US Navy Develops World's Worst E-reader 249
First time accepted submitter Dimetrodon (2714071) writes "It is an unspoken rule of military procurement that any IT or communications technology will invariably be years behind what is commercially available or technically hobbled to ensure security. One case in point is the uncomfortably backronymed NeRD, or Navy e-Reader Device, an electronic book so secure the 300 titles it holds can never be updated. Ever."
In the navy (Score:5, Insightful)
security > usability
No sir, that's just my Kindle. I didn't load classified files on to it, I swear!
What? Our secret base was compromised because Private Biff's iPad, which tracked everywhere we went, was stolen by a hooker at the last port?
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I'm just shocked to learn that squids can read.
I'm sure it's perennial thrillers (Score:3)
like "The Importance of Avoiding Sexually-Transmitted Diseases In Port," "Heavy Maintenance On Carrier Launchers: Packing Steam Pistons," and "Don't Throw That Wrench."
Re:I'm sure it's perennial thrillers (Score:5, Funny)
Re:I'm sure it's perennial thrillers (Score:4, Insightful)
It's a long assumption that the sun will live long enough, at the pace GRRM writes...
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Re:In the navy (Score:5, Informative)
security > usability
No sir, that's just my Kindle. I didn't load classified files on to it, I swear!
What? Our secret base was compromised because Private Biff's iPad, which tracked everywhere we went, was stolen by a hooker at the last port?
Actually, on a nuclear-powered, nuclear-armed vessel with the ability to start World War III, I would argue that for the purposes of recreational reading, security is more important than usability. Consider the failure modes of usability for an e-reader meant for recreation. Now consider the failure mode of security on a nuclear missile submarine.
I've tried to think of a way to make it updatable...including strong crypto that you'd need a keyloader to manage, so that only trusted devices could update or manage content on the readers. But ultimately, I couldn't find a way to make it so that the device wouldn't have to be considered a controlled asset...and that's essentially the situation they're trying to avoid in the first place. The sub is basically a gigantic SCIF, so if there's any doubt at all as to the device's capability for carrying data out of the environment, it becomes a lot harder to manage. And the OP speaks to it in terms of comparison to an e-reader like we'd have out in the open world; that's not what this is meant to be. It's meant to make it possible for sailors on the boat to have more books than they are used to having. It's a step forward.
Re:In the navy (Score:4, Insightful)
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Easy. Don't bother to secure it. Just make it harmless.
Screen. Five button keypad. SD card slot. So what if some attacker manages to root it? They can't do a thing from there: No radio interface to report back, no USB to compromise connected devices, no microphone or camera for spying. The worst you can do is find out what the crew are reading, with no way to report it back. Maybe you could imply their schedules a little. The very worst a compromised device could do is write some sort of virus to an SD card
There's a reason books can't be updated (Score:5, Insightful)
It's not like they "forgot" that users might want to add new books, the inability of any updatable storage was a design requirement to prevent it from being used for espionage or as a channel to inadvertently bring malware aboard a ship.
This is to prevent it being used to smuggle secret military data ashore, take illicit photos, introduce computer malware or record covert conversations.
Though it seems that there are so many ways for a person to smuggle a MicroSD card into a secure area that an eReader is probably not a huge concern.
Re:There's a reason books can't be updated (Score:5, Interesting)
Getting data onto that MicroSD card would be an issue.
The main reasons for the lockdown on the device is stray EM emissions which can give away a ships position - and that includes peripherals, so no ports. I have no doubt that its cheaper to replace the readers with new ones every year than it is to build in a way to securely updateable.
Re:There's a reason books can't be updated (Score:5, Interesting)
EM emissions in what is effectively a huge Faraday cage? I don't think so.
The ebook lockdown is intended to prevent ex-filtration of security information. I'm rather surprised at the rather restricted number of titles they provide. And it seems that they could have designed it to permit updating of the contents while on shore. Say perhaps with a special loader that cryptographically signs the new content and the actual data transmission path being near field interactions. If such devices were only available at shore bases, it would be cumbersome, but would still allow for the updating of contents while preserving the security aspects of the readers.
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I would guess that many of the e-books on the reader are rules, manuals and procedures for current military hardware and practices which are unlikely to change in the next few years. The military does not like change for the sake of simplicity and reliability. I imagine the e-reader with its fixed documents will fit right in.
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Clearly you followed /. tradition and did not RTFA, since it makes no mention of non-fiction. t appears that these e-readers are simply a method to provide a library of fiction to keep the sailors entertained.
