marsRoverDev

You could say the same thing about the UK government's equivalent, which I would argue is somewhat of an influence on 18F (though I'm not an insider). They actively open source their work, this being a great example of it: https://github.com/alphagov

I don't think that 18F and US taxpayers lose out on anything by open sourcing this. It builds a lot of good will and they are probably using systems that have been contributed to by others as well.

Australia is too car dependent, these tolls will slowly help wean us off that and will eventually result in good public transport for all. When you live in a city where the balance has shifted from cars to public transport, your life gets better.

Because said system would be very heavy, and probably on balance it would result in more crashes due to an increased number of failure modes.

It'll be more costly for them if the EU ban all combustion consumer vehicles and VW are left unable to sell to the european market.

That is beside the point that the author of this article will be on the wrong side of history.

Either way, you probably don't want to be using a name that implies failure on the part of the person who started the project.

It's worth noting that they hash their email lists and upload those. They are never given access to a list of the list of people on facebook who share those addresses.

I think that the best solution here would be for the major players to go dark together for a day or two. No Google, no Bing, no WhatsApp, no Facebook.

I say this as an Australian developer who relies on these services to communicate with family back home. The Australian market is so small that these companies could do it, and I think that it would have the desired effect. Australia is a country which requires these services, and if every single citizen was suddenly without these facilities then something would be done about the problem.

Right now, the average person in Australia is not informed about the changes, and they do not know the impact it will have on them long term. It needs to be brought into sharp focus.

That is of course, if these companies actually see it as a threat to them - which is up in the air.

Full retail price in china is 1,999 RMB ($289-300). Wholesale on Alibaba for more than 300 is $153USD per scooter.

Bird probably manages to get a further $25-30 off that, so perhaps as low as $120 per scooter, plus perhaps $10 for the bird brain modification and shipping by container, another $10-15.

So theoretically, a scooter could pay for itself in 10-20 days if used that heavily. I'd say that they are very capable of absorbing the cost of the occasional one going missing

Does anyone have a source for confiscated Bird scooters in europe? I would definitely buy a Xiaomi M365 from a government/police auction and do this mod if possible; for now, it seems like they are being welcomed with open arms though.

In most cases, it is possible to convey the same information in a concise manner to the average person.

Just like with math, I get the impression that sometimes the level of jargon/legalese used is an attempt to differentiate oneself from the everyday person. The same information could theoretically be put forward in a way which is understandable to all, not just those with a degree.

I have never heard any complaints in real life, only praise. Gov.uk is brilliant for the same reason facebook beat myspace; it's clean and predictable design which focuses on functionality.

This place is wonderful - for someone like me who works with languages like C, but is quite young it was very valuable to be able to see how programming with older machines worked - and seeing the progression of things like Vi/Vim etc.

The ability to modify memory contents is pretty much universal; you can modify things like eeprom contents, the RAM, hard drive, etc. There is no differentiation between critical and non-critical; it's all just fairly critical.

Ground won't send telecommands to a spacecraft to modify a piece of memory without knowing exactly what they're doing first.

You are right, they have redudnancy in all cases - but it isn't usually software written by multiple teams with different hardware.

I think that in some cases it's simply due to the launch schedules being more optimistic than reality; the hardware has to be done, but the software development doesn't necessarily have to stop once you launch the thing.

Yes, we can send commands to the spacecraft once it's up there to do thing like modify memory or hard drive contents directly, turn on/off or command payloads and equipment. The full list is pretty exhaustive - anything you could want to be able to do, you can command manually. These things aren't 100% autonomous (though they have autonomous elements in the software).

There is also a way to send pre-programmed task lists to them which are executed sequentially, with delays if necessary.

That kind of thing is in the hands of operations, so it's not usually the job of the software team to test in the normal manner.

There is usually a piece of software running on the machine which basically just does this - allows you to command an image upload to the SSD, do a checksum of the file, then install it if all goes well. There is also usually a simpler version of the software on a redundant SSD or partition which the onboard computer will install if it detects that the software that is currently installed is malfunctioning.

My understanding is that some spacecraft launch with beta/alpha equivalent software. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe that the rovers do this, with simple software installed first, then more complicated versions installed once they know everything is working.

It's somewhat similar to updating your iphone, but instead you use a huge dish to do the transmission and the bitrate is pretty horrendous.

I'm going to need a definition of "ad-hoc" here; no-one "deploys straight to production" on a spacecraft. Any patches have to be thoroughly tested on simulators and models of the spacecraft on earth before they are transmitted.

This redundant software and hardware setup typically isn't necessary when humans aren't involved. The space shuttle system is similar to what you will find on a Boeing or Airbus aircraft. Redundant software, written by different people in different countries with completely different cultures in different languages (on purpose), running on multiple machines with different hardware and voting on the decisions to be made.

It is complete overkill when "all" you're going to lose is a robot and some pride, as with a space probe you want to have lots of features and this level of safety is very restrictive on development effort.

More than likely, the spacecraft in question is written in C or C++ with the help of RTEMS or VxWorks. It is probably running a radiation hardened, very slow processor.

C/C++ is fine as long as you adhere to coding standards like MISRA and you thoroughly test it. Our code for example, is unit tested, then we have java tests running on a server-based simulator, then other independently written java tests running on test benches that more closely represent the spacecraft itself, then a replica of the spacecraft.

The industry used to use Fortran / Ada quite extensively, and depending on company/organisation and team, might still do so. Things like the F-35 are written in C++, which is where I can see these things heading.

The hardware we use for non-earth stuff is effectively arduino-level (ok, maybe not exactly - but on the order of 70-100Mhz) because of the constraints put upon it by the radiation hardened hardware. Writing python is a trade-off between computer resources and developer time; we've got a lot of developer time and not a lot of hardware resource, so we write in compiled languages.

There are also some safety implications centered around determinism etc which mean interpreted languages are a bit more gray area; with a well understood compiler and language you understand what the code is doing better, and you know it will run the same every time. That may be the case with python if you understand the whole shebang, but not that many people do... And if you have that level of knowledge of python, you may as well be writing C or C++.

NASA / ESA epoch is 1 January 1958:

https://public.ccsds.org/Pubs/301x0b4e1.pdf

If NASA are anything like us, their epoch is January 1, 1958:

https://public.ccsds.org/Pubs/301x0b4e1.pdf

I think there is a balance when it comes to unions - a point where they are very much necessary, and a point where they are a burden upon society.

If workers in general are being underpaid, I think they are justified. But then you have other industries where they have a good grip on it and then take things a bit too far.

Why is this term so familiar to people on HN but like OP I cannot find a single reference to it on Google...

I can vouch for this - had my charger overnighted in a foreign country free of charge.

I used to be able to rely on Apple to put this kind of effort in, but I don't think I would be able to today. Dell are really trying.

On the flip side, some countries really need these places - Australia being a key example.

The Australian Postal Service even runs their own in the US, in order to allow australians to order from the likes of amazon:

https://shopmate.auspost.com.au/

I will reconsider the UK as a place to live and work if / when it goes through as I have both British and European nationality.

I believe that it is already having a negative impact on the industry as there has been a definite slow down in projects going to UK industry after the vote.

Similar - the facility in Stevenage; there's a sand dune in a warehouse next to the station on the left hand side (when travelling towards cambridge).

We use ada for older projects, I think the move to C was precipitated by the fact that it's hard to hire for ADA and there is not that much external support.

C + MISRA + extensive testing plugs the gaps.

For reference, I used to be in web/mobile dev before working with OP. You can always transfer over, as to be honest a lot of the skills are transferable.

That said, space code has its own versions of webpack dependency hell...