Tuesday, November 30, 2010

Google Earth Adds 3-D Trees

They paved paradise...put of a virtual tree...

starSlashdot
November 30, 2010 6:32 PM
by CmdrTaco

Google Earth Adds 3-D Trees

terrancem writes "Google has populated several major cities with more than 80 million virtual trees based on an automated process that identifies trees in satellite images. The realistic 3D representations are based on actual tree species found in urban areas. But Google has also extended realistic tree coverage to rainforests in Africa, Mexico, and the Amazon."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.



google


Art Trembanis
CSHEL
Department of Geological Sciences
University of Delaware

Active Atlantic Hurricane Season a 'Gentle Giant' for U.S.

Phew...

starNOAA News Releases
November 29, 2010 1:19 PM

Active Atlantic Hurricane Season a 'Gentle Giant' for U.S.

With a total of 19 named storms, 12 hurricanes and five major hurricanes, the 2010 Atlantic hurricane season was one of the busiest on record - as NOAA forecasters had predicted. Fortunately, nearly all of those storms avoided the U.S. coastline.
hurricane, season


Art Trembanis
CSHEL
Department of Geological Sciences
University of Delaware

It's The Age Of "Aquarius" For NASA Astronauts - cbs4.com

http://cbs4.com/local/aquarius.nasa.training.2.2027250.html


Art Trembanis
CSHEL
Department of Geological Sciences
University of Delaware
http://cshel.geology.udel.edu

Poster at SERDP/ESTCP Symposium

Sunday, November 28, 2010

Which Shipping Company Is Kindest To Your Packages? - Slashdot

I'm afraid to look...

http://slashdot.org/story/10/11/29/0037244/Which-Shipping-Company-Is-Kindest-To-Your-Packages?from=rss


Art Trembanis
CSHEL
Department of Geological Sciences
University of Delaware
http://cshel.geology.udel.edu

Google Offshore Wind – Atlantic Wind Connection Transmission Backbone - Popular Mechanics

They have the location of the DE site in the wrong place but still interesting.
http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/environment/green-energy/taking-bets-on-8-offshore-wind-projects?click=pm_news


Art Trembanis
CSHEL
Department of Geological Sciences
University of Delaware
http://cshel.geology.udel.edu

Maker Birthdays: William Blake

starMAKE Magazine
November 28, 2010 6:01 PM
by Gareth Branwyn

Maker Birthdays: William Blake

MZ_MakerBirthday.gifblakeBanner.jpg

Most people probably think of William Blake (November 28, 1757 - August 12, 1827) as a slightly whack-a-doodle British poet and painter. But he was so much more than that. He was a slightly whack-a-doodle British craftsman, inventor, engraver, printer, and self-publisher, among many other things.

Blake believed that every human being had a "poetic genius" within them, something that was systematically destroyed by the single-minded needs of institutions, such as the State and the Church (think: drones in a hive). He was certainly a living embodiment of what could happen if you fought against some of this institutional indoctrination and unleashed some of that creative potential. Although he was basically laughed at during his lifetime, sold next to nothing of his artistic work, and he and his wife barely ate and kept a roof over their heads, he remained incredibly prolific, literally working until the day he died. He invented a number of new art techniques, such as illuminated printing (a kind of freeform engraving which allowed the artist to paint resist media directly onto copper plates) and a form of fresco painting (a failed experiment in bringing a fresco technique to conventional painting using tempera paints mixed with carpenter's glue).

Blake came of age during an exciting, tumultuous time (see: American and French revolutions) and at a time when an expanding trade-class was on the rise in Britain. Blake was trained as a traditional engraver and was a printer, and throughout his life, he remained very proud of his tradecraft and always saw himself as a tradesman. It was also a time in which art in Britain was expanding beyond the academy and the collections of the wealthy. Artists, such as water colorists, fed up with lack of respect and support for their media, began their own art societies and mounted their own shows. The only show that Blake ever did, in 1809, was a solo one, held in a bedroom above his brother's hosiery shop in Soho (the home in which Blake was born). The fact that he addressed his books and catalogs "To The Public" and "For Public Inspection" was quite a revolutionary gesture at a time in which only the aristocracy was supposed to understand or care about art.

