4 ms·

Spaceprob.es catalogues all the probes that still communicate with Earth

182 points by input_sh 6y ago

somedude895 6y ago
Would be cool to see how often they communicate, and what data is exchanged. Also, what bandwidth and the time it takes to arrive back here.
- cygx 6y ago
  Also [...] the time it takes to arrive back here For reference: Voyager 1, interstellar space 21 lighthours Perseverance, Mars surface 12 lightminutes Artemis, lunar orbit 1.2 lightseconds
  - spzb 6y ago
    Aren't those measures of distance?
    - gberger 6y ago
      Yes, but the data travels at approximately the speed of light, so you can just drop the "light" unit in front of the time units
      - spzb 6y ago
        But where’s the fun of pedantry in that?
    - argvargc 6y ago
      Delete "light" and it's the answer.
      - emayljames 6y ago
        Yeah, it takes me 2 trainhours to get to work.
        deleted 6y ago
        [deleted]
    - cygx 6y ago
      Sure, but conversion to travel time is trivial given a signal velocity of c. Or just assume a 'natural' system of units where c=1 :p
- gspr 6y ago
  Maybe some of what you desire can be found here? https://eyes.nasa.gov/dsn/dsn.html https://eyes.nasa.gov/dsn/dsn.html
  - shagie 6y ago
    And occasionally... you get a glimpse of something neat... like dish 43 getting data from VGR2. https://i.imgur.com/ZVAnt03.png https://i.imgur.com/ZVAnt03.png The downlink is 160 b/s at -154.54 dBm (as I type this - might have been different in the screen shot)... and then compare that to other data feeds on other dishes.
walrus01 6y ago
I was not aware the 2001 mars orbiter was still operating!
- arielwaldman 6y ago
  It's a pretty hardcore space probe!
moontear 6y ago
This is really nice, but I want more data. Everything of course only if publically available: - Where are the probes located right now (map)? - what is their trajectory/target location? - what does the data look like being transmitted (I.e. Voyager isn’t more than a blip, or is it)? - what Kind of data could be still gathered, e.g. could we ask the Probe to „take a picture“ or would the bandwidth simply not be enough?
- gspr 6y ago
  > (I.e. Voyager isn’t more than a blip, or is it)? According to [1], as we speak the DSS 14 antenna at Goldstone is receiving Voyager 1 data at a whooping 160 bits/sec. [1] https://eyes.nasa.gov/dsn/dsn.html https://eyes.nasa.gov/dsn/dsn.html
  - cgb223 6y ago
    How quickly is the bit rate degrading from Voyager? Like if it’s 160 bits per second now, how long until it’s 100 bits per second? 10? 1?
    - gspr 6y ago
      Interesting question! At any rate, I believe death is imminent anyway: in a few years, the RTGs will have degraded so far that no single instrument can be powered :-(
- OnlyOneCannolo 6y ago
  Map: https://armchairastronautics.blogspot.com/p/solar-system-missions.html https://armchairastronautics.blogspot.com/p/solar-system-mis... An example of what a signal from a probe looks like: http://spacecollege.org/isee3/video-recording-both-isee-3-transponders-at-arecibo-after-first-contact.html http://spacecollege.org/isee3/video-recording-both-isee-3-tr...
- argvargc 6y ago
  Yourself and others interested in detail, may appreciate Daniel Estévez's recent post on his use of GNU Radio and the Allen Telescope Array to detect Voyager 1 transmissions: https://destevez.net/2021/02/voyager-1-single-dish-detection-at-allen-telescope-array/ https://destevez.net/2021/02/voyager-1-single-dish-detection... Also this JPL document on both Voyagers is packed. Check out the chart on page 44, regarding diminishing bitrates over the coming years: https://descanso.jpl.nasa.gov/monograph/series13/DeepCommo_Chapter3--141029.pdf https://descanso.jpl.nasa.gov/monograph/series13/DeepCommo_C...
procd 6y ago
No wonder why Maven is so freaking slow
techas 6y ago
Very nice site! Although, many links to data are broken, that is very frustrating...
- arielwaldman 6y ago
  fixed!
jeffgreco 6y ago
This is a lot more crowded since the last time I checked! You know I’ve been reading too much Kim Stanley Robinson when I immediately start worrying about contaminating these various celestial bodies’ surfaces...
darkwater 6y ago
Does anybody know why the bot[1] publishing Pluto photos from New Horizons has been suspended? [1] https://twitter.com/bitsofpluto https://twitter.com/bitsofpluto
- shagie 6y ago
  Not an answer, but a pointer... https://github.com/hugovk/bitsofpluto https://github.com/hugovk/bitsofpluto is the GitHub repo for the code https://twitter.com/hugovk https://twitter.com/hugovk would be the person on twitter to ask.
  - darkwater 6y ago
    Thanks (and sorry) for doing my homeworks
    - shagie 6y ago
      No problem. Most times the bots are lost in the "who runs that?" and its pointless to look. This one happened to have been not difficult to track down. I'm curious of the answer if you get one. ... and I see that someone dug up the answer further down.
- ly 6y ago
  The answer appears to be that "The Twitter Algorithm just doesn't seem to like it..." https://twitter.com/hugovk/status/1364506939686875137 https://twitter.com/hugovk/status/1364506939686875137
mitchdoogle 6y ago
These kinds of domains always rubbed me the wrong way. Not only does it abuse the intent of the TLD, but the dot breaks up the word in an odd place. I just imagine trying to tell someone this domain in person and it feels very awkward. Why not just go with spaceprobedata.com or spaceprobes.org, or one of the other thousands of TLDs they have now? It seems like this is a symptom of people wanting the shortest possible domain name, similar to people refusing to use a new TLD and instead spending thousands on a .com. It's all strange to me, but maybe I'm just a rule follower who doesn't care about vanity that much.
- lioeters 6y ago
  I thought I'd seen a phrase that describes these kinds of domains. Found it: > A domain hack is a domain name that suggests a word, phrase, or name when concatenating two or more adjacent levels of that domain. > For example, "bir.ds" and "examp.le", using the fictitious country-code domains .ds and .le, suggest the words birds and example respectively. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domain_hack https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domain_hack
iJohnDoe 6y ago
Very cool site! Awesome design. Awesome domain. Great job on the project.
golemiprague 6y ago
@bitsofpluto, the bot that suppose to show pictures from New Horizon on twitter is suspended for breaking Twitter rules, I wonder why?

