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Japanese 'Minerva' Robot Lost in Space
space_weasel writes "A little Japanese robot that was supposed to land on the surface of an asteroid has accidentally been flung into space by its mothership. New Scientist Space reports that the accident occurred as the data link with the spacecraft was being switched from an station in Japan to one in Australia. Mission controllers still plan to punch a hole in the asteroid and collect samples, which will be returned to Earth."
Perhaps, but someone failed it when it came to the hazard analysis on that spacecraft...
"There are a dozen opinions on a matter until you know the truth. Then there is only one." - CS Lewis (paraprhase)
I wonder how, exactly, the software being used had the capability to allow this to happen. Even if the problem were procedural, I would think that, on transfer of control, you would lock down all non-essential functions - like "flinging" payloads into space - until control has been successfully handed off.
Of course, this is all pointless conjecture on my part - it may have been a hardware malfunction, for all I know. It would be interesting to analyze things like these. Having only a few years real-world experience, I doubt my programming skills would be worth a damn, but I would be thrilled just to have the opportunity to read the code they use before hand. Generally I don't volunteer my time to OSS-like programs, but this is one situation where I could easily see myself helping. Or trying to help, more like it.
Then again, by releasing it beforehand open source, someone else may very well be able to analyze the code and "steal" control of the probe/satellite/whatever-is-using-the-software, possibly using it for nefarious gain, or possibly just being a bunch of dicks. So this probably wouldn't pan out. Still, a nerd can dream.
During this 40-minute antenna change, information about the spacecraft's vertical motion was unavailable to ground controllers.
For a country which prides itself as being at the forefront of robotics technology, this is rather surprising. The latency inherent in space communication over great distances is the primary reason for using intelligent robots in space. If the probe was sufficiently intelligent, it would perform its tasks without supervision from ground control. I hope they (including NASA and the ESA) put a lot more effort into automating their space probes in the future.
Yeah, killing a scientist is really a bad thing.
For those who have no idea what I'm talking about I would refer you to this link about the new definition of science from the folks who are trying to bring us Intelligent Design.
We will bankrupt ourselves in the vain search for absolute security. -- Dwight D. Eisenhower
You'd sure know more if you went to the (somewhat unclear) article, which would obviate the need for lots of your conjecture.
The main probe has been going on one of its three "stablizing wheels," the other two having failed. There's a sidebar link in the article to an earlier one about those failures. Mission controllers have been burning extra fuel keeping the thing at the right distance from the asteroid, facing the asteroid, and with its solar panels facing the sun; they already had that against them. Then the altimeter data they were getting was bad, they were closer than they thought, because some combination of the laser altimeter (previously untested) and the slope of the asteroid's surface confused the data.
They realized they were within 100 meters and had to send the detach command while the antenna switch was happening. The blackout prevented them from realizing a "keep above minimum altitude" engine thrust had just gone off.
This is much more of a reflection of this model of probe: it's cheaper, it's faster to develop, and there are going to be failures like the Beagle and this.
(Personally I do think there'd be a big gain if, before and after missions like this, the code got reviewed. I doubt very much that hackers in Idaho would have foreseen the failed stabilizers, the workaround, the potential for misjudging the altimeter data, and the combination of the blackout and the necessity for the release command. But in terms of intellectual freedom, it'd be a nice statement, and the Post Mortems would sure feature a lot of people asking Feynman-esque questions about icewater and O-rings.)
"Fundamentalism" isn't about divine morality. It's about human authority.
The laws of thermodynamics have very little influence here since they all deal with a closed system.
You'll find that the laws of physics and the laws of thermodynamics call for pockets or order within the larger system as a whole.
Hmmm witty sig or funny sig? Maybe elitest techy sig!
Competition makes people try harder. It also makes "the best" look better.
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make install -not war
If I have an inch standard, I can go fairly easily down to an accurate 1/32 or even 1/64 of an inch. Without a ruler with accurately scribed gradations, can you measure me 0.396875 cm?
Please tell me you're not being serious there. Do you honestly believe that centimetres can't be halved recursively too? Or, a more realistic solution, a metric person can pull an ordinary plastic ruler out of their desk drawer, and mark off 4mm (all metric rulers are marked with mm, some even half or quarter mm, except perhaps children's rulers).
If you really need a measurement more accurate than a millimetre (about a 25th of an inch), you should probably be using a more accurate tool.
So you're example was meant to point out that 10/64ths of an inch is harder to do in metric than imperial. Surely most people find it considerably easier to manipulate base-10 numbers (even the Americans do that with their money), then round to mm than manipulate fractions with differing denominators (albeit normally powers of 2), then work out how many 16ths, 32nds, and 64ths they need. And if you want to use a calculator, you end up with decimal anyway, or a denominator determined by the calculation (which may not even be a power of 2).
"I want 8 lengths of 1 and 3/16th inches, plus 3 lengths of 2 and 13/64th inches, then divide the whole lot by 3".