Ars Technica reports
A second-tier German professional basketball team has been relegated to an even lower tier as a result of being penalized for starting a recent game late—because the Windows laptop that powered the scoreboard required 17 minutes to perform system updates.
The March 13 match between the Chemnitz Niners and the Paderborn Baskets was set to begin normally, when Paderborn (the host) connected its laptop to the scoreboard in the 90 minutes leading up to the game.
In an interview with the German newspaper, Die Zeit (Google Translate), Patrick Seidel, the general manager of Paderborn Baskets said that at 6:00pm, an hour and a half before the scheduled start time, the laptop was connected "as usual."
"But as both teams warmed up, the computer crashed," he said. "When we booted it again at 7:20pm, it started automatically downloading updates. But we did not initiate anything."
After all the updates were installed, Paderborn was ready to start the game at 7:55pm.
By the end of the match, Paderborn won 69-62. But then Chemnitz formally protested, saying that because Paderborn had delayed the start time of the match by 25 minutes (instead of the 15-minute maximum as allowed under the German basketball rules), they should be penalized. As a result, Paderborn lost another point in the standings (Google Translate), according to a Basketball Budesliga press release, which meant that it would certainly be relegated to the "ProB" league of German pro basketball.
(Score: 3, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 08 2015, @02:50AM
Should have used Linux. systemd or not, it's better than winblows.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by c0lo on Wednesday April 08 2015, @03:28AM
Not even that! When it comes to mission critical (such as the case of a basketball game that make-or-break your professional team's standing), one should use a real-time OS, so maybe the RTLinux [wikipedia.org] distro.
Anywho, I'm compelled to agree: Windows is indeed a poor (-man's?) choice, good only for ancient (but still operational) British nuclear subs [tomshardware.com]: US upgraded [wordpress.com] its subs and drones [gizmodo.com] to Linux and even Russia uses Linux for retaliatory purposes [wikipedia.org]
(large grin)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 5, Touché) by GungnirSniper on Wednesday April 08 2015, @03:40AM
Even Linux won't protect you from incompetent admins and beancounters. Handling Windows Update settings isn't rocket science, nor is having a backup for critical systems.
Tips for better submissions to help our site grow. [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 3, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 08 2015, @04:26AM
Many folks never change the default settings that their systems come with.
In addition to this event, I've also heard of folks being in the middle of a task, getting up to get a beverage, and coming back to find that their MICROS~1 system has auto-updated and auto-rebooted, thereby losing their previous hour's work.
The set of defaults in this case sounds very aggravating.
Can any Soylentil think of a non-MICROS~1 example that compares?
-- gewg_
(Score: 5, Informative) by vux984 on Wednesday April 08 2015, @05:01AM
Many folks never change the default settings that their systems come with.
The defaults for home users make sense for most home users. This was not a home user; and they had special requirements. They should have changed the defaults. Although we don't REALLY know the real truth. Just that they are claiming they did not initiate them.
Lots of people will click install updates; then when they are installed see the prompt that says updates are installed; windows update needs to reboot to finish installing updates, and then they hit "postpone and do it later" for days on end. And then when they finally reboot it are pissed about it taking forever to do updates.
Can any Soylentil think of a non-MICROS~1 example that compares?
Actually yes.
1) Name a cloud service. Pretty much any cloud service. Q.E.D I can cite lots of examples where a cloud outage or internet outage to cloud provider caused major problems.
2) Linux - yup; I've seen servers take literally ages to startup after a crash. Its gotten better in recent years. But 30 minutes or more downtime after a linux box went down wasn't unusual - even if all that was needed was to power it back up. Even scheduled outages, we often gave them 30 minutes+ to boot.
3) OSX? No. Not yet. I've never had OSX actually do this to me yet. Although certain updates have taken HOURS literally on older systems where it just says "optimizing" or something for seemingly forevor; it happened when I need it to finish up so i can do something. But so far its never been so timing critical that its cost me badly. But then Windows updates happening at inopportune times have never bitten me in the ass THAT badly either.
(Score: 2) by gnuman on Wednesday April 08 2015, @05:15PM
2) Linux - yup; I've seen servers take literally ages to startup after a crash.
It's called a file system check. Your problem is purely related to administration problems.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by vux984 on Wednesday April 08 2015, @06:19PM
It's called a file system check. Your problem is purely related to administration problems.
