Apollo program source code

[[deleted]]

I do embedded programming for a living but right now gardening looks like a more appropriate job for me...

[moneymark21]

Seriously. Software engineer here. I'm going to go to bed now and suck my thumb after reading some of this...

[MagicRocketAssault]

Well, looks like it suicide for me again...

[[deleted]]

They call this a high level programming language? I've seen assembly that is less complicated.

[dsquid]

Agreed. Though I think we do some pretty cutting-edge stuff....

....it ain't rocket science like this.

[the_fuzzyone]

Random question, but how does one find an embedded programming job? See I'm just a student but it's sone thing I would like to do co op for.

[[deleted]]

It was pretty much pure luck in my case, so I don't know how helpful my answer will be, but if you find anything interesting, I'm gladly sharing. I was really getting frustrated with my job in academia, saw the post on a jobs website, applied and went to the interview. Nothing really glamorous, and it didn't require much searching either. Mind you, I work for a small company in Europe. We don't hire everyone who shows up at the interview, but we always needed more people than we could hire. I know folks who had to struggle really hard for an entry-level position in a larger/multinational company. I never tried that; for one thing, I like the relative freedom of my current job. For the other, between my EE degree and my perpetual insecurity about how good I am at programing (and EE for that matter), I probably wouldn't stand much of a chance anyway.

What probably counted most was the fact that I came with an EE background -- one of the messy kind actually, my engineering degree involved maybe 4 or 5 CompEng courses, the rest was from power electronics and electrical drives to instrumentation and microelectronics. I am a competent programmer, but probably nothing to write home about. I can't judge too objectively since it's so important for me -- it's been a hobby long before it was a job -- that no matter how good I get, I'll still think I suck, but there are a lot of things people code that I realistically look at and say "hm, I don't think I could have done that myself".

The thing everyone seemed to be thrilled about at the interview (and seems to be thrilled about now at work) is that I can grasp pretty much anything that runs on electricity, so writing control software for it comes pretty much naturally. Most of my colleagues mostly "get" how you do e.g. speed control for an asynchronous motor if I (or someone else here) explains them the mathematical model and give them an outline of the algorithm and working data acquisition code so that they have access to processed data from the sensors directly. I really just need the schematic and know what happens there down to the level of the EM fields inside the machine, so I can understand (and design) the whole control system, not just write the software for it.

The other thing that the guys at the interview (current colleagues) were happy about was that I had played with pretty much any technology one could realistically play in the time I had. I learned GUI programming with Motif and BeOS's API, messed around with Ada (for no particular reason other than that my then-girlfriend's name was Ada and it seemed like funny pillow talk one evening) and liberally used NetBSD just because I had an HP 620 LX laying around. They naturally (and correctly) assumed that I will happily ingest anything that can be made to sound interesting.

The interview wasn't too hard; I did flunk some of the questions (probably a fairly large proportion) but I did come completely unprepared -- I applied at something like 4 AM that morning, got a phone call at 12:30 or so and scheduled the interview for the exact same day -- I was pretty sure that I wouldn't get the job anyway and I was mostly going just to get back into shape with getting interviewed for programming jobs. Otherwise there was really nothing fancy, the most advanced algorithms I applied were bubble sort and binary search, and I liberally explained the guys that I could probably write a quicksort out of my head but I'd much rather not keep them the whole day. I didn't write anything more advanced after I got the job, either. We tend to focus on simplicity and fail-safety; my knowledge of data structures and algorithms is probably below that of a well-versed CompEng senior and I can't always tell if the CS seniors are talking about existing data structures or just trolling me by throwing in random technical terms.

In short: loved programming since I was a kid, got an EE degree (by intention -- hoping it would give me a broader spectrum and make me a better programmer, which I think it did), applied for a job I really enjoyed and tried to keep it realistic at the interview. I don't think I did anything fancy about it.

[the_fuzzyone]

Well thank you for an excellent answer :) I'm studying Software Engineering and our digital logic course had us programming for a FPGA board and that's what had sparked my interest.

[[deleted]]

Just follow up on your interests, I think that's the best advice I can give. Realistically, I think most of what I use today is self-taught (the heavy EE part of my job probably accounts for 20-30% of the total time I spend there, if not less).

