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Check out this talk: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dF_9YcehCZo

The source code isn't hiding in a repo somewhere for security reasons — it's spread around on various pieces of paper and computers over the last 50 years. There isn't a single source of truth. Adds a whole other level of wizardry to keeping the thing running.




Like, maybe that was originally true, but they have had decades. Numerous times contact has been lost, hardware failed, key people died, etc.

How has nobody at the top ordered a digitization and consolidation of all known code and supporting documentation during that time frame.


It costs money that would better be sent towards other projects, and NASA needs to be as careful as possible with spending their very limited budget.

Having a ton of people run around the office for a couple months to collate a bunch of documents so you can better pass info on to a new generation of workers when the satellite might not even be usable anymore isn't very efficient. Might as well just pay an extra 50% or whatever to the 5 dudes who know what's going on until the thing is inop. Even if it died today, the mission still would've been a massive success.


The architecture probably doesn’t lend itself to the same development process we are all familiar with.




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