My less than a year old Whirlpool French door fridge locked up in the
off state from an apparent power glitch. There was no indication on the
control panel that it was off. Unfortunately we were away on a one week
vacation. Of course, everything was lost. When we returned home, we
found the unit at about 58 degrees in the fridge and about the same in
the freezer. The ice in the ice maker had melted and seeped through the
gaskets warping the laminate floor. I played the Microsoft game and
attempted a reboot. First I pushed the buttons to turn off the unit and
it responded with "cooling off" on the display. And then I pushed the
buttons to turn it on. Amazingly, it started and ran. After a few
hours it was up and running perfectly. BTW, the clock on the microwave
(WP) had blanked and the the wall oven indicated PF for power failure,
but it had the correct time ... minus one minute. So apparently it was
a very short power on/off thing. When I called WP the person was very
rude. They call their call center the "Customer Experience Center" and
boy, was it an experience. She said the unit functioned properly and WP
takes no responsibility in any of it. All she kept saying was that the
unit works perfectly. BTW, I had a WP for the previous 6 years and only
replaced it because we wanted the French doors instead of a
side-by-side. It just fit better in the kitchen. Anyway, it never did
anything like this in its 6 years and I assume even now it is probably
still working for the person that bought it. This is just plain crazy.
These things should have built in safeties for this kind of thing. I
worked for 25 years in industry designing fault tolerant systems and
something like this just could not be tolerated. Am I supposed to sit
there and watch the unit 24/7/365, or hire someone when on vacation, to
come in an check it? I did find a nice little product for just over
$100 that would report the temperature inside the fridge to the
company's cloud and when it went out of range, they would send off an
email or text to me. Still not good if I am in Europe or something like
that, but, it could send to a friend with a house key. BTW, WP is
coming out later this week to check it out. There seems to be one other
problem and this is the water dispenser operation. It seems to have
shifted to a measured fill and I can't seem to make it go back to
providing water only when the paddle is pushed as it was before. If the
repair person tells me that they are all this way (the power down thing)
I will demand that WP remove the box permanently. Sorry for being so
verbose.

On Sunday, April 17, 2016 at 7:48:09 AM UTC-4, Art Todesco wrote:

I feel your pain. I would expect a fridge to restart after a power
outage. Did the customer service person say that it's designed not
to, ie if you cycle the breaker, it won't restart? I would suspect
that what happened is some unusual aspect to the power interruption,
eg low sustained voltage or something caused it to go into some
unusual state. But it's clearly not a good thing. I've never had
a fridge or freeze that did that. Did you do any experimenting
with cycling the breaker to see if you can duplicate it?

My less than a year old Whirlpool French door fridge locked up in the
off state from an apparent power glitch. There was no indication on the
control panel that it was off. Unfortunately we were away on a one week
vacation. Of course, everything was lost. When we returned home, we
found the unit at about 58 degrees in the fridge and about the same in
the freezer. The ice in the ice maker had melted and seeped through the
gaskets warping the laminate floor. I played the Microsoft game and
attempted a reboot. First I pushed the buttons to turn off the unit and
it responded with "cooling off" on the display. And then I pushed the
buttons to turn it on. Amazingly, it started and ran. After a few
hours it was up and running perfectly. BTW, the clock on the microwave
(WP) had blanked and the the wall oven indicated PF for power failure,
but it had the correct time ... minus one minute. So apparently it was
a very short power on/off thing. When I called WP the person was very
rude. They call their call center the "Customer Experience Center" and
boy, was it an experience. She said the unit functioned properly and WP
takes no responsibility in any of it. All she kept saying was that the
unit works perfectly. BTW, I had a WP for the previous 6 years and only
replaced it because we wanted the French doors instead of a
side-by-side. It just fit better in the kitchen. Anyway, it never did
anything like this in its 6 years and I assume even now it is probably
still working for the person that bought it. This is just plain crazy.
These things should have built in safeties for this kind of thing. I
worked for 25 years in industry designing fault tolerant systems and
something like this just could not be tolerated. Am I supposed to sit
there and watch the unit 24/7/365, or hire someone when on vacation, to
come in an check it? I did find a nice little product for just over
$100 that would report the temperature inside the fridge to the
company's cloud and when it went out of range, they would send off an
email or text to me. Still not good if I am in Europe or something like
that, but, it could send to a friend with a house key. BTW, WP is
coming out later this week to check it out. There seems to be one other
problem and this is the water dispenser operation. It seems to have
shifted to a measured fill and I can't seem to make it go back to
providing water only when the paddle is pushed as it was before. If the
repair person tells me that they are all this way (the power down thing)
I will demand that WP remove the box permanently. Sorry for being so
verbose.

