Was DS9 up to date with UFP safety standards?

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Was DS9 up to date with UFP safety standards?

Post by Lord Revan »

After seeing the SFdebris review for the DS9 episode "Civil Defense" , I started wondering about 1 thing. I seem to remember O'Brien complaining that cardassian systems on DS9 weren't up to the Federation safety and quality standards and that most of his work seemed to revolve around dealing with potential death traps either intentional ones (left there by the cardassian) or unintentional ones due to shoddy workmanship. Is this something that actually happend in the series or is it something I've picked up somewhere and falsely (though unintentionally) attribute to the series itself?
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Re: Was DS9 up to date with UFP safety standards?

Post by Lonestar »

There was that episode where Cardassian counter-grav plating wasn't compatible with Federation anti-grav tech. It's why wheelchairs and gurneys were used rather than hover-chairs and whatnot.
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Re: Was DS9 up to date with UFP safety standards?

Post by Prometheus Unbound »

When they first got the station, no it wasn't. In "Destiny" (the 3 cardassian scientists, the comet and the wormhole) the Cardassians express surprise at O'Brien's fiddling and adding in backups and redundancies (3 levels of redundancies). O'Brien responds that Starfleet specs are more thorough than Cardassian ones (paraphrased) which the Cardassians scoff at ("You need a second auxiliary backup??").

So by season 3/4 it was - and starfleet had been upgrading the station. I'd imagine by season 4 it was "up to spec" and certainly there were very few occurances after then, of O'Brien whinging about the station computer like he did in the 1st and 2nd seasons.

The only thing that probably goes against Starfleet Health and Safety Regulations at this point are those stupid steps in front of each door which I can only assume would mean people tripping up all the damned time in the corridors, but apparently not.

http://vignette2.wikia.nocookie.net/mem ... -prefix=en

You can see there, the doors have about 2-3 inches of ... plastic? metal? for no reason. Well, I suppose it helps make it air-tight in the event of an explosion in the refinery I guess - maybe more air tight than the doors on the Enterprise - but the Enterprise ones never seemed to be an issue or give way due to vacuum.

Some stuff on DS9 didn't work (anti grav stuff sometimes) but that's not a "Safety issue" that's just a "it ain't working" issue. DS9's computer was much slower than that of the Enterprise (Birthright, Emissary, A Man Alone) - but that's not a safety specs thing.
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Re: Was DS9 up to date with UFP safety standards?

Post by atg »

Prometheus Unbound wrote:DS9's computer was much slower than that of the Enterprise (Birthright, Emissary, A Man Alone) - but that's not a safety specs thing.
Except the Feds didn't bother to do the equivalent of a full wipe and reinstall, or just canning the computer and putting a standard Federation one in its place. So it becomes a safety issue when such minor things like anti-worker riot software starts taking over the station attempting to kill all onboard.

That episode showed that they didn't even have full codes for their own station! (They were still using Cardassian ones) Who knows what other backdoors could have been hidden. Either Federation security procedures are a joke or the DS9 crew was incompetent in that area.
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Re: Was DS9 up to date with UFP safety standards?

Post by Lord Revan »

atg wrote:
Prometheus Unbound wrote:DS9's computer was much slower than that of the Enterprise (Birthright, Emissary, A Man Alone) - but that's not a safety specs thing.
Except the Feds didn't bother to do the equivalent of a full wipe and reinstall, or just canning the computer and putting a standard Federation one in its place. So it becomes a safety issue when such minor things like anti-worker riot software starts taking over the station attempting to kill all onboard.

That episode showed that they didn't even have full codes for their own station! (They were still using Cardassian ones) Who knows what other backdoors could have been hidden. Either Federation security procedures are a joke or the DS9 crew was incompetent in that area.
or third the cardassian systems were made so that a full reinstall was impossible without a special code the feds don't have and trying to force a system wipe, remove the main computer or bypass it would probably trigger said anti-riot software. You got remember that cardassians trashed the place when the left it's highly unlikely that cardassians exactly told federation about every "safety" precaution they left in there or gave federation any codes beyond the ones absolutely needed to run the place even Gul Dukat wasn't told about the part where the anti-riot soft-ware could lock him in on the station while it was counting to self-destruct. You got remember that cardasssians give the romulans a run for their money in being paranoid and devious.

Basically it's neither DS9 crew isn't a incompetent nor is Starfleet safety standards a joke but they got dealt a shitty hand with Terok Nor and fixing it without full station shutdown and possibly years of investigation and repair/rebuilding, something the Bajoran goverment might not approve of after all DS9 was only ran by Starfleet it was owned by the bajoran goverment. So no I don't think DS9 crew was incompenent enough to not notice an easy solution to pretty much all their problems but rather they stuck between cardassian anti-tamper precautions and bajoran redtape. I'm pretty sure had Starfleet had their will with DS9 they would turned Terok Nor into scrap metal and built a UFP designed station in orbit of Bajor but the bajoran goverment said no to that. So if anyone is incompetent in this matter it's the bajoran goverment forcing the DS9 crew to work with Terok Nor with all the booby traps that might lay hidden rather either allowing the station to be scrapped or be off-line for years while engineers looked thru it with a fine comb to get rid of faulty tech or booby traps.
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Re: Was DS9 up to date with UFP safety standards?

