Submarine missing near Titanic used a $30 Logitech gamepad for steering • Hacker News Board

Re: Submarine missing near Titanic used a $30 Logitech gamepad for steering

#951

Post by pcthrowaway » Wed, Jun 21, 2023, 9:15 PM UTC

swid wrote: post #918

mysterydip wrote: post #827

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He told CBS News: "You know, there's a limit. At some point safety just is pure waste. I mean if you just want to be safe, don't get out of bed. Don't get in your car. Don't do anything. At some point, you're going to take some risk, and it really is a risk/reward question. I think I can do this just as safely by breaking the rules." https://metro.co.uk/2023/06/20/titanic-sub-ceo-was-worried-a...

I’ve know mountain climbers, hang glider/paraglider pilots, scuba divers, sky divers, and more and we pretty much say that exact thing. I’ve been casual acquaintances with people who have died doing extreme sports. Usually, the people in these sports say if the worst were to happen to them, they accept that risk and wouldn’t want their fate to stop other people from following their passions. That the feeling of being…

There's a spectrum of risk comfort in mountaineering though.

At the end of the day if there's a rockslide, there's nothing you can do, so you have to be willing to accept some level of risk.

But at the same time, the majority of mountaineering deaths are due to people taking unnecessary risks (for the sport). Being poorly prepared in terms of gear, or making poor decisions, or not being educated enough in climbing, safety assessment, and rescue techniques.

There's absolutely a lot you can do to mitigate the risk, and I think even the experienced mountaineers who choose to take more risk (say, traveling lighter and placing less protection in order to cover more ground in a day) don't advocate for that as the standard way to practice the sport.

I'll be honest, I've had a few close calls myself, but I've taken those as lessons in how to do things more safely going forward, because I value doing things safely more than "bagging more peaks".

I guess if your dream is something like "climb every mountain" accepting more risk is necessary.

But I don't see why the people on this Titanic expedition couldn't have achieved their goals while spending a bit more time on R&D + QA.

Also, people should be making these risk decisions for themselves, not others. The CEO may have had it coming to him, but I feel bad for the other crew on board if they weren't able to decline the expedition, or weren't provided adequate information about the testing that had been done.

Re: Submarine missing near Titanic used a $30 Logitech gamepad for steering

#952

Post by bigmattystyles » Wed, Jun 21, 2023, 9:16 PM UTC

RajT88 wrote: post #591

bigmattystyles wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"1 ping only" -Russian sub captain with Scottish accent for some reason. It's still one of my favorite movies though.

Far from the most egregious accent offenses committed by Connery. There's so many, it's hard to pick!

I'm also fond of the spanish Highlander with a Scottish accent. There can only be one (accent for Sean Connery).

Re: Submarine missing near Titanic used a $30 Logitech gamepad for steering

#953

Post by jjk166 » Wed, Jun 21, 2023, 9:22 PM UTC

omniglottal wrote: post #938

rob74 wrote: post #747

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The use of the controller is symptomatic of their attitude, but I agree that it's probably not as relevant as, say, using an untested (and apparently untestable) carbon fiber hull: > Lochridge’s concerns mainly focused on the company’s decision to rely on sensitive acoustic monitoring – cracking or popping sounds made by the hull under pressure – to detect flaws, rather than a scan of the hull. Lochridge said the com…

Nothing is untestable. If validation results in destruction, then destructive testing is how this is done. Failing to test is a choice, similar to the choice made by a software engineer who determines, without testing, that their production service has no bugs. If a component's flaw can only be detected right before a failure, we need statistical analysis of multiple such failures being intentionally induced to estim…

No one was claiming that it was untestable, the company did decide to go with an acoustic monitoring, which is a destructive test, instead of a scan, which is a nondestructive test. The company claimed there was no non-destructive test that could be done. The issue is that when you're dealing with short run custom components, like the hull of a submarine, just because one passes a destructive test doesn't mean the others are free of manufacturing defects. You can't do useful statistical analysis when your sample size is small.