The joys of having microprocessors control everything. There may be a firmware update for your refrigerator. Contact someone who actually works on these refrigerators to get the real story.

On 04/17/2016 05:48 AM, Art Todesco wrote:
I played the Microsoft game and attempted a reboot. First I pushed the buttons to turn off the unit and it responded with "cooling off" on the display. And then I pushed the buttons to turn it on. Amazingly, it started and ran. After a few hours it
was up and running perfectly.

Seems like every device I own that has any kind of a microcomputer in it, needs to be rebooted at least once per year.

But having to reboot a refrigerator to get it to cool again is absolutely totally unacceptable.

Maybe you can get W to exchange it for a model without a microcomputer control?

On 4/17/2016 7:48 AM, Art Todesco wrote:
My less than a year old Whirlpool French door fridge locked up in the
off state from an apparent power glitch.


These things should have built in safeties for this kind of thing. I
worked for 25 years in industry designing fault tolerant systems and
something like this just could not be tolerated. Am I supposed to sit
there and watch the unit 24/7/365, or hire someone when on vacation, to
come in an check it?

Wow, that is completely unacceptable. We bought a new Samsung French
door and I may just cut the power to see what happens. To not reset is
a major problem if you are away for a day.

I'd certainly try to find out what the problem was. Even though they
have exclusions in the warranty, if it is a design problem you may be
able to get something out of them for your losses. Refrigerators should
come back on with no intervention.

On Sun, 17 Apr 2016 06:48:05 -0500, Art Todesco
wrote:

My less than a year old Whirlpool French door fridge locked up in the
off state from an apparent power glitch. There was no indication on the
control panel that it was off. Unfortunately we were away on a one week
vacation. Of course, everything was lost. When we returned home, we
found the unit at about 58 degrees in the fridge and about the same in
the freezer. The ice in the ice maker had melted and seeped through the
gaskets warping the laminate floor. I played the Microsoft game and
attempted a reboot. First I pushed the buttons to turn off the unit and
it responded with "cooling off" on the display. And then I pushed the
buttons to turn it on. Amazingly, it started and ran. After a few
hours it was up and running perfectly. BTW, the clock on the microwave
(WP) had blanked and the the wall oven indicated PF for power failure,
but it had the correct time ... minus one minute. So apparently it was
a very short power on/off thing. When I called WP the person was very
rude. They call their call center the "Customer Experience Center" and
boy, was it an experience. She said the unit functioned properly and WP
takes no responsibility in any of it. All she kept saying was that the
unit works perfectly. BTW, I had a WP for the previous 6 years and only
replaced it because we wanted the French doors instead of a
side-by-side. It just fit better in the kitchen. Anyway, it never did
anything like this in its 6 years and I assume even now it is probably
still working for the person that bought it. This is just plain crazy.
These things should have built in safeties for this kind of thing. I
worked for 25 years in industry designing fault tolerant systems and
something like this just could not be tolerated. Am I supposed to sit
there and watch the unit 24/7/365, or hire someone when on vacation, to
come in an check it? I did find a nice little product for just over
$100 that would report the temperature inside the fridge to the
company's cloud and when it went out of range, they would send off an
email or text to me. Still not good if I am in Europe or something like
that, but, it could send to a friend with a house key. BTW, WP is
coming out later this week to check it out. There seems to be one other
problem and this is the water dispenser operation. It seems to have
shifted to a measured fill and I can't seem to make it go back to
providing water only when the paddle is pushed as it was before. If the
repair person tells me that they are all this way (the power down thing)
I will demand that WP remove the box permanently. Sorry for being so
verbose.