If one has their linux box set perform a 30-minute filesystem check after a crash; and the unit crashes 5 minutes before game time that seems to be equivalent to me.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 09 2015, @05:33PM
But you can cancel a fsck. Updates, not so much.
(Score: 2) by vux984 on Monday April 13 2015, @05:20AM
But you can cancel a fsck.
Unless you can't...
However, in Arch Linux the fsck disk checker does not offer the option to abort a disk check once it has started. In Ubuntu for instance, you are told to press Esc to cancel. You can however abort fsck with Ctrl-C, but by default, fsck will then treat the disk as having failed the disk check, and only mount it read-only.
To get round this, create a file called e2fsck.conf in /etc/, and add the following line:[...]
Admiittedly, as is documented, there are ways around it if you had sufficient foresight. Then again, ditto for windows updates.
(Score: 3, Funny) by c0lo on Wednesday April 08 2015, @05:13AM
Mmmm... maybe. Back into early 1980-ies, an unstable Spectrum clone, resetting itself randomly. Had to save every 10 mins or so, when "saving" meant using a standard audio cassette tape with a tape recorder unable to "mute" while recording.
Think wee hours in the morning, in a student dorm.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 4, Informative) by mojo chan on Wednesday April 08 2015, @10:50AM
Sorry, but there is no excuse. The machine shouldn't even have been connected to the internet to get update. It was a single purpose machine, or should have been.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
(Score: 2) by scruffybeard on Wednesday April 08 2015, @12:25PM
If this machine is being used to keep score, then it may need an internet connection so that fans can get real time updates on the game.
(Score: 2) by mojo chan on Wednesday April 08 2015, @01:25PM
Just air-gap it with a mobile phone and Twitter or something...
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
(Score: 2) by davester666 on Wednesday April 08 2015, @05:33AM
That doesn't sound right. You really don't want to have to depend on a blackberry phone. You definitely won't be able to get an app for that.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 08 2015, @02:32PM
Not even that! When it comes to mission critical (such as the case of a basketball game that make-or-break your professional team's standing), one should use a real-time OS,
Not in the slightest. I get the feeling you don't even understand what a real-time OS is - its a way to embed an application into the operating system so that it gets reliable millisecond level scheduling.
The problem with real-time OSes is that they are not even close to general-purpose. They are appropriate for the embedded controller in the score-board, but not for an application that tracks scoring and has as one of its functions sending the score to the scoreboard computer.
Linux wasn't necessary here either. All they had to do was turn off auto-updates or failing that, just leave it off the network. It was simple operator error, nothing more.
(Score: 2) by tibman on Wednesday April 08 2015, @02:58PM
I doubt the operator asked it to crash and reboot before the updates started. Some windows updates happen during bootup and shutdown which prevents the computer from being usable. You don't always know when that is going to happen either. You could have installed updates the night before and shut the computer down. The next morning you'll spend 20 min waiting for your desktop because it's stuck in an update and won't present the login screen until it's done. I also see people who want to leave for the day and their laptops say "please don't turn off power" or whatever when trying to shutdown. They could be waiting anywhere from 10 seconds to 10 minutes.
SN won't survive on lurkers alone. Write comments.
(Score: 2) by vux984 on Tuesday April 14 2015, @06:42PM
This particular day it was windows updates. Next month, the hard drive could fail outright and it won't matter what OS you have installed. They should have had a spare laptop.
(Score: 2) by tibman on Tuesday April 14 2015, @07:23PM
The scoreboard could also fail. At some point you have to draw a line in the risk analysis sheet.
SN won't survive on lurkers alone. Write comments.
(Score: 2) by vux984 on Tuesday April 14 2015, @10:58PM
The scoreboard could also fail. At some point you have to draw a line in the risk analysis sheet.
Very true.
But a 'spare laptop' need not even been a dedicated unit. It could have just been one of the coaches personal units with the scoreboard control software preinstalled and ready to go.
(Or maybe not... who knows what the licensing and DRM for the scoreboard software looks like. :)
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Wednesday April 08 2015, @07:30PM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 3, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 08 2015, @03:50AM
systemd or not, it's better than winblows
you say that now, but based on how systemd is "expanding its capabilities", there will come a day when you can't tell the difference
(Score: 3, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 08 2015, @05:02AM
We need a -1 Douché moderation...
(Score: 5, Funny) by Kell on Wednesday April 08 2015, @05:46AM
Sounds like that's what you get when you combine Touché and Disagree mods.
