The centrifugal gravity approach requires a massive structure - you need something like 200+ meter radius to keep rotation rates low enough that Coriolis effects don't make people nauseous (which would create a whole different toilet problem). Building a better space toilet is orders of magnitude cheaper and lighter than spinning up a habitat.
You could just dangle the toilet on the end of a filament, and rotate the capsule and the outhouse around the centre of mass. No massive structure needed, just remember to take the farmer’s almanac with you before you head out.
Even with centrifugal "gravity" the toilets need to be designed for the worst case scenario (no "gravity"). Even if you could use a "regular" toilet the system needs to sequester and process the septic waste. That precludes even using the likes of an airplane toilet.
It's a significant amount of engineering effort, testing, feedback, and iteration to build effective life support systems for manned spaceflight. Long duration spaceflight is orders of magnitude more difficult.
Toilets are systems that can incapacitate or even kill the crew if they malfunction. In a low or microgravity environment aerosolized septic material can get in astronauts' eyes or lungs. It can also seep into electronics or other ship systems causing malfunctions. Even just clean water spraying into the cabin could be dangerous in microgravity.
- To build a centrifuge in space of sufficient size, you need to solve the problem of delivering a large amount of materials to orbit, because it has to be hundreds of meters in diameter at least.
- Such a centrifuge will create a gyroscopic effect, and the station will quickly become very difficult to control.
Couldn't you have two centrifuges next to each other spinning in opposite directions, cancelling most of the effect out? I believe some helicopters work like that, with two sets of rotors on longer troop transport helis. A few even have two sets on top of each other. And many planes have the props on opposite wings rotate in opposite directions.
It depends on the scope of the mission. If you're going to commercialize long term space travel then you're going to want some form of artificial gravity.
If you build a better toilet you need a better pooper to use it. And they need to use it correctly every time or you're going to need a really good waste cleaning and disinfecting strategy for your ship.
The article mentions that on Mars, with 0.38x Earth gravity, there will still be challenges, so I expect you need a significant fraction of 1g for the problems to go away.
It's not an absurd question. The threshold value is the one that breaks surface tension and effectively pulls waste away from the body. It will be more than a few hundredths g but less than 1g.
Unfortunately we have basically no data on the effects of partial gravity, in this context or any other. We can try flying partial-gravity parabolas in aircraft and simulate a Martian toilet the same way they tested the design for Skylab; I don't think this experiment has been done.
Don't get me started on that. Outlook PWA is so stupid that I can't delete invitations without sending a decline response. Run all rules on the inbox? Tough luck, no such option. I use a Linux VM at work and the only Microsoft thing I am forced to run on my Windows PC is Outlook. That PC is basically the VM launcher at this point because everything else I need to run is on KDE inside the VM and I couldn't be happier that I get to use KDE both at office and home. Microsoft deserves every ounce of hate that it gets and much more.
I found virtual files support also somewhat critical. This is not really stable on Linux yet and makes using Nextcloud with 8TB and Million of files pretty difficult.
What are you using for virtual files? I definitely found it to work much much better when I added Nextcloud through Gnome’s settings rather than the Nextcloud client
You mean via WebDav? That is definitly an option, but then it is not possible anymore to mix working file directories within Nextcloud. E.g. I have a long list of ignored files for nextcloud [1], such as .git folder etc.
I would need to create a separate file tree, splitting my work between nextcloud maintained files and working files. That feels cumbersome. On Windows, I could directly add my whole drive to nextcloud as a virtual file system.
I've done this several times over the last 18 years or so. The most recent was a few months a go. And my steamdeck persuaded me. Unfortunately I ran into the same WiFi networking issue I've never managed to resolve. Even on different hardware. Pings to my default gateway are ridiculously slow compared to windows. I spent countless hours trying to resolve. I gave up and have gone with windows 11 ltsc.
This is the type of thing that AI is actually good at diagnosing in my experience. Haven't had anything similar happen but seems more of a router issue upstream.
Maybe worth checking what Steam Deck's connection has configured differently given it's on the same network?
That is a very good point, what on earth was I thinking, I didn't try pinging it from my steamdeck. Actually, I'll try that, but now I'm back on windows the ship has sailed.
Good point about AI too.
