Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Explore Mars with Maestro

Posted by michael on from the sim-mars dept.

The Maestro Team writes "NASA has released Maestro, a public version of the primary software tool used by scientists to operate the Mars Exploration Rovers from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Anyone can download Maestro for free from mars.telascience.org and use it to follow along with the rovers' progress during the mission. You can use Maestro to view pictures from Mars in 2D and 3D and create simplified rover activity plans. During the mission, updates will be released for Maestro containing the latest images from Mars."

6 of 180 comments (clear)

  1. sloooow maestro by ruprechtjones · · Score: 5, Funny

    I think we just /.ed Mars...

    --
    Kip Hawley is an idiot.
    1. Re:sloooow maestro by Gleng · · Score: 4, Funny

      Well, the ping times are a bitch.

      --
      "Proudly Posting Without Reading The Article"
  2. Miles Or Kilometers? by Silverkm · · Score: 5, Funny
    When creating the activity plans, is it miles or kilometers? Wouldn't want to crash into anything

    Overall Looks like an interesting idea, they should look into putting it in schools. Could be a very educational "toy" to play with.

    --
    "After I'm dead, I'd rather have people ask why I have no monument than why I have one." - Cato the Elder, aka Marcu
  3. And here I thought... by Eberlin · · Score: 5, Funny

    All I needed to do was ssh to mars.rover.org and I can see a curses version of the 3D mars landscape. Fuel packs are depicted as % symbols. The rover is depicted as an @ sign.

    No, wait, come to think of it, that's nethack. A very good program to take up if you're one of the folks working with the Beagle2.

  4. Simulation by Rosco+P.+Coltrane · · Score: 4, Funny

    Anyone can download Maestro for free from mars.telascience.org and use it to follow along with the rovers' progress during the mission.

    Thanks to Slashdot, downloading Maestro also provides a vividly real simulation of the long months of space travel between Earth and Mars.

    --
    "A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
  5. Demo Only by Waffle+Iron · · Score: 4, Funny
    NASA's business model makes this kind of a rip off. In this space-aged version of "give away the razor, sell the blades", you don't actually get to run your own mission with this freebie software. Instead, all you get to do is watch as NASA calls all the shots for the two demo probes that are being sent to Mars this month. It's like they're handing out game consoles with no input controllers to go with them.

    What they don't tell you up front is that if you actually want to run your own mission, you're going to have to pony up at least $100 million to buy a probe of your own. NASA stands to make a pretty penny if they sucker many people to buy into this scheme.