In the book it was meant for an alternative means of communication. Sojourner has six wheels that turn independently. The thought had been to write the alphabet on the wheels, and NASA can then spell out messages. However, Mark was never able to get Sojourner to work in the book. In the end he had to use ASCII to get messages and get the rover hack.

the basic idea was that he probably thought the rover had parts he could use so might as well taking it back to base.

@@santoshchouhan2822 Where'd that come from? Sojurner's top speed was tens of meters per hour and last we heard from it, it was still close to Pathfinder. They lasted longer than designed, yeah, but they were a very weak pair.

@@nevadaxelizabeth In that kind of scenario, there's no such thing as too much equipment.

@@santoshchouhan2822 Where in the hell are you getting 6 kilometers from? Sojourner drove a *grand total* of 100 meters, or about 300 feet, during the 80 some-odd days it was active. The last command Sojourner was given was to stay still for some set amount of time and to then drive around Pathfinder. So uh, where'd the other 5.9 kilometers come from?

he looks up in the sky to earth

introverts' heaven!

Its only 138.69 million mi, so you are off by 70 million miles.

50 million not 200 million

You're all wrong... and you're all right as well. The AVERAGE distance between Earth and Mars is 140 million miles (225 million km)... BUT depending on where Earth and Mars are in their orbits relative to each other, they can be anywhere from 34 million miles (55 million km) to 250 million miles (401 million km) apart. This vast difference is one of the reasons why there launch windows to give workable travel times for the minimum fuel usage are limited. There is only one launch window every 26 months.

One of those things, that someday the real Martian mission planners will consider. 'Why don't we bring a crane?' And 'What is wrong with disco in the music library?' Cue "The Hustle (1975)" by Van McCoy ...

Honestly I thought that was a great addition. The Book has "room" for all the little challenges he faces, but in a movie, less can be more. Though I did kind of wish they had included the dust storm plot.

@@SmallLab129 The martian would make such a great 10 or 12 episode series. Put everything in it.

And it makes sense. Why _wouldn't_ it have a crane if it's supposed to assist in a long-term mission where they need to construct a base?

@@NurmYokai Don't forget the "emergency potato"

😅

But he knew that any future Q&A (provided he got the initial "yes" would require the Earth crew to have a "no" option, so he put it in there from the start.

@@bobmclennan1727 Don't spoil our fun with the facts 😁

I keep having to remind myself how big the rovers actually are.

True, maybe next time we'll have a rover in a helicopter in a rover.

What’s ingenuity? Can you elaborate for me please?

@@GetERekted ingenuity is a small aerial drone that the latest mars rover brought with it

hopeless science fiction also tells us we have to be wary of creating rampant AI that wants to kill us.

what does more harm than good is our death-drive capitalist system. art is going to reflect peoples feelings so, get ready for even MORE dystopian, sci fi.

it probably helps that the book was written by a NASA engineer

Robert Sawyer writes about positive futures

you must be easily entertained

The movie did a great job of condensing the story to fit the time constraints

Not to mention, it kept the movie’s storyline from becoming too technical. I’m still a little in the dark about hexadecimals. But I’m old enough to remember a time where computers were the stuff of science fiction and Star Trek. I never dreamed as a kid that I would have a desktop, let alone a phone/tablet connected something called the internet which put, at my fingertips, the sum of human knowledge. I’m still waiting on my flying car, jet pack, space stations the size of cities and bases on the moon and Mars, though. I’m fifty nine as of this writing. Get your asses moving, kids. You can thank me later

@@airdriver hey I watched the jetsons, I was expecting my flying car that folds into a suitcase by now. Hex is just base 16 numbers.

