Ken,
That is super cool. As you are aware, getting parts "space qualified" will
have its own unique set of challenges.
Honeywell supplied most of the computers that run the ISS. They called them
MDMs (for Multiplexer/DeMultiplexer). They all started out as 386 computers
although some of them have been updated to a Pentium of sorts. Initially a
few of them had disk drives but during assembly flight 6A (when the Canadian
robotic arm was delivered), all 3 C&C (Command & Control) computers crashed
resulting in an automatic recovery action referred to as Mighty Mouse ("Here I
am to save the day"). The Mighty Mouse recovery consisted of the node
computers automatically issuing commands to the INT computers to recycle power
on the C&Cs until one of them woke up. I was in Toronto doing flight
following when that occurred because the Canadians developed the space station
robotic arm and I had been involved in a lot of software interface tests with
the Canadians for that system.
The disk drive (we called an MSD - for Mass Storage Device) has since been
replaced with a solid state memory unit (SSMU There never has been a
reoccurrence of that nature of catastrophic failure, but there were a few times
where we came close. However for every major release of software, I would
still perform Mighty Mouse tests in our lab - usually with the Russians. I
ran this test at least once a year for over 20 years.
The MDMs had no display or keyboard but would talk to a COTS laptop over a
Mil-Std-1553 interface. The laptops (we called PCS) provided a GUI to see
status and send commands. However, since the on-board crew were usually busy
doing their crew things, most of the commands were sent from the ground (MCC).
Since our lab did not have all the displays that MCC had, we would use the
PCS for commands and status for most of our software tests.
Lloyd
-----Original Message-----
From: M100 <m100-boun...@lists.bitchin100.com> On Behalf Of Ken Pettit
Sent: Saturday, August 28, 2021 8:32 AM
To: m...@bitchin100.com
Subject: Re: [M100] OT: Yet Another Calendar Program ... thanks
On 8/27/21 3:48 PM, Lloyd Johnson wrote:
> It sounds like you had/have a very interesting job. Signal processing was
> an area that I had an interest in when pursuing my masters (which I did not
> receive until 1995 - 20 years after my bachelors). Shortly after getting my
> MSEE, I transferred from Seattle to Houston to work on a NASA contract as a
> software test engineer for the International Space Station. I didn't really
> use my electronics background too much at work after that. This was okay
> since I really loved working with NASA on the space station.
We just recently became a sub to a company that won a their 2nd phase contract
(prototype) with NASA for a communication system on NASA's Moon base project.
Their plan is to use our 64GS/s converters, meaning if they were to win the
final phase contract in late 2023 time-frame, our chips could one day end up on
far side of the Moon!
Maybe in my production version of that chip I should embed a complete Model 100
system to control the frequency hopping or something :)
> The work you do for the Model 100 Users Group is greatly appreciated. I have
> found the information at www.club100.org to be extremely helpful.
Thanks, though the past couple of years I haven't really had time to do all
that much except keep the "lights on and sweep the floors" as Rick Hanson would
have put it.
Ken
