Communications - Intra-Colony/Intra-Settlement

Palomar · 2003-04-30 10:28:52

*How will members of a colony or settlement on Mars communicate within the colony or settlement, "long distance"?

Suppose a colony is 1/2 square mile in size. How will people communicate from across that distance? Supposing Colonist A is working 1/4 mile from where Colonist B is working...and they need to communicate. They would need a reliable, quick way of communicating.

CB Radio [or something similar]? Walkie-Talkies?

My copy _The Case for Mars_ seems to have sprouted feet and walked away, so I'm unable to look in it and see if Zubrin addressed this issue.

Just wondering. Any NONsuper high-tech replies would be appreciated. Apologies if this has been addressed and answered here before; I don't recall that it has...or perhaps honestly forgot.

--Cindy

Bill White · 2003-04-30 11:21:02

Wireless LAN (local area network)

For more info you can google "Wi-Fi" or "802.11" or "ultrawideband wireless network" or even "Starbucks Hot Spots"

New generation microchips today include low power radio braodcast capability. Scatter hundreds or thousands of off the shelf Intel chips throughout the settlement and every settler can have constant access to substantial bandwidth.

Each settler can have VERY advanced Palm Pilot type devices with alwasy on streaming video and audio and with body sensors, each settlers precise location, heart rate, blood pressure and the like can be continunally monitored by the computer network.

Star Trek Next Generation com badges ("Computer, locate Captain Picard") is way, way behind what we will be able to do even in the next 20 years.

Given the plunging prices of microchips, in 20, 30 or 50 years the first Mars settlers may well be more integrated with computing power than any human community in history. (Intel vs AMD could generate a sponsorship war to fund this LAN and thereby obtain some of the necessary funding)

Bill White · 2003-04-30 11:31:23

One sample link - http://www.boingo.com/ - "insanely fast imnternet access for mobile people"

This may not be the best example but you can buy one of these today. Extrapolate forward 25 years and it boggles the mind what boingo type devices might be like.

How much might a boingo style company pay to be the service provider of a Mars settlement Wi-Fi?

The Wi-Fi Opportunity Is Exploding
The adoption rate of the Wi-Fi space has reached escape velocity. The analysts agree that Wi-Fi will have an enormous impact on the technology sector. Goldman Sachs has projected that more than 95 Million people will become mobile Internet subscribers by 2004, and the Cahners In-Stat Group has estimated that the revenue generated by public space Wi-Fi service will grow to be hundreds of millions of dollars over the next few years. Laptop manufacturers such as Hewlett Packard, Sony, Dell, Toshiba and IBM are already building Wi-Fi radios into the motherboards of many of their machines, rapidly making the Wi-Fi radio a standard computer component similar to the way the 56k modem is standard today. The Boingo "Hot Spot in a Box" is your opportunity to become part of this exciting technology movement.

Bill White · 2003-04-30 12:02:29

To my knowledge I have not discussed this technology before - yet I always knew this stuff will be very real part of why there will be NO privacy on Mars, except privacy created by social custom.

Bill White · 2003-04-30 12:47:59

Cindy -

Sorry if this is too "techie" for your request. I find Wi-Fi nets to be very very cool and a natural application for a Mars settlement.

The boingo link given above seems like a good point of introduction. Another great topic is flexible organic display screens. By 2010 we can pretty much say good-bye to teh glass faced computer monitor and flexible screens can be made any size and hung like wallpaper in nearly every room of a Mars settlement.

One poor entry link to this is http://www.signweb.com/digital/cont/bladerunner.html

PDAs might well be "scrolls" which roll up or fold up and go into a pocket. Way way way cool, IMHO

The reasons are compelling. LCDs and plasma screens must be backlit in order to be viewed, which adds thickness to the display. But OLED displays are self-illuminating. They can be as thin as a credit card or even heavy paper. They are also lighter-weight, brighter, more temperature tolerant and generally more robust than conventional flat screens.
For these reasons, it's not wildly speculative to observe that the days of LCDs and plasma displays are already numbered. In perhaps a decade, when the current process of replacing CRT monitors with LCD flat screens has run its course, the next phase -- replacing flat screens with OLED displays -- will be well underway.
In terms of ultimate versatility, the final powerful differentiator will be that OLEDs can be manufactured on flexible plastic substrates. Fig. 1 shows a screen grab from a demo video from Universal Display Corp.'s Website (www.universaldisplay.com). The video shows a prototype of a flexible, organic light-emitting device (FOLED), which runs live, full-motion content while being physically bent and distorted.

