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Sunday Things - miscellaneous edition

posted in Links by Cargo Cult on Sunday July 7 2013

Considering it's artificial stone, concrete can decay remarkably quickly.

I suppose it's that decidedly reactive rebar inside.

This place will appear in a million computer games in six months or so.

Hashima Island on Google Street View - that oft-explored abandoned coal-mining facility off the coast of Japan has been explored again, this time with a Street View backpack. I've already spent ages photographing the place with the screenshot keyboard shortcut. via laura

The Mad Hatterpillar - out-hat all competitors by wearing one's previously moulted head capsule as a headpiece. Which in turn is wearing the previous head capsule as a headpiece, and so forth. via

In ten years, enthusiasts will be making new vintage CPUs from raw silicon.

Veronica - mad hacker-lady Quinn Dunki builds a 6502-based computer from first principles, home-etching PCBs with vinegar and hydrogen peroxide. Now complete with custom bit-banging GPU hardware, memory and even a keyboard. Amazing documentation of this glorious bit of hardware lunacy. See also: a Z80-based alternative, and even a complete custom wire-wrapped CPU.

Bonus Soviet Space Program corner:

Proton M launch with ASAS disabled - if you don't get why this video is inappropriately hilarious, go play Kerbal Space Program.

Article comments (now closed)

1. Proton

Posted by phuzz at 2:43AM, Wednesday July 10 2013

Apparently someone installed the sensors the wrong way up [insert In Soviet Russia! joke here].
http://arstechnica.com/science/2013/07/parts-installed-upside-down-caused-last-weeks-russian-rocket-to-explode/

Which is pretty much like when I forget which end of the craft I should be controlling from in KSP.

2. Re: Proton

Posted by Cargo Cult at 2:25PM, Sunday July 14 2013

It seems to be traditional to install sensors the wrong way round, going back to the original Murphy's Law:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murphy%27s_law#Association_with_Murphy

Other examples include the Genesis spacecraft:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genesis_(spacecraft)#Mishap_Investigation_Board_.28MIB.29

... and the Galileo atmospheric probe, which somehow still managed to open its parachute on its one-of-a-kind descent into Jupiter:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galileo_(spacecraft)#Near-failure_of_atmospheric_probe_parachute

As for KSP, I've *never* accidentally done a perfectly measured orbital injection burn in entirely the wrong direction. I did *not* lose the enormous Kerbalstation II in that way. ('Polyus II' would have been a better name.)