This is on mint Linux and unless I'm remembering wrong years ago it was mint Linux that had the same issue completely different hardware and network
Interesting; I haven't had wi-fi issues in Linux for more than a decade, but admittedly I sort of selection-bias towards laptops that are known to work fine with Linux.
I recently changed my distro to Bazzite expecting it to work well on a laptop since it's supposedly optimized for handhelds. While it "just works" and I had no hardware problems, it still required tweaking to get the battery life anywhere close to what it would be in Windows. "Normal people" would still need someone to support them with the installation to get it to work well for their machine.
The website of Bazzite says it comes with 'cpu-governors that are optimized for gaming'. A governor basically decides when and how to change the power level of your CPU. If a core is experiencing high load, it might increase power and clockspeeds to compensate. Of course this draws more power, so 'optimized for gaming' kind of means unoptimized for battery. I think most distros come with a 'power-saver' governor by default. This option should be available in power settings called 'governor' or 'power profile' or something like that.
Also, I recently switched from KDE Plasma (one of the Bazzite options) to xfce4 and I've seen massive gains in battery life, about 1-2hrs extra. I don't remember how many hours I used to get on win10 on this laptop, but I'm sure it has never been as good as this.
The problem with linux is that it is made and maintained by people who love linux. Until product people start getting involved, it's damned to it's eternal ~5% consumer market penetration.
The problem with Windows and MacOS is that they are hostile to the user, and that's because they serve a "product" manager who is trying to maximize business value for a massive corporation, not serve you a good OS.
We don't need three garbage corporate operating systems mismanaged by MBAs, we already have two!
Anyone who's ever tried to get support online with a question about Linux will quickly meet *actual* user hostility as they're asked why they didn't know to check for the config file in the filing cabinet in the basement behind a locked door saying beware of leopard, how dumb they are, etc.
> This has been my experience with the Linux community for 26 years.
I read through that post that elicited those comments that you have a problem with. At the end of a long list of complaints, it says: ".....yep, just as user friendly as I remember."
Nowhere does that post request help, and with that last comment, is clearly intended as a disparagement of Linux, not a request for help.
Then, you are turning around, and cherry picking responses to highlight the negative responses to a negative post, and disparaging the Linux community while ignoring the helpful responses.
Half those aren't even remotely harsh. Saying the raspberry pi wasn't designed to be mained is totally reasonable, what possible objection do you have to somebody saying that?
I understand pointing out that an upgrade failure should be expected when Ubuntu tells you that upgrades won't work, but I don't agree with calling the Pi a "device for experimentation". Not only it's used for serious applications in industrial settings, but some products are sold as... personal computers:
> Raspberry Pi 500
> The refined personal computer.
> A fast, powerful computer built into a high-quality keyboard, for the ultimate compact PC experience.
That my complaints trying to install software have absolutely nothing to do with it being a Raspberry Pi and the experience is identical on any Linux machine.
> Half those aren't even remotely harsh.
....and the fact that people consider this to be the case is more evidence of the Linux community's hostility.
Linux is like Rick and Morty: I don't mind it, but I never want to be associated with its fans.
If you can't take the mildlest of implied criticisms without feeling offended, this isn't a Linux problem, it's a you wandered out of your safe space hugbox problem.
That's how it has to be. Volunteer community doesn't have the bandwidth to make everything maximally user friendly. Users have to do their share too, by accepting the responsibility to learn about their system. Otherwise the model isn't feasible. If you want an appliance experience where you have zero responsibility as a user, you can go to the commercial vendor, but they will also have power over you and abuse it.
Linux is indeed for people who can love linux. For people who don't like computers, there's basically no solution.
Ironically, 3 of the 4 are unix based with product people in the loop.
Linux can work as the savior of computer users, but it's not going to happen with a bunch of people who fetishize using a computer like trinity in the matrix.
I think that's a fair criticism for issues where Linux devs might be blind to the friction a lot of Linux distros come with, but I don't think it's universal for all devs and for all features, all the time.
Personally, although I'm not a Linux maintainer, I am a dev and I love doing work that makes UX better for everyone.
> The problem with linux is that it is made and maintained by people who love linux
To specialize that statement a bit, Linux is made and maintained by people who showed up and contributed. These two facts create a vicious cycle. The people show up to add things they love to Linux, and Linux becomes something that only those exact people love. We're deep into this spiral where Linux has become specialized for ultra-nerds who enjoy solving puzzles to get their wifi to work.
