Technology, Books and Other Neat Stuff

Mars Global Surveyor has photographed Mars Odyssey. They're in similar orbits, so it was only a matter of time - but it's still a neat achievement.

Mars Global Surveyor and Mars Odyssey are both in nearly circular, near-polar orbits. Odyssey is in an orbit slightly higher than that of Global Surveyor in order to preclude the possibility of a collision. However, the two spacecraft occasionally come as close together as 15 kilometres (9 miles).



It's the first time one spacecraft has photographed another outside of the Earth-Moon system.

One of my favourite poets is James Elroy Flecker, a British diplomat in the Middle East, with a love for the Levant and the oral culture of Islam. He died tragically young in 1915, a victim of TB.

For many years I've been trying to track down his posthumously-performed play Hassan. While on Jersey recently, we popped into a charity book sale, and suddenly I found not one, but three copies of the 1946 Penguin edition. Quickly choosing the best condition copy, I quickly added it to my pile of books.

So what is it like?

Hassan is a schezerade, an Arabian Nights-style story of duplicity, betrayal, and love that surmounts all. Alternating light and dark, Flecker tells the story of the rise of Hassan, a Bagdad carpet-seller, to the right-hand of the Caliph, and then his self-betrayal. It's a complex story, difficult to stage, with ghosts, bandit armies, and disguises galore. The play ends with Hassan leaving Bagdad, joining a caravan on the road to Samarkand - the source of what is probably Flecker's best known poem.

The Golden Journey To Samarkand

We are the Pilgrims, master; we shall go
Always a little further: it may be
Beyond that last blue mountain barred with snow,
Across that angry or that glimmering sea,

White on a throne or guarded in a cave
There lives a prophet who can understand
Why men were born: but surely we are brave,
Who take the Golden Road to Samarkand.

Sweet to ride forth at evening from the wells
When shadows pass gigantic on the sand,
And softly through the silence beat the bells
Along the Golden Road to Samarkand.

We travel not for trafficking alone;
By hotter winds our fiery hearts are fanned:
For lust of knowing what should not be known
We make the Golden Journey to Samarkand.

Well worth tracking down.

...spotted at Interop, from Korean ODM GB25.

An flash MP3 player that also claims to be a VOIP phone. It comes in the usual range of memory sizes, and has a fairly clear OLED display. It's unclear just how it works as a VOIP phone - I suspect that it's likely to be a USB audio device that will work with various VOIP applications.



Quite cute, really...

That classic of ASCII role-playing gaming, NetHack, now has an official release for the Microsoft Smartphone. It's rather cute, with a virtual keyboard and a rather nice graphical set of game tiles.

There's also an unofficial port for some Symbian devices. I've yet to find it for any series 60 phones... (lproven will be pleased that there's a relatively up to date Psion port...)