The Pod Bay

Undo

02:50

Finally I get my Enthusiast badge!

Jon Ericson

04:55

54

Q: Nailing it up on your Community Bulletin Board

As some of you may have noticed, there's a new feature on Stack Exchange: The Community Bulletin box is a tool for the community to promote events and initiatives that are important to them. On-site activities like tag cleanup events, chat events, and weekly topic contests are some examples...

TildalWave

10:56

@JonEricson Cheers Jon! So if I get this correctly, when I created a new meta tag live-event I was close enough to scheduled-event? Or that doesn't even matter and is simply there because it's the only scheduled chat room event? Also, why is that Shog's mSO post / announcement not a SE blog post? Is that common practice for moderator only tools?

Stack Exchange

11:08

0

Q: How can we increase the number of visits/day?

Every time I check our report card we are around 200 visits a day. With 500 being the needs work low score. At 40 days old we seem to be doing well at the other indicators. There is no doubt in my mind that Space Exploration asks and answers questions critical to the future of humanity. From...

discussion site-promotion

Undo

11:40

@TildalWave I'm pretty sure that most things are in moderator.stackexchange.com

TildalWave

@Undo Damn, you're right, it is there and pointing to that same meta post @JonE pinged me with! :) Cheers!

Undo

:D

TildalWave

@Undo good morning! ;)

Undo

Good morning! 7:44 here. I like 7:44.

@TildalWave Interesting question:

3

Q: Can solid-fuel leak?

Recently the ISRO GSLV launch was called off on account of a fuel leak. Other launches too have, on occasion, been called off for similar reasons. Fuel used to launch a craft to orbit may be solid, or liquid. Have solid-fuel leakage ever been reported? Can solid-fuel even leak?

launch fuel

TildalWave

12:21

@Undo hehehe yeah that's ... "mourning" :)

@Undo It'll take quite some research into all the thousands of different solid rocket fuels. I think it'd be best to not even attempt a complete answer, but just give some examples, like in the comments.

Undo

@TildalWave You don't think that there could even be an answer for just the 'general case'?

TildalWave

@Undo If you wanna write it, then go for it. I'm working on another answer now, and @DeerHunter usually pings with a comment when he doesn't have the time to properly answer it too

Hash

Hello everyone :-)

Undo

@TildalWave Maybe it should be too broad?

Hai @Hash

TildalWave

@Undo Well yes, but it's always nice to substantiate that with actual examples

@Undo neah, it's not asking for a list of possible fuels that could leak, it's just asking about the possibility ... not too broad IMO

Undo

12:26

k

Hash

TThe above question is very nice but couldn't find a clue to answer

Undo

I'd say they won't leak if they stay solid like they're supposed to :P

Hash

They could leak hypergolic fuels may leak

TildalWave

@Hash they may but that's got nothing to do with them being hypergolic ... it's just an unfortunate consequence, that it'll end up in an explosion since they spontaneously combust ;)

them main reason would probably be that what we call "solid" rocket fuels aren't "solid" at all, just extremely viscous liquids

Hash

Yes but how a high viscous fuel would leak unless there viscousity decreases(which happens on heating) @TildalWave

TildalWave

12:36

@Hash dunno, that depends on the chemical composition, but there might be other reasons than "heating"... i.e. they're nearly all thermochemical as is, then there's molecular decomposition, reaction with the container, impurities, ...

also "sweating" i.e. perspiration, and also sedimentation ... the more I think about it, the more reasons I can think of how a "solid" could "leak".

Donald.McLean

Sweating isn't a leak. That would be an entirely different engineering problem.

TildalWave

@Donald.McLean well strictly speaking, it isn't... but it can lead to condensation, which then it is (??) LOL

Donald.McLean

No, with sweating, the problem is that moisture is getting into the fuel. The symptoms may be superficially similar to an untrained observer, but they are not even remotely the same problem.

