The Science Thread
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Heh.. I actually didn't realize it was that late until you mentioned it. I went out with some friends tonight, and I'm still a little energized from certain beverages.
With that said, I think I'll be signing off for a bit...
I'm not sure about the more risk bit. From what I read, the Soviet leaders had a complete disregard for safety during their space programme; the deadline was the only priority - they might even have coined the word
.But it was risky for everyone nonetheless, as you said. They must have been insanely brave.
I meant but didn't say "more risks than now".
Hum, it's obvious when I read again. Sorry, I wasn't fully awake.
Move Over Eclipse, a New Celestial Wonder Is Set to Take Center Stage
A nearby star system, teetering on the edge of a spectacular explosion, promises a rare cosmic show that’ll be visible to the naked eye.
gizmodo.com
T Coronae Borealis is a recurring nova system. Two stars orbiting each other, around 89 million km apart. One of them a red star, the other a white dwarf. The red one is leaking material to the white one which eventually will pass 1.4 solar mass (the so called Chandrasekhar limit) causing an eruption. And then it starts again. On the average it erupts roughly every 79th year. Which means it's likely to erupt again sometimes between April and September this year. It won't be like what happens when Betelgeuse goes "boom", but it should be visible to the naked eye. If you know where to look.
pibbuR who hopes the clouds will open up some time during this period.
"Unable to repair the chip, the team decided to place the affected code elsewhere"
pibbuR who wonders if the code is C (developed before launching Voyager). Probably not. Then he wonders if there are watchers knowing Voyager assembly.
It's assembly and an intepreter (like Apollo), on new custom processors.
"Unable to repair the chip, the team decided to place the affected code elsewhere"
pibbuR who wonders if the code is C (developed before launching Voyager). Probably not. Then he wonders if there are watchers knowing Voyager assembly.
I looked a little into it. NASA tells us there were several custom processors on the Voyager 1:
- Computer Command System (CCS) - 18-bit word, interrupt type processors (2) with 4096 words each of plated wire, non-volatile memory.
- Flight Data System (FDS) - 16-bit word machine (2) with modular memories and 8198 words each
- Attitude and Articulation Control System (AACS) - 18-bit word machines (2) with 4096 words each.
Computers in Spaceflight: The NASA Experience (1988, from a NASA contractor) gives more details on the FDS processors on pp. 185-190, with more insight on the computer architecture on p. 189. BTW, it's a hell of a good document if you want to dig into the subject. It hints at an assembler, which is confirmed in Voyager Interstellar Mission: Challenges of Flying a Very Old Spacecraft on a Very Long Mission (2016, from Jet Propulsion Lab itself) explaining all the challenges of long space missions and listing the interventions on Voyager 1 & 2, and in which we can read on p. 6:
Wikipedia and other websites have erroneously stated it was FORTRAN, then C, but this is the software used on Earth to process the received data, not on the probes (according to this Wired article, which might be a leap of faith). I see this error on Wikipedia has been recently corrected.
PS: The Computers in Spaceflight document above mentions that the first high-level language was used for Galileo (p. 194). It's all relative, since they talk about FORTH, HAL, and macros (and FORTRAN for prototyping).
HAL 9000, obviously.PS: The Computers in Spaceflight document above mentions that the first high-level language was used for Galileo (p. 194). It's all relative, since they talk about FORTH, HAL, and macros (and FORTRAN for prototyping).
pibbuR singing Daisy, Daisy.....
PS. It is BTW fascinating/disturbing all those objects we can't repair because they're too far away. We could fix Hubble (with an effort). But Voyager, James Webb, Parker and the Mars rovers are out of reach. DS
PPS. The latter is BTW 2 one of the reasons I think humans should not go to Mars. Physical problems that cannot be fixed by the (for a time) natives (for instance food rockets missing target) aren't exactly easy to solve. There's no way Matt Damon could have survived. DS.
PPS. NB! I definitely hope humans will go there (before I hopefully reach level 90) DS
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Oh. I didn't know that film, but I'll fix this today, thanks for the reference! Since Saving Private Ryan, it seems this actor needs rescuing now and then.
Yes, they'll need slightly mad (or courageous) people for their first settlements on Mars. Even on the Moon. If the Russians and the Chinese go on with their nuclear-powered ILRS station project, we'll see how they cope (if they haven't thrown all the nuclear stuff at us first, at this point). But with hardware made in China and Russia, what could possibly go wrong?