Boeing 747s receive software updates over floppy disks • Hacker News Board

Re: Boeing 747s receive software updates over floppy disks

#61

Post by alfalfasprout » Mon, Aug 10, 2020, 4:21 PM UTC

notacoward wrote: post #24

WJW wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Navigation is not critical? It seems like a pretty dangerous turn of events to try a low-visibility landing based on outdated navigation data.

Navigation data is important , which is why it's required to be refreshed within 28 days (this was a big worry during the recent Garmin outage BTW), but whether it's critical depends on often domain-specific definitions. AFAIK it doesn't meet that standard by either software or aviation standards. Also, it's definitely not software, so "critical software updates" is still incorrect.

On an airliner that can land in cat III approaches (ultra low visibility down below 100') then this data is critical since it's used in automated systems to help land the plane.

Re: Boeing 747s receive software updates over floppy disks

#62

Post by bluedino » Mon, Aug 10, 2020, 4:25 PM UTC

ir77 wrote: post #12

i'm surprised that people are surprised by this. i work for aerospace, and this is fairly typical -- albeit not floppy disk examples, but we keep a bunch of old laptops running win 7 and other examples around, hound around for them and spare parts. these machines are off the network, etc. these systems were developed 20+ years ago and per contract the a manufacture is obligated to maintain them for the service life,…

>> we keep a bunch of old laptops running win 7

I guess I was thinking laptops running DOS, like the ones used to interface with the Mclaren F1 (supercar) computer.

Re: Boeing 747s receive software updates over floppy disks

#63

Post by inetsee » Mon, Aug 10, 2020, 4:26 PM UTC

At one point in my career, I was working on maintenance software for the US Air Force's C-130 Cargo plane. Floppies weren't used to update the flight software (the Mission Computers didn't have floppy drives). A ruggedized portable computer was used to load the Mission Computer software over a wire connection. The software doing the loading was held to the same MIL-Spec standards as the flight software itself, and we spent a lot of time convincing the reviewers that the checksums used to verify the integrity of the load were sufficient to the task.

If the software doing the load is performing its integrity checks to a sufficiently high standard, then I don't see why using a 3.5" floppy disk would be a problem.

Re: Boeing 747s receive software updates over floppy disks

#64

Post by fennecfoxen » Mon, Aug 10, 2020, 4:27 PM UTC

ceejayoz wrote: post #27

fennecfoxen wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That says more about "the bear", and the overbearing nature of the compliance process, then it does about the wisdom or foolishness of relying on an aging hardware platform like the floppy more generally. Most industries don't deal with that. Maybe if this process had actually proved sufficient to prevent the 737 Max woes, we would pay it more respect?

> Maybe if this process had actually proved sufficient to prevent the 737 Max woes, we would pay it more respect? A better measure is passenger deaths per kilometer. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Fatalities_per_reven... It's been on a steady, large decline since the 1970s. Even with the 737 MAX crashes, it's an incredibly safe way to travel. In the last ten years, one passenger has died on a US carrier due…

The 737 Max grounding cost about $18 billion so far (according tot he Google infobox which knows everything and is never wrong.) The high-end estimates of the value of a statistical human life tend to run about $4-8 million, depending who you ask. The FAA grounding of the Max has 2250 has thus cost enough money to save 2,250-4,500 statistical lives, had the money been spent more wisely elsewhere.

How does your "better" passenger-deaths-per-km measure account for these deaths? (And what is it superior to, exactly?)

Re: Boeing 747s receive software updates over floppy disks

#65

Post by stuff4ben » Mon, Aug 10, 2020, 4:27 PM UTC

rwmj wrote: post #10

The Panavia Tornado fighter jet famously used cassette tapes for mission data. I guess aircraft are a product of their time and because of stringent safety requirements why try to update something if it works fine?

Yep, same for the F-14...

"...Then there was the computing power on the aircraft—or lack thereof. It was a Commodore 64 with wings on it ...For example: the mission computer loaded off of magnetic tape.

That magnetic-tape computer had so little memory that its crew had to switch programs depending on what the jet was doing at the moment—the RIO would hit a switch to bring up the bombing program, and then after the bomb-dropping ended, they’d reload the air-to-air program"

https://nationalinterest.org/blog/buzz/navy-deathmatch-f-14-...

Re: Boeing 747s receive software updates over floppy disks

#66

Post by sandworm101 » Mon, Aug 10, 2020, 4:30 PM UTC

justapassenger wrote: post #28

ir77 wrote: post #12

i'm surprised that people are surprised by this. i work for aerospace, and this is fairly typical -- albeit not floppy disk examples, but we keep a bunch of old laptops running win 7 and other examples around, hound around for them and spare parts. these machines are off the network, etc. these systems were developed 20+ years ago and per contract the a manufacture is obligated to maintain them for the service life,…

I worry how companies will be able to provide similar services in the future, as more and more stuff is running as services in the cloud. It’ll most likely become more and more costly, as you won’t be able to buy offline version of some complement, and keep it working on your support device for 30 years. You’ll need to build all of them yourself. And that will also most likely mean it’ll be less reliable.

Lol. Aircraft software running "in the cloud". Damb right it will. It will also work "in the rain" and "in the snow".