". . .which runs live, full-motion content while being physically bent and distorted." Cool!

Palomar · 2003-04-30 13:15:31

Cindy -
Sorry if this is too "techie" for your request. I find Wi-Fi nets to be very very cool and a natural application for a Mars settlement.
". . .which runs live, full-motion content while being physically bent and distorted." Cool!

*Bill:

Thanks for your replies. I'll check out the links. No, what you've posted isn't too "techie."

Clark, let's please avoid more steering off onto the privacy issue, or please create your own thread relative to it. I doubt the Feds are going to turn the fillings in our teeth into some kind of relaying/tracking devices any time soon, so please...

Thanks.

--Cindy

Bill White · 2003-04-30 13:43:08

Clark, let's please avoid more steering off onto the privacy issue, or please create your own thread relative to it. I doubt the Feds are going to turn the fillings in our teeth into some kind of relaying/tracking devices any time soon, so please...

Poor clark - I think I started the privacy comments.

clark · 2003-04-30 14:30:11

Clark, let's please avoid more steering off onto the privacy issue, or please create your own thread relative to it. I doubt the Feds are going to turn the fillings in our teeth into some kind of relaying/tracking devices any time soon, so please...

I apologize for my intrusion into this thread. Have a great day.

soph · 2003-04-30 19:08:50

Bill: as I see it, Tablets are the notebooks of the future. On my graduation, I'm going to see to it that I get a tablet for college. No books for me (except, of course, textbooks). And miniturization has made this possible!

LCDs are great, but LEDs are going to be better. CNT is going to expand our microengineering capabilities by huge amounts. And the next generation of processors are going to be amazing.

You know, I think those Star Trek badges might even be possible today: we have voice dialing, we have ounce-heavy cell phones, just combine the two. I think people are just attached to the idea of phones, now.

Wireless networks are already beyond the limits of cable and dsl broadband connections. Wired networks, except on T1 or T3, waste about 60 to 80 mbps of bandwith->cable and dsl get around 28 mbps of data flow. The only benefit of wired networks, except on the most advanced connections, is direct PC to PC data transfer.

Bill White · 2003-05-01 07:48:02

Bill: as I see it, Tablets are the notebooks of the future. On my graduation, I'm going to see to it that I get a tablet for college. No books for me (except, of course, textbooks). And miniturization has made this possible!

With flexible 5x7 OLEDs bound together you could a fashion an 8 page "book" that has the the feel of very thick paper. Chips could be stored in the spine.

Whenever you turn a page, the last page blanks and the next page appears on the page to come. Seems to me you could fashion an "endless" book so when you reach page 8 you return to page 1 yet the pages continue to flow digitally.

clark, IMHO, is correct that Mars settlers will have tiny audio receivers either implanted or tightly hung on the ear. Earpiece cell phones are available today. His comment about flexible strips taped across the larynx (sp?) for voice transmission seems reasonable as well. Add a Wi-Fi net and voice activated dialing (saying "voice link - George" opens an audio lne to George) and you have instant communication 24/7.

Palomar · 2003-05-01 08:58:06

Clark, let's please avoid more steering off onto the privacy issue, or please create your own thread relative to it. I doubt the Feds are going to turn the fillings in our teeth into some kind of relaying/tracking devices any time soon, so please...
Poor clark - I think I started the privacy comments.

*Apologies to Clark.

--Cindy

Palomar · 2003-05-01 09:07:30

Wireless LAN (local area network)...Each settler can have VERY advanced Palm Pilot type devices with alwasy on streaming video and audio and with body sensors, each settlers precise location, heart rate, blood pressure and the like can be continunally monitored by the computer network.

*Okay, if they use LAN, will that be powered by a satellite link? If yes, what will serve as backup to the LAN if something happens to the satellite (say, gets smashed by a meteor)?

I've got 2 other questions related to the above, but will start a separate thread for it, as it's a bit off topic to this thread.

--Cindy

RobertDyck · 2003-05-01 10:18:35

LCDs are great, but LEDs are going to be better.

