forty years ago today, the apollo 11 launched, carrying the first people who would ever look back towards earth from the surface of the moon.
researching relative computer power for a work project today, i came across these astonishing facts:
- the computers that guided man across space and landed them safely on the moon were less powerful than a pocket calculator.
- the apollo guidance computer was "more basic than the electronics in modern toasters that have computer controlled stop/start/defrost buttons".
- the codefor the AGC program can be downloaded as a PDF file.
this explanation of how difficult it is to navigate back to earth, by astronaut david scott, really blew me away:
"If you have a basket ball and a baseball 14 feet apart, where the baseball represents the moon and the basketball represents the Earth, and you take a piece of paper sideways, the thinness of the paper would be the corridor you have to hit when you come back."
it's easy to forget how incredible a feat this was. i'm going to celebrate the landing itself by watching this and bowing towards that great bright orb:
ps: james may has the best job in the world. ever.
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