Launch HN: Sorcerer (YC S24) – Weather balloons that collect more data • Hacker News Board

Re: Launch HN: Sorcerer (YC S24) – Weather balloons that collect more data

#111

Post by michaelmior » Tue, Aug 20, 2024, 12:52 AM UTC

lajr wrote: post #73

jviotti wrote: post #17

Very cool! How are the balloons transferring telemetry back to earth for analysis, etc? Asking because my research at the University of Oxford was around hyper space-efficient data transfer from remote locations for a fraction of the price. The result was an award-winning technology ( https://jsonbinpack.sourcemeta.com ) to serialise plain JSON that was proven to be more space-efficient than every tested alternative…

This looks promising! One of the important aspects of protocol buffers, avro etc is how they deal with evolving schemas and backwards/forward compatibility. I don't see anything in the docs addressing that. Is it possible for old services to handle new payloads / new services to handle old payloads or do senders and receivers need to be rewritten each time the schema changes?

A lot of people already think about this problem with respect to API compatibility for REST services using the OpenAPI spec for example. It's possible to have a JSON Schema which is backwards compatible with previous versions. I'm not sure how backwards-compatible the resulting JSON BinPack schemas are however.

Re: Launch HN: Sorcerer (YC S24) – Weather balloons that collect more data

#112

Post by tndl » Tue, Aug 20, 2024, 12:53 AM UTC

scottyah wrote: post #110

tndl wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How we make it go up and down is the secret sauce :) I'm a hangglider guy, so I'd love to be using thermals, but I can say that's not how we do it right now

Do you plan to sell to hobbyist consumers? As another thermal-rider I realize this would be amazing if it could do short term soundings at a launch site, or to have a fleet that can navigate back to a designated site for pickup and redeployment. I'm picturing having a few dozen at launch site containers, launching them at the start of a day of flying, having them programmed to land in a rural area that a member can p…

This might be the coolest use case I’ve heard suggested. We’re not quite at the level where all of this is user friendly enough, but let’s catch up in 9-12 months

Re: Launch HN: Sorcerer (YC S24) – Weather balloons that collect more data

#113

Post by hyperific » Tue, Aug 20, 2024, 1:25 AM UTC

It seems to me there is a real application for wide area persistent surveillance (WAPS). This is a significant concern for civil liberties and WAPS is a largely controversial technology. To whom will this technology be licensed and what, if any, limitations will you impose on allowed payloads?

Re: Launch HN: Sorcerer (YC S24) – Weather balloons that collect more data

#114

Post by bigveech » Tue, Aug 20, 2024, 1:53 AM UTC

petervandijck wrote: post #45

When they said "launch more often" I guess you took that advice to heart :) Congrats on the launch(es).

Yes! It’s quite confusing to distinguish between launches at the office haha

Re: Launch HN: Sorcerer (YC S24) – Weather balloons that collect more data

#115

Post by promiseofbeans » Tue, Aug 20, 2024, 1:57 AM UTC

jviotti wrote: post #17

Very cool! How are the balloons transferring telemetry back to earth for analysis, etc? Asking because my research at the University of Oxford was around hyper space-efficient data transfer from remote locations for a fraction of the price. The result was an award-winning technology ( https://jsonbinpack.sourcemeta.com ) to serialise plain JSON that was proven to be more space-efficient than every tested alternative…

Do you have any info on how your system stacks up to msgpack? (https://msgpack.org/index.html)

Asking because we use msgpack in production at work and it can sometimes be a bit slower to encode/decode than is ideal when dealing with real-time data.

Re: Launch HN: Sorcerer (YC S24) – Weather balloons that collect more data

#116

Post by tndl » Tue, Aug 20, 2024, 1:59 AM UTC

hyperific wrote: post #113

It seems to me there is a real application for wide area persistent surveillance (WAPS). This is a significant concern for civil liberties and WAPS is a largely controversial technology. To whom will this technology be licensed and what, if any, limitations will you impose on allowed payloads?

I don’t know much about WAPS at all, but generally speaking, we’re only interested in doing weather sensing. As of now, we’re not planning to license the vehicle at all. And generally speaking our platform doesn’t work for payloads that are heavier than ~0.25lb and have more than minimal power requirements.

Re: Launch HN: Sorcerer (YC S24) – Weather balloons that collect more data

#117

Post by maxmclau » Tue, Aug 20, 2024, 2:05 AM UTC

thoop wrote: post #106

Very cool and very useful! "Worldwide, most radiosonde observations are taken daily at 00Z and 12Z (6 a.m. and 6 p.m. EST)" - NOAA.gov I know we get more weather data from other sources, but it seems insane that these 2 launch times per day (per balloon location) are what make up most of our current weather forecasting data. You mentioned solar. Do you have the capability (or plans) to run these over night as well?

You’re right - Satellite data like GPS occultations and aircraft derived data still make up most of the data by volume. Soundings remain the ideal data source and are weighted very heavily in models, punching way above their volume.

As of right now power constraints mean we maintain tracking throughout the night, but cannot execute altitude maneuvers. We have a solution to this cooking though!

Re: Launch HN: Sorcerer (YC S24) – Weather balloons that collect more data

#118

Post by firesteelrain » Tue, Aug 20, 2024, 2:08 AM UTC

Very Cool! We have made and built many PicoBalloons that have circumnavigated the globe. No weather reports - just WSPR reports. We can detect spots in the world where GPS spoofing is happening.

“ Each vehicle (balloon + payload) weighs less than a pound and can be launched from anywhere in the world, per the FAA and ICAO reg”

Florida recently passed a law that does not allow PicoBalloon or your weather balloon type launches from Florida soil. It will result in a $150 fine.

HB321

https://www.flsenate.gov/Session/Bill/2024/321/BillText/er/P...

Article

https://www.cbsnews.com/miami/news/floridas-balloon-ban-will...

Re: Launch HN: Sorcerer (YC S24) – Weather balloons that collect more data

#119

Post by maxmclau » Tue, Aug 20, 2024, 2:17 AM UTC

firesteelrain wrote: post #118

Very Cool! We have made and built many PicoBalloons that have circumnavigated the globe. No weather reports - just WSPR reports. We can detect spots in the world where GPS spoofing is happening. “ Each vehicle (balloon + payload) weighs less than a pound and can be launched from anywhere in the world, per the FAA and ICAO reg” Florida recently passed a law that does not allow PicoBalloon or your weather balloon type…

Got our start with WSPR pico balloons!

Just saw that - No Florida launches on the horizon luckily

Re: Launch HN: Sorcerer (YC S24) – Weather balloons that collect more data

#120

Post by tndl » Tue, Aug 20, 2024, 2:39 AM UTC

firesteelrain wrote: post #118

Very Cool! We have made and built many PicoBalloons that have circumnavigated the globe. No weather reports - just WSPR reports. We can detect spots in the world where GPS spoofing is happening. “ Each vehicle (balloon + payload) weighs less than a pound and can be launched from anywhere in the world, per the FAA and ICAO reg” Florida recently passed a law that does not allow PicoBalloon or your weather balloon type…

We're actually just going to have kids launch our balloons, it's no problem:

  A person who is 6 years of age or younger who
  intentionally releases, organizes the release of, or
  intentionally causes to be released balloons as 
  prohibited by s.
  379.233 does not violate subsection (4) and is not. 
  subject to
  the penalties specified in subparagraph 1.