The fundamental truth that must be considered of any article like this is "YMMV". (Your mileage may vary)
Especially in a big organization, things are different depending on the division you're in and where you work. I work at a large .gov institution and am only here a decade later because my leadership team in the early days were great bosses and amazing mentors. They taught me a lot both in a professional and personal level. I aspire and in many ways fail to be the same.
I look at other parts of the organization and see great places as well divisions where employees are treated like crap and are demoralized to the point of depression.
Working in a "good part" of a big company or institution can be amazing.
This is one of the best-chosen comments in the thread. The OP has encouraged commenters here to make generalizations about "NASA" software, but this does not make sense. It's too big, too dispersed, and the software developed is in a big range from research codes to operational codes to human-rated (see upthread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14886727).
In short, s/w practices and the dedication and capabilities of the people writing the software vary too much to characterize at that level of granularity.
Especially in a big organization, things are different depending on the division you're in and where you work. I work at a large .gov institution and am only here a decade later because my leadership team in the early days were great bosses and amazing mentors. They taught me a lot both in a professional and personal level. I aspire and in many ways fail to be the same.
I look at other parts of the organization and see great places as well divisions where employees are treated like crap and are demoralized to the point of depression.
Working in a "good part" of a big company or institution can be amazing.