Re: Boeing 747s receive software updates over floppy disks

#67

Post by ashtonkem » Mon, Aug 10, 2020, 4:31 PM UTC

virtue3 wrote: post #57

ceejayoz wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Maybe if this process had actually proved sufficient to prevent the 737 Max woes, we would pay it more respect? A better measure is passenger deaths per kilometer. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Fatalities_per_reven... It's been on a steady, large decline since the 1970s. Even with the 737 MAX crashes, it's an incredibly safe way to travel. In the last ten years, one passenger has died on a US carrier due…

just want to call out - The engine literally exploded, and they made it home via the rest of the plane OK (minus the unfortunate passenger). In the past this would have cut hydrolics (this happened with a DC10 rear engine exploding) and then losing control. Major props to the pilots and boeing (all SW planes are 737s I believe).

Yes, Southwest only flies 737s in order to simplify their maintenance logistics and to ensure that every pilot they have can fly every plane.

Re: Boeing 747s receive software updates over floppy disks

#68

Post by bartread » Mon, Aug 10, 2020, 4:33 PM UTC

alfalfasprout wrote: post #54

reaperducer wrote: post #30

Did it work? Yes. Was it secure? Yes. So, what's the problem? Updating 30-year-old gear with media from its era seems to make sense. If they were really wedded to digital media and needed to bridge that gap, Sony used to make a floppy disk that you could jam a memory stick into and it would read in a normal 3½ inch floppy drive. Very cool gadget.

Frankly, provided you have error checking logic and don't store them next to a magnet... floppy disks are pretty damn bulletproof. I've had way more issues per-use reading a thumb drive or a CD/DVD-ROM than I ever did reading floppy disks.

Yep. Only a single datapoint, but I've had more issues with flash drives and USB sticks than I've ever had with floppies.

CDRs are next level in terms of unreliability. Last year I discovered that almost none of the CDRs I'd burned in the early to mid noughties remain readable: simply had to destroy them.

Re: Boeing 747s receive software updates over floppy disks

#69

Post by jermaustin1 » Mon, Aug 10, 2020, 4:37 PM UTC

hindsightbias wrote: post #34

ir77 wrote: post #12

i'm surprised that people are surprised by this. i work for aerospace, and this is fairly typical -- albeit not floppy disk examples, but we keep a bunch of old laptops running win 7 and other examples around, hound around for them and spare parts. these machines are off the network, etc. these systems were developed 20+ years ago and per contract the a manufacture is obligated to maintain them for the service life,…

It is interesting that people don't think on these scales. What percentage of the HN crowd has developed something that has had (or will have) a 10, 20 or 40 year life span? Because I've seen a bit of that and it's what makes the world go round. There's certainly a lot of bad/crazy stuff out there but wonder if the ephemeral fashions of today will stand the tests of time.

I'm in my 30s, I've been a primarily web developer for 15 years, and I know there is software I wrote in 2008 that is still running today for processing the rent of 1000s of residents. It has been updated a few times, adding a console argument to automate the process more. It was originally a Bob-O-Matic process. At midnight on the first of the month, this old-timer Bob would launch the application, click one button to load the residents, double check the numbers, click another the button to pull the rent statements, check those numbers, and then click a third button to process the transactions which actually took about an hour to run through, and on occasion would actually crash once a year or so, but it had the ability to pick back up after a crash where it left off.

That was probably my first real bit of production code, it (un)fortunately replaced half a floor of people with one man, who faithfully clicked those buttons every first midnight for the next 10 years before he retired. It was then automated by the couple of South African contractors that replaced the NYC-based app development team.

The company spent about 12 years automating away almost every job except management.

Re: Boeing 747s receive software updates over floppy disks

#70

Post by ashtonkem » Mon, Aug 10, 2020, 4:38 PM UTC

fennecfoxen wrote: post #64

ceejayoz wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Maybe if this process had actually proved sufficient to prevent the 737 Max woes, we would pay it more respect? A better measure is passenger deaths per kilometer. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Fatalities_per_reven... It's been on a steady, large decline since the 1970s. Even with the 737 MAX crashes, it's an incredibly safe way to travel. In the last ten years, one passenger has died on a US carrier due…

The 737 Max grounding cost about $18 billion so far (according tot he Google infobox which knows everything and is never wrong.) The high-end estimates of the value of a statistical human life tend to run about $4-8 million, depending who you ask. The FAA grounding of the Max has 2250 has thus cost enough money to save 2,250-4,500 statistical lives, had the money been spent more wisely elsewhere. How does your "bette…

You can't point to the grounding of the 737 Max 8 as a reliable indicator of the cost of regulation because:

1. Arguably this is the cost of regulations not being followed properly

2. This is an extra-ordinary circumstance that is costing much more than a regular plane would cost to get certified and fly (see point 1)

3. You are drastically underestimating the cost to the industry both in terms of reduced customer confidence, hull losses (~$100mil an airplane), and increased insurance premiums if we were to continue flying the Max 8.

But honestly, I'm having a really hard time understanding what your point is. Are you asserting that we should just fly the Max 8 and not worry about it? Are you asserting that airplanes aren't safer now? What are you getting at?