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EM emissions can get out of a Faraday cage. Just not in.
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Yeah, but now the device would cost $1M each and the system would require $200M/year to operate, as opposed to the $50K price tag on these dumb units.
Ok, so I'm pulling numbers out of my ass, but you get the point.
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And don't forget the screen doors. The EM emissions just pass through like water through a sieve.
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You have no idea what the EM restrictions are like on a submarine.
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Really? In a giant, grounded Faraday cage? Maybe for sonic, infrasonic and ultrasonic frequencies, but RF doesn't travel much in water.
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It travels far enough.
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Sure, if you're towing an antenna capable of sending a buttload of power with a wavelength measured between 10 and 100 kilometers...
Those high frequency emissions that any consumer digital device would emit (even when being tortured with a car battery) aren't going to make it very far with any appreciable strength.
You'd be better off trying to detect the sub by looking for magnetic flux disturbances (eg large conductive object moving within the earth's magnetic field) - they mount them to helicopters.
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Well, it looks like either you are well put of date, or those sailors are flouting the rules...
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Nellie Moffitt is a clueless person who shouldn't be quoted on technical manners.
"their GPS ... can give away their position to the enemy"
A GPS receiver in a traditional e-reader (ARE there any traditional e-readers with a GPS?) can't give away your position on a sub because:
1) A GPS receiver is only a receiver
2) It doesn't know your position because it is in a metal tube 100's of feet below the water.
Kindle fire? B&N Nook? Yep both of those "e-readers" have GPS. And you know submarines occasionally do spent time at the surface, where their whereabouts are still a good thing to keep secret? Clearly instead of a more detailed policy they simply exclude any device that might resemble one with such capabilities, as a safeguard.
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Not all Nooks or Kindles have GPS, only the more general-purpose ones. The simple eReaders do not.
They do have wifi, and that is something Moffitt doesn't like. Still seems like it might be cheaper to build one without wifi but with the computer connection.
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Those aren't "traditional" e-readers in the sense of having an eInk display. Both are LCD based tablets with Android.
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Re:There's a reason books can't be updated (Score:5, Insightful)
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I think people are actually reacting with skepticism based on a long history of huge military orders which clearly are not the best value for taxpayer dollar.
Why the fuck should we start now? $2B for a bomber whose primary capability is nuking vast portions of a continent is a poor "Value" according to many, many taxpayers yet there are a few dozen of those things and we don't have slashdot discussions on it. An e-reader that they are procuring a few hundred of? This surely is not the low hanging fruit when it comes to wasted money.
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$2B dollars actually is pretty good for that kind of force projection, delivering a couple cruise missiles beyond air defense can decide a war.
$1.1 trillion for a fighter program that hasn't been delivered yet and actually might not ever is rather different [wikipedia.org]. The B-2 has a big bottom-line number but the development and maintenance programs are really where we get taken to the cleaners. You should smell a rat the moment you see the word "affordable" in a military mission patch [f-16.net].
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For one, it's meant to be shared by the crew, not a personal device. There will be a lot less arguments over what to load, accidental or 'accidental' erasures of other people's books, etc if it is a fixed device. It has what it has, no room to argue.
Re:There's a reason books can't be updated (Score:5, Insightful)
Though it seems that there are so many ways for a person to smuggle a MicroSD card into a secure area that an eReader is probably not a huge concern.
I'd think it would be more of an issue with someone potentially editing or replacing the books, changing vital details in operation manuals. If you cannot change the books, at least you know exactly what they contain.
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So it's updated about exactly as often as a shipboard library would be in the first place. And probably contains more titles... I don't see Navy ships dedicating a lot of space to libraries.
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A long time ago, I was on a submarine. We had a ship's library. It fit into a locker that was slightly smaller than a typical file cabinet drawer.
Re:There's a reason books can't be updated (Score:4, Funny)
For the same of variety, I'm hoping they didn't stock a lot of large print books...
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Not only can you carry your own books onboard... the Navy has had a library service [navymwr.org], which provides books to ships and maintains libraries on base, for decades (at least as far back as WWII AFAIK). This reader is a (piss poor IMO) supplement/replacement for the latter.
Heck, even my submarine (designed and built in the early 60's) had a library space provided. It wasn't much
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They've got 300 popular books and literary classics. It's a lightweight, standardized, secure library for sailors who are bored and want to read. While this would be a terrible consumer device, I think it makes sense for the use case. If you're deployed on a ship for six months, having 300 books to choose from is a lot better than having zero books to choose from.
