
A moonlit tribute to a moon landing icon - ChrisArchitect
https://blog.google/products/maps/margaret-hamilton-apollo-11-tribute/
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pronoiac
I'd read about her daughter's fault-finding skills before, and the same bug
_was_ triggered by astronauts, on "the very next flight, Apollo 8..." And
_then_ the safeguard got added before Apollo 11.

* [https://wehackthemoon.com/people/margaret-hamilton-her-daugh...](https://wehackthemoon.com/people/margaret-hamilton-her-daughters-simulation)

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slg
It turns out that children are inherently well qualified for the job of chaos
monkeys.

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Animats
No mention of Saydean Zeldin, her partner in the Apollo effort and Higher
Order Systems?

(I met both of them a long time ago, in my proof of correctness days.)

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danso
It's an article focused on Hamilton; seems to be part of a series of articles
for an Apollo 11 anniversary feature:
[https://artsandculture.google.com/project/moon-
landing](https://artsandculture.google.com/project/moon-landing)

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degenerate
For those of you only interested in what 107K mirrors are doing in the desert,
it's the Ivanpah Solar Facility. The mirrors bounce sunlight onto solar
receivers in the towers. [http://www.brightsourceenergy.com/ivanpah-solar-
project](http://www.brightsourceenergy.com/ivanpah-solar-project)

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tajstar
Thank you I was wondering if they would set all of these mirrors up just for
this event.

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gundmc
I used to drive past this facility often. The towers are shockingly bright
from the highway. Never thought about using the mirrors for an art
installation, really cool idea!

I wonder how Google convinced Tonopah to be onboard.

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reaperducer
That's the Ivanpah facility south of Las Vegas, not the ones in Tonapah.

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gundmc
Oops, you're right! That's the one I was thinking of, just got the names
reversed.

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ketzo
Dang, I was hoping the blog would go into a little bit about how they
accomplished this! Either way though, insanely cool tribute.

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prashnts
Agree! It looks great — I assume they did it pretty much how DMD (Digital
Mirror Device) chips in DLP projectors work. The mirrors already have a
mechanism to track sun (mentioned in the article), and adjust the direction
its reflection should point. they could activate tracking partially to create
the image.

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snthd
A recent interview:
[https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/jul/13/margaret-...](https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/jul/13/margaret-
hamilton-computer-scientist-interview-software-apollo-missions-1969-moon-
landing-nasa-women)

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daveslash
Not related to the Article really, but in those photos there seem to be fires
at the base of the Ivanpah solar collector towers... what's going on there?

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learnfromstory
Just looks like high pressure sodium lights to me.

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daveslash
Thank you. That makes sense. I appreciate the answer. I camp outside that area
sometime -- I'll try to get a good look with my binoculars the next time I'm
there.

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learnfromstory
Note that they _do_ heat the plant with natural gas overnight, so there is a
huge fire in there somewhere.

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daveslash
Oh really? Why? Is it to keep things at a nominal operating temperature in
prep for the next day, or is it to continue generating electricity once the
sun has gone down (or other reason)?

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24gttghh
>Gas is burned at night to keep the system primed and to heat water used in
the tower boilers. This allows electricity production to start up more quickly
when the sun comes up each morning, plant operators said. Gas also is burned
during periods of intermittent cloud cover.

[https://www.pe.com/2017/01/23/ivanpah-solar-plant-built-
to-l...](https://www.pe.com/2017/01/23/ivanpah-solar-plant-built-to-limit-
greenhouse-gases-is-burning-more-natural-gas/)

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hi41
I noticed that the stack of folders almost exactly matches her height! Amazing
work!

