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The US nuclear forces’ messaging system finally got rid of its floppy disks

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Re: The US nuclear forces’ messaging system finally got rid of its floppy disks

#71

Post by arethuza »

k_sze wrote: post #29
RcouF1uZ4gsC wrote: post #10

> While SACC’s hardware is decades old, its software is constantly refreshed by young Air Force programmers who learn software development skills at Offutt’s Rapid Agile Development Lab. I am not so sure I want “Rapid Agile” development for something that literally controls nuclear missiles.

`git commit -m “added factoryboy to generate random target coordinates to test the launch sequence.”` `git commit -m “Fuck fuck fuck, forgot to replace the launch API endpoint with a mock one.”` Scrum master: “Let’s implement the stuff with the highest customer value first.” Developer A: “I guess that means being able to launch the nukes.” Developer B: “Yeah. Auth can come later.” Developer C: “Nobody answered us abo…

Just set the password to 00000000 for now and we can change it later....

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permissive_Action_Link#Develop...

Re: The US nuclear forces’ messaging system finally got rid of its floppy disks

#72

Post by benj111 »

NoGravitas wrote: post #68
benj111 wrote: post #35

" Air Force software development hubs like Boston-based Kessel Run or Los Angeles-based Kobayashi Maru" Is this article a troll, or is the Air Force just trying to be 'cool'.

Surely Kobayashi Maru should be a Navy development hub.

I think an unwinnable scenario works quite well with the nuclear weapons theme.

Re: The US nuclear forces’ messaging system finally got rid of its floppy disks

#73

Post by Zenst »

robdachshund wrote: post #25
dsamarin wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As far as I know, we don't even know the length of time CDs will last because they haven't been around long enough. I would love someone to correct me if I'm wrong.

CDs already get disc rot, sometimes just after a few years if they are cheap. Don't forget, CDs have been out since 82, and they were not the first optical disc format around, either. Tapes however, can last 50+ years. It's a much better medium than most think it is, for analog or digital storage. Heck, a reel to reel tape unit offers the best analog sound quality you can get.

I have CD's from that period - some fine as, others disc rot most evident. Even had rot in gold layered ones (few VCD's I had). Gets down to manufacturing quality and in just the same way silicon chips are made, not all chips are equal and work perfect forever. Same with media.

Tape has done well, however when you look at how it was used and how it is used today. The density of data is much tighter today than the 80's era. So tolerance of errors was greater and more forgiving as data would be stored in a larger area, so a few atoms going adrift won't stand out, when you get into density when a few atoms is your data, errors are statistically more prone to happen.

Re: The US nuclear forces’ messaging system finally got rid of its floppy disks

#74

Post by C1sc0cat »

goatinaboat wrote: post #40
benj111 wrote: post #35

" Air Force software development hubs like Boston-based Kessel Run or Los Angeles-based Kobayashi Maru" Is this article a troll, or is the Air Force just trying to be 'cool'.

is the Air Force just trying to be 'cool'. Why wouldn’t the Air Force be full of geeks?

I Know some one in our DnD group who when working for the MOD in the UK, got into trouble for naming a set of servers after the kings of Rohan.

Re: The US nuclear forces’ messaging system finally got rid of its floppy disks

#75

Post by kalleboo »

madengr wrote: post #11
dsamarin wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As far as I know, we don't even know the length of time CDs will last because they haven't been around long enough. I would love someone to correct me if I'm wrong.

CD-R are maybe 10 years. Floppies are more reliable. I have plenty of C64 and Apple II floppies that work fine.

Floppies from the last decade of their reign were absolute garbage. I had many that didn't last more than a week before they started throwing errors. That's when I switched to FTPing schoolwork to my free 10 MB ISP spacr despite still being on 56k

Re: The US nuclear forces’ messaging system finally got rid of its floppy disks

#78

Post by finnthehuman »

dmix wrote: post #15
RcouF1uZ4gsC wrote: post #10

> While SACC’s hardware is decades old, its software is constantly refreshed by young Air Force programmers who learn software development skills at Offutt’s Rapid Agile Development Lab. I am not so sure I want “Rapid Agile” development for something that literally controls nuclear missiles.

I don't see why Agile or other similar approaches can't handle reliability and safety as the primary goals. Things change often in most other software because that's what people demand of it. No one will be changing the Nuclear launch systems often where never ending iteration is a threat.

It's all about how you define "Agile."

I work in safety critical software, my biggest problem with agile (and other popular development methodologies) has always been that there is too much equivocation and other semantic games by their advocates to turn into something useful to me.

When we have a development tool vendor on site they often ask if we're "waterfall or agile?" I hate this question because the real answer is "neither, but sorta both, and can we just move on because it's not going to fit into your simplistic model of the world?"

Re: The US nuclear forces’ messaging system finally got rid of its floppy disks

#79

Post by PietdeVries »

bArray wrote: post #36

I know of several military systems that still use floppy disks, that comforts me for a few reason: * Their maintenance is well understood - every fault that is likely to happen has happened and has been recovered/repaired from. It's very unlikely there will be new surprised down the road. * Their degradation is well understood - it's been around long enough that parts have failed and have been repaired. * Isn't easil…

And the downside: you will only have a few technicians that really understand how things work, hiring new ones is next to impossible as teenagers have never seen neither the hardware nor the software that is running on it. It scales terrible to new locations. I recall a few years ago NASA was looking for 286-processors for the Space Shuttle. I cannot imagine your spacecraft is getting safer because of outdated hardware.()

Then again, armies are known to prepare for the previous war. In WW-1 they used trenches and then came the machine-gun and the gas. In WW-2 all soldiers were prepared against gas, the French dug the Maginot line and the Germans just skipped around. Now we have amazing tanks but the next war is online...

() I have to correct myself: NASA was looking for 8086 chips in 2001 - not 286 chips a few years ago. https://www.geek.com/chips/nasa-needs-8086-chips-549867/

Re: The US nuclear forces’ messaging system finally got rid of its floppy disks

#80

Post by PhasmaFelis »

bArray wrote: post #36

I know of several military systems that still use floppy disks, that comforts me for a few reason: * Their maintenance is well understood - every fault that is likely to happen has happened and has been recovered/repaired from. It's very unlikely there will be new surprised down the road. * Their degradation is well understood - it's been around long enough that parts have failed and have been repaired. * Isn't easil…

Absolutely. When you have a system that absolutely must not fail ever, you want it to be set up so that all the code involved--not just the application but the system it runs on--can be manually reviewed in a practical timeframe. If you're running on any modern OS, even a really good, stable one, that's millions of lines of code that you're just hoping don't have any weird, undiscovered edge case interactions with your program.

On the other hand. Based on the article, it sounds like maintaining the nuclear launch system frequently involves working with soldering irons and microscopes, manually replacing individual wires, and it takes years of training to reach an acceptable skill level. That has the potential to be nearly as dangerous as unreliable code.

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