Space Shuttle Update

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Space shuttle Endeavour is ready to launch this week on its final flight to the International Space Station following a daylong Flight Readiness Review, last Tuesday (4/19/11). Endeavour is scheduled to launch Friday, April 29, at 3:47 p.m. EDT.

The STS-134 crew is scheduled to arrive at Kennedy on Tuesday, April 26, for final launch preparations.

It all started with STS-1, launched on April 12, 1981, just twenty years to the day after Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin became the first human in space. When astronauts John Young and Robert Crippen launched that morning in Columbia, it was the first time in history a new spacecraft was launched on its maiden voyage with a crew aboard.

STS-135: Checking Out Space Cargo Container
NASA – In the Space Station Processing Facility at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, the STS-135 crew inspects the Raffaello multi-purpose logistics module with the carrier’s technician. From left are STS-135 pilot Doug Hurley, Sandy Magnus, Commander Chris Ferguson (upper level), a carrier technician and Rex Walheim. The four-member crew is at Kennedy participating in the Crew Equipment Interface Test, which gives them an opportunity for hands-on training with tools they’ll use in space and familiarization of the payload they’ll deliver to the International Space Station. Shuttle Atlantis is being prepared for the STS-135 mission, which will deliver the Raffaello module packed with supplies and spare parts to the station. Atlantis (STS-135) is targeted to launch June 28, and will be the last shuttle flight for the Space Shuttle Program. Image Credit: NASA/Kim Shiflett

A Double Dip Recession for 2012?

By Robert Kuttner – Economists are painting a pretty bleak picture of the economic outlook between now and the November 2012 election.

The Federal Reserve has been buying up lots of bonds to keep interest rates very low. The Fed disguises what it’s doing with the antiseptic and mystifying term, “quantitative easing,” or QE for short. This is the second time the central bank has tried this trick, hence the coy nickname, QE 2. The problem is that very low interest rates only take you so far in a depressed economy.

For the most part the Fed’s policy has been good for large banks and good for the stock market. Ordinary borrowers, businesses and homebuyers have trouble getting credit. more> http://twurl.nl/kx66r4

related>

• The Second Recession: What It Will Feel Like, Michael Lombardi, Wall Street Pit
• Major economies losing growth momentum: OECD, Vicky Buffery and Leigh Thomas, Reuters
• Evidence for Double Dip is Growing, Bob Adelmann, New American
• Gold Bugs Beware Of Fed Extermination, Mark Sunshine, Forbes
• What’s Really Driving Up Stock Prices? Josh Lipton, Forbes
• A Double-Dip Recession in 2011 is Probable, Simon Nguyen, Yahoo! News

In System Integration, Software Rules

By Al Presher – “Software is the key to control system development, and the importance of ease of use comes down to the software inside the control system,” says Tom Jensen, technology manager at B&R Industrial Automation.

A lot of people will look at software in a modern machine, and say it is complex. But in reality, software is only reflecting the complexity of the machines now being made. If we go back 10 years, for example, a sophisticated machine may have had two servos on it, and it allowed a certain part of the machine to changeover automatically, but now it might have 20 servos. more> http://twurl.nl/vkhpef

Huawei’s $30 Billion China Credit Opens Doors in Brazil, Mexico

By Edmond Lococo, Crayton Harrison, Michael Forsythe, Diana ben-Aaron, Matthew Campbell, Fabiola Moura, Jonathan Stearns and Andres R. Martinez – When Tele Norte Leste Participacoes SA, Brazil’s biggest land-line company, was shopping for network equipment last year, Huawei Technologies Co.’s offer stood out: access to China Development Bank’s $30 billion credit line.

A two-year grace period on payments and an interest rate of 2 percentage points over the London interbank offered rate created an unbeatable deal, Tele Norte Chief Financial Officer Alex Zornig says.

“The Chinese are filling the space left empty by Americans and Europeans. They are very aggressive and they have a lot of money.” more> http://twurl.nl/pw4dpy

related>

• Huawei’s Trojan Horse, Michelle Donegan, Light Reading

Patent reform hurts ‘little guy’

By Rep. Dana Rohrabacher – Admit it or not, there are powerful multinational electronics companies that are out to destroy the U.S. patent system. This is not new. Over the years, global corporatists’ destructive designs on U.S. patent laws have been thwarted — just barely — by a small, less influential, bipartisan group led by myself, Rep. Marcy Kaptur (D-Ohio), the activists Phyllis Schlafly, Pat Choate and Raymond Damadian, inventor of the MRI.

Now, however, the barbarians are not just at the gates; they’re inside the wall. The Senate has already passed an anti-patent bill, and an equally alarming version has now passed in the House Judiciary Committee. more> http://twurl.nl/i58r04

related>

• The Patent Bill is Unconstitutional ↑
• Patent Reform 2011 ↓