It evidently isn't just a Whirlpool problem. I did a search for
refrigerator power glitch lockup. Samsung Galaxy can do the same thing.
http://support-us.samsung.com/cyber/popup/iframe/pop_troubleshooting_fr.jsp?idx=32312&modelname=RM2 57ABRS/XAA
or http://alturl.com/e6ydi


--
Using Opera's mail client: http://www.opera.com/mail/

In article ,
says...

On 04/17/2016 05:48 AM, Art Todesco wrote:
I played the Microsoft game and attempted a reboot. First I pushed the buttons to turn off the unit and it responded with "cooling off" on the display. And then I pushed the buttons to turn it on. Amazingly, it started and ran. After a few hours it
was up and running perfectly.

Seems like every device I own that has any kind of a microcomputer in it, needs to be rebooted at least once per year.

But having to reboot a refrigerator to get it to cool again is absolutely totally unacceptable.

Maybe you can get W to exchange it for a model without a microcomputer control?


The good old mechanical devices seem to work for years and not give any
problems. The computers seem to have all kinds of problems if there is
a voltage spike or sometimes just have a problem with them that no one
can find.

At work there was a microprocessor that was used to detect the level in
a vessel. It worked like a giger counter for radiation. We had about
30 of them. When they were first installed we found they had a habbit
of locking up at some level. That caused either over flow or running
empty. That could be a $ 50,000 problem. Some point level detectors
were installed to warn us of the problem.

The factory came out with the 'solution' There was a 'watch dog timer'
put in the softwear. Every day at 7 AM the instrument would do a reset.
Seemed to work most of the time. We also had many high dollar
controlers that seemed to hang up and the standard 'cure' was to cut the
power off for a few seconds and restrt.

On Sunday, April 17, 2016 at 6:48:09 AM UTC-5, Art Todesco wrote:
My less than a year old Whirlpool French door fridge locked up in the
off state from an apparent power glitch. There was no indication on the
control panel that it was off. Unfortunately we were away on a one week
vacation. Of course, everything was lost. When we returned home, we
found the unit at about 58 degrees in the fridge and about the same in
the freezer. The ice in the ice maker had melted and seeped through the
gaskets warping the laminate floor. I played the Microsoft game and
attempted a reboot. First I pushed the buttons to turn off the unit and
it responded with "cooling off" on the display. And then I pushed the
buttons to turn it on. Amazingly, it started and ran. After a few
hours it was up and running perfectly. BTW, the clock on the microwave
(WP) had blanked and the the wall oven indicated PF for power failure,
but it had the correct time ... minus one minute. So apparently it was
a very short power on/off thing. When I called WP the person was very
rude. They call their call center the "Customer Experience Center" and
boy, was it an experience. She said the unit functioned properly and WP
takes no responsibility in any of it. All she kept saying was that the
unit works perfectly. BTW, I had a WP for the previous 6 years and only
replaced it because we wanted the French doors instead of a
side-by-side. It just fit better in the kitchen. Anyway, it never did
anything like this in its 6 years and I assume even now it is probably
still working for the person that bought it. This is just plain crazy.
These things should have built in safeties for this kind of thing. I
worked for 25 years in industry designing fault tolerant systems and
something like this just could not be tolerated. Am I supposed to sit
there and watch the unit 24/7/365, or hire someone when on vacation, to
come in an check it? I did find a nice little product for just over
$100 that would report the temperature inside the fridge to the
company's cloud and when it went out of range, they would send off an
email or text to me. Still not good if I am in Europe or something like
that, but, it could send to a friend with a house key. BTW, WP is
coming out later this week to check it out. There seems to be one other
problem and this is the water dispenser operation. It seems to have
shifted to a measured fill and I can't seem to make it go back to
providing water only when the paddle is pushed as it was before. If the
repair person tells me that they are all this way (the power down thing)
I will demand that WP remove the box permanently. Sorry for being so
verbose.