To those who don't spend a lot of time teasing out the deeper meanings in Blake's work, much of it can come off as "distempered" (to quote the only review of his show), apocalyptic, impenetrable, and just plain nutso. He was certainly an intense and complex character who felt an urgency to alert the world to a discovery he thought he'd made: The limitless potential of the human imagination to render the world paradisaical (and the risk that the scientific and industrial revolution might kill a lot of that potential). An overly simplistic and romantic notion perhaps, but certainly a thought, a dream, that remains as relevant today as it did at the turn of the 19th century.

"The Foundation of Empire is Art & Science Remove them or Degrade them & the Empire is No More -- Empire follows Art & Not Vice Versa as Englishmen suppose." -- Wm. Blake


More:
See my article on William Blake from MAKE Volume 17, in the digital edition

Read the Full Story » | More on MAKE » | Comments » | Read more articles in Arts | Digg this!
Arts


Art Trembanis
CSHEL
Department of Geological Sciences
University of Delaware

Thursday, November 25, 2010

I'd like to be under the sea

Would be fun to go map some of these sites.

starMAKE Magazine
November 24, 2010 6:00 PM
by Gareth Branwyn

I'd like to be under the sea

underseaStatue_3.jpg
underseaStatue_2.jpg
underseaStatue_1b.jpg

This amazing artwork, by Jason de Caires Taylor, has been making the viral socmedia rounds. Taylor casts life-size cement sculptures of people, animals, furniture, and then submerges them off the coast of South America. Hauntingly beautiful. Imagine scuba diving and coming upon a guy typing at a desk. Awesome. [Thanks, Fran!]

Drowning Beautiful

Read the Full Story » | More on MAKE » | Comments » | Read more articles in Arts | Digg this!
Arts


Art Trembanis
CSHEL
Department of Geological Sciences
University of Delaware

One Giant Cargo Ship Pollutes As Much As 50M Cars

starSlashdot
November 23, 2010 4:42 PM
by kdawson

One Giant Cargo Ship Pollutes As Much As 50M Cars

thecarchik writes "One giant container ship pollutes the air as much as 50 million cars. Which means that just 15 of the huge ships emit as much as today's entire global 'car park' of roughly 750 million vehicles. Among the bad stuff: sulfur, soot, and other particulate matter that embeds itself in human lungs to cause a variety of cardiopulmonary illnesses. Since the mid-1970s, developed countries have imposed increasingly stringent regulations on auto emissions. In three decades, precise electronic engine controls, new high-pressure injectors, and sophisticated catalytic converters have cut emissions of nitrous oxides, carbon dioxides, and hydrocarbons by more than 98 percent. New regulations will further reduce these already minute limits. But ships today are where cars were in 1965: utterly uncontrolled, free to emit whatever they like." According to Wikipedia, 57 giant container ships (rated from 9,200 to 15,200 twenty-foot equivalent units) are plying the world's oceans.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.



earth


Art Trembanis
CSHEL
Department of Geological Sciences
University of Delaware

Monday, November 22, 2010

3-D Scanner Takes On the Goddard Shipwreck | Magazine

Check out the photos here are from our friend Donnie Reed of PLRP! Great photos and neat application of the blueview system.

http://m.wired.com/magazine/2010/11/st_goddardwreck?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+wired%2Findex+%28Wired%3A+Index+3+%28Top+Stories+2%29%29&utm_content=Google+Feedfetcher


Art Trembanis
CSHEL
Department of Geological Sciences
University of Delaware
http://cshel.geology.udel.edu

Old, Ignored Records Yield 200 Years of Fish Population Data | Wired Science | Wired.com

http://m.wired.com/wiredscience/2010/11/old-fish-populations/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+wired%2Findex+%28Wired%3A+Index+3+%28Top+Stories+2%29%29&utm_content=Google+Feedfetcher


Art Trembanis
CSHEL
Department of Geological Sciences
University of Delaware
http://cshel.geology.udel.edu

