Talk:International Space Station

Cost estimate

Why does this article no longer contain an estimate of total program cost? It did not long ago. This is a very important piece of information. 174.60.75.146 (talk) 04:46, 6 February 2012 (UTC)

it did, but that estimate was always pretty much the overly round figure of $100 billion USD. Nice figure, but there is no telling where it came from really. There have been many ongoing costs and changes that should change any total. The mission life has been extended, so any estimate of the total cost has to be extended also. If it was a tally of costs so far, then it would need to be updated from time to time to stay current. As it was, it was either wrong or wrong either way. Nobody seemed interested in maintaining it, so eventually it got killed off. Any solution or references would be appreciated. As it is, with whats available, I could write a lovely section saying the ISS is basically free, because space agencies have said it cost 100, they have been saying it for years, and still say it after the mission was extended, so hence, it's free after 2015 or something. Penyulap _talk 04:16, 7 February 2012 (UTC)

Or what about a piece that points out that people have been saying for years that it's 100 billion dollars and that it is patently absurd. I like how you can use perfectly good references to illustrate why those references are perfectly wrong. Like here where lots of refs are wound together in a critique of bad reporting. Maybe that is easier, as there is nobody I know who wants to do the currency conversions for all 5 partners space agency spending over the years, I mean, which currency and in what period would you do the conversion, do you convert JAXA 1990's spending from Yen to USD at the 1990 rates when it was spent or tally it until today and then convert. Or just have 5 totals, if you can find them would be easier, but 5 totals aren't what people are after. I think people want a twitter sized answer to an overly complex question. How many notes will a symphony play in a concert that has only been composed halfway. Penyulap _talk 07:11, 11 February 2012 (UTC)

Well, someone has popped a cost section in, which is cool, I've helped out in a rough manner by labeling it as US dollars, and moving it into politics, if you or anyone wants more help, I am happy to oblige. Penyulap _talk 11:54, 21 February 2012 (UTC)

Freedom animated piccy

Like it, hate it, how can it be improved ? too fast, too slow, something in the MOS ? I got the idea from reading about our featured pictures on Wikipedia, something someone said about animations showing the ISS in it's stages of construction. Freedom was an easier place to start. Rather than link to the animation, it links to the article, so the individual pictures may be examined in greater detail, which is not available from the anim.

Freedom with Kibō

Main articles: Space Station Freedom, Kibō, and H-II Transfer Vehicle

Space Station Freedom

Approved by then-president Ronald Reagan and announced in the 1984 State of the Union Address, "We can follow our dreams to distant stars, living and working in space for peaceful economic and scientific gain", the proposed Freedom changed considerably.

NASA's first cost assessment in 1987 revealed the 'Dual Keel' Station would cost $14.5 billion. This caused a political uproar in Congress, and NASA and Reagan Administration officials reached a compromise in March 1987 which allowed the agency to proceed with a cheaper $12.2-billion Phase One Station that could be completed after 10 or 11 Shuttle assembly flights. This design initially omitted the $3.4-billion 'Dual Keel' structure and half of the power generators. The new Space Station configuration was named 'Freedom' by Reagan in June 1988. Originally, Freedom would have carried two 37.5 kW solar arrays. However, Congress quickly insisted on bla bla blah blah bla, bla bla blah blah bla, bla bla blah blah bla bla bla blah blah bla bla bla blah blah bla ZZzZzZZzzzzzzz ...zzzzzzzzz.....huh....what...... Penyulap _talk 08:48, 3 March 2012 (UTC)

I would prefer a series of static pictures so they can all be seen at once. And at the end of the day, this is an article about the ISS, not Freedom, so we only really need one. --W. D. Graham 08:50, 3 March 2012 (UTC)

My thoughts Exactly ! Penyulap _talk 09:49, 3 March 2012 (UTC)

Your comment is ambiguous actually. I guess mine is too. Would you say that your looking at the problem in this way "I would prefer a series of static pictures so they can all be seen at once." + "article about the ISS...so we only really need one" = no series, or are you looking at it as "I would prefer a series of static pictures so they can all be seen at once." + "article about the ISS...so we only really need one" = a series of static pictures i.e. a suitable animation. ? Penyulap _talk 10:19, 3 March 2012 (UTC)

I'm thinking it's too fast to look at the detail, which is something people might like to do. Any other ideas ? Penyulap _talk 06:13, 7 March 2012 (UTC)

New bot has a task ready for this article

A bot that is in development is able to update a template holding data that would be of use to the article.

