Sensor Network Technology in Vinge’s a Deepness in the Sky
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Sensor Network Technology in Vinge’s a Deepness in the Sky
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Re: Sensor Network Technology in Vinge’s a Deepness in the Sky
#2One of my favorite sci-fi books. I had a lot of fun thinking about how I would implement the localizers. I don't have the relevant background so I later found out that my ideas, some of which I put into a blog post[0], were rather naïve.
Anyway, great timing to see this posted over the Christmas break. I wanted to reread The Witcher, but this has revived my desire to read more of Vernor Vinge. Recommendations welcome.
Re: Sensor Network Technology in Vinge’s a Deepness in the Sky
#3I believe the sensors are used more prominently and are actually an essential element of the plot in "A fire upon the deep".
In that book, giant ships are being powered by computer systems that are so complex, nobody fully master them and you need computer archeologists who spend their entire life studying how those system works to maintain and improve them. The hero of the book is actually one of those archeologists. If I remember correctly, he's the only one to know the meaning of the "unix epoch".
Edit: got my wires crossed. Indeed the book I am refering is actually the one mentionned in the article.
Re: Sensor Network Technology in Vinge’s a Deepness in the Sky
#4As the article refers to, the technology demo 20 years ago got as far as deploying the sensors from a radio-controlled airplane, and then driving a tank nearby, and receiving and processing the sensor data received. I can only imagine how far this technology has developed in the meantime.
I'm vaguely disappointed I can't go down to Costco and buy a 100-pack of localizers to sprinkle around my own property.
Re: Sensor Network Technology in Vinge’s a Deepness in the Sky
#5I believe the sensors are used more prominently and are actually an essential element of the plot in "A fire upon the deep". In that book, giant ships are being powered by computer systems that are so complex, nobody fully master them and you need computer archeologists who spend their entire life studying how those system works to maintain and improve them. The hero of the book is actually one of those archeologists…
You're thinking of "A deepness in the sky" :) One of my favorite passages: http://akkartik.name/post/deepness
Re: Sensor Network Technology in Vinge’s a Deepness in the Sky
#6"The QHL is not depicted as being able to move itself; it is moved passively around its environment by riding on humans, air currents, etc. However, at least a bit of mobility is implied by the presence of a magnetic actuator and by the QHL’s ability to create a gritty surface on a switch."
The way I imagined this while reading the book was that the sensors are ubiquitous, so it's not about making them move so much as selecting the sensors in a specific area to view imagery from or enable grit attraction on.
Re: Sensor Network Technology in Vinge’s a Deepness in the Sky
#7at long last we have created the torment nexus
Re: Sensor Network Technology in Vinge’s a Deepness in the Sky
#8"The main thing we know about the QHL’s software is that it is large and complex enough to defeat a years-long “software archeology” effort directed at determining whether the nodes can be trusted (in the end, they cannot)."
"cheap, effective sensor nodes lead to a government with the capacity for ubiquitous surveillance, which leads to a police state, which leads to societal collapse or worse."
It feels helpful to reframe "can it be trusted?" as "who knows more about its emergent runtime behavior?" This makes it more obvious that there are answers that can't be found by staring at the source code. Vinge was likely aware of the unanticipated behavior of the Morris worm (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morris_worm) when he wrote Deepness. In the years since this book, we've seen more examples (stuxnet[1], ethereum[2]) of software with behavior unanticipated by -- and even weaponized against -- its creators.
(I'm very interested in this subject, and research ways to prevent unanticipated runtime behavior. My approach can be summarized as, "keep software small and simple to stay out of dark forests[3].")
[1] "accidentally spreading beyond its intended target" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stuxnet#History
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethereum#The_DAO_event
[3] https://www.paradigm.xyz/2020/08/ethereum-is-a-dark-forest
Re: Sensor Network Technology in Vinge’s a Deepness in the Sky
#9I believe the sensors are used more prominently and are actually an essential element of the plot in "A fire upon the deep". In that book, giant ships are being powered by computer systems that are so complex, nobody fully master them and you need computer archeologists who spend their entire life studying how those system works to maintain and improve them. The hero of the book is actually one of those archeologists…
You're thinking of "A deepness in the sky" :) One of my favorite passages: http://akkartik.name/post/deepness
“The word for all this is ‘mature programming environment.’ Basically, when hardware performance has been pushed to its final limit, and programmers have had several centuries to code, you reach a point where there is far more signicant code than can be rationalized..."
The heat death of programming
Re: Sensor Network Technology in Vinge’s a Deepness in the Sky
#10I believe the sensors are used more prominently and are actually an essential element of the plot in "A fire upon the deep". In that book, giant ships are being powered by computer systems that are so complex, nobody fully master them and you need computer archeologists who spend their entire life studying how those system works to maintain and improve them. The hero of the book is actually one of those archeologists…
You're thinking of "A deepness in the sky" :) One of my favorite passages: http://akkartik.name/post/deepness
My favorite part of that was the historical mix-up - the Qeng Ho, and presumably the rest of humanity, assumed that the Unix epoch marked the moon landing, which was only six months' off!