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I really feel space tech is gonna be the next big thing going forward, but I have zero clue about how to get involved. It seems like one of those things where y

I really feel space tech is gonna be the next big thing going forward, but I have zero clue about how to get involved. It seems like one of those things where you really need to either be some government agency or have a PhD in it or something.

mulcahey 6y ago
Well it depends what you mean by “involved” but there are plenty of “new space” companies hiring software engineers - from real time Linux to web dev
avmich 6y ago
It's both pretty easy and insanely hard. Insanely hard - from an engineer prospective - because there is a big gap between software disciplines and, ughm, "the real world". When you're pushing bits, today it's easy to forget about the times when computers were quite unreliable, from the hardware point of view. Bad contacts? Unreliable memory bits? Overheating parts? Magnetic tape which loses data and paper media which breaks? Today most of this is factored away and engineers largely operate with logic. Try to do hardware projects - even easy Arduino-based designs will give you a glimp of difficulties you're going to get with space technology, and if you're trying something modestly interesting... Pretty easy is because "rocket science isn't rocket science". It's technology invented more than a century ago - converging-diverging nozzle was invented about 150 years ago, about 120 years ago Tsiolkovsky wrote about liquid hydrogen fuel and multistage rockets, more than 90 years ago Goddard flew his first rockets, almost 80 years ago von Braun was already working on V-2, and this year we're celebrating 60th anniversary of Spootnik. A great deal of efforts went into perfection of rocketry, and now we know a lot - that's a big part of the reason why SpaceX moves so fast - and can do a lot. Now you can have a nano-launcher startup for less than 100 million dollars - may be way less - which just couple of decades ago is unheard of. More, there are competitions - X Prize for flight 100 km up, Northrop Grumman Lunar Lander Challenge, Google Lunar Prize, and now, say, NASA's https://breaktheicechallenge.com/ https://breaktheicechallenge.com/ - where you can participate with much smaller barrier to entry. The webinar from this last challenge - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UXgdEDBTPJE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UXgdEDBTPJE - contains references on other competitions NASA is hosting. So, to conclude, if you're an engineering mind, especially capable of working outside of applied math of programming, the possibilities are certainly there to try in growing space industry.
- avmich 6y ago
  > and this year we're celebrating 60th anniversary of Spootnik. Gagarin's flight, of course.
mhh__ 6y ago
There's still going to be a lot of room at the bottom, e.g. the people building the (say) Control algorithms for the rocket need to have testing infrastructure run for them. A PhD isn't as necessary as you might think, it really depends whether you're doing front-line engineering or a more abstract work - e.g. I would assume the people specifying SpaceX's self-landing system will have PhDs in control theory or similar but the people making it happen beneath are mere mortals. That being said, I am currently applying to do what I believe would be referred to as a paid-internship in the US, and it's quite difficult breaking into traditional engineering roles from my background as it's quite difficult to prove you'll be useful as a Theoreticsl Physics student (/ Compiler person) because I don't have any formal credit in a lot of the things I do have non-trivual knowledge about. Jim Keller doesn't have a PhD, and he "only" went to Penn State and he is now a god amongst men, so there's hope for us all (hopefully).
bumby 6y ago
It totally depends on what you want to get into. Want to get into the applied side and build/test aerospace equipment? You don’t even necessarily need an advanced degree. Don’t discount how many contractors do this work for the government either. Lockheed, Boeing, Honeywell, Jacobs, etc. all need engineers to do the applied science. Don’t overlook tangential roles like quality either because the industry is littered with them. If you want to do research, you’ll probably need an advanced degree and possibly time in academic research.
simonh 6y ago
Bear in mind space tech isn’t all about the rockets, it’s also about what they take up there. If Starship pans out, the market for satellite hardware, orbital habitats, space probes and associated software and services is going to explode. In a lot of threads about this people seem to think Boeing, Lockheed, etc are finished because they can’t compete with SpaceX. On the contrary, the demand for their skills at building payload hardware is about to expand massively. Somebody’s going to need to build all the infrastructure and systems for these Moon and Mars cities.
Rebelgecko 6y ago
Basically all space companies (oldspace, newspace) hire software folks. Some specific jobs might require PhDs, but most don't. Flight software sometimes has requirements for certain experience (e.g. Embedded). However, flight software is a surprisingly small sliver of all the space related software that gets written. Even though it's outer space they still need GUIs for ground systems, CRUD apps for handling downlinked data, WebGL people to build fancy visualizations, etc
- Klathmon 6y ago
  Even the space fairing vehicles need UIs, and at least at SpaceX they are being written using web technologies [1]! [1] https://www.reddit.com/r/spacex/comments/gxb7j1/we_are_the_spacex_software_team_ask_us_anything/ft66thc/ https://www.reddit.com/r/spacex/comments/gxb7j1/we_are_the_s...
- TaylorAlexander 6y ago
  Indeed. See this great talk on the build system in use at SpaceX (and many other places): https://youtu.be/t_3bckhV_YI https://youtu.be/t_3bckhV_YI
d_silin 6y ago
As mentioned above and below, software development skills are always in demand. If you are really that interested, you can get involved with our company :)
throwaway846283 6y ago
It’s not for the faint of heart. The consequences of failure are equivalent to setting off a bomb. You can’t just tweak a line of code and recompile. You have to know how to manage the risk. Advanced degrees help. Operational experience helps. I have a master’s and flight hours, for example. If you’re serious about aerospace, you’ll make your own way. Piece of advice though: don’t tell an interviewer you’re getting into this field just because it’s the next big thing.