LCDs create colour by using polarization to block light over coloured reflective background: the spot either appears coloured or black. This works by using ambient room light to illuminate the display. LEDs must use power to generate light; this requires more power. For this reason LED displays will always consume more power than LCDs. My first digital watch was LED; its battery did not last 6 months and its display was off unless I held a button to illuminate it. Today?s LEDs are a bit more power efficient, but not much. Some laptop computers are using continuous backlight with an electroluminescent (EL) panel, even when room light is sufficient. This does drain considerable power and makes the power drain of LEDs appear not much different. An efficient LCD does not use a backlight at all, and that will always consume less than 1/10th the power of an LED display. Less power means the battery lasts longer.

With flexible 5x7 OLEDs bound together you could a fashion an 8 page "book" that has the the feel of very thick paper. Chips could be stored in the spine.
Whenever you turn a page, the last page blanks and the next page appears on the page to come. Seems to me you could fashion an "endless" book so when you reach page 8 you return to page 1 yet the pages continue to flow digitally.

If you can change the text on the page, then why do you need more than one page? An electronic book could be software displayed on a tablet; although the tablet could be a single flexible page. Thin film transistors developed for flat panel displays can be built into quite sophisticated circuits. A small computer could be built of the same material as the display page. Has anyone seen the TV show Andromeda? The flexi portrayed on that show has a heavy but flexible plastic sheet that displays one book of information. You touch spots on the display to advance to the next page. Infrared communication like that already used for palmtop computers could permit downloading a different document. A single spine, like Bill suggested, could permit greater capability with the full power of today?s palmtop computer.

Or a flexi could simply be an enlarged display for an existing palmtop computer. With the 4-segment folding keyboard available for PalmPilot brand palmtop computers, addition of a flexi display would give you the full capability of a laptop computer. Have you seen the capacity of today?s high-end palmtops? There is a reason I don?t just call them PDAs (Personal Digital Assistants). A Compaq iPAQ h5455 has a 400MHz 32-bit RISC processor, 64MB SDRAM, 48MB Flash ROM, 240x320 display with 16-bit colour, touch screen with stylus, handwriting recognition, speech recorder. Its lithium polymer battery has 1250 mAh capacity, and comes with AC power and car charging adapters, USB cable, and it only weighs 206 grams (7.27 ounces). Communication includes 802.11b WLAN (Wireless Local Area Network), Bluetooth, and IR. Software includes Microsoft Windows for Pocket PC 2002, Word (with spellchecker), Excel, Outlook, Media Player 8 (MP3, audio and video), MSN Messenger, Microsoft Reader (eBooks), and a universal remote. It even has a fingerprint reader for those who want enhanced security. You can get a card to add 32 to 64MB of compact flash memory, or 64 to 256MB of SD memory; or a full-size foldable keyboard similar to the PalmPilot keyboard. The iPAQ and folded keyboard can fit in jacket pockets. Welcome to the 21st century.

Bill White · 2003-05-01 11:55:23

If you can change the text on the page, then why do you need more than one page?

My grandchildren (and perhaps my children) will NOT need more than one page. Me? I foresee becoming a whining geezer going on and on about BOOKS! real old fashioned BOOKS!

Binding OLEDs into a book would be pure affectation done to appease older folk like me. My senior year high school AP chem class was the last class required to use slide rules and forbidden to use those brand new HP calculators.

*Okay, if they use LAN, will that be powered by a satellite link? If yes, what will serve as backup to the LAN if something happens to the satellite (say, gets smashed by a meteor)?

No satellites are needed. We are shopping for a new home computer (almost typed DELL - that choice is pretty much made) and will probably add a Wi-Fi LAN to link together our WinTel boxes into a home LAN. Sadly, the LinkSys home network cables I bought 2 years ago remain uninstalled yet the ease of Wi-Fi trumps everything.

cindy - each computer chip would have a low power radio transmitter stamped on it. It draws power from the PC power supply. Low power for US home use means 50 to 100 feet of range. This way my home LAN does not mess with my neighbors home LAN.

For Mars, power up that radio signal to travel 1000 meters to cover the whole settlement. Scatter 100 or 1000 chips in various forms throughout the settlement and create a Wi-Fi net/LAN. These chips do double duty - communications nodes and processing power.

In my pending sci fi/future history project they will do triple duty. The manufacturer will have paid the settlement sponsor wads of cash for the privilege of - giving - cameras, radios, chips and related LAN equipment to the settlers,

. . . for appropriate promotional considerations, of course

Palomar · 2003-05-01 12:25:13

If you can change the text on the page, then why do you need more than one page?
My grandchildren (and perhaps my children) will NOT need more than one page. Me? I foresee becoming a whining geezer going on and on about BOOKS! real old fashioned BOOKS!

