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Artemis computer running two instances of MS outlook; they can't figure out why
- 0x073 7mo agoAt least it's no discord or ms teams.
- allears 7mo agoWhy in the name of all that's holy would you use a Microsoft product on a mission like this? Just about the only thing you can trust about MS is that their software is buggy.
- mronetwo 7mo agoBecause they have the power to insert themselves in places like these. It's a bigger problem. There are places in which companies with Microslop's level of quality have no business to be, but they're already there.
- shimman 7mo agoThe fun thing about this, is it can change at anytime for any reason. All we need to do is get the right people in power, a good step toward this direction would be to actually support abolishing big tech (which many primary challengers have as a platform position).
- SanjayMehta 7mo agoUSS Yorktown, the aegis missile carrier comes to mind for some reason. I think it was the same ship which shot down a passenger airliner.
- robin_reala 7mo ago“Guns don’t kill people, Windows does”?
- HeyLaughingBoy 7mo agoI believe that the use of Windows NT for Aegis control was fleet-wide, so that problem wasn't unique to the Yorktown. That just happened to be where it was discovered.
- mrguyorama 7mo agoYou are wrong on all points. The US shot down Iran Air 655 using the USS Vincennes, a Ticonderoga class ship. The shootdown was before Windows existed. It's controversial what to "blame", but I generally blame the captain, who defied all reason and caution to shoot down an aircraft that they never identified. He went gung ho and maybe got tunnel vision but he should have been outright court martialed. That should have been treated as "No, this is not acceptable behavior for someone of the rank of captain even if you hadn't shot down an airliner" Windows has zero relevance to that.
- SanjayMehta 7mo agoI'm not wrong on all points. Just the identity of the terrorist which shot down the airliner. But it's the same gang of habitual war criminals who all need to be Nuremburged.
- fuzzfactor 7mo agoFrom the comments: Andy Meyers @andymeyers10.bsky.social · 3h I said “launch window”, not “Launch Windows”!
- nekusar 7mo agoCopilot (which one?!?) says "I'm sorry Dave, I cannot allow you to do that"
- bilekas 7mo agoThere was a literal meme in spaceforce about this. Have we learnt nothing ? Microslop will now troll people outside of the Earth, a great achievement for them. So does this mean they now also have... 2 Copilots... ? Terrible joke.
- Rooster61 7mo ago[flagged]
- alex1138 7mo agoClippy "It looks like you're trying to go to the Moon. Want any help with that?"
- rich_sasha 7mo agoJust imagine the aliens capture a probe and try to use Windows. What will they think of us?!
- fuzzfactor 7mo agoFirst they laugh. Then they wanna just cry when it brings down their whole starfleet with a virus that they have no immunity to ;)
- burnt-resistor 7mo agoDon't worry, it will stop them at installation and demand internet access and creation of a Microsoft cloud account.
- deleted 7mo ago[deleted]
- rich_sasha 7mo ago[flagged]
- ramesh31 7mo ago>"Is it just me that finds it terrifying that theres any Windows bits on a spaceship?" SpaceX Crew Dragon console interfaces are entirely React apps
- ryandrake 7mo agoEverything is terrifying in computing these days, and bringing it to space rockets makes it even more terrifying.
- burnt-resistor 7mo agoI think we need to mandate intentionally slower, sandboxed, and resource-constrained development environments/containers so developers are unable to abuse resources like they're "free" and in so using wasteful and improper algorithms to expand to fill the volume of the container (RAM, CPU, IOPS, storage capacity, and network bandwidth and latency) like an ideal gas. Lazy coding and excessive abstractions on top of VMs on top of more abstractions all the way down leads to shit.
- hunterpayne 7mo agoSo a web app then?
- burnt-resistor 7mo agoYou're conflating dev and production erroneously. Not necessarily in dev but it could be a VM, process, or web app. The point being the production version should be performant and light on restrictions... and not necessarily web-centric either.
- kotaKat 7mo ago
- jmacklin308 7mo agoWe migrated earlier this year and had a similar problem. Outlook (classic) works differently than the OWA version. They keep the classic version so people don't spontaneously throw a chair out a window. It's being phased out slowly.
