Pure’s Sensia Internet Clock Radio Brings Touchscreen and Impressive Sound [Radio]

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Like the Chumby, I'm not totally sure that the Pure Sensia is meant as a clock radio. But I don't know what the hell else you'd use it for, and it'd be pretty sweet to wake up to.

Pure mainly focuses on internet radio, releasing little docks and speaker sets and that kind of thing, but this is their first effort with a touchscreen and it definitely looks to best the Chumby One (though not the sorta similar iLuv App Station) in the specs department. It's got a 5.7-inch capacitive glass touchscreen (the Chumby's got a 3.5-inch resistive), a 30W sound system (Chumby's only packing a paltry 2W) and offers weather, Facebook and Twitter apps, with "more to come."

Now here's the part where Chumby kicks the Sensia's ass: The Sensia is far bigger, like dominate-your-bedside-table big; its design is, at best, inoffensive, while the Chumby is damned adorable; it's got no homebrew community to hack away and make it a great gadget, let alone a huge repository of fun approved apps; and most importantly, it's $350 to the Chumby's $100. $350 is super expensive for a clock radio, or a bedside boombox or whatever you'd call this thing. Availability has yet to be announced. [Pure]



Generator Excitation

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Why is the excitation of a generator (not a generator transformer unit) switched ON at near to rated speed?

For example, the excitation of 750rpm rated speed generator is switched ON at 560rpm. Switching ON of the excitation a very low speed would have overloaded the excitation system and

Samurai Air Sword Will Swoosh Your Enemies in Two [Toys]

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Hookai. So. The Samurai Air Sword is really an iPhone in disguise. It doesn't come with touchscreen, CPU, multimedia processor, memory, GPS, or compass. But it has a gyroscope and runs a clone of the only iPhone application that matters.

The Lightsaber app! Except it's not really an app, and this is better: It makes 48 swooshabolous sound effects while you move it up in the air using a motion sensor. So screw the web browser, the mail, the stupid touchscreen, and all that fancy crap. For $18 and two AAA batteries, this thing does exactly what you need it to do. [Happinet via IT Media via DVICE]



Good Morning DC | The Intersection

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Picture 29This morning I’m back in the District to address the Federation of Earth Science Information Partners (ESIP) about ways to improve the communication of science. With members representing over 90 organizations including NOAA, NASA, and USGS, they work to collect, interpret, and develop applications for Earth observation information. It’s my first talk of 2010 and I’m very much looking forward to spending the day with such a neat interdisciplinary group.


Cable Lug Diameter

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Why is the lug inner diameter more than the cable core diameter?

I have a 500sq.mm single core stranded aluminium cable whose core diameter is 26.4sq.mm. Corresponding copper lug inner diameter is 30mm. Ofcourse, the cable inner diameter should be slightly more than cable core diameter so tha

Bonding Aluminum 7075

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I am trying to find a braze or soldering compound to join two "hockey pucks" of 7075 aluminum together. The 7075 has a melting point of 1175F, and there are holes in the pucks that need to maintain their integrity, so it needs to be a low temperature. I will be using a small annealing oven as the he

Drip Leg Design

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Hi Everyone,

What would be the possible effects on energy loss of a drip leg design as described below.

1. The steam mains are 12 inches in diameter and the drip leg diameters are only an inch.
2. Drip legs are not insulated and the drip leg length is 13 ft.
3. Thermodynamic steam

Magnetic Flowmeter

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Hi,

Can any one explain the difference between " Center-Line Method" and " Mean Axial Velocity Method" for adjusting the probe of the insertion type magmeter. Which one is preferred and for what reason?

Aviation Week honors the “Space Entrepreneur”

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The efforts of the emerging NewSpace field to reshape the space industry have attracted the attention of a leading trade publication, Aviation Week & Space Technology, which named “The Space Entrepreneur” as its 2009 PErson of the Year in this week’s issue. “Collectively, they are in the vanguard of a new industry, poised to transform how humans venture into space in ways that most observers can scarcely imagine today,” the Aviation Week article states. “Space entrepreneurs had a big influence on aerospace in 2009, although it does not begin to compare with the impact they are likely to have in years to come.”

The article devotes a fair amount to Masten Space Systems, who won $1.15 million from NASA’s Centennial Challenges program in 2009 in the Lunar Lander Challenge. (Dave Masten is featured on the cover of the issue as well.) Also mentioned in the article is XCOR Aerospace, whose CEO, Jeff Greason, served on the Augustine committee that made the case for commercial crew transportation to low Earth orbit.

A contrarian view, though, is expressed by John Marshall, an aerospace consultant who serves on NASA’s Aerospace Safety Advisory Panel. He tell’s Aviation Week that he’s skeptical that there’s a big market for commercial human spaceflight, particularly to orbit. “There is a very small, unique industry that is potentially there,” he said of suborbital spaceflight, and acknowledged that there is a government market for cargo and crew transportation to orbit. “After that, I don’t see any market. I don’t see Hilton Hotels putting a vehicle in there to be able to accommodate space tourism anytime soon.” Commercial space companies, he added, “are a long way away from endorsing the same kind of safety culture that a mature airline has.”

