A translated version of a magazine article from the other side of the Iron Curtain.
N8 Buryak (or “Beetroot”) is a command-combine designed to coordinate a fleet of drones more effectively than any previous Union design. While this machine appears to be designed for a civilian operation (the endless harvest), systems much like this one were armed and directed towards the local fauna and separatist groups, eventually turning the Union’s Ministry of Agriculture into one of the largest military organizations in the Solar System and a powerful faction within the Union.
It’s safe to call this the machine equivalent of a COMBINE.
VICTORY OF THE CYBERNETIC MACHINE
December 2046 • Technology in Life 203
A SHEPHERD TENDS TO HIS FLOCK
N8 «BURYAK» coordinates an army of drones to perform the same task in half the time, using the new KOMANDA protocol.
GREMLIN multifunction drone, and the BURYAK n8 master.
BURYAK ARRIVES ON VENUS.
The hot sun rises over Zoziv for the fifteenth time in the Venusian colony’s history. As workers return from their dachas on the other side of the planet, they begin to prepare the cybernetic combines and computer models for uninterrupted operation. For the next 243 Earth days, the harvest will be continuous, broken only by unexpected ashfall or caustic rain. Our comrades expect to coordinate and service the machines around the clock in long, gruesome shifts for the rest of the endless harvest.
This harvest, however, will be different. The colonists unseal a new shipment dropped from Jovian orbit, and assemble it. The BURYAK n8 walks out of the workshop — a «command combine», created by the cyberneticists at Dunin-Petrova OKB. It is the first combine to exploit the new KOMANDA protocol.
As they set the system loose on the fields, they witness a miracle of engineering. With nearly no input and in less than half the time, BURYAK has plowed the fields, fertilized and planted the supercorn pods, collected the equipment, and rotated back into storage.
HOW DOES IT WORK?
Despite the incredible improvisation technology inherent to Union automata, its communication capabilities have been limited relative to their counterparts; an effect of being the first on the technological stage. Robots on the field often use these antiquated algorithms (such as BRD-6 and ADNA), designed for intermittent upstream communication in an era before high bandwidth gigastreams were common. The limitations of these protocols have prevented programmers from creating successful self-coordinating automata.
Until now. BURYAK n8 takes direct and instant control of a fleet of micro-drones utilizing the newly designed KOMANDA protocol, commissioned by NANCOM.
The fleet and master coordinate in real-time, extending the reach and capability of the overall cybernetic system in a way that is far more effective than previous approaches. Using the new protocol, the neuromorph is effectively extended beyond it’s own immediate chassis.
PATRONAGE
DUNIN-PETROVA OKB Design Bureau
NANCOM Committee for Scientific Integrity
Print authorized by:
Ministry of Communications of the USSR
N-991-DPOKB-BURYAK for more information on AGREGAT node network UNION-BURYAK for more information on Datanet network protocol