- mvkel 7mo agoI'm betting in 15 years, people will still be using Outlook (classic). This is the culture.
- nekusar 7mo ago[flagged]
- gchamonlive 7mo agoAnd also because apparently "nobody has ever been fired for choosing Microsoft", which is something that should start happening more often if you ask me
- wang_li 7mo agoAs long as Linux distros have such shit accessibility stories, MacOS and Windows being available should be a requirement for all systems in government.
- babypuncher 7mo agoThe culture is correct, the new version of Outlook is hot garbage
- joe_mamba 7mo agoWhich "new" Outlook? I think there's like 3 versions of Outlook currently on the market. The Classic Win32 one they want you to stop using, the new Lite variant bundled for free with Windows 11, and the new Full Spec one that comes with Office 365, both of which are built on web technologies IIRC.
- unethical_ban 7mo agoI want to say something like "oh well, this is certainly a non-critical piece of software". Hopefully it's the convenient dashboard and there are other, more hardened consoles for fallback or something. But in all seriousness, and without glibness or sarcasm: I cannot comprehend how there is any "unexpected" software running on that spacecraft, regardless of operating system. EDIT*** For those who like me only watched the video and didn't read the thread: This is on a laptop that is non-critical, it is not a part of the spacecraft. Whew. Now I'm sad that one of the Linux distros didn't try to pitch themselves to the astronauts for a sponsorship... Would have been especially on brand for Pop_OS.
- dgellow 7mo agoAnd connected to the network!
- russdill 7mo agoThey have a diverse range of devices, including iPhones
- bombcar 7mo agoIt'd be fun to be a telco tech and realize that you've an attempted connection from an iPhone 50 miles up and receding fast.
- themafia 7mo agoReceiving airdrops on the moon is something to look forward to. https://www.youtube.com/shorts/e7MP3SQWZDc https://www.youtube.com/shorts/e7MP3SQWZDc "Hey Artemis, we've got some great pictures of you, we'll try to airdrop them up to you!"
- kaybe 7mo agoOh ya I remember how some computer pulled a windows update over a satellite connection during a research flight (aircraft). That was super expensive, wow. Now Microsoft servers are banned at the outgoing point since you couldn’t reliably stop it the computer itself and new teams with new computers come in.
- xnyan 7mo agoI'm not letting Microsoft off the hook here, but if you have an expensive metered connection and you're trusting clients (especially a modern personal computer of any operating system type)to play nicely with bandwidth, that's 100% on you.
- jubilanti 7mo agoThat's a really sorry state of things, then. There's zero trust in software now, in the literal sense. How did it get that we live in a world where you can't trust a client to enforce its own documented behavior? How did it get to be the user's fault for not using OS and hardware level measures and not the software vendor's fault when the "Automatic updates" toggle is a no-op?
- EvanAnderson 7mo agoIn an environment where bandwidth utilization costs money I think it's a good belt-and-suspenders approach, regardless of the expected behavior of the clients, to enforce policy at the choke point between expensive and not-expensive. (I think more networks should be built with default deny egress policies, personally. It would make data exfiltration more difficult, would make ML algorithms monitoring traffic flows have less "noise" to look thru, and would likely encourage some efficiency on the part of dependencies.)
- CoastalCoder 7mo ago> How did it get that we live in a world where you can't trust a client to enforce its own documented behavior? My guess a combo of economic incentives and weak legal protections. I realize that answer applies to so many issues as to be almost not worth saving, but I think it's still true here.
- rationalist 7mo agocomputer virus noun A program which can covertly transmit itself between computers via networks (especially the Internet) or removable storage such as CDs, USB drives, floppy disks, etc., often causing damage to systems and data. A software program capable of reproducing itself and usually capable of causing great harm to files or other programs on the same computer.
- netsharc 7mo agoThe astronaut's quote needs to be a billboard ad.. "I also see I have 2 instances of Outlook, and neither of those are working".
- simonh 7mo agoHouston, we have a problem!