Bionic Elephant's Trunk, Manta Rays and Jelly Fish

starSlashdot
November 22, 2010 1:53 PM
by Soulskill

Bionic Elephant's Trunk, Manta Rays and Jelly Fish

Zothecula writes "Festo, the automation company that designed the bionic penguin and its robotic stablemates – AirRay, AquaRay, AirJelly and AquaJelly – has found another natural model in its latest application of biomimicry – the elephant's trunk. Festo's Bionic Learning Network research program focuses on mechatronic and bionic concepts using nature as a model. 'The AquaJelly is possibly the most interesting of all the bionic creatures as it has been designed to autonomously emulate swarming behavior of wild jellyfish. Like the others, it consists of an electric drive unit and intelligent adaptive mechanism, but with a control board housed by a translucent dome, a water-tight body and eight tentacles. The control board has pressure, light and radio sensors that work with eight blue and eight white LEDs allowing communication between the AquaJellies.'"

Read more of this story at Slashdot.



robot


Art Trembanis
CSHEL
Department of Geological Sciences
University of Delaware

Capstone Projects: Disruptive technologies

starSystems Engineering at the US Naval Academy
November 22, 2010 10:00 AM
by Systems Engineering

Capstone Projects: Disruptive technologies

Commercial Technologies with Disruptive Applications by 1/C Brad Cash (Class of 2010)



The overall purpose of this project is to explore what type of capabilities a domestic terrorist could achieve using commercial technologies that could prove harmful to the U.S. by supporting asymmetric disruption. For this particular project, we explored how to control a cheap off-the-shelf RC vehicle from considerable distances by using the wireless Verizon 3G network. The vehicle is equipped with a small Artigo Pico ITX kit computer on board and connected to the 3G
network via a wireless modem. The user controls the vehicle via a webpage.
Design Projects Autonomous Vehicles


Art Trembanis
CSHEL
Department of Geological Sciences
University of Delaware

Life Found In Deepest Layer of Earth's Crust

starSlashdot
November 19, 2010 1:01 PM
by Soulskill

Life Found In Deepest Layer of Earth's Crust

michaelmarshall writes "For the first time, life has been found in the gabbroic layer of the crust. The new biosphere is all bacteria, as you might expect, but they are different from the bacteria in the layers above; they mostly feed on hydrocarbons that are produced by abiotic reactions deep in the crust. It could mean that similar microbes are living even deeper, perhaps even in the mantle."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.



earth


Art Trembanis
CSHEL
Department of Geological Sciences
University of Delaware

Saturday, November 20, 2010

Chris Yates' "Depths" puzzle

The perfect holiday gift for seafloor mappers on your shopping list!

starMAKE Magazine
November 19, 2010 2:00 PM
by Becky Stern

Chris Yates' "Depths" puzzle

depths1.jpg

depths3.jpg

yatesdepthspuzzle.jpg

MZ_MakerHobbies-Badge.gifChris Yates' puzzle entitled "Depths" uses 407 pieces, built up in layers to fill the pond-like base. Many more photos illuminate his build process over on Flickr.

Read the Full Story » | More on MAKE » | Comments » | Read more articles in DIY Projects | Digg this!
DIY Projects


Art Trembanis
CSHEL
Department of Geological Sciences
University of Delaware

Tuesday, November 16, 2010

How Wii and Kinect Hack Into Your Emotions | Wired Science | Wired.com

http://m.wired.com/wiredscience/2010/11/wii-emotion/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+wired%2Findex+%28Wired%3A+Index+3+%28Top+Stories+2%29%29&utm_content=Google+Feedfetcher


Art Trembanis
CSHEL
Department of Geological Sciences
University of Delaware
http://cshel.geology.udel.edu

3DVista Panoramic Tour of the Sharp

starOcean Bytes
November 16, 2010 9:11 AM
by Doug White

3DVista Panoramic Tour of the Sharp

I tinkered around with a demo copy of the 3DVista Stitcher and 3DVista Show 3.0 to push its capabilities a tad. I touched on the packages in a previous blog post about the Global Visualization Lab where I did a simple panorama of the room. The wheels started turning and we decided to push the envelope a little and create a series of panoramic views of the RV Hugh R Sharp as a proof of concept for an online virtual tour of a research vessel.

Panoramic Tour of the RV Hugh R Sharp

Click on this image to visit the proof-of-concept panorama...

