Saturday, October 4, 2014
Jeh Johnson, HHS secretary on Fox News
Bret Baier had him on the 6PM news show last night. Put a good long 20 minute interview on the air. Asked Johnson about Ebola, and the Secret Service. Johnson did not do well. He came across as evasive and a man with something to hide. Several somethings in fact. I thought Baier did a nice fair interview, but Johnson kept evading the questions or changing the subject, or replying with meaningless platitudes.
Easier to see scrollbars in Firefox
Some how in making the jump from XP to 8.1 Firefox messed up his scrollbars. They went light grey, almost invisible, and the slider, or thumb, was just a shade or two darker than the scrollbar and damn hard to see. PITA.
There is a fix for Firefox. Down load an add-in called NewScrollbars, or sometimes NOIAScrollbars 1.21. Google will find it for you. Good fix, you can set any color you like and the slider is a nice high contrast easy to see. Significant improvement.
Too bad I haven't found something like this for Windows 8.1 itself. The M$ people were into very soft pastels this time which are hard to see. User friendly those Microsofties.
There is a fix for Firefox. Down load an add-in called NewScrollbars, or sometimes NOIAScrollbars 1.21. Google will find it for you. Good fix, you can set any color you like and the slider is a nice high contrast easy to see. Significant improvement.
Too bad I haven't found something like this for Windows 8.1 itself. The M$ people were into very soft pastels this time which are hard to see. User friendly those Microsofties.
Friday, October 3, 2014
Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital
The one that failed to diagnose Ebola and sent the infectious patient home with some antibiotics. I wonder if they are on the narrow Obamacare network? According to the TV news, a nurse actually asked the patient about travel, and the patient said he was from Liberia. The nurse didn't tell the doctors, she just typed it into the electronic medical records system. The doctors didn't read the electronic system. The hospital is blaming the computer system. I'm thinking that nurse should have known that Liberia was Ebola country and she should have brought it to everyone's attention. As it is, the electronic medical records system recorded it for later embarrassment of the hospital. Obamacare has been demanding everyone go over to insecure electronic systems, claiming they improve care. Right. In actual fact, they make everyone's medical records available to anyone who cares to snoop, such as potential employers.
Any how, I would avoid Texas Health Presbyterian. The goofed, big time, allowing an infected Ebola patient to wander around infecting people.
Any how, I would avoid Texas Health Presbyterian. The goofed, big time, allowing an infected Ebola patient to wander around infecting people.
Australia's over-the-horizon radar.
Standard radar is strictly line of sight. It's like using a searchlight. The radar transmitter illuminates the target and some of the energy is reflected off the target back to the receiver where it is "seen". Should the target be over the horizon it is just out of view.
Down under, the Jindalee system uses extremely low frequencies, at least low for a radar. The Aviation Week article didn't mention the frequencies used, but its got to be 10 meters or longer. CB band and below. At low frequency the ionosphere acts as a mirror and reflects the transmitted pulse back down to the ground far beyond the horizon. The Australians have constructed three low frequency over-the-horizon (o-t-h) radars spread across their sub continent, looking northward, covering the sea between Australia and Indonesia.
O-t-h radar, since it reflects off the unstable and fluxuating ionospheric mirror, suffers from image distortions, blind spots, and difficulties computing range. You might say the picture is blurry. But usable. And operating three radar stations has got to be cheaper than flying reconnaisance, or launching recon satellites.
I notice that the o-t-h radar covers the sea areas in which they are still looking for that lost Malaysian airliner, the one that dropped off radar and was never heard from again. Could the searches be guided by Jindalee o-t-h radar tracks?
Down under, the Jindalee system uses extremely low frequencies, at least low for a radar. The Aviation Week article didn't mention the frequencies used, but its got to be 10 meters or longer. CB band and below. At low frequency the ionosphere acts as a mirror and reflects the transmitted pulse back down to the ground far beyond the horizon. The Australians have constructed three low frequency over-the-horizon (o-t-h) radars spread across their sub continent, looking northward, covering the sea between Australia and Indonesia.
O-t-h radar, since it reflects off the unstable and fluxuating ionospheric mirror, suffers from image distortions, blind spots, and difficulties computing range. You might say the picture is blurry. But usable. And operating three radar stations has got to be cheaper than flying reconnaisance, or launching recon satellites.