Post by atg »

Lord Revan wrote: ...the cardassian systems were made so that a full reinstall was impossible without a special code the feds don't have...
..You got remember that cardassians trashed the place when the left it's highly unlikely that cardassians exactly told federation about every "safety" precaution they left in there or gave federation any codes beyond the ones absolutely needed to run the place...
...You got remember that cardasssians give the romulans a run for their money in being paranoid and devious...
These are all *exactly* the reasons why the Federation should have ripped the computers out and replaced them straight away. IIRC when they took over the main computer wasn't even running, so they deliberately repaired a system that they didn't have full control over. That is incompetence.

A couple episodes into the series, so weeks to months at most after the take over, they find a Bajoran terrorist device attached to one of the systems that infected station personnel with a deadly virus. Was the response to rip out the Cardassian computers or perform a byte-by-byte analysis of the code to ensure nothing similar could happen? Well the anti-riot software clearly shows they didn't. That is incompetence.

Quark - A known thief/smuggler/crook is found to have relatively high level access to the system. Higher than the own station security chief, and nothing is changed. Who knows what other criminals, assassins, etc, else could have access to the system. Not doing a basic security audit when taking over is incompetence.

Its also repeatedly mentioned throughout the series that the Cardassian computer doesn't run things to the same safety protocols as the Federation, and they essentially don't have the ability to change that within their access levels.

These are just examples off of the top of my head and the steps that would have stopped them are incredibly basic IT security and safety precautions.

To try a real world analogy, this would be like the Ukraine asking the USA to administer a former base of the USSR on their soil, and the USA not replacing the control systems even after it floods the place with nerve gas.
Basically it's neither DS9 crew isn't a incompetent nor is Starfleet safety standards a joke but they got dealt a shitty hand with Terok Nor and fixing it without full station shutdown and possibly years of investigation and repair/rebuilding, something the Bajoran goverment might not approve of after all DS9 was only ran by Starfleet it was owned by the bajoran goverment. So no I don't think DS9 crew was incompenent enough to not notice an easy solution to pretty much all their problems but rather they stuck between cardassian anti-tamper precautions and bajoran redtape. I'm pretty sure had Starfleet had their will with DS9 they would turned Terok Nor into scrap metal and built a UFP designed station in orbit of Bajor but the bajoran goverment said no to that. So if anyone is incompetent in this matter it's the bajoran goverment forcing the DS9 crew to work with Terok Nor with all the booby traps that might lay hidden rather either allowing the station to be scrapped or be off-line for years while engineers looked thru it with a fine comb to get rid of faulty tech or booby traps.
The Bajorans owned it, but all running of the stations, command crew, maintenance, new installations, were run by the Federation. The only 'mandatory' Bajoran officer was Kira as the official liason officer. Even Odo and his security team were only tolerated and were kicked out for a while when it suited the Federation. It was the Federation and the Federation crews responsibility to make sure the station was safe and secure. Once the aphasia virus incident happened Sisko and O'brien should have performed a full tear down of the entire station.
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Re: Was DS9 up to date with UFP safety standards?

Post by Khaat »

Should have, yes, but s) budget (time of qualified personnel more than anything else?) and b) plot required otherwise.

I can't see the Bajorans fighting to protect a symbol of Cardassian oppression in orbit over Bajor (thank the Prophets they moved it to the wormhole.) But I can also see the diplomatic situation the Federation is in: there may be restrictions (by treaty) on where they can build their stations/starbases (I think that was the reason they moved DS9 in the first place.)
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Re: Was DS9 up to date with UFP safety standards?

Post by Lord Revan »

something the size of Terok Nor isn't like a PC desktop where you can unplug a system and plug a replacement in mere minutes and need I remind you that DS9 isn't sitting on a planet, your analogy is wrong in that unlike your USSR base, DS9 could kill everyone if you didn't make absolutely sure that the old systems understood the new mainframe 100%. With a base that's on a habitble planet like Earth, if the mainframe fries it's no big deal really. on a space station it's a major issue especially if it fries other systems as well in the process.

Why I mentioned the bajoran goverment is because it's pretty clear from the early episodes that bajoran goverment wouldn't allow DS9 to be taken off-line by starfleet for any signifigant period of time or dismantled either, the bajorans might not like the starfleet presence but they see Terok Nor as theirs. it would be impossible for starfleet to take down DS9 for long enough time to replace the countless systems DS9 has all over the place (it's not a 1 room office with maybe 3 terminals at most but a mile wide space station) the bajorans wouldn't allow it and to do it without bajoran consent would diplomatic screw that could be only made worse if they deorbit DS9 and crash it in middle of major bajoran city, remember that UFP is trying to have bajorans join them so screwing them over isn't an option.

I'm pretty sure that the DS9 crew was updating the systems but it was going slowing since they essentially have to hotswap systems instead of taking the whole thing down and inspecting it with time.

Basically it wasn't DS9 crew going "duh this looks funny lets poke it and see what happens" but rather bajorans saying "we want this station running yestarday and we're not taking 'no it's not safe' for an anwser" and DS9 crew having work with that.
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Re: Was DS9 up to date with UFP safety standards?

Post by Lord Revan »

Khaat wrote:Should have, yes, but s) budget (time of qualified personnel more than anything else?) and b) plot required otherwise.

