Revising the old computer props (???)

[Christopher]

About the communicator though, I have real problems with a military issuing "touch screen" ANYthing for field use...too easy to break and almost impossible to fix.

I have the same problem with "black panel" control interfaces...what happens if the computer generating and controlling the patters fries? What happens if the panel breaks. Individualized physical controls make more sense as they can be repaired/replaced one at a time, and a fault on one end of the board doesn't take the whole control rig off line.

Your measuring devices from 300 years in the future based on current day durabilities.

On the contrary -- "glass cockpits" (using computer-generated video displays rather than conventional dials) are already standard in military and civilian aircraft and even the Space Shuttle. So even today they're considered durable and reliable enough for use in highly sensitive situations. They do occasionally fail, but there are backup controls for that eventuality and pilots are trained to cope with a failure. And I'm sure that devices for military use are designed to be far more durable than a consumer cell phone or tablet computer.

 

[Ian Keldon]

I know all that. It is my considered opinion that such faith is misplaced. The guiding principle in military technology should be K.I.S.S., or, as Mr Scott put it: "The more they over-think the plumbing, the easier it is to stop up the drain..."

 

[sojourner]

Yep, the military should go back to bolt actions, horses and hand signals. Just because something is hard today does not mean it won't be simple tomorrow.

 

[Maurice]

Nothing wrong with a guess at future tech -- it's just that those look too much like present tech, right down to things like the design of the buttons and camera lenses on the sides of the communicator mimicking a current cell phone. It's just too contemporary. (Then again, the original tricorder was modelled on what was then the advanced, state-of-the-art technology of the portable cassette recorder...)

I'm fairly convinced that one of the key inspirations for the design of the tricorder was the Philco Safari Model H2010L, apparently the first transistorized and "portable" (battery powered) TV set. It's especially noticeable when you see it with its "hood" closed and then open.

Hood closed
Hood open
This angle is pretty tricorder-esque
And in black, even more-so!

 

[Ian Keldon]

Yep, the military should go back to bolt actions, horses and hand signals. Just because something is hard today does not mean it won't be simple tomorrow.

No one is suggesting that extreme. You cannot deny the inherent limitations of a "virtual" control interface where you have to essentially have one computer to make the controls for you to use the other computer. Such and overly complex system is just begging to break at the weakest link (the interface generator) and leave you with no ability to access your controls at all.

That is not smart thinking, esp for organizations expecting to go into harm's way. You want simple, reliable equipment with the fewest things to go catastrophically wrong in the field.

 

[Ptrope]

And good points, indeed; it's tough to see in the 'promo' image for the TriComm, I'll admit, but not everything on it is touch-controlled - there are 6 external buttons plus a trackball, and another 4 physical buttons under the cover. I've had Palm smartphones since the beginning, and I personally think that the buttonless interface that the iPhone slammed on the market, and which everyone (including Palm) has since doggedly copied in the name of 'cool style,' is a mistake of form over function, which is why I reverted somewhat to add the buttons for more control and feedback - but I'll also grant that a couple more centuries of progress will enable a much more robust and troublefree touch interface that can stand up to a great deal more abuse than our equipment today. And for the record, the military does currently use a great deal of touchscreen equipment in the field, ruggedized far more than anything available to consumers.

As for the designs I've created, I'll accept that they will date equally rapidly, if not more so, as the originals. We're caught, though, in something of a trap: design something plausibly advanced or design something recognizable to the context. I don't think we can do both. Look at the current state of the art, and the prototypes that pop up on a daily basis on the Web, and there's just no way that anything we recognize from Trek could ever be plausible. Communicators? Yeah, right - take fabrics with integrated electronics, the Google glasses, a typical Bluetooth headset and wrap them all together with concepts like haptic feedback, and what you have is a uniform that is itself a part of the network. All a landing party member needs to do is slip on a pair of lightweight gloves, no heavier than batters' gloves (if even that), and a lightweight headpiece, and he has eye protection with a built-in heads-up display and HD digital scanning and recording, stereophonic sound for both communication and scanning purposes, and 10 manual input points with feedback, not to mention better protection for his soft body parts.