Re: Submarine missing near Titanic used a $30 Logitech gamepad for steering

#954

Post by carbine » Wed, Jun 21, 2023, 9:45 PM UTC

heavyset_go wrote: post #725

truemotive wrote: post #681

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm really frustrated by anyone that poo-poos this specific issue. One shall absolutely fucking obsess, me for instance about the game controller they used. Look at this. https://i.imgur.com/FrdR7TP.png So the F710 Logitech gamepad was something I wouldn't even trust as a teenager to let me play emulated retro games accurately. It has a hardware switch to toggle between DirectInput (an ancient input technology within…

. Edit: The bit mentioned above is at 0:37 in this video: https://youtu.be/ClkytJa0ghc?t=37 - "we keep a couple of spares on board just in case", that's great but I'm wondering who in that sub knows how to pair an ancient Logitech gamepad and remap XInput like a kid playing Diablo. They don't, in the BBC Travel episode "Take Me to Titanic" about this team and their sub, they did a dive with customers and almost had t…

Watched this too. I am alarmed by the CEO's assertion in the CBS video segment that only the hull was critical, everything else could break and you'd be safe. We know for a fact that other submersibles have gotten caught in wreckage down at the site. Being able to control your thrusters and steer could be the difference between life and death.

I'll admit I absolutely don't have this adventurous spirit, and I admire those who do. I'm sincerely praying for their successful rescue. But some of this does seem careless and possibly negligent.

Re: Submarine missing near Titanic used a $30 Logitech gamepad for steering

#955

Post by carbine » Wed, Jun 21, 2023, 9:52 PM UTC

TheCondor wrote: post #853

truemotive wrote: post #681

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm really frustrated by anyone that poo-poos this specific issue. One shall absolutely fucking obsess, me for instance about the game controller they used. Look at this. https://i.imgur.com/FrdR7TP.png So the F710 Logitech gamepad was something I wouldn't even trust as a teenager to let me play emulated retro games accurately. It has a hardware switch to toggle between DirectInput (an ancient input technology within…

>> This controller is a metaphor for something This all will be better discussed after the recovery or memorials or whatever (Godspeed to them, I honestly hope for a miracle) This metaphor is extremely double edged, especially in Silicon Valley ethos. When it fails, everyone piles on about the game controller and the lack of ‘flight worthiness.’ When it works they are lauded as heroes because of the extreme savings o…

Regulation in areas of extreme innovation is by definition difficult. When you have people onboard any space or deep sea craft, you do have some level of moral obligation.

Whatever you feel about Elon Musk, I appreciate his distinction in approach between crewed and un-crewed craft at SpaceX. I'm paraphrasing but he has said that when something is uncrewed, you can push it to the limit over and over again to push the technology fwd. But the second you have people on board (i.e. Crew Dragon), the margin for error goes down to zero. There are unavoidable risks, but you want to be damn sure you've minimized the avoidable ones. So you can be both -- a fast moving startup, and a "safe" organization.

Obv we still know so little about the Titan, but what upsets me is that the 'uncrewed' extreme testing does not (afaik) seem to have been particularly rigorous.

Re: Submarine missing near Titanic used a $30 Logitech gamepad for steering

#956

Post by carbine » Wed, Jun 21, 2023, 9:59 PM UTC

eterevsky wrote: post #785

meigwilym wrote: post #781

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure of your point here. You claim that SpaceX's process was an iterative one which lead to the 'most reliable rocket in history', but state that the process does not matter.

As I see it, there are two approaches: "NASA" approach and "SpaceX" or "Silicon valley" approach. In "NASA" approach you are building the system bottom-up ensuring the reliability on each level. In "SpaceX" approach you build a barely functional system as fast as you can and then iterate to improve reliability (and other characteristics). The top comment in this thread seems to imply that "NASA" approach is inherentl…

SpaceX has explicitly very different approaches for crewed and uncrewed crafts. Uncrewed rockets are pushed to the limit over and over and over again, to drive innovation and thoroughly test them. As soon as a single person is on board, their margin for error goes to zero.