I can't see the Bajorans fighting to protect a symbol of Cardassian oppression in orbit over Bajor (thank the Prophets they moved it to the wormhole.) But I can also see the diplomatic situation the Federation is in: there may be restrictions (by treaty) on where they can build their stations/starbases (I think that was the reason they moved DS9 in the first place.)
the thing to remember about DS9 is that people aren't always logical so Terok Nor is seen as symbol the Cardassian occupation by many bajorans, but they also see as "theirs" so it's theirs to destroy or preserve. It's not for the federation to dictate what to do with it. Logical no but then people rarely are. It's kind of like that Volgograd in Russia wanted to return to the name of "Stalingrad" even though Stalin wasn't exactly well like in modern Russia (at least at the time that change was in the news) and uses the name "Stalingrad" during 9 special days related to the famous battle.
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Re: Was DS9 up to date with UFP safety standards?

Post by Lord Revan »

Something people seem to forget in their zeal to paint starfleet as a bunch of drooling morons that would make Trump look like a Paragon of competence and that's that the bajorans didn't trust starfleet or the federation at all, so getting DS9 online ASAP regardless of how safe or useble the station was and federation bound to it was in a way to make sure that if the cardassians would return that federation wouldn't just go "you're on your own, it was nice knowing you" and leave Bajor, at least that's is the point of view of the more rational part of the bajoran goverment.

To have something the federation would willing to protect so when the cardassians came back Starfleet would be forced to fight rather just watching from the sidelines like during the occupation. So to have DS9 spend months or even years with minimal crew (really just repair and inspection teams) and essentially off-line wouldn't sit well with those members of the goverment and the rest of bajoran goverment hated non-belivers on princible anyway so UFP wouldn't find any support there.

I remember that cardassians didn't leave bajor out of the kindness of their hearts and would have taken any chance to retake Bajor indeed the only reason cardassian didn't retake Bajor during the dominion war was that bajorans made a pack with founders preventing cardassians from taking Bajor without upsetting their (much more powerful) allies.
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Re: Was DS9 up to date with UFP safety standards?

Post by FaxModem1 »

DS9 always seemed to be a frontier place for the UFP, it took them a while just to get anything functioning due to the Cardassians stripping the place.
Commence station log, Deep Space Nine, Commander Benjamin Sisko, Stardate 46388.2. At the request of the Bajoran provisional government, Starfleet has agreed to establish a Federation presence in this system following the withdrawal of Cardassian occupational forces. The first contingent of officers, including my Chief of Operations, Miles O'Brien, arrived two days ago on the Enterprise.

[Promenade]

(The place looks like it's been in the middle of a war zone. O'Brien is in black overalls with coloured shoulders whilst Sisko is in the TNG style uniform still.)
O'BRIEN: I'm told the Cardassians decided to have some fun the day they left. Four Bajorans were killed trying to protect their shops.
SISKO: Why hasn't anybody cleaned this up?
O'BRIEN: We've got all available personnel assigned to repairing primary systems, sir. The Cardassians took every component of value. We're virtually defenceless. I discussed this with Major Kira, the attaché assigned here by the Bajoran government and we decided
Do keep in mind that the UFP had more than one priority here.
One, establish a Starfleet presence there.
Two, keep friendly relations with the Bajorans.
Three, keep the Bajoran government from collapsing.
Four, make sure that the Cardassians don't take the station right back.
Five, groom Bajor for UFP membership once the previous steps are accomplished.

Then, suddenly, Six, guard the wormhole.

So, Starfleet, in a cold war with the Romulans, and apparently seeking a peace treaty with the Cardassians, sent Bajor supplies and occasional patrols to keep the area safe. Sisko and company have to try and fulfill all of the above tasks, while also dealing with problems of the week and Bajor unrest. What does Starfleet give Sisko to accomplish these tasks? About 30 Starfleet officers and crewmen, three runabouts, and occasional help from ships in the area.(For example, the Enterprise visits DS9 in one episode just to help install new replicators.)

So, Sisko has to have a base on Day 1 and onward, otherwise the Cardassians get opportunistic. While also not offending the Bajorans, who are, understandably, very wary of outsiders. This, combined with the general portrayal that Starfleet is stretched thin, means that they can't dedicate a huge presence there.

We also see that the crew are also constantly working to make Bajor have a quality of life above 'starving disease ridden ghetto.' And they have to make sure to do this while keeping the Bajorans isolationists happy. After all, the Cardassians came in and built a military refining station in orbit and raped their planet for half a century. The Federation really doesn't want to be viewed as the new boss, same as the old boss.

Years later, Starfleet is able to give Sisko the Defiant, then a year later, upgrade the station to be battle ready. And this is only when they have the Boogeyman of the Dominion around to scare up resources.

Tl:Dr Sisko made do with what he had, and did his best.
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Re: Was DS9 up to date with UFP safety standards?

