Windows Upgrade, FAA Error Cause LAX Shutdown

Windows Upgrade, FAA Error Cause LAX Shutdown 862

Posted by michael on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @05:48PM from the first-woodpecker-to-come-along dept.

fname writes "The recent shutdown of LAX due to an FAA radio outage was apparently caused by a Windows 2000 integration flaw, possibility related to an old Windows 95 bug. An article at the LA Times claims that the outage was caused by human error, as the system will automatically shut down after 49.7 days (related to this Windows 95 flaw?), and a technician didn't reboot the system monthly as he should have. This happened after an upgrade from Unix to Windows. I don't think blame should be assigned to the technician who missed the task; rather, it seems a gross oversight for the FAA to guarantee that such a critical system will crash after only one missed maintenance task. Who's really at fault?"

Windows Upgrade, FAA Error Cause LAX Shutdown

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"Upgrade"? (Score:5, Funny)

by thelenm ( 213782 ) writes: <mthelen AT gmail DOT com> on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @05:50PM (#10313329) Homepage Journal

"Upgrade" from Unix to Windows, eh. You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.

What?! (Score:5, Funny)

by ottergoose ( 770022 ) writes: on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @05:51PM (#10313340) Homepage

I thought switching to Windows from *nix saved time, money, and hassle! Haven't you guys seen those banner ads here?

Heather Locklear (Score:5, Funny)

by Billy Donahue ( 29642 ) writes: on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @05:53PM (#10313357)

To the rescue!
http://www.nbc.com/LAX/ [nbc.com]

Uprgrade from UNIX to Windows.. (Score:4, Funny)

by Anonymous Coward writes: on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @05:53PM (#10313364)

"This happened after an upgrade from Unix to Windows."

Thats the funniest thing I heard all day. Windows is an upgrade from unix. I almost choked on my coffee.

integration flaw exposed: (Score:3, Funny)

by overbom ( 461949 ) writes: <overbom AT yahoo DOT com> on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @05:54PM (#10313368)

sleep 4294080
shutdown /s

Re:Heh (Score:5, Funny)

by Nuclear Elephant ( 700938 ) writes: on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @05:55PM (#10313390) Homepage

It's an upgrade because it helps to create thousands of jobs for full-time system power cycling engineers.

They said Windows 98 or Better (Score:4, Funny)

by www.sorehands.com ( 142825 ) writes: on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @05:56PM (#10313403) Homepage

So I installed Linux.

Re:Repent, Sinners! (Score:5, Funny)

by Da Twink Daddy ( 807110 ) writes: <bss03@volumehost.net> on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @05:57PM (#10313420) Homepage

You have to love a system that requires downtime as part of uptime. How many Linux users have this problem? (Please press the Start button to shut down (stop) the computer.)

Sure,

init 6

doesn't sound like it should start (initialize) anything...

Re:I Hate to Say It (Score:5, Funny)

by multimed ( 189254 ) writes: <mrmultimedia@ya h o o.com> on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @05:58PM (#10313423)

No way is it Microsoft's fault. It even says so in their EULA...
I'm still amused & suprised the poster left off the quotes as in "upgrade" from Unix to Windows.

49.7 days (Score:5, Funny)

by k4_pacific ( 736911 ) writes: <`moc.oohay' `ta' `cificap_4k'> on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @05:59PM (#10313443) Homepage Journal

I remember back when that bug was announced. Seems it was at least a couple of years after Windows 95 had been out. I guess they had to work through a lot of other bugs to get Windows 95 to make it long enough for this bug to occur.

Re:Migration (Score:5, Funny)

by legirons ( 809082 ) writes: on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @06:01PM (#10313464)

"Why did they move from Unix to Windows in the first place?"

Maybe they didn't want to have to reboot on January 19, 2038

Re:We used to joke (Score:1, Funny)

by Anonymous Coward writes: on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @06:04PM (#10313503)

UNIX -> Windows is like Clinton -> Bush.

Sorry, but someone had to say it.