- netsharc 7mo agoThank you for contacting us, my name is James, I am a senior Microsoft application community troubleshooter...
- workfromspace 7mo agoWelcome to Houston support chatbot, powered by CoPilot. How may I help you?
- euroderf 7mo agoOne is hacked by a Russian hacker group based in St. Petersburg, the other is hacked by a Chinese hacker group, and the third instance was actually BackOrifice but it couldn't get enough resources to run because of the other two.
- dgb23 7mo agoBashing on MS products and on ReactJS (apparently used by spacex UIs) is a common pastime here and I'm guilty of it myself. But here we're talking about actual space rockets flying to space with humans in them. My expectation would be that something like https://tigerstyle.dev/ https://tigerstyle.dev/ would be followed or the NASA rules linked from there https://spinroot.com/gerard/pdf/P10.pdf https://spinroot.com/gerard/pdf/P10.pdf
- babypuncher 7mo agothis is a crew laptop and not a mission critical computer at all.
- chasd00 7mo agosince the astronauts are asking about it i'm guessing it wasn't snuck onboard. Sneaking stuff on to spacecraft to play with on the moon was a thing, i think one of the Apollo astronauts smuggled a golf club and balls to hit on the moon. (I realize this mission is to only orbit and not land on the moon)
- dgb23 7mo agoThat info puts things into perspective thanks.
- HeyLaughingBoy 7mo agoAt a previous job I was a developer on a medical instrument that used Windows to run the UI. Before everyone gets all up in arms about it, Windows/Linux UI & database with external microcontrollers handling real-time control is a very common architectural choice for medical and industrial equipment. To the point where many Systems-on-Module (SoMs) come with a Linux-capable ARM processor and a separate, smaller processor for real-time, linked via shared memory. Anyway, a customer called to report a weird bug that we couldn't resolve. After remoting into the instrument, we discovered that one of the lab technicians had attempted to install Excel on it. At some point the install must have failed, but it left a .dll behind that was causing a conflict with something in our code and keeping the UI from starting properly. No, we did not learn anything from this incident...
- nasretdinov 7mo agoThe poor technicians having to RDP with (what I imagine must be) a horrible latency. Although still might be better than some corporate environments lol
- pinum 7mo agoAt its current distance, best case RTT would be about 420ms
- EvanAnderson 7mo agoThat wouldn't be terrible to use. I feel like I've done worse supporting in-cab computers on fleet vehicles across 3G cellular. Keyboard shortcuts and "caching" the state of the remote client in your mind are the keys to doing that work.
- HeyLaughingBoy 7mo agoYup. 57kbps transatlantic modem connection to a remote desktop in some country with poor telephone connectivity was probably even worse. Never want to have to do that again!
- Thlom 7mo agoLow bandwidth is a bigger problem than high latency. If it takes half a second or even a second for your clicks to register it's not a big deal, you learn to work around it. But if the bandwidth is so low that it takes 5-10 seconds just to write the screen it really sucks.
- ricardobeat 7mo agoI don’t know if this craft has it, but they’ve been announcing all over that we’ll get 4K over a 260mbps link from the moon, so that shouldn’t be a problem
- canucker2016 7mo ago
- rmrfchik 7mo agoI didn't expect they are running Windows up there. Shouldn't be specialized and curated ... smthing else?
- hyi96 7mo ago[dead]
- liendolucas 7mo agoIs this actually true? What's next? A BSOD? I would have ever ever in my life bet that Microsoft software could be shipped in a spacecraft carrying human beings. Unbeliveable.
- kube-system 7mo agoYou're a couple decades behind the news. Basically every version of Windows since 95 has been on spacecraft carrying humans. The ISS notoriously migrated to Linux after a virus spread across their Windows XP systems. But these things aren't running the guidance computers -- they're laptops.
- mmooss 7mo agoLaptops have built-in battery backup lasting hours.
- kube-system 7mo agoAre you suggesting that’s the reason they use them? They use laptops because desktops are too big. The laptops aren’t there as some sort of a contingency for a power loss. They’re there to do their research work. You know, how scientists on earth use laptops, and or desktops.