@@airdriver Yessir! You might be interested to know that NASA is currently flying missions to make a permanent moon base! It's called the Artemis Program, and their second mission is set to launch next year. As for hexadeximals (hex), they're a system of numbers that repeat every 16 characters, unlike our usual method of counting (which is called decimal, or denary!), that does so every 10. We call this "base-16" (our own numbers are "base-10") Decimal, What you'd be used to, goes: 0, 1, 2, 3, 4 ,5 ,6, 7, 8, 9. Then the pattern repeats (10, 11, 12, 13, etc.) Every time the pattern gets "full", we add a new column (think of this as going from 9 -> 10 or 99 -> 100) Each new column, represents a power of 10 (1, 10, 100, 1000). So, in decimal, 345 is shown as: (100 times 3) + (10 times 4) + (1 times 5), Which is equal to the number 345 (no surprises here) (I apologise if this may seem like I'm being a bit patronising, but this should hopefully let you compare decimal to hex easier) Hex uses: 0, 1, 2, 3, 4 ,5 ,6, 7, 8, 9, *but also*: A, B, C, D, E, F. These are in place of 10, 11, 12, 13, 14 and 15 respectively (A = 10, F = 15) This is often the part that people find confusing: Like decimal, the pattern then repeats, with 10, 11, 12, etc. However, unlike each new column representing a power of 10, this time it becomes a power of 15! (1, 15, 225, 3375, etc.) Which means "10" in hex is actually equal to the number 16, with "1F" being equal to 31! So, in hex, "345" is shown as: (225 times 3) + (15 times 4) + (1 times 5), which is equal to the number 837! This seems very complicated for us (and it is!), but computers are good at this sort of math, and it lets them express any number from 0 to 15 with only 1 character, which saves a lot of space in the long run. Computers are limited by the length of characters they can put together at a time. (I'm sure you've heard the phrase "8-bit" or "16-bit" or some variation). With systems like Hexadecimal, you can store much bigger numbers in the same amount of physical space! (9999 in decimal is a *lot* smaller than FFFF in hex) Sorry if this is too long-winded! Hope this helps you with Hexadecimals :D

I mean, A flatbed rover with a crane is better than the big round moon rovers.

On some (many, ??) it's visual diagnostics for ground/Earth testing; seen one and they had money to burn... BUT having wrote that, permanent spacecraft RGB (UGH) would take up precious weight and space and power. And yes that seems rather unnecessary for something that won't ever be seen again by human handlers. Wonder if NASA or JPL ever commented on that?

@@NurmYokai Remember back in the day video game had cheat codes? Cheat codes were often added to make development easier, just like built-in hardware test functions. It is simply safer to not remove them when everything is working, removing development features has risk of breaking things. But today we have all these fancy simulation software for testing and debugging, plus it is a lot cheaper to manufacture most hardware now, so these quirks are mostly history now, mostly just old IT person may remember them; just like Bedlam DL3 (but this one is bit more famous).

exactly what i was thinking 😂

@@8749236 JTAG points on the PCB weigh a lot less (actually, they take away milligrams of solder mask and copper for trace spacing) and have no additional active parts over the existing processor. Then you can plug your test equipment straight onto them on earth.

A lot of the machinery just makes sounds. As an example, the NASA crew operating... Opportunity, I think, made it play itself "Happy Birthday" using its testing equipment since it hums at a consistent tune.

Every once in awhile, it's worth getting the extended cut version of a movie.

@@NurmYokai I got the Extended Version of The Martian. Well worth it.

@@_R-R i think you mean the EE! ;)

He was unneccessarily snarky in that moment.

Unrealistic character, noone and I mean noone is going to be making snarky comments considering the scope of what they are doing and the hurdles they are overcoming. If he's smart enough to be in that room he's smart enough to understand how absurd he's being

@@hansolo631 Seriously. I don't care if he's the best technician in the world, after his second bit he'd be replaced.

what's algonquin?

It'd be funny if he kept going to see how far he could push his wit... (whirrrr) "No? You pointed the camera at no?" "Well he's been alone for a while, I thought he'd appreciate a joke." Then when he gets the hex panels up he sends: 4E 65 77 20 70 68 6F 6E 65 2C 20 77 68 6F 20 64 69 73 3F

He's a typical Indian that always want to get his last words in or thinks he's entitled to something 24/7. (And yes, I'm Indian so I know LOL)

You're not that guy pal, you're not that guy.

