Ron's Log

It doesn't look like much yet, but it could be interesting some day

Six researchers have developed a system that goes well beyond matching up photos for simple things like panoramas, aerial maps, Gigapan or Google Streetview. This system takes photos from Flickr (such as the 2,081,629 photos labeled "Rome") and manages to match them up with each other. You can dig through their paper if you want to know how it deals with photos of Rome, New York, or restaurants with "Rome" in the name. There are some short videos on the site which, by themselves, are not that impressive. You get a 3-D cloud view of famous landmarks that, if you didn't already know about the technology behind it, looks lke it could have been developed by any CGI program used in Hollywood. I am sure that as work progresses something miraculous will come out of this.

But after looking at their videos I realized that the little pyramids (at a distance they're just black dots) that litter the scenes represent the positions from which each photograph was taken. THAT makes it interesting to me. It's especially clear in this video of San Marco Square in Venice (AKA "Plaza San Marcos" "Piazza San Marco" "St. Mark's Square" etc.) that uses 14,000 Flickr images.

They don't say whether they bothered to clear copyright on all those images they used.

Public Service Announcement - Safe Driving

Please don't tailgate.

Palin Makes Sense

But only when read by the great Shatner.

Waterproof Cameras

Digital Photography Review has reviewed seven waterproof point-and-shoot digital cameras. Desert dwellers may scoff at the need for a waterproof camera, but you should be aware that a waterproof camera is also dustproof...and if you are going to Burning Man, you will want to be able to take photos in the dust.

Their tied-for-first-place top picks? The Canon Powershot D10 ($320 at B&H) and the Panasonic Lumix DMC-TS1 ($400 at B&H).

Oh, Now I Understand

Bill O'Reilly explains that life expectancy is higher in Canada than in the U.S. because the U.S. has ten times the population, so ten times the number of accidents, etc. By that logic, China should have the shortest life expectancy on Earth, while tiny nations like Lichtenstein or the Vatican should have the longest. In the U.S. Wyoming should have the longest life expectancy and California the shortest. Within California, Los Angeles County should have the shortest life expectancy, while Mono County would have a much longer one. I don't know if Bill O'Reilly's logic begins to fail as you look at smaller and smaller political subdivisions, but if it doesn't then the inescapable conclusion would be that in order to live a very long life you should avoid human contact.

Mission Springs Park Reconstruction Underway

That's Roger Rice keeping an eye on things.

More photos here.

Not The Solution For Public Male Urination

Here you see the design for a proposed urinal to be placed on a public wall. Click the image for more SFW photos and description. The only problem it attempts to solve is the problem of urine on the wall and trickling along the street. It does nothing for the, uh, "public exhibition" problem. But I don't think it can even solve the problem it aims at.

First, you've got an opening that looks like it's 2 or 3 inches across. The only practical way to hit that consistently is to actually introduce your member into the opening. Most men do not want to insert their member into a little hole that's just been pissed in by some other man. So they're going to stand back a bit and do their best - if they are motivated - and I don't know what would motivate a man to use this thing unless a cop is standing right there. You could offer some reward. Place sensors in and around the urinal and if the man gets almost all of it into the opening (say 95% of the flow), then a little ticket is generated that entitles the bearer to a free drink or free parking or a taxi discount or something. Obviously, the price of this urinal has just gone up quite a bit.

Second problem is that the urine goes into a very small reservoir and then flows out through a small pipe on the back. Let's just assume that pipe is supposed to drain into the sewage system, even though it's not shown. With that small reservoir, the flow through the pipe will have to be fast to keep up with young, healthy drinkers. I believe someone who has plumbed or janitored will tell you that it will be easy for a small obstruction to completely block things up when you are depending on a gravity-fed water flow through a small opening.

Here on Gizmodo the readers point out all the many shortcomings of this design.

Compare this design which is used successfully throughout Europe. Photo by mLeePhilly.

Feds To Pay For One More Police Officer For DHS

City of Desert Hot Springs
65-950 Pierson Blvd. · Desert Hot Springs · CA · 92240
(760) 329-6411

City of Desert Hot Springs Awarded COPS Hiring Recovery Program Grant

Contact: Police Chief Patrick Williams
City of Desert Hot Springs
(760) 329-6411 ext 301

July 28, 2009

U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder announced that the City of Desert Hot Springs was awarded a COPS Hiring Recovery Program Grant in the estimated amount of $346,258. The grant funds will provide an additional police officer to the Desert Hot Springs Police Department.