I Feel Like the Philips Activa PMP Is Judging Me [PMPs]

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"Did you really need that fourth bourbon? And why did you go with the super burrito? Is the cheese and sour cream really necessary?" it seems to ask. "Maybe you should go for a run."

Well, fuck you, Activa, I don't need your judgment, and yes, I did need that fourth bourbon. If you must know, the Philips Activa is the next in what's becoming a trend: The fitness-based PMP. It makes sense—smartphones are replacing PMPs at a rapid rate, and one of the only niches that they can't (or shouldn't) cover is workouts. You really shouldn't bring your Droid or iPhone with you while working out; they're big and bulky and valuable.

The Activa is a teeny little pocket player, includes a clip like the Sansa Clip+, and in what has to be a first, I have no idea what the capacity is. Either 4GB or 8GB is expected, but it's not listed in the specs for some reason. It matches your music with your workout by tempo and measures the usual distance and calorie counts, as well as giving audio feedback to let you know what your status is (a nice feature, for sure). It should be available in April 2010 for $130. [Philips]



Detecting a Missing Pulse Using a PIC16F873A

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I am relatively new to PIC assembly code and need to monitor a pulse stream on a single port testing a bank of relay contacts, the pulse rate is very slow at about 500ms mark space. All I need to do is monitor the pulse stream to detect any missing pulses and then jump to a failure routine I have al

Eclipses Yield First Images of Elusive Iron Line in Solar Corona

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images of the solar coronaSolar physicists attempting to unlock the mysteries of the solar corona have found another piece of the puzzle by observing the sun’s outer atmosphere during eclipses.

Ground-based observations reveal the first images of the solar corona in the near-infrared emission line of highly ionized iron, or Fe XI 789.2 nm. The observations were taken during total solar eclipses in 2006, 2008, and 2009 by astrophysicist Adrian Daw of NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., with an international team of scientists led by Shadia Habbal from the University of Hawaii’s Institute for Astronomy (IfA).

Comparison of the first image of the corona in Fe XI 789.2 nm, taken during the 2006 eclipse, with a white-light image taken by Miloslav Drückmuller from Brno University of Technology in the Czech Republic"The first image of the corona in Fe XI 789.2 nm was taken during the total solar eclipse of March 29, 2006," said Daw.

The images revealed some surprises. Most notably, that the emission extends out at least three solar radii -- that’s one-and-a-half times the sun’s width at its equator, or middle -- above the surface of the sun, and that there are localized regions of enhanced density for these iron ions.

Combined with observations of other iron charge states, the observations yield the two-dimensional distribution of electron temperature and charge-state measurements for the first time, and establish the first direct link between the distribution of charge states in the corona and in interplanetary space.

This image of the solar corona contains a color overlay of the emission from highly ionized iron lines and white light taken of the 2008 eclipse"These are the first such maps of the 2-D distribution of coronal electron temperature and ion charge state," said Daw.

Mapping the distribution of electron temperature and iron charge states in the corona with total solar eclipse observations represents an important step in understanding the solar corona and how space weather impacts Earth.

The scientists’ results will be presented at the American Astronomical Society meeting on January 4 in Washington and published in the January issue of the Astrophysical Journal.


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The PARASOL Satellite Moving Off the A-Train’s Track

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Hurricane Rita as seen by PARASOL on September 23, 2005After nearly 5 years of concurrent operations with the Afternoon Constellation, known as the "A-Train," the PARASOL satellite is going on another orbit "track." The A-Train includes a number of NASA satellites that orbit the Earth one behind the other on the same track and until this month, PARASOL has been part of that train.

PARASOL is an Earth observation mission, managed by the French Space Agency (CNES). PARASOL stands for "Polarization and Anisotropy of Reflectances for Atmospheric Sciences coupled with Observations from a Lidar." According to CNES, it was maneuvered to leave its position inside the A-Train at 12:48 UTC, December 2, 2009.

The Afternoon Constellation A-Train consists of five U.S. and international Earth Science satellites that fly within approximately 10 minutes of each other to enable concurrent scienceThe A-Train satellite formation currently consists of five satellites flying in close proximity: Aqua, CloudSat, CALIPSO, PARASOL and Aura. Each of these satellites cross the equator within a few minutes of each another at around 1:30 p.m. local time. By combining the different sets of nearly simultaneous observations, scientists are able to gain a better understanding its main mission, studying the important parameters related to climate change. As an additional benefit, the A-Train satellites provide unique information about tropical cyclones, the collective term for tropical depressions, tropical storms, hurricanes and typhoons.

