After a few delays, the inaugural mission of the Orbital Sciences Antares mission successfully made it into orbit on April 21st. While the mission didn’t carry the actual spacecraft Antares is designed to lift (that’s currently slated for June), it didn’t go up there empty handed. The Antares rocket safely delivered all three of NASA’s PhoneSats into their intended orbit, and [...]
Antares Rocket Launch Scrubbed at T-12 Minutes
This evening’s planned launch of the Orbital Sciences Antares rocket had to be canceled just 12 minutes before liftoff, due to the unexpected separation of the booster’s umbilical cable while the vehicle was on the launch pad. This is the first attempt to fly the Antares rocket, which is a commercial craft and direct competitor to the [...]
STRaND-1 Satellite Preparing to Activate Onboard Nexus One
We’ve previously reported on the NASA project to base a new generation of small, cheap, spacecraft around Android phones, dubbed PhoneSat. While PhoneSat is still on track to launch in April, the British have beaten their American counterparts to the punch with the Surrey Training, Research, and Nanosatellite Demonstrator (STRaND-1) satellite, currently orbiting the Earth. [...]
SpaceX Software Engineers to Answer Questions on Reddit
Software engineers from commercial space pioneer SpaceX will be hosting a Reddit AMA (Ask Me Anything) tomorrow at 1:00 PM Eastern (10:00 AM Pacific), offering a rare glimpse into the inter-workings of this extremely successful company. Based on comments from SpaceX founder Elon Musk and SpaceX job listings, it’s known that their spacecraft’s avionics are written in C++ and run [...]
New GUI for IRAF, MYRaf, Releasing Next Week
While GNU/Linux might struggle with the simple things like getting more game developers on board, there is one area where this open source operating system has never had trouble: high performance scientific software. It’s no wonder, as Linux runs on most of the worlds most powerful supercomputers. If you’re a scientist looking to get a [...]
Hackers In Space
Foreword If you’ve been following my articles here on “The Powerbase”, you’ve probably come to the realization that I’m really into space. The idea of hackers and makers being able to communicate with, or ideally even control, an orbiting satellite is simply incredible to me. Just a few years ago, setting up an amateur network of communications [...]
Mars Mapped With Open Source Tools From MapBox
With the recent successful landing of the Curiosity rover on the Martian surface, it seems NASA has managed to once again inspire the masses about the possibilities of space flight and exploration of other world in our solar system. But even for the most ardent of space buffs, it can be hard to truly grasp the scale and features [...]
FUNcube Dongle Pro+: When RTL-SDR Isn’t Enough
Awhile back we published a guide for getting started with software defined radio (SDR) using the RTL-SDR project, which has turned out to be one of the most popular pieces we’ve ever run. It’s pretty clear that the open source community is into the idea of SDR and all of its applications. But the hardware [...]
Copenhagen Suborbitals Release Snowmix, an Open Source Video Mixer
The Copenhagen Suborbitals, if you weren’t aware, have a pretty simple goal: to launch a human being into space. As you might expect, this takes a bit of work to accomplish; and along the way they will be creating and researching many ideas and technologies that otherwise would be limited to global superpowers and corporate [...]
FTL Debuts on Linux, Joins Diaspora In Top-Tier Space Sims
We do a lot of reporting at The Powerbase on notable Kickstarter projects. It is always gratifying for us to help spread the word when something great is brewing. Whether or not we help it ferment is debatable, but when a Kickstarter project delivers on its promise, it is doubly gratifying to share with you. FTL (Faster [...]