And all of that is just in the next 10 years, let alone 200.

The problem there is that for this particular exercise, it would no longer have any resemblance to Star Trek .

 

[Christopher]

But at least I can look at TOS designs and believe that they're more "futuristic" than the technology in Enterprise, because they aren't as recognizably functional. NX-01 has cooling fans in its computer consoles, handles everywhere in case the gravity goes out, lots of neat functional touches which suggest a more basic, limited, familiar technology. The TOS designs are more minimalist, more fanciful, and thus they look farther removed from present technology (so long as I focus more on the design than the execution with '60s technology, as discussed above). Not in the sense of being a remotely accurate prediction, but in the sense of feeling more exotic and distant from the everyday.

 

[Wingsley]

Communicators? Yeah, right - take fabrics with integrated electronics, the Google glasses, a typical Bluetooth headset and wrap them all together with concepts like haptic feedback, and what you have is a uniform that is itself a part of the network. All a landing party member needs to do is slip on a pair of lightweight gloves, no heavier than batters' gloves (if even that), and a lightweight headpiece, and he has eye protection with a built-in heads-up display and HD digital scanning and recording, stereophonic sound for both communication and scanning purposes, and 10 manual input points with feedback, not to mention better protection for his soft body parts.

And all of that is just in the next 10 years, let alone 200.

The problem there is that for this particular exercise, it would no longer have any resemblance to Star Trek .

My feeling is that all of those ultra-sleek gadgets could exist in the TOS Universe, and most of them probably would not cost alot of FX $$$, so yeah, it's easy to imagine them there.

But I still adhere to the "stone knives and bear skins" philosophy. Starfleet field equipment items aren't meant to be super-sleek or flashy. They're meant to be easy to maintain, disassemble/reassemble and repair in field situations where there is no infrastructure, no repair shops, and probably few if any specialists to spend time tinkering with them. We saw this with Spock tinkering with his electrical impulse scrambler and with the Universal Translator device ("Metamorphosis"), Scotty adapting phaser powerpacks to shuttlecraft propulsion ("The Galileo Seven"), and Kirk and Spock using their communicators as sonic weapons to divert a larger hostile force ("Friday's Child").

There are numerous examples sprinkled throughout TOS of Starfleet personnel salvaging, repairing or adapting various field gear, weapons, engines and other equipment for mission-specific purposes, APOLLO 13-style. It's obvious that the equipment and the training of the Starfleet personnel are geared to facilitate this kind of ingenuity-in-a-crisis. ("Someday, Midshipman Kirk, this technique could save your life!")

So, sure, there probably are folks wearing an earring-sized smartphone dangling from their ear lobe or apparel. (That's what Deela and her fellow Scalosians had in "Wink of an Eye", right?) But sometimes sleek and ultra-tech aren't the best answer. You'll notice many military and survivalist types today take technology with a grain of salt, still preferring their favorite knife, firearm and first aid kit as their constant travelling companions. Clearly, the take-home point is that sleeker ins't always more practical in the field.

 

[Christopher]

There was one TOS episode that implied they had advanced technology built into their clothing: in "Spock's Brain," when they beamed down to the frozen surface of the planet, Kirk ordered, "Suit temperatures to 72" and they all adjusted some unseen control on their waistbands. So evidently their uniforms had built-in thermal regulation systems despite appearing to be just cloth. (Which the producers of TWOK obviously didn't notice, since they used those heavy parkas.) Though of course that wasn't so much a brilliant bit of futurism as a convenient handwave to avoid having to spend money on creating winter gear for the landing party.

 

[sojourner]

Yep, the military should go back to bolt actions, horses and hand signals. Just because something is hard today does not mean it won't be simple tomorrow.