- mmooss 7mo agoHow do you know that? Desktop form factors are much more flexible, making them effectively smaller. They don't need a case - you can disassemble them, build them into cabinets and consoles; you can reduce their volume to a keyboard (or less).
- kube-system 7mo agoThey’re not looking for a science fair project, it’s a production piece of IT equipment. Adding a bunch of bespoke equipment is an unnecessary risk when a well understood off the shelf product fits the bill. It’s just office equipment for doing basic computer tasks. A laptop is appropriate.
- stackskipton 7mo agoEveryone likes to point and laugh, sure, I'm getting a chuckle as well. However, on more practical level, what are other options? Outlook, the desktop application works really well with local copies, is pretty low bandwidth and very familiar to end users. IMAP with Thunderbird is probably only other option that would satisfy the requirements. EDIT: Yes they need to get email in space. It's easy way to send documents back and forth.
- croes 7mo agoI hope they don’t need to search an email. Outlook may be familiar but it’s a familiar pain.
- EvanAnderson 7mo agoI don't know why people are surprised by this. Using suitable off-the-shelf solutions for non-mission-critical purposes seems like a very reasonable thing to do. I'm recalling this from my memory of "The Space Above Us" podcast: There were various bespoke teleprinters sent up on early shuttle flights that had exciting failure modes (if I remember correctly one of them started smoking) and in at least a couple of cases they had to stow the new hardware and pull out the old backup hardware because the new stuff didn't work.
- cj 7mo agoRelated thread from 2023 about the US Navy using Xbox 360 controllers instead of custom built hardware. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36408604 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36408604
- bombcar 7mo agoXbox 360 controller: Good times! US Navy approved. Madcatz controller: Bad times! OceanGate approved.
- sidewndr46 7mo agoHaving had the unfortunate experience of using MadCatz controllers, I would doubt the sanity of anyone that selected one
- golfer 7mo agoWhy on God's green earth is Windows running on the Artemis spaceship?
- maxerickson 7mo agoWhat should they use for email?
- buildbot 7mo agoAlpine & Linux?
- maxerickson 7mo agoAre you running that on a flight system or on an additional computer where it would be fine to run Windows?
- buildbot 7mo agoThe entire point is to avoid an OS like windows; and an email client like Outlook?
- maxerickson 7mo agoYeah I get the point, I'm saying it's not really a good point, running Windows and Outlook on a secondary system is fine. Forcing the astronauts to learn to use some other system would be a waste of time and probably worse than whatever it is you see as the problem.
- benhurmarcel 7mo agoMost probably it can’t connect to the server without running IT-mandated security software that runs only on Windows
- buildbot 7mo agoFYI Alpine: https://github.com/realpine/alpine https://github.com/realpine/alpine Not Alpine Linux, too late to edit to clarify
- PretzelPirate 7mo agoI don't understand the title. It doesn't seem like they are trying to figure out why two copies of outlook are installed, they're trying to figure out why neither is giving them access to their email.
- EvanAnderson 7mo agoPeople opening the "wrong" Outlook has been the norm for the last couple of years. Between "Outlook (classic)", "new" Outlook (rolled out with Office 365 clients), and "Outlook" (rolled out with Windows 11) it's been a shit show for a while now.
- qaadika 7mo ago[dead]
- Chihuahua0633 7mo agoDid they consider scrapping the humans, and just installing co-pilot? heh .. heh.. /s
- EvanAnderson 7mo agoThis talk about off-the-shelf hardware in space makes me wonder, given the clear line of sight, if it would be possible to detect their Wi-Fi access points' beacons from Earth. I'm not a "radio guy" and don't know if this would be impossible, simply on the basis of physics, due to the presumably low radiated power from the APs and the limitations of the size of typical antennas on the ground. (Obviously it's possible with the right equipment. We can communicate with the Voyager probes, but that's not with a "can-tenna" and an off-the-shelf Wi-Fi card...) Edit: Anybody know how difficult it would be to keep an antenna pointed at them? I have no intuition for how fast their transit would be. I assume, since an orbit is around 90 minutes, pretty damned fast. Edit 2: Some search-engining and back-of-the-envelope not-very-good-at-trig math says the longest possible transit would be about 5 minutes, moving though about 40 degrees of arc / minute. I'm probably completely talking out my ass, though. It feels like it would be do-able to keep a directional antenna trained on a target moving at that speed.