It's terrible for the use case.
The average size of an eBook in my collection is 1.1MB. The basic Kindle has 1.25GB of available storage. That means it can hold 1,100 books (Amazon claims 1,400). A Kindle is generally used by one person, so that's a huge amount of storage, but if you are sharing among 30 other people (about 150 crew on a US submarine), it makes a lot more sense.
So, why does this e-reader for the Navy hold only 300 books, when over 108,000 are available to sailors (as eBooks) when they are
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If you're deployed for six months and you like to read you've brought your own e-reader loaded with books you want to read with you.
Or not... Or your e-reader can go berserk, borken or otherwise unusable. Shit happens. Having 300 books around is *much* better than nothing.
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If you're deployed for six months and you like to read you've brought your own e-reader loaded with books you want to read with you.
Unless you're not allowed to, in which case, this device is the difference between living in Hell for six months and living in relative contentedness for six months.
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Though it seems that there are so many ways for a person to smuggle a MicroSD card into a secure area that an eReader is probably not a huge concern.
How much experience do you have in securing high-value military devices and how much knowledge dop you have about the reasons for securing such devices?
.
None and none, you say? Gee, I would have never known that from your comment.
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read again.
it's a fucking unconnected kindle. there's zero practical reason why it couldn't update the books that were on it. if the makers had any fucking sense they would have included a loader machine on the ship with 30 000 titles the sailors could pick and choose books from...
but hey, now they can sell another edition next year.
yes, there would be zero fucking security viability in this, except maybe if you count it as a risk that the extended library would have "objectionable content". it is just an e
Comment removed (Score:3, Insightful)
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Or one can assume that 300 titles in the space on one is all they really needed, and that more frequently used manuals will be stored physically.
Or instead of assuming you are smarter that everyone in the procurement process, you could read more and assume less.
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RTFA! It's not used for storing manuals.
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Maybe they only wanted to use American made components, and the largest memory they could find was an old stockpile of 128K DIP-style flash made back in the 80's.
I jest, I jest...
I know that flash memory is still being made in the US (by Intel and maybe others), but seriously, it must be getting pretty damn hard to make any military gear that uses US-only components...
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Or they loaded up a bunch of public domain titles, instead of spending tax payer money on titles that they had no idea would appeal to any of the readers.
I'm sure the military is capable enough to put more than 64MB of memory on a device.
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Yeah, which Bible? Which Koran?
The old standards are just like the new standards - so many to choose from!
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Yeah, which Bible? Which Koran?
Actually, there *are* no alternate versions of the Koran -- or at least there's not supposed to be. Any translation of the Koran is not considered an actual "Koran" for purposes of Islamic law or worship. Anyone who wants to read or recite from the Koran is obliged to learn seventh century Arabic.
So there are no disputes in Islam equivalent to Christian disputes over whether the King James or the Revised Standard Version are more accurate; whether 1 Maccabees or the Epistles of Clement are divinely inspire
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You forgot The Book of Mormon and a few others.
Guess I should had only mentioned one.
Then I could have said "THOSE ARE ALL WRONG!"
Damn religinuts are retarded.
You are so eloquent. Where did you go to school? Get back to us with a larger vocabulary and avoid using insults and slurs. Then and only then will your opinion be worth hearing.
makes sense (Score:5, Insightful)
"The company has already delivered similar gadgets to members of the US Army and other military personnel.
The brainchild of the Navy's General Library Program, the electronic ink Kindle-alike has no internet capability, no removable storage, no camera and no way to add or delete content. This is to prevent it being used to smuggle secret military data ashore, take illicit photos, introduce computer malware or record covert conversations."
Actually makes sense to me.....
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You mean photos of illicit activities.
Let's be honest here: the route the ship took has zero tactical value after the fact, unless they keep on taking the same routes (which would be beyond idiotic). This is about stopping another leak a la Snowden or Manning, which in turn means there's more dirty secrets where those came from. The only real question is: what unsavory activities are being covered up this time?
It would make more sense to clean up their act than live in a constant state o
Re:makes sense (Score:5, Informative)
You mean photos of illicit activities.
No, he means take illicit photos. Not to get in the way of a good conspiracy theory, but there are many highly sensitive areas on a US nuclear submarine that certain foreign powers would love to get pictures of for competitive intelligence purposes. That's what they're worried about, not some coverup of the Navy heartlessly waterboarding harp seals or giving blue whales torpedo enemas.
