Robots seeking life ‘out there’

Great post here about NASA robots and Mars – there are, I guess two general schools of thought – send humans into space or send robots.

Robots are hardier and dont need as much oxygen / heat / organic fuel (food) / water as humans, so cheaper to achieve and health and safety aspects lower too.

 

 

PC in my pocket

A long,long time ago, in a galaxy that seems so far away, Bill Gates said there would be a PC in every home. That revolution was scoffed at back then in the 1970s. But it has come to pass.

What is happening now – which I think Microsoft is trailing behind on – is the PC in every pocket.

I have a HTC phone – which has more processing power than the first computer I ever owned (tho that Spectrum +2 will always have a special place in my heart). I would guess it is also more powerful than the first IBM clone (PC) I ever owned too. It runs an Android operating system and I use it to surf the net more than my desktop PC.

I would hazard a guess my HTC has more processing power than NASA used to send men to the moon, but that statemnet would have to come with a citation request (more on Wikipedia another time).

At some point the PC in my pocket will become as powerful as the desktop in my house. There is a good article about the future of “smartphones” here.

When my pocket PC (that also makes phone calls) is as powerful as a desktop is now, what I want is either a docking station (or an app that conects via wireless) to my 17 inch monitor, keyboard and mouse, so I can work from home in a comfortable way.

Humanoid robot goes to space

NASA has sent a humanoid robot into space.

This type of robot is called a Robonaut (this  specific oneis  named R2) it was sent into space in the Space Shuttle Discovery’s cargo bay en route to the International Space Station.

R2 is the first humanoid robot in space.