Thu Jul 28 15:34:54 2022
(*4a83cc77*):: Permacomputing is very interesting https://permacomputing.net/`
(*4a83cc77*):: Civboot is super cool for those going far down the rabbit hole: https://github.com/civboot/civboot
*** GitHub – civboot/civboot: Civilizational Bootstraper: landing page and wiki
*** Civilizational Bootstraper: landing page and wiki. Contribute to civboot/civboot development by creating an account on GitHub.
*** GitHub
(*4a83cc77*):: +public!
How large would a warehouse have to be in order to both:
- Build simple computers in a semi-autonomous way from scratch using only tools and knowledge within the warehouse.
- Build another such warehouse and make improvements to it.
If such a warehouse existed, it would be a Civboot. Civboot aims to simplify technology by simplifying technology’s requirements. Fundamentally Civboot is an educational tool: it can provide a working understanding of the tools and processes that underpin our technology. Putting the question another way, if there were a high-school & college curriculum with the sole goal of accomplishing “project based learning” of having the entire class (400+ students) understand and reconstruct a Civboot using only the tools within the Civboot; how many people would that be, how large would the warehouse be and how many instructors would be required?
This is the fundamental question of Civboot, a project which aims to reduce the tools and knowledge necessary to bootstrap modern civilization as much as possible. It is important to point out early that a Civboot does not contain everything required to build or support civilization such as food, clothing or a bed; in the same way as a bootstrapper for an operating system does not contain all the bells and whistles of the operating system itself. A Civboot only contains the tools and knowledge necessary to build computers and itself.
In terms of supporting a community with things like food, clothing and shelter, a Civboot has one additional goal: be able to provide these things within three degrees. For instance, a Civboot cannot construct a tractor directly, but you can use tooling within a Civboot to build a factory (the 1st degree), then you can use the factory to build gears and other tractor components and assemble a tractor (the 2nd degree).
Another point: a Civboot only contains tutorials to provide a working knowledge of how to reconstruct and improve the Civboot. Deeper understanding of things like transistors, hardware architecture, software architecture, chemistry, mechanical engineering, etc can take potentially a lifetime of learning. It is hoped that Civboot can be a foundation for that learning, but Civboot itself aims to provide only a working understanding.
This project is NOT an attempt to DIY or “do this at home.” Creating the first Civboot will no doubt require millions of dollars and the efforts of thousands of individuals to design, experiment, document and simplify a huge number of technologies which cross an extremely broad range of disciplines. The first Civboot will likely be made “distributed” (if it is ever made at all) — with teams from all over the world sending their products to each other, collaborating on multiple different approaches. The hope is to get hackers, professionals, retired experts, universities and organizational support to help distill civilization’s knowledge into a stack that can be understood and self replicated.
Even if we fail, it will be worth the effort. Having a simplified working-understanding of technology has many advantages other than the construction of a Civboot.