that the ones
> that are vital to life-support operations could be identified and avoided
> (in addition to simply be hiding or locking the components in memory).
>
> I suppose there is a Imperial Buerau of Computing Standards (IBCS)
> somewhere. I also suppose that by the era of Traveller, the programming
> language used by Imperial computers would be ubiquitous and virtually
> failsafe, which hundred to thousands of years of testing and
> error-correction to it's credit. Even if there are several languages, each
> specialized to take care of certain tasks, any cross-platform problems
> would have been ironed out long ago (at least by the era of the CT
setting).
>
> Ciao,
>
> Joseph R. Dietrich
> yikes@evansville.net
>
>
>

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

End of Traveller-digest V1999 #1070
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