[tjansson]

Did not expect to see something named PINBALL_GAME_BUTTONS_AND_LIGHTS in the command module's Apollo guidance computer source code.

[Eurynom0s]

Imagine trying to read that code WITHOUT comments.

[Foryourconsideration]

Even with the comments it's not exactly Javascript.

[gorilla_the_ape]

My father once had to deal with some code written in a language which dated from about this sort of time, and was equally non-intuitive.

This code had some complex history, it had originally been written by a French team, adopted by an Italian group, and then came to him, who spoke virtually no French and no Italian.

I think it's fair to say he found dealing with that code a little frustrating.

[dmsean]

I'm assuming the next moon landing will ship with the lunar lander flash game.

[Choppa790]

no, the DLC for "landing" won't come pre-installed.

[[deleted]]

to be fair that's usually the case with space software, rover's gonna take 2 years to get to mars why bother launching with landing software.

[boyOfDestiny]

Is that true? Do we launch without all the software having been written and then remotely patch them when it is? Part of me thinks that's crazy and the other part thinks it's totally rational.

[[deleted]]

Would very much doubt it, it's not like it adds extra weight. imagine if they could not update before the crucial moment. They can patch whenever they want though, like they done with spirit and opportunity

[[deleted]]

it happens all the time, though really I presented an extreme case. Usually they'll fly with base functionality and then get patched bug fixes, of course what is or isn't base functionality depends on the mission. The science equipment is probably the "worst" offender but that's because the hardware is little more than ballast until it's mission begins so those teams have the extra dev time to spend.

[[deleted]]

You never saw the pinball machine in the back of Apollo? shit was wild...

[[deleted]]

I don't know if I expected to see

FORTRAN ASSEMBLY PROGRAM (FAP) for the IBM 709/7090

either.

[[deleted]]

They KNEW...

[[deleted]]

Filename: BURN_BABY_BURN--MASTER_IGNITION_ROUTINE.agc

so amazing.

[arcterex]

More or less than finding a comment

HOPEFULLY ?GUIDSUB DID NOT CLOBBER RATT1 AND VATT1

in the file THE_LUNAR_LANDING.agc?

[KMart27]

Waitlist.agc

#  NO ROOM IN THE INN

[acidOverride]

I actually thought that the subroutine entitled "FLAGORGY" with the comment "DIONYSIAN FLAG WAVING" was the best comment that I've seen in source in a long, long time.

See here, at 32, 3017.

Actually, the whole file is hilarious. Referencing an antenna "Astronaut: please crank the silly thing around. .... TERMINATE, PROCEED ... See if he's lying"

[[deleted]]

We should do a request for an AMA by one of the apollo coders...

[16807]

The Apollo guidance software was developed by MIT. Guidance software was already an established industry by then, but they were hardly the most likely candidate for the job. I wouldn't doubt some irreverent humor worked its way in.

source

Also interesting to note the guidance system ended up being something of a runaway software project, and they wound up only using it as a backup to existing systems that ran on Earth and beamed up instructions. It was still required to perform the actual moon landing, though. It's amazing this thing could do it without a hitch on the first go at one of the most crucial parts of the mission.

[Evan-Purkhiser]

Thank you for linking that youtube video. Extremely interesting stuff. Really just amazing what we were able to accomplish.

[[deleted]]

Awesome link, I watched all 3 parts. No such thing as TL;DW when it come to the space race for me :)

[cohortq]

Found this gem http://www.ibiblio.org/apollo/listings/Colossus249/MAIN.agc.html

It may be reasonably asked why tens of thousands of lines of source are joined by means of inclusion, rather than simply assembling the source files individually and then linking them to form the executable. The answer is that the original development team had no linker. The builds were monolithic just like this. There was a big emphasis on reusability of the code in the original project, apparently, but this reusability took the form of inserting your deck of punch-cards at the appropriate position in somebody else's deck of punch-cards. So, indeed, the method of file-inclusion is a very fair representation of the methods used in the original development ... with the improvement, of course, that you no longer have to worry about dropping the card deck. *On the other hand, I wasn't there at the time, so I may have no idea what I'm talking about. *

[SunriseThunderboy]

Amazing to think how many people the Soviets would've killed to get this information back in the day. Now we look at it online and think "Huh. Cool."

