Re: starship-design: Massively Distributed Computing for SETI

[KellySt@aol.com]

In a message dated 3/18/01 9:35:17 AM, zkulpa@ippt.gov.pl writes:

>However, if the platform moves along the Sun-centered orbit,
>its velocity is of the order of tens of kilometers a second
>(see another table below), hence it must compensate 
>for its change of position with appropriate change of orientation,
>and the latter must be VERY accurate (as the deviation table shows).
>Moreover, the change of orientation must change very accurately
>with the distance to the target ship. The latter, I am afraid,
>is hard to know exactly in real time at long distances
>(e.g., the acceleration/speed will vary due to many factors,
>among others the accuracy of aiming the beam [and hence the
>thrust], the distribution of unknown masses along the way
>[e.g., invisible gas clouds or stray brown dwarf nearby...]).


As a nit.  Since we couldn't try anything like this over more then a couple 
tens of light years.  We'ld know of any of the big clouds or small stellar 
objects.