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NASA

Simulation of Close Asteroid Fly-By 148

Posted by Soulskill from the close-enough-to-feel-the-vacuum-breeze dept.
c0mpliant writes "NASA and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory have released a simulation of the path of an asteroid, named Apophis, that will come very close to Earth in 2029 — the closest predicted approach since humans have monitored for such heavenly bodies. The asteroid caused a bit of a scare when astronomers first announced that it would enter Earth's neighborhood some time in the future. However, since that announcement in 2004, more recent calculations have put the odds of collision at 1 in 250,000."
Games

Revisiting the "Holy Trinity" of MMORPG Classes 362

Posted by Soulskill from the or-druid-as-the-case-may-be dept.
A feature at Gamasutra examines one of the foundations of many MMORPGs — the idea that class roles within such a game fall into three basic categories: tank, healer, and damage dealer. The article evaluates the pros and cons of such an arrangement and takes a look at some alternatives. "Eliminating specialized roles means that we do away with boxing a class into a single role. Without Tanks, each class would have features that would help them participate in and survive many different encounters like heavy armor, strong avoidance, or some class or magical abilities that allow them to disengage from direct combat. Without specialized DPS, all classes should be able to do damage in order to defeat enemies. Some classes might specialize in damage type, like area of effect (AoE) damage; others might be able to exploit enemy weaknesses, and some might just be good at swinging a sharpened bit of metal in the right direction at a rapid rate. This design isn't just about having each class able to fill any trinity role. MMO combat would feel more dynamic in this system. Every player would have to react to combat events and defend against attacks."
Earth

Yellowstone Supervolcano Larger Than First Thought 451

Posted by timothy from the even-superer dept.
drewtheman writes "New studies of the plumbing that feeds the Yellowstone supervolcano in Wyoming's Yellowstone National Park shows the plume and the magma chamber under the volcano are larger than first thought and contradicts claims that only shallow hot rock exists. University of Utah research professor of geophysics Robert Smith led four separate studies that verify a plume of hot and molten rock at least 410 miles deep that rises at an angle from the northwest."
Space

Herschel Spectroscopy of Future Supernova 21

Posted by Soulskill from the that's-a-big-star dept.
davecl writes "ESA's Herschel Space Telescope has released its first spectroscopic results. These include observations of VYCMa, a star 50 times as massive as the sun and soon to become a supernova, as well as a nearby galaxy, more distant colliding starburst galaxies and a comet in our own solar system. The spectra show more lines than have ever been seen in these objects in the far-infrared and will allow astronomers to work out the detailed chemistry and physics behind star and planet formation as well as the last stages of stellar evolution before VYCMa's eventual collapse into a supernova. More coverage is available at the Herschel Mission Blog, which I run."

Comment Re:It's sad that none of it works (Score 1) 238

by cayle clark (#29232499) Attached to: Big, Beautiful Boxes From Computer History

The CHM is very definitely a "real" museum. It takes as its purpose, the collection and preservation of artifacts and documents. Also as with most real museums, the part on display to the public is a tiny fraction of the whole collection, which comprises some 30,000 cataloged artifacts and even more documents. 99% of those are in a rather amazing warehouse in Milpitas, CA.

Far from being a junkpile, every artifact from single vacuum tubes or circuit boards up to the massive cabinets of the Zuse, is photographed, cataloged and stored on shelving in a climate-controlled space.

Most of the collection is pieces of computers because that's what people and companies donate, often discards and salvage.

Like that 360/91 console that features in the photographs? There is only the console panel; you go around back of it, and see thick bundles of yellow wires that were hacked off with a bolt-cutter when the machine was scrapped. Those lights will never blink again. So, should it be thrown out, or is there some value in preserving and displaying the hacked-off panel?

Comment Re:It's sad that none of it works (Score 1) 238

by cayle clark (#29232367) Attached to: Big, Beautiful Boxes From Computer History

There are several working restorations at CHM. (1) That 1620 definitely works, I've seen it run. They interfaced a PC to replace the console typewriter, but otherwise it ran. (2) there is a complete, working PDP-1 that is demo'd every month, you can play the orignal spacewar game on its vector CRT, and last Christmas they had a carol sing with PDP-1 synthesizer accompaniment. (3) There is a complete 1950s-era machine room with raised floor containing two complete 1401 systems, along with working 026 keypunches, 085 sorter, and tape drives. These are demo'd monthly also. (4) The restoration of the IBM RAMAC, the original hard disk drive, is nearing completion and should be on display later this year.