- b3orn 7mo agoProbably not possible. Their Wi-Fi access point is inside the capsule, the capsule is made from metal and probably shielding the signal somewhat. Maybe even quite a lot if it's intended to provide some radiation shielding. Also it's low power as it only needs to work inside the capsule, at the given distances signal attenuation will make it almost impossible to pick up anything.
- estimator7292 7mo agoThe correct answer is far too often the most boring answer. But yeah, this is basically it. We could detect the signal, but they simply aren't emitting a signal in the right direction for us to detect.
- wil421 7mo agoWhat’s the NROs take on capturing the signal from the ground? They already have it from a satellite in space.
- 7mo ago
- cocodill 7mo agoMaybe for emails and calendars, wouldn't want them to arrive and miss the appointment.
- EvanAnderson 7mo agoCoordinating time-zone issues between remote meeting participants on a single celestial body is complex enough. >smile<
- workfromspace 7mo agoThat gives me so many questions: Should there be a non-Earth timezone? How do you define a "day" in space? Is there a day light saving in space? At least they are not travelling near the speed of light. That's a whole different can of worms.
- marcosdumay 7mo agoAt least the proposal let's time-zones go away, since "day" is completely artificial: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timekeeping_on_the_Moon#Coordinated_Lunar_Time https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timekeeping_on_the_Moon#Coordi...
- NitpickLawyer 7mo ago> At least they are not travelling near the speed of light. That's a whole different can of worms. Oh, they're building software and hardware for this anyway. The differences between earth clocks and moon clocks (CotS) would lead to large errors if you were to calculate distances. There was an article about this a while ago. Fascinating stuff.
- zombot 7mo agoAs long as you're not in the shadow of some celestial body, the sun never goes away. So they'd need more nightlight saving than daylight saving.
- scottburgess33 7mo ago[dead]
- dminik 7mo agoWell, I wasn't that worried for the astronauts before, but now that I know they're running windows, I'm not so sure.
- ashton314 7mo agoPlease imagine the luxury of being SO FAR AWAY from all the crap happening on our planet right now, only to be spoiled by some lousy marketing emails from Microslop hawking their latest Copilot incursion.
- FerretFred 7mo agoSomeone, somewhere has an unwatched phone waiting for an authorisation code response...
- AmVess 7mo agoRunning Windows in outer space takes some pretty big balls. Gives me a cold sweat just thinking about it.
- lateforwork 7mo agoWhat should they be using instead? These astronauts are not Linux hackers.
- relaxing 7mo agoThese astronauts are trained to use the system NASA puts them in.
- kube-system 7mo agoAnd ultimately they have a lot more important things to be doing then learning a different email client than the one they use at their desk on earth. This is an email client on a laptop, not a navigation system.
- relaxing 7mo agoNo they don’t. They’re our best and brightest, and they train for years at their one, important job, which is to use the system they’re given.
- kube-system 7mo agoThe mission of the astronauts on board is to test the damn Orion spacecraft in preparation for a human landing on the moon. > NASA flight controller and instructor Robert Frost explained the reasoning plainly in a post on Quora (via Forbes). “A Windows laptop is used for the same reasons a majority of people that use computers use Windows. It is a system that people are already familiar with. Why make them learn a new operating system,” he reportedly wrote. https://www.msn.com/en-in/technology/space-exploration/nasa-artemis-ii-moon-mission-astronauts-face-microsoft-outlook-problem-in-space/ar-AA200Yib https://www.msn.com/en-in/technology/space-exploration/nasa-...
- ano-ther 7mo agoThis is the modern version of the slave reminding the Roman emperor that he is mortal: https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/4pywzk/did_roman_generalsemperors_really_have_a_slave/ https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/4pywzk/did_r...
