After listening to a segment on NPR's
Living on Earth and
Jack sending me an
MSNBC article on hypermiling, where people change their driving behavior to extract the most amount of milage per gallon, I decided to give it my own non-scientific try.
The article mentions these tips for trying to maximize mileage but I have a very small brain and am wholly non-committal about eating raw foods, etc, so I picked a few things that I thought I could do for the day; these are highlighted in bold:
- Avoid jackrabbit starts.
- Slightly overinflate tires.
- Shift into neutral when going downhill.
- Drive 5 mph below the speed limit, but stay in the right lane.
- Coast to a stop at red lights.
- Shut off the air conditioner.
- Monitor your mileage on a real-time gauge and adjust as you go.
- Draft sensibly behind tractor-trailers.
- Know alternate routes to avoid stop-and-go traffic.
- Park at the highest point in parking lot and let gravity get the car moving.
I think I already stay in a higher gear than is probably recommended (cutting down on engine use) and use engine braking enough, so getting to coasting to a stop wasn't a problem. It's a bit strange to hold in the clutch to put the engine in neutral at various times during driving, though. Instead of "avoiding jackrabbit starts" which, honestly, is a travesty and malfeasance of driving S4, I would go over the speed limit and then push in the clutch, "pulsing" my driving. It reminded me of how tentative grandmothers (or my mom, sorry mom!) drive. I could see there being a sort of art to figuring out when to overshoot so that the ups and downs in the road could be maximized. Doing that, alone, got me this picture:
That was taken in a 30 mph zone, so I'm just above the speed limit before I have to pulse again. Note my low RPMs, my 133.0 mpg, and that I'm listening to
KGNU. My readout maxxes at 200 mpg and I saw that a few times, too, on my 15 minute drive to work. So, pretty cool. And it does have a net effect. My overall avg mpg for the day was just about 30, which is way above my normal 21-23 mpg. (I also put the A/C on "econ" instead of "auto," but it was a cool day today.) That 9 mpg difference is like (1.3 miles/day, 0.3 gallons/day...) about $230/year at $3.20/gallon
here. If I kept it up it might be worth it, but after a day of experimentation I've sort of had enough.
This brings me to my conclusion: Hypermiling is dangerous and stupid. I took a picture while driving, I was in neutral a whole lot when I shouldn't've been (slaloming through parking lots, just gliding along), I was watching my dynamic mpg readout, I was trying not to apply the breaks and attempting to time when people in front of me would go fast enough, etc - I wasn't paying attention to driving, I was paying attention to maximizing
my desire to save gas, or whatever hypermilers think they're doing. I was endangering myself and others. Encouraging mpg-thirsty drivers to draft along with trucks is just irresponsible, even if there're caveat-words like "sensibly" attached to recommendations. Since when've words stopped people from doing stupid things? Driving is ultimately a community experience - you look out for everyone else and hopefully they're trying not to hit you, too. It's ironic that people who're ostensibly trying to save the
environment (and presumably the people that live in the environment)
are selfishly endangering others.
One of my first thoughts was that people could put up a sign or a bumper sticker that said "Hypermiler on Board" and that way people would know that this car was going to be driving erratically like a new teenager or Mr. Magoo. We're already a society of people who drive like idiots, barely having to take any sort of formal driving classes beyond our sweet 16's. I don't think getting a few more mpg is justification enough for trying out or even practicing a new method of driving. Add this new way to
eating while... ,
talking on the cell while..., and
applying makeup while... and the net effect would probably be enough to get Ralph Nader in a twitter. The upside of self-identifying hypermilers would be that when a law is passed, we'd all be able to see who the irresponsible ones are.