Post by atg »

Lord Revan wrote:something the size of Terok Nor isn't like a PC desktop where you can unplug a system and plug a replacement in mere minutes and need I remind you that DS9 isn't sitting on a planet, your analogy is wrong in that unlike your USSR base, DS9 could kill everyone if you didn't make absolutely sure that the old systems understood the new mainframe 100%. With a base that's on a habitble planet like Earth, if the mainframe fries it's no big deal really. on a space station it's a major issue especially if it fries other systems as well in the process.
You realise that these are all reasons for exactly why the Federation should have replaced the computer before taking over fully right? If things are that risky then they should have made sure that they had full control over the station. But hey, its not like there was software lurking that could create an aphasic virus or attempt to murder everyone on the station. Or that a known criminal had better access codes to the Cardassian computer than the security chief. Oh wait...
Why I mentioned the bajoran goverment is because it's pretty clear from the early episodes that bajoran goverment wouldn't allow DS9 to be taken off-line by starfleet for any signifigant period of time or dismantled either, the bajorans might not like the starfleet presence but they see Terok Nor as theirs. it would be impossible for starfleet to take down DS9 for long enough time to replace the countless systems DS9 has all over the place (it's not a 1 room office with maybe 3 terminals at most but a mile wide space station) the bajorans wouldn't allow it and to do it without bajoran consent would diplomatic screw that could be only made worse if they deorbit DS9 and crash it in middle of major bajoran city, remember that UFP is trying to have bajorans join them so screwing them over isn't an option.

I'm pretty sure that the DS9 crew was updating the systems but it was going slowing since they essentially have to hotswap systems instead of taking the whole thing down and inspecting it with time.

Basically it wasn't DS9 crew going "duh this looks funny lets poke it and see what happens" but rather bajorans saying "we want this station running yestarday and we're not taking 'no it's not safe' for an anwser" and DS9 crew having work with that.
And for all the Federation knew there could have been a trojan in the systems that would have de-orbited the station and crashed it into the middle of a major Bajoran city. They had no idea what was lurking behind the scenes. In fact that would have been a perfect thing for the Cardassian's to have done to drive a wedge between the Federation and Bajor. Station crashes, any possible evidence of Cardassian involvement gets destroyed in said crash, Bajor blames the poor Federation crew for the massive loss of life...

But wait you say! Wouldn't the Bajorans instead suspect that the Cardassian's left something behind to do just that? Cardassian answer: Surely the Federation wouldn't have been so incompetent to take over the station without checking for such things. Clearly their crew didn't know what they were doing...

The Federation/Starfleet absolutely should have insisted on being in full control of the station and its systems and to hell with the Bajoran's answer. Any other response is incompetence or an institutionalized lack of care for safety, both for their crew and for the civilians on the station. Again this is basic systems security. Who else would the Bajorans have turned to anyway? The Romulans? The Klingons? Back to the Cardassians? Hah. Bajor needed the Federation more than the Federation needed Bajor, and Major Kira even makes this point to that Bajoran extremist that tried to collapse the wormhole.

Even IF we allow for them not wanting to do it when they first took over, it absolutely should have been done when the systems make a virus that tried to kill everyone on the station. A virus that didn't spread off station ONLY because a freighter that attempted to escape was in need of repair and exploded. If the efforts to find a cure had failed what would have Starfleet's answer have been? "Lol woops send in the next lot of suckers crew. Can't annoy the Bajorans!".

They should have learned from this experience, and the fact they didn't is a very damming mark on the crew and on Starfleet. They had NO IDEA that another system couldn't do the same thing, but this time the virus makes it off station to Bajor or other worlds and spreads from there.

And then the worker riot protocol tries to kill the crew and civilians on the station because they failed to learn from experience. If Starfleet said no Sisko should have resigned his command in protest to draw attention to the failing and try to protect not just his crew but also the civilian population of the station.
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Re: Was DS9 up to date with UFP safety standards?

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atg wrote:And for all the Federation knew there could have been a trojan in the systems that would have de-orbited the station and crashed it into the middle of a major Bajoran city. They had no idea what was lurking behind the scenes. In fact that would have been a perfect thing for the Cardassian's to have done to drive a wedge between the Federation and Bajor. Station crashes, any possible evidence of Cardassian involvement gets destroyed in said crash, Bajor blames the poor Federation crew for the massive loss of life...

But wait you say! Wouldn't the Bajorans instead suspect that the Cardassian's left something behind to do just that? Cardassian answer: Surely the Federation wouldn't have been so incompetent to take over the station without checking for such things. Clearly their crew didn't know what they were doing...

The Federation/Starfleet absolutely should have insisted on being in full control of the station and its systems and to hell with the Bajoran's answer. Any other response is incompetence or an institutionalized lack of care for safety, both for their crew and for the civilians on the station. Again this is basic systems security. Who else would the Bajorans have turned to anyway? The Romulans? The Klingons? Back to the Cardassians? Hah. Bajor needed the Federation more than the Federation needed Bajor, and Major Kira even makes this point to that Bajoran extremist that tried to collapse the wormhole.

Even IF we allow for them not wanting to do it when they first took over, it absolutely should have been done when the systems make a virus that tried to kill everyone on the station. A virus that didn't spread off station ONLY because a freighter that attempted to escape was in need of repair and exploded. If the efforts to find a cure had failed what would have Starfleet's answer have been? "Lol woops send in the next lot of suckers crew. Can't annoy the Bajorans!".

They should have learned from this experience, and the fact they didn't is a very damming mark on the crew and on Starfleet. They had NO IDEA that another system couldn't do the same thing, but this time the virus makes it off station to Bajor or other worlds and spreads from there.

