Hai-Etlik's New Writeups

CD jewel case design errors (idea)

2002-01-22T00:56:51Z

DVD cases (I'm looking at Grand Turismo 3 while writing this) seem to have resolved the errors of CD cases but are somewhat bulkier. They are made of a tougher plastic and have an improved disk locking mechanism consisting of three large teeth connected by a button, rather than a whole lot of little ones. The case lock is stronger so you don't need to worry about it slipping open and spilling everywhere. The booklet is held in by a pair of large clips which grip the booklet's spine (this does require fairly thick booklets to work though, GT3's is about 50 pages with a thin card, rather than paper, cover). If you want to insert your own cover art or move it to a different case (in case the origional is damaged), then it is quite easy, the outside of the case has a sheet of clear plastic secured at the ends, when the case is open it goes loose and you can slide a sheet of paper underneath.

On the down side, the hinge is flexible plastic, given enough openings and closings it will eventualy…

Treaty of Algeron (thing)

2002-01-22T00:10:33Z

Treaty between the United Federation of Planets and the Romulan Star Empire established after the Tomed Incident in 2311. It created the Romulan Neutral Zone and banned the development or use of cloaking devices by the Federation. It has been violated a number of times by both sides, but remained in effect at least untill the Romulans entered the Dominion War, and is probably still in effect.

Stormtrooper Effect (idea)

2002-01-21T23:18:00Z

The law of TV/Movies which causes "Bad Guys" to be wildly inaccurate and "Good Guys" to be highly accurate under most circumstances. However, it is really an effect of the numbers of targets and attackers rather than the ethicality of the people involved. The Stormtrooper Effect is named after the Imperial Stromtroopers in Star Wars, a whole battlestationful of them couldn't hit a small group of rebels.

The equation can be arrived at by starting with

P∝N_t/N_a

where P is the probability of a hit and N_t and N_a are the numbers of targets and attackers respectively. Now a fairly safe assumption of the constant of proportionality is the difficulty for one attacker to hit one target under the same circumstances (Which we will denote P₁). This gives us

P=P₁×N_t/N_a…

Galaxy Class Starship (thing)

2002-01-21T22:33:22Z

Galaxy Class Ships have included: USS Galaxy (Conjectural Prototype), USS Yamato (Second ship, Destroyed in TNG "Contagion"), USS Enterprise-D (TNG, Destroyed, ST:7), USS Odyssey (Destroyed, DS9 "The Jem'Hadar"), USS Venture (Appeared in several DS9 Battle Scenes along with at least four other unnamed ships), USS Challenger (Chased the Delta Flyer in an alternate future, VOY).

The TNG Tech Manual says that there were 6 ships in the initial production run, plus an additional 6 produced as just spaceframes which were then put in storage. It is likely that they would have been completed and put into service after Wolf 359 and if any remained they would have been put into service during the Domminion War. Additional Galaxy class ships would probably have been built from scratch.

Even with their limitations in battle, they have cavernous shuttle bays and could be used as mobile starbases. With all the space on board, a battle oriented Galaxy Class could fit a LOT of extra…

Nanaimo Parkway (thing)

2001-09-12T04:40:43Z

A section of BC Highway 19 which bypasses the city of Nanaimo. It starts at an interchange with the Trans Canada to the south of Nanaimo and runs north to meet the main section of 19 on the north end of the city. It is Two lanes all the way with a limit of 90km/h and a large grassy median for most of it's length. A bike/pedestrian trail runs parallel to it for a large part of it's length.

September 10, 2001 (idea)

2001-09-12T04:23:54Z

It now seems a bit of a trifle compared to what happened down in the US September 11, 2001 but it was a lot more personal, and could well have killed me. I was hit by a Semi on the Nanaimo Parkway just north of the interchange with the Trans Canada while heading to class at Malaspina University College. The crash occurred at 1:10pm PDT when the semi (in the inner of three lanes)changed lanes into me(in the middle lane) just after the inner lane from an intersection joined with the middle and outer lanes from an overpass. I was sent spinning into the grassy median area and nearly entered into an oncoming lane (fortunately there was not much traffic in either direction).

The damage to my car was a partially flat front driver side tire, loss of my side view mirror, smashed bodywork along the driver side, and the steering wheel was out of whack. After trading information with the Truck driver and a witness from the oncoming side I managed to drive…