Did they try turning it off and on?
NASA can't figure out what's causing computer issues on the Hubble telescope
131–140 of 333 posts
Re: NASA can't figure out what's causing computer issues on the Hubble telescope
#132I volunteer as rubber duck!
Re: NASA can't figure out what's causing computer issues on the Hubble telescope
#133Earlier quoted context omitted.
If you want to see debugging a computer in space, check out Apollo 13's sequel, Apollo 14. The moon landing is being held up by shorted-out switch that's causing the LM to abort the landing, and it's up to the programmers back home to figure out how to work around it in time to allow the landing. Apollo 13 was the story of a 'successful failure', while Apollo 14 shows how hard work and creative thinking can turn fail…
Is there actually an Apollo 14 movie? I can find Apollo 18 but not a Apollo 14 feature movie. I saw this but it's a short documentary and may not be what you meant: https://www.amazon.com/Apollo-14-Complete-Downlink-Edition/d...
There's the HBO series "From the Earth to the Moon", which covers this with the Apollo 14 mission. Highly recommended.
Re: NASA can't figure out what's causing computer issues on the Hubble telescope
#134Earlier quoted context omitted.
Didn’t they also get a few older (Hubble type) spy satellites to use? I remember a story about that.
My hazy memory is that the NRO offered NASA a few satellite bodies that they could populate with optic systems. Since they were originally designed for monitoring earth they aren’t well suited for capturing data at much longer distances. If I recall correctly I think someone explained that it’s like trying to peer through a straw, it works, but ideally you’d want a much wider field of view. And apparently the James W…
They're launching one, the other is waiting for a use-case.
Re: NASA can't figure out what's causing computer issues on the Hubble telescope
#135Earlier quoted context omitted.
In the movie Hero [0], two kung fu masters fight a battle purely in their minds. And when the mental fight was over, they only execute one physical move to finish the battle. Think of this as the computer equivalent of that scene. [0] https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0299977/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1
Both: Dance around for 10 minutes trying to out-physics each other Guy 1: Why don't I just poke him with the pointy bit Great scene though, makes me want to watch the whole movie.
Yeah, this is strictly artistic kung fu, which is basically high-mortality ballet. There are also many "realistic" martial arts films, if that's your thing. I enjoy both styles, depending on mood.
Re: NASA can't figure out what's causing computer issues on the Hubble telescope
#136I know that, at different times, NASA has used Forth[1] and Lisp[2] in some of their space applications. Both of these languages offer REPLs that generally accelerate the debugging process, and while your "average" Lisp might be unsuitable for hard real-time applications (due to the presence of a garbage collector, usually without the hard real-time constraints that you can get out of garbage collectors with extreme…
> Wait, then why don't they just switch over each component in turn? The "divide and conquer" debugging strategy.
It's better to understand the problem than to just start changing stuff hoping you find the right thing even systematically. There's not a huge rush to fix this since it's the payload computer and the telescope is still being maintained by other systems. A lot bad could happen, if the switching system is flakey you could maybe get stuck in a bad system, or if there's a number of faults you might damage one of the backups. Without the shuttle there's not a plan to service it any more so why take the risk rushing through to the most simplistic debugging method?
Re: NASA can't figure out what's causing computer issues on the Hubble telescope
#137How specific is the Hubble that you can only repair it with the Space Shuttle? o_O
The Space Shuttle is the only vehicle ever built that can do in-orbit service. It's not that the Hubble is special in that regard, it is that the Shuttle was special.
So does this also mean that the ISS is no longer able to get serviced, or are there projects to work on in-orbit service vehicles?
Re: NASA can't figure out what's causing computer issues on the Hubble telescope
#138I can't figure out what's causing computer issues on my desk. I'm not even in space.
Responding to this comment while debugging a CI/CD pipeline failure for the last hour. I'll toast to the NASA engineers with my cup of coffee.
Have you tried turning it off and turning it on again?
Re: NASA can't figure out what's causing computer issues on the Hubble telescope
#139Earlier quoted context omitted.
Is there actually an Apollo 14 movie? I can find Apollo 18 but not a Apollo 14 feature movie. I saw this but it's a short documentary and may not be what you meant: https://www.amazon.com/Apollo-14-Complete-Downlink-Edition/d...
There's the HBO series "From the Earth to the Moon", which covers this with the Apollo 14 mission. Highly recommended.
[deleted]
Re: NASA can't figure out what's causing computer issues on the Hubble telescope
#140Earlier quoted context omitted.
A lesson not taught to any modern software developer. Instead they change things all the time for no real reason other than that they want to change things.
One of the best senior engineers I worked with taught me how to run an outage. The most important thing? Stop what you are doing, take charge, and get everyone else to stop what they are doing. The best case scenario of a bunch of engineers flailing about on a bridge turning knobs is that you luck into a fix but don't know how you got there. But you're more likely to make things worse.
Sounds like “locking the doors” (Space Shuttle disasters). Although, there was really not much to recover from there.