Software enjoys a strange reputation in the space industry. On one hand —let’s call it the hero side— software tends to be the lifeline sought after when it comes to solving problems on a troubled flying satellite, given that there is basically nothing else you can do after launch other than trying to fiddle with the on-board software and see if you can bring things back to normal. On the other hand—the villain side— software is considered the evil of all evils by outsiders. In any troubled space mission, the fingers naturally tend to point to software as the probable (usually without tangible evidence) cause of failure—any conversation next to a coffee machine between two non-software engineers (say, a mechanical and a thermal engineer) would either blame software, or radiation.