Portrayed Computing Technologies

While the ship AI in Alien can react to changes and answer questions, it feels more like our current generative language models more than a sentient being. Other movies with AI's such as the steering wheel from Wall-e and Hal-9000 in A Space Odyssey portray more sentient AI's that make decisions on their own and attempt to override the humans they were made to protect.

This technology is realistic especially given the movie takes place in 2104. It is possible to recreate this technology in our current time without further development.

The ship controls share a similar sci-fi look to other movie/tv series like Star Wars and Star Trek. They use large monotone buttons and switches with blue holographic looking displays. 

While meant to look futuristic, the bulky analog nature of these features are actually outdated compared to modern technology. Modern space technology such as the interfaces found in the SpaceX Dragon capsule are much more minimalistic and feature a single high definition screen to accomplish many tasks. Because of this the controls seem unrealistic as the they are behind its time.

The Ground-Orbital Transmitter is similar to that used by radio men in warefare. Instead of communicating with a nearby base however, it communicates with an orbital ship from the ground serving a similar function to orbital ground stations.

This technology is very realistic. Modern space flight technology accomplishes this task with ground stations set up accross the globe to communicate with orbiting vehicles and the people on them. Given the jump into the future, it is realistic that this technology has been miniaturized and is still used to communicate with ships from a long distance. Also in the movie, the transmission is interrupted by a storm causing the crew to do a hard reset. This grounds the technology and displays its limitations which are realistic for smaller lower powered communications.

A plannet scanner is a popular device amongs sci-fi films. Movies like Interstellar, The Martian, and A Space Odyssey all feature some form of technology that scans a planet for its habitability and/or life.

This technology seems unrealistic as a relatively small ship cannot detect an entire planet without at least traveling some distance to adjust its viewpoint. The amount of planet exposed to the ship at any given time grows with distance, making it more difficult to scan when more of the planet is exposed to the ship. 

The 3D holographic display shown, while exact implementation changes, is a distinctive factor in the sci-fi genre as a whole. Other movies such as Star wars or Ironman show holographic displays in full 3D, while the one displayed here is more 2D projected into 3D space. 

There are similar technologies today, however nothing currently is able to replicate a floating display like this one without some physical medium there to direct/project the light. While the idea itself is realistic, the implementation of it is far fetched.

Many other movies feature cryogenic technology to freeze and preserve lifeforms. Companies right now have developed this technology to freeze the dead in hopes of being able to bring them back to life in the future when technology supports it. 

The closest current technology is quite a far leap from the implementation of it displayed in the film. Preserving the dead is much easier than sustaining life for long periods of time while frozen. Because of this, the displayed cryogenic monitors in the movie seem drastically unrealistic, even given the time the movie takes place in.