NASA's new application-building challenge can boast one thing no other agency can top: participants aboard the International Space Station.
The space station is included in a list of locations where volunteer developers will be participating in the challenge. A presumably tongue-in-cheek note explains "transportation will not be provided."
The apps challenge scheduled for April 21 and 22 will also be held at 11 Earth-bound locations across all seven continents, including at the McMurdo Research Station in Antarctica.
The challenge is actually seven smaller challenges mostly structured around building software, hardware or a data visualization that makes space-generated or space-related data easier for ordinary citizens and developers to access.
One more-detailed challenge is to build an application that allows random participants to estimate the circumference of Earth by aggregating local observations, a feat first performed by the Greek astronomer Eratosthenes about 2,500 years ago, according to the challenge.
Joseph Marks
Joseph Marks covers government technology issues, social media, Gov 2.0 and global Internet freedom for Nextgov. He previously reported on federal litigation and legal policy for Law360 and on local, state and regional issues for two Midwestern newspapers. He also interned for Congressional Quarterly’s Homeland Security section and the Associated Press’s Jerusalem Bureau. He holds a bachelor’s degree in English from the University of Wisconsin and a master’s in international affairs from Georgetown.
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