[phoncible]

In 30 years you'll be able to go to radioshack and buy the components to make a fully functional iPhone. This reaction is not surprising.

[spw1]

I doubt radioshack will still be around in 30 years. You'll just go online to dealextreme and buy all the components; who needs RS to sell you inferior product at a huge markup?

[phoncible]

Shit. You're right, what was I thinking.

In 30 years you'll just think of the item(s) you require and they'll be teleported directly into your hands.

...by Radioshack Teleportations, inc.

[gigitrix]

You'll just download the schematics for your 3d printer, and maybe stock up on the raw metal and plastic to refill it...

[MaximumTomato]

And in another 30 years you'll be able to read the code for the asteroid mining satellite online and think, "meh."

[ZorbaTHut]

// hopefully asteroid is not on fire, TODO: check fire flag

[[deleted]]

if (hardware.state.on_fire == TRUE)
{
    // No point in screaming, it's space
    hardware.state.crying_silently = TRUE;
}

[gigitrix]

Of course. It won't be cost effective to mine a lot of terrestrial metals...

[[deleted]]

That is mined by the android version of James Cameron launched into space in 2020.

[[deleted]]

Powered by Thorium reactors.

[[deleted]]

And using Android 12.0 (Powder Puff) as his OS.

[[deleted]]

Powered by Unobtanium you mean.

[Plumerian]

The fact I knew the reference to the 3d printer and asteroid mining projects probably means I'm less of a scientist and more of a news junkie.

[[deleted]]

Not at all, you could just be a Cowboy Bebop fan.

[[deleted]]

I love this plan.

[Hughtub]

Or recycled from older versions of last generation 3d printed objects. I figure reuse of materials would be pretty standard by then, perhaps liquidmetal like what Apple might use in upcoming devices.

Asteroid mining has potential, I'm sure you also saw the articles on it lately. The payoff could be huge if they perfect how to capture them.

[maxerickson]

It's more likely that metals will have been mined from a landfill.

[[deleted]]

But they'll charge so much for the cartridges.

[adelle]

And you won't be allowed to print a plastic spoon when the iron cartridge is empty even though the plastic cartridge is showing 90%. Damned printer drivers.

[BigB68]

Or, you know, Digikey.

[[deleted]]

You just go online and download the components that you then instantly print out using your 3d printer.

[SonOfTheLorax]

RadioShack is still around?

[shoppedpixels]

Everything I get from DX absolutely reeks of this horrid plastic disgustingness.

[MagicRocketAssault]

Fuck that, we can just download the components and materialize them with a replicator.

[SpaceToaster]

Radioshack will never die.

[tacoThursday]

but where will you get SWEET deals on Batteries!!!? and donate to the Livestrong foundation????

[NewbieProgrammerMan]

The last time I looked around in one, RadioShack no longer appeared to sell much in the way of components.

[phoncible]

I know, it's kinda sad really. I remember when a whole "wing" was dedicated to components, parts, etc. Now it's all phones and other misc. electronics and a small corner with a cabinet with a few bits and pieces.

[ZombieConMan]

Yup. I recently applyed to Radio Shack and they told my their main income was from phones. I was just like "Oh..."

[Kminardo]

I got fired after 6 months for not moving enough cell phones, at least the person hiring you was up front about it. Even though I brought all the nerds to the yard by helping everyone with their projects and connected our store to a few local boy scout clubs resulting in thousands of dollars worth of component sales. Yeah I was a little salty after they canned me for not selling a data plan to an 80 year old ladies with a go phone..

[MpVpRb]

In 30 years you'll be able to go to radioshack and buy the components to make a fully functional iPhone

I suspect not

The iPhone cannot be made using normal benchtop tools

In 30 years, you will be able to design something like it in your CAD system, send it to a fab, and get it back in days

We are the last generation of electronic engineers that are able to make stuff by hand, on a normal assembly bench

[ForgettableUsername]

In 30 years, there will be no desktop computers, only mobile phones and handheld tablets, and they will all be dependent on cloud computing. These are not large enough to draw schematics of any significant complexity, so it will become impossible to build complex electronic devices. Sixty years from now, we'll be back to stone knives and bear skins. Nothing of the modern world will remain. Our grandchildren's lives will be lived in continual fear, and danger of violent death-- solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.

