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Computer scientist Margaret Hamilton with the extensive amount of code she and her team wrote to guide the NASA mission to the Moon, USA, 1969 (media.piefed.social)

submitted 3 weeks ago by PugJesus@piefed.social to c/historyphotos@piefed.social

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[-] Treczoks@lemmy.world 43 points 3 weeks ago

There is even a LEGO set commemorating this image.

[-] JetpackJackson@feddit.org 16 points 3 weeks ago

Link? I wanna see it

[-] hoch@lemmy.world 41 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

#21312 - Women of NASA

[-] JetpackJackson@feddit.org 9 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

That's awesome, they even did the blackboard

[-] MrSoup@lemmy.zip 6 points 3 weeks ago

And the coat rack, for some reason

[-] victorz@lemmy.world 5 points 3 weeks ago

And the coat hanger lol

[-] BradleyUffner@lemmy.world 30 points 3 weeks ago

It's part of a set with 3 Vignettes celebrating women in historic tech moments.

Here is a picture of them from my wall of nerdy shit

[-] Olgratin_Magmatoe@slrpnk.net 14 points 3 weeks ago

Solid taste in nick nacks

[-] JetpackJackson@feddit.org 3 points 3 weeks ago

Oh nice!

[-] bonenode@piefed.social 2 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

Is that a Q thermos?

[-] Treczoks@lemmy.world 2 points 3 weeks ago

LEGO Set 21312

[-] JetpackJackson@feddit.org 2 points 3 weeks ago

Thanks

[-] red_tomato@lemmy.world 31 points 3 weeks ago

I see post mentioning Margaret Hamilton. I upvote.

[-] TheBat@lemmy.world 27 points 3 weeks ago

How did they do it without AI🤯

[-] four@lemmy.zip 16 points 3 weeks ago

They obviously failed to get to the Moon, duh. Now with AI we will get there faster and better ✨🚀

/s, just to be safe

[-] zqps@sh.itjust.works 5 points 3 weeks ago

You can just ask the rocket to not explode.

[-] Ceruleum@lemmy.wtf 2 points 3 weeks ago

Computer says no.

[-] iatenine@piefed.social 26 points 3 weeks ago

import RocketScience rs

rs.goto(moon)

[-] mycodesucks@lemmy.world 18 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "app.py", line 8, in <module>
    import RocketScience 
  File "/usr/lib/python3.11/site-packages/RocketScience/__init__.py", line 5, in <module>
    from .core import initialize
  File "/usr/lib/python3.11/site-packages/RocketScience/core.py", line 22, in <module>
    libc = ctypes.CDLL("libc.so.6")
  File "/usr/lib/python3.11/ctypes/__init__.py", line 364, in __init__
    self._handle = _dlopen(self._name, mode)
OSError: /usr/lib/libc.so.6: version `GLIBC_2.34' not found (required by /usr/lib/python3.11/site-packages/RocketScience/core.py)

[-] ardentengender@toad.social 13 points 3 weeks ago

@PugJesus How many lines of code is that? A paper pile is not a metric that tells me anything! :D

[-] PugJesus@piefed.social 41 points 3 weeks ago

145,000 lines of code, but about 4x that is included in that pile in documentation.

REMEMBER TO COMMENT YOUR CODE

[-] crank0271@lemmy.world 24 points 3 weeks ago

not sure what this does but everything breaks if we remove it

[-] victorz@lemmy.world 3 points 3 weeks ago

LGTM

[approve]

[-] Liz@midwest.social 1 points 3 weeks ago

Printed letter paper has about 80 lines per page. Rough numbers let's call it 100. That makes for 1,450 pages. Let's double it by assuming lots of page headers, comments, half-filled pages, etc. So 3000 sheets of paper. A ream of paper is 500 sheets, so we're looking at 6 reams. A ream is about 4 cm thick, but let's call it 5 since there will be air and creases and whatever. So 30 cm gets us to about a foot high for our code, all printed out.

I'm pretty sure my original question was correct, this isn't the code. I'm pretty sure it's the debug output.

[-] AngryPancake@sh.itjust.works 14 points 3 weeks ago

It's on GitHub!

https://github.com/chrislgarry/Apollo-11

[-] Avicenna@programming.dev 5 points 3 weeks ago

fucking hell....

[-] StarvingMartist@sh.itjust.works 12 points 3 weeks ago

It's wild to think but our phones literally have the processing power to run this program

[-] Skysurfer@slrpnk.net 15 points 3 weeks ago

Millions of times more processing power than that code needs to run, at that.

[-] Noodle07@lemmy.world 10 points 3 weeks ago

Your phone charger can run that

[-] piccolo@sh.itjust.works 5 points 3 weeks ago

Home computers from the mid 70's like the Apple II could run it. Computer hardware evolved rapidly.