Humanity is almost at the point where NASA 'relics' could be salvaged. Like salvaging relics from the Titanic. We hope these space milestones are left alone. Excluding retrieval of parts from orbit: The first (sanctioned) salvaging operation took place on the Moon. Apollo 12 (November 1969) astronauts Pete Conrad and Alan Bean retrieved parts from the Surveyor 3. See also the (science fiction) movie "Salvage" (1979).

@@NurmYokai But why? They're monuments to human progress.

@@anzaca1 also they problably want the first person to survive in Mars for that long to be alive

@@anzaca1 what about keeping the person alive who planted potatoes on mars

Well then, it’s a good thing this movie is fiction

You must be Singaporean.

Wait what? Even his real name is Wong? Tf

Watch the "extended cut" version. It will be worth the time.

@@NurmYokai ill check it out! thanks!

Watch the movie and read the book. If nothing else it’s just a simple story of survival and perseverance. Both the author and producer played funny with the science but it was a good story. Best science fiction I’ve read in almost 25 years.

You're a space nerd yet you've never watched The Martian? For the love of Elon, Yoyleb17, go watch The Martian.

The infamous 'KZfaq Algorithm' strikes again. Hope you enjoyed the video.

My thought exactly. The no plate was kind of useless

@@ulicqueldromal Mark: "Do you currently have a plan to rescue me?" NASA: "No."

If you’re referring to the dust storms you couldn’t be more wrong. Mars is well known for it’s essentially planet wide dust storms on occasion, and they’ve spelled doom for many rovers. If one of those things hits a human settlement, you better hope you’re inside.

@@RAdaltonracer So how many rovers were doomed by storms on Mars? You should better study physics.

What? Mars is super infamous for massive storms that are continental size. In fact a storm is what killed the Opportunity rover and many others before it.

@@ditto9300 The size of storms does not matter. The density of the atmosphere is too low.

@NurBull It really depends. Most storms are not very dangerous, some of the most powerful storms on Mars would only be half as strong as some of the most powerful storms here on Earth. But also consider you are on Mars, and everything is dangerous including 30mph storms.

No so that further questions can be asked. He set it up for future questions. And also, they could answer no if the image quality was terrible or required improvement.

In the novel, there was no "No" option. It was just "Yes" and "keep the camera pointed here if you can't read me" - or something along those lines.

@@duze5822 makes more sense than in the film!

People do dopey stuff all the time like this. Even highly trained astronaut/botanists stuck on Mars.

@@duze5822 Commenting since I just looked it up. The two signs were "Are you receiving?" and "Point here for yes." But you are absolutely correct; there was no 'No'.

Yep...that was my first thought too.

because adding another half hour to the movie as he tries to integrate different systems with each other doesn't add anything to the story. A movie has to deal with a limited length, you have to focus on what is important to tell the story and move the plot forward.

There is an explanation in the book where he talks about how NASA stated to meticulously make all connections comptable BECAUSE of the Apollo mission. If it hadn't happened, you would be right.

@@bibliophilelady6106 sojourner would not fall under that, unmanned and no reclamation. No need to externally power it or connect to download.

@@bibliophilelady6106 maybe within a mission, but to suggest connections from late Apollo working on the Shuttle serves no purpose. Also, Sojourner was unmanned and non returning, being compatible with tech 50 years later….

Ive always found it funny that he included a NO option as well lol

Thats a common joke in my family about this scene. What would he have done if the camera had pointed to "No". Probably laughed, because in a way, both answers are "yes"

There was no „No“ sign in the book. Mark thought about the same thing and trolled NASA.

This wasn't a logistics issue

... that time in the conversation when everyone's 'favorite technician' decides to take a break ...

He would be died.

