[time-nuts] time-nuts Digest, Vol 196, Issue 31

[jimlux]

On 11/29/20 10:38 AM, lstoskopf at cox.net wrote:
> Great fun to have the guys who were there share War Stories on how things were done.  But I'm the kind of guy who buys some machine tool on eBay and then looks up the name on the WEB to see something about the guy that used it (angle block at GM, etc.)  Thanks, N0UU

Well, in this case, you're getting the stuff from the guy who used 
(suffered from) it.<grin>

At JPL we publish a lot on the web, but not nearly everything we could - 
it's mostly a time (and money) thing. You finish the job, publish a 
final report, and you're on to the next task.  There's typically lots of 
information laying around in boxes (and disk drives, these days) most of 
which isn't in "publishable" form, i.e. reviewed, checked for 
correctness, doesn't contain export controlled info.  All this takes 
time (and a charge account, too).

Sometimes it's published, but not obvious where.  That TCXO spec was, 
I'm sure, published on JPL's acquisitions page with all RFPs at some 
point.  Is it still there? I don't know.  Is it indexed by Google? 
Probably not.

In general, though, most folks at JPL are willing to answer email 
questions, subject to time availability, as long as it's not too lengthy 
and doesn't start to stray into proprietary rights for a supplier or, 
more commonly, export controls. "in an abundance of caution", most stuff 
is considered export controlled unless reviewed and determined 
otherwise.  In reality, of course, the vast majority of what JPL does is 
NOT export controlled.

I'm pretty willing to talk at the block diagram level about designs 
(what's known as "basic system description" and "general marketing 
information" in the export control world) and published performance. 
And, as well, the design issues we had (since we generally, eventually, 
publish a paper or report on that, time and money allowing).

Where it might get sticky and require some review is if someone needs 
detailed design information, what part #, what resistors - most isn't 
controlled, but some is.