milliways_bar | (no subject)

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The final layer of encryption on the Aperture data is proving to be remarkably stubborn. Alyx has, at least, confirmed that it is the final layer, which means the trickier code is understandable. Whatever they're, the higher-ups at Aperture wanted it to stay hidden.

Hopefully, it's something of vital importance to their portal research that could give the Resistance another edge over the Combine. But given that this is Aperture Science we're talking about, it could just as easily be Cave Johnson's secret devil's food cake recipe. Who knows?

Anyway, Alyx is in Milliways in the hope that a change of venue will help her work. She's got the laptop, a legal pad full of notes, and a heaping platter of onion rings.

(What? Just because she's working doesn't mean she can't soothe her pregnancy cravings at the same time.)

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"Oooh," says Ellen. "That's got to be- wow. Codebreaking's hard. They only protect really important stuff with difficult codes, don't they?"

"And this is the third layer of encryption," says Alyx. "There was a bunch of less secure data on the other two layers."

Nothing terribly useful, though. Unless you want to know the best way to coerce orphans and tramps into being laboratory test subjects.

"Wow. I don't think they even used that much encryption to protect troop movement information before the final thrust of the Battle of Anchorage," Ellen says.

Blink. Blink.

"...why not?"

"I don't know. I only remember what I read about it in the history texts," Ellen says. "I know they double-encrypted everything and they wrote in code phrases even before they started scrambling the contents with their ciphers, but if they did any more than that then it was never declassified before the bombs fell."

"Do you know what kind of encryption they used?"

"Unfortunately no," Ellen says. "Just that some of the biggest mainframes ever built were constructed on both sides to try and crack the other side's codes. They didn't really go into specifics in the texts."

Edited 2010-04-21 03:46 (UTC)

"Criminy." Alyx facepalms. "Were they all running on vacuum tubes, too?"

"Oh, no. Transistor systems all the way," Ellen says. "Most of the historical advances in the development of real transistor technology came out of the intelligence race between Chinese and American spy organizations in the 2060s. They even developed a couple of potential standalone terminal types during that time, although I don't think those ever really got into production anywhere much."

"...you guys didn't get transistors until the middle of the twenty-first century."

Wut.

"No, no, we had them, they just weren't very good," Ellen says. "They were more of a... sort of a scientific curiosity than a real development for a long time. Too expensive to build in any kind of real numbers. The government had to start dumping research money into them in earnest to get really decent ones."

Alyx shakes her head. "That--just--they started making cheap transistors in 1945, for Christ's sake. How the hell do you get portable radios without transistors?!"

Edited 2010-04-21 04:22 (UTC)

Ellen looks at Alyx blankly.

Guess who's never seen a portable radio in her life.

"Radiation King made radios about this big before the War," Ellen says, indicating something the size of a toaster. "But they're mostly vacuum tubes. My Pip-Boy's heavy on the transistors and that was cutting-edge design when the bombs fell."

"...okay, you see this?" Alyx lifts her laptop slightly. "There is not a single vacuum tube in it. It's all transistors and microchips. And it has several thousand times the processing power and memory capacity of the computers used for the moon landing."

"Wow," says Ellen, peering at the tiny device. "That's impressive. I guess you hook it up to the server and dump your data to tape when you go home, right? Which port do you use?"

"The data gets stored here," says Alyx. "There's a hard disk with 250 gigabytes of storage in this thing. The data dump from Aperture is in this--" she points to a squat cylinder plugged in to the side of the laptop. "There's about a hundred terabytes of files. Most of it's just company memos and crap like that, but still."

".... I don't know what those words are," says Ellen. "What's a gigabyte? Or the other one?"

"--!" Alyx takes a deep breath and drags her hands over her face again. "Okay. How much data storage does the Pip-Boy have?"

"That depends on the size of the holotape you insert," Ellen says. "Mostly it's just for basic personal information and stuff. I don't know."

"Okay, but you know how data storage is calculated, right? A one or a zero is a bit, eight bits is a byte..."

"I... think so," Ellen says cautiously. "I never learned to program anything. But the numbers sort of sound familiar."

"Okay." Alyx nods. "In general, computer data storage is calculated in powers of two, and you get a step up on nomenclature every 1,024 units. 1,024 bytes is a kilobyte, and 1,024 kilobytes is a megabyte. From there, you go to gigabyte, terabyte, and petabyte, which is enough room to hold the text of the entire Library of Congress about fifty times over."

Ellen considers this, and then looks at the little computer. You'll forgive her for the skeptical expression that crosses her face. She's having some trouble picturing that much tape.

Yes, Alyx said hard disk, but Ellen wouldn't know a hard disk from one of Three Dog's old records if it leapt out of a mole rat's corpse and bit her.