182 points by input_sh 6y ago

Would be cool to see how often they communicate, and what data is exchanged. Also, what bandwidth and the time it takes to arrive back here.

cygx 6y ago
Also [...] the time it takes to arrive back here For reference: Voyager 1, interstellar space 21 lighthours Perseverance, Mars surface 12 lightminutes Artemis, lunar orbit 1.2 lightseconds
- spzb 6y ago
  Aren't those measures of distance?
  - gberger 6y ago
    Yes, but the data travels at approximately the speed of light, so you can just drop the "light" unit in front of the time units
    - spzb 6y ago
      But where’s the fun of pedantry in that?
  - argvargc 6y ago
    Delete "light" and it's the answer.
    - emayljames 6y ago
      Yeah, it takes me 2 trainhours to get to work.
      - deleted 6y ago
        [deleted]
  - cygx 6y ago
    Sure, but conversion to travel time is trivial given a signal velocity of c. Or just assume a 'natural' system of units where c=1 :p
gspr 6y ago
Maybe some of what you desire can be found here? https://eyes.nasa.gov/dsn/dsn.html https://eyes.nasa.gov/dsn/dsn.html
- shagie 6y ago
  And occasionally... you get a glimpse of something neat... like dish 43 getting data from VGR2. https://i.imgur.com/ZVAnt03.png https://i.imgur.com/ZVAnt03.png The downlink is 160 b/s at -154.54 dBm (as I type this - might have been different in the screen shot)... and then compare that to other data feeds on other dishes.

walrus01 6y ago

I was not aware the 2001 mars orbiter was still operating!

arielwaldman 6y ago
It's a pretty hardcore space probe!

moontear 6y ago

This is really nice, but I want more data. Everything of course only if publically available: - Where are the probes located right now (map)? - what is their trajectory/target location? - what does the data look like being transmitted (I.e. Voyager isn’t more than a blip, or is it)? - what Kind of data could be still gathered, e.g. could we ask the Probe to „take a picture“ or would the bandwidth simply not be enough?