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How many times do you need to be caught red-handed before assuming you're at it again stops being a conspiracy theory and becomes just common sense? Well, in the US it takes a single serious offence to mark you a felon for life, never to be trusted again, so why not judge the country itself by the same standard?
O RLY? (Score:4, Interesting)
Makes sense (Score:3, Insightful)
Can't have machines capable of transporting unauthorized files or tracking your fleet location on board. Would be idiotic.
This provides a way to give sailors a decent library of books to read without having to find a place to have a dead tree library on a cramped ship.
The concept is perfectly sound, despite obvious failings in the design/specs (only 300 books, and probably thousands of dollars each, hah)
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Not if they want to comply with regulations, they don't. As should hopefully be obvious.
Titles? (Score:5, Interesting)
The WSJ is marginally more informative on the contents:
"The content consists mainly of newer bestsellers and public-domain classics, as well as titles from the Navy reading list and other texts for professional development. Since publishing partners include Simon & Schuster, HarperCollins, Hachette and Random House, the lineup is impressive, ranging from contemporary fiction such as A Game of Thrones and The Girl with a Dragon Tattoo, bestselling non-fiction such as The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, and bonafide nerd favorites including The Lord of the Rings series, Orson Scott Card's Ender's Game, and Stephen King's The Stand."
Anyone have a list, or is it classified? Is 'Mutiny on the Bounty' allowed?
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Why would anyone be inspired by the mutiny on the Bounty? As far as I know, the story goes like this:
16 escaped to Tahiti. A year later, one was killed by a fellow mutineer, who was subsequently killed by an angry mob. Within another year, the Royal Navy arrived and arrested them; 4 drowned. After lengthy trials, 3 were executed, 4 acquitted and 3 pardoned.
The 9 remaining mutineers marooned themselves (along with a group of kidnapped natives) on the deserted Pitcairn island, with all of 4.6 km to spend thei
It doesn't seem so bad to me. (Score:3)
I think they could have put a larger library on it relatively cheaply, but other than that, it makes perfect sense that it can't be connected to a computer network.
Nope. Not so bad at all.
Better Headline (Score:5, Insightful)
"Navy Invents E-reader that is Secure, Meets its Needs; Hated By People Who Will Never See or Use It"
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Re:Better Headline (Score:5, Funny)
Next on Slashdot: "Army tanks are uncomfortable, get horrible mileage."
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why is that cheaper? You still need special hard ware. Special limited hardware, in fact; which means hirer prices. You still need to pay for the specialize OS, and testing, and maintenance, and change management.
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Cheap solution : don't even run an OS. There's likely no need for an OS at all on a single purpose device with limited inputs/output as this. My 1989 Game Boy didn't run an OS and had more abilities than the Navy e-book. Stuff like micro-waves and alarm clocks don't run an OS either.
Put evething : the program, fonts (all sizes and styles pre-baked) and books in a single mask ROM.
Very bad summary title (Score:5, Insightful)
This is not the "Worst" e-Reader ever.
Why do I say that?
Because it is working as designed.
Frankly, for certain high-security situations this kind of "immutable" device is the only kind of device that would be allowed in. So it's either something like this, or books-on-tape/CD/paper/something else.
For slightly less-but-still-very-secure situations you could allow some type of external read-only, no-processor-chip-onboard "expansion pack" memory so that the book content could be switched out without getting a whole new device. I wouldn't use USB though, as that requires a processor on the stick itself.
Also, I'd make very sure the data format was really "data only" not something that could, in theory, be a vector for "code." This would rule out PDF and PostScript. In other words, it would be pretty limited.
The things you absolutely do not want for this type of device in a high-security environment are:
* Any ability to "run code"
* Any wireless
* Any ability to export data other than through the screen (you can't stop someone from photographing the screen)
* Any ability to "hack" the device without physical access and accessing it in a non-standard way (e.g. with a screwdriver). This means the software must be proven to never do anything "bad" other than "just die, requiring a reboot" if the operator is tricked into giving it even carefully-crafted/designed-to-do-bad-things bad data.
In some cases, you do not want it displaying anything other than what is "whitelisted." This can be done by either only displaying properly-digitally-signed files or, as in this case, by only providing a limited set of files and "sealing" the device.
It's not a bug, it's a feature (Score:2)
Why do you think the Navy would want their sailors to read whatever they see fit instead of the wholesome library that was carefully selected for them?
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Being so close to water and all, the entire idea of an e-reader for naval sailors is preposterous.
This is not your bathtub. This is for the pros.
