Hacker Remix

Carnarvon's NASA satellite dish receives first signal in almost 40 years

128 points by zdw 5 days ago | 25 comments

emmelaich 4 days ago

OTC is such a nostalgia name for many in Aus. The dish is here if you want a look: https://www.google.com/maps/place/OTC+Tracking+Station/@-24....

It also reminded me that they released one of the first comprehensive open source C++ libraries way back It originally predated templates and Boost so I'd be very surprised if anyone uses it anymore.

https://sourceforge.net/projects/ose/

http://www.pennelynn.com/Documents/CUJ/HTML/14.04/PATAPIS/PA...

femto 3 days ago

The google maps link in turn leads to a walk through the "Carnarvon Space and Technology Museum" in the buildings next to the Carnarvon dish.

https://www.google.com/maps/@-24.8687566,113.7039752,3a,75y,...

Bearstrike 3 days ago

> "...I'd be very surprised if anyone uses it anymore."

We actually still use OSE on my team believe it or not. The project started in 1997, so OSE was a great choice for container structures / string handling / etc.

We are re-factoring OSE usages to use standard library features as we go along. But the project is huge with a very small team; hence why we still use it.

gradschool 4 days ago

See [1] for a funny nostalgic Australian movie about it titled "The Dish".

[1] https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0205873/

teractiveodular 4 days ago

Fun fact: there was a cafe at the Parkes visitor centre, inevitably called "The Dish".

https://maps.app.goo.gl/xe5Udu4HPkrt7hqL6

wduquette 4 days ago

Different antenna, though from the same era.

dcminter 4 days ago

Indeed, "The Dish" is about the Parkes⁰ radio telescope. Very fictional though :)

Tom Scott did a nice video¹ visiting it a little while back - as a vintage computing enthusiast I was rather pleased to see a PDP-11 in their equipment racks!

⁰ https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parkes_Observatory

¹ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6o38C-ultvw

erex78 4 days ago

Because they refurbished it and it’s back up after 40 years (we didn’t just suddenly communicate with extra terrestrials).

jagged-chisel 4 days ago

I think the title would be more accurate to say “processed first signal in almost 40 years.” I was wondering what this thing was listening to that hadn’t transmitted in almost 40 years.