- lwansbrough 7mo agoMay need triple redundancy for MS Outlook for the next mission.
- AIorNot 7mo agoguys former NASA Mission Control Web Tool Team and OCA here (Orbital Comms Adapter office which was a backroom position) Crews have been using thinkpad laptops (personal laptops since the 2005) on the ISS and Shuttle. Artemis is likely an extension of this Laptops go through a long space hardening and verification process. Windows and Outlook is the result of that We used to do "Mail Syncs" which taking the outlook file and pushing it up to the crews laptop doing a comm window via TDRSS network -that how astronauts got their email is this high tech - no -does it work and been done for years yes.
- workfromspace 7mo ago> guys former NASA Mission Control Web Tool Team and OCA here Wow, very cool and lot's of respect! But... why not use linux, unix, custom OS, iPad, Android, Nintendo SNES, Atari, Commodore 64... anything BUT Microsoft? (Seriously though, why not Linux? I'd really appreciate if you could answer, thank you! )
- AIorNot 7mo agoWell as to why they were chosen back in the STS (shuttle) era (before my time) see a good history on the decision here: https://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=27043.0 https://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=27043.0 1. In the space program decisions are made years before and changes are very difficult owing to a myriad of reasons from procedures to paperwork, eg there was a whole mirror lab setup on the ground To support them etc 2. Astronauts/Aerospace operationally often come from defense world - they are used to windows - see DoD -that battle was fought in the 80s/90s 3. Once something is a part of the space program it takes on a life of its own/ we had an IIS webserver onboard the ISS for example and also apache tomcat - we (myself wrote software for both) using .NET and Java 4. Training and operational software and docs were all MS Office variety for years (were talking from floppy disk era here) 5. Lot of other linux/unix based systems too this is is just crew support laptops - not considered mission critical
- mike_hearn 7mo agoBut how can we square that claim with the fact that they're having bog standard broken IT issues .... in space? What kind of "space hardening" process results in the mission having problems like this so quickly?
- workfromspace 7mo agoOMG, this almost became real: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2zpCOYkdvTQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2zpCOYkdvTQ ("Fuck Microsoft" scene from the Netflix TV Series: Space Force)
- frizlab 7mo agoUnless I’m mistaken Space Force is a netflix series.
- workfromspace 7mo agoOh, apparently you are right! Thanks for the correction.
- tempodox 7mo agoWasn’t it Bill Gates’ dream that every coffee machine should run Windows? I guess he’s got his wish. Also, redundancy: Imagine going into space and then have no email! Can’t let that happen.
- londons_explore 7mo agoThere are probably more running copies of freeRTOS than windows in the world...
- mememememememo 7mo agoEnshittification has reached space. Woohoo! We did it. Just use the web version! Love to know how how the web version loads with a couple of seconds network latency.
- amai 7mo agoEvery car has more reliable software onboard.
- varjag 7mo ago"Houston, we've got two problems"
- xg15 7mo agoMoon landing 1969: 4 KB RAM for the guidance computer is enough. Moon landing 2026: Two instances of MS Outlook sort of started themselves on the guidance computer and we have no idea why.
- ertian 7mo ago1969: Every line of assembly code has been coded according to rigorous standards and vetted and reviewed by a panel of experts. 2026: lol we just realized there's a few million lines of extra code running but we can't figure out why
- testfrequency 7mo agoWhat could go wrong!
- doug_durham 7mo ago1969: Every bit of every line of assembly manually woven into core rope memory by highly skilled technicians. 2026: We filled up our 2 TB flash. How do we get another?
- PTOB 7mo agoI'll bet someone's trying to run the New Outlook and classic Outlook at the same time.
- nickandbro 7mo agoGood thing they didn’t bring copilot with them
- top_sigrid 7mo agoI wouldn’t be too sure about that
- booleandilemma 7mo agoAbsolutely Dave! I can do that for you!
- nmstoker 7mo agoThe two Outlook thing happens all the time at work. It's silly but never causes me issues, I just close the second one. Haven't ever figured out why it happens. Did the Artemis crew any side effects / problems tied to Outlook?
