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The Software of Space Exploration

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the software-in-spaaaace dept.

David Boswell writes "The O'Reilly Network is running an article called The Software of Space Exploration that looks at a number of the software projects that NASA has released as open source under their NOSA license. It explores how they are using other free and open source projects for use in some of their missions. Information about the European Space Agency and other space organizations is also covered." From the article: "A number of tools allow you to track objects in space, from asteroids to shuttle missions. A consortium of scientists working in the field of celestial mechanics has released OrbFit as free software under the GPL. This software can compute the orbits of asteroids and predict an asteroid's future position. You can also track artificial satellites with several free-as-in-beer and free-as-in-freedom options. Amateur radio enthusiasts use Linux and these tools to hear transmissions from the space station or from other satellites in Earth orbit."

4 of 45 comments (clear)

  1. Hack the planet! by ollj · · Score: 2, Funny

    "Hack the planet!" "Which one?"

  2. Free as in ... by NoMoreBits · · Score: 5, Funny

    You mean free as in cheese

  3. Re:NASA and Eclipse by bsytko · · Score: 2, Funny

    So that explains the 7 minutes of delay time between Earth and Mars. And all this time I thought it was the distance that was the main factor...

  4. Oh No! Not Open Source! by glass_window · · Score: 4, Funny

    That means the terrorists will get ahold of it, track some meteors, and alter their course so they crash into a landmass of their choice! Open source is bad!

    </scarasm>