On the DEWLine 2.0: Dwight Williams

Edge of Midnight: Base Map Progress XIII

Wed, 21 Feb 2024 15:42:09 GMT

Nailed down four more systems' host stars last night. I'm not entirely happy with the choices, mainly because the catalogue numbers available to use are not short enough and distinct enough. Numbers starting with GAIA DR3, APASS9, SKYM2, 2MASS and so on...and the SIMBAD database is very much a work in progress, perpetually playing catch-up with the new data - or old data finally data-entered after months to years' waiting - as it comes in.

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"Space is Part of the Land"

Mon, 05 Dec 2022 13:56:01 GMT

Noting this for ongoing discussion...and Musk is clearly enmeshed in this particular mess, by our settler-nations' encouragement.

https://apt613.ca/space-is-part-of-the-land-indigenous-knowledges-and-colonization-by-light-and-satellite-pollution/

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Radio: Liminal Spaces

Wed, 02 Mar 2022 01:10:12 GMT

https://www.cbc.ca/radio/ideas/liminal-space-popularity-1.6365390

Inspired by this subreddit:

https://www.reddit.com/r/LiminalSpace/

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Flight and the Quiet Happy

Sun, 26 Dec 2021 00:24:36 GMT

This morning, I tried to watch the launch of the new space telescope on YouTube, but it turned out I missed the launch time by about seven minutes. I still got to see enough to make me quietly happy for most of the rest of the day.

The household range is having problems. The heating elements on top are still working just fine for frying, steaming and boiling, but the burner box - the oven - is not in good shape. I'd call the process of heating anything "sluggish" if anything. We're not sure what's caused that, and calling for help is naturally Problematic right now. So cooking lasagna was cancelled in favour of relying upon Pizza Pizza last night.

My day job is on hold until after New Year's due to lack of people available to supervise.

*shrugs*

More as it comes to mind...

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From American Georgia to the Stars

Sun, 02 May 2021 13:19:14 GMT

Listening to this because Stacey Abrams (among others):

https://www.cbc.ca/radio/sunday/the-sunday-magazine-for-may-2-2021-1.6008904

Reading this as well:

https://www.cbc.ca/radio/quirks/this-mission-to-deep-space-could-last-a-lifetime-or-even-more-1.6008763

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MARS: Imagery from Perseverance!

Mon, 22 Feb 2021 21:50:08 GMT

This is cool.

https://mars.nasa.gov/mars2020/multimedia/raw-images/

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Congratulations to the NASA Perseverance Team!

Thu, 18 Feb 2021 21:06:51 GMT

I just watched the successful landing of the Perseverance Rover!

Cue the Starfleet March!

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Mid-January 2021

Wed, 13 Jan 2021 13:53:05 GMT

Okay, writing workshop went okay yesterday afternoon. Last night's architecture/urbanism discussion centering on Black involvement in architecture, design, urban (re)development, etc. was useful in seeing how equity principles can be made reality, as well as giving the wider public a look at projects being made reality right now.

This morning? I've started some laundry, gotten started on today's job search work, and planning to hope-scroll and doom-scroll through today's news as it evolves. Seems like we've got some hot stuff breaking on the exoplanet front.

NGTS-14Ab:

https://phys.org/news/2021-01-neptune-sized-exoplanet-ngts-survey.html

TOI-561b:

https://www.cnn.com/2021/01/12/world/super-earth-star-milky-way-scn-trnd/index.html

KOI-5Ab:

https://phys.org/news/2021-01-planet-koi-5ab-orbits-triple-star-skewed.html

Oh, and the count at exoplanet.eu as of today? 4404, split up between 3250 systems.

More on various topics later.

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JOB SEARCH: Drupal 8 First Look

Tue, 29 Dec 2020 19:03:20 GMT

I started looking at the training videos available via Skillport for that version.

I see from their website that the development teams have already moved onto v. 9 as a stable release, and I suppose I'm going to be playing catch-up for some months if I really want to understand what I can do with this and how to do it...?

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Space: ESA's Science Fleet

Sun, 27 Dec 2020 15:50:28 GMT

Space nerd wants to revisit this site later. You might end up having fun too.

http://scifleet.esa.int/#/

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SPACE/MAPS: More GAIA-Inspired Goodness...

Thu, 03 Dec 2020 21:00:52 GMT

...from Kevin Jardine at GalaxyMap.org via his Twitter feed!

https://twitter.com/galaxy_map/status/1334455740367560707

Maybe useful to some of you?

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ASTRONOMY: Arecibo Reborn?

Wed, 02 Dec 2020 18:43:39 GMT

I was hoping for a response along these lines, but am pleasantly surprised at the speed of it.

Details in the Twitter thread starting here:

https://twitter.com/ruperto1023/status/1334184780192223232

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ASTRONOMY: Arecibo Collapse

Tue, 01 Dec 2020 17:57:11 GMT

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/2020/12/arecibo-radio-telescope-in-puerto-rico-collapses/

My opinion: the facility should be rebuilt, to the best standards now available. The campaign to rebuild was already starting up when the announcement of plans to decommission the telescope was made, after all. We just need to keep moving on that project.