ManishEarth

Boo

TildalWave

this is a bit of a play on words anyway... I think the most important part to cover would be to explain that solid rocket fuels might not be solid at all, they merely react as such on ignition which will limit your approach to designing the engine / nozzle part

@ManishEarth "morning" :)

@Donald.McLean Meh, I didn't say it right ... moar coffee please!! Anyway, I think you know what I meant... to describe where that "solid" in "solid rocket booster" comes from.

Donald.McLean

12:54

Yes. Sometimes I get more pedantic when I'm half asleep.

TildalWave

@Donald.McLean well I'm usually on some US coast time also, so we're currently dealing with same problems :)

Undo

13:39

@Tildal BTW, I fixed that link in your Meta post.

ManishEarth

@Undo You fixed it? Whaddya mean, fixed it?

The diamond defines perfection

Which means you destroyed it.

Prepare to be hit by a tildal tsunami

:P

Undo

@Manish Well, apparently he dropped his diamond when he added that link, as it wasn't perfect.

@Manish Also, I somewhat doubt Tildal would destroy me for, uh, changing a link in one of his Meta posts for this chat room to point to here instead of to a timezone-estimation-thingy.

ManishEarth

14:01

@Undo Then @Tildal is clearly not doing his job. Tildal! Be more oppressive! Ban! Ban! Ban!

:P

TildalWave

14:21

@Undo cheers dunno how that happened ... as @ManishEarth says it couldn't have been my fault, so it must be the SE parser :))

ManishEarth

No, Community ♦ is a mod too, it can't make mistakes

Like I said, perfection is defined by whatever you do. It wasn't wrong. It is now.

Of course, this can be a problem when two mods disagree on something. The resultant implosion of logic can be devastating. :P

TildalWave

@ManishEarth whoever ends their take with "QED" is right ;)

ManishEarth

ha!

TildalWave

there's 2 questions now in the list that I have 20 pages open for ... I have to decide on only one, I don't have a week to spare LOL

Jon Ericson

@TildalWave It picks up on chat room events. It'll list as many as you have scheduled. The algorithm is listed:

13

A: How is the contents of the Community Bulletin determined?

The rules are as follows: Events can be created with a start date and time, an end date and time, a simple title, and a link to something somewhere on the network. Current or upcoming events are listed, with those starting or ending nearest to the current time shown first. If there are fewer th...

TildalWave

14:26

@JonEricson hahaha there is a mSO post for everything, right? A bit like Wikipedia:

Everything

Everything (or every thing), is all that exists; the opposite of nothing, or its complement. The totality of things relevant to some subject matter. Without expressed or implied limits, it may refer to anything. The Universe is often defined as everything that exists. It may refer to an anthropocentric worldview, or the sum of human experience, history, and the human condition in general. Every object and entity is a part of everything, including all physical bodies and in some cases all abstract objects. Scope In ordinary conversation, everything usually refers only to the totality of ...

@JonEricson You think there's some way to create a feed out of mSO posts that are only mod related? I already added the SE community moderator blog feed (to the "Mission Control" room), but apparently there's a lot more of that on mSO. Wouldn't want all the posts there in the feed tho, for obvious reasons :)

ManishEarth

@TildalWave Yes

TildalWave

@ManishEarth how?

ManishEarth

meta.stackoverflow.com/feeds/…

Search [moderator*] on MSO, get feed

TildalWave

@ManishEarth wow that's a long query :)) cheers!

ManishEarth

Yeah, it expanded itself

TildalWave

14:32

@ManishEarth you're lucky this isn't the DMZ :P

ManishEarth

Oh, right. Oops :P

TildalWave

Oops! Something Bad Happened!

TildalWave

14:55

0

A: What feeds should we have in The Pod Bay?

XKCD http://xkcd.com/rss.xml

would you like to have XKCD feed in here?

Deer Hunter

15:16

@TildalWave - XKCD is not entirely space-related. A judicious combination of What-If and plain XKCD should IMHO be placed as a resource post in the Meta question on books.

Come on, folks, please confess who deleted my nuke-in-orbit comments.

