Hillwalker News 2004/09 - Festive Opening

In this Newsletter

FESTIVE OPENING AND CLOSING

ISYS OUTDOORS Sales and Support will be open (and closed) at the following times throughout the festive season:

December 2004

 

January 2005

 

LAST (ULTIMATE) HILLWALKER NEWS

Next year the Newsletter will be called the ISYS OUTDOORS Newsletter. The content will have the same style but the name will be inclusive for cyclists, ramblers, canoeists, alpinists and, of course, hillwalkers. This is, therefore the last Hillwalker news.

If you would like just the Product info without the chat, ask to be put on the Product Newsletter distribution.

 

SUPPORT NEWS

Version 4 support will cease on 31 January 2005. The free upgrade, included in all version 5 programs, will be available until 31 January.

 

HILL NEWS

My thanks to John Burdin who points out that the 1999 edition of Munro's Tables had already moved Beinn a' Chroin. The correct location of the summit is NN 38759 18584. I will correct the location in Hillwalker The Munros next year.

OTHER COMMENTS FROM THE LAST (PREVIOUS) HILLWALKER NEWS

Here is a selection of comments received about the last newsletter:

A theodolite is called a transit in the US as well as in Canada. I know because I spent a lot of time lugging a heavy one up and down 8 to 10 thousand footers in the Purcell range (the next range to the west of the Rocky mountains in Southern BC, Canada) in the good old days when triangulation was a tough job but enjoyable if you liked mountaineering. I still do it even at age 77.

 

Fred, Madrid (it's amazing where the Hillwalker News gets to)

French? French we don't need no Entente Cordial, nor Auld Alliance  

Anyway I quote from http://www.bahria.net/academics/robotics/where_robot_word.htm

The word 'robot' was coined by the Czech playwright Karel Capek (pronounced "chop'ek") from the Czech word for forced labour or serf. Capek was reportedly several times a candidate for the Nobel prize for his works and very influential and prolific as a writer and playwright. Mercifully, he died before the Gestapo got to him for his anti-Nazi sympathies in 1938.

The use of the word Robot was introduced into his play R.U.R. (Rossum's Universal Robots) which opened in Prague in January 1921. The play was an enormous success and productions soon opened throughout Europe and the US. R.U.R's theme, in part, was the dehumanization of man in a technological civilization. You may find it surprising that the robots were not mechanical in nature but were created through chemical means. In fact, in an essay written in 1935, Capek strongly fought that this idea was at all possible and, writing in the third person, said:

"It is with horror, frankly, that he rejects all responsibility for the idea that metal contraptions could ever replace human beings, and that by means of wires they could awaken something like life, love, or rebellion. He would deem this dark prospect to be either an overestimation of machines, or a grave offence against life."

[The Author of Robots Defends Himself - Karl Capek, Lidove noviny, June 9, 1935, translation: Bean Comrada]

There is some evidence that the word robot was actually coined by Karl's brother Josef, a writer in his own right. In a short letter, Capek writes that he asked Josef what he should call the artificial workers in his new play. Karel suggests Labori, which he thinks too 'bookish' and his brother mutters, "Then call them Robots" and turns back to his work, and so from a curt response we have the word robot.

Alan, Dingwall (it's amazing where the Hillwalker News gets to) who responded within minutes of receiving his Hillwalker News.

"The bot of Spybot is from robot ... are its French origins completely lost?

Iain, they never existed, it comes from Czech "robota" = "work".  The Russian equivalent is "rabota".  The word was invented by Karel Capek in a play called "Rossum's Universal Robots".

Michael, Edinburgh who also suggests:

 

"Whilst on the subject of Astronomy...", I suppose it could also be a typo for "setting".  Perhaps I ought to read the book?

(The Da Vinci Code - absolutely! I did find one other inconsistency which I might share with you all sometime!)

 

On the subject of GPS, I learned from the Aberdeen Press & Journal that the two Edinburgh chaps who spent a night in the Glenshee hills last week were lost because the batteries gave out on their GPS. Is this the first reported occurrence?

from Dave, Dunfermline (Battery voltage falls with temperature!)

 

A Merry Christmas to all from the staff at ISYS,

 

Iain R White

ISYS OUTDOORS Support           

http://www.isysoutdoors.com     

support@isysoutdoors.com        

0845 166 5701 (UK local call cost)

+44 141 943 1533

 

 

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