Scientists ask questions. Engineers solve problems.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 08 2015, @02:24PM
Sorry to hear you need a douche. Try having sex with less partners, or at least stop having sex with animals. Maybe try vinegar, if that doesn't work try the extra strength drano, that should clear up the clogged orifice you speak from.
(Score: 2) by mtrycz on Wednesday April 08 2015, @08:06PM
So we'll have a scoreboard software directly in systemd sometime soon? That would be cool!
In capitalist America, ads view YOU!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 08 2015, @05:27AM
Get real...if someone doesn't know how to disable auto-updates on a M$ or Apple (or Chromebook), how the hell are they going to be able to deal with sudo hell in configuring or running any Linux disto?
(Score: 3, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 08 2015, @07:53AM
You should try using Linux. It's not what you think it is.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 08 2015, @02:19PM
What's sudo hell? Never heard of it, never experienced it, use it all the time. In fact, an inexperienced user can install and use linux without ever having to use a terminal, it's more for customization or troubleshooting.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 08 2015, @02:42PM
No such thing as sudo hell. Unlike windows with dll hell, update hell, BSOD hell, graphics hell, etc, etc, etc. In the time it takes windows to update, or even defrag, I can do an initial install of Ubuntu or any other flavor of Linux, and have it up and running with my saved ~ directory copied over.
(Score: 2, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 08 2015, @03:58AM
The German team now has the full complement of mobile skins and sound effects from the Redmond UX labs.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 08 2015, @11:59AM
This explains why I cringe when I hear the Lotus Formula 1 Microsoft ad. Now I know why they're so slow.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by kaszz on Wednesday April 08 2015, @04:06AM
Hope this illustrates the problem with computers doing things the users didn't told it to do. However the world is full of morons. Just hope they don't run nuclear plants, airplanes, life support, etc.
FOSSinator: Hey, nice Microsoft software you use there. Ever seen the effect of special self propagating code snippets? ;)
(Score: 5, Interesting) by anubi on Wednesday April 08 2015, @05:35AM
Unfortunately, the people who specify these products also have the power to lay people like us off if we don't go along with it.
I did not go along with it, and I am paying the price.
Incidentally, the process "wuauserv" is responsible for the windows updating. Terminate it via performance monitor and the system will become responsive again, or at least until you boot or wake from sleep or something kicks it back on. It normally seems to get started upon startup. In my case, it was a delayed startup which let me get started into what I needed to do, then started this update in the background. I would see my CPU usage go to 100%, memory start draining, and soon the system would have to be powered down to regain control... of course Windows did not like that one bit.
For quite some time, I had no idea what was going on. All I knew is my computer would slow down then lock up for no apparent reason, and then only if the internet was on. It would wait until I turned the internet on, wait a few minutes, then nail me. I feared I had the cryptolocker virus knowing how much cpu time encrypting everything would take. It was quite unsettling to know my computer was running balls-to-the-wall doing something I had no idea what it was doing.
I had several frustrating rounds of this when I needed my computer for a presentation. There was little I could do at that point than look like a hapless fool.
I feel I took quite a credibility hit for that. I was trying to impress them with my mastery of Eagle and LTSpice, and I came out looking damned inept. Every time I tried to get onto the internet to retrieve some files they wanted me to look at, my system would lock up doing Microsoft's bidding, and I honestly thought I had a nasty malware that no one would tell me about. I even thought it was the NSA backdoor being used as ADVAPI.dll kept showing up in the list of running threads.
After a little run-in I had over Microsoft distributing chip-killing drivers for FTDI chips through the update system ( I build Arduino-compatible stuff, and had been using FTDI download cables... I now use the Prolific ones as I fear the software is now out to kill FTDI products and consider actually soldering one onto a board to be risky business ).
Control Panel -> System and Security -> Windows Update
If you turn it off ( you will be warned not to do this ), this will stop this from happening.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Wednesday April 08 2015, @09:27AM
Add microsoft.com to the firewall?
What's kind of funny is that all these updates are supposed to make the system more secure. But it usually don't become that so one might as well skip it..
(Score: 2) by Nerdfest on Wednesday April 08 2015, @01:55PM
Yes, more secure for whom? Certainly not us it seems.
(Score: 2) by tibman on Wednesday April 08 2015, @03:01PM
Only counterfeit FTDI chips are "bricked". Also that update has been rolled-back and no more chips (counterfeit or not) will be bricked.