49.7 Days - A New Record for Windows 95! (Score:4, Funny)

by akiy ( 56302 ) writes: on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @06:05PM (#10313516) Homepage

I believe the 49.7 days of uptime for a Windows 95 box is a new record, shattering the previous record in Norway of 27.9 days back on January through February of 2001. Congratulations!

Re:Repent, Sinners! (Score:2, Funny)

by SoSueMe ( 263478 ) writes: on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @06:06PM (#10313533)

... the LAX shutdown...

Would that be 'exLAX'?

Re:Uhm, THE TECHNICIAN (Score:2, Funny)

by Kwil ( 53679 ) writes: on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @06:07PM (#10313535)

Are you kidding?

Think about it.. the Tech managed to keep Windows up and running for almost 50 days. The guy's a hero!

Re:"Upgrade"? (Score:1, Funny)

by Anonymous Coward writes: on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @06:10PM (#10313567)

"Hello. My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my server. Prepare to die."

Re:Uprgrade from UNIX to Windows.. (Score:5, Funny)

by Mateito ( 746185 ) writes: on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @06:11PM (#10313573) Homepage

I almost choked on my coffee.
Try preparing the coffee with some sort of liquid. I recommend water.
You don't get the instant caffiene high like you do with chewing the beans*, but it does go down easier**
*Yes, I do this. Chocolate coated coffee beans rock
**Unless its Starbucks, which needs shot of snotberry flavoring to make it tolerable.

"Who's really at fault?" (Score:3, Funny)

by switcha ( 551514 ) writes: on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @06:11PM (#10313574)

You guessed it.
Frank Stallone.

gettickcount maybe? (Score:5, Funny)

by plopez ( 54068 ) writes: on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @06:13PM (#10313598) Journal

http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url= /library/en-us/sysinfo/base/gettickcount.asp

Sounds like who ever wrote the software/OS module they were relying on used this gem. I hereby dub who soever was so silly as to do this as a 'code monkey, first class'.

Ouch, poor ad placement (Score:5, Funny)

by Eric Seppanen ( 79060 ) writes: on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @06:15PM (#10313611)

Headline:

Microsoft server crash nearly causes 800-plane pile-up
failure to restart system caused data overload

giant advertisement:

Make a name for yourself with Windows Server System

I'm thinking that maybe "the guy that almost crashed a bunch of planes" is not the name they were looking for.
(I'm not making this up- that's really the ad I'm seeing.)

Microsoft's new slogan... (Score:3, Funny)

by TWX ( 665546 ) writes: on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @06:19PM (#10313643)

... should be:

"Microsoft: Writing the software to prevent SkyNet since 1981."

Re:Anyone want to clue them in to scheduled jobs? (Score:5, Funny)

by Billy the Mountain ( 225541 ) writes: on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @06:29PM (#10313739) Journal

Each M T W Th R S Su 12:45 AM shutdown /l /r /y /c

We have used that exact script for YEARS to nightly reboot a troublesome NT4 BDC at a remote location.

Does it work on Friday? You might want to check on that...

BTM

Re:Anyone want to clue them in to scheduled jobs? (Score:5, Funny)

by Dun Malg ( 230075 ) writes: on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @06:37PM (#10313807) Homepage

Such a script could, if I'm not mistaken, be used to reboot the machine. One would think this would be an ideal way to hide the problem very nicely.
For a real-time application like air traffic control, you really can't automate reboots like that. You need someone standing there to say "crap! crap! crap!" and take the necessary actions when the system decides it doesn't want to reboot properly.*
*even if they don't know what to do, they can at least shout "crap!", which is more than a system stuck at the BIOS screen with an "elbow parity error" can say.

Re:Check out this little pile of bullshit (Score:1, Funny)

by Anonymous Coward writes: on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @06:38PM (#10313820)

I'd hate to sit next to you during Price is Right.

64 bit int (Score:5, Funny)

by Alien54 ( 180860 ) writes: on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @06:42PM (#10313864) Journal

Note to Microsoft (or anyone else storing milliseconds, for that matter): unsigned 64-bit int! Instead of having to reboot every 49.7 days, you'll have to reboot every 213,503,982,334 days, give or take a leap-second.
That's every 584,942,417 years. Which is simply not going to be good enough in my book.

