Chatterer is my favorite mod for Kerbal Space Program, and it brings these tones (and other authentic sounds) to the game: https://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/index.php?/topic/83290-...
Quindar Tones: the beeps heard in recordings of astronauts in space
41–50 of 63 posts
Re: Quindar Tones: the beeps heard in recordings of astronauts in space
#42> if NASA wanted to send control signals like transmit on and off, they’d need to run a whole parallel set of wires, which would be expensive. So, they came up with a solution: use the same lines for control signals as well! It really seems that in earlier years, when resources were limited, people really used their ingenuity far better than today. Maybe I have rose tinted glasses, but the level of creativity and cle…
If there is a more effortless way to do it, it will be done this way. It's getting interesting when there is no such way because the problem is at the edge of our current capabilities.
If I wanted to search for ingenuity and creative solutions, I would start at the cutting edge or maybe even moonshot projects.
Re: Quindar Tones: the beeps heard in recordings of astronauts in space
#43> if NASA wanted to send control signals like transmit on and off, they’d need to run a whole parallel set of wires, which would be expensive. So, they came up with a solution: use the same lines for control signals as well! It really seems that in earlier years, when resources were limited, people really used their ingenuity far better than today. Maybe I have rose tinted glasses, but the level of creativity and cle…
If there is a more effortless way to do it, it will be done this way. It's getting interesting when there is no such way because the problem is at the edge of our current capabilities. If I wanted to search for ingenuity and creative solutions, I would start at the cutting edge or maybe even moonshot projects.
Some massproduced parts also contain a fair bit of ingenuity in their circuitry, though usually of the "they summoned Satan just so they don't need this $0.02 part" type of ingenuity.
Re: Quindar Tones: the beeps heard in recordings of astronauts in space
#44> if NASA wanted to send control signals like transmit on and off, they’d need to run a whole parallel set of wires, which would be expensive. So, they came up with a solution: use the same lines for control signals as well! It really seems that in earlier years, when resources were limited, people really used their ingenuity far better than today. Maybe I have rose tinted glasses, but the level of creativity and cle…
In-band signaling was the norm until the early 80's.
Re: Quindar Tones: the beeps heard in recordings of astronauts in space
#45> if NASA wanted to send control signals like transmit on and off, they’d need to run a whole parallel set of wires, which would be expensive. So, they came up with a solution: use the same lines for control signals as well! It really seems that in earlier years, when resources were limited, people really used their ingenuity far better than today. Maybe I have rose tinted glasses, but the level of creativity and cle…
It really seems that in earlier years, when resources were limited, people really used their ingenuity far better than today.
More importantly though, "ingenuity" is somewhat a limited resource. If your systems are highly constraining, you burn a lot of it on working around the constraints. It can be clever as hell, but also means a lot of other stuff couldn't be done.
Also, there are vastly more people working in the area now, with the corresponding regression to the mean.
Re: Quindar Tones: the beeps heard in recordings of astronauts in space
#46When these tones are used in music, it instantly instills a sense of mystery and wonder. I don't know if it's something intrinsic to the sound, or if it's because of the recognizable context of exploration and discovery. One song that comes to mind is Satellite by BT, but I know I've heard it elsewhere too.
Re: Quindar Tones: the beeps heard in recordings of astronauts in space
#47> if NASA wanted to send control signals like transmit on and off, they’d need to run a whole parallel set of wires, which would be expensive. So, they came up with a solution: use the same lines for control signals as well! It really seems that in earlier years, when resources were limited, people really used their ingenuity far better than today. Maybe I have rose tinted glasses, but the level of creativity and cle…
Modern wireless microphone transmitters are configured and updated via audible tones generated by a smartphone app.
Re: Quindar Tones: the beeps heard in recordings of astronauts in space
#48Earlier quoted context omitted.
Didnt some guy figure out how to get free phone calls using a cheap whistle from a cereal box :-)
The book "Exploding The Phone" goes into all of these stories and much more. If you ever wanted to know about how and why the analog phone system was so hackable/phreakable, this book is for you. [0] http://explodingthephone.com/
Wow, don't know how I missed that book. Looks great!
Re: Quindar Tones: the beeps heard in recordings of astronauts in space
#49> if NASA wanted to send control signals like transmit on and off, they’d need to run a whole parallel set of wires, which would be expensive. So, they came up with a solution: use the same lines for control signals as well! It really seems that in earlier years, when resources were limited, people really used their ingenuity far better than today. Maybe I have rose tinted glasses, but the level of creativity and cle…
In addition to what else has been said, we have more ready-made solutions we've converged on, which pushes the scope for creativity higher in the stack. For example, we don't have to hack up a low-level communications system because we can just put JTAG parts on and use something everyone understands. We don't have to figure out how to allow multiple users to share the same network without stepping on anyone else's toes because we have TCP/IP and decades' worth of cleverness poured into things like creating a transparent, securely-encrypted tunnel over that protocol suite.
So our cleverness is inside the applications, getting stuff at the top of the stack to do things it wasn't intended to do by combining relatively high-level pieces. I've done that, I'm sure a lot of us here have done that.
Re: Quindar Tones: the beeps heard in recordings of astronauts in space
#50Earlier quoted context omitted.
Inband vs out-of-band signalling is one of those great debates in telecoms. You can see it in RS232 as well, with "XON/XOFF" characters versus "RTS/CTS" extra signalling lines. Most internet protocols are "in-band", but there are two big exceptions in FTP and SIP, which is very much an internet protocol designed by phone people.
> SIP, which is very much an internet protocol designed by phone people. Allegedly SIP is much better than the ITU's H.32x standards, and if that is true, then H.32X has to be an unspeakable horror.
H.323 is the internet protocol designed by phone people, SIP is prime example of second systems effect caused by internet people trying to make it “more internet-ish”.
The reason why H.323 is “unspeakable horror” to internet people is mostly about it being built on top of existing practice of telco signaling, so: global titles instead of URIs and ASN.1 PER instead of HTTP-style (in case of SIP arguably overly verbose and complex) text messages.
Edit: and IIRC there is significant user experience difference caused by that: H.323 supports the traditional telco style Initial address/Subsequent address/Address complete dialing, while SIP works in terms of complete SIP URIs and the user terminal has to somehow divine that the dialed number is complete.