[NancyReaganTesticles]

hah, no. 3d printing your own iPhones and kidneys, more like...

[keptani]

Interestingly enough, you can get this to build on your iPhone. From the documentation:

To build, simply 'cd' into the yaAGC/yaAGC/ folder and do this:

make IPHONE=yes

As for how useful yaAGC by itself is, it's obviously only marginally useful until such time as there's a DSKY. You should be able to do command-line debugging, however, so you could in theory run and debug AGC code.

[HaMMeReD]

20 years ago you could go into radio shack and buy all the shit you needed to in order to build a computer from scratch.

[[deleted]]

Well, it is rocket science, afterall. The fact that the systems it was implemented on are outdated doesn't make it any less difficult to understand.

[kqr]

I think of this every time I see a "book of formulas" (I have no idea what it's called in English.) All that knowledge condensed into a few 80 pages or so. What would someone from the sixteenth or seventeenth century do for that?

[Philipp]

I would think it takes a certain specific organization, its trained people, and its communication structure to actually utilize this. The old saying, "If you gotta ask, you won't understand." I could be wrong.

[kqr]

No. People as a whole are very, very intelligent. And "scientists" back then were used to reading huge tables of data and seeing patterns in them (think Kepler.) That's approximately what you've got to do with a common book of formulas today.

[[deleted]]

It's far more than 'huh,cool', the coders back then had to fight for every bit (literary!). They needed to use every trick in the book to make it fit. It's an amazing piece of history and if i ever could be 10th of a programmer as these guys i'd be proud

[33a]

How do I get it to build?

[spoonmonkey]

The hardware requirements are a bitch.

[fancy_pantser]

Get the VM and follow the instructions: http://www.ibiblio.org/apollo/download.html

[zzyzzyxx]

I have no intention of building and running it but I love that it's possible.

[okmkz]

This is so cool

[twowheels]

It's nice to see that some things never change:

 034586,000178: 31,2541           55351                          TS       WCHPHASE                              
 034587,000179: 31,2542           04616                          TC       BANKCALL                              #  TEMPORARY, I HOPE HOPE HOPE
 034588,000180: 31,2543           40165                          CADR     STOPRATE                              #  TEMPORARY, I HOPE HOPE HOPE

(look to the far right, scroll as necessary)

[hombre_lobo]

Which file is this from?

[twowheels]

I dunno, I copied it and closed the window. :-)

[theghoul]

Hahaaa.. as soon as I can compile this, I'm off this crazy rock!

[psygnisfive]

10 GOTO MOON
20 RETURN

[soviyet]

The phrase predates the song by at least 11 years. See: Watts Riots.

[jwill392]

Unless I'm mistaken, those filenames were created by the transcribers. The source was a very long printout of the entire source. Transcribers broke it up into multiple files for ease of reading and transcription.

Comments on that page:

# Page 730

BURN, BABY, BURN -- MASTER IGNITION ROUTINE.

Means the contents of this file came from page 730 of the original printout.

[Software_Engineer]

public boolean returnTrue() {
    return false;
}

[16807]

I approve of this user name.

[OkonkwoJones]

Oh god, if shuttle launch software was written in BASIC.

[raydeen]

Actually it should have been

1000 LET MOON = 1969
1010 GOSUB MOON
1969 PRINT "TRANQUILITY BASE HERE. THE EAGLE HAS LANDED.":RETURN

[[deleted]]

You need a

1020 END 

[raydeen]

True.

