thoughts for the winter

[wallwalker]

I'm probably going to start posting nerdy commentary about programming and similar things here, just to try to make sure I'm spending a bit more brainpower on it.

I had a large post started about one of the cautionary tales about sloppy programming that I studied this past year, the Therac-25. (It's a medical device, a linear accelerator, and the errors in programming resulted in some pretty terrifying things. I'd post it under a cut, because it's really hard to read if you're squeamish about medical mistakes.) It wasn't very technical, and I lost it because I didn't save it to a file. Might rewrite it later, since it's a good reminder not to be sloppy with important code.

Sometimes I don't think I can be technical about these things anymore. I know that it'll help when I'm not so tired from lack of caffeine. Just have to keep at recovering.

Comments

[pegasuswrites]

It's a medical device, a linear accelerator, and the errors in programming resulted in some pretty terrifying things. That sounds horrifying, and yet I'm desperate to hear more...?

[wallwalker]

I'll work on rewriting that post. Just need to find the sources I was using.

[pegasuswrites]

It feels ghoulish to say that I'm excited? Intrigued is probably a better word. Yes, let's go with intrigued....

[wallwalker]

If I can ever get started without this headache. ^^;

[samuraiter]

The idea of spaghetti code in the equipment that is supposed to prolong my life is a little unsettling, I agree.