SN won't survive on lurkers alone. Write comments.
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Thursday April 09 2015, @12:43AM
But trust in Microsoft, FTDI and automatic updates were bricked permanently.
(Score: 1) by anubi on Thursday April 09 2015, @01:27AM
True.. maybe Microsoft and FTDI wised up and decided nuking their customer's stuff isn't really the brightest way to enforce digital "rights".
But someone *did* go through all the effort to make chip-nuking software and release it.
By now, every script kiddie and hacker has a copy of it, disassembled, and knows how to use it.
The stuff I build is industrialized Arduino-compatibles. I take the issue of resilience *very* seriously. Because *I* am the one my customers are going to be mad at if it stops working, and I am not "businesslike" enough to hide behind hold harmless clauses. If MY stuff does not work, I fix it. Pure and simple.
Since that debacle, I no longer solder USB to serial interface chips on a board. I simply no longer trust them. I will use a tossable download cable instead.
I know I can reload an Arduino-compatible bootloader anytime I want ( Thank you, Bill Westfield, for designing and sharing your OptiLoader! ) via the SPI/ISP port I design on all my stuff, and still trust my I2C and SPI chips.
I work with smaller companies who do not yet have the resources, patience, or legal framework to play or design with the big boys. Mostly, I work with machines that need a very simple digital supervisor to execute a procedure 24/7/365. Sensing something, controlling something. And it has to be extremely reliable. No-one I deal with wants to flip the power switch on and the thing doesn't go.
I found the Arduino framework ideal for implementing such low-level stuff as it used a lot of the same things I had for years done under DOS. I used to write all my stuff in Borland C++ for DOS. The Arduino framework uses the same language. Since the advent of things line X-port TCP/IP and ALFAT USB interfaces, I can talk to the big boys but do not have to have the overhead of being a big boy. I can still sit in the micropower range and do my simple thing, collecting results, and chucking them back to the big boys for analysis and report generation. I just mind the machine. And if the big boy is not around, I can still run the machine, storing anything the big boy might want on USB sticks or flash until the big boy is available.
One of my favorite things about the Arduino is a lot of kids know it, and its easy to show them how to use my thing. My thing is designing the hardware. I will show my customer how the thing works, what chips I used, and sample drivers, but when it comes to implementing exactly what the customer wants it to do, often he is in a far better position to write his own code. Its quite easy. Documentation of Arduino programming is very available. High school kids do it all the time. I will teach them, and let them take it from there. They can make the machine I build for them do exactly what they want it to do. I will write code that does what they want, but its my belief they should be able to season it to taste. Criminey - they bought the machine - it should do whatever they program it to do.
About the last thing either me or my customers want is some script loose that wipes out the interface chips. FTDI wrote one. If I dealt in finicky machines subject to a variety of viruses and backdoors, I would not be dealing with things as simple as Arduinos.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
(Score: 2) by urza9814 on Thursday April 09 2015, @01:44PM
Yes, but how many companies are buying their chips direct from FTDI? Quite easy to buy a part through Mouser or whatever thinking it's genuine, and it turns out it isn't and your product gets bricked.
And the update was rolled-back by Microsoft, but you have no idea whether every one of your customers has removed it. There's certainly the possibility that it's still out there and active somewhere.
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Thursday April 09 2015, @12:45AM
Perhaps a partial solution is to start your own business and interact more directly with the real customers?
(Score: 1) by anubi on Thursday April 09 2015, @01:26AM
That is what I had to do after that.
I had already resisted authority. I could not count on them for any sort of reference.
Hiring managers do not take kindly to anyone who questions authority.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Thursday April 09 2015, @02:10AM
What were your hugest obstacles?
(Score: 1) by anubi on Thursday April 09 2015, @02:39AM
My biggest obstacle is very few people know what I do and have seen my work.
The work I did before was not public.
However, I did get in a pissing match with a supervisor. He won.
I intend to change this shortly, as I have been designing a line of products for release as open-source. The main processor boards are already done. I am now working on interface boardsets. I have no intention of trying to manufacture them. I expect Chinese knockoffs every bit as good as mine to appear shortly after I release. I intend to support myself just supporting these things.
I have just about given up hope for ever working for anyone else, as I am in my 60's. Who wants old farts like me around? I have lived in the simplicity of the past and have gotten used to knowing exactly how my stuff works and how to fix it. Farm style if I have to.
