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Talkback
I have two basic questions on this case:
1) In US or any other country, has Microsoft Windows Operating System a legal basis to be deployed in such a critical transportation system?
2) Why "back-up system" always fails in time of need? I've been told too many stories about that.
in answer to question 1 look at this
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/09/06/ams_goes_windows_for_warships/
This story implies that this was a problem caused by a Microsoft System. But it sounds like a bug in the application running on the system, which could happen on any system. A unix program with a memory leak would probably eventually crash, too.
I know of people who keep Windows itself running much longer than 30 days at a time. So did this really have anything to do with Microsoft? If not, the story is poorly written.
The article mentions a problem that occurs after 49.7 days... Could it be the infamous Win 95/98 crash first reported in 1999? A five year old bug in a seriously outdated OS? And Win 98 running air traffic control?!?!?!?
http://news.com.com/2100-1040-222391.html?legacy=cnet
Regardless of whether or not a microsoft operating system could be held liable for aircraft falling from the ai, or a third party software riding on top of it, It does appear that when you mention reboot that it truly was due to a windows operating system. Why in the world would anyone with any sense at all use a windows operating system for air traffic control?
A thought. If windows on your home computer needs rebooted periodically due to it's issues with .... well ... everything, when windows needs rebooted after almost every software install, why in the hell would it be considered for anything other than non-critical applications? Do we remember what happened when Bank of America decided to use a winxp embeded devices in their machines?
This is never going to stop. Replacing known good with known bad doesn't work. Unix, Linux, BSD, or anything other than windows or a microsoft product should be used for mission critical environments. This world is turning into windows fools and the governments are allowing it.
Aside from all of the why use microsoft for a critical application...I have to ask...WHY are they relying on a human being to remember to reboot the machine. If it's to be done at a particular time on a particular day why not schedule the reboot?
I am not sure if they are using windows 2003 server or not, if someone could find that out for me would be nice and I don't think 2003 has to restart in every 30 days. I am not a MS or Redhat fans, however for my department, 90% or our webservers are running on Linux (around 30 Servers) with Linux HA. Of course some of the servers will fail, however it seems we do not have any downtime with the HA solution.
Since you have to reboot the system, that's a flaw in the underlying OS as well as the application. This has been a fundamental problem with Windows for some time, and I include the NT-based OS's, the latest of which are XP and Server 2003. Applications can easily take down the entire system.
The EULA for all Windows platforms states quite clearly that you understand that Windows is not intended for critical or life-saving applications. I think that air traffic control certainly falls within that scope. These folks were wrong to use Windows for this application in the first place. If they're afraid of Free and Open Source Software (they shouldn't be--it runs the Internet), and they want the security blanket of a "Big Company", then they should've gone with something like Solaris.
This is a great example of firms like Microsoft buying our politicians and compromising our safety--and in many cases, liberty--in the process.
HI guy
do you know that in France the ticket reservation system from SNCF (railroad) was down during more than one day because AD and windows servers ?
I can't believe that this reporter (and I use the term loosely) is even allowed near a keyboard with the level of obvious spin-doctoring in this article. It starts out with a headline that it doesn't even back up in the story!
Let's see: "Microsoft software implicated in air traffic shutdown" - but then the article says this "The newspaper said that a Microsoft-based replacement for an older Unix system needed to be reset every thirty days 'to prevent data overload', as a result of problems found when the system was first rolled out."
So, there was a problem with the PROPRIETARY SOFTWARE (last I checked, MS doesn't make PC's) they knew about, and chose to ignore it, instead sending out a tech every 30 days to reboot it.
If you follow the link to the LA Times article, it reads a LOT differently... In fact, the only time MS is mentioned is here: "When the system was upgraded about a year ago, the original computers were replaced by Dell computers using Microsoft software. Baggett said the Microsoft software contained an internal clock designed to shut the system down after 49.7 days to prevent it from becoming overloaded with data" -- now, gee, this reeks of BULL to me. What does the OS have to do with anything when you're running a PROPRIETARY SOFTWARE SYSTEM?
