SSI Activity (and its rebirth?)

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|> | I support the space habitat vision, I just don't support the
|> economic roadmap and think space habitats have to be pursued
|> directly (or, at least, via a physical self-replicating seed
|> bootstrap approach funded by volunteers and charity). | I believe
|> that we are in total agreement on this point. There may at some
|> point be an economic reason for building a space infrastructure,
|> but even if that happens the methods and results are not likely
|> to be along the lines that would make colonies in space viable.
|> To me the first problem to be solved was to make sure that what
|> was needed at the end was produced at the beginning therefore the
|> reason why I created InnerTransit.org. Which is a specific
|> method for tracking requirements through design and
|> implementation. The next step of course is to have viable
|> projects that are done within the frame work.

| As I raised the point long before, I feel free projects should be
| based on free tools (as in end user modifiable and/or
| distributable), or at least free and well documented data exchange
| standards. And for me, that's the sort of tool I keep to using when
| possible (for example, I've moved to "Open Office".
| http://www.openoffice.org I'm not sure the InnerTransit tools are
| "free" in that sense
| http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/license-list.html

I am not against putting some form of InnerTransit into some open form
of open source and had considered doing that last year. At the moment
it is the projects that are open which is where the intellectual
effort is. A tool that is totally web based is a little different
than a tool that you use on your personal machine. Case in point
would be ebay or paypal or google as compared to open office. I use
mostly Linux and open tools for everything on my computer. But I use a
variety of services on the web, which is any web site including the
one that we are doing this email through, that are not open source.

| (even if one perhaps can get a "free" account). I've just gotten
| burned too many times putting a lot of effort into building stuff
| on proprietary systems which disappear. Now this doesn't mean you
| should change your stuff; you may well have a fine business venture
| for whatever your model is; I'm just saying where I am coming from.
| I have no doubt from looking at:
| http://www.innertransit.org/common/introduction.html that you know
| your stuff about collaborative engineering and project management.

| [Also, out of curiosity, I tend to do my work in Python these days
| for maintainability; what languages do you like to work in for
| InnerTransit?]

php apache mysql. the standard web applications.

|> Which is where we need a good hunk of charity to get that first
|> small eye catching seed project implemented. Without a seed
|> project there will be no volunteers to help push the vision
|> along.

| Well, no doubt it would help (if we didn't fight over it. :-). But
| how far can we get without it? Maybe further than we think?

|> | Certainly, once you are talking about owning hardware, then you
|> are | on much stronger ground arguing for a central owner of a
|> complex | artifact | Exactly! The first seed project has to be
|> something real that works. It may work very poorly but it must
|> work. Therefore the first seed project has to have working
|> hardware / software. Anything that is just a mental exercise
|> will not attract volunteers. The project that I have had in mind
|> for a long time is some sort of web accessible robotic assembly /
|> sand moving lunar simulation where the goal would be to work on a
|> telerobotic interface.

| This is a good idea, and it builds on Greg Maryniak's telerobotic
| physical simulator (a robot arm with time delay). Still, I think
| kids do spend a lot of time playing games, which are simulations,
| so I'm not sure I would count out computer simulations entirely, or
| just call them "mental exercises" if that is what you meant there.
| There are a lot of free or open source programmers out there
| working on simulation type things. And even LunaCorp has the notion
| of having kids practice on simulators before driving their real
| lunar rovers. Now, this is not to say current day simulations are
| that great; they often aren't. Part of what I see happening over
| the next decade or two is every greater realism as we get a million
| times more computer power for a constant price. That's enough for
| some pretty detailed calculations (if we had the real physics and
| chemistry data to put into them).

I do high end simulators for my day job. So I know a bit about the
limitations and capabilities of simulators. In this case having real
hardware that is part of the development process is extremely important.

|> These are seat bidets. They don't take up any extra space in
|> your bathroom. They replace the toilet seat of an elongated
|> toilet and "Y" off of the water line going into the toilet.
|> http://www.BidetsUnlimited.com> I put up a first page just for
|> you. Space habitats are going to need seat bidets.

| Thanks! I've already found a use for that link in another email to
| the list. ;-)

| Anyway, I'd say more on all your excellent points, but I need to go
| to sleep!

| --Paul Fernhout

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