gspr 6y ago
> (I.e. Voyager isn’t more than a blip, or is it)? According to [1], as we speak the DSS 14 antenna at Goldstone is receiving Voyager 1 data at a whooping 160 bits/sec. [1] https://eyes.nasa.gov/dsn/dsn.html https://eyes.nasa.gov/dsn/dsn.html
- cgb223 6y ago
  How quickly is the bit rate degrading from Voyager? Like if it’s 160 bits per second now, how long until it’s 100 bits per second? 10? 1?
  - gspr 6y ago
    Interesting question! At any rate, I believe death is imminent anyway: in a few years, the RTGs will have degraded so far that no single instrument can be powered :-(
OnlyOneCannolo 6y ago
Map: https://armchairastronautics.blogspot.com/p/solar-system-missions.html https://armchairastronautics.blogspot.com/p/solar-system-mis... An example of what a signal from a probe looks like: http://spacecollege.org/isee3/video-recording-both-isee-3-transponders-at-arecibo-after-first-contact.html http://spacecollege.org/isee3/video-recording-both-isee-3-tr...
argvargc 6y ago
Yourself and others interested in detail, may appreciate Daniel Estévez's recent post on his use of GNU Radio and the Allen Telescope Array to detect Voyager 1 transmissions: https://destevez.net/2021/02/voyager-1-single-dish-detection-at-allen-telescope-array/ https://destevez.net/2021/02/voyager-1-single-dish-detection... Also this JPL document on both Voyagers is packed. Check out the chart on page 44, regarding diminishing bitrates over the coming years: https://descanso.jpl.nasa.gov/monograph/series13/DeepCommo_Chapter3--141029.pdf https://descanso.jpl.nasa.gov/monograph/series13/DeepCommo_C...

procd 6y ago

No wonder why Maven is so freaking slow

techas 6y ago

Very nice site! Although, many links to data are broken, that is very frustrating...

arielwaldman 6y ago
fixed!

jeffgreco 6y ago

This is a lot more crowded since the last time I checked! You know I’ve been reading too much Kim Stanley Robinson when I immediately start worrying about contaminating these various celestial bodies’ surfaces...

darkwater 6y ago

Does anybody know why the bot[1] publishing Pluto photos from New Horizons has been suspended? [1] https://twitter.com/bitsofpluto https://twitter.com/bitsofpluto

shagie 6y ago
Not an answer, but a pointer... https://github.com/hugovk/bitsofpluto https://github.com/hugovk/bitsofpluto is the GitHub repo for the code https://twitter.com/hugovk https://twitter.com/hugovk would be the person on twitter to ask.
- darkwater 6y ago
  Thanks (and sorry) for doing my homeworks
  - shagie 6y ago
    No problem. Most times the bots are lost in the "who runs that?" and its pointless to look. This one happened to have been not difficult to track down. I'm curious of the answer if you get one. ... and I see that someone dug up the answer further down.
ly 6y ago
The answer appears to be that "The Twitter Algorithm just doesn't seem to like it..." https://twitter.com/hugovk/status/1364506939686875137 https://twitter.com/hugovk/status/1364506939686875137

mitchdoogle 6y ago

These kinds of domains always rubbed me the wrong way. Not only does it abuse the intent of the TLD, but the dot breaks up the word in an odd place. I just imagine trying to tell someone this domain in person and it feels very awkward. Why not just go with spaceprobedata.com or spaceprobes.org, or one of the other thousands of TLDs they have now? It seems like this is a symptom of people wanting the shortest possible domain name, similar to people refusing to use a new TLD and instead spending thousands on a .com. It's all strange to me, but maybe I'm just a rule follower who doesn't care about vanity that much.

lioeters 6y ago
I thought I'd seen a phrase that describes these kinds of domains. Found it: > A domain hack is a domain name that suggests a word, phrase, or name when concatenating two or more adjacent levels of that domain. > For example, "bir.ds" and "examp.le", using the fictitious country-code domains .ds and .le, suggest the words birds and example respectively. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domain_hack https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domain_hack

iJohnDoe 6y ago

Very cool site! Awesome design. Awesome domain. Great job on the project.

golemiprague 6y ago

@bitsofpluto, the bot that suppose to show pictures from New Horizon on twitter is suspended for breaking Twitter rules, I wonder why?