The PARASOL satellite has now reached an orbit of 3.9 kilometers (2.4 miles) under the A-train, which will enable it to keep on sharing data periodically with the A-train members, while gradually leaving the A-Train neighborhood. Based on a typical decay of its orbit, it is expected to be completely out of the A-train neighborhood at the end of 2012. The CNES team will continue to coordinate operations with the A-Train Mission Operations Working Group to ensure safety.

PARASOL's measurement of aerosols is based on polarization, so is unique within the existing A-Train. Its departure leaves a data gap that will be filled when Glory (also a polarization spectrometer) launches in 2010. Cross-calibration between Glory and PARASOL, to merge the 2 datasets into a single long-term trending dataset, will take longer with PARASOL in a different orbit.

An artist's rendition of the PARASOL satelliteSteven Platnick, Acting Earth Observing System Project Scientist at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. said, "With its novel combination of polarimetry and multiangle capabilities, PARASOL continues to provide a unique and important perspective on cloud and aerosol properties. More important, as a strong complement to other A-Train instruments, POLDER has contributed to an unprecedented data set that will be studied for years to come."

CNES launched PARASOL into the A-Train orbit in December 2004. For the past five years, PARASOL, originally designed to be a 2-year mission, flew within ~30 seconds of the CALIPSO and CloudSat satellites.

For more information about the A-Train and hurricane research, visit:

 http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/hurricanes/features/atrain.html
For more information about PARASOL, visit: http://smsc.cnes.fr/PARASOL/
For more information about Aqua, visit: http://aqua.nasa.gov/
For more information about CloudSat, visit: http://cloudsat.atmos.colostate.edu/
For more information about CALIPSO, visit: http://www-calipso.larc.nasa.gov/
For more information about Aura, visit: http://aura.gsfc.nasa.gov/

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Former Gary Johnson Campaign Manager, now GOP candidate for New Mexico Governor Doug Turner

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A "Johnson-ite," but not a carbon copy

Doug Turner has quite an impressive resume. The lifelong New Mexican has an MA from the Universite libre de Bruxelles in Belgium. He has lived and worked overseas in politics for both the Japanese Democratic Party (not the same as the US Democrats), and the Orange Revolution in Ukraine.

He's the owner of a successful public relations firm. He has worked for former US Senator and budget hawk Pete Domenichi. And he's worked for his Dad, former US Senate candidate Bill Turner. He is the former Chairman of the Albuquerque Business Development Commission.

But it's his win as Campaign Manager for now prospective Republican Presidential candidate Gary Johnson for Governor, that may gain him the most gravitas. Turner is one of several Republicans vying for a shot to fill the shoes of retiring Democrat Governor Bill Richardson, in what most experts see as a banner GOP year, even in an increasingly blue Western State.

Turner has Johnson's enthusiastic backing:

"I think he'd do a great job as Governor. He's a very good people person. He's sharp, and he communicates well. Doug's got all the ingredients."

Turner was recently featured in the Albuquerque Journal, Jan. 3:

Although he shares some libertarian perspectives with Johnson, Turner said people shouldn't expect a carbon copy of the former governor. Turner said he would be a more pragmatic leader, getting things accomplished -- boosting the state's energy economy and improving education are big Turner priorities -- rather than just saying no to a Democratic Legislature.

"But if we want to look at the issues that directly affect most New Mexicans, and if we as Republicans have an expectation we can win in this state, then we have to talk about the issues that are important to most people."


And what are his main issues? Three actually: Jobs, Jobs, and Jobs.

What does he see as the biggest impediement to his Jobs Agenda? Government Regulations.

Turner wants to see the Enchanted State adopt a more friendly Pro-Business attitude much like their Lone Star State neighbors. From his campaign website:

"I love this State. But trying to run a business here is tough... it's really tough. In fact, I was in Hobbs, speaking to some small businessmen there, and they said they were running 10 miles across the border to Texas where you don't have to do with the same rules. So, I'm running cause I want to see New Mexico have a regulatory environment, that allows businesses to do business."

Watch a brief video on his policy agenda at his campaign website - Doug Turner, Jobs and Economic Growth.

Rock Garden

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Rock Garden
This image of a cluster of rocks labeled 'Rock Garden' is where NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Spirit became embedded in April 2009. The Spirit and Opportunity rovers landed on the Red Planet in January 2004 for what was to be a 90-day mission, but which has lasted 6 Earth years, or 3.2 Mars years. During this time, Spirit has found evidence of a steamy and violent environment on ancient Mars that is quite different from the wet and acidic past documented by Opportunity, which has been operating successfully as it explores halfway around the planet.


Spirit used its navigation camera to capture this view of the terrain toward the southeast from the location it reached on the 1,870th Martian day, or sol, on April 7, 2009.

Wheels on the western side of the rover broke through the dark, crusty surface into bright, loose, sandy material that was not visible as the rover approached the site. Spirit became stuck in an area near the left of the image's center later in April.

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