4 ms·

"that was coded in an outdated assembler language" LOL, that's just a sad statement.

codewritinfool 9y ago
Can anyone explain to me why is this being downvoted? I have coded in assembly since the 1970's and still do today. It is essential for some tasks and when these spacecraft were designed, it was the obvious choice. I just don't understand why NASA would call it "outdated".
- mastax 9y ago
  "an outdated assembler language" While I think many folks here would argue that assembler is outdated in general, the specific form of assembler used in the Voyager probe is probably considered outdated by any reasonable standard.
  - tomxor 9y ago
    > While I think many folks here would argue that assembler is outdated in general Assembly is not outdated in general, it's just outdated as a human interface for big CISC programs. If you are working on very small micro-controllers it's not even necessarily outdated as a human interface since you might be working on a much more minimal platform in which case it's important you understand exactly what's going on. What was probably meant in the article is that the particular assembly used in the CPUs of the CCS at the time is quite different compared to various modern micro-controller assembly (not compared to CISC like x86 or even ARM which are almost completely different beasts). Sometimes these projects have custom silicon and so are even quite different to other commercial chips of the same era... Having a quick google, the CCS was NASAs first redundant computer, having two of everything, but at a fairly low level unlike say the mars rover with it's triple redundancy basically at the "whole computer" level. Interesting stuff, I wish there was more info available about all the details of these machines.
- scott_karana 9y ago
  Maybe the toolchain no longer runs on modern architectures?
  - solarkraft 9y ago
    They could use an old system or emulate.
- kakwa_ 9y ago
  Maybe because they have less and less people who know how to read and program with this particular assembly language? The program was written more than 40 years ago, most of the people who wrote it are probably retired now. Also, it's not a "mainstream but old CPU" like a Z80 or a 6502, given the constrains of a space probe it's probably more a custom thing developped specifically for these (kinds of) missions.
  - ams6110 9y ago
    Some information on CPUs used in spacecraft http://cpushack.com/space-craft-cpu.html http://cpushack.com/space-craft-cpu.html
    - codewritinfool 9y ago
      Great link!
  - NotSammyHagar 9y ago
    How old do you have to be to be retired en mass? I'm in my early 50s, first assembler was 6502, second s/370. I'm going strong as a dev. That was a misleading comment "outdated assembly language", but assembly is less common than in the past.
    - codewritinfool 9y ago
      Thank you. I was beginning to feel old. I am also in my early fifties. I spent a long time with PPS-4, 8080, Z80, 6809, 8051, and many others. These days I work primarily with Microchip PICs, and still program in assembly fairly often.
      - NotSammyHagar 9y ago
        I never use assembly these days, it's all C++ and before that Java. The only assembly I see is in the debugger and I occasionally look at it and is that left to right or right to left on x86 :-) Let's see, the best assembly was s/370, right? I am pretty sure the destination was on the left. and on x86, does it move right? They got everything else wrong on it :-)

Can anyone explain to me why is this being downvoted? I have coded in assembly since the 1970's and still do today. It is essential for some tasks and when these spacecraft were designed, it was the obvious choice. I just don't understand why NASA would call it "outdated".

mastax 9y ago
"an outdated assembler language" While I think many folks here would argue that assembler is outdated in general, the specific form of assembler used in the Voyager probe is probably considered outdated by any reasonable standard.
- tomxor 9y ago
  > While I think many folks here would argue that assembler is outdated in general Assembly is not outdated in general, it's just outdated as a human interface for big CISC programs. If you are working on very small micro-controllers it's not even necessarily outdated as a human interface since you might be working on a much more minimal platform in which case it's important you understand exactly what's going on. What was probably meant in the article is that the particular assembly used in the CPUs of the CCS at the time is quite different compared to various modern micro-controller assembly (not compared to CISC like x86 or even ARM which are almost completely different beasts). Sometimes these projects have custom silicon and so are even quite different to other commercial chips of the same era... Having a quick google, the CCS was NASAs first redundant computer, having two of everything, but at a fairly low level unlike say the mars rover with it's triple redundancy basically at the "whole computer" level. Interesting stuff, I wish there was more info available about all the details of these machines.
scott_karana 9y ago
Maybe the toolchain no longer runs on modern architectures?
- solarkraft 9y ago
  They could use an old system or emulate.
kakwa_ 9y ago
Maybe because they have less and less people who know how to read and program with this particular assembly language? The program was written more than 40 years ago, most of the people who wrote it are probably retired now. Also, it's not a "mainstream but old CPU" like a Z80 or a 6502, given the constrains of a space probe it's probably more a custom thing developped specifically for these (kinds of) missions.
- ams6110 9y ago
  Some information on CPUs used in spacecraft http://cpushack.com/space-craft-cpu.html http://cpushack.com/space-craft-cpu.html
  - codewritinfool 9y ago
    Great link!
- NotSammyHagar 9y ago
  How old do you have to be to be retired en mass? I'm in my early 50s, first assembler was 6502, second s/370. I'm going strong as a dev. That was a misleading comment "outdated assembly language", but assembly is less common than in the past.
  - codewritinfool 9y ago
    Thank you. I was beginning to feel old. I am also in my early fifties. I spent a long time with PPS-4, 8080, Z80, 6809, 8051, and many others. These days I work primarily with Microchip PICs, and still program in assembly fairly often.
    - NotSammyHagar 9y ago
      I never use assembly these days, it's all C++ and before that Java. The only assembly I see is in the debugger and I occasionally look at it and is that left to right or right to left on x86 :-) Let's see, the best assembly was s/370, right? I am pretty sure the destination was on the left. and on x86, does it move right? They got everything else wrong on it :-)