I am not much good as a "leader" as I abhor a lot of the stuff that today is seen as a "leadership skill", where I see it as "ass-holery", have had things like that done to me, and I flat refuse to do the same to others. I will teach, but I do not want a thing to do with being someone else's enforcer.
Where I used to work, they actually sent people to classes to teach them how to become assholes. They were not born that way, rather it was what they had to do if they wanted to stay employed. An enforcer is more valuable to many companies than do-ers.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Thursday April 09 2015, @03:26AM
I mean obstacles in getting your business going ;)
Fighting people in a position of power inside a company is a rigged playing field.
(Score: 1) by anubi on Thursday April 09 2015, @07:40AM
I would say primarily operating capital.
I have to do everything myself, and there are a lot of things I have very little experience in. Enormous amounts of time get wasted... #1 culprit being forms governments require in order to open shop. I have avoided the issue so far by going under the radar and not involving anyone else in my affairs. The instant I hire someone, I leave myself very vulnerable to not filling out all the paperwork governments at all levels expect.
So, I end up spending a lot of time doing a lot of things that have no bearing on my product, simply because I cannot afford an accountant and tax attorney to interface to my government for me and get permission to operate in exchange for exaction of tax.
Hell, trying to research the tax owed costs me a lot more in time than the tax itself.
Although I would like to sell my stuff to businesses, for now I cannot afford to as much as accept payments from them, as the costs of processing the paperwork to government standards would overwhelm me. I keep hearing about all this "help" governments are supposed to be making available to small business, but the biggest help they could possibly give me is just get out of my life and let me try to get this thing started. Some of my Mexican friends have this down pat... they only work for homeowners, who cannot deduct expenses, for cash.
So, for now, I have been applying my product line to stuff I do for small business that hires me as a contractor. They 1099 me, and I pay the tax on that, and everyone goes away happy. I simply do not have the time to design my product and understand all the tax code. I guess in a country as prosperous as the United States, its not very important that people actually produce anything. If it was, our tax code would encourage, not discourage, productivity. For now, they even see fit to take what little I do get which leaves me just that much less to work with.
I am just happy I foresaw the writing on the wall and prepared for the "seven years of drought". I have a lot to learn on the business aspect of this, and likely will just end up taking social security in a few years. From what I can see, there just isn't all that much call for people who do what I do. A lot of skilled tradesmen have the same story as manufacturing goes overseas. I thought I was doing the right thing studying engineering, but in hindsight, I should have gone into auto mechanics. Only reason I do this is because this is what I was "wired" to do, just as some were wired for art, music, sports, or whatever their passion is.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Thursday April 09 2015, @12:34PM
Move to another country where regulations are more business friendly?
(Score: 1) by anubi on Friday April 10 2015, @01:04AM
That is definitely in the cards.
For right now, I just want to get this running. Where the weather is such that I can develop and test this thing.
I am so convinced this thing will work that I am devoting every resource I have left to it, and flat refuse to have anyone else involved. Especially investors.
Once I have the whole thing known good design, I will then be free to take what resources I have left and reconstruct another one somewhere else. Out of the jurisdiction of the takers.
I saw where in the old company I used to work for, there were like three people who "made it happen". Once the financial and government crowd got involved, the fire went out.
Very few can kindle the fire of innovation. However, any entity funded by cash-rich entities such as the government or investment groups can hire the skills to put the fire out.
Its also my belief that more than half of the people here on this forum have seen that same thing happen... personally.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Friday April 10 2015, @01:26AM
Guess the answer is to exclude, manage or deceive those entities?
(Score: 1) by anubi on Friday April 10 2015, @03:15AM
Exclude. They are about as helpful as tin whiskers on solder joints.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
(Score: 3, Insightful) by q.kontinuum on Wednesday April 08 2015, @05:01AM
Wouldn't it make sense to be able to count scores manually? A computer is nice-to-have, as is the large score-board, but it shouldn't be too hard to have some flip-numbers to count manually.
(I also find the default settings of Windows insane and have lost track on the count of meetings where presentations were prevented because the presenters notebook preferred to update it's OS. Luckily, Whinedows is only in a VM on my notebook :-) But that was already covered by other comments.)
Registered IRC nick on chat.soylentnews.org: qkontinuum
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 08 2015, @05:17AM
I would expect there to be a crowd that would like to be able to see the score and the clock at all times.
I'm guessing those folks paid to get the full professional experience.
