Re: Hooking processors together

Eugene Miya wrote:
In article <SrWdnWgDF9iX8KnVRVnyjwA@xxxxxxxxxxxx>,
Terje Mathisen <terje.mathisen@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Nothing weird about it: When you've read as many articles and books about the cost of putting a kg of payload into orbit as I have (possibly in the same ballpark as you?), anything as heavy as an additional astronaut really stands out.

No, it's weird.
It's instaneous weight. This is why craft has to get "manned" ratings.
Humans require lots more resources than the mere power computers use.

I do know that, simply carrying the air, water & food is a significant additional load, not to mention all the gear that's required to make sure there's a breathable atmosphere at all times. :-)


Oh, I agree. Designing systems with absolutely no safety valve should be a criminal offense.
OK writing bugs should be made a crime. Round up the usual suspects.
Maybe cut the programmer's right hand off? We don't like back doors
written into our software, especially when it takes up valuable memory space.
Hang on a moment, Gene!

Sarcasm. Seen Casablanca?

I did realize that that statement was way over the top, but you did write it in the middle of an otherwise serious post, including how you lost a friend.

With English as my second (or third?) language, I went over my head.
:-(

You guys should talk. I'm the guy who lost a close friend on Columbia.
I'm sorry to hear that, but it had nothing at all to do with the flight control sw afaik?

That's not a simple yes-no question. She was the most experience
software person to fly in space. That wasn't her direct job (she went
as flight engineer, the #3 seat), but she was a most important link between
the pilots and the rest of the astronaut flight community to software
community. Her loss sets back flight software potentially for years.

Having a large part of humanity's space capability in the form of the flying elephants (i.e. Shuttle) is a serious problem.

At least the GPCs won't be used in the next set of vehicles.

Personally I'm hoping that the competition from the various private initiatives, including sw guys like John Carmack (Armadillo Aerospace) will reduce the cost of putting payloads into orbit by an order of magnitude.

Terje

--
- <Terje.Mathisen@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
"almost all programming can be viewed as an exercise in caching"
.

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