No one is suggesting that extreme. You cannot deny the inherent limitations of a "virtual" control interface where you have to essentially have one computer to make the controls for you to use the other computer. Such and overly complex system is just begging to break at the weakest link (the interface generator) and leave you with no ability to access your controls at all.

That is not smart thinking, esp for organizations expecting to go into harm's way. You want simple, reliable equipment with the fewest things to go catastrophically wrong in the field.

Here again you're equating what's complex today as still being complex in 300 years. It just doesn't hold up. A military man from 1850 could say the same thing about a modern tank. "It's overly complex and just begging to break down, give me some muzzle load cannons that are tested and true technology".

 

[Christopher]

^Right. Before much longer we'll have mechanisms that can repair themselves. Eventually the weakest link will be the human operator -- although by then humans will probably be technologically augmented too.

 

[Mytran]

A point worth making about the TOS control interfaces (at least the ones on the bridge) is that they are just as dependent on the computer as the touch sensitive TNG ones - none are switches tied directly into a dedicated function (like ones in your car, for instance)

 

[Timo]

Or in your granddad's car, at any rate.

Also, if we regard the interfaces on a starship bridge, "rugged and reliable" push-buttons could fail fatally (e.g. when subjected to two-handed pounding by the Vulcan Executive/Science Officer - see ST:TMP). If you lose the button that cools down the warp core, you lose it for good and the warp core cannot be cooled. However, if all your interfaces are kewl multifunctional reconfigurable flatscreens, you can safely lose the cooling button - it's always possible to order up another one by rubbing the corner of another, still intact flatscreen the right way.

I don't see a pressing need to think that the breadboxes are actually computing devices as such. They are devices one sometimes needs to access to get computing done, yes. But for all we know, they are in fact chiefly for housing the sensors and effectors used in monitoring and maintaining the environment in the room; the computing system itself is purely abstract and virtual and does not feature any physical components (centralized or distributed) anywhere; and all the interfacing is achieved by touching a single lighted roundel with your finger and sending pseudo-telepathic impulses into it by regulating your skin conductance, a trick you learn at childhood after you've been implanted with the Universal Translator and all the other routine gadgetry.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Albertese]

...

and all the interfacing is achieved by touching a single lighted roundel with your finger and sending pseudo-telepathic impulses into it by regulating your skin conductance, a trick you learn at childhood after you've been implanted with the Universal Translator and all the other routine gadgetry.

Timo Saloniemi

Nope. We see people who are not native, Federation-born and raised citizens activate the control surfaces of the TOS E with ease. Which suggests that the layout must actually be fairly simple and intuitive when you're really there looking at it in person and that it doesn't require anything so esoteric as cybernetic implants or childhood familiarization to be used. Heck, even mooks fresh from the 20th Century can manage easily enough; witness Kahn and Captain Christopher. No one gave them a fancy implant and taught them to send pseudo-telepathic impulses to the machinery by subtly altering your skin's conductance. And while it seems as though Ferengi do have implanted UT devices in their ears (which, evidently, only other Ferengi can see?), I'm not sure why Kirk would need his giant chrome flashlight-style UT to chat it up with the Companion or the Gorn captain. I'll admit this one it harder to swallow, as there does seem to be an awful lot of English spoken amongst the Star Trek galaxy in every series...

tl;dr: They're just buttons, deal with it.

--Alex

 

[Ian Keldon]

As always, Timo has a...unique...perspective on Trek...

 

[Wingsley]

Well, I will say this, the breadboxes don't have to be just ridiculously oversized (for the 23rd century) computers. They could be equipped with a power source and/or a device for tapping wirelessly into a discreet power grid. This would explain how they can be so portable, even to the point of them being used in the field ("Miri", "The Omega Glory"). The breadboxes could also house subspace transceivers for the TOS analogue for both WiFi and the ability to tap in on communications. "Mudd's Women" and "Wolf in the Fold" seemed to suggest that these desktop/tabletop machines also contain sensors, so each unit would be a little like a bundled multi-purpose machine with a built-in tricorder.