-- gewg_
(Score: 4, Insightful) by q.kontinuum on Wednesday April 08 2015, @05:36AM
Like, waiting for half an hour for the game to actually start, and then in the aftermath see one team lose by some technicality? I'm not saying to exclude computer usage from sport events, just considering flip-boards the lesser of two evils in case of a computer failure.
Registered IRC nick on chat.soylentnews.org: qkontinuum
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 08 2015, @08:54PM
The flip-cards solve 1 element of the problem but there is another problem to be dealt with.
Going back many years to when The Wide World of Sports was a thing (and when I actually paid any attention to sports), I learned that there is a game played by Scots with big sticks (now, there's a mental image for you).
The players and the crowd don't see a timeclock that displays the minutes left to play.
The only guy who knows exactly when the game will end is the official timekeeper holding the stopwatch.
Americans would never stand for such a thing.
...and basketball was originally an American invention.
Going back many years again, there were special timeclocks for sporting events.
Those were analog things with a sweep hand for seconds and one minutes. [google.com]
To flesh out your backup idea, you're going to need one of those as well.
...and, as scruffybeard mentioned above, in the Internet age, it's also possible that they routinely stream data to their fans in cyberspace.
-- gewg_
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 08 2015, @05:35AM
Windows downloading updates does not stop anything from working. From the description it appears that updates were set to be applied automatically. System rebooted on its own and started applying updates. Crashing and then downloading updates necessitating nothing else could be done with the machine is not a plausible failure mode. It is just another case of people not knowing the basic workings of the things they own.
(Score: 5, Informative) by MostCynical on Wednesday April 08 2015, @06:00AM
When windows is installing the updates from boot, it prevents anything else from happening until the updates are finished.
Often, one update will trigger a re-boot, which then triggers another update.. With one corporate laptop, I spent over three hours stuck in this cycle after the auto-updater had stopped working for a few months.
As it was a corporate machine, there were no user permissions for doing anything in the settings area at all.
"I guess once you start doubting, there's no end to it." -Batou, Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 08 2015, @02:06PM
When updates are downloading a person still can use the machine. Your machine is set up to instantly apply without prompt. Ergo, every machine can not be used when updates are downloading.
There seems to be something amiss.
(Score: 1) by skater on Wednesday April 08 2015, @02:48PM
Good point, but at the same time, if I get a laptop of unknown history (such as it was issued by work or whatever), I always boot it up and let it run for a while before trying to use it in a critical situation like a presentation or a meeting, for exactly the reason that updates can happen at any time. It doesn't insulate me, but it does cut down a lot of headache.
Of course in the basketball situation, who knows whether they even had the chance to do that. "Hey, Franz, can you run the board for the game in an hour?" "Sure, where's the laptop?" Or, "Sorry, but you can't check out the laptop for tonight's game until 5 p.m." We've all been in administrative snafus.
Also, I've seen plenty of sporting events where clocks and scoreboards weren't working and they went along just fine, so I think this basketball game probably could have gone with a low-tech solution to get the game underway.
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Thursday April 09 2015, @03:59AM
However Microsoft update is like a logic bomb so you can't wait it out. It may just start whenever some crazy dude at MS felt like it.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 08 2015, @06:15AM
You start looking around the internet for things like svchost.exe railing the CPU and there are a lot of people who get that experience.
It took me some digging to discover what was prompting svchost to do me in. Even a "seasoned" friend did not want to get involved with this.
I was one of them having problems related to svchost, as apparently Microsoft started using larger buffers, and my system has only 1.5GB available RAM. What did me in is I had a substantial portion of that spoken for with FireFox, EAGLE, and LTSpice running. When the Windows Update ( I had no idea who was doing it to me at the time ) started , it would just rail me out.
Its easy to say someone is ignorant of their system. I definitely was. Someone often has no business trusting critical stuff to someone else.
I still remember an old scoreboard that ran on RS-232 from a laptop running DOS. Never had any problem with it. The program that ran it was freely distributed, and anyone wanting to use the scoreboard just brought their own laptop and plugged in. If that had happened in my younger years, that computer would have been switched over to another one in about three minutes.
We are sure losing resiliency in our endless chase for complexity.
Telling someone he is ignorant sounds to me like something a manager would say. Finding out exactly why the system is misbehaving sounds like something a not-so-highly paid guy who can't farm his problems onto others will do.
Many companies regard their name-callers over their do-ers... and it shows.