- amelius 7mo agoRedundancy is a thing in aerospace engineering.
- flysand7 7mo agoSomething tells me this ain't the kind of redundancy aerospace engeneering really needs
- anthk 7mo agoNNCP would have more sense there.
- giancarlostoro 7mo agoOne's the "Metro" instance or whatever its called, the other is probably Win32.
- exabrial 7mo agoWhy is anyone still running Windows
- chickensong 7mo agoGames. Also the enterprise features are pretty good.
- sph 7mo agoThey don't make programmers like Margaret Hamilton any more.
- bitwize 7mo agoApollo's computer: Ran in 2 KiB memory! Miniaturized design before microprocessors became widely available! Rope memory for the ROM hand-woven by weaver ladies! Multitasking operating system kernel! Margaret Hamilton coined the term, and practice, of "software engineering" to develop the software for it! Houston had to debug it from the ground! Artemis's computer: [theme from Curb Your Enthusiasm plays]
- erkt 7mo agoThey have also been having audio issues...that are very very VERYY reminiscent of Microsoft audio driver issues I run into all the time while gaming...
- cyberlimerence 7mo agoEven having one instance running should have been immediate whole of NASA five fire alarm type of situation.
- starkparker 7mo agohttps://www.businessinsider.com/artemis-astronauts-microsoft-outlook-accessing-email-nasa-mission-control-problem-2026-4 https://www.businessinsider.com/artemis-astronauts-microsoft... > After Wiseman flagged the issue, Mission Control said it could remotely access his system with permission. > Soon after, a member of Mission Control said, "We wanted to let Reid know we are done remoting into his PCD 1." They added that the issue had been resolved and that the system would appear offline, as "expected." > The personal computing device, or PCD, is how the crew accesses the internet during the flight and tracks its timeline, NASA said on the livestream. The device used on the mission is the MS Surface Pro, per an Artemis II factsheet. The factsheet: https://ntrs.nasa.gov/api/citations/20230017638/downloads/1325_Melendrez_Orion%20Imaging%20Capabilities.pdf https://ntrs.nasa.gov/api/citations/20230017638/downloads/13... > Used for PFCs (private family conference), PMCs (private medical communication/conference), office apps, DSLR imagery storage, viewing recorded stills/videos on camera controllers
- starkparker 7mo agoNotably, it looks like it came down to the Surface Pro and Dell XPS 15, and part of the reason why the Surface won was "significantly more particulate and quantities of toxic gases" emitted by the XPS's larger battery in the worst-case scenario of a battery fire: https://ntrs.nasa.gov/api/citations/20210013869/downloads/20210013869.pdf https://ntrs.nasa.gov/api/citations/20210013869/downloads/20... > The six key test configurations are shown in Table D-2. A ¼-scale OSEF was used in place of a full-scale unit. Performance results were assessed accordingly. The Orion Program is considering flying one of two different laptop models, a Surface Pro or a Dell XPS 15. Both were tested during this test series. Sealed and unsealed OFC prefilters also were tested. ... > Testing revealed that the rise in temperature is directly related to the number of cells ignited. Maximum temperature rise inside the CBA during a Dell XPS 15 fire was 22 °F. The maximum temperature rise inside the CBA during a Surface Pro fire was 7 °F. Figure D-13 shows the relative temperature rises for several tests. ... > - When larger numbers of laptop cells were ignited, higher concentrations of toxic gases, increased particulate densities, and greater production of thermal energy were observed. > - The larger the number of laptop battery cells ignited, the more likely the ammonia concentration was to reach levels capable of potentially poisoning the OSEF CO oxidation catalyst.
- notorandit 7mo agoThe point is not running Windows or Outlook on a PC in space. The point is that the Software was not sealed, downloading upgrades while in space, sending telemetry back to Microsoft (or to whoever else). Those PC are like any other instrument onboard the spacecraft: it's status needs to be known and predictable by NASA. Not to talk about the amount of unknown and unpredictable extra traffic caused by those PCs onto the "space internet links" which can easily clog any other communication. And not to talk about smartphones. This is actually rocket (and space) science, not the horse market fair!
