winscape 2262
On Thu, 13 Oct 2005 00:01:35 GMT, Morten Reistad
snip Sure it is -- in a few places, anyway. It's taught mostly in theory clbuttes (*), at a few schools, and in general it's not well regarded by either the students...
Marconi UK : we have stopped making SW transmitters and antennas, our reason for being now ... shoddy naval software.
Source: Article by Neil Mackay, Investigations Editor, *Sunday Herald* (Scotland), 10 Oct 2004
The Royal Navy's new, state-of-the-art destroyer has been fitted with combat management software that can be hacked into, crashes easily and is vulnerable to viruses, according to one of the system's designers who was fired after raising his concerns.
Gerald Wilson, who has 25 years' experience designing naval software, worked for Alenia Marconi Systems (AMS) in a joint venture with Bae Systems and the Italian company Finmeccanica on the combat system for the Type 45 destroyer, which will rely on Microsoft Windows 2000. System failure in action, he says, would leave the ship blind, defenceless, and as good as sunk.
Dismissed after voicing his fears to the Ministry of Defence and the Defence Procurement Agency (DPA), Wilson wants to give evidence to the parliamentary defence select committee about the software.
Versions of DEC BASIC that I've seen (BASIC 11, Vax BASIC, et al) had a different underlying philosophy...
Last night he told Channel 4 news that "the use of Windows For Warships puts the ship and her crew at risk, and the defence of the realm".
There are also plans to install a similar Microsoft Windows-based computerised command system on Britain's nuclear submarines.
Snipped a lot more in the same vein...
The thought of Windows and nuclear subs worries me a bit... :-) -- Cheers, Stan Barr stanb .at. dial .dot. pipex .dot. com (Remove any digits from the addresses when mailing me.)
The future was never like this!
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