6 ms·

This is incredible. Not just because of the engineering that went into such a long lived machine, but also because of the ingenuity of the teams that have looke

• johnnyAghands 3y ago
  This for summing up what I couldn't find the words for!
• pantulis 3y ago
  > Not only is the technical achievement something to be celebrated Only the _documentation_ effort must be monumental.
  • OldGuyInTheClub 3y ago
    Yes, and JPL makes it available. Voyager Telecom: https://descanso.jpl.nasa.gov/DPSummary/Descanso4--Voyager_new.pdf https://descanso.jpl.nasa.gov/DPSummary/Descanso4--Voyager_n... A lot more at the top-level site and the links on the right-hand side: https://descanso.jpl.nasa.gov/ https://descanso.jpl.nasa.gov/
  • quietpain 3y ago
    Lets hope the _archival_ effort can match or in 50 years time we’ll have another one of these: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_11_missing_tapes https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_11_missing_tapes https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stolen_and_missing_Moon_rocks https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stolen_and_missing_Moon_rock...
    • shiroiuma 3y ago
      Even with those problems, those are still far better than the (complete lack of) documentation I see in software workplaces these days.
      • mdaniel 3y ago
        In fairness to the workplaces that I've been in, documentation for a software stack, or even the product, from 18 months ago may as well be in Swahili for as much good as it would do any new member to the team Just like the comparison to code quality I often see is any such NASA thread: it's a whole different ballgame when one is sending a spacecraft out, or carrying lives to space, than "I tried to send a Slack message and it did a sowweee,oopsiez"
    • chpatrick 3y ago
      The missing tapes are definitely one of the saddest engineering stories for me. Such an important moment in history and we just threw it away.
  • ChicagoBoy11 3y ago
    I've been trying to "learn" the missions more thoroughly by flying them on Orbiter and NASSP, and just the sheer amount and depth of documentation that is accessible today is truly astounding. There's something awe-inspiring about sitting and my computer and looking at the mission plan, only to then not understand the "why" of this particular switch that I'm throwing, to then open a pdf with a "astronaut training booklet" which explains the overview of the thing I'm using, to then open another pdf with the detail technical documentation of it, to then a schematic of the equipment should I at any point (but prob not) ever try building one myself.
• Aardwolf 3y ago
  Also the fact that this CPU is still running at all, after such long time in such hostile environment (radiation, temperatures)!
  • shiroiuma 3y ago
    These spacecraft don't have CPUs, at least not the way we think of them, in the sense of a single microprocessor IC. Their "CPUs" are built from discrete logic gates on CMOS and TTL ICs, the way the earliest digital arcade games were. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voyager_program#Computers_and_data_processing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voyager_program#Computers_and_...
    • varjag 3y ago
      The concept of CPU predates micro-processors. They were cabinet sized originally.
• jcaldas 3y ago
  As Oscar Wilde wrote, "We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars".
• palijer 3y ago
  This is a great read digging into the team that I loved. I wonder how many of the core team are still there. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/03/magazine/the-loyal-engineers-steering-nasas-voyager-probes-across-the-universe.html https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/03/magazine/the-loyal-engine... >Over decades, the crew members who have remained have forgone promotions, the lure of nearby Silicon Valley and, more recently, retirement, to stay with the spacecraft. NASA funding, which peaked during the Apollo program in the 1960s, has dwindled, making it next to impossible to recruit young computer-science majors away from the likes of Google and Facebook.
  • ianlevesque 3y ago
    > NASA funding, which peaked during the Apollo program in the 1960s, has dwindled, making it next to impossible to recruit young computer-science majors away from the likes of Google and Facebook. This problem can be attacked in a couple of ways, one way is to increase compensation sure, but another is to make it possible to have healthcare and housing on the salary they do offer. The chasm between pay and cost of living is huge and growing.
    • macintux 3y ago
      I've long thought universal healthcare (& UBI) would enable more people to take entrepreneurial risks, but I hadn't considered that passion jobs like NASA could also be beneficiaries.
      • zrail 3y ago
        UBI and universal healthcare would enable _so_ many people to take risks that they can't today. We would see an explosion in the arts, in fundamental science, in passion projects like this. It would be absolutely incredible. Except according to half of the people in charge it would mean The Wrong People would get money and all they would do is buy drugs. And that's why we can't have nice things.
        • rrdharan 3y ago
• Simplicitas 3y ago
  "antidote to the darker side of our species." .. LOVE THIS!
• ChicagoBoy11 3y ago
  If you feel that way about this, I would highly recommend "Carrying the Fire" for you as a tremendous read. Out of all the Apollo-era books I've read, I'd say this one does the best job of mixing in really interesting technical details to really get you to peek at just how much complexity there really was (and may I even suggest giving NASSP a go so you can even try it yourself) while also doing a fantastic job at connecting it to the human and meaning side of the whole endeavor. Just a fantastic read, and sounds like you'd be the perfect target audience for it!
• simpaticoder 3y ago
  >Half a century of operation. The stability of society (specifically American, specifically California/Caltech/JPL/Pasadena) must also be marveled at. That's 2 or 3 generations of engineers and scientists that were trained well enough to actually get things done. This is a marvel of teaching, technical communication, and societal infrastructure. Notably, NASA/JPL has maintained its prestige and funding for that entire time, as has Caltech. There are many institutions (Sears), and world superpowers (USSR) from 50 years ago that seemed like they would dominate forever, but are gone.
  • troyvit 3y ago
    This is a really good point, especially for a country that is so young and that has grown so fast. Maybe the instability resulting from that growth is yet to come but it doesn't detract from what NASA and JPL have accomplished so far.
    • sheepscreek 3y ago
      > especially for a country that is so young and that has grown so fast USA gained independence 247 years ago. That puts it in a minority of countries that have been sovereign as long or longer.
      • deleted 3y ago
        [deleted]
  • slingnow 3y ago
    You're going to be blown away when you discover people have been reliably passing down information to future generations for many many centuries.
    • ethanbond 3y ago
      "Reliably passing down information" includes a lot of stuff a lot less impressive than "reliably passing down the information required to keep operational a spacecraft mid-flight at the edge of our solar system."
• jjice 3y ago
  The care that must go into writing and testing software that goes out to a machine like this is incredible. I write software that, if and when it fails, it fails hard and it just comes back with no added cost to me while I go ahead and look at what went wrong and release a fix within the hour. Not having that failure feedback loop is daunting. I really respect that kind of work.
• wutwutwat 3y ago
  Shared this with my son who really enjoyed reading that others share his optimism about our species. Very well said, thank you. You've impacted the outlook of a young man trying to figure out his place in the universe, who often times struggles with noticing the rare opportunity it is to be gold dust peppering a radio telescope.