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A new way to stop digital decay
The Economist ^
| September 15, 2005
| Economist Staff
Posted on 09/20/2005 4:13:50 PM PDT by Zuben Elgenubi
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To: Zuben Elgenubi
So this Universal Virtual Computer is being currently written to work on today's technology.
What happens in the not too distant future when the hardware no longer supports a particular version of the Universal Virtual Computer?
Then wont they need to write another UVC to run the original UVC.
But then the hardware will continue to evolve and you will need an ever-increasing string of UVC updates to read each other and ultimately read the files.
This is all very silly.
All we need is a complete list of rules for reading each file type. At any time in the future someone can write a program to read any file for which the rules have been maintained.
In the future when humans all have brain implants or have been replaced by AI robots it will take microseconds to generate the code and run it against the sum of all documents.
To: Zuben Elgenubi
More complex items, like CD-ROMs or videos, will be unreadable even sooner. CD-ROMs last much shorter than a good quality paper. Hard disks and tapes last even less.
22
posted on
09/20/2005 8:37:39 PM PDT
by
A. Pole
(Gov.Gumpas:"But that would be putting the clock back, have you no idea of progress, of development?")
To: supercat
I would think that three such drives (one each for 8", 5.25", and 3.5") would be able to read 99.99% of the floppies produced in those sizes (and would also, with proper programming, be better able to deal with bit rot than the drives of yesteryear. Floppies, CD's etc decay physically.
23
posted on
09/20/2005 8:39:24 PM PDT
by
A. Pole
(Gov.Gumpas:"But that would be putting the clock back, have you no idea of progress, of development?")
To: Mr_Moonlight
Information (data) has been 'lost' thru eons of history, but somehow scientists and historians have been able to recreate a fairly accurate picture of the past using only some of the smallest parcels of indirct data still in existance The computer PRINTOUTS on a good paper will survive.
24
posted on
09/20/2005 8:41:06 PM PDT
by
A. Pole
(Gov.Gumpas:"But that would be putting the clock back, have you no idea of progress, of development?")
To: sneakers
They tell me that the newer microfilm has a shelf-life of 500 years if stored properly. Good paper lasts longer and it passed the test of time.
25
posted on
09/20/2005 8:47:39 PM PDT
by
A. Pole
(Gov.Gumpas:"But that would be putting the clock back, have you no idea of progress, of development?")
To: A. Pole
The computer PRINTOUTS on a good paper will survive. And all it takes is one careless flick of a Bic lighter to burn that theory to ash .. hence my point, that information (data) has always been lost thru the ages, regardless of its media type
To: supercat
On the contrary, we have documents from the early 1800's which are very readable on microfilm and we get good copies. Of course, it depends upon the condition of the document in the first place. We have to adhere to strict guidelines when filming and cannot dispose without the go-ahead of the State Historical Commission - and that is after they have looked over the archival copy of our film.
As far as daguerrotype, well, I'm not an expert on the the evolution of photography, so I couldn't tell you anything about that. :)
27
posted on
09/20/2005 8:59:36 PM PDT
by
sneakers
To: A. Pole
You are absolutely correct. We have early 19th records which are holding up much better than a lot of our 20th century records. But it's always good to have a backup in case, God forbid, a fire should occur.
I wish they had filmed all the military records that were burned in the St. Louis fire in the early 1970's. My dad's WWII records were lost. They recreated as much as possible, but who knows what else was there.
28
posted on
09/20/2005 9:06:11 PM PDT
by
sneakers
To: A. Pole
Floppies, CD's etc decay physically. True, there is magnetic degredation. But signal-processing techniques should make it possible to discern data which is faded too much to be readable via standard hardware (which must 'get' everything in one go).
Of course, if the oxide falls off the disk that's another story.
29
posted on
09/20/2005 9:29:32 PM PDT
by
supercat
(Don't fix blame--FIX THE PROBLEM.)
