(Side note: I suspect that something got jammed up at the Freelance
Traveller mail server; the 'missing' messages came back to me in one
swell foop. Only it wasn't so swell that they didn't come in "on time".
Seems to be OK now, though.)

In "classical" Traveller (i.e., the Third Imperium and 'compatible'
settings), ships are allocated engineering space, and on deck plans the
various 'drives' are roughed in as very irregular shapes. However, with
the sort of miniaturization of electronic components that we can do even
today, about the only thing that causes irregular shape is _mechanical_
connection or interfacing. If controls are electronic, they can be
managed by a touch-screen arrangement, much like on /Star Trek: The Next
Generation/ or /Deep Space Nine/ or /Voyager/.

So, if I walk in to Engineering on e.g., an Empress Marava or a Beowulf,
what am I going to see? Will I see grey, blue, white, purple, etc.,
boxes with consoles attached? Or will I see something that looks like
steampunk updated to the 1970s? Or will I see something like Engineering
on one or another of the Star Trek franchises?

(Ulterior motive: At some point, I want to build a Traveller starship
interior using The Sims 2, and then do a "photo tour" for Freelance
Traveller. I can fake up a bridge easily enough (there are Star Trek
consoles of all sorts downloadable as add-ons), and living areas are
essentially trivial, but Engineering is a potential problem.)

--
Jeff Zeitlin, Editor
Freelance Traveller
    The Electronic Fan-Supported
    Traveller® Fanzine and Resource

xxxxxx@freelancetraveller.com
http://www.freelancetraveller.com
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®Traveller is a registered trademark of
Far Future Enterprises, 1977-2014. Use of
the trademark in this notice and in the
referenced materials is not intended to
infringe or devalue the trademark.

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