- raverbashing 7mo ago> it's status needs to be known and predictable by NASA Ah yes but do you think MS gives a flap about this? Same thing with the recent Fedramp certification. "Hey they're using it so we might as well certify"
- zelphirkalt 7mo agoWell, it is the other way around actually: NASA should not give a flap about MS tooling, and naturally avoid it completely. Whoever thought of having an Outlook or even 2 out of all the things on there should look for another job, because they clearly cannot be trusted with astronaut lives.
- conorcleary 7mo agoOne is Russian malware and the other is Chinese ;)
- m3047 7mo agoMicrosoft beleaguered a federal agency which pretends to be a lot larger than it is (and has a lot of help doing it) with nonresponsive filings. The employees of that agency, FedRAMP, referred to Azure as "a pile of shit" but ultimately approved it anyway. https://www.propublica.org/article/microsoft-cloud-fedramp-cybersecurity-government It's hard to find hard numbers (I looked), but in the "FedRAMP over 10 years" chart partway down in this article FedRAMP themselves claims to have approximately 25 employees, which (I infer prior to DOGE) was augmented to approximately 80 staff with contractors. https://www.fedramp.gov/2025-09-30-fedramp-built-a-modern-foundation-in-fy25-to-deliver-massive-improvements-in-fy26/
- anon291 7mo agoIt's insane to me that microsoft licensing for large companies and mission-critical systems operators doesn't include a stripped down version of windows that really just provides the NT kernel and window system. Why on earth is MS telemetry running in space LOL
- randomNumber7 7mo agoThey likely can't separate that with their spaghetti code.
- hsbauauvhabzb 7mo agoMicroslop in space
- Garlef 7mo agoMicroslorbit
- bytesandbits 7mo agowhy is a mail client needed in an onboard space computer at all?
- fsh 7mo agoTo send email.
- 1dontnkow_ 7mo agoUntil somebody remembers to read those mails, the mission will be already over and forgotten. LOL
- themafia 7mo agoI wonder if we could FOIA that inbox.
- andrepd 7mo agoFor those nostalgic for different times https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xx7Lfh5SKUQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xx7Lfh5SKUQ
- cultofmetatron 7mo agowith all that money, they could have selected or designed a power efficient arm soc and installed a custom linux that was power efficient and built for stability. It would have been a net positive for everyone in FOSS. Instead they slapped some winshit together and told the astronauts to deal with it... at least they aren't manually shitting into bags for this mission.
- ptman 7mo agoCompare the cost and you will find the reason
- trolleski 7mo agoUsing Windows in space? What?
- danr4 7mo agoIn space no one can hear you blue screen
- kunley 7mo agoMisleading. Sounds like "computer driving Artemis spacecraft" while is is realy "some computer onboard Artemis spacecraft". Very big difference.
- 1dontnkow_ 7mo agoDue to the immense resources NASA has why would they ever deploy this bloated software on spaceships? Wouldnt it make more sense to fork some open source project and slim it down and adapt it perfectly to their needs?
- jzer0cool 7mo agoHmm redundecy?
- PeterStuer 7mo agoThe real shocker is why would this craft spend energy on a Windows machine? I can honestly not think of a single sensible thing.
- trakkstar 7mo agoTaking ANY Microsoft products with you to space is proper Russian roulette, I mean, what could go wrong?
- MetroWind 7mo agoLmao why is it running Windows at all...
- KellyCriterion 7mo agoMaybe there are just missing the latest Service Pack Update with Copilot integration on their machines? :-D
- Jotalea 7mo agoThis situation reminds me of that one scene where a computer starts automatically updating, and the manager screams "F*CK MICROSOFT" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2zpCOYkdvTQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2zpCOYkdvTQ
- deleted 7mo ago[deleted]
- lilyterry 7mo agoThis is a known Outlook pain point it's notoriously sensitive to network configuration, especially on high-latency or intermittent connections. I have been using Emclient past two years for my business, works so much better