I thought there were some existing parametrics for the savings in mass fraction for a stage or a lander launched dry (versus wet), but apparently not. Is there anyone out there who whomp up a simple system in AutoCAD or Solidworks? Say 50,000 lbs of LOX/Hydrogen, launch acceleration 6 gees?
All posts by Rand Simberg
Linux Problem
Can anyone figure out why /home is mounting read-only at boot?
Here’s my fstab:
# /etc/fstab
# Created by anaconda on Sat Apr 18 17:14:21 2015
#
# Accessible filesystems, by reference, are maintained under ‘/dev/disk’
# See man pages fstab(5), findfs(8), mount(8) and/or blkid(8) for more info
#
/dev/mapper/fedora_new–host–5-root / ext4 defaults 1 1
UUID=058cc312-d471-41b9-a346-6ecf7dd2484b /boot ext4 defaults 1 2
#/dev/mapper/fedora_new–host–5-home /home ext4 defaults 1 2
/dev/mapper/fedora_new–host-home /home ext4 defaults 1 2
/dev/mapper/fedora_new–host–5-swap swap swap defaults 0 0
Note that /dev/mapper/fedora_new–host–5-root is an SSD (as is boot), and /dev/mapper/fedora_new–host-home is a physical hard drive.
And here’s /proc/mounts:
sysfs /sys sysfs rw,seclabel,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime 0 0
proc /proc proc rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime 0 0
devtmpfs /dev devtmpfs rw,seclabel,nosuid,size=7787916k,nr_inodes=1946979,mode=755 0 0
securityfs /sys/kernel/security securityfs rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime 0 0
tmpfs /dev/shm tmpfs rw,seclabel,nosuid,nodev 0 0
devpts /dev/pts devpts rw,seclabel,nosuid,noexec,relatime,gid=5,mode=620,ptmxmode=000 0 0
tmpfs /run tmpfs rw,seclabel,nosuid,nodev,mode=755 0 0
tmpfs /sys/fs/cgroup tmpfs ro,seclabel,nosuid,nodev,noexec,mode=755 0 0
cgroup /sys/fs/cgroup/systemd cgroup rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,xattr,release_agent=/usr/lib/systemd/systemd-cgroups-agent,name=systemd 0 0
pstore /sys/fs/pstore pstore rw,seclabel,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime 0 0
cgroup /sys/fs/cgroup/blkio cgroup rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,blkio 0 0
cgroup /sys/fs/cgroup/net_cls,net_prio cgroup rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,net_cls,net_prio 0 0
cgroup /sys/fs/cgroup/hugetlb cgroup rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,hugetlb 0 0
cgroup /sys/fs/cgroup/memory cgroup rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,memory 0 0
cgroup /sys/fs/cgroup/perf_event cgroup rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,perf_event 0 0
cgroup /sys/fs/cgroup/cpu,cpuacct cgroup rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,cpu,cpuacct 0 0
cgroup /sys/fs/cgroup/cpuset cgroup rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,cpuset 0 0
cgroup /sys/fs/cgroup/freezer cgroup rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,freezer 0 0
cgroup /sys/fs/cgroup/devices cgroup rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,devices 0 0
configfs /sys/kernel/config configfs rw,relatime 0 0
/dev/mapper/fedora_new–host–5-root / ext4 rw,seclabel,relatime,data=ordered 0 0
selinuxfs /sys/fs/selinux selinuxfs rw,relatime 0 0
systemd-1 /proc/sys/fs/binfmt_misc autofs rw,relatime,fd=24,pgrp=1,timeout=300,minproto=5,maxproto=5,direct 0 0
tmpfs /tmp tmpfs rw,seclabel 0 0
debugfs /sys/kernel/debug debugfs rw,seclabel,relatime 0 0
hugetlbfs /dev/hugepages hugetlbfs rw,seclabel,relatime 0 0
mqueue /dev/mqueue mqueue rw,seclabel,relatime 0 0
nfsd /proc/fs/nfsd nfsd rw,relatime 0 0
/dev/sdb1 /boot ext4 rw,seclabel,relatime,data=ordered 0 0
/dev/mapper/fedora_new–host-home /home ext4 ro,seclabel,relatime,data=ordered 0 0
sunrpc /var/lib/nfs/rpc_pipefs rpc_pipefs rw,relatime 0 0
tmpfs /run/user/42 tmpfs rw,seclabel,nosuid,nodev,relatime,size=1559960k,mode=700,uid=42,gid=42 0 0
tmpfs /run/user/1000 tmpfs rw,seclabel,nosuid,nodev,relatime,size=1559960k,mode=700,uid=1000,gid=1000 0 0
gvfsd-fuse /run/user/1000/gvfs fuse.gvfsd-fuse rw,nosuid,nodev,relatime,user_id=1000,group_id=1000 0 0
fusectl /sys/fs/fuse/connections fusectl rw,relatime 0 0
binfmt_misc /proc/sys/fs/binfmt_misc binfmt_misc rw,relatime 0 0
[Update a while later]
OK, clearly the disk is getting corrupted. I put in a file check option in the fstab, and it (temporarily) mounted it read-write at boot, but after working a while it became remounted read-only.
Any suggestions?