And then the worker riot protocol tries to kill the crew and civilians on the station because they failed to learn from experience. If Starfleet said no Sisko should have resigned his command in protest to draw attention to the failing and try to protect not just his crew but also the civilian population of the station.
Congratulations, the Circle just got more legitimacy in the Bajoran government because you think making DS9 a fully operational station is more important than saving a Bajoran village from a plague, or helping with a power plant to keep people from freezing to death, or building a hospital, or making sure that supplies are being delivered to Bajor on-time for rebuilding purposes. Sometimes, resource management constrains your options. Who knew?
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Re: Was DS9 up to date with UFP safety standards?

Post by FaxModem1 »

It's also worth noting that keeping the station functional was a full time job for O'brien.
O'BRIEN: I see the problem now. You've got a bad ODN relay here. We'll have to replace the whole unit.
WORF: How long will it take?
O'BRIEN: Two or three hours. But after that, it'll work like a charm.
WORF: Until the next time it breaks down.
O'BRIEN: That's the problem when you combine Cardassian, Bajoran and Federation technology. None of it was meant to work together.
WORF: How do you tolerate working in this environment?
O'BRIEN: It's a lot easier than working on the Enterprise.
WORF: Easier? The Enterprise never had these kind of problems.
O'BRIEN: Tell me about it. Have you have any idea how bored I used to get sitting in the Transporter room waiting for something to break down? Here, I've a half dozen new problems every day. This station needs me. Oh, do me a favour. Hand me the coil spanner.
So much so, that whenever he went on leave, the station broke down:
(Odo and Quark enter through different doors.)
QUARK: Major, I'm sorry
ODO: Excuse me, Major
ODO + Odo: Go ahead.
QUARK: There's something wrong with
ODO: I need a
KIRA: All right. You first, then you.
ODO: I need an engineering crew to run a diagnostic on the internal security sensors. There's been an unusual number of false alarms lately.
KIRA: I'll have someone take a look as soon as possible. Now, Quark.
QUARK: There's something wrong with the fire suppression system in the bar. Every time I serve a flaming cocktail, the system engages and snuffs it out.
KIRA: I'll put it on the list.
QUARK: Please do. You have no idea what people are willing to pay for a glass of burning alcohol.
BASHIR: Excuse me. Major?
KIRA: Oh, let me guess. There's a malfunction in the Infirmary.
BASHIR: How did you know?
(The turbolift stops just below the floor level)
WORF: Major, there is something wrong with the turbolift.
KIRA: I can see that.
DAX: We seem to be having a lot of system glitches.
KIRA: It happens every time Chief O'Brien goes away.
WORF: I do not understand why his staff cannot keep the station running in his absence.
QUARK: He must have left my idiot brother in charge.
KIRA: The engineering crew are doing the best they can.
DAX: The problem is no one knows how the Chief keeps all this Federation and Cardassian technology working together.
QUARK: We've got to do something. This can't go on.
Supposition: Cardassian technology and computers are required to keep the station running, without it, the whole thing becomes cantankerous. However, you want Starfleet and Bajoran tech so that you have some security. Without a master of maintnenance like O'Brien fixing everything, the station becomes a floating relic and nothing else. This might be why they need Cardassian software, Federation software, and Bajoran software, to keep everything in check.

Though, in keeping with my resources argument, it could just be that DS9 needs a lot of people to keep it constantly running, and like any overly swamped office or workplace, one person leaving is enough to make the whole place fall out of sync.
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Re: Was DS9 up to date with UFP safety standards?

Post by atg »

FaxModem1 wrote:Congratulations, the Circle just got more legitimacy in the Bajoran government
The Circle was an unknown entity when Starfleet took over, they didn't find out about them until circa a year after the take over (also roughly a year after the first time the station tried to kill everyone on board...) of DS9, and would not have been an influence in any Starfleet decision regarding how to take over the station.
because you think making DS9 a fully operational station is more important than saving a Bajoran village from a plague, or helping with a power plant to keep people from freezing to death, or building a hospital, or making sure that supplies are being delivered to Bajor on-time for rebuilding purposes. Sometimes, resource management constrains your options. Who knew?
Where exactly did I say it was more important than the relief efforts? I didn't. I said it shouldn't have been made operational with a live crew and civilians until it could be made safely operational. Why is it an either/or anyway?

There is no real reason why the relief efforts couldn't have been coordinated from the ground. Despite its impressive looking size, the shape of the hull form of DS9 limits the available space (compared to the same dimensions but more 'filled in') so its utility would be reduced for storage compared to planet side facilities. On that topic why the hell can't they just replicate the food if things are that bad instead of having to do things like trading with the Ferengi for fertilizer to grow food? Sort out naturally grown food after people have stopped starving.
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Re: Was DS9 up to date with UFP safety standards?

Post by Prometheus Unbound »

FaxModem1 wrote:
Supposition: Cardassian technology and computers are required to keep the station running, without it, the whole thing becomes cantankerous. However, you want Starfleet and Bajoran tech so that you have some security. Without a master of maintnenance like O'Brien fixing everything, the station becomes a floating relic and nothing else. This might be why they need Cardassian software, Federation software, and Bajoran software, to keep everything in check.

