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Comment by sjtgraham | Hacker News Reader

BURN_BABY_BURN--MASTER_IGNITION_ROUTINE.s - https://github.com/chrislgarry/Apollo-11/blob/dc4ea6735c4646...

And the name inspiration [1]

## At the get-together of the AGC developers celebrating the 40th anniversary ## of the first moonwalk, Don Eyles (one of the authors of this routine along ## with Peter Adler) has related to us a little interesting history behind the ## naming of the routine.<br> ## <br> ## It traces back to 1965 and the Los Angeles riots, and was inspired ## by disc jockey extraordinaire and radio station owner Magnificent Montague. ## Magnificent Montague used the phrase "Burn, baby! BURN!" when spinning the ## hottest new records. Magnificent Montague was the charismatic voice of ## soul music in Chicago, New York, and Los Angeles from the mid-1950s to ## the mid-1960s.

[1] https://github.com/chrislgarry/Apollo-11/blob/dc4ea6735c4646...

I really wish we can do an AMA with these two,

> # THE MASTER IGNITION ROUTINE WAS CONCEIVED AND EXECUTED, AND (NOTA BENE) IS MAINTAINED BY ADLER AND EYLES.

I had to look this up, NOTA BENE is latin for,

  observe carefully or take special notice

Hence N.B.

I never made that connection. TIL. Thank you!

Random note: When I was in the 5th grade, our math teacher taught us the meaning of Nota Bene, and used a NB sign to mark important notes when deriving formulas. Still use to this day when making notes

I think I'm going to start using NOTA BENE in my source code comments just to be fancy.

[EDIT] On second thought "HONI SOIT QUI MAL Y PENSE" would be much better ("Shame on whosoever would think badly of it")

Postgres' code is full of NB: :)

Also the "NOLI SE TANGERE" for "DO NOT TOUCH".

Suddenly my Latin and Computer Science majors make more sense together.

"Note well"

… lest you fall into it.

I found Don Eyles' website[1],

> At MET 102:39:31 the best possible confidence builder occurred — throttle down, right on time. "Ah! Throttle down... better than the simulator" commented Aldrin, "Throttle down on time!" exclaimed Armstrong, their excitement palpable. In the official transcript of communications between spacecraft and ground during the powered descent, these are the only exclamation points[11].

goosebumps.

[1] http://www.doneyles.com/LM/Tales.html

NB. Is how you indicate a comment in J.

Maybe you will find this article interesting:

Don Eyles Walks Us Through the Lunar Module Source Code

http://hackaday.com/2016/07/05/don-eyles-walks-us-through-th...

... and the HN discussion of this article 2 days ago:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12036864

I learned a new word: ULLAGE (the amount by which a container falls short of being full)

Ullage (the word) has terrestrial applications too:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ullage_(wine)

Also of note, in zero-gravity the ullage space must be forced to the opposite end of the tank before ignition so the fuel is at the intakes. Commonly this task is accomplished by "ullage motors" which fire to settle the fuel before primary ignition[1].

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ullage_motor

Did you notice the date:

> # Assemble revision 001 of AGC program LMY99 by NASA 2021112-61 > # 16:27 JULY 14, 1969

Likely the printing date but I envisioned the last minute all-nighters right away.

Considering that the binary was woven by hand using copper wire into the computer's core rope memory, I imagine the flight revision had to be finished months before the actual flight.

Also interesting is the name of two of the "General Purpose Ignition Routines" (I'm assuming, I don't speak Assembly):

  159: BURNBABY
  169: B*RNB*B*

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