Desert Hot Springs was 1 of 51 police agencies from jurisdictions in California with a population of less than 150,000 that applied for the highly competitive grant, and was 1 of the 14 agencies that was awarded funding.

The Desert Hot Springs City Council approved 2009-10 Operating Budget provided funding for 33 officer positions. The increase to 33 officers was made possible in part by the passage of Measure A in May, 2009. The award of the grant will increase that number to 34 officer positions. Presently, the Department has 29 positions filled, and Police Chief Patrick Williams is actively recruiting and filling the vacancies.

Public Safety is the Desert Hot Springs City Council’s number one priority. The addition of another officer is an important step in the process to the long-term community safety that our residents, businesses and visitors have come to expect. The addition of this position will help us increase community safety, improve the Department’s capacity to deter crime and to proactively seek out those who would do harm in our neighborhoods.

IIRC, this was the program that Finance Director Jason Simpson found out about and for which he began the grant request process while he was in Washington with Mayor Parks and Mayor Pro Tem Baker. The grant pays for one police officer for three years.

The Boys At MIT Do It Again

MIT researchers are working on an electric car that dramatically overcomes some of the usual limitations of electrics. In ten minutes you can give the batteries enough charge to travel 200 miles. Coupla drawbacks that keep it from being ready for the market right now. That ten minutes of charging requires 350 kW of power. In case you are wondering if your household 120 volt outlet is good for 350 kW, one of the researchers comments "That's enough power to blow the fuses on 20 residential homes at once." Also, the array of 7,905 lithium iron-phosphate batteries costs about $80,000. But give 'em another six months and they'll get over that hurdle.

Here's the research team's blog.

Another Big One

The Consolidated-Vultee RB-36H Peacemaker is big. Here's a little table comparing it with the B-52 and the modern C-5.

	Wingspan	Length	Max Takeoff Weight
B-36	230'	162' 1"	410,000 lbs.
B-52	185'	159' 4"	488,000 lbs.
C-5	225' 9"	247' 1"	840,000 lbs.

It's got six piston engines on the rear of the wings, plus four jet engines. Development of the B-36 began before the U.S. entered World War II in anticipation of the need for a bomber that could take off from the United States, fly to Europe to drops its bombs, and then return to the U.S. However, it did not enter use until 1948. It had a range of 8,800 miles. The B-36 was not surpassed in the weight of the payload it could lift until the development of the Boeing 747 and the C-5 Galaxy. The B-36 was the only means available to deliver the first hydrogen bomb. Each of the piston engines had its own 100-gallon oil tank for lubrication. More info on the B-36 at WikiPedia. From the 1955 movie Strategic Air Command starring Jimmy Stewart and June Allyson, comes this high quality, color film (with dramatic music) of a B-36 (with jets) taking off.

The largest bomber ever built (at the time), the B-36 served as America's airborne nuclear deterrent in the 1950s. Armed with sixteen 20 mm remotely controlled cannon in nose, tail and retractable fuselage turrets, it could carry 72,000 pounds of conventional or nuclear bombs. It had a maximum speed of 411 MPH, range of 8,800 miles and could operate to 39,000 feet. Fortunately never required to fire a shot in anger, they were the "big stick" of the Cold War until the advent of the B-52. This aircraft at Castle Air Museum is RB-36, reconnaissance bomber, equipped with multiple cameras. The camera ports are visible in the forward fuselage. It is one of four surviving B-36s and the only surviving RB-36. Castle Air Museum volunteers went to Chanute AFB, Illinois, to disassemble the aircraft and load parts on eleven flat cars supplied by Santa Fe Railroad. It was reassembled here on site, utilizing thousands of hours of volunteer effort. This aircraft was assigned to the 28th Bomb Wing at Ellsworth AFB, South Dakota. It displays the markings of that unit.

Looking forward from underneath the tail.

The security system on the RB-36H.

The two jet engines that are mounted further out on the wing than the three propeller engines.

This was the only plane at Castle Air Museum with an open bomb bay.

One of the observation windows.

More photos of this B-36 here.