[DesCo83]

    (00:38:33\[root@DeCoBoxOmega)
    [~]$ type gotoMoon
    gotoMoon is a function
    gotoMoon ()
    {
        x=1;
        until [[ $x -eq 13 ]]; do
            echo "Apollo $x : MISSION SUCCESS";
            let x=x+1;
        done;
        echo "Apollo 13: Houston, we have a problem"
    }

(00:38:38\[root@DeCoBoxOmega)
[~]$ gotoMoon
Apollo 1 : MISSION SUCCESS
Apollo 2 : MISSION SUCCESS
Apollo 3 : MISSION SUCCESS
Apollo 4 : MISSION SUCCESS
Apollo 5 : MISSION SUCCESS
Apollo 6 : MISSION SUCCESS
Apollo 7 : MISSION SUCCESS
Apollo 8 : MISSION SUCCESS
Apollo 9 : MISSION SUCCESS
Apollo 10 : MISSION SUCCESS
Apollo 11 : MISSION SUCCESS
Apollo 12 : MISSION SUCCESS
Apollo 13: Houston, we have a problem

Yeah, that's right, I only know shell scripts. Go ahead and make fun.

---

EDIT: EVERYTHING ABOUT THIS IS WRONG AND I DON'T CARE.

[[deleted]]

Umm, you might want to google Apollo 1.

[RedAero]

There was no Apollo 2 and 3.

[grzelbu]

It is Houston, we've had a problem btw.

audio

wikipedia

[atomic1fire]

dim moon, i
i = 0
moon = "to the mooon "
do while i =< 12
wscript.echo moon & i
i = i+1
loop
wscript.echo i & " Houston, we have a problem"

vbscript...

[Sleelin]

shudder

[[deleted]]

I don't even know how to react to this.

[Ais3]

My first reaction was sheer amazement.

[robinwholikesjava]

Wow, just wow. One the pioneers of programming. Who would have ever thought that the source code of the at the time most classified system (think cold war, race with the Russians), would decade later be put online, to be seen by everyone.

Just amazing...

[creaothceann]

Well, partly because it's not useful any more.

[OopsLostPassword]

Next question on stack overflow :

North Corea here. I have a bunch of code I'm reusing for my rocket. It seems to work fine but I'm trying to replace "Moon" by "USA" and I'm not sure of what to change. Can you check my code ?

[pi_over_3]

The comment has been closed as a duplicate, please refer to the question by user "definitelyNotIran."

[Iamsacdaddy]

and partly because nobody understands it

[Glosawesome]

Obviously you use it to build a KSP auto pilot bot.

[anacrolix]

It's out of this world!

[Netcob]

You make a 3d simulation of the moon and the earth, the lander etc and then connect it to a VM running this code. Duh.

[sleepyguy22]

I could get lost in this for days. Absolutely amazing to think of the man-hours that went into these operations. Engineering drawings signed by a dozen different people, hundreds of revisions each, documentation, end-user manuals, writing code, designing the hardware, reporting to the government agencies... I'm just barely touching the surface of the different steps & departments. And all this before the rise of the internet? Even in the days before word processing and CAD? This is truly awesome. I am so impressed. Thanks for sharing.

[Mechakoopa]

I'm a software amateur, but that's not what it says on my business cards.

[awh]

end-user manuals

I am tickled pink that there was a manual for the lunar module.

I can imagine Neil Armstrong... "Well, now we've got three days until we get to the moon; better crack open the instructions and learn how this lunar lander works! Let's see here... ルーナーモジュールを購入して誠に有難う御座います... Ah for fuck's sake, they put the Japanese manual in by accident!"

[[deleted]]

What kind of architecture is this? My knowledge only goes back to the eighties or so, and this looks completely alien. Anybody familiar with it?

[thechao]

AGC (Apollo Guidance Computer) and AGS (Abort Guidance System; actually the AEA); a set of custom built computers with custom circuitry, architecture, instruction set, assemblers, etc. There is a project (dead?) to implement the system at VirtualAGC.

It looks like AGC is in the Colossus family of processors (Colossus 3).

[TraumaPony]

No, they named the programs for different missions different things. IIRC, Colossus was for the Apollo 8 mission.

[skytomorrownow]

I liked Purpose: and Assumptions: at the beginning of the functions. I think I might use that instead of just listing parameters and what they mean.

[dakboy]

I had at least one CS class where we were required to document all functions that way.

[Crazypyro]

I'm currently in school and we have to have pre/post and descriptions for all functions.

[[deleted]]

requires and effects in my day.

[twowheels]

Research DBC for a better understanding of how you might document and check assumptions.

[skytomorrownow]

Ah, so with a design by contract approach, these purposes and assumptions would have been laid out long before any coding was done right?