I didn't have the chance to read the "discourage all the folks" comment, would you care to repeat it here?

@Chris? @Pearson? @TildalWave? :P

JohnB

@DeerHunter could have been Robert, I see he's been cleaning up some comments

<comments removed> Please do not use comments to answer these questions. Not only does it discourage others from posting a proper answer, but it encourages others to do the same, and we've seen that it causes the site to start operating more like the old discussion forums Stack Exchange was designed to avoid. — Robert Cartaino 2 mins ago

space.stackexchange.com/users/68/robert-cartaino?tab=activity

TildalWave

15:37

@DeerHunter hmmm not me, but there should be a perfectly valid reason, I'll check

2 hours later

Oh, @JohnB already did :))

JohnB

Well, that was just a guess, I'm unable to actually tell

(As I'm not sure which post the comments in question were actually on)

TildalWave

@JohnB I can and that's the reason yup ;) I personally agree that we should keep the comments section short-ish, but sometimes it's still not that bad to leave a few comments, if it later translates to a proper answer

@JohnB the question

JohnB

@TildalWave which one, the one I linked?

eh, whatever it doesn't matter anyway :P

TildalWave

@JohnB Yes. A few of us regulars here tend to have the time for maybe 1 answer per day (@DeerHunter and me included) , but sometimes try to leave some hints for answerers where to look at. I've also noticed most of us actually go and delete comments later, when answers are posted, I guess @Robert didn't get that memo LOL

JohnB

on GD if I see a good potential answer in a comment, I'll usually leave a reply asking them to make an answer out of it

TildalWave

15:47

but his comment is still valid, there were some in that comment thread that don't review their comments at all, I've had flags to clear with "too chatty" reason already

JohnB

I think they (SE team) are pushing to crack down on comments, especially with the new-ish placeholder text

"Please use comments to request clarificaiton..."

TildalWave

@JohnB ditto

ManishEarth

@JohnB Nah, UX in general. They don't want users to go "Why can't I comment?!!11"

Comment crackdown has always been there

Especially for new betas.

JohnB

@ManishEarth I've never seen a comms team member wipe out comments like that, but could be because it's a new beta as you said

ManishEarth

@JohnB No, that's Robert Cartaino's usual

He's been doing the <comments removed> thing from the beginning of time :P

JohnB

15:49

ah, ok. Well he doesn't do it on GD, cause otherwise he'd be doing it a lot :P

ManishEarth

@JohnB New betas. No mods.

TildalWave

I think it wouldn't be a bad idea we go through posts say once a fortnight and remove unnecessary comments

so @Robert doesn't have to :)

ManishEarth

@TildalWave I sometimes do that

JohnB

What's the point in him leaving a comment though? Will the other commenters get a notification?

otherwise it would seem he is talking to nobody

or rather, not the people that should be reading it

ManishEarth

@JohnB So that they don't go "I typed in a box and now it's all gone!! Whyyyyyyyy does this happen to meeeeeee!!!?"

JohnB

15:52

ah, ok :P

ManishEarth

Also, it's a learning experience for everyone who sees it.

TildalWave

@JohnB no LOL ... you don't get a notification if you were in the comments thread but are no longer because your comment was deleted :))

JohnB

yeah I didn't think so

Deer Hunter

0

Q: Deleting valuable comments without warning

I have noticed some comment cleanup action lately which wastes work done by others and myself posted as comments. I consider it a little bit irresponsible and impolite. If any of the mods do this, please take care to maintain backup of deleted comments.

discussion comments

JohnB

@DeerHunter all comments are "backed up"

they can be undeleted

TildalWave

15:53

@DeerHunter scroll up a few lines here ^^^^ ;)

JohnB

well, I suppose a mod could do things to really wipe it out, but that's unlikely

Deer Hunter

@TildalWave @JohnB - but only mods can see them.

JohnB

@DeerHunter right, so what do you mean by "maintain backup"?