Though, in keeping with my resources argument, it could just be that DS9 needs a lot of people to keep it constantly running, and like any overly swamped office or workplace, one person leaving is enough to make the whole place fall out of sync.
Also supporting this is the Voyager episode Dreadnaught. Dreadnaught was the Cardassian missile - Torres says they had to keep the computer in the missile but reprogrammed it from scratch - but even then the Cardassians had hidden layers and in the end she's tried to put in a Federation and a Cardassian computer into one device and it starts fighting itself - each computer thinks the other is malware. And that was just ... an engine with a warhead on it.
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Re: Was DS9 up to date with UFP safety standards?

Post by Lord Revan »

atg wrote:
FaxModem1 wrote:Congratulations, the Circle just got more legitimacy in the Bajoran government
The Circle was an unknown entity when Starfleet took over, they didn't find out about them until circa a year after the take over (also roughly a year after the first time the station tried to kill everyone on board...) of DS9, and would not have been an influence in any Starfleet decision regarding how to take over the station.
just because a specific movement or organization is unknown to starfleet at this point, it doesn't mean the potential of such a movement existing is also unknown. This wasn't some random system Starfleet had just made first contact with, Occupation of Bajor was known to starfleet and thus would suspect there were radical elements within the bajoran goverment even if they couldn't name them so in a effect yes the Circle would influence how Starfleet treated taking over DS9. Also the fact that the bajoran goverment distrusted the motives of starfleet was no big secret so that would also limit how the federation could realistically act.
because you think making DS9 a fully operational station is more important than saving a Bajoran village from a plague, or helping with a power plant to keep people from freezing to death, or building a hospital, or making sure that supplies are being delivered to Bajor on-time for rebuilding purposes. Sometimes, resource management constrains your options. Who knew?
Where exactly did I say it was more important than the relief efforts? I didn't. I said it shouldn't have been made operational with a live crew and civilians until it could be made safely operational. Why is it an either/or anyway?

There is no real reason why the relief efforts couldn't have been coordinated from the ground. Despite its impressive looking size, the shape of the hull form of DS9 limits the available space (compared to the same dimensions but more 'filled in') so its utility would be reduced for storage compared to planet side facilities. On that topic why the hell can't they just replicate the food if things are that bad instead of having to do things like trading with the Ferengi for fertilizer to grow food? Sort out naturally grown food after people have stopped starving.
Limited resources and manpower kind of you know limit what you can do and remember people don't always act logically and as Faxmodem1 pointed out starfleet needed both a military presense on orbit to keep cardassians from simply coming back and needed to help the bajorans on the surface if for nothing else then as symbolic gesture that said "were not the new slave Masters that look down on you while you suffer" but thanks to the borg attack and other things (like the UFP/Cardassian Union war that just ended) starfleet didn't have infinite resources to spare for DS9 like you assume they have.

Also replicators aren't magical "make things apear" boxes you need either power or raw stock to fuel them and that shifts the logical problem a bit after all the federation doesn't have the resources to build a powerplant with exclusive purpose of running those replicators since it's not an unreasonble assumption to make that local bajoran powergrid is either highly unrelible or doesn't exist at all.

your arguments seem to revolve around "which logical issue I ignore this time to claim there was no logical explanation for DS9 being the way it is, so I can keep on insisting there's no-one with anything resembling competence in starfleet no matter how illogical my arguments become".
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Re: Was DS9 up to date with UFP safety standards?

Post by FaxModem1 »

atg wrote:
FaxModem1 wrote:Congratulations, the Circle just got more legitimacy in the Bajoran government
The Circle was an unknown entity when Starfleet took over, they didn't find out about them until circa a year after the take over (also roughly a year after the first time the station tried to kill everyone on board...) of DS9, and would not have been an influence in any Starfleet decision regarding how to take over the station.
Because Sisko encountered Major Kira on day one, and even she thinks Starfleet will be the same as the Cardassian Union, so he has to prove that they aren't. Again, they have to prove that they aren't the same as the Cardassians:
KIRA: You are throwing it all away! All of you!
BUREAUCRAT [on monitor]: You're being a fool!
KIRA: Well then, don't ask my opinion next time!
(turns off the monitor)
KIRA: Yes?
SISKO: I'm Benjamin Sisko.
KIRA: I suppose you want the office.
SISKO: Well, I thought I'd say hello first and then take the office, but we could do it in any order you'd like.
KIRA: Hello.
SISKO: Is something bothering you, Major?
KIRA: You don't want to ask me that, Commander.
SISKO: Why not?
KIRA: Because I have the bad habit of telling the truth even when people don't want to hear it.
SISKO: Perhaps I want to hear it.
KIRA: I don't believe the Federation has any business being here.
SISKO: The provisional government disagrees with you.
KIRA: The provisional government and I don't agree on a lot of things which is probably why they've sent me to this god-forsaken place. I have been fighting for Bajoran independence since I was old enough to pick up a phaser. We finally drive the Cardassians out and what do our new leaders do? They call up the Federation and invite them right in.
SISKO: The Federation is only here to help
KIRA: Help us. Yes, I know. The Cardassians said the same thing sixty years ago.
So, getting on the Bajorans good side is a huge priority.
because you think making DS9 a fully operational station is more important than saving a Bajoran village from a plague, or helping with a power plant to keep people from freezing to death, or building a hospital, or making sure that supplies are being delivered to Bajor on-time for rebuilding purposes. Sometimes, resource management constrains your options. Who knew?
Where exactly did I say it was more important than the relief efforts? I didn't. I said it shouldn't have been made operational with a live crew and civilians until it could be made safely operational. Why is it an either/or anyway?

