In article <so1sq31mnq2gg7ff1b1eqm84j9bfohnvj1@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>,
pethorne@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
says...
> When astronauts type in orbit, does microgravity mean they have to do
> extra work to return their fingers to the keys? Or does gravity play
> only a minor role in touch-typing?
>
> This could be partially tested on Earth by arranging a keyboard in a
> vertical or inverted position; the problem is that your arms would
> fatigue in that posture.
>
> I ask because microgravity affects many common postures: You sleep
> against a firm slightly-padded board, not a mattress. You stand to
> eat, feet strapped down, with your knees naturally bent; sitting is
> uncomfortable. Most gross-motor activities without gravity involve
> twice the effort.
>
> (Disclaimer: this was true in the early 1980s, since I'm referencing a
> book on the Shuttle Experience written then. NASA and its cosmonaut
> equivalents may have discovered differently in the past 20 years.)
>
> ***
>
> This is the sort of thing that people could ask astronauts on blogs,
> if they had blogs. Do blogs constitute part of NASA's astronaut
> outreach nowadays? Sort of, but they're undated:
>
>
<http://www.nasa.gov/centers/johnson/astronauts/journals_astronauts.html>
>
> Given limited orbit-to-ground bandwidth, text blogs would be an
> efficient way to communicate; but given the hyper-planned schedule of
> an STS or ISS mission, astronauts probably don't have the luxury of
> composing reflective blog entries. And they'd want to use a local
> server, then mirror the completed entries to the ground, to avoid
> excess HTTP traffic.
>
> Wait, here's one from Ed Lu of Expedition 7. Also undated, ugh.
>
> <http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/station/crew/exp7/luletters/>
>
> ***
>
>
<http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/shuttle/launch/sts-121/launch-vlcc_070106.html>
> "NASA's Launch Blog - Mission STS-121 07.01.06"
>
> If you didn't already know that the STS-121 mission was in July 2006,
> how could interpret that datestamp? Is it ordered as mm.dd.yy
> (American style), dd.mm.yy (European), or yy.mm.dd (computer)?
>
I have not heard of any major problems, astronauts today in orbit now
blog, get and write email and surf the net (within the limits that NASA
allows).
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