[Update a while later]
I had a spare 2T drive that I hooked up, and made it /home at boot (it was an old original, and the new drive was actually backup of it, so it had a lot of the data on it already). It’s working fine so far, except that when I copied my Gnome user configuration data over and rebooted, it decided that I wanted to have a Spanish desktop. I’ve changed the system settings to en_US, and even ‘localectl status’ give me:
System Locale: LANG=en_US
VC Keymap: us
X11 Layout: us
I can’t figure out where in the configuration files it’s getting the idea that I want to compute en Espanol, but while I can stumble along in it, it’s quite annoying.
[Wednesday-morning update]
OK, I determined that the language is changed in Gnome in “Settings,” but in the Spanish interface, that gets translated into “Configuracion,” so I was looking in the wrong place. So, now all is well, as far as I can tell. And as of this morning both the old and the new drive remain read/write. So still not sure what the problem was, but it seems to be a lot better now.
[Update a while later]
Wow. That drive had been causing problems I hadn’t even realized. My system had been running like molasses, with lots of runaway processes (like in Chrome). That’s completely disappeared. It’s like greased lightning now, even with several instances and many dozens of tabs open in Firefox.
Meth
It’s not an argument for drug prohibition; it’s a demonstration and consequence of the failure of drug prohibition.
News College-Bound Men Can Use
Four questions men should ask when selecting a college:
Since most college handbooks now define sexual assault broadly to include pretty much everything, one’s best bet is to avoid sex in college altogether. Colleges have enacted policies that allow non-students to bring accusations against students, so dating off campus isn’t safe either.
There’s really nothing that can be done to protect oneself from an accusation in the current climate. Sorry to sound so dire, but when a school puts up posters suggesting that even a sip of alcohol renders a women unable to give consent, things have gotten dire.
…I apologize if this seems like fearmongering, but college campuses are no longer safe for students accused of sexual assault. Due process rights have gone out the window because, activists tell us, this issue is so important that draconian measures must be taken. Their message is clear: Due process is fine and dandy for criminal courts, but this is a college campus, damn it, due process has no place here for those accused of felonies.
This is all making on-line education look better and better. And once again kudos to Ashe for being all over this beat.
Hillary’s Server
It was even less secure than previously thought.
This is my shocked face.
As someone noted on Twitter, this is the equivalent of leaving a new Mercedes out on the street with the key taped to the outside of the windshield.
Lyndon Johnson’s Daily Brief
I’ve been looking forward to this. Some formerly classified documents from the Apollo era have emerged.
Hoplophobic Professors
I think they should be shunned and punished for being the bigots that they are.
Gary Gygax
Thoughts on his suggested reading list:
Ideological diversity in science fiction and fantasy was a given in the seventies. We are hopelessly homogenistic in comparison to them.
The program of political correctness of the past several decades has made even writers like Ray Bradbury and C. L. Moore all but unreadable to an entire generation. The conditioning is so strong, some people have almost physical reactions to the older stories now.
All part of the reason that I don’t read anywhere near as much SF as I did as a kid.
Columbus Day
Some perennial thoughts from Instapundit (and Jim Bennett).
I agree that Columbus gets too much credit, and I don’t disagree that his behavior was depraved by modern lights. But the Carib Arawak were hardly the noble savages that the SJWs would have us believe. They had themselves subjugated the Taino, killing, raping, assimilating, into a brutal patriarchal society that practiced human sacrifice and, by some accounts, cannibalism. So it’s amusing to see all the whining about Columbus in that context.
It’s Like It’s The Nineties Again
Gennifer Flowers is back:
Asked what she thinks of Hillary’s candidacy and her platform focusing in part on women’s issues, Flowers began by explaining, “You know, people criticize me for talking about her because I had an affair with her husband.”
“And I don’t blame them for that,” she continued. “I understand that. I understand that they can be mad at me. I get it. I accept my responsibility. … But she’s never accepted her responsibility at being an enabler. She’s been an enabler that has encouraged him to go out and do whatever he does with women.”
“Woman’s rights. Ha!” Flowers retorted. “I personally have worked my tail off to get where I am in the entertainment business, which has not been easy since the Clinton scandal, by the way. … Hillary never put up a shingle and worked for her clients and built her clientele. She always got things on the back of her husband. … I think it’s a joke that she would run on women’s issues.”
…Klein referenced an interview from this past week in which Matt Drudge of the Drudge Report asked on Alex Jones’ radio show, “Why aren’t we seeing Hillary’s lovers? … Where’s the cover-up on this? … So many issues that are suppressed on a daily basis.”
Listen to Part 2 of Gennifer Flowers talk with Aaron Klein:
Affirming comments she made in 2013 to the Daily Mail, Flowers replied to Klein, “I know that Bill acknowledged to me that he was aware that she had a propensity for women and he didn’t care.”
“I’m not saying that she is a lesbian, but he acknowledged that she, as we say down on Arkansas, took a liking to women.”
Like Drudge, Flowers also asked, “Why something hasn’t come out on that? That’s amazing.”
I wish it were. I knew about it twenty years ago.
I blame Hillary for this. If she weren’t such a power monger, we wouldn’t have to go through all this again. This time, the gatekeepers are gone, and it will come out.