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Writing Code for Spacecraft

Posted by michael on from the carried-the-bits-uphill-one-by-one-in-the-snow dept.

CowboyRobot writes "In an article subtitled, "And you think *your* operating system needs to be reliable." Queue has an interview with the developer of the OS that runs on the Mars Rovers. Mike Deliman, chief engineer of operating systems at Wind River Systems, has quotes like, 'Writing the code for spacecraft is no harder than for any other realtime life- or mission-critical application. The thing that is hard is debugging a problem from another planet.' and, 'The operating system and kernel fit in less than 2 megabytes; the rest of the code, plus data space, eventually exceeded 30 megabytes.'"

6 of 204 comments (clear)

  1. Imagine a ... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

    ...Beowulf cluster of Mars Rovers.

  2. there is only one by Foktip · · Score: 0, Troll

    Do the Debian.

  3. Chinese Threat: Keep the NASA Code Secret! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll
    If NASA were to open source the code, then the Chinese would have access to the latest technology for remote-controlled drones. The Chinese are morally bankrupt and would use the software to create remote-controlled war vehicles.

    Sometimes national security requires that we keep certain things secret. At least, be glad that we in the West have a lock on the technology thus far.

  4. Microsoft. Where do you want to go today? by rice_burners_suck · · Score: -1, Troll
    I don't understand why writing an OS for something like the Mars rover or some spacecraft that's going to be on the other side of the universe needs to be such a difficult thing to do. It's just software. Why can't they just save the billions of taxpayer dollars and just install an old copy of Windows 95 on it? That would be good enough.

    After all, nobody ever got fired for buying Microsoft. And putting Windows on Sputnik 2 gives a new meaning to "Where do you want to go today?"

  5. Re:Chinese Threat: Keep the Source Code Secret! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

    Heh, the US (and definitely more than 51% of the country) is morally bankrupt! Get off your high horse! Finding examples of corruption are left to the reader, if you can't find any, congratulations, you're an idiot.

  6. Interview or free commercial? by Stiletto · · Score: -1, Troll


    Is this an interview or a free commercial for Wind River? I read the article and still can't figure out which it is.

    Slashdot: Offers for Nerds. Commercials that Matter.