Why would it need updating? (Score:2)
"Moby Dick" has not been updated since originally released in 1851! Nearly all literature is similarly stuck at version 1.0 . Few Navy Manuals / Publications see updates more than every few years.
Perhaps you are thinking of adding to the collection? Rethink your acquisitiveness and participation in the hysteria of new-is-better. Or let the USN rethink it for you!
They have email, but no books? (Score:3)
IIRC Email is far more insecure than any ebook reader.
Hobbled.. (Score:2)
Or hobbled to create the false impression of security, while not actually being secure at all, just terribly inconvenient to use.
Not bad (Score:2)
If the 300 books are worth reading that's decent but not only that, they're all properly bought/licensed. The collective value of the book's data is probably more than that of the hardware itself, ignoring price gouging and low runs.
So there's no 4000 books, but even at $1 a piece a 4000 book device would cost $4000, multiplied by hundreds of units. We can joke at the list of "approved material". It's a bit easier to navigate a list of 300 books than 4000 or 50000, too.
There's the option of releasing new "e
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There are very large numbers of excellent public domain books on Project Gutenberg and others. You do not have to pay $1/copy for, say, Dickens novels.
Dear Berenice Baker.... (Score:3)
Also interesting to note, the submitter submits things from the same group of sites...
Naval-technology.com
Power-technology.com
Army-technology.com
Offshore-technology.com
Pharmaceutical-technology.com
Hydrocarbon-technology.com
There are articles about NeRD going back days. I guess these days news is more about rehashing someone else's news and getting traffic to your site.
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Fiat S.p.A. (Fabbrica Italiana Automobili Torino) [wikipedia.org] You might want to find another example.
TL;DR (Score:2)
Kindle: Waah, Amazon can take away my titles at any time!
Navy: Waah, I can't change anything!
Army Build Worst High Efficiency Car! (Score:2)
Hummer.
Air Force Builds Worst Passenger Jet, Only Hold 1!
F16, F35, etc.
A lot of use specific military stuff has little to no application outside the military. The headline and summary is stupid.
CmdrTaco says (Score:2)
I can't imagine the use for this. (Score:2)
They could have fitted a receive-only radio (Score:2)
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You really have no clue about military needs, do you?
What waste? I hear it all the time, but no one can point to any. Oh, by 'waste' you mean thing you limited experience and complete ignorance deems as waste?
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it's all fun and games until someone tapes the entry of nuclear launch codes onto their device and shares it to youtube. or the workings of secret equipment that make our subs the best in the world
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Yes, because we should force the military to use consumer level products which might not meet their particular requirements. After all, the money saved in using a consumer product versus developing a secure, rugged, locked-down, for-military-use-only device won't be offset by people exploiting said devices (since they won't live up to military level security) or by the devices failing when they are subjected to military conditions (not what your average consumer puts their devices through). Kindle/iPad/et
Re:Hmmm, So its like a book? (Score:4, Interesting)
Manuals generally can't be updated unless new sections are added or pages added.
Actually most technical manuals onboard ships that are still kept in paper form are designed to be easily updated. The pages aren't glued in place - they are three-hole punched and kept in binders. When an update to the manual comes out, they only need to distribute the specific pages which have changed. Each page has a revision number on it, and the manuals will contain a "List of effective pages" noting the most current version of every page in the manual.
This means you can now assign people to do nothing but go through paper manuals page-by-page and verify that every page is present and at the correct revision.
Re:Hmmm, So its like a book? (Score:4, Insightful)
This is not too different from commercial aircraft.
Take a Boeing 747. They've been in production for almost 50 years, been through dozens of iterations and tweaks, man different variations, and quite possibly no two are exactly alike.
You essentially need to be able to get the full manual as it applies to any given aircraft, because over time there's been upgrades, changes, recalls, and everything else you can imagine.
When you have a few million parts flying in formation, making sure you know which specific parts are in which specific plane is a Very Important Task.
And, compared to the cost of, say, an aircraft carrier of a submarine, the cost of that is pretty insignificant.
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If they actually pushed the manuals for the effin' piddly crap you have to deal with on those things, it would maybe actually serve a purpose.
In case you don't know: Whenever you get some "new" device in any army anywhere on this planet, one thing is certain: The manual is missing, mangled or the critical pages (especially tables and the like) are suspiciously absent.
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Right, got it. Everybody is stupid, except for you.
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Actually, I'm surprised that they don't have some kind of proprietary nonvolatile memory device where they can groups of books, so you can swap them out.