The issue with me is obviously how people drive. We'd all be better off if we taught people how to drive, drive defensively, and maybe even to drive in an "hypermiling" manner (a "more efficient" manner might be less 'activist'). Sure, but this isn't IndoctrinationCampistan. People do what they want with an in their cars. The federal government gives us
tips to drive more efficently and maintain our cars, but that's the extent of it. I don't think Colorado even requires any length of formalized driving education. In Illinois, it was just a bunch of 15 and 16 y/o's flirting with each other for a few hours a week while we watched movies from the 60's and 70's and some parallel parking. Years afterwards, with bad habits developed, an HBO special and some wapo and npr articles aren't going to make everyone straighten up.
Who knows, maybe there'll be a lane for the driving equivalent of the Ministry of Silly Walks.
Jack sent me an article from MSNBC that had this great picture of an Anbar province Iraqi shiek having a cigar with a US military commander. The article went on to describe how the US is making friends with the Sunnis of Anbar. I found it all ironic and just another rotation of the short-term US spotlight on various Iraqi ethnofactions in order to curry US domestic short term political gain. Then again, I'm opinionated and jaded. First, no-fly Kurds, then appeasing the Shia majority, now, pretending like minority Sunnis give a crap about the US just to appease surrounding Sunni states (Egypt, Saudi and the gulf emirates, and Jordan). At least they're getting closer to getting neighboring buy-in, only 4 years too late. They'll turn against us just like all of them do as our support wanes with our political tides.
Lucian Read / Atlas Press for Newsweek
Smoking Buddies: Marine Lt. Col. Craig Kozeniesky shares a cigar with Sheik Shakir Saoud Aasi, one of his new tribal alliesThe much bigger and historic news is the diplomatic meeting between
us and Iran this weekend. I'm literally agape at the whole thing, given the rhetoric on both sides, but it's much more of a real path to stablizing the region than a cigar/hooka exchange. This story's already faded from the front pages, which is also telling as to how serious the US populace and media consider the breaking of a 25 year diplomatic freeze.
I've begun two documents about integrating the NASA World Wind Java SDK into the Eclipse framework -
Creating Plug-Ins out of World Wind and
Hello, Globe! (basic integration). They're in process, so I wouldn't mind any feedback. They're a bit light on justifications of the Eclipse framework, so they're more suited to people familiar with Eclipse.
From the
forums regarding the future plans for the Java SDK
There is no feature roadmap written down.
What's troubling me today is not that NASA isn't elaborating on their goals for the WWJ SDK other than what they've already said ("The goal is 100s of World Winds, not one.
That's why NASA created WWJ as a Java component.
NASA has no plans to create a World Wind Java client similar to World Wind .Net.
They plan only to continue to develop and expand the SDK." -
WWJ FAQ) though that statement is a bit ominous (open source, vague/unstated patch & development process), but the minor technical discoveries I'm making as I use the SDK. There's a real overuse of static members and methods that is complicating the process of trying to douse how NASA intends the use of this SDK. For example, layer classes have a construtor that requires a LayerSet or PlacenameSet to have already been created. That means a static method. This makes it appear that almost all their AbstractLayer derived code isn't designed for extension or reuse but as an example of how to create a Layer - and that means a lot of redundancy. The options are to change the source and allow for a constructor that doesn't require LevelSet/PlaceNameSet (cons: changing the code means changing
their SDK code) or copy wholesale and reproduce what appear to be core SDK classes, such as. TiledImageLayer and PlaceNameLayer.
The other thing that irks me and irks me bad is the variety of OGL implementations on various video cards. Though this appears to be a case of "it's the video card manufacturer's issue, not NASA's" it becomes a very large barrier to adoption when an example works perfectly on one machine (ATi X1500), partially on another (ATi FireGL 5200), and is an abysmal failure on a third (Intel Extreme). To me, this is a massive user acceptance issue. I see a lot of people (primarily through failed demos or inability to see their own houses with ease) discounting a WWJ-derived app due to driver issues.
Unbeknownst to me, NASA
had a proposal to develop a MMO (massively multiplayer online) environment a la SecondLife or World of Warcraft with a budget of $3M that was cancelled or tabled before it was reviewed. Word got out enough for John Carmack to propose assistance.
