Q&A with Jacob Acosta, Apex Software Engineer Intern

Q: You’re the first intern Apex has hired—tell us a bit about what drove you to work for Apex.

I've been looking for a place where I can apply the skills I've been developing through my time in class and my time working on hobby projects, and Apex was the perfect opportunity because I can apply and refine my old skills while learning lots of new skills related to aerospace.

Q: Why does software engineering matter for satellites?

Obviously you don't have access to the satellite once it's in flight, so if something goes terribly wrong you can't just swap disks or anything like that. In a lot of cases if the software fails then so does the satellite, so being certain the software is correct is crucial

Q: What project from Caltech are you most proud of?

In my operating systems class last term my partner and I implemented several basic parts of an OS including filesystem, scheduler, virtual memory, and syscalls. I feel like I learned a lot during the project and I'm pretty proud of it.

Q: Tell us a bit about what you do in your free time

In my free time I like to play all kinds of card and board games, practice guitar, and write simple computer games.

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