General

Painting & Drawing on Mac OS X

I’m running into some pointless frustration trying to put together simple illustrations for a talk I’m going to be giving. The software I have access to is simply too powerful for the task. I’m using Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop to knock out simple technical illustrations. The crapware paint program that comes with powerpoint is too crapware for the task, but the learning curve required for Illustrator and Photoshop isn’t worth climbing for tasks I’ll be doing maybe once every couple of months.

Back in the early nineties there was a program for the Mac called SuperPaint. It hit the spot exactly. It had a drawing layer (vector based), a painting layer (pixel based), and the ability to copy stuff from drawing to painting layers. There was a modest selection of tools, an intuitive interface, and a trivial learning curve. I can’t believe that such a program doesn’t still exist somewhere, but I can’t seem to find it. It’s such a basic and useful thing that someone has to be making it. There’s no reason there should be a large gap between kiddie-style drawing programs and the full fledged professional graphical design software. I can’t be the only person who occasionally needs to put together a simple illustration that looks halfway decent.

If anyone in out there knows of a suitable program, please let me know about it, either in email or comments.

[update a few minutes later] Of coursee, as soon as I post this I discover how to do something in Illustrator that I’d been assured was impossible, by people who use the program almost daily. It occurs to me that a lot of high powered software would be made vastly more usable by have a Beginners Mode, or Simple Mode, in which much of the more sophisticated functionality was pushed into the background. My Illustrator learning curve is made considerably worse just due to the sheer number of menus and options I have to dig through to find what I’m looking for. We have this problem at the lab with ProE (CAD software) – the guy who really knew how to use it left, and now we have a detailed set of drawings of the machine that we can’t really work with because nobody has the time to learn the ins and outs. If ProE had a Beginners Mode we could just dive in and and at least get some basic use out of the drawings.

Space

Another Regulatory Milestone

According to Aleta Jackson of XCOR (see comments), Mojave Airport is now an FAA-licensed spaceport, the first inland one in history (note: probably not a permalink), as of yesterday, with Launch Site Operator License # LSO 04 009. I’m sure that it’s just by coincidence, but it’s just in time for Burt’s flight on Monday.

[Update at 6 PM PDT]

There seems to be a lot of confusion in the comments section. When I say spaceport, I mean a place that the FAA has specifically licensed for commercial launches under American jurisdiction. As far as I know, that doesn’t include, for example White Sands (which is one reason that Armadillo probably won’t be able to make an X-Prize attempt this year). And it has nothing to do with Shuttle launches or landings.

Space

A Mainstream Columnist Gets It

Jeff Jacoby says that space should be given over to the private sector.

…if human beings are truly meant to slip the surly bonds of Earth, as the poem “High Flight” says — if we are destined to live on the moon, walk on Mars, explore the solar system — we will need to draw on greater reserves of imagination and creativity than government bureaucracies can manage. Solid rocket boosters can get human beings off a launch pad, but getting them permanently into space will require something even mightier: the unmatched power of competition, incentive, and free enterprise.

Space

Even More Aldridge Thoughts

I’ve skimmed the report. It’s got a lot of good things in it, and it’s probably the best report of its kind to ever come out in terms of policy recommendations (which is to damn it with faint praise). I agree with Andrew that absolutely the most damaging recommendation in it is to initiate a heavy lift program as soon as possible, and to imply (with that photo of a Shuttle-derived vehicle on page 29) that the Shuttle would be a good basis for such a program. It provides absolutely zero support for its contention that (from page 30) “…Heavy-lift capability is a critical enabling technology for mission accomplishment and a plan for achieving this capability needs to be developed now.”

A major omission in the section on engaging the public was any mention about public space travel. This was disappointing–I had hoped that they would have paid attention to Tony Tether’s testimony. Apparently they didn’t. Instead, they fall back on the same time-worn calls for better propaganda:

The Commission recommends that industry, professional organizations, and the media engage the public in understanding why space exploration is vital to our scientific, economic, and security interests.

The poor proles just don’t seem to be able to understand why we should take money from their wallets to send government employees off to other planets so they can watch on teevee. Apparently we haven’t been explaining it well enough. This time for sure!

It was particularly disappointing that in support of a repeat of this flawed approach, they chose this comment from an audience member, rather than Tony Tether’s:

And so my One Urgent Request

Space

More Thoughts On The Aldridge Report

I’ve had a chance to read through the Aldridge Commission report, and I’ve made some notes along the way. I have no doubt that much of this is duplicated by other blogging spacehounds, but I haven’t yet surveyed the blogosphere. After the usual suspects take a shot at it perhaps we can compare notes and put together a canonical list of kvetches, comments and compliments.

Continue reading More Thoughts On The Aldridge Report →

War Commentary

Compare And Constrast

You know, if Dubya were one tenth the murderous bloodthirsty imperialistic stormtrooper cowboy that the foaming-at-the-mouth rabid left says he is, we wouldn’t be dropping leaflets with reward offers. We’d be dropping leaflets with an ultimatum to give him up in twenty-four hours, allow a monitored exodus, and then MOAB the place.

I’m not saying that’s an appropriate strategy, of course–I’m just pointing out that that’s what the George Bush of their fevered fantasies would do. Or perhaps he wouldn’t even give the warning–he’d just level the town. You know, like most other rulers in the region (who they seem determined to keep in power) would.

Biting Commentary about Infinity…and Beyond!