» When you absolutely, positively have to write software that does not fail

21st Apr 2008 by Mark Turansky

When you absolutely, positively have to write software that does not fail

Filed under Engineering

I’ve been fascinated about the software they run on the space shuttle ever since I read this article years ago: They Write the Right Stuff

Today, I ran across this article about Self-Modifying Code written by someone that used to work at Lockheed on the shuttle. He describes using it for fault tolerance down near the hardware.

I imagine the computers running the Federal Reserve have similarly robust features baked in. Interesting stuff.

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2 Responses to “When you absolutely, positively have to write software that does not fail”

April 21st, 2008 at 4:38 pm C. Enrique Ortiz Says:

Hi Mark. Thanks for the comments. FYI, it wasn’t Lockheed, but it was IBM…

ceo
April 27th, 2008 at 5:04 pm tinou Says:

interesting article about the space shuttle software. any thoughts on comparing NASA’s process to the current software development methodologies like agile or tdd?