I notice that the o-t-h radar covers the sea areas in which they are still looking for that lost Malaysian airliner, the one that dropped off radar and was never heard from again. Could the searches be guided by Jindalee o-t-h radar tracks?
Thursday, October 2, 2014
Leaves are beginning too fall
Leaves will be quite good this weekend. By next weekend they will be mostly on the ground. Or brown.
Airborne tower of Babel
Long article in Aviation Week deploring the lack of a common data link standard between USAF combat aircraft. Apparently older aircraft like AWACs and F16's were equipped with a datalink system known as Link16. The newer F22 has a different system called IFDL and the even newer F35 has a system called MADL. As you might imagine, the various systems cannot talk to each other. There is a project, hoping for funding, to build a "translator" box that can talk to all three systems and translate between them.
Of course, old fogies like myself wonder just why such a datalink is needed. Is it to allow aircrews to websurf on their way to target?
Way back in the day, the F106 fighter had a data link to the SAGE centers. When it worked, it allowed the ground based SAGE computers to drive the horizontal situation display in the fighter, and set a steering needle to point to point right at the target. When it was feeling especially clever it could put a bright circle on the fighter's radarscope highlighting the area in which the target was expected to appear.
Headquarters ADC loved datalink (dollie they called it) and insisted upon its use on every practice intercept. When dollie broke, and the aircrew used trusty voice radio to get vector and altitude to target from the ground controller, HQ would go ballistic and chew out the controller, the aircrew, and avionics maintenance (me) over the "broken dollie sortie".
In actual fact, voice radio worked just fine, everyone knew the procedures, and it doesn't take long to say "Vector 034, Angels 18" over the air.
But HQ ADC was on a dollie kick and we all did a lot of running around to make them happy. Only the then new F106 had dollie. The older F102, F101, and F89 interceptors lacked it, and my controller friends always said the oldest (F89) was the most likely to score a kill. Dollie didn't make the F106 more effective.
Of course, old fogies like myself wonder just why such a datalink is needed. Is it to allow aircrews to websurf on their way to target?
Way back in the day, the F106 fighter had a data link to the SAGE centers. When it worked, it allowed the ground based SAGE computers to drive the horizontal situation display in the fighter, and set a steering needle to point to point right at the target. When it was feeling especially clever it could put a bright circle on the fighter's radarscope highlighting the area in which the target was expected to appear.
Headquarters ADC loved datalink (dollie they called it) and insisted upon its use on every practice intercept. When dollie broke, and the aircrew used trusty voice radio to get vector and altitude to target from the ground controller, HQ would go ballistic and chew out the controller, the aircrew, and avionics maintenance (me) over the "broken dollie sortie".
In actual fact, voice radio worked just fine, everyone knew the procedures, and it doesn't take long to say "Vector 034, Angels 18" over the air.
But HQ ADC was on a dollie kick and we all did a lot of running around to make them happy. Only the then new F106 had dollie. The older F102, F101, and F89 interceptors lacked it, and my controller friends always said the oldest (F89) was the most likely to score a kill. Dollie didn't make the F106 more effective.
Can he fire anyone?
OK, Obama dumped the head of secret service and appointed a new old guy. Name escapes me, despite a lotta TV coverage I haven't cuaght his name yet. Not a good sign.
Clearly Secret Service has some problems, fence jumpers making to the East Room, agents on trips getting drunk and laid, ex-con with a gun riding the elevator with the president.
I'd guess these problems come from ineffective supervisors, officers we called 'em in the military, dunno what the secret service calls 'em. To fix things, you gotta fire the ineffective supervisors and replace them with good people. Will the new guy (who is retired secret service and ought to know the people) be able to fire the inefficient? On his own say-so? Fairly quickly, like within a few weeks rather than after years of hearings and appeals? Does secret service have a union to protect the guilty? Are they under civil service, which basically forbids firing even for very strong cause?
Clearly Secret Service has some problems, fence jumpers making to the East Room, agents on trips getting drunk and laid, ex-con with a gun riding the elevator with the president.
I'd guess these problems come from ineffective supervisors, officers we called 'em in the military, dunno what the secret service calls 'em. To fix things, you gotta fire the ineffective supervisors and replace them with good people. Will the new guy (who is retired secret service and ought to know the people) be able to fire the inefficient? On his own say-so? Fairly quickly, like within a few weeks rather than after years of hearings and appeals? Does secret service have a union to protect the guilty? Are they under civil service, which basically forbids firing even for very strong cause?
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