The article infobox has the following information displayed

• Perigee 376 km (234 mi) AMSL (1 October 2011)
• Apogee 398 km (247 mi) AMSL (1 October 2011)

This information is transcluded from the 'bots template

• Perigee 378 km (235 mi) AMSL (26 March 2012)
• Apogee 399 km (248 mi) AMSL (26 March 2012)

it updates automatically (daily, weekly, whatever, to keep up with reboosts) and doesn't show in the article history. This is the normal wikicode:

• Perigee {{convert|{{ISSIB|ISS|perigee_height}}|abbr=on|km}} AMSL ({{Str crop|{{ISSIB|ISS|epoch}}|9}})
• Apogee {{convert|{{ISSIB|ISS|apogee_height}}|abbr=on|km}} AMSL ({{Str crop|{{ISSIB|ISS|epoch}}|9}})

The altitude of the ISS varies a bit from a few kms, to 10 to 15 kms, with boost burns every two weeks on average as you can see here. Anyhow this would be one of the useless bits of busywork that a bot could do. Unless someone wants to do this kind of updating, or supports using dated info or just removing the info ? There are some other bits and pieces that the bot could do later on, I'll mention as development comes along. Penyulap _talk 06:00, 18 March 2012 (UTC)

Well here is PALZ doing his thing updating all that orbital trajectory data rockety sciencey kind of numbers stuff, and well Tiangong 1's apogee dropped by a kilometer, and so the stations speed increased as it's inversely proportional to height, as shown by the increased orbits per day. Hmm fascinating stuff, but it's probably no good for the article, although, thing is, it's in there already. So someone wants it there. If it were meant to be a static number, it should be a range, but a discrete number indicates updating. Anyhow, it's a tiny thing not worth the bother. Penyulap ☏ 12:52, 20 March 2012 (UTC)

Calculating the orbital period

Template:ISSIB revolutions per day from the bot updated template with info taken from the Heavens-above ref page

divide 24 hours by Template:ISSIB revolutions equals hours

Times 60 minutes per hour equals minutes

using the first two digits of that string to get <s minutes

multiply the remainder of the string by 60 to get <s seconds

Gives an orbit time of <s minutes and <s seconds for [[:Templat according to the Heavens-above reference page. (is that UTC ? I have no idea, but guess it is) Penyulap ☏ 00:26, 28 March 2012 (UTC)

should it go in a note, to say it's converted from revolutions per day ? Penyulap ☏ 00:38, 28 March 2012 (UTC)

I've done Perigee and period, no time at the moment to do the other or combine the refs. Penyulap ☏ 00:58, 28 March 2012 (UTC)

Where's the party ?

In the article, the Russian space agency is having such a good time that old Yuri's concrete statue is up and dancing, and the European space agency having a party on their website, where abouts are the Japanese gettin down ? and the Canadians ? do the Canadians know how to par-tae ? I don't know, < cn > I found a nice vid I can use of one of the girls saying she has a tiger she has to keep tied up so it doesn't run loose around the station (it's a toy tiger) I think it shouldn't be too long till there is a fun on the ISS sub article I suppose. Any assistance finding material would be welcome. I'm pretty sure NASA doesn't know how to party though (wink Craigboy). Penyulap ☏ 16:06, 29 March 2012 (UTC)

Templates on this page and edit notice for this article.

Template:Uninvolved A straw poll to decide the issue was archived as a straw man. The section and objection was "Changing this article from American English to British English" that's American-> to-> British and it was turned around to a poll in the opposite direction change the article from British English to American English. That's British-> to-> American. The template failed to gain the consensus required to keep it. Penyulap ☏ 11:52, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

Why are you bringing this up again? You are the only editor objecting to the template and weather the version of English should be American or British. You are skewing the consensus. You are saying there was none to keep it, when it was removed and there was none to remove it in the first place. The templates and edit notices should be restored immediatly and left in place. Brining this s*** up again is only going to cause Wikipedia to lose great editors (I left once over it, I will leave again for good).--NavyBlue84 13:53, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

You and WD make me feel like a partner who has been cheated on, always assuring me that I'm the only one, but I'm no bimbo who'll eat up any line you feed me. There are only three possible options into the future 1) you boys can convince divorce court that there is nobody else except me. 2) Stop ignoring your long line of ex's, take down the wp:own templates, and let them all have their say. 3) Uninvolved assistance removes the wp:own templates.

