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Joe Manning

ODRI & You

ODRI & You

The Starfleet Officer's Field Guide to

The Optical Data Relay Interface

 

Published by Starfleet R&D Division

May 19th, 2392

 

 

ODRI is Born

In these tenuous years following catastrophic alien invasion, Joe the Starfleet Officer has voiced his demand for a new Optical Assistant designed to encapsulate all the functions of his four basic support devices -- tricorder, PADD, chronometer, and commbadge. "Why do I need to carry around all of these easily misplaced items," Joe prudently asks, "when a single device could be made to meet all of my data gathering, storage, and transmission needs?" The brilliant tech heads at Starfleet's Research and Development Division have worked tirelessly to give Joe the answer he's been looking for -- "You don't anymore! The ODRI has arrived!"

 

Have you ever found yourself digging through tedious stacks of PADDs, frantically searching for your tricorder as hostile entities boarded your starship around you? Have you ever found your shirt torn off during an away mission, separating you from your basic communication device? Have you ever suffered the humiliation of accidentally sending a love letter to your commanding officer because you got your PADDs mixed up? Have you ever found yourself unable to tell the time because your chronometer was misplaced? You likely answered 'yes' to all but the last of those questions. No officer ever misplaces his chronometer because it is conveniently strapped to his wrist. This basic convenience has been borrowed by the uni-functional, forearm-mounted ODRI.

 

 

Ease & Comfort

"This looks awfully uncomfortable," Joe the Officer remarks as he surveys his new ODRI. "It looks like a device intended to measure my blood pressure." Never fear, Joe. The ODRI's strap automatically tightens to wrap firmly but comfortably around an arm of any girth. It works just like magic, but we assure you that it is only the sensors on the underside of the device's control panel that tell the straps when to tighten. The ODRI itself is extremely thin and easy to bear, its shell made of advanced lightweight polymers, its nanocircuitry constructed for maximum space-efficiency. Put on your ODRI and marvel -- it will seem like a natural extension of your arm, and you will never want to take it off, even while sleeping or showering.

 

"Wow, it does feel like a natural fit!" Joe exclaims. "But all I see on the control panel are a bunch of buttons. There's no screen! How can this device serve the function of my tricorder or PADD?" You have a keen eye, Joe, so surely you must notice the crystalline strip near the top edge of the panel. Touch your ODRI's Activate button (that's the long blue one just below the strip) and be astounded! The strip is actually an array of holoemitters and motion sensors. The emitters are capable of holoform displays of various sizes and dimensions depending on your needs, all specified at a root menu which is displayed when the Activate button is pressed. All of the displays are touch-sensitive, allowing for the full interactivity of a PADD or tricorder screen.

 

The ODRI's root menu provides access to all systems programmed within the device's main core and supplementary modules. Any function that a user requires quick and repeated access to can be assigned to one of the panel's quick-access buttons, allowing for a convenience and personalization that any officer will appreciate. Further, users can define what data is displayed on the LCD strip just beneath the holoemitters. Most officers will wish to display the Starfleet Standard time on their LCDs, though this chronometer function can be adjusted to display any local time. Atmospheric readouts are always helpful for away team personnel to keep a constant eye on, and a heart rate reading is useful for officers who have been advised to keep their stress levels down. Your needs and preferences will guide the fully customizable ODRI. Over time, the device's pseudo-AI algorithms will 'learn' more about your tendencies as an officer and will begin to configure itself to suit your needs! You will swear that your ODRI is alive!

 

 

Function Universal

Joe the Officer is used to possessing the 'third eye' of Starfleet personnel -- the tricorder. He will frequently finding himself assigning tricorder functions to most of his ODRI's buttons. The four outer edges of the ODRI panel contain multifunctional sensor arrays which provide the scanning capability of an unmodified tricorder. But no tricorder can provide motion-sensitive, precisely-positioned holographic displays of its sensor data. Sure, Joe the Engineer's tricorder can show him a flat clumsily-navigable schematic of a derelict spaceship, but his ODRI can provide him with a full-scale holographic overlay that shows him the exact positioning of utility conduits running beneath the ship's interior hull. "Wow," Joe remarks. "I can see the wiring behind the hull panels. And the image remains still even when I move my arm!" We assure you that the ODRI is no magician, Joe, simply the product of Starfleet ingenuity at its best.

 

An unmodified ODRI is capable of storing 510 kiloquads of information in its memory core. Important sensor images, personal audio logs, the results of ongoing experimentation -- anything you wish to record -- can be stored for later access without the hassle of carrying cumbersome PADDs. You can quickly and easily establish a constant uplink between your ODRI and your personal computing station, allowing you to freely share data between both storage devices. In fact, an ODRI can establish a remote uplink with any computer system that is not secured against outside intrusion. With the right translation and decryption modules, Joe the Scientist can gain access even to alien computing technologies with his ODRI! And uplinks are always possible between ODRI's, allowing officers to share data with ease. With an uplink to the subspace network, even interstellar correspondence is possible. "Hey, what about love letters from back home?" Joe the Romantic asks. "I wouldn't want any of the guys reading my holographic displays." Not to worry, Joe -- privacy is fully accounted for. The ODRI's holoemitters can buffer any display with solid light in order to ensure that they are visible only to the user and any designated viewers.