The image above is a screen shot of the proof-of-concept panoramic tour we came up with. Click the image above or this hyperlink to visit the actual panoramic tour. The pane on the left shows an interactive panorama of the various points of interest on the ship. The right-hand pane shows a scan of the deck and compartment that the panorama represents. If there is no user action, the tour will cycle through a complete 360 view of each panorama and will move onto the next panorama in the list if nothing is clicked. There are two drop-d0wns to the right, one above the deck layout to select a specific panorama and one below it to select a specific panorama.

A really cool feature of the product is the ability to take the panorama full-screen for a more immersive experience. To do so, just click on the arrow button in the top-right-hand corner next to the question mark symbol. Once in full-screen mode, you can easily cycle through the various pano's by mousing over them near the bottom of the screen.

The 3DVista Show software allows you to insert hot-spots into the panorama's as well that can either link to other pages/sites or to include an audio clip into the mix. This makes it quite easy to include additional information about a specific area or feature. I inserted an animated arrow pointing to the Multibeam Operator Station on the Main Deck -> Multibeam Tech Area that links out to the Reson Seabat 8101 Multibeam Echosounder posting.

Multibeam Tech Pano

The mind races with the various uses for this type of technology. It allows for mobility impaired individuals and class groups to tour a space that they'd ordinarily be unable to access. It also allows scientists to "look around" and get a feel for the spaces that they'd be using when they come onboard a vessel. For future a project, I'd like to get support do some panorama's both inside and outside of the various UNOLS lab vans that would allow scientists to virtually stand in the lab vans and walk around them to see how they're laid out. 3D panorama's of research sites in remote locations like the arctic and antarctic also come to mind as does tours of mineral sample and other collections with hotspots included for the various specimens for links to additional information. The application of this tech abounds.

I talked with the folks at 3DVista and it looks like they offer a 15% academic discount for the software so be sure to ask about if if you're going to purchase it. They also list a one-shot 360 degree pano lens and adapters to make shooting the digital pics a little easier. We used a 180 degree fish-eye lens for our pano shots, which means we did 3 shots at each location 120 degrees off from one-another and stitched them together with the 3DVista Stitcher program.

Many thanks to Lisa Tossey for taking the photos and getting this project rolling. I posted this as an unpolished proof-of-concept version. I look for the ready-for-prime-time panorama that she comes up with for the CEOE site. I also look forward to seeing any cool panoramas that are out there for research projects. Be sure to share your links.

IT Stuff Research Vessels/Ships Science and Technology 8101 IT multibeam Panorama Research Vessel RV Hugh R Sharp


Art Trembanis
CSHEL
Department of Geological Sciences
University of Delaware

Monday, November 15, 2010

360 Panoramas Now Part of Google Earth Photos Layer

Who's ready to start making and sharing 360 photos of places we visit and do field work? Better yet how can we do 360s from the AUV?!

From Google Earth
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/GoogleEarthBlog/~3/Bmp6zQkWUUY/google_updates_the_photos_layer_to.html


Art Trembanis
CSHEL
Department of Geological Sciences
University of Delaware
http://cshel.geology.udel.edu

Adus Ltd :: The Fallen Oak

I came across a 3D shipwreck view from this company in a recent issue of Sea Technology and went online to check this out.  Wow there is something very otherworldly about these point cloud displays that you don't see in gridded colored data.
-Art
http://www.adus-uk.com/TheFallenOak.html

One-way trip to Mars, anyone?

http://journalofcosmology.com/Mars108.html

~Ashley

Thursday, November 11, 2010

Enough Oxygen for Life Found Millions of Years Too Early | Wired Science | Wired.com

http://m.wired.com/wiredscience/2010/11/early-earth-oxygen/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+wired%2Findex+%28Wired%3A+Index+3+%28Top+Stories+2%29%29&utm_content=Google+Feedfetcher


Art Trembanis
CSHEL
Department of Geological Sciences
University of Delaware
http://cshel.geology.udel.edu

Squid Skin Reveals Hidden Messages

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/09/060920191616.htm


Art Trembanis
CSHEL
Department of Geological Sciences
University of Delaware
http://cshel.geology.udel.edu

Solving a problem with Open Source Hardware

Game on!
starMAKE Magazine
November 9, 2010 11:00 PM
by Phillip Torrone

Solving a problem with Open Source Hardware

Pt 10529
A guest post - Solving a problem with Open Source Hardware by David Carrier (Parallax)...