I'd argue this is in fact superior to NASA's approach, which rarely allows for uncrewed testing (and spectacular RUDs), leading to technological stagnation and catastrophic organizational risks. (i.e. internal resistance to doing anything about the O-ring problem on Challenger, even though they had been alerted about the potential issue).

Re: Submarine missing near Titanic used a $30 Logitech gamepad for steering

#957

Post by carbine » Wed, Jun 21, 2023, 10:01 PM UTC

Eisenstein wrote: post #825

eterevsky wrote: post #785

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As I see it, there are two approaches: "NASA" approach and "SpaceX" or "Silicon valley" approach. In "NASA" approach you are building the system bottom-up ensuring the reliability on each level. In "SpaceX" approach you build a barely functional system as fast as you can and then iterate to improve reliability (and other characteristics). The top comment in this thread seems to imply that "NASA" approach is inherentl…

> My view is that from the point of view of safety, the approach doesn't really matter and what matters is the results But you won't know the 'results' until you have a catastrophe and can do a post-mortem and find out where you went wrong. The approach does matter because one approach is 'let's do everything we can to prevent the catastrophe'. I mean, the approach is safety.

Yeah. IMHO this thing should have gone unmanned to the bottom a gajillion times, and exposed to all variety of stressors, before a paying passenger was on board. Maybe that's not possible? Maybe it was in fact prohibitively expensive? I'd love to hear why I'm wrong, but it seems wild to me that paying passengers are along for a ride after only really a handful of successful trips in this thing, ever.

Re: Submarine missing near Titanic used a $30 Logitech gamepad for steering

#958

Post by fasthands9 » Wed, Jun 21, 2023, 10:05 PM UTC

Osiris wrote: post #425

fasthands9 wrote: post #415

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is not really how the government operates. If this was operating at scale the government would absolutely be involved. You can't just run cruise ship operations and advertising without government involvement. I dont see how this is any different. Perhaps you personally have a "so be it" libertarian view but thats not the view the government takes.

It’s international waters. What “government” are you referring to?

A cruise ship is on international water but there are still strict laws about what cruise ships can operate at US ports or can advertise to US consumers.

Re: Submarine missing near Titanic used a $30 Logitech gamepad for steering

#959

Post by berniedurfee » Wed, Jun 21, 2023, 10:42 PM UTC

salawat wrote: post #945

omniglottal wrote: post #938

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nothing is untestable. If validation results in destruction, then destructive testing is how this is done. Failing to test is a choice, similar to the choice made by a software engineer who determines, without testing, that their production service has no bugs. If a component's flaw can only be detected right before a failure, we need statistical analysis of multiple such failures being intentionally induced to estim…

THIS . As a Quality Assurance person, this is what drives me up the wall, across the ceiling, and down the other wall. You can always do a test run. Not doing that test run is essentially saying every person you subject to that system is not worth the trouble of doing the test.

FOMO is a helluva drug.

Re: Submarine missing near Titanic used a $30 Logitech gamepad for steering

#960

Post by berniedurfee » Wed, Jun 21, 2023, 10:51 PM UTC

major4x wrote: post #697

dehrmann wrote: post #688

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For the most part (so no self-driving cars), startups are in a low-stakes game, so it makes sense to hack away, and it nas nothing to do with an "old guard." Google (or any other tech company) outages aren't particularly memorable unless you were an engineer involved in it. The space shuttle accidents were labeled "disasters."

Theranos? All those cases of neglected security when data leaked and/or people killed themselves over scams?

I agree. With software being ever more embedded in our daily lives and ability to function in society, the stakes are very high, even in domains outside of physical products.

Social media has shown to be pretty destructive. I don’t think there are many low stakes areas for software. It’s all impactful and potentially harmful at scale.