*Mmmmm-hmmmmm. And newspapers were supposed to be obsolete ::by now::, according to "projections" made 20 - 25 years ago.

Books won't go out of style, at least not for a very long time. Take that from a genuine book lover.

--Cindy

RobertDyck · 2003-05-01 12:34:25

My senior year high school AP chem class was the last class required to use slide rules and forbidden to use those brand new HP calculators.

My high school classes also forbade the use of calculators. You were supposed to learn to do math in your head, or at most with paper and pencil. Programmable calculators were also forbidden at university computer science exams.

I remember stating in high school computer class that we would have a portable computer similar in size and shape to a 3-ring binder; with a keyboard on the inside of one side and a display on the other. It would fold open with the binding at the back to hold up the display. Everyone said I was nuts; computers are far too big for that. High school had a pair of card punch machines, a card read and printer, and a modem to the central mainframe that all schools in the city shared. When the Osborne 1 came out a few years later, people who remembered though I was a genius; but claimed it was still impractical to take notes in school. Then I said it would shrink down to laptop size, increase in capacity, the 5" screen would increase to the size of the cover of a 3-ring binder, and it would operate on batteries. Some said I was still nuts, but remembered my prediction of a portable computer. Then I said it would include speech recognition so you could dictate notes into a microphone with a soft cup over your mouth. Most said was lazy and this prediction wouldn't happen either, but some remembered my prediction of a portable computer. The soft cup microphone is being used by court recorders today. I stated at minimum the laptop computer would have a spelling checker. Most didn't believe this either, but Microsoft Word as had a spelling checker built in for the last few versions.

Hmm. I also stated in 1984 that PCs would increase in capacity to the point where the highest end system would rival the lowest end mainframe. Midrange computers would be squeezed out, so Digital Equipment Corporation would be challenged and probably go bankrupt just before the year 2000. File servers would be high-end PCs, most business systems would use banks of servers with different functions, and mainframes would be reserved to those few applications where extremely fast, high volume processing must be centralized (as apposed to distributed over multiple servers), such as airline reservation systems. Everyone laughed at me in 1984, but those predictions did come true.

The next major change is already happening, so the prediction is hardly dramatic. Television, telephone and home computing will integrate to a greater extent, but there will always be some separation. Flat screen monitors are already available, as are flat screen digital TVs; integration of these is obvious, but computer monitors require much higher resolution and TVs must have a larger viewable area. Convergence will move desktop monitors to have the same aspect ratio as digital TV (wide screen). Telephone companies already offer ADSL, and are starting to offer digital cable over the telephone line. Cable companies offer cable modems, and some are starting to offer digital telephone over the cable.

A more dramatic prediction is orbital hotels for space tourism, and asteroid mining. I think these will happen, and when they do the leading companies in these fields will get rich. The question is when this will happen.

Bill White · 2003-05-01 13:43:10

Robert, what is your opinion of including a significant wireless LAN based on large numbers of hardened - but otherwise ordinary - PC variety microchips in any Mars settlement?

Both for abundant bandwidth for internal communication and for heavy computational power (if linked in parallel) when necessary?

If there is considerable excess in the numbers of chips deployed, a modest failure rate for individual chips could be simply be routed around and thereafter ignored.

soph · 2003-05-01 14:04:30

The next major change is already happening, so the prediction is hardly dramatic. Television, telephone and home computing will integrate to a greater extent, but there will always be some separation. Flat screen monitors are already available, as are flat screen digital TVs; integration of these is obvious, but computer monitors require much higher resolution and TVs must have a larger viewable area. Convergence will move desktop monitors to have the same aspect ratio as digital TV (wide screen). Telephone companies already offer ADSL, and are starting to offer digital cable over the telephone line. Cable companies offer cable modems, and some are starting to offer digital telephone over the cable.

One peeve: flat screen and flat panel are different. I know what you mean (I think): flat screen monitors are CRTs, while flat panels are LCDs.

My flat panel is 15"->fine for watching TV if I wanted to. And the price is not all that much greater than a quality TV of the size. Friends of mine already watch TV on their computers (they don't have TVs in their rooms, so I recommended TV tuners, which allow tv viewing on PCs), and I might, if I didn't have a large TV already.

Monitors today are already big enough to function as TVs. I think integration of TVs and monitors will be really visible within the next 5 to 10 years, especially as bulky CRTs hit the dumpsters, and LCDs drop in price.

