She didn't make it up, she quoted a senior official - the Boeing payload manager at KSC (Mike Kinslow). This is the first public mention that I've seen, but it is in the planning stages (as a recent addition, which is why this is the first public mention of it).

One of the well documented problems is that if you cut wood that is "too wet" then the brake will activate, thinking that it's hit flesh.

So really the article should say "Each time you cut wood that's too damp (which you have no way to determine beforehand) you pay $169 to replace the blade and brake". That puts into focus why some woodworkers who know how to be careful do not WANT the safety feature.

So what DO you do when the battery charger bursts into flames on orbit?

I'll reinforce your point here. Knowing something about the fire response strategy on ISS you do the following:

1) If you actually are lucky enough to witness the charger burst into flames, remove the power from it, hit the fire alarm, put on a mask, and expend a CO2 based fire extinguisher on it. The mask keeps you from asphyxiating yourself with the extinguisher.

2) If you don't physically see what happens (which is most likely, ISS is big and some modules may go unattended for hours) - the combustion products will trip off a cabin smoke detector in the module. That will stop ventilation inside the module and ring the alarm. In most cases, this will put out a fire in zero g - fires tend to smother themselves without gravity to force convection currents.

Meanwhile, not having any knowledge other than a smoke alarm from a module, the crew will converge in a safe haven in the vehicle away from the fire. Two (of the 6) may go forward to investigate with masks, fire extinguishers, and a hand held device to detect combustion products (mainly so they know if they are entering a lethal pocket of CO or other gases). Hopefully the module isn't a total fog of combustion products - if it is, the crew is likely to isolate it and leave it. If you don't know what the fire source is (because you can't see it), it may well end up that the entire module ends up getting powered down to ensure an electrical fire isn't being fed. This of course has some pretty serious ramifications as well - shutting down power to a module is not a simple event to reverse (since all the computers, cooling, lights, etc. go down with it). It's likely that collateral damage to a module's systems would happen if that were done.

Even if you do understand what happened and know it's out, the harmful gases from burning plastic aren't going to just go away on their own, they have to be scrubbed out with deployed fans and special canisters. It would take weeks to clean up.

Fighting a fire in a closed environment is very different than something you would do in your home. In zero gravity, most of the control is by prevention - don't use flammable materials, stop ventilation on a detected fire so it doesn't spread, don't use things that generate poison air when they burn, etc. Even a minor fire that many of us have encountered at one time or another (smoked electronics, plastic bag on fire, etc.) would be an extremely serious event in space. That's why so much time is spent making sure equipment conforms with fire prevention standards.

Sounds like an excellent idea for foreign espionage. Set up a private shell company, then invite a bunch of former officials who know exactly how the real systems work, to get together in a hotel you've bugged and start pretending they're responding to a cyber attack of some sort.

Official1: "Call the NSA Task force Orange, tell them to begin operation Stork."
ForeignAgent: (making notes) Operation Stork.... NSA... means X..."

FYI, NASA does not have a pension plan and has not for years. Lately, we're all on the "TSP" - Thrift Savings Plan. It's the government equivalent of the 401k.

There's another important factor in the paranoia about data breaches and risk that's often VERY overlooked.

As part of the chain of responsibility, the CIO community (the individual CIOs at the 11 NASA centers, and the federal CIOs in general) are very risk-averse. Why might that be? Well, in addition to the normal slamming your agency has to endure if there's a data/privacy breach, the CIOs and decision makers may also be civilly or criminally liable for negligence if it can be shown that they were permitting workplace practices that went against federal regulations. A few CIOs that I know are actually carrying personal liability insurance (out of their own pockets) to cover themselves in case such accusations are leveled.

Now, imagine you're the person tasked with pushing the envelope technologically (Hey, it's what NASA does) but the only thing your bosses ever remind you of is that it's your ass on the line if anything is ever breached, inappropriately stored or transmitted, etc -- and that fines and jail time aren't out of the question. That's enough to make someone pretty risk-averse!

To follow up on this (Disclaimer: I am a NASA employee), NASA and other federal agencies are prohibited by policy and law from transmitting or storing many of our data types on non-government owned hardware and networks. (Transmitting of course can be done if it's tightly encrypted). Processing our data on private servers is strictly prohibited in many cases.

The most frequently cited laws and policies which dictate this are FISMA and OMB M-06-16, but there are many others. Employees are even prohibited from doing team collaboration with things like Google Docs, because information which is not yet deemed to be sensitive (say, an immature design for a propulsion system) might become very sensitive, and once it's "out" it is out for good.

Like it or not, there's a lot of other countries with developing missile programs, communications programs and many other technologies which have dual civilian and military use, and NASA is charged by congress with keeping technology that may have military applications out of foreign hands.

If Nebula is able to perform as well as clouds such as EC2 and the like, and allow NASA and other federal agencies to do cloud style processing within the government sector, it could save HUGE amounts of taxpayer money that's otherwise legally obligated to be "Wasted".

I'm an IT Security guy, and am part of a union. Our parent organization is the IFPTE -- International Federation of Professional Trade Engineers. I'm sure you could contact them about unionization at your workplace if you think you need to organize.

I've had fantastic luck with m0n0wall on a Soekris Net5501 box - The hardware was basically built for routing, switching and firewalling and m0n0wall is a great distribution.

Hit www.soekris.com for info on the products. (I have no financial connection whatsoever, just a satisfied customer)

Sounds like you both enjoy poking fun at each other and bickering about inconsequential things. Assuming this doesn't rise to the level of genuine arguments (like couch guy below) I say it sounds like a normal and healthy relationship. Just thought you might appreciate the thought after all the other comments soon to follow.

(5 year wedding anniversary 2 weeks ago, goin' on 9 years together, bicker like it's been 80)

I hate to say it and fuel the flames, but I also got my wife a Mac. Then her parents got one, and my parents both got them. Know what? My tech support load dropped significantly and they're really happy their machine doesn't give them problems anymore.

This whole "iPhones are an ungodly sum" meme is getting old. Have you priced out a smartphone vs an iphone lately?

My iPhone w/ 3G service is costing me $50/month LESS than a Palm Treo 755 w/ Verizon that I just gave up to make the switch. Same minutes, same texts, MMS is no skin off my teeth since the data unlimited gives me twitter/facebook to send photos instead.

Ouch! Generally we use interns and junior staff to watch over the techs on the floor. This policy stands mainly because it's not just Sun coming in to maintain Sun equipment, it's a vast range of vendors and suppliers. A/C guys to come change the A/C filters, fire guys to check the fire system, electrical guys, safety guys, structural guys for earthquale checks... you get the picture! Quite a lot of those folks are NOT at all capable of knowing not to (for example) lay a big plastic sheet across the air intake to a cooling system while they're trying to inspect the fire sprinklers.

Even our junior staff may not know the specifics of the board being replaced in the E4k by the Sun guy - but they've had datacenter care and respect driven into their skulls by the time they've been there a month, so they can keep watch.