If you look at old Linux magazines, the community is completely different. People were focused on "beating Microsoft" and democratizing computing. The people who took those goals seriously have left the scene.
The people who take that goal seriously get burned when, having persuaded a normie to install Linux, they realize they just volunteered to provide free tech support to that person until whenever time they give up and buy a Mac.
The last two people I handed Linux to were not tech literate. I offered them tech support from the beginning. They have been happy users for well over a year now that have not once called me for help. The story for normie Linux use really is pretty good now.
A few people installing Linux on their friend's PCs is nothing. They can check their email, do their taxes, and play games from their iPad. It's an illusion of accomplishment. The entire Linux community, including people who actually build things, used to be focused on making Linux usable by EVERY class of user, including engineers, doctors, and lawyers.
No, the problem is that windows is in schools and come pre-installed with majority of computers. Another problem is kernel-level anti-cheats mentioned earlier.
I actually hope “product people” won’t be involved as long as possible. “Product people” is mostly a reason of our current state of enshitification of most of the products. I would actually try my best to gatekeep.
Ubuntu is a good example of why you don't let "product people" near the thing, Ubuntu is not even remotely the most noob appropriate distro but costs on marketting. As for SteamOS, Valve does many things which everybody else fails at, so they're not a good model for typical outcomes.
Frankly, I hope Linux keeps the product people out. Product people always turn what they touch to shit. It’s the product people who made Windows the ad ridden mess it is today.
You can't have privacy when out in public!! No-one's privacy was given up here because no-one here was engaging in private acts, since all of them were in the public.
People generally aren't complaining about home owners mounting cameras for themselves (the car is no different). A 3rd party combining the interconnected nature of their system into a holistic system with sweeping coverage is much different than a single person figuring out who hit their car.
It would be nice for neighborhood cameras to timely alert neighbors when a porch pirate was on the prowl in their neighborhood. I get the privacy implications, but after having a few packages stolen one might just not care anymore.
Since police absolutely have no care about porch pirates where i live, I rig my camera to turn up a siren for 10 seconds (using a homekit power plug) when it sees someone near my townhome after 11PM (this is enough to usually scare them off to easier pickings). It wouldn't be so bad if the kids bedroom wasn't on the first floor and we are on the third, but it is what it is. At least its only really bad in late spring and summer, the only time when Seattle's long rainy season comes in useful.
Its too bad that I can't bike in Seattle anymore, the theft situation just makes it too unbearable (and probably why you see fewer people biking these days even though they are dumping lots of money into biking infrastructure). Think what we could do with cameras like we've done with apple tags to ramp down bike theft (then again, police don't care, and people aren't ready to go vigilante here).
Their insurance paid for the repairs to my car and a rental for the duration. Otherwise I would've had to go through my insurance ($1000 deductible) + possible rise in rates.
I think there should be more than one standard. "Reasonable expectation of privacy" is usually used to dismiss people's concerns about constant surveillance. Let's stop being complicit in public surveillance.
No, it really hasn't. Sweeping the problem under the rug has already resulted in at least 150 deaths, which could have been prevented by allowing pilots to seek mental health care.
150 deaths is statistically insignificant on this scenario and actual a very good evidence the current policy is working.
It is hard for some people to have the emotional maturity to understand this, but we can't fucking prevent every fucking death. We will all fucking die sooner or later, too.
You have absolutely no objective reason to suppose that changing this policy would have prevented this, not to mention the risk of making things worse.
But the paradox is, all of them will die and not all preventions are Pareto efficient.
I can keep an old decrepit rich guy living a miserable life for some more 6 months at the same cost that would take to me to improve the life expectancy of some 100 poor babies a few decades.
I can try save a bunch of fat very-sick boomers from a respiratory infection at the cost of causing an economic crisis that will completely fuck a lot of young people too for decades ahead. Was it fucking worth?
The amount of flying that people do is not constant; if lots of airplanes fall out of the sky and explode in fiery wrecks, people will fly less.
In this case, "lots" is "anything more than once a month" because footage of the above is addictive to anyone trying to make money from the news. Look at how many flights there are a day. How high can the crash rate be until those pictures are seared into our eyeballs?
It's actually funny you bring up COVID, because I agree with you that the restrictions were... not good. I also think that the FAA could use a lighter touch on just about everything, EXCEPT the level of safety it requires from Part 121 operators.
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