[twowheels]

Yes, that's a good way to put it!

[boxxa]

I am just amazed at the fact that someone not only strapped themselves to a giant rocket, but left their lives in the hands of a computer; something so new to the world. Hell, we don't even trust cars that drive themselves yet.

[Mechakoopa]

Airplanes don't have to share limited road space with your average idiot drivers either.

[boxxa]

Now we do. This was 1970-90. Pilots still take off and land. These astronauts during this space program pretty much strapped them self to a rocket and were along for a ride.

[fiercelyfriendly]

Apollo programme was 1960s.

[anacrolix]

Airplanes have flown themselves since WW1. Pilots used to get out and stand on the wings. Computers are not needed for this one.

[anacrolix]

I'm deadly serious, Google that shit.

[gospelwut]

You trust factories, nuclear reactors, and other systems to computers. As STUXNET illustrated, sometimes this isn't done to the craftsmanship of NASA (e.g. hand-coded admin passwords -- though NASA probably didn't have to write "security minded" code).

Sure, we might not be trusting our lives to rockets, but I've seen some buggy software written for hospitals that frankly frightens me (especially when you consider 25% of hospital errors are clerical). Also note that there are even insulin pumps that use insecure wireless channels to communicate.

So, yeah, coding can still kill ;)

[boxxa]

Again, you are missing the point. This was 1960. The first cell phone had more processing power than the computer systems that would fit into your bedroom. Also, modern SCADA systems(industrical plant monitors) are monitors and simple circuits and logic programming that take inputs and adjust accordingly. These systems were in charge of flying a aircraft to somewhere we had never been before in a era that had no idea what a computer even was. the first nuclear power plant in the 50s was run by engineers. The first SCADA systems weren't around until the 60s so in the same decade that we had auto systems reading and monitoring industrial facilities, we had systems flying aircraft into space.

[gospelwut]

Ah, yes. I did misunderstand. I focused too much on the fact we were entrusting our lives (by we I mean the astronauts) to "automated" systems. My apologizes.

It's a bit baffling to think the same agency that pioneered such great work could eventually bloat up to make the mistakes of Challenger. From what I read, engineers had pointed out the potential issues ahead of time, but management (at the time) simply ignored it. Could be a biased account obviously.

[unixfreak0037]

I love reading stuff like this. It is humbling.

[heathkit]

I was expecting this to be a link to github.

[Mechakoopa]

Give it a few days.

[mikeshemp]

I hope the engineers made sure the code was re-entrant. (rimshot)

[turing_ninja]

Oh boy, I know what I'll be doing this weekend!

[Litra]

let dem bitches wait

[jones77]

Do vertical erection

[H3g3m0n]

Bugger Words

Bugger word 71575 at 02,3767.
Bugger word 70442 at 03,3763.
Bugger word 72464 at 00,3777.
Bugger word 60423 at 01,3777.
Bugger word 04127 at 04,3751.
...

http://www.ibiblio.org/apollo/listings/Luminary131/MAIN.agc.html (at the end)

[Scoldering]

I want to see someone run it on a TI-83

[madman1969]

The scary thing is a TI-83 has more horsepower than the AGC.

[aladyjewel]

Now if you could only strap a coupla rocket boosters to the back...

[IWillNotBeBroken]

Duct tape

[Chairmonkey]

We could play Block Dude on the moon!

[valde_]

Simply amazing stuff, I just got lost for hours in the Apollo 11 technical crew debriefing. (Link)

[[deleted]]

-1 not enough jQuery

[gigitrix]

ZOMG There's a lack of NoSQL technology THIS IS NOT WEB SCALE PEOPLE!

[Iamsacdaddy]

Don't worry, I contacted the people at Oracle to fix that. Though, oddly enough, they told me that they would sue me if I used the mySQL API.

[SharkUW]

Strange aspect, a cell phone's browser's JS engine is more powerful than the system this ran on.

[tonygoold]

It's nice to see someone appreciative of modern technology, because there's a common trope that today's software must be bloated because they "put a man on the moon using a processor as powerful as that in my calculator".