I recently listened to a Freakonomics podcast that talked about using contests to promote innovation, in this case the efforts of the X Prize foundation. If you listen to the podcast, at 18:15 they mention the significant effort that people put into the contests. Some lost their fortunes, their homes, and their personal relationships in an attempt to win. I see it as somewhat of a moral dilemma, because despite the costs, the benefits of the contest on the community far outweigh the accumulative costs to all the participants. One downside of many contests though, is that often only the work of the winner benefits the community. Everyone else's work is just a less successful attempt to do the same thing.
Read the Full Story » | More on MAKE » | Comments » | Read more articles in Open source hardware | Digg this!
Open source hardware


Art Trembanis
CSHEL
Department of Geological Sciences
University of Delaware

Top 10: Unusual scientific phenomena videos

starMAKE Magazine
November 11, 2010 5:00 PM
by Sean Michael Ragan

Top 10: Unusual scientific phenomena videos

As evidence, nothing beats one's own senses: I'll have to see that for myself. But some experiments are too expensive, too time-consuming, or too dangerous for most folks to reproduce on their own, and for these, well, the next best thing is video. And the tubes are rich with great footage of phenomena that have to be seen to be believed. Here's a sampling of some of the gems we've covered, over the years, to get you started.

#10

Mercury "beating heart" demo video

#9

Nitroglycerine detonation at 1/600 speed

#8

Nuclear reactor test footage

Read the Full Story » | More on MAKE » | Comments » | Read more articles in Science | Digg this!
Science


Art Trembanis
CSHEL
Department of Geological Sciences
University of Delaware

Tuesday, November 9, 2010

November 9, 2010

Visualizing election and US economy data over the past 100 years!

http://www.johnwpalmer.com/100/

Reducing familiar brand name logos to colored circles, how many of the following can you still identify?  


-Steph

--
---------------------------------------------
Stephanie H. Nebel

Department of Geological Sciences
University of Delaware
255 Academy Street
Newark, DE 19716
---------------------------------------------



Monday, November 8, 2010

1,800-Year-Old Roman Multitool | Gadget Lab | Wired.com

Whatevs the Greeks had previously invented the iPad!! :-)

http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2010/11/2000-year-old-roman-multi-tool/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+wired%2Findex+%28Wired%3A+Index+3+%28Top+Stories+2%29%29&utm_content=Google+Feedfetcher


Art Trembanis
CSHEL
Department of Geological Sciences
University of Delaware
http://cshel.geology.udel.edu

Scripps class - Introduction to Computers at SIO

A great post from Kurt. I earned my stripes in grad school taking a computational numerics course that forced us to use fortran.  Valuable learning about how computers actually think and use numbers especially for someone who came in (like many) without a computer programming background- before that I *gasp* basically just used excel for data processing. However, I think there is a lot to be said about going through that process.  It certainly helped me appreciate script languages a lot more.  Matlab is great for quick prototyping and for a lot of what I do the inefficiencies are an easy trade off even when I was doing real-time forecast models of mine burial for the Navy, matlab could easily handle the loads - and that was with a lot of lazy kludgy code. Matrix math is powerful and an important lesson to learn that matlab really helped me understand.  Other advantages is that there is a lot of existing code especially in the oceanographic community so that is a bonus.  There are free alternatives such as R that many I know have gone to but I haven't switched...guess I've become an old fogy.  I guess it comes down a bit to what the discipline herd tends to use- atmospheric folks seem to use IDL and a lot of biologist i've known use mathematica.

One thing to consider especially for a field or lab observational need is that many of these are good for number crunching or modeling but not good for data acquisition.  I learned a lot about how instruments work by learning LabVIEW and in fact I got my first job out of grad school because of my LabVIEW skills.  This G-language was a very different approach to programming and in some ways a welcome and intuitive way of seeing problems and sketching out the work flow.  Inherently parallel that sometimes was a problem both for efficiency and because it could make debugging hard.  We used it a lot with our first AUV and I used it to develop the web GUI for the original VIMS OOS and the mine burial model but I've since drifted from it.