Those landers would be probably in a very bad shape by that point, Keep in mind they are in 427°C for more than 30 years

If humans went to Venus, we’d die in under half an hour. Unless we developed some kind of heat resistant suit

I cant because everything will have been melted including the main character lol

Theybgot practically incinerated

The Martian atmosphere is thin, but you can hear sound. But if you're human, don't do it outside without a SUIT. You'll enjoy sounds longer. Check out "NASA's Perseverance Rover Hears Ingenuity Mars Helicopter in Flight." "On April 30, 2021, NASA's Perseverance rover made history as the first spacecraft to record sounds from another spacecraft on another planet."

@@NurmYokai He's also sitting right next to it, maybe on one of the solar panels itself, so a reason for him knowing about the camera activating is he could have felt the vibrations of the camera starting to move.

@balls up ok first of all, he has a helmet on, which means if not it being completely muffled, it's at least quieter, but even than the camera wouldn't be that loud. Connected to the fact that the helmet seems to probably be pretty thick, and looks to have foam in it, which muffles sound more. So pretty much everything points to the fact that he wouldn't be able to hear it. I know I just said a whole paragraph to prove a point but really I don't care about it I just wanted to say it

@@lc8339 he probably has a micro that transmits ambient sound to him

It would be a very George Lucas moment, if Ingenuity were the nearest available 'rover.' 'Beep whir boop whir chirp chirp Whir chirp Whirr blip WHIRRRRRRR.' As actuators and rotors power up, Watney views Phobos and the Sun. And sighs. 'Let's get you closer to C3PO.'

The hard part would be getting to Percy. Though it’d be kinda hilarious to approach that rover all “Yo Percy, I’m stranded. Mind sending NASA a video to tell em I’m with ya?” Lol

@@FinkipGirl any idea the distance between where Mark is and the rover is currently? I can't find it lol

Yes. It's little right from middle

I'm fairly certain that's meant to be earth. It would be borderline impossible for him to align that with a satellite let alone for him to know where the satellite is.

@@will2brown50 that's not what he meant. He didn't align it. The comment is pointing out that that thing is satellite

Natural satellite ?

That's the Earth...

You should read the book. It explains how most of the equipment was sent in several supply missions and they built the HAB their first day. The material the hab itself is made of is a canvas that was folded up. They had to unfold and pitch the structure like a tent.

Tubes, you'd need a lot of storage for these missions. Space for gym and stuff, it's the 2030s and you're sending people on journeys that will last for 1-1.5 years (only going, not even counting the return home). Sending them in crammed up spaces isn't good for psychology and also the mission itself. Hermes was providing artificial gravity for it's habitants by making the vehicle turn around itself, so you need a wider vehicle already. Plus, if you have the opportunity and tech, why not take it? Humanity won't travel in space in narrow tubes for forever. Plastic sheeting can help with protecting things from martian dust, and also plastic is cheap, easy to use, and usable in space.

He was being pessimistic and snarky while someones life is on the line. Of course he is an asshole.

He was on the orginal crew for the Pathfinder program. You wouldn't fire someone who is as smart as he is just because he can be kind of a smartass dickhead.

Not a plot hole. He knows NASA has a satellite in orbit and is most likely watching. And if they see him drive for a few days right to the Pathfinder site and then back, it's obvious he's planning to do something with the probe.

Nate the great

You mean using a map?

The hub has a beacon that works in the same vain like a vor/dme Station works on Earth. It gives Watney a bearing and distance from the hub in line of sight, with a very good precision (i calculated 300m at the horizon 9 km away). Outside of that, you would just use topography and Odometry (measuring the distance travelled by the amount the wheels turned). If you want to see a whole bunch of examples of such rovers working, there is the currently running European Rover Challenge, where students make rovers that CAN'T use gps and they are still able to do (at least some parts *flashbacks to epfl today* ) autonomously

I was watching it the other day and said the exact same thing.

@@thedundronian6164 I'd say the book concurred. It just had two signs. "Are you receiving?" "Point here for yes." Not that I'm complaining; both the book and the movie were exceptionally well done, and I recommend both.

Most movie goers aren't as astute as you.

Because he was apart of the original crew and he knows how to operate the thing. Also, just because he is very sarcastic does not mean he doesn't give a shit about the operation.