 

You may have once thought that you'd never see the day that you'd throw out your commbadge. ODRI will render the commbadge obsolete! The ODRI is capable of sharing audio messages with any interfacable communications device. If all participants possess an ODRI, a conversation can be visually represented -- scans of the speakers' faces are shared between devices, allowing for holographic displays that sync themselves to the voices of whomever is speaking. The days of making silly faces while conversing with your CO will be eliminated by this amenity. Think not, however, that the user-recognition and location capabilities of a commbadge have been sacrificed. Sensors along the ODRI panel's underside provide faultless cellular identification, preventing unauthorized users from accessing restricted data and functions and ensuring that the ODRI's user can always be located.

 

 

Modular Customization

We've saved the best for last, Joe! "My ODRI is capable of so much," Joe marvels. "What more could there be?" Snap open your ODRI's panel and pull it back to reveal the circuitry underneath. You will notice that your ODRI's circuit board is equipped with twenty-two ports that can accept any one of the ODRI modules that is continually being developed by Starfleet R&D. ODRI modules have the same function expansion capabilities as a tricorder isochip, but they are much smaller and easier to install, and they are designed for maximum compatibility.

 

Consider Joe the Doctor. Sure, his ODRI can provide basic scans of a patient's physiology. But without modifications to his ODRI, he still requires a dedicated medical scanner and a hypospray injector. That defeats the primary purpose of the ODRI -- consolidation. By issuing the basic suite of ODRI medical modules to Joe, we succeed at transforming his ODRI into a fully equipped medical assistant. The medical suite contains four modules which widen the ODRI's scanning capabilities, expand its database with the collected knowledge of Starfleet's Medical Division, and can even extend drug infusion and dermal regeneration devices to ODRI's exterior. Further modules can be inserted which are capable of synthesizing a broad range of common medical compounds.

 

Possibilities for such expansions are limited only by the minds at Starfleet R&D. We have already successfully tested modules which extend basic engineering tools to the ODRI's exterior. Our standard pair of universal translation modules will be capable of real-time analysis and translation of alien linguistics as well as analysis of alien symbology. We have nearly finished testing a suite of security bypass modules which will be issued to all Starfleet Intelligence operatives. And we certainly aren't leaving out the little people -- even Joe the Water Reclamation Maintenance Man will receive an ODRI module to make his job easier!

 

 

Your ODRI will need to be linked to an external power source every few months to recharge its battery. The ODRI is powered by a basic energy cell that is capable of fueling typical usage of the device for approximately six months. If the ODRI is to be customized for particularly rigorous usage, such as aiding scientific research, or if recharge will not be possible on a field mission, backup power modules can be acquired and inserted.

 

The ODRI's panel was designed to withstand a wide variety of environmental hazards, allowing it to remain a reliable assistant to an officer in the field. Like any electronic device, it must be regularly sterilized to avoid contamination of its circuitry. In the event that your ODRI does sustain damage, such as from the threat of weapons fire that has sadly become prevalent in these times, you will want to turn it in to your quartermaster as soon as possible for immediate replacement and eventual repair. If your ODRI is damaged in the field, seek out an engineer at once! An officer without his ODRI is like a commander without his voice. Do not let your ability to function as an officer go impaired for long.

 

 

Throw away that commbadge and tricorder, Joe! The first ODRI's are already being issued to the brave men, women, and androgynous beings of Starfleet. Our projections suggest that ODRI's will be in universal Starfleet circulation within two years, and within five years they will become basic parts of the lives of all the Federation's citizens. Starfleet's Admiralty would have it no other way -- they have closely supervised the development of the ODRI to meet the changing needs of a Federation of Planets and its defenders. With hostile entities of all varieties prowling the borders of our great Federation, won't you feel more secure knowing that you have a little piece of Starfleet Command strapped to your body at all times?

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Do Odri have names? Would anyone mind if I call mine ODRI Hepburn?

Edited by Joy

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Do Odri have names? Would anyone mind if I cal my ODRI Hepburn?

 

Starfleet encourages good, healthy relationships with their ODRI's. Naming yours is an obvious first step. :)

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:: Clutches her faithful tricorder in a curiously posessive manner. ::

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I've got the feeling that we might not have unlimited supplies of the newest Federation toys, anyway?

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I've got the feeling that we might not have unlimited supplies of the newest Federation toys, anyway?

 

No. :)

 

The database on our website has been updated with an entry on the ODRI. The Federation does allow us to use the ones that have trickled into Bull's Head over the years. Supplies are still limited enough that they're expensive to acquire, though. And Starfleet inspectors wouldn't be thrilled with an ODRI that's received 'special' modifications.

 

There are a few ODRI's floating around, though.

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