Anyways that's my $0.02

starKurt's Weblog
November 8, 2010 3:25 PM
by Kurt

Scripps class - Introduction to Computers at SIO

I was just answering a quick question from a friend and ran into <a href="http://magician.ucsd.edu/~ltauxe/">Lisa Tauxe's web page</a> on <a href="http://mahi.ucsd.edu/class233/">SIO 233: Introduction to Computers at SIO</a>. When I was at SIO, the class was taught just by <a href="http://mahi.ucsd.edu/shearer/">Peter Shearer</a> (<a href="http://mahi.ucsd.edu/shearer/COMPCLASS/">COMPCLASS</a>). Lisa is bringing Python to the class, which is really exciting. Being a programmer before I came to SIO (who had seen too much F77 code), I didn't take the course, but looked over some of the other students assignments to see that they were learning some great material. <br /><br /> I personally argue that <a href="http://mahi.ucsd.edu/shearer/COMPCLASS/fortran.txt">Fortran</a> should not be the first language for anybody. And python is a great place to start. Yeah, I'm definitely biased. I might have pushed Lisa towards python while doing my thesis <img src="http://schwehr.org/blog/moods/smilies/smiley.gif" alt=":)" border="0" <br /><br /> I'm in the process of trying to work similar material into the Research Tools course at CCOM for Fall 2011. If you are willing to deal with typos and really rough drafts, you are welcome to look at the material I am putting together. The command-line chapter is the farthest along. <br /><br /> <a href="http://vislab-ccom.unh.edu/~schwehr/Classes/2011/esci895-researchtools/">2011/esci895-researchtools</a> <br /><br /> My style is different than Lisa and Peters', so I encourage people to check out their lecture notes. I especially like their introduction: <br /><br /> <a href="http://mahi.ucsd.edu/class233/intro.txt">intro.txt</a> <br /><br /> <pre> ----- Why you should learn a "real" language ----- <!-- --> Many students arrive at SIO without much experience in FORTRAN or C, the two main scientific programming languages in use today. While it is possible to get by for most class assignments by using Matlab, you will likely be handicapped in your research at some point if you don't learn FORTRAN or C. Matlab is very convenient for quick results but has limited flexibility. Often this means that a simple FORTRAN or C program can be written that will perform a task far more cleanly and efficiently than Matlab, even if a complicated Matlab script can be kluged together to do the same thing. In addition, Matlab is a commercial product that does not have the long-term stability of other languages, including large libraries of existing code that are freely shared among researchers. <!-- --> Your research may involve processing data using a FORTRAN or C program. If you do not understand the program, you will not be able to modify it to do anything other than what it can already do. This will make it difficult to do anything original in your research. You may resort to elaborate kludges to get the program to do what you want, when a simple modification to the code would be much easier. Worse, you may drive your colleagues crazy by continually requesting that the original authors of the program make changes to accommodate your wishes. <!-- --> Finally, you will be in a more competitive position to get a job after you graduate if you have real programming experience. </pre> I would suggest replacing "Python" every time you see FORTRAN above. They have a section comparing languages. Here is what they have on FORTAN and C: <br /><br /> <pre><b>FORTRAN</b> Advantages Large amount of existing code Preferred language of most SIO faculty Complex numbers are built in Choice of single or double precision math functions <!-- --> Disadvantages Column sensitive format in older versions Dead language in computer science departments <!-- --> <b>C</b> Advantages Large amount of existing code Preferred language of incoming students, some younger faculty Free format, not column sensitive More efficient I/O Easier to use pointers <!-- --> Disadvantages Less user-friendly than FORTRAN (I think so, but others may debate this) Fewer built in math functions (but easy to fix) No standard complex numbers (but easy to fix) Easier to use pointers </pre> Here is my take on Python based roughly on their format: <pre><b>Python</b> Advantages One standard version of the language (many C and Fortran compilers in use: GNU, IBM, Microsoft, and many other companies have their own versions) Features easy to use <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Procedural_programming">Procedural</a> or <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Object-oriented_programming">object-oriented programming (OOP)</a> Easy to call C or C++ code (possible, but not fun, to call Fortran) Less strict type system Standard math and science libraries: <a href="http://docs.python.org/library/math.html">math</a>, <a href="http://numpy.scipy.org/">numpy</a>, and <a href="http://www.scipy.org/">scipy</a> Lots of integrated libraries for getting, parsing, and manipulating data A standard way to install extra packages: <a href="http://pypi.python.org/pypi/distribute/">Distribute</a> that pulls from <a href="http://pypi.python.org/pypi">12,000 packages</a>. (most of which are open source) Interactive shells that work like a terminal shell (e.g. like bash) Automatic memory management Encourages development of libraries of reusable code Formatting controls the structure of the code (indentation matters) <!-- --> Disadvantages Formatting controls the structure of the code (indentation matters)... this drives some people crazy Sometimes slower to execute scripts (but often easy to replace a slow loop with C or C++ code) </pre> And here is my take on matlab: <pre><b>Matlab</b> Advantages Built in Integrated Development Environment (IDE) that is standard and has built in documentation. Lots of built in math capabilities Strong plotting capabilities in a standard interface Strong community of people writing matlab code (python has matplotlib, modelled after this) Easy to prototype complicated systems <!-- --> Disadvantages "Everything is a array (aka Matrix)", which can be in a structure module. Expensive (very expensive for non-academics) Requires a license key (this can really bite you on a ship or if the $ runs out) Hard to embed into other software or systems Slow and inflexible design (hard to create proper data structures) Encourages poor programming practices Harder to automate The MATLAB <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MATLAB#Classes">objected oriented system is not great</a>. Built in IDE (yeah, I'm an emacs guy) Not much of an open source community </pre> And yes, I've written a lot of code in all of the above languages. If you disagree with my take, write your own comparison and post it.