(from the Proposal)
Intramural Call for Proposal Ideas (ICPI)
Fiscal Year 2007
Internal Call for Proposal Ideas
NASA Learning Technologies
ICPI Schedule
Release of ICPI: March 20, 2007
Notices of Intent Due: April 20, 2007
Notices of Intent Decisions: April 30, 2007
Final Proposals Due: June 29, 2007
Selection: July 31, 2007
Announcement of Awards: September 1, 2007
Massively multiplayer online games (MMOG) have characteristics that set them apart from other games. They are shared spaces where hundreds, thousands and even millions of players can experience the same game. They are persistent and evolving online environments. For example, with a stand-alone game, the game environment turns on and off at the user's whim and is essentially loaded with all of its potential states when it is shipped from the factory. If there is a sequel, the new game comes with a brand new, though probably familiar, game environment. MMOGs, in contrast, run continuously. Actions by players can alter the game world and the game creators can change features of the world through expansions or patches. The persistent and evolving nature of MMOGs makes them more like the real world and less like the static, intermittent nature of stand-alone games. The game setting in MMOGs, is thus a synthetic world, while the game setting of a stand-alone game is not.
A massively multiplayer online NASA game can be built with the primary goal of engaging young people in NASA’s mission. The power of games as educational tools is rapidly gaining recognition (Gee, 2003). NASA is in a position to develop an online game that functions as a persistent, synthetic environment supporting education as a laboratory, a massive visualization tools and collaborative workspace while simultaneously drawing users into a challenging, game-play immersion. Innovative university faculty are already holding classes and taking fieldtrips to synthetic worlds like Star Wars Galaxies and Second Life (Thomas, 2005). A NASA game built on a game engine that includes full physics capabilities will support accurate in-game experimentation and research. It will present real NASA engineering and science missions in a medium that is comfortable and familiar to the overwhelming majority of students in the United States today. A NASA-inspired game will provide opportunities for students to investigate Science, Technology, Engineering and Technology (STEM) career paths. A NASA game can contribute to the development of the critical skills and capabilities needed to build a pipeline of qualified scientific and technical employees required to fulfill the Vision for Space Exploration. Recently, both Time and Fortune have recognized synthetic environments and robust and significant technology entering mainstream society. The MacArthur Foundation, the Federation of American Scientists and National Science Foundation have all identified computer games as significant educational tools. A Horizons of Technology report marked massively multiplayer online games as one of the technologies with the greatest potential to impact education in the next decade.
A game-quality synthetic environment will be a vital element of NASA's cyberstructure. The synthetic world will be a collaborative work and meeting space of a kind familiar to increasing numbers of Americans. Games and challenges in the synthetic environment will engage students in a way that is both familiar and comfortable for them. In turn, success in the games will build increased student awareness of STEM fields. The synthetic environment will allow immersive career exploration opportunities in a much deeper way than reading alone would permit and at a fraction of the time and cost of an internship.
I'm following some threads on the World Wind forums and whenever an official NASA WWJ Developer (Tom Gaskins or Dave Collins) responds, it's worth noting. For me, that means here. Hopefully I'll use it later. Nothing to see here, move along.
On
use of InterpolatorTimer.ViewProperties:
"What is it you're trying to do?
We decided that InterpolatorTimer was not the appropriate class for app control of viewing. It's really an internal class. We're modifying the View interface to handle many of the cases we saw people using InterpolaterTime for. Let us know what you're intent is so we can be sure to support it in the changes."
On
Eclipse Public License compatability with NOSA:
"The intent is that World Wind can be distributed with RCP (or other) applications. We haven't studied the EPL, however, so I can't give you a legal answer. Clearly we'll have to come up with one, though. Consider it "on the list.""
On
JOGL versions:
"The old JOGL libraries are almost certainly the problem. You must remove them from the classpath. Then please see the "Having Problems" section at http://worldwind.arc.nasa.gov/java and follow the instructions there."
On
RPF and RPF Layers:
"That's right, the RPF converters are not yet in the release."