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ASTRONOMY: Arecibo Repairs

Tue, 17 Nov 2020 14:01:11 GMT

Noticing this on Slashdot while otherwise continuing my job search this morning:

https://tech.slashdot.org/story/20/11/17/0053200/cable-failures-endanger-renowned-puerto-rico-radio-telescope

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MAPS: 3 Kiloparsecs Out, By Way of Waterloo

Sun, 25 Oct 2020 18:53:48 GMT

Something else that Kevin "Galaxy Map" Jardine brought up recently: there's a "travelling salesperson lab" at University of Waterloo, and they took some of Kevin's work and played with it.

https://twitter.com/galaxy_map/status/1318092187972866048

https://www.math.uwaterloo.ca/tsp/star/index.html

https://www.math.uwaterloo.ca/tsp/star/about.html

https://www.math.uwaterloo.ca/tsp/star/gaia1_data.html

https://www.math.uwaterloo.ca/tsp/star/kj37859.html

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WORDS: Acedia

Fri, 02 Oct 2020 20:04:13 GMT

We re-learned that word here:

https://www.schneier.com/?p=60284

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COMICS: Mimicking Old-Style Print in Clip Studio Paint

Tue, 15 Sep 2020 12:16:28 GMT

I am reminded via the Celsys mailing list of the power inherent in this software. That reminder takes a nostalgic tone - pun intended - where the comic books and other magazines of my childhood and adolescence, and the imperfections that could crop up in those books and magazines are concerned.

Details here:

https://tips.clip-studio.com/en-us/articles/3541

Powerful kit there.

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SPACE: Crew Dragon's Live-Crew Test Run

Mon, 03 Aug 2020 00:22:18 GMT

Noting comments from krpalmer and muchado about today's spaceflight milestone...

I admit to being distracted myself by multiple factors:

- solving the printing-from-open-applications issue plaguing me for the last two days, successfully.
- the meeting of my Mac User Group earlier this afternoon via Zoom.
- trying to work up a custom-designed greeting card for a neighbour's imminent birthday, preferably by using new-to-me graphic design software.
- worries about the tornado watch AND warning late this afternoon in my region.
- shopping errands.
- general research and exploration of the internet.
- other stuff to be added later, maybe.

The fact is that this was an important milestone of sorts today. The revival of American spaceflight technologies used from Mercury to Gemini to Apollo with upgraded components, with some success. It's a capability rebuilt to some degree, and yet as someone who enjoyed much of the Shuttle era, I cannot help but see it as backsliding somewhat. Physics and economics and human biology and psychology will certainly have their ways to varying degrees here, and have done so these past weeks.

I do await further developments with great interest and some hope. I want to see human adventure expand its horizons, and not to see this turned into a mere escape hatch for the richest of us.

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Mapping the Orion Spur, Continued

Sun, 28 Jun 2020 16:23:42 GMT

Kevin Jardine's got another update...

https://twitter.com/galaxy_map/status/1277264515273560065

http://gruze.org/galaxymap/map_800pc/225dpi.png

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CGP Grey Video: Exploring an Abandoned Test Range

Tue, 12 May 2020 18:07:26 GMT

Well, this was a fun way to spend a quarter-hour between job-search activities.

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Actors in Space

Thu, 07 May 2020 23:07:26 GMT

I suppose that if Cruise's deal to film a movie aboard the International Space Station leads to more paid work in space exploration + commerce, that will be a good thing. Let's just be sure LEO space is cleaned up a bit for the next movie projects to go "upstairs".

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SPACE: More on Fomalhaut/alpha Piscis Austrini

Wed, 22 Apr 2020 16:54:45 GMT

Noting another essay from Phil Plait, this time about Fomalhaut's supposed planet...or is it an pre-planetary formation belt of material?

https://www.syfy.com/syfywire/fomalhauts-planet-may-actually-be-a-dust-cloud-from-a-giant-asteroid-collision

And how many stars are components of the Fomalhaut system, anyway? I've read reports of anywhere from two to six stars being part of the system, and that doesn't seem to have been sorted out yet. As of this writing, the Wikipedia article devoted to that star's been rewritten to argue for a trinary. Fomalhaut B is AKA "TW Piscis Austrini", Fomalhaut C AKA LP 876-10.

Oh, something else I got pointed out to me via Wikipedia: the Castor Moving Group. Didn't know about that before, either!

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SPACE: Milky Way-Andromeda Collision Prospects

Mon, 13 Apr 2020 00:14:26 GMT

Had this pointed out to me a few minutes ago at NCF's Speakers' Corner:

https://www.physics-astronomy.com/2016/06/new-research-suggest-andromeda-and.html

Our galaxy and Messier 31 might already be "touching"...

Exoplanet.eu's count as of yesterday: 4248.

So, that's seven new-to-humanity planets in two weeks. The process of automating discoveries really is picking up speed, isn't it?

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TREK: Octonary Star Systems

Thu, 26 Mar 2020 13:44:24 GMT

Phil Plait takes a deeper dive than I can re: the Aia system from "PIC: Broken Pieces".
And he's right about at least one species that could manage to build something like that. Go read!

https://www.syfy.com/syfywire/octonary-stars-and-broken-pieces-can-the-eight-star-system-from-star-trek-picard-actually

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SciAm: A New Map of the Milky Way

Thu, 19 Mar 2020 12:05:15 GMT

This was an unlocked article at the Scientific American website, excerpted from the April 2020 issue. As a fan of astronomy and of the space opera branch of science fiction and fantasy, there was no way I wasn't going to distract myself from my troubles for at least a few minutes to look this one over.

I keep saying: the Star Trek people are going to need to update their maps too. This is one more part of why.

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/a-new-map-of-the-milky-way/

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