There is no real reason why the relief efforts couldn't have been coordinated from the ground. Despite its impressive looking size, the shape of the hull form of DS9 limits the available space (compared to the same dimensions but more 'filled in') so its utility would be reduced for storage compared to planet side facilities. On that topic why the hell can't they just replicate the food if things are that bad instead of having to do things like trading with the Ferengi for fertilizer to grow food? Sort out naturally grown food after people have stopped starving.
Again, Sisko's crew and resources are limited. As soon as the Enterprise leaves orbit of Bajor, the Cardassian come back to try and take the station again.
(A Cardassian warship is on the viewscreen)
O'BRIEN: Message coming in from their commander, Gul Dukat.
KIRA: Dukat. He used to be the Cardassian Prefect of Bajor.
O'BRIEN: He's requesting permission to come aboard to greet us. Surely a coincidence that the Enterprise just left.
SISKO: Mister O'Brien, tell Gul Dukat I look forward to meeting him.
Note that Sisko drives people to settle the station, and blackmails Quark into staying, to boost the local economy and make DS9 a place for commerce to thrive. Like any small town, the more money that comes in, the more the government is able to do there to help its populace. The difference is that they also have to make defences, and Bajor is such a wreck that the best place to do that is using the old Terek Nor station.
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Re: Was DS9 up to date with UFP safety standards?

Post by Q99 »

Another factor is the Wormhole.

It meant that rather than being able to take their time, they *had* to have an operational presence at a strategic location days after arrival. Which also becomes a more active trade hub.

New computers? Weeks to months I'd figure. Hard enough when it's just an orbital port, being strategic defense makes such a gap even harder to make. So instead they do a slower longer term job while having it in use.

And while there were many glitches, the anti riot system was the only major problem so they didn't do that bad a job. It became alive less often than the Ent D's computer.
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Re: Was DS9 up to date with UFP safety standards?

Post by Lord Revan »

and we know that thanks to both trying to not seem like the new slave masters or simply not having ships to spare starfleet cannot simply permanently post few ships on the orbit of Bajor or near DS9 until such a time that the total rebuilding of all the control systems can be done it's not just unplugging the mainframe and plugging another mainframe in, it isn't too unreasonble to assume that secondary systems were built to work with a cardassian designed and made OS while a SF main frame would use a federation designed and made OS that might not be compateble with the cardassian systems.

The fact that while both computer systems are based on the isolinear system the cardassian system uses rods instead of chips might possibly mean there's more differences between the 2 then a different language option.
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Re: Was DS9 up to date with UFP safety standards?

Post by Q99 »

Lord Revan wrote:and we know that thanks to both trying to not seem like the new slave masters or simply not having ships to spare starfleet cannot simply permanently post few ships on the orbit of Bajor or near DS9 until such a time that the total rebuilding of all the control systems can be done it's not just unplugging the mainframe and plugging another mainframe in, it isn't too unreasonble to assume that secondary systems were built to work with a cardassian designed and made OS while a SF main frame would use a federation designed and made OS that might not be compateble with the cardassian systems.

The fact that while both computer systems are based on the isolinear system the cardassian system uses rods instead of chips might possibly mean there's more differences between the 2 then a different language option.
I imagine you may want at least half a year or so just going over things and designing the computer to work, before even getting around to the changeover (which would naturally uncover a few more bugs).

The physical side of the changeover would involve converting everything from rods to chips too (unless you want the only computer system in the quadrant that uses Federation programming on rods, meaning neither rods nor chips are designed for it), which includes, at bare minimum, every replicator and every transporter. That'd take either a ton of engineers or time, but that itself is only following after design work.
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Re: Was DS9 up to date with UFP safety standards?

Post by Lord Revan »

Q99 wrote:
Lord Revan wrote:and we know that thanks to both trying to not seem like the new slave masters or simply not having ships to spare starfleet cannot simply permanently post few ships on the orbit of Bajor or near DS9 until such a time that the total rebuilding of all the control systems can be done it's not just unplugging the mainframe and plugging another mainframe in, it isn't too unreasonble to assume that secondary systems were built to work with a cardassian designed and made OS while a SF main frame would use a federation designed and made OS that might not be compateble with the cardassian systems.

The fact that while both computer systems are based on the isolinear system the cardassian system uses rods instead of chips might possibly mean there's more differences between the 2 then a different language option.
I imagine you may want at least half a year or so just going over things and designing the computer to work, before even getting around to the changeover (which would naturally uncover a few more bugs).

The physical side of the changeover would involve converting everything from rods to chips too (unless you want the only computer system in the quadrant that uses Federation programming on rods, meaning neither rods nor chips are designed for it), which includes, at bare minimum, every replicator and every transporter. That'd take either a ton of engineers or time, but that itself is only following after design work.
I'd suspect they'd pretty much have pull anything that uses computer control, replace the computers while making sure those new systems are compateble with the hardware left, honestly I suspect it would be cheaper and faster to simply build a new station using SF hardware and use Terok Nor for target practice then to try replacing the systems on Terok Nor with federation hardware which would essentially be full rebuild of all computer systems. Mind you that building a new station is neither fast nor cheap.