Pray You Never Hear This (Score:5, Funny)

by craXORjack ( 726120 ) writes: on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @06:48PM (#10313930)

Ladies and Gentlemen, at this time the Captain would like to ask you to remain seated with your seatbelt firmly fastened, however if there are any computer technicians flying with us today, especially if they know what to do when a 'Fatal Exception has occured at 0029:C02FDEC6', would that person please come forward to the cabin immediately?

Re:What?! (Score:2, Funny)

by tool462 ( 677306 ) writes: on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @06:48PM (#10313932)

Nope. [mozilla.org] :)

Re:Anyone want to clue them in to scheduled jobs? (Score:4, Funny)

by thrills33ker ( 740062 ) writes: on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @06:49PM (#10313936) Homepage

"This wasn't an ARTCC. Besides, the ARTCC's are all on DSR now, and a bunch have URET on top of that."

Well, I'm glad you cleared that up!

Mod parent down (Score:1, Funny)

by Anonymous Coward writes: on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @06:54PM (#10313976)

Let me see, you claim that the error was in the integration of the Windows server. Thanks for clearing that up, because the submitter wrote, "The recent shutdown of LAX due to an FAA radio outage was apparently caused by a Windows 2000 integration flaw."

Ya, way to correct that error. It was in the integration of the Windows servers, not a Windows 2000 integration flaw.

Re:Repent, Sinners! (Score:2, Funny)

by admdrew ( 782761 ) writes: on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @07:02PM (#10314057) Homepage

Personally, I use an axe.

Re:Lessions from other Aviation Authorities (Score:1, Funny)

by n9mdh ( 800649 ) writes: on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @07:10PM (#10314119)

...2) Every box must be able to FAIL ON ITS OWN

That requirement makes it obvious why they needed to switch from Unix to a Microsoft product, doesn't it?

Re:Repent, Sinners! (Score:5, Funny)

by Hatta ( 162192 ) writes: on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @07:39PM (#10314356) Journal

Personally i use sudo reboot because I would never login as root for security/safety reasons.

Funny, those are the only reasons I ever log in as root.

Re:Anyone want to clue them in to scheduled jobs? (Score:3, Funny)

by 0x0d0a ( 568518 ) writes: on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @07:39PM (#10314359) Journal

Aviation expects 99.9999% uptime with absolutely no message loss, and we would achieve that with hot-standbys and MySQL mirroring.

Yes, that was a jab at you, Postgres fans. ;-)

Re:Heh (Score:5, Funny)

by InfiniteWisdom ( 530090 ) writes: on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @07:49PM (#10314444) Homepage

Surely you mean Microsoft Server Cycling Engineers (MSCE)

Re:Repent, Sinners! (Score:5, Funny)

by secolactico ( 519805 ) * writes: on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @08:30PM (#10314744) Journal

Golly gee-whiz, if someone is too stupid to migrate a million-record dBase table to SQL, he only deserves a real good whacking (and a career re-orientation into would you like grits with that ???)...

Most of the time it is not because the inability of the database tech, but the "hey, it's been working so far" attitude of the decision makers.

Maybe the powers that be are allergic to Open Source solutions and commercial databases can be expensive. Maybe the client applications are tied to the current system and porting them would be too expensive (example, POS systems).

I can imagine the conversation:

- "We are closed at night anyway"
- "Yes, boss, but recovering from a failure (knock on wood) can be too difficult in the current system"
- "Well, that's what we are paying you for"
- "Yes, sir. Thank you, sir. Would you like grits with that?"

Why replaced (Score:3, Funny)

by jamesl ( 106902 ) writes: on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @09:19PM (#10315050)

The decision to replace the legacy system was made the same week RadioShack quit selling vacuum tubes. Coincidence? I think not.

Re:64 bit int (Score:2, Funny)

by Dmala ( 752610 ) writes: on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @09:29PM (#10315119)

That's every 584,942,417 years. Which is simply not going to be good enough in my book.

What are you? A geologist?

