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What language is Boeing's MCAS written in?

Thanks

Cloud
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    The answer to this question may help: https://aviation.stackexchange.com/questions/3608/what-programming-languages-are-used-for-equipment-onboard-aircraft I'm guessing Ada in a safety critical subsystem like that. – John K Sep 09 '20 at 12:54
  • As long as it is not assembler, I doubt the language itself was the main reason of the failure. I would even doubt be it assembler, if done properly, with full test coverage and code reviews. – h22 Sep 11 '20 at 07:56
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    Why has this question been downvoted? - I'd vote to reopen but have insufficient rep. This is not only a reasonable question, but an interesting and important one. – stevec Dec 06 '20 at 22:28
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    @stevec There are a few "troll" users on here, who down-vote every question I ask without discrimination. I have stopped using the site mostly for that reason – Cloud Dec 07 '20 at 12:20
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    @Cloud don't stop, your question is a very good one. Funnily, I found my way back to it when researching the 737 max a second time. Thank you for your question, even if others don't appreciate it – stevec Mar 18 '21 at 13:01
  • I don't think I down-voted this question, but I can understand why some might have done so. You don't tell us why you want to know, or in fact, give us any more information other than simply restating the exact wording from the title to the body. You don't give any information about prior research you have done, which means, any potential answerer may re-do work you already did. So, let's look at the hover-text from the down-vote button: This question does not show any research effort. True. It is unclear False or not useful Partially true. Why do we care what language? – CGCampbell Mar 19 '21 at 15:02
  • You want us to research your answer for you, yet you have not taken time to tell us why, or shown us that you have done even a minimal amount of research before hand. This does not explain why it was closed, but does explain why it has so many down-votes. – CGCampbell Mar 19 '21 at 15:04
  • Fair enough @CGCampbell thanks for the feedback! – Cloud Mar 21 '21 at 09:26

1 Answers1

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What language is Boeing's MCAS written in?

I believe the Flight Control Computer is a Collins Aerospace FCC-730 with two 16-bit processors.

Collins are known to use Ada for at least some of their products.

A job advert for Collins stated:

Job description: Sr Software Engineer - Flight Controls ...
Required Qualifications: ... Experience with C/C++ ...
Preferred Qualifications: Experience using Ada. ...

Ada is widely used in the aviation industry for flight-critical applications.

Other Boeing aircraft make extensive use of Ada:

in the 777 program it was a goal to use Ada as a standard language, and it represented nearly 70% of the source line of code developed for the 777.

So it is very likely that they used Ada for the code running in the FCC-730 on the 737 Max.

RedGrittyBrick
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