God, does it show.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 08 2015, @09:50AM
We are sure losing resiliency in our endless chase for complexity.
Indeed. Combine that with the fact than if we lose power nothing, absolutely nothing will work. Pretty scary.
(Score: 2) by sudo rm -rf on Wednesday April 08 2015, @02:34PM
Pretty scary.
True.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by hendrikboom on Wednesday April 08 2015, @07:28PM
It *was* scary during the Montreal area ice storm in the late 90's. Only locations with emergency generators were functioning. Our house became uninhabitable, because although the furnace burned oil, and there was lots of it in the tank, the burner was, for some reason, powered by electricity, and without electricity it was unable to burn the oil. We spent a week or more in emergency shelters and a relative's house in an area which got power connected before we did. The water purification plants were also affected, with only one functioning for the entire city. If that had failed too, clean water would have been unavailable, and, of course, boil-water advisories would be moot.
I heard that the emergency organisations briefly considered evacuating the city, but rejected it as utterly infeasible.
Surface travel off-island was prohibited because the bridges had so much ice encrusted that they were unsafe for normal traffic loads. I was told they finally got them operational by having helicopters swing weights at them to break the ice off the superstructures.
I do remember a moment when I looked out a window at the shelter to see trees and shrubs coated with huge encrustations if ice. A beautiful, deadly crystal landscape.
-- hendrik
(Score: 1) by anubi on Thursday April 09 2015, @02:02AM
Your experience is exactly what I am trying to avoid.
I am in Southern California. Earthquake territory.
I know we are going to pay our dues one day just as New Orleans paid the price to be in the middle of Hurricane Alley.
And I saw how much the government "helped" them. ( the "helped" is in quotes... I guess you know why I did that. ).
I lived in a poorer area for a while. My neighbor had a diesel-powered welder. It would put out 220V as well. We had already figured out and had made some cables so we could shinny up our power pole, open the pole-pig transformer with the switch Edison already had on it, and backfeed the neighborhood with his welder's output ( or at least four houses of it ). We figured we could at least keep minimal lighting and refrigeration running with it.
The more well-to-do area I am living in now is *totally* unprepared.
I am quite frustrated since losing employment that I cannot afford to put up solar panels and water wells. I wanted the well mostly for 60 degree fahrenheit water to use for geothermal heating/air conditioning use, but wanted to leave access to the water for emergency use in the event of earthquake. And solar panels to power the whole shebang. One of my intentions was to put lots of USB and 12 volt power access in the fence posts around my home so in the event of an earthquake, my neighbors would have a place to charge cellphones and car batteries. The power would come from the solar array. I would give water too, as the city water mains are likely to lose pressure due to rupture or power failure to the pumping stations. Of course, the water is just river water and would need treatment for drinking, but would work great for sanitary/bathing/firefighting purposes. However the main obstacle I would have, even if I had the finances to do it, would be getting permission to do it.
A friend of mine, a radio amateur, even had an impromptu TV station set up in his garage, and could transmit on the old style Analog TV bands. Best of my knowledge, he only did it once, just to make sure he could get out. He picked an unused TV channel, powered up for a few seconds, transmitted, and asked me if I got it on my TV. I did. It was then put back in mothballs, awaiting the day commercial TV got knocked out with the earthquake. He had plans of asking the city's police and fire to drop by to use his setup for communication with the city if all else was failing. It never got used.
There are a lot of very well intentioned people out there, who will give selflessly of themselves for the good of their neighbors, just as we see it all the time on the internet.
Unfortunately, though, our society places permission-givers above do-ers.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Thursday April 09 2015, @04:13AM
Money enables you to buy your way out. Catastrophes disables you from anything unless it's at your disposal, right here, right now. Thus rich people may loose touch with the ground. Which is kind of interesting because in that situation it's so cheap to fix a backup for most things.
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Thursday April 09 2015, @04:10AM
I think this a good example of "oops" ..!
Of course you could splice some cable. But then you would need some materials which can't be had because there's no working or open shop. And a temporary solution might start a fire etc.
So one needs to think: If all utilities, even garbage collection.. is cut off without recourse. And nothing can be bought. Will you manage on your own? add to that some people might be tempted to grab something..
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 08 2015, @02:04PM
More accurately we are losing resiliency for ease of use. Note this was a problem with auto update. Note your problem was with, guess what? Hidden services. All in the name of making things easier for people while making errors more prone as people know less and less about more and more. A paradox for sure.