Re:Repent, Sinners! (Score:4, Funny)

by Bush Pig ( 175019 ) writes: on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @11:09PM (#10315700)

I'm still having a bit of trouble with the notion that moving from UNIX to Windows was regarded as an upgrade.

Re:Repent, Sinners! (Score:4, Funny)

by Vinson Massif ( 88315 ) writes: on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @11:17PM (#10315758) Homepage

Personally I:
% su -
# uname -n
and MAKE SURE I'M ON THE RIGHT MACHINE !!
# shutdown -r 120 'go away!!'

Most system's reboot invoke a `shutdown -r now`.

Re:Repent, Sinners! (Score:2, Funny)

by GMFTatsujin ( 239569 ) writes: on Tuesday September 21, 2004 @11:19PM (#10315770) Homepage

I'm sure Emilia Airhart said the same thing before she patched her Windows 3.11!

Unix to Windows an Upgrade? (Score:3, Funny)

by CodeBuster ( 516420 ) writes: on Wednesday September 22, 2004 @01:25AM (#10316305)

Unix to Windows95? more like downgrade...big time

Well done Harris! (Score:2, Funny)

by BouffeMoiLaChatte ( 188459 ) writes: on Wednesday September 22, 2004 @04:02AM (#10316772)

Now you've become a thrustworthly company!

Re:Repent, Sinners! (Score:2, Funny)

by jones948 ( 726106 ) writes: on Wednesday September 22, 2004 @08:49AM (#10317623)

Click Me. Menu. Actions. Tasks. Open Here.
Any of those make more sense than "Start".

Ah, but then you couldn't tie in a catchy Rolling Stones song with your product launch.

There may be more comments in this discussion. Without JavaScript enabled, you might want to turn on Classic Discussion System in your preferences instead.

"Upgrade"? (Score:5, Funny)

What?! (Score:5, Funny)

Heather Locklear (Score:5, Funny)

Uprgrade from UNIX to Windows.. (Score:4, Funny)

integration flaw exposed: (Score:3, Funny)

Re:Heh (Score:5, Funny)

They said Windows 98 or Better (Score:4, Funny)

Re:Repent, Sinners! (Score:5, Funny)

Re:I Hate to Say It (Score:5, Funny)

49.7 days (Score:5, Funny)

Re:Migration (Score:5, Funny)

Re:We used to joke (Score:1, Funny)

49.7 Days - A New Record for Windows 95! (Score:4, Funny)

Re:Repent, Sinners! (Score:2, Funny)

Re:Uhm, THE TECHNICIAN (Score:2, Funny)

Re:"Upgrade"? (Score:1, Funny)

Re:Uprgrade from UNIX to Windows.. (Score:5, Funny)

"Who's really at fault?" (Score:3, Funny)

gettickcount maybe? (Score:5, Funny)

Ouch, poor ad placement (Score:5, Funny)

Microsoft's new slogan... (Score:3, Funny)

Re:Anyone want to clue them in to scheduled jobs? (Score:5, Funny)

Re:Anyone want to clue them in to scheduled jobs? (Score:5, Funny)

Re:Check out this little pile of bullshit (Score:1, Funny)

64 bit int (Score:5, Funny)

Pray You Never Hear This (Score:5, Funny)

Re:What?! (Score:2, Funny)

Re:Anyone want to clue them in to scheduled jobs? (Score:4, Funny)

Mod parent down (Score:1, Funny)

Re:Repent, Sinners! (Score:2, Funny)

Re:Lessions from other Aviation Authorities (Score:1, Funny)

Re:Repent, Sinners! (Score:5, Funny)

Re:Anyone want to clue them in to scheduled jobs? (Score:3, Funny)

Re:Heh (Score:5, Funny)

Re:Repent, Sinners! (Score:5, Funny)

Why replaced (Score:3, Funny)

Re:64 bit int (Score:2, Funny)

Re:Repent, Sinners! (Score:4, Funny)

Re:Repent, Sinners! (Score:4, Funny)

Re:Repent, Sinners! (Score:2, Funny)

Unix to Windows an Upgrade? (Score:3, Funny)

Well done Harris! (Score:2, Funny)

Re:Repent, Sinners! (Score:2, Funny)

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