It appears that the simpler a machine is, the more reliable it is. A mechanical thermostat can wear out but it won't be damaged by a power surge and it doesn't cost $500 to replace. A standard thermal overload for a refrigerator does a pretty good job of protecting a compressor and it's $5 to replace. I love gee wizz fancy electronics but when I want something to work every time, I go with old school. ^_^

[8~{} Uncle Reliable Monster

On Sun, 17 Apr 2016 07:48:05 -0400, Art Todesco
wrote in

Sorry for being so
verbose.

Thanks for reporting the experience. Let us know how it turns out.
--
Web based forums are like subscribing to 10 different newspapers
and having to visit 10 different news stands to pickup each one.
Email list-server groups and USENET are like having all of those
newspapers delivered to your door every morning.

On 4/17/16 7:48 AM, Art Todesco wrote:
My less than a year old Whirlpool French door fridge locked up in the
off state from an apparent power glitch. There was no indication on the
control panel that it was off. Unfortunately we were away on a one week
vacation. Of course, everything was lost. When we returned home, we
found the unit at about 58 degrees in the fridge and about the same in
the freezer. The ice in the ice maker had melted and seeped through the
gaskets warping the laminate floor. I played the Microsoft game and
attempted a reboot. First I pushed the buttons to turn off the unit and
it responded with "cooling off" on the display. And then I pushed the
buttons to turn it on. Amazingly, it started and ran. After a few
hours it was up and running perfectly. BTW, the clock on the microwave
(WP) had blanked and the the wall oven indicated PF for power failure,
but it had the correct time ... minus one minute. So apparently it was
a very short power on/off thing. When I called WP the person was very
rude. They call their call center the "Customer Experience Center" and
boy, was it an experience. She said the unit functioned properly and WP
takes no responsibility in any of it. All she kept saying was that the
unit works perfectly. BTW, I had a WP for the previous 6 years and only
replaced it because we wanted the French doors instead of a
side-by-side. It just fit better in the kitchen. Anyway, it never did
anything like this in its 6 years and I assume even now it is probably
still working for the person that bought it. This is just plain crazy.
These things should have built in safeties for this kind of thing. I
worked for 25 years in industry designing fault tolerant systems and
something like this just could not be tolerated. Am I supposed to sit
there and watch the unit 24/7/365, or hire someone when on vacation, to
come in an check it? I did find a nice little product for just over
$100 that would report the temperature inside the fridge to the
company's cloud and when it went out of range, they would send off an
email or text to me. Still not good if I am in Europe or something like
that, but, it could send to a friend with a house key. BTW, WP is
coming out later this week to check it out. There seems to be one other
problem and this is the water dispenser operation. It seems to have
shifted to a measured fill and I can't seem to make it go back to
providing water only when the paddle is pushed as it was before. If the
repair person tells me that they are all this way (the power down thing)
I will demand that WP remove the box permanently. Sorry for being so
verbose.

Wonder if the problem is the microprocessor got zapped from a power
surge that accompanied the power failure?

--
€œIm interested in making sure we get the maximum amount of revenue from
those who can well afford to provide it.€�
- Hillary Clinton, February 11, 2016

On 4/17/2016 10:16 AM, Dean Hoffman wrote:


It evidently isn't just a Whirlpool problem. I did a search for
refrigerator power glitch lockup. Samsung Galaxy can do the same thing.
http://support-us.samsung.com/cyber/popup/iframe/pop_troubleshooting_fr.jsp?idx=32312&modelname=RM2 57ABRS/XAA

or http://alturl.com/e6ydi



That makes me feel just great. Bought a Samsung a few month ago. At
least a couple of times a year the power goes out from something, even
though it is usually just a couple of minutes.