Deer Hunter

@TildalWave - If a mod is not at hand, and I've forgotten where I've commented - these comments are as good as lost.

TildalWave

@DeerHunter true... I suggest that if there's a post you had comment on that you believe should be undeleted, you flag the post and say that in a custom "Mod attention needed" reason

@DeerHunter not really no, because I sometimes go around reading such stuff... I'll undelete, if I think it was needlessly deleted or actually still serves a purpose to the post it was commented on

but the one that the whole "chat" of messages is missing now has been answered later by yourself @DeerH ;)

Deer Hunter

15:57

@JohnB - wholesale deletion of non-chatty comments is not in the spirit of SE. I'll go and find relevant meta-SO Q&As later. I'm a bit p***ed off that a comment notifying me of deletion was deleted itself.

Okay folks, gotta work. Take care.

JohnB

@DeerHunter All the advice I can offer is, don't use comments to post valuable answers. Clearly SE does not want you doing that, so saying it's "not in the spirit of SE" can't be quite true since an SE employee deleted them

ManishEarth

@DeerHunter Actually, no, comments are considered ephermal and can be deleted at will.

TildalWave

2

A: Deleting valuable comments without warning

All comments are stored in the system and visible to mods1. Comments deleted by a moderator can be undeleted. Don't use comments for anything you feel is worth keeping there long term. Use comments to: Suggest improvements in an answer Point out mistakes in an answer Ask for clarification Have...

Cheers @Manish you saved me the trouble I was just writing it LOL

ManishEarth

Ha!

If we had waited I bet Robert Cartaino would have given a beautiful answer

TildalWave

16:14

@ManishEarth there is one place where comments shouldn't be so discouraged tho - in some of the meta threads.

Stack Exchange

1

Q: Deleting valuable comments without warning

I have noticed some comment cleanup action lately which wastes work done by others and myself posted as comments. I consider it a little bit irresponsible and impolite. If any of the mods do this, please take care to maintain backup of deleted comments.

discussion comments

TildalWave

and that discussion tag actually suggests it... and IMO you'd want as open discussion as possible, not bring it down by insisting on a format

Deer Hunter

19:31

Yeah folks. You can delete anything you want. I am stepping aside for a while, can see no sense in escalating this discussion to metaSO. Wish you all the luck. I invest my bloody time to make this site better, and it turns out just another Wikipedia, with narrow-minded, subject domain-ignorant deletionism.

JohnB

20:46

@Tildal the launch is in a few hours, right? I'm going to try to be there!

TildalWave

21:09

1

Q: Live chat room event: Launch of JAXA Epsilon-1 with SPRINT-A on board (August 27, 2013 at 4:25 a.m. UTC/GMT)

This is an invitation to attend our chat room event, where we will be covering the launch of the first JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) Epsilon Launch Vehicle (Epsilon-1) with the Spectroscopic Planet Observatory for Recognition of Interaction of Atmosphere (SPRINT-A) on board. Chat eve...

discussion chat announcement scheduled-event

I put the timezone info there ;)

JohnB

@TildalWave That's awesome! The map looks auto-generated.....but it's wrong :P

Should be 12:25AM For New York!

and vice versa for China

TildalWave

@JohnB yeah, I knew I screw'd it up somewhere ... but it was already the 2nd revision (I first completely reversed all of them LOL), so ... yeah... you have proof mods aren't always purrfect :P

JohnB

You made the map yourself? Dedication!

I just fired up PS to fix it for you :D

TildalWave

@JohnB ah sure go ahead, replace it if you bothered to fix it :) thanks!

I need to write some tool to do that auto ... I didn't find any online that do it properly, and it would be so simple

JohnB

@TildalWave I'd use it!!

TildalWave

21:19

I need to finish this project I'm stuck with now, maybe a week more, then I'll see what I can do

JohnB

@TildalWave I can't edit in Meta, I flagged it with a link

gotta run, see you tonight!

TildalWave

21:35

@JohnB cheers... take care, see you ;)

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