There's nothing canon to suggest it, but I wouldn't be surprised if each breadbox also at least had the built-in capability to project images, if not holograms, as well. Why should you need to reply on a separate viewing screen when the unit should have that ability built-in?

At the very least, 23rd century desktop/tabletop computers should have the ability to interact wirelessly both with the ship and with a user through spoken dialogue. "Mirror, Mirror" and "Wolf in the Fold" show us that these machines can conduct research, analyze data and synthesize both hypotheses and highly technical procedures. This suggests (to me, anyway) that these machines have the ability to both network with other machines aboard the ship and to engage in pooled computing to perform heavy-load "supercomputing" tasks on a moment's notice. These machines seem to be portable, even to the point of operating in the field, with either a similarly portable power source or one that is built-in.

 

[Mytran]

All of that is good, but in Miri it was precisely the breadbox's lack of computing power that led to the "beaker of death" moment.

 

[Ian Keldon]

A point worth making about the TOS control interfaces (at least the ones on the bridge) is that they are just as dependent on the computer as the touch sensitive TNG ones - none are switches tied directly into a dedicated function (like ones in your car, for instance)

That's acutally not true. We don't know definitively which keys did what on most of them, but they did have specific functions by sector, as revealed in the tech manuals. When Phase II/TMP came around, the set designers even went so far as to work out detailed instructions for key pressing patterns to do various things, and the actors were given "manuals" on how to do it right.

 

[Mytran]

What I meant was, they're not hard wired directly to a piece of equipment - the computer intervenes and routes the command to the neccessary servos etc.

 

[Timo]

We see people who are not native, Federation-born and raised citizens activate the control surfaces of the TOS E with ease.

Well, we see technologically advanced aliens (that is, more advanced than our heroes) do that. And I'm not necessarily saying that every push-button is a skin conductance interface; indeed, usually the buttons that do get touched are also shown being depressed. Perhaps a function is performed with a keypress, but a more complex function is performed when the operator knows how to manipulate the push-button further with futuristic tricks?

Heck, even mooks fresh from the 20th Century can manage easily enough; witness Kahn and Captain Christopher.

I'm a bit curious... What did the latter ever do?

I'm not sure why Kirk would need his giant chrome flashlight-style UT to chat it up with the Companion or the Gorn captain.

There always seem to be two layers of linguistic skill to our heroes' discussions with aliens. They can speak with Klingons and other known quantities easily enough, far away from their ship or any of their hardware, but truly new and alien aliens pose a difficulty. One would assume the implant to handle the known languages, while additional hardware (in TNG, external resources tied in through the commbadges; in TOS, clumsy handheld contraptions) would decipher new languages, especially when the opposite player doesn't have interpreting hardware of his own.

It works pretty well for TNG, although some TOS stories would seem to require Kirk to have these "extra resources" in hand when all he's packing is a communicator, a tricorder, or sometimes neither.

In the end, though, if we don't assume invisible (and thus probably implanted) hardware, we're in much more trouble than if we do.

...they did have specific functions by sector, as revealed in the tech manuals.

And since the actors couldn't follow these "instructions" (and probably weren't even aware of them), we're forced to think that the function of each key or key group was user-definable...

All of that is good, but in Miri it was precisely the breadbox's lack of computing power that led to the "beaker of death" moment.

Lack of computing power is not necessarily unexpected or unrealistic: the device might be more capable than everything we have today put together, and still unable to tackle the task without a further boost from the ship's systems. Although the task seems simple enough: "Tell us whether this compound is poison." They don't even have to find out whether it cures the disease; they can continue brewing potion after potion as long as they can safely test their effectiveness on themselves.

What is odd is the inability to communicate with the ship without the assistance of the handheld communicator units. I could easily buy this if Miri's world were a hostile environment (there must be a limit to what sort of jamming-penetrating capabilities you build into everyday hardware you expect to utilize in connection with dedicated jamming-piercers anyway), but it's "another Earth"...

Timo Saloniemi