Do you think there could possibly come a day when divorce court says 'hey guess what, there were no other editors upset about the template, it was only Penyulap all along over the entire two year period, in fact before he arrived, he was still the only one, and that straw poll thing, it was perfectly legit. I'd like to see arbcom put their name to something like that, as I wouldn't need any further convincing that wiki is a lost cause, and I'd get a life. But seriously, what do you think the odds of that happening are, 10 to 1, 2 to 1, 100 to 1 ? Hmm ?

What chance arbcom will say that poll was nice and proper, what do you think ? shall we go ask them now ?

I know you guys say there are no editors who objected to the insertion, what chance arbcomm will agree ? Penyulap ☏

So, it's taken you two days since the last discussion closed to start a new one. Penyulap, the problem here is you, and the fact that you won't let this rest. I've told you this before, and you really should listen this time, Just Drop It. --W. D. Graham 18:00, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

Oh, and for the record the article was started in British English, and subsequently partially changed to American without consensus. When the dialect was changed "from American English to British English", it was actually standardised since both were in use. This is something which I have told you on multiple occasions, but which you still conveniently omit whenever you try to wikilawyer this into your preferred format. --W. D. Graham 18:04, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

(edit conflict) I'm very happy to drop the subject of which var to use, I've always been ridiculously flexible on that one anyway, anything from Jedi to Morse code to Jamaican. But the idea that I will ignore all the other editors on this talkpage, and simply pretend that they don't exist ? that WD, is NEVER GOING TO HAPPEN. I'm not a party to the British / American argument. But I will never stand by and allow consensus policy to be trampled all over.

Also, where you say 'two days since the last discussion closed', I think you might like to reconsider. Miszabot doesn't close discussions, it's not a party to them, it archives discussions. The difference is significant. Miszabot is a bot, not an arbitrator.

(response) Hmm, sounds like a nice interesting persuasive argument about eng:var. Now can you give me a nice interesting persuasive argument about the way you tied up the straw poll the opposite way around ? I'd REALLY like to hear your idea on that one. Penyulap ☏

Penyulap, this is tendentious and disruptive behaviour on your part. You refuse to drop this issue, and have created a hostile and unwelcoming atmosphere on this talk page as a result. Please just focus on editing for a change. --Ckatz^chat_spy 18:34, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

I disagree. I think the harmony of the talkpage was disrupted two years ago, and hasn't been repaired since. I refuse to ignore the other editors on the talkpage, if that is a problem, too bad. It's time to focus on healing the rift between editors, I believe it is still possible. Penyulap ☏ 19:01, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

If you really wanted to heal this "rift", you wouldn't be propping it open with your failure to accept the community's decision on this matter. As far as I'm concerned, it's closed. --W. D. Graham 19:03, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

Penyulap, you say you don't care what version of English is used. Yet you take offence to a simple template message saying that the article is in British English, and that there are differences between British and other variants of English. I think you will not find many other editors, or admins for that fact, willing to side with you. Like WD said, listen to us for once, and just drop it. If you keep it up, you are going to come across and admin who will block you for being disruptive. Lets just drop this and not speak of it ever again!--NavyBlue84 23:31, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

Navy blue84, I have never cared about which variant. It is the disrespect of other editors, disrespect of consensus policy, stifling of the poll and tying it up back to front in favor of the minority that I object to. There is no chance I will ignore a template on this page that states the matter is 'settled', it is a clear insult to policy and other editors. To say that I will 'keep it up' and defend policy and other editors is precisely the course I will always take, other editors can be bullied into silence and bullied into leaving, I cannot. Penyulap ☏ 02:21, 4 April 2012 (UTC)

So what about all those who were ignored when the initial change was made from British to American? Facts are facts, and the fact is the article was started in British, with no consensus for it to be changed. There probably never will be a consensus to change it, so the subject should be dropped. And since we are discussing and opposing templates, I object to the one you added about being available to help. This is being disruptive no matter how you spin it, and you can be blocked for it. I think you should take a little cool off break before you do get banned.