mulcahey 6y ago

Well it depends what you mean by “involved” but there are plenty of “new space” companies hiring software engineers - from real time Linux to web dev

avmich 6y ago

It's both pretty easy and insanely hard. Insanely hard - from an engineer prospective - because there is a big gap between software disciplines and, ughm, "the real world". When you're pushing bits, today it's easy to forget about the times when computers were quite unreliable, from the hardware point of view. Bad contacts? Unreliable memory bits? Overheating parts? Magnetic tape which loses data and paper media which breaks? Today most of this is factored away and engineers largely operate with logic. Try to do hardware projects - even easy Arduino-based designs will give you a glimp of difficulties you're going to get with space technology, and if you're trying something modestly interesting... Pretty easy is because "rocket science isn't rocket science". It's technology invented more than a century ago - converging-diverging nozzle was invented about 150 years ago, about 120 years ago Tsiolkovsky wrote about liquid hydrogen fuel and multistage rockets, more than 90 years ago Goddard flew his first rockets, almost 80 years ago von Braun was already working on V-2, and this year we're celebrating 60th anniversary of Spootnik. A great deal of efforts went into perfection of rocketry, and now we know a lot - that's a big part of the reason why SpaceX moves so fast - and can do a lot. Now you can have a nano-launcher startup for less than 100 million dollars - may be way less - which just couple of decades ago is unheard of. More, there are competitions - X Prize for flight 100 km up, Northrop Grumman Lunar Lander Challenge, Google Lunar Prize, and now, say, NASA's https://breaktheicechallenge.com/ https://breaktheicechallenge.com/ - where you can participate with much smaller barrier to entry. The webinar from this last challenge - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UXgdEDBTPJE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UXgdEDBTPJE - contains references on other competitions NASA is hosting. So, to conclude, if you're an engineering mind, especially capable of working outside of applied math of programming, the possibilities are certainly there to try in growing space industry.

avmich 6y ago
> and this year we're celebrating 60th anniversary of Spootnik. Gagarin's flight, of course.

mhh__ 6y ago

There's still going to be a lot of room at the bottom, e.g. the people building the (say) Control algorithms for the rocket need to have testing infrastructure run for them. A PhD isn't as necessary as you might think, it really depends whether you're doing front-line engineering or a more abstract work - e.g. I would assume the people specifying SpaceX's self-landing system will have PhDs in control theory or similar but the people making it happen beneath are mere mortals. That being said, I am currently applying to do what I believe would be referred to as a paid-internship in the US, and it's quite difficult breaking into traditional engineering roles from my background as it's quite difficult to prove you'll be useful as a Theoreticsl Physics student (/ Compiler person) because I don't have any formal credit in a lot of the things I do have non-trivual knowledge about. Jim Keller doesn't have a PhD, and he "only" went to Penn State and he is now a god amongst men, so there's hope for us all (hopefully).

bumby 6y ago

It totally depends on what you want to get into. Want to get into the applied side and build/test aerospace equipment? You don’t even necessarily need an advanced degree. Don’t discount how many contractors do this work for the government either. Lockheed, Boeing, Honeywell, Jacobs, etc. all need engineers to do the applied science. Don’t overlook tangential roles like quality either because the industry is littered with them. If you want to do research, you’ll probably need an advanced degree and possibly time in academic research.

simonh 6y ago

Bear in mind space tech isn’t all about the rockets, it’s also about what they take up there. If Starship pans out, the market for satellite hardware, orbital habitats, space probes and associated software and services is going to explode. In a lot of threads about this people seem to think Boeing, Lockheed, etc are finished because they can’t compete with SpaceX. On the contrary, the demand for their skills at building payload hardware is about to expand massively. Somebody’s going to need to build all the infrastructure and systems for these Moon and Mars cities.

Rebelgecko 6y ago

Basically all space companies (oldspace, newspace) hire software folks. Some specific jobs might require PhDs, but most don't. Flight software sometimes has requirements for certain experience (e.g. Embedded). However, flight software is a surprisingly small sliver of all the space related software that gets written. Even though it's outer space they still need GUIs for ground systems, CRUD apps for handling downlinked data, WebGL people to build fancy visualizations, etc

Klathmon 6y ago
Even the space fairing vehicles need UIs, and at least at SpaceX they are being written using web technologies [1]! [1] https://www.reddit.com/r/spacex/comments/gxb7j1/we_are_the_spacex_software_team_ask_us_anything/ft66thc/ https://www.reddit.com/r/spacex/comments/gxb7j1/we_are_the_s...
TaylorAlexander 6y ago
Indeed. See this great talk on the build system in use at SpaceX (and many other places): https://youtu.be/t_3bckhV_YI https://youtu.be/t_3bckhV_YI

d_silin 6y ago

As mentioned above and below, software development skills are always in demand. If you are really that interested, you can get involved with our company :)

throwaway846283 6y ago

It’s not for the faint of heart. The consequences of failure are equivalent to setting off a bomb. You can’t just tweak a line of code and recompile. You have to know how to manage the risk. Advanced degrees help. Operational experience helps. I have a master’s and flight hours, for example. If you’re serious about aerospace, you’ll make your own way. Piece of advice though: don’t tell an interviewer you’re getting into this field just because it’s the next big thing.