Technology, Books and Other Neat Stuff

An inadvertent(?) tribute to the infamous goatse.cx image.

Spotted as a poster for a play, at East Putney tube station.

Putney, London
February 2006

The IEEE's Spectrum has posted a list of the coolest engineering jobs going. Having wielded a mean soldering iron and pipe cutter in my time, Anthony Eckersall's story is one that was dear to my heart. He specialises in the design and development of complex computer-controlled fountains and water displays. One of his projects was the reworking of the Bellagio's fountains.

The article takes us behind the scenes of the fountains, which can throw water 160 metres in the air.

Even in a city famous for excess, the Bellagio fountain is exceptional. There are 8000 meters of pipes, 1200 nozzles, and 4500 lights. It cost US $75 million to build and attracts crowds every half-hour. When the show begins, pipes rise from the depths of its 8 acres of water, as if a huge school of dolphins were called to the surface by the music. Water flows from the nozzles in streams that meld into bracelets of liquid diamonds, seemingly suspended in midair. They begin to sway left, then right, then forward and back. Suddenly, more pipes break the surface and with a convulsive kick discharge a mist of water nearly 50 meters into the air. At their summit the new arcs seem to pause, then come crashing down with a sound that nearly drowns out the oohs and aahs from the crowd.

Behind the liquid pyrotechnics is some serious technology, including a host of small robots and two classes of computer controls. The small robots, called oarsmen, point each nozzle anywhere in a 360-degree range. There's also a show computer, which acts like a stage manager, choreographing the shooters and robots in their hydrodynamic ballet. And there's a housekeeping brain—a second computer that monitors the water's pH and its filtering and can override the show computer. Finally, there's the human brain that programs the electronic ones.

It's also an excuse to post this collage of photos we've taken of the fountains over the last couple of years...



Links to the individual images can be found here

Mary Janice Davidson's Undead and Unappreciated brings back Betsy, Queen of The Vampires. Betsy's in a bit of a slump. Her hated stepmother is pregnant, and her father has suddenly revealed that she's got a half sister. Oh, and her half-sister is the daughter of the devil and is destined to rule the Earth. And she's not been invited to the baby shower (even if it is in daylight).

Interestingly this volume reads rather like a Jennifer Cruisie novel. Betsy gets snark (and a dose of evil), bonds with her devilish kid-sister and finally realises she's in love with the aloof vampire king. All very predictable, of course, but liberally dosed with humour and fun incidents from the life of a vampire who doesn't believe in the rules.

And the Devil? Well, she's got very good taste in shoes.

A fast read (two tube journeys), but fun.

Other recent reading:

The Two Space War, Dave Grossman and Leo Frankowski - Heinleinesque homage to Patrick O'Brien's Jack Aubrey novels. Swashbuckling wooden starships sail 2D space in a retro-future straight out of a collectible card game. Oh, and it's got elves. And dwarves.
Protectorate, Mick Farren - a reread of a tale of alien invasion. Like William Tenn's "The Liberation OF Earth", this one doesn't work out for humanity. An enjoyable inversion of a common trope from an under-rated writer.
Pioneers, Philip Mann - rather depressing eco-catastrophe story set in New Zealand, where a failed starflight programme is the only hope for a sterile humanity.
Stars In My Pocket Like Grains Of Sand, Samuel R. Delany - a regular re-read of a wonderful book that I can quite happily say changed my life. If only he'd written the sequel...