Art Trembanis
CSHEL
Department of Geological Sciences
University of Delaware

Wearable Cameras Move Beyond Sports to the Mainstream - NYTimes.com

Thanks to Val for pointing out this story. There were Go Pro cameras being used at Pavilion Lake this summer and they are quite nifty.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/07/business/07novel.html?_r=1


Art Trembanis
CSHEL
Department of Geological Sciences
University of Delaware
http://cshel.geology.udel.edu

Sunday, November 7, 2010

Gazetteer of Planetary nomenclature

Under Images and GIS data, there are .kml's and .kmz's. Some of them don't seem to make sense because they are placemarks for something like a moon of Neptune and Google Earth drops them on the Earth, but the Mars and Moon files go on the GE Mars and Moon.
Kinda cool!


~Ashley

Tuesday, November 2, 2010

NOAA Education Resources Website

http://www.education.noaa.gov/


Art Trembanis
CSHEL
Department of Geological Sciences
University of Delaware
http://cshel.geology.udel.edu

Save the Bay!

starSystems Engineering at the US Naval Academy
November 2, 2010 11:00 AM
by Systems Engineering

Save the Bay!

The United States Naval Academy (USNA) uses a REMUS autonomous underwater vehicle as a sensor platform for research on water quality in local waters.


Originally developed at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution and marketed by Hydroid Inc. of Pocasset Massachusetts, USNA's vehicles were originally purchased for mine warfare and operated by Naval Special Clearance Team ONE in such operations as clearing of the Iraqi port of Umm Qasr of mines during OPERATION IRAQI FREEDOM.






This REMUS enables researchers and students to map suitable habitats for oyster restoration, crab distribution and submerged aquatic vegetation. Dissolved oxygen is one of the most important water quality parameters because it is the dominant proxy for extreme eutrofication; excess nutrient loading of coastal waters. The Severn River has been identified by the State of Maryland as an impaired waterway for multiple water quality parameters. Round Bay has consistently developed a summer-long anoxic zone (dissolved oxygen concentration less than 0.2 mg/l) for the last four years.




The Photo is from the 25 August 2010 Chesapeake Bay conference, held at USNA. In the photo is a REMUS with an oxygen sensor installed. From left to right: me, Maryland Governor Martin O'Malley, Secretary of the Navy Ray Maybus, EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson, Superintendent VADM Miller (in the back), Andrew Muller (USNA Oceanography department).
Autonomous Vehicles


Art Trembanis
CSHEL
Department of Geological Sciences
University of Delaware