On
flying to a Lat/Lon:
My apologies for this, it's a known issue with the current View implementation. We do have a workaround, but it's not intuitive.
(1) Set the View's latitude and longitude coordinates.
(2) Set the View's zoom to your desired altitude.
This workaround is appropriate only when the View's pitch is equal to zero (see like 4 in the code below).
Code:
1 gov.nasa.worldwind.geom.LatLon myLatLon = ...;
2 double myAltitude = ...;
3 View myView = ...;
4 myView.setPitch(gov.nasa.worldwind.geom.Angle.ZERO);
5 myView.goToLatLon(myLatLon);
6 myView.setZoom(myAltitude);
If this works for you, please let me know. I'd like to post this in the official WWJ space if it's useful for anyone.
rearranging auto-generated reverse-engineered uml class diagrams is architect sudoku.
Here's an Eclipse View with NASA's World Wind from the Java SDK 0.2.
It's not terribly exciting at the moment, since it's just an SWT_AWT bridge with the JOGL component in it, but it's a start! Note the Swing->SWT status bar interaction. More to come.
2002 - Jose Padilla picked up and accused of planning a "dirty bomb" plot, stuffed in a Navy brig not to be seen for 3.5 years.
2007 - Fast forward 5 years, he's in civilian court being accused of supporting/organizing a cell in Florida assisting resistance/jihad in BCA (Bosnia, Chechnya, Afghanistan), along with Adham Amin Hassoun and Kifah Wael Jayyousi, "providing material support to extremist groups."
Never one to be accused of repeating the obvious, I'll say it looks as if the legal system is being consistent, going for whatever they can make most easily stick, ie the low-hanging fruit. One could also state this in a way that faults the government - they're CYA'ing themselves by not revealing "national secrets" regarding the dirty bomb.
Another way to interpret this is that the lowering of the bar, ie going from terrorism to being a cheerleader as well as punting it to civilian court, is further widening the net to include anyone who's ever given money to support anyone in BCA. Yes, that's broad, but if that's the "scare" that then narrows to "evidence," (again, not to state the obvious) check your charitable records from pre-9/11 because if terrorism or the hint of terrorism is prosecutable in civilian instead of military court, I can't wait to watch the torts.
Btw, the government's evidence is a "
job application."
ref:
A first look at US case against Padilla, Christian Science Monitor
It's been in the works for over a year now, and NASA, today, is finally releasing a SDK of WorldWind for Java. Patrick Hogan, the Project Manager for NASA's WorldWind which, up until now, has been a Microsoft .NET application, explains in a JavaOne session yesterday:
CNet Video.
The .NET application, version 1.4, is
still available as well as the source code. There's much speculation on the WorldWind open source community about the future of the .NET version. Hogan says that NASA will turn it's efforts back to the .NET codebase as interest in the Java version picks up, but that hasn't stopped the community's worries. On the Microsoft platform, ESRI has dominated the GIS space, while most of the innovation in open source GIS has been in the C++ and Java languages, geared to either cross-platform or linux use. That's a bit of a generalization, but it's useful to see why a successful open source globe viewer like WorldWind .NET could easily (and quickly) be overshadowed by a proliferation of WW Java SDK based apps.
I'm hoping to pop out an Eclipse RCP based one, but that's dependent on how good the AWT/JOGL wrangling goes into SWT.
Here are
my first impressions.
Meanwhile, another, usually under the radar, government agency gets all paranoid: (I've blinded myself with bad puns!)
Intel chief: Curbs on public satellite photos may be needed, Vice Adm. Robert Murrett, NGIA director, May 8, 2007
05/11/2007 Edit: NASA reupped their Sourceforge and their zip includes two demo jars (worldwind.jar 4.5mb, BasicDemo.jar 10k)which don't run. For all those people looking to download a SDK and double-click stuff, they'll be disappointed. Granted, it'd be nice if they did have working demos for simple people, but download it anyway and build it yourself, you'll be pleased.