To: sneakers
On the contrary, we have documents from the early 1800's which are very readable on microfilm and we get good copies. Of course, it depends upon the condition of the document in the first place. We have to adhere to strict guidelines when filming and cannot dispose without the go-ahead of the State Historical Commission - and that is after they have looked over the archival copy of our film. All depends on how well the film is made. Documents which are being archived for the purpose of preserving a good quality copy of the original will probably do pretty well. Documents which are thrown on microfilm because regulation XYZ says to do so even though nobody ever looks at them anyway may not do so well.
30
posted on
09/20/2005 9:31:44 PM PDT
by
supercat
(Don't fix blame--FIX THE PROBLEM.)
To: Zuben Elgenubi
Why don't they just ask the BATFEC and the IRS what to do about it. I'm sure the pasty-faced droids up there have figured out how to store every detail of personal information about every living human on Earth for at least the next 103,487 years with no possibility of escape, oops excuse me I mean data degradation.
31
posted on
09/20/2005 11:48:28 PM PDT
by
fire_eye
(Socialism is the opiate of academia.)
To: supercat
A computer may be able to tell that a file contains a picture, and a human may be able to tell that it contains a picture of a woman holding a baby. But who are the woman and the baby? If there isn't anyone around to identify the significance of a picture, that significance will be lost even if the picture itself remains. JPEG and TIFF accommodate embedded metadata of that type (and more). See http://www.aspjpeg.com/manual_06.html for details on embedded image metadata insertion and extraction.
32
posted on
09/21/2005 12:48:47 AM PDT
by
Prime Choice
(E=mc^3. Don't drink and derive.)
To: Zuben Elgenubi
The advertisement column is funny and misleading. Parsers for all interesting formats are being easily written and maintained for UNIX systems. OS emulators to be frequently udpated are unnecessary, although many of those are also being written and maintained.
33
posted on
09/21/2005 12:50:40 AM PDT
by
familyop
("Let us try" sounds better, don't you think? "Essayons" is so...Latin.)
To: sneakers
I wish they had filmed all the military records that were burned in the St. Louis fire in the early 1970's. My dad's WWII records were lost. They recreated as much as possible, but who knows what else was there. Don't forget the wealth of historic records and photonegatives that were lost when the World Trade Center was destroyed. The basement of that building was used to house tons of historic content that is now forever lost.
34
posted on
09/21/2005 12:50:44 AM PDT
by
Prime Choice
(E=mc^3. Don't drink and derive.)
To: sneakers
Making daguerreotypes is what killed Daguerre.
35
posted on
09/21/2005 12:58:47 AM PDT
by
TypeZoNegative
(Future Minnesota Refugee)
To: A. Pole
CDs, if kept at a good temperature, humidity, and kept away from light, will last several hundred years.
36
posted on
09/21/2005 1:00:30 AM PDT
by
familyop
("Let us try" sounds better, don't you think? "Essayons" is so...Latin.)
To: Zuben Elgenubi
I have wondered about this "digital decay" every time I send off a sound recording to the Library of Congress for copyright registration. Not only will CDs be unreadable and obsolte in the near future (if they aren't already), but I heard that there is a natural depletion that occurs over time of the digital data on the CDs themselves.
To: Zuben Elgenubi
Baconian, Websterian, Collierian, call it what you will, encyclopedic efforts are inspired by the very nature that dooms them - the light that eclipses itself.
Maybe "dark ages" are of the same order of "ice ages."
38
posted on
09/21/2005 1:18:16 AM PDT
by
Old Professer
(Fix the problem, not the blame!)
To: Zuben Elgenubi
Rose petals in Grandma's bible.
39
posted on
09/21/2005 1:19:42 AM PDT
by
Old Professer
(Fix the problem, not the blame!)
To: RockyMtnMan
The only way to freeze time is to unplug the clock.
40
posted on
09/21/2005 1:21:14 AM PDT
by
Old Professer
(Fix the problem, not the blame!)
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