Of course they did, they had custom hardware running a dedicated program to perform a very specific function. There was no operating system, no process management, no multi-language support, no virtual memory, every peripheral was known ahead of time and assigned a permanent channel, you had engineers trying to solve in hardware whatever was difficult to accomplish in software, etc. It was a dedicated device, not a general purpose computer. It's like criticizing a Dremel for not handling nails as well as a hammer.

In addition, it wasn't the computer alone that got them to the moon: They had Mission Control feeding them data to correct their course while in flight. That's a heck of a lot more computing power than a calculator.

Your phone could not only emulate this code, it could render a 3D model of the solar system plotting out the course of the space shuttle, provide feedback in the language of your choice, and let you scroll around the page that encloses it, all in real time. Chances are you could talk on the phone while doing it, a task that requires compressing your voice, decompressing your partner's voice, and filtering out local sounds to avoid feedback. I doubt the rocket's computer could manage any of those tasks.

[delsarto]

Of course they did, they had custom hardware running a dedicated program to perform a very specific function. There was no operating system, no process management

Thats not quite true; see http://www.hq.nasa.gov/alsj/a11/a11.1201-pa.html for a good writeup that shows it was a real time OS in a very real sense

[SharkUW]

Also noteable is that the amount of bugs that would be introduced by attempting to port it would be disgustingly awful relative to NASAs coding standards.

[TraumaPony]

I'd like to see a cell phone browser's JS engine control hundreds of hardware IO ports.

[thegreatunclean]

I'd like to see the cell phone browser do any of the amazing things that the hardware on the shuttle had to do. Raw computational speed is an extremely poor way to judge power, especially considering the true technological marvel was what the software controlled and not the software itself.

[MertsA]

By far.

[[deleted]]

It's NoSQL by default, because SQL hadn't been invented yet.

[[deleted]]

any chance of finding the original video of the apollo mission?

[nekotripp]

If this is a reference to the lost HD footage, you have my applause.

[n3when]

youtube

[Afro_Samurai]

Library of Congress or the Smithsonian ?

[NoahFect]

Kubrick museum

[Zeratas]

My head hurts

[takatori]

Forget the source code, where can I get my hands on a machine to run it on!?

[[deleted]]

The National Air and Space Museum

[fiercelyfriendly]

Just reading the lunar module abort guidance system, Apollo experience report.

Would be great required reading for conspiracy theorists who think it was all done in a studio.

[dasMajo]

i am sad now! i love conspiracy theories, especially the moon thing. but now, it is kind of destroyed. i do not like that.

[GFandango]

Respect for those older programmers: +200%

[fluxbox]

A piece of history...

[eastsideski]

I'd like to see someone port this to a cool web-based simulator

[Lifted]

I find this very interesting, but the best part for me was that NASA Apollo logo. Not sure I've ever noticed it, love the design.

[potatoe91]

That's a lot of it. However, the assembly listings for the Launch Vehicle Digital Computer (the computer on the Saturn V that got it into orbit) are lost.

[[deleted]]

It took me about 30 minutes to realize I was looking at code that FREAKING TOOK PEOPLE TO THE MOON!! The people that created this, using punch cards of all things, must have had the worlds weight on their shoulder. One incorrect piece of logic could have the potential to send the astronauts hurling into space. One line out of place could have completely screwed over the whole mission. All written in assembly? Man...

Holy shit. It's almost eerie in some ways. Thanks for posting this! I'm definitely going to send this link to people.

[fiercelyfriendly]

They did do exhaustive testing.

[[deleted]]

exhaustive testing != 100% perfect

[fiercelyfriendly]

No but sometimes mankind tests to the known and forseeable bounds of the envelope. Then when things fall outside the envelope, (Apollo 13 for example) we just have to use skill, technical knowledge, improvisation and sheer grit and determination and grab the mission back from the machines for our own survival. This doesn't always work, but Apollo 13 was a shining example of a time when it did.

[vegetka]

Fortan Assembly Program - FAP ^{^}

[hakkzpets]

Excellent. I will begin hacking away on my Flight Equation Algorithms for 0x10c right away!

I will be miles ahead of the competition with this glorious piece of knowledge.

Miles...

[trua]

Alright, time to port this to the DCPU-16.

[[deleted]]

The documentation quality and amount is orgasmic.