All the above proceed slowly because they are 100% volunteer-run. They get minimal funding from CHM and only minimal help from the small paid staff. It takes tens of thousands of donated hours to get one of those old machines running and debugged. There are a myriad of age-induced problems, for example dried-up electrolytic caps, corroded contacts, hardened bearing grease and cracked or flattened rubber rollers, which introduce hard-to-trace problems.

If you live anywhere near Mountain View and know something about one of these machines, your help (or money) would be welcome.

Comment Peas were user discovery (Score 5, Informative) 104

by cayle clark (#28867239) Attached to: New Class of Galaxy Discovered

I've spent a lot of hours classifying galaxies at GalaxyZoo. The abstract sense of making a tiny contribution to research gets thin real fast. What keeps me coming back is the surprise factor. You'll click away sorting boring balls and streaks and then up pops a perfect barred-spiral, or a swooshy collision or an oddity that doesn't fit any of the categories, and wakes you up. There are millions of galaxies in the deep-field surveys that are the source, most of them never looked at individually, and you never know what the software will toss up next.

The site has an active and supportive forum community, and it was in the forums that the users -- not the astronomy post-docs who run the site -- first commented on the little green balls, suggested they might represent a unique class, and started collecting them as posts on a thread. There are user-run threads going on for other odd types of galaxy some of which might ultimately turn into research topics as well.
Games

Braid, Games As Art, and Interpretation 37

Posted by Soulskill from the sometimes-a-rocket-is-just-a-rocket dept.
Zonk points out an opinion piece at Gamers With Jobs about Braid, an independent platformer that received high praise when it was released a few months ago. It's often held up as an example of "games as art," and in this article, Julian Murdoch comments on the act of interpreting such art. He takes Braid's creator, Johnathan Blow, to task for the effect his comments have on the game and its players: "My frustration with Braid is multiplied because it would seem to have been designed with me specifically in mind. I am a student of the obscure. I am pathologically drawn to books, movies, games, and passages of scripture that are dense, difficult, and which hide (and thus reveal) meaning behind layers of art and artifice. Games lend themselves to this layering more than any other medium. The casual player of Oblivion, System Shock 2, Fallout 3 or Bioshock can have an extraordinarily story-light experience if they simply 'play' the games. One layer deeper, a close reading of the environments informs deeper levels of story. Deeper still, evidence in the form of written texts and audio tracks provides footnotes, side-plots and appendices to a central story. ... by the end of my Braid experience, I felt like Blow had specifically constructed something that would generate emails and forum posts begging him to please tell us 'what it all means.'" There is some interesting discussion in the comments, including a response from Blow himself.
The Internet

How To Supplement Election Coverage? 241

Posted by kdawson from the news-junkie-overload dept.
An anonymous reader asks "What information sources and social networking sites will you be using to supplement the election coverage on TV next Tuesday? I am ready with a big HDTV with Comcast, a Mac mini, and and an Xbox 360. I also have two laptops (one good for websites and one for streaming video), an old-school Blackberry, a 'regular' cell phone, a Nokia N810, a Squeezebox, and finally Sirius Satellite Radio. Which websites should I watch for live county results? I already know about the Twitter Vote Report for tracking and reporting voting issues and I already watch 'CNN Reporters' on Friendfeed for the national flair. What other Twitter accounts should I follow? Which urgent ones should I send to my phones? Which YouTube accounts or keywords I should subscribe to in Miro? What are the most popular sites for posting 'on-scene' videos — iReport, Flickr, something else? I know most local Fox affiliates are great about streaming, but is there a page that lists all of the streams, in case I need to quickly focus on one city or area? Basically, how would you configure all those gadgets?" This reader might find some guidance in what to focus on from a video produced by reader (and data modeler) Bruce Nash that lays out a predicted timeline for when the media will call each state, depending on when the polls close and how tight each race is expected to be.

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