space-x has taken over Nasa to some degree, i think
Old software keeping space missions alive
31–40 of 67 posts
Re: Old software keeping space missions alive
#32Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not to mention that they confuse RAM with storage. The iPhone 14 certainly doesn't have a minimum of 128 GB of RAM.
Depending on context and the audience, it could be fair to use "RAM" to refer to SSD storage. SSDs are random access, just not volatile like DRAM.
The only context in which the technical difference between memory and disk can be glossed over is one where the audience is made of laypersons that wouldn’t understand the first thing about seekable vs random-access memory in the first place.
A tech-illiterate author/editor is the much more plausible explanation.
Re: Old software keeping space missions alive
#33How about traveling-wave vacuum tubes from the pre-transistor era. Doesn't Voyager use them to generate its RF transmission power?
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Re: Old software keeping space missions alive
#34Earlier quoted context omitted.
An example is SSL root certificates, which expire by design. Also ABI. But if you use containers or virtual machines you can basically have a program run forever.
You can, but you shouldn't, because at some point you should patch the vulnerabilities you inevitably find on any non-trivial piece of code after a while.
Certain code can run with bugs forever, even vulnerabilities, because it will never interact with anything (see the famous "the missile" bug - a counter would overflow at some point, but by then the warhead would have detonated, so who cares?).
Re: Old software keeping space missions alive
#35jesus christ, i dont think ive ever seen an article that beats around the bush for as long as this one does before finally getting to the point. anyways, for those who don't have the patience, the title is misleading. it's just some old software from the 90s. It's only ancient if you're one of those people who completely rewrites their entire code base from the ground up every two years because to pad out your resume…
Agreed. The older I get, the saltier I get when I read anything that refers to something from the 90s as "ancient".
> Agreed. The older I get, the saltier I get when I read anything that refers to something from the 90s as "ancient"
As someone who started programming in 1980, I feel your pain. My oldest spreadsheet goes back to 1995.
Re: Old software keeping space missions alive
#36How about traveling-wave vacuum tubes from the pre-transistor era. Doesn't Voyager use them to generate its RF transmission power?
Slightly tangential, but if money were no object, do vacuum tubes or solid-state amps have a longer service life in this kind of application?
Theoretically, solid state amplifiers would have a longer service life. Vacuum tubes will always have cathode depletion causing them to degrade eventually (although this is pretty well controlled in most cases for long life). In space though the answer might become more complicated. Because the vacuum tubes are more tolerant of high voltages, they are probably also more tolerant of charge build-up and discharge from free electrons in space. Significant amounts of free electrons trapped in the second Van Allen belt that affects satellites in geosynchronous orbit (like a lot of comm satellites with big TWTAs). Less of an effect in deep space though.
Re: Old software keeping space missions alive
#37Earlier quoted context omitted.
Depending on context and the audience, it could be fair to use "RAM" to refer to SSD storage. SSDs are random access, just not volatile like DRAM.
The only context in which the technical difference between memory and disk can be glossed over is one where the audience is made of laypersons that wouldn’t understand the first thing about seekable vs random-access memory in the first place. A tech-illiterate author/editor is the much more plausible explanation.
On the other hand, a modern SSD is probably faster than RAM on a spaceship from the 90s. (Don’t quote me on this, I didn’t double check).
All of a sudden I had an urge to get MS-DOS to run with a SSD as memory. Unfortunately I know DOS can’t address 1TB of memory, but the mental image of it is hilarious.
Re: Old software keeping space missions alive
#38jesus christ, i dont think ive ever seen an article that beats around the bush for as long as this one does before finally getting to the point. anyways, for those who don't have the patience, the title is misleading. it's just some old software from the 90s. It's only ancient if you're one of those people who completely rewrites their entire code base from the ground up every two years because to pad out your resume…
> it's just some old software from the 90s.
What nonsense. the 90s is recent, not ancient.
Re: Old software keeping space missions alive
#39jesus christ, i dont think ive ever seen an article that beats around the bush for as long as this one does before finally getting to the point. anyways, for those who don't have the patience, the title is misleading. it's just some old software from the 90s. It's only ancient if you're one of those people who completely rewrites their entire code base from the ground up every two years because to pad out your resume…
There's a little more to it. If your original team retires because of old age, that's a lot of wisdom lost. Not everyone wants to learn COBOL to keep planes in the air and the IRS running, imagine needing to figure out the low level code on something millions of miles away with half the hardware broken, the battery cracked and leaking – and if the software update doesn't work, the entire mission is over? It's altoget…
> Not everyone wants to learn COBOL to keep planes in the air and the IRS running
But there's excellent money in being a COBOL programmer. Some might be interested in that.
Re: Old software keeping space missions alive
#40Earlier quoted context omitted.
Software does degrade with age, though. Simply the fact that vulnerabilities are found over time means that our understanding of a piece of software and how it works changes. But it's not just vulnerabilities being found, it's protocols used that may be unsupported etc. That change is a kind of a rot like people call 'bit rot' but it's a specific software rot that does happen. Systems are complicated.
An example is SSL root certificates, which expire by design. Also ABI. But if you use containers or virtual machines you can basically have a program run forever.
Sure, but none of that applies to non-networked embedded systems.