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mrarjen | 6 years ago

Likely in some way also to do with the amount of moving parts and it's complexity, not saying the dry dock is simple, but compared to many "invisible" and prone to break parts due to dependence on one another, code can be quite harsh.

When one section of the dock doesn't work it won't suddenly flip upside down as could be the case for code.

discuss

order

pjc50|6 years ago

> suddenly flip upside down

https://catless.ncl.ac.uk/Risks/3.44.html (1986): early F-16 software would flip the plane upside down on crossing the equator :)

exikyut|6 years ago

Wh..oa.

From the above page:

> From Dagens Nyheter [Stockholm], Aug. 22, 1986. My translation, abridged.

> The chairman of the governmental data- and public-access committee [offentlighetskommitt'en], Carl Axel Petri, rejects the criticisms which have recently been brought by the moderate party [conservative] and folk-party [liberal conservative] concerning sales of personal information from computer data banks.

> "It is important to quickly get a law that stops general sales. We have allowed some exceptions, nine specified computer companies, but even their sales shall, in the future, be controlled by parliament. Nobody should be allowed to earn money by [selling] personal information. Sales should have a public interest, in principle, the new law will forbid sales" said Petri. ...

I'm removing a bit of context from the above, but it's nice/interesting that this was being discussed in this way back then. Ha.

mrarjen|6 years ago

Thanks for that! Now I'll have sweaty palms going past the equator in airplanes.

Neil44|6 years ago

I found your choice of words quite amusing because the dock really could simply flip upside down!

mrarjen|6 years ago

Would be fun to calculate what is required for the dock to actually flip, the scale of it is huge, so you would see it coming a mile away no?