Science Fiction
Dictionary
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
 |
Digital Squab Line (DSL) Has High Bandwidth
Which is faster - ADSL (Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line) or DSL (Digital Squab Line)? If you're thinking pigeons are faster - you're right.
Networking enthusiasts gathered at Ohalo, by the Sea of Galilee in Israel. They watched a live test in which three homing pigeons were sent to Ramat Hasharon, some 100 kilometers away. Each of the pigeons carried tiny memory cards with a total of 4 gigabytes of data.
Pigeon-powered data transfer was pioneered in Bergen, Norway, using a data protocol defined by David Waitzman, an American computer scientist - CPIP (Carrier Pigeon Internet Protocol).
Pigeons have long been used for remote data transfer. In the 19th century, roving reporters used handy pocket pigeons to report back to the home office, getting around the then-clumsy fixed infrastructure of telegraph (see illustration below).
The data transfer would be timed from the release of the pigeons to the arrival of the last pigeon. Haim Sperling, veteran pigeon breeder from Ramat Hasharon, was in charge of infrastructure, supplying the three pigeons named Blue Sky, Two Colors and Dotted Light.
The results? Dividing data carried by time elapsed shows a data transfer rate of about 2.27 Mbps (million bits per second), a significant improvement over standard ADSL connections.
Drawbacks? Very large packet size, in this case a little over 1 gigabyte. This also increases the problems with lost packets. In the this experiment Dotted Light almost failed to arrive. Pigeon routing systems are poorly understood, making it difficult for engineers to correct problems. Studies on cerebral lateralization of homing are still in progress.
(See pigeon homing study.)
Also, as was pointed out in WWII, during operations using PGP (Pretty Good Pigeons), problems with hacking by the enemy were encountered.
Fans of Frank Herbert of course remember the distrans, a system of encoding messages onto the nervous system of bats. The transfer rate is not given in the books.
Read more about it at Pigeon-enabled Internet is faster than ADSL.
Scroll down for more stories in the same category. (Story submitted 4/5/2004)
Follow this kind of news @Technovelgy.| Email | RSS | Blog It | Stumble | del.icio.us | Digg | Reddit |
Would
you like to contribute a story tip?
It's easy:
Get the URL of the story, and the related sf author, and add
it here.
Comment/Join discussion ( 1 )
Related News Stories - (" Communication ")
Holobox? Who Doesn't Want A Home Hologram?
'...there appeared standing upon the disk, the image of a man...' - Edmond Hamilton, 1928.
EBS-260 Handjet Free Hand Dot Matrix Printer
'McKie held a chalf-memory stick over the dusted surface.' - Frank Herbert, 1964.
CD, DVD Bit Rot And PKD's Civic Notification Distorter
'...copy two of the original document no longer can be superimposed on copy one.' - Philip K. Dick, 1965.
Zoom Education Idea Is 100 Years Old
'... the frosted glass squares began, one by one, to show the faces and shoulders of a peculiar type of young men.' - Harry Stephen Keeler, 1915.
Technovelgy (that's tech-novel-gee!) is devoted to the creative science inventions and ideas of sf authors. Look for the Invention Category that interests you, the Glossary, the Invention Timeline, or see what's New.
Science Fiction
Timeline
1600-1899
1900-1939
1940's 1950's
1960's 1970's
1980's 1990's
2000's 2010's
Current News
Robot Preachers Found To Undermine Religious Commitment
'Tell me your torments,' the Padre said, in an elderly voice marked with compassion.
CyberCab - Tesla Renames The Robotaxi
'A cybercab dogged their heels...'
SpaceHopper Microgravity Robot Lands On Its Feet
'...a slender-legged tripod surmounted by a spherical body no larger than a football.'
Brin's 1990 Novel Earth Still Full Of Predictions
'... making the point that their likenesses, every move they made, were being transmitted.'
'Whisper Mode' ala Blue Thunder Researched At Bristol
'Forest Lawn.'
Gaia - Why Stop With Just The Earth?
'But the stars are only atoms in larger space, and in that larger space the star-atoms could combine to form living matter, thinking matter, couldn't they?'
Microsoft VASA-1 Creates Personal Video From A Photo
'...to build up a video picture would require, say, ten million decisions every second. Mike, you're so fast I can't even think about it. But you aren't that fast.'
Splendid View Of Eclipse From Orbit Visualized And Repurposed By Arthur C. Clarke
'The area affected was five hundred kilometres across, and perfectly circular.'
Bespoke Environment Music From AIs
'Call 'em Winter Mute," said the other, making it two words.'
Goldene - A Two-Dimensional Sheet Of Gold One Atom Thick
'Hasan always pitched a Gauzy - a one-molecule-layer tent, opaque, feather-light, and very tough.'
SpaceX Wants A Moonbase Alpha
'And he had been sent with troops, supplies and bombs to command Russia's most trusted post, the Moonbase.'
Vast Apartment Living Will Get Even More Vast
'What is your population', I asked. 'About eighty millions.'
NASA Wants Self-Driving Or Remote-Controlled Vehicles For Lunar Astronauts
'THE autobus turned silently down the wide street of Hydropole. Robot-guided, insulated from noise and cold...'
Elon Musk Says Robotaxis Will Be Ready This August, 2024
'The car had no steering wheel, and no one drove!'
Moonwalkers AI-Controlled Electric Shoes
Now that's power walking that Hugo Gernsback would have approved.
Steve Jobs: 'Capture The Next Aristotle - With AI'
'It was disturbing to think of the Flatline as a construct...'
