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Assembly Code That Took America to the Moon Now Published On GitHub (qz.com)

Posted by EditorDavid on from the one-small-step dept.

An anonymous Slashdot reader writes: "The code that took America to the moon was just published to GitHub, and it's like a 1960s time capsule," reports Quartz. Two lines of code include the comment "# TEMPORARY, I HOPE HOPE HOPE," and there's also a quote from Shakespeare's play Henry VI. In addition, the keyboard and display system program is named PINBALL_GAME_BUTTONS_AND_LIGHT, and "There's also code that appears to instruct an astronaut to 'crank the silly thing around.'"

A former NASA intern uploaded the thousands of lines of assembly code to GitHub, working from a 2003 transcription made from scans inherited by MIT from a Colorado airplane pilot, and developers are already using GitHub to submit funny issue tickets for the 40-year-old code -- for example, "Extension pack for picking up Matt Damon". Another issue complains that "A customer has had a fairly serious problem with stirring the cryogenic tanks with a circuit fault present." Because this issue succinctly describes the Apollo 13 mission in 1970, the issue has been marked "closed".

4 of 74 comments (clear)

  1. Idiots. Idiots everywhere. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Unfortunately, with the amount of coverage that this is getting in the geek sphere, the Dunning-Kruger Effect is in full force. So far, just today, I've seen:

    - Someone trying to look into the code who had apparently never encountered a .s file before, and
    - Some (judging by his name) Indian guy who had apparently never heard of the term "attitude" in relation to flight control, and submitted a pull request to change it to "altitude".

    Idiots. Idiots everywhere.

    1. Re:Idiots. Idiots everywhere. by theurge14 · · Score: 3, Funny

      We'll never get into space with that kind of attitude!

  2. good code too by phantomfive · · Score: 3, Informative

    The mathematical sections tend to be better, well defined, well commented, and well-written code.

    --
    "First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
    1. Re:good code too by Lumpy · · Score: 3, Interesting

      And remember they did ALL OF THIS with integer only math and NO freaking math libraries.

      Want to drive a fre grad programmer nuts? have him convert celcius to Farenheit and Kelvin with 4 decimal places of accuracy using only integer math on an 8 bit micro, no you can not use ANY libraries at all, and you need to do it in less than 6 lines of code.

      Most shit themselves.

      --
      Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.