The FACT is that they are running an asinine old program called VSCS which was designed for Unix - and now they're porting it to XP or NT, decades later, and expect the old fogies they have running the place (who probably designed the VSCS in the first place) to make it mesh. Again, if you READ the article you get this inormation:
"As originally designed, the VSCS system used computers that ran on an operating system known as Unix, said Ray Baggett, vice president for the union's western region"
and
"The VSCS system was built for the FAA by Harris Corp. of Melbourne, Fla., at a cost of more than $1.5 billion..."
and this
"FAA officials said they had known for more than a year that a software glitch could shut down radio communications and were in the process of fixing it. In the meantime, they required manual resetting of the communications system — a process they described as similar to rebooting a personal computer."
and this "But they said the quirk in the system, known as Voice Switching and Control System, is a "design anomaly" that should have been corrected after it was discovered last year in Atlanta."
So, does MS design VCSC? Uhh, no, read the article. In fact, if you learned to READ everything, it'd be pretty obvious that this is a clean case of typical large-business netwrok upgrades: They want to upgrade their PC's, but won't upgrade the in-house software, they just patch the shit to keep it running.
The LA Times even says that the FAA claims is was "human error"... but you say thety implicate Microsoft? Bald faced liar, you should be ashamed. Your article is very poor reporting, you should be ashamed. If you have to MS bash, at least don't lie and spread falsehoods. Try providing facts instead...
This is just another example of how the idiocy and extreme incompetence fostered and legitimized by the MS culture had permeated business and critical computing environments, causing nothing more than disaster after dissaster.
Since many just familiar with a Mickey mouse MS PC or just after swift training to get a MCSE can boast and claim to be a knowleable and expert in computer matters, the MS culture legitimize them, enabling them to get involved in projects and decisions were REAL qualified personel is nothing but mandatory.
No other discipline has suffered so much lost of professional credibility, respectability and polution than the computer sciences field. In the medical field for example, Managed Medicine has managed to poop on the Medical profession, but the limits of the capabilities and competence of the people that work on that field are very well defined, and you don't see a nurse or pharmacy clerk jumping into the operating room to give opinion and get involved in a open heart surgery or other critical medical procedure and be taken seriously. In architecture or Law or virtualy other professions the polution of unquailified people willing to perform jobs for which they simple are NOT qualified is kept under control.
Otherwise we would see the number of deaths in hospitals, or buldings sudenly crashing to the ground increasing in stagering numbers; something that would be anything but acceptable.
On one side it is good that a lot of people have access to computers, but on the other they should know that there is A LOT more that just MS PC's, which is the lowest denominator in computers. But here the rottten part is the MS Software. Being familiar MS PC's or even having an MSCE or any other phony cerification does NOT make anybody qualified in the computer field.
Certainly many people get into the computer field through a MS PC, but if they were to go to College to get a degree or if they were smart enough not to need College education they would discover that there is A LOT more than MS, and that MS related knowledge is limited to the very small, not critical systems. Most of MS experts are neither one. They are MS trained but Computer Sciences ignorant.
There we have in this talk back some of those "experts" whose opinion reveals nothing more than lack of even basic computer field knowledge and incompetence :
" But it sounds like a bug in the application running on the system, which could happen on any system. A unix program with a memory leak would probably eventually crash, too. I know of people who keep Windows itself running much longer than 30 days at a time."
Here is the other :
"What does the OS have to do with anything when you're running a PROPRIETARY SOFTWARE SYSTEM? "
How people like this can call themselves "experts" with a strait face ?. (sofware developer, IT /Network)
In both cases it is obvious that these guys don't even understand that memory managenet policy is a function of any decent OS, which until know NONE of the Windows OS fully have.
If a program has a memory leak, any decent OS, and specially one in a CRITICAL environment should stop that program, while others continue running, and the whole system won't crash.
Any application software PROPRIETARY or not runs on TOP of the OS, it is JUST application software it runs in its OWN USER SPACE, of which the OS has complete control per application, per user, and this is even more important in a CRITICAL environment. Any Unix (AIX, HPUX, TRUE, Solaris, BSD, Linux) does this.
It is obvious that the garbage OS on which the application was running it to blame for such failure.
But the failure began the day incompetent, unqualified, ignorant people were allowed to take part in the evaluation and replacement of the aging system. These people are as much to blame.
Sounds like PPP ( Piss Poor Planning ) Never put a MS server in a CRITICAL job roll, as a non critical app or file server MS does a ok job. They should have at a minimum set up some type of clustering with alert monitoring, maybe they should find some company ( like EDS,IBM or HP ) that knows what it is doing to manage their servers.
windows should never have been used for this - what were they thinking?