RobertDyck · 2003-05-01 14:14:51

Robert, what is your opinion of including a significant wireless LAN based on large numbers of hardened - but otherwise ordinary - PC variety microchips in any Mars settlement?
Both for abundant bandwidth for internal communication and for heavy computational power (if linked in parallel) when necessary?
If there is considerable excess in the numbers of chips deployed, a modest failure rate for individual chips could be simply be routed around and thereafter ignored.

Sounds good to me. Unless quantum communicators are developed by then.

A quantum communicator would be used on Earth first to replace cell phones. Wireless phones would no longer require cell towers, so cost would be dramatically reduced. Quantum communicator chips would be built in pairs so the handset can only communicate with the wireless carrier you bought it from. The carriers will love that. And the range is the planet (actually greater than the planet) so wireless phone companies will compete with each other world wide; they will no longer be restricted to geographic areas unless their marketing guys want to. They will really love that. Quantum communicators will give laptop and palmtop computers a permanent broadband connection to the internet: uninterruptible, travel anywhere, as fast as a broadband connection at home. Once all this is available on Earth, it can be used on Mars as well. So again this will be simply a matter of using existing technology.

The fact that a quantum communicator can operate instantaneously between Earth and Mars means telephone, digital TV, and internet will be available to Mars colonists just as they are to people on Earth. It could be developed by NASA now for use on near-future Mars probes; then commercialized. Developing the next major consumer communication technology would give NASA something to brag about. I do now have all the pieces to develop one except money, and the last Announcement of Opportunity from NASA included Mars communication technology. Perhaps I should put together a bid.

Bill White · 2003-05-01 14:58:27

Unless quantum communicators are developed by then

If you do submit a bid - maybe use the trade name Ansible. This link says it comes from Ursula LeGuin and I first saw it in Orson Scott Card's Ender's Game.

If a quantum communicator were indeed instantaneous - and I confess I have reservations whether physics allows this - couldn't you also build a computer with infinite processing speed based on that device?

soph · 2003-05-01 15:37:17

If a quantum communicator were indeed instantaneous - and I confess I have reservations whether physics allows this - couldn't you also build a computer with infinite processing speed based on that device?

Which is exactly what physicists are trying to do in researching quantum computers. In fact, these devices would help verify the multiverse theory-they could not work unless there were other quantum universes from which to draw the calculations.

RobertDyck · 2003-05-01 15:38:36

If a quantum communicator were indeed instantaneous - and I confess I have reservations whether physics allows this - couldn't you also build a computer with infinite processing speed based on that device?

Communication speed between switching elements would be instantaneous, but the switching elements themselves would not. This could increase computing speed, but it would not be infinite. By the way, there are people trying to develop computing technology using this.

Bill White · 2003-05-01 15:53:12

Could you do a SETI search looking for quantum communicators? *IF* these things are feasible, wouldn't "every" species use them meaning no radio signals to find?

Could you contact another species - in another galaxy for example - if you could deduce that they had this technology?

RobertDyck · 2003-05-01 17:24:02

Could you do a SETI search looking for quantum communicators? *IF* these things are feasible, wouldn't "every" species use them meaning no radio signals to find?
Could you contact another species - in another galaxy for example - if you could deduce that they had this technology?

Ah, now there is the catch. Without getting into details how this works (I know, you're fishing), the two ends would have to be so perfectly aligned that it is not possible. To establish communication you have to point each end so perfectly that a straight line drawn from it passes through a subatomic particle at the other end, with that particle vibrating at close to the speed of light. You can do it if both particles are less than an atom's diameter apart, but not over interstellar distances. That means a pair of chips must be linked in a single machine at the factory, then ensure the linkage is never broken. Theoretically you could use one pair to establish linkage for another pair, and then separate that second pair from the first pair without breaking the linkage between partners of a pair. So once linkage is established across interstellar distance, that linkage could be used to create additional links, thus increasing the communication bandwidth. However, establishing the initial link would require physically transporting a chip from one star to another. Also theoretically, the link would be completely immune to interference, shielding, or any means to block, jam, tap, or detect the signal. The only means to stop communication is to break the link between pairs. That could only be accomplished by physically destroying one of the chips, exposing the active element of a chip to ionizing radiation, loosing power to the tiny containment field on the chip, or passing a quantum singularity (black hole) directly through the line of sight between the chips. There could be interstellar civilizations using this technology right now and there would be no way for us to detect it.

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Re: Communications - Intra-Colony/Intra-Settlement

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