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RE: RE: starship-design: unmanned missions



Paul Anderson writes:
 > On Thu, 12 Feb 1998, L. Parker wrote:
 > 
 > > Kelly,
 > > 
 > > My understanding was that the original shuttle computers were running some
 > > sort of version of DOS on 8086s. Is this true?
 > > 
 > Depends on what you mean by 'original'.  AFAIK, the apollo missions had an
 > on-board computer, I beleive it was analog.  TTYL!

It was definitely digital.  Analog computers have too many moving
parts and aren't going to work well during launch or landing
operations.

I inititally tried searching the Apollo Lunar Surface Journal
site at http://venus.hq.nasa.gov/office/pao/History/alsj/ for an
account I remember reading about the Apollo LEM computer, which
as I recall was operated using what were practically subroutine
addresses or the like.  However, the search turned up an even
more interesting document that I haven't had a chance to read
yet, but which probably addresses many of the questions about
computer control of spacecraft:

Computers in Spaceflight: The NASA Experience
http://www.hq.nasa.gov/office/pao/History/computers/Compspace.html