On Sun, 17 Apr 2016 10:43:26 -0400, Ralph Mowery
wrote:

In article ,
says...

On 04/17/2016 05:48 AM, Art Todesco wrote:
I played the Microsoft game and attempted a reboot. First I pushed the buttons to turn off the unit and it responded with "cooling off" on the display. And then I pushed the buttons to turn it on. Amazingly, it started and ran. After a few hours it
was up and running perfectly.

Seems like every device I own that has any kind of a microcomputer in it, needs to be rebooted at least once per year.

But having to reboot a refrigerator to get it to cool again is absolutely totally unacceptable.

Maybe you can get W to exchange it for a model without a microcomputer control?


The good old mechanical devices seem to work for years and not give any
problems. The computers seem to have all kinds of problems if there is
a voltage spike or sometimes just have a problem with them that no one
can find.

At work there was a microprocessor that was used to detect the level in
a vessel. It worked like a giger counter for radiation. We had about
30 of them. When they were first installed we found they had a habbit
of locking up at some level. That caused either over flow or running
empty. That could be a $ 50,000 problem. Some point level detectors
were installed to warn us of the problem.

The factory came out with the 'solution' There was a 'watch dog timer'
put in the softwear. Every day at 7 AM the instrument would do a reset.
Seemed to work most of the time. We also had many high dollar
controlers that seemed to hang up and the standard 'cure' was to cut the
power off for a few seconds and restrt.

Use a compressor restart protector with about a 5 minute restore delay
mounted in a box with a plug and receptacle for the refrigerator and
power.
--
Mr.E

On 4/17/2016 4:48 AM, Art Todesco wrote:
My less than a year old Whirlpool French door fridge locked up in the off state
from an apparent power glitch. There was no indication on the control panel
that it was off.

Amazingly, it started and ran. After
a few hours it was up and running perfectly. BTW, the clock on the microwave
(WP) had blanked and the the wall oven indicated PF for power failure, but it
had the correct time ... minus one minute. So apparently it was a very short
power on/off thing. When I called WP the person was very rude. They call
their call center the "Customer Experience Center" and boy, was it an
experience. She said the unit functioned properly and WP takes no
responsibility in any of it. All she kept saying was that the unit works
perfectly.

This is just plain crazy. These things should have built in safeties for
this kind of thing. I worked for 25 years in industry designing fault tolerant
systems and something like this just could not be tolerated.

It's just a bad design.

Unfortunately, most people "writing code" are "programmers", nowadays.
Writing software for a "computer" and writing software for an "appliance"
(embedded system) are entirely different experiences and require very
different skill sets. Just because there's a computer *in* it doesn't
MAKE IT a computer!

[Amazing how many people are naive about this -- which is exemplified in
your reported experience. Programmers and managers think "code is code".
Their goal is to get something that *looks* like its correct in the least
amount of time and for the least number of dollars -- out of the greatest
number of interchangeable brains.

Just like doing the books for a small Ma&Pa firm should be the exact
same sort of experience as doing the books for a large multinational:
ledgers are ledgers, right? Or working on a lawnmower engine the same
as a big V8?]

And, of course, designing the *hardware* for an embedded system is
an entirely different issue than designing (or *buying*, COTS) the
hardware for your "computer"

Install a normally closed pushbutton switch in the power line to
your PC. *Briefly* push it to interrupt the power to the PC
and see what happens. Will it reboot? Or not? (I have machines
that fall into both categories). The more oversized the power
supply (i.e., UNDERSIZED your current utilization), the greater the
chance that the computer will weather the outage -- until, of
course, the outage is long enough that the power supply
can't maintain the load!

If it