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Open Source Satellite Control
Debra writes "Have you ever wondered how you harness a satellite control system written in three languages, on four development platforms, and deployed to multiple client environments? With open source, naturally. When one wrong move can cost millions, you must rely on teamwork, smart design, and open standards to keep the project -- if not the satellite -- from going down in flames. This article covers software engineering basics, taking advantage of outside solutions, and scripting multi-million-dollar manuvers."
Woah! Imagine a Beowulf cluster of those!
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seems most EULA's basically say it's not their fault if you use the software, and because of this, you screw something up, expensive or not. among other things, software makers, even commercial, can't always account for all possible uses of their software ... if they've missed something (like, say, interfacing with thing X will cause it to crash once in a million times) ... well, you didn't ask for custom software, now did you? with OSS, you can check it yourself ... possibly tweak it yourself, if you know that something else you're interfacing with might be quirky. and that's probably more to their taste than having the ability to take another company to court -after- something goes down ... yeah, satellites should be replaceable, given enough time ... but for, say, launch windows to other planets, you don't get another chance for a -long- time ... money's nice ... but getting it right the first time, and having the ability to fix stuff yourself, and feel confident in your own work, may be worthwhile.