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> It is possible to write safe and secure software. It's expensive, but it's possible. And we've done it before (safe, anyway). Is our electric grid as critic
by a3n 7y ago
> It is possible to write safe and secure software. It's expensive, but it's possible.
And we've done it before (safe, anyway). Is our electric grid as critical as space shuttle software?
- MFLoon 7y agoNot to be a pessimist, but just because a software error never caused a catastrophic space shuttle accident doesn't necessarily mean that the software actually was safe and secure.
- bluejekyll 7y agoMaybe not the space shuttle, but: NASA’s Mars Climate Orbiter; crashed or is now inoperable and orbiting the sun due to a bad numerical conversion. ESA’s Ariane 5 Flight 501; manual self destruct triggered after a 64bit number being truncated into 16bits caused faults to be thrown. https://raygun.com/blog/costly-software-errors-history/# https://raygun.com/blog/costly-software-errors-history/# I don’t think we should go back to manual operation (as the default, but should be overridable). Instead we should be using stricter compilers, and better unit, integration tests, and fuzz testing to test as many edge conditions as possible.
- mattmar96 7y agoMatt Parker's book Humble Pi is full of math/programming errors like this.