[-] Liz@midwest.social 8 points 3 weeks ago

It's my understanding that that is the the debug output from the program, is it not?

[-] chonglibloodsport@lemmy.world 1 points 3 weeks ago

Yeah there’s no way the primitive computer from they had on the Saturn V’s LEM could even store that amount of code! This was before hard drives!

[-] Zink@programming.dev 7 points 3 weeks ago

That is such an adorable and proud smile. I love it. She looks exactly like one of my nieces too. Excuse me while I have my old man moment.

[-] DancingBear@midwest.social 4 points 3 weeks ago

The coat rack behind her mimics her stance

[-] DupaCycki@lemmy.world 1 points 3 weeks ago

Pretty sure I wrote more code. Can also confirm some of it works.

[+] Shameless@lemmy.world -10 points 3 weeks ago

And yet haven't they lost the technology to get to the moon? Or is that just a conspiracy?

[-] PugJesus@piefed.social 41 points 3 weeks ago

Just conspiracy. We can get to the moon, the issue is that there's no real reason to now. During the Space Race, it was a combination of "We need to test rockets in case the Cold War goes hot" and "WE HAVE TO SHOW THE COMMIES WE'RE THE SUPERIOR ENGINEERS"

Once we actually got up there and did some basic tests, it was very much "Yep, this is what every scientist predicted it would be: a barren rock that costs a horrific amount to get to and back from." It's still of some scientific interest, but not "Pour billions of dollars to push a few guys there and back" level interest. The ISS in low-earth orbit is cheaper to get to, more scientifically useful, and has its costs split between several countries instead of one country trying to fund a dick-waving contest.

India and China have both done unmanned moon landings in the past few years for the prestige, because unmanned is much cheaper.

[-] BeardedGingerWonder@feddit.uk 7 points 3 weeks ago

They literally pushed the rocket for a crewed loop round the moon to the launch pad today in fact. Hopefully Artemis III goes ahead next year.

[-] wonderingwanderer@sopuli.xyz 5 points 3 weeks ago

But when will we install a borosilicate dome on the dark side of the moon and fill it with an artificial atmosphere to preserve biodiversity in case of an apocalypse on earth?

[-] zqps@sh.itjust.works 4 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

Sci-fi plans to "save humanity" from catastrophic climate change usually remain in the planning / CGI stage. That's much cheaper, and it is all you need to placate people who might otherwise make demands about our economy and ecology here on earth.

[-] wonderingwanderer@sopuli.xyz 1 points 3 weeks ago

We just need a little more compute, and then all our plans will be in reach. Please pledge $100 billion today. We can only guarantee a 5000% ROI in ten years. And you'll even get this cool mug. See, it says "Space Wiz." Wouldn't it look great on your desk?

[-] Treczoks@lemmy.world 14 points 3 weeks ago

They can't replicate many things straight from the blueprints because nobody produces those parts anymore. But take the AGC (Apollo Guidiance Computer) and the earthly counterparts: they can be replaced by modern technology. Like some guys recently did, they were working with a telemetry module that sent data from the rocket back to the earth. They did not have the earthly counterpart of it anymore, a wall of cabinets with electronics to receive and decode the data. They just replaced that wall of cabinets with a script running on a Raspberry Pi.

[-] peoplebeproblems@midwest.social 4 points 3 weeks ago

Oh that would be a really fun experience. If the code is available anywhere I'd love to turn it into Rust.

[-] Tar_alcaran@sh.itjust.works 7 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

It is!

https://github.com/chrislgarry/Apollo-11

Note that it wasn't saved digitally, so this is reconstructed from paper and might have transcription errors

[-] peoplebeproblems@midwest.social 5 points 3 weeks ago

Well

There goes my Saturday

[-] Treczoks@lemmy.world 2 points 3 weeks ago

There are teams out there doing reconstruction of the AGCs. I mean, they have real ones there and try to figure them out. The most sophisticated "computer chips" on that thing are basic logic chips: 10 pins, two for power and ground (12V, IIRC), and 2x4 pins for three-input NOR gates. They used them for everything: building flip-flops for registers, adders, and other stuff to for a kind-of 16-bit computer.

There is loads of documentation out there on the net.

[-] gmtom@lemmy.world 5 points 3 weeks ago

Weve already sent Artemis 1 to the moon and Artemis 2 which is due to be a crewed launch to Luna orbit is currently being rolled out to the launch pad and will likely launch next month. Then Artemis 3 which will actually land on the moon will launch next year (hopefully if SpaceX can actually pull through)

this post was submitted on 17 Jan 2026

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