Granted neither of those is not really an option as Starfleet doesn't really have resources to have permanent naval presence at Bajor while the new station was built not mention that bajorans might not be all that happy with permanent UFP naval presence that could leave (the trust issues again). So UFP was stuck with having to deal with turning Terok Nor into Deep Space 9 with rather limited resources in both men and material.
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Re: Was DS9 up to date with UFP safety standards?

Post by atg »

Lord Revan wrote:Limited resources and manpower kind of you know limit what you can do
Exactly which is why I offered some suggestions on other things the Federations could do first to establish a presence where they a) actually have full control over the situation, and b) as others have pointed out DS9 used up lots of manpower and resources just keeping the thing patched together. Said resources could have been more efficiently used elsewhere first , such as the rebuilding of Bajor, then spent on the station later when they have time to do things properly.
and remember people don't always act logically
No they don't, but acting logically in an engineering and technical context is a sign of competence. Which we are discussing.
and as Faxmodem1 pointed out starfleet needed both a military presense on orbit to keep cardassians from simply coming back
Did they really? The only reason the Cardassian's attempted to come back was because of the wormhole, which no one knew about when the decision was made to reactivate DS9. Ergo that couldn't have factored in Starfleets decision. I think the risk of Cardassia coming back sans-the wormhole being discovered is greatly overstated. After all they literally had just withdrawn because of the Bajoran resistance - why would they come back just a few weeks/months later where the same thing would happen again? Do people think the resistance would have magically disappeared?
and needed to help the bajorans on the surface if for nothing else then as symbolic gesture that said "were not the new slave Masters that look down on you while you suffer" but thanks to the borg attack and other things (like the UFP/Cardassian Union war that just ended) starfleet didn't have infinite resources to spare for DS9 like you assume they have.
I don't assume they have infinite resources. You've ignored where I've pointed out the limitations of DS9 in such a role and where doing the coordination, etc, from the ground itself would likely be more efficient.
Also replicators aren't magical "make things apear" boxes you need either power or raw stock to fuel them and that shifts the logical problem a bit after all the federation doesn't have the resources to build a powerplant with exclusive purpose of running those replicators since it's not an unreasonble assumption to make that local bajoran powergrid is either highly unrelible or doesn't exist at all.
Fair enough points re the logisitcal train around replicators.
your arguments seem to revolve around "which logical issue I ignore this time to claim there was no logical explanation for DS9 being the way it is, so I can keep on insisting there's no-one with anything resembling competence in starfleet no matter how illogical my arguments become".
Disagreeing with the logic and reasoning of something isn't ignoring it thank you.

At the end of the day:
  • The Federation took over a station without having full control over it's internal systems. From an enemy specifically known to love to leave booby traps behind (mentioned both by Kira in the pilot and by O'Brien in the episode where they go to the other abandoned Cardassian station).
  • Within weeks had an incident where the station created a virus that almost killed everyone on the station and only didn't spread to Bajor or other planets because of luck.
  • And did nothing about it, as the fact that the work riot software was still around proves.
Now I'm willing to grant that maybe there was a need to have DS9 up and running straight away that overrides my alternatives and reasonings (I don't agree but in universe lets accept it). But things should have changed after the virus incident and it didn't. As I alluded to before there could have been any number of other traps hidden by the Cardassians (or the Bajoran Resistance per the virus incident). I'm sure there would have been Cardassians laughing with glee if a sub-routine left behind crashed the station into Bajor, or turned the weapons on Bajor or nearby ships. Even just getting the ~4000-5000 civilians off of a station that could have killed them while its fixed would have been a step in the right direction.

Now as viewers we know that such things didn't exist, but the crew didn't and after the virus incident violently shoved that prospect in their face they should have taken appropriate steps. And didn't. Not learning from that incident is absolutely a sign of incompetence. Whether that falls on Starfleet, Sisko, or O'Brien I'll leave to you.
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Re: Was DS9 up to date with UFP safety standards?

Post by FaxModem1 »

Remember, the Cardassians showed up before the wormhole was discovered, as soon as the Enterprise left. They thought it easy pickings, and Starfleet being on the station held them back. A year later, they push for Starfleet leaving, and support an isolationist faction to win the Bajoran civil war, so that they could invade, er, I mean , establish order.

Also, you seem to be under the mistaken impression that the Bajorans will take orders from the Federation in their territory. We see throughout DS9, whenever there is a conflict of interest, Bajoran sovereignty trumps a Starfleet decision. Kira actually did this in season 7 to kick out a Romulan base on one of their moons.
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Re: Was DS9 up to date with UFP safety standards?

Post by Tribble »

atg makes a good point about the civilians; after the virus incident all non-essential personnel should have been evacuated until they knew with absolutely certainly that there weren't other hidden "gems" in the computer programming or other booby-traps.

As for replacing the station that was a non-starter; the Bajorans certainly wouldn't have approved and neither would the Cardassians. IMO the Cardassians initially tolerated the Feds presence since technically it was a civilian station under Bajoran control with the Feds merely providing oversight; I doubt they would have put up with an official Federation starbase and military presence (though things changed when the Dominion were discovered).
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