Riding the wind of rebirth

"The more rockets and satellites of the same model that are produced, the lower the cost will be in the design and verification phases. With more workshops, production tasks can be arranged more flexibly, and more rockets and satellites can be built. This can bring all the plans forward significantly."

"However, there will be a queue at the window in the end, which is a bit troublesome..." Old Zhang frowned.

Large-scale engineering projects are like this: a single move can affect the whole situation. Every aspect must be carefully considered. It is often not something that can be solved simply by expanding production. Materials, funds, manpower, coordination, production, debugging, acceptance... bottlenecks can appear everywhere. If a problem occurs in one place, the entire progress will be slowed down. Therefore, the plan must be adjusted as a whole and a feasibility analysis must be conducted before any actual rectification can be implemented.

Fortunately, everyone was an expert and had a clear understanding of the project, so they quickly identified several key issues.

"This problem is not unsolvable," said Professor Yu. "We can calculate it more precisely and create more launch windows."

“But…” Old Zhang was in charge of this part of the work: “The Institute of Computing Technology already has a heavy workload, unless…”

At this point, Old Zhang looked at Mai Xiaomiao: "Xiaomiao, could you ask Xiaozhi to help us out?"

“That’s right! Those two IBM mainframes at the Institute of Computing Technology can’t possibly compete with Xiaozhi’s nonlinear supercomputing matrix!” Old Yu said. “If this problem can be solved, then the plan to expand the production line will basically be fine.”

"Isn't the Institute of Computing Technology mostly focused on simulating linear calculations?" Zhou Zhi said. "I don't understand these aspects, but I imagine that the satellite launch window and trajectory selection are probably related to the laws governing the movement of celestial bodies in the solar system, right?"

“That’s one aspect,” Old Zhang said. “It also depends on the transportation vehicle, the load, the delivery location, and so on.”

"However, these calculations are actually simpler; the more complex parts are more related to weather conditions," Zhang said. "Moreover, the timeliness requirements for this kind of forecast are even higher, making the calculations more complex."

Upon hearing this, Zhou Zhi felt relieved and looked at Xiao Miao, saying, "If it's weather forecasting, then this really is Xiao Zhi's first job, right, Xiao Miao?"

"Yes, Xiaozhi's acceptance test involved collaborating with the National Meteorological Center to perform forecasting calculations using meteorological data from recent years, and then comparing and analyzing the forecast results with the actual results to obtain a reliable probability curve."

"I am quite confident that Xiaozhi would be able to do this job."

"Won't there be any confidentiality issues?" Zhou Zhi then became concerned about another aspect: "Just like our cooperation with the ship design institute, there are very strict confidentiality requirements. We don't even know the details of what they're tinkering with in Xiaozhi."

"Don't you have data black box technology?" Old Zhang asked with a smile.

“Old Zhang, you must know very well, so please don’t joke with us.” Zhou Zhi laughed: “The amount of data from simulating water flow cavitation is not even in the same league as the amount of data from combining astronomy and meteorology to extrapolate launch windows and trajectories. Our data black box technology can’t contain such a large computational data unit.”

"Xiao Miao, can you give me some ideas?" Old Yu looked at Mai Xiaomiao: "You are the expert in this area."

“Actually, we can design a data exchange interface.” Mai Xiaomiao thought for a moment: “This interface is mainly used for exchanging unit results between data black boxes and public data.”

"What I mean is that we should delegate most of the nonlinear computation tasks to Xiaozhi to perform in the public area. The confidentiality requirements for this part of the data are not very high, but you need to determine how to sample it, what methods to use, and what scale and depth of computation to perform."

"This program can be sent to Xiaozhi via an interface to instruct it to complete the calculations, and then the results are pushed back to the black box, which is considered to have completed your task. As for what these results are and how they are used, outsiders have no idea."

"Could the program emanating from this black-box interface be obtained by someone with malicious intent, and then analyzed through various methods to obtain its operational logic, ultimately deducing what we are actually doing?"

“This part of the program is only a portion of your calculations. Although crucial, it’s not clearly defined. While you could glean some clues through rigorous analysis, it wouldn’t reveal the whole picture,” Mai Xiaomiao said. “Furthermore, we can leverage the characteristics of Xiaozhi’s neuron-like computing system to design a dynamic interface mechanism.” “We can design the interface with random neuron output and feedback patterns. Which neuron a random output is sent to is only known and recorded by the underlying control program of the black-box user. The program is distributed across a series of output neuron interface tasks. This way, anyone wanting to obtain the program must master the random sequence of all neuron output interfaces to piece together the original program. And aside from Xiaozhi possessing this capability, it’s virtually impossible for other external programs to spy on or collect this information.”

Zhou Zhi thought for a moment: "Then does the black box have an additional function called fuzzy output mode? The information exchanged between the data black box module and the supercomputing matrix can only be obtained by the information releaser inside the black box?"

Mai Xiaomiao laughed and said, "You're so good at naming things, Zhouzi. From now on, we'll just call her 'Fuzzy Output Mode'."

"However, this pattern isn't foolproof; it can still be deciphered, as long as..."

"Just what?"

"As long as the other party also has a supercomputing matrix and conducts targeted analysis on Xiaozhi's black-box data exchange, there is still a certain probability that they can gather all the effective information units of the fuzzy output."

Upon hearing this, Old Yu was immediately relieved: "Then let's proceed with this plan! I knew inviting you all here would be very beneficial; now we have solutions to many problems, don't we? Let's leave it at that for today. Come on, let's go to the cafeteria for a celebratory meal! We'll report this idea to our superiors when it gets light!"

"We have a few more partners in the observation hall..."

"Then let's invite them all!" Old Yu laughed. "I can afford to treat them!"

As expected, he could afford it. When Zhou Zhi and his friends excitedly arrived at the canteen, they realized that what Mr. Yu meant by treating them was actually just the canteen's standard breakfast.

Looking at the time, it was already six in the morning, which was also the time when military units could eat.

It's not that the breakfast at the base wasn't plentiful, but it fell far short of Zhou Zhi's expectations of a truly generous treat.

The team members were quite excited, carrying stainless steel trays and bowls as they lined up to get their meals from the base staff, who were all dressed in military uniforms, blue lab coats, and white lab coats.

Actually, this method is similar to that on university campuses, except that the food is more refined and caters to both northern and southern tastes.

Noodle dishes include pancakes, fried dough sticks, glutinous rice balls, steamed buns, twisted rolls, steamed bread, cakes...

There are plain congee, vegetable congee, meat congee, eight-treasure congee...

Drinks include soy milk, milk, juice...

There are also eggs, fried eggs, steamed eggs, ham sausages, bacon, and various side dishes...

In addition, there are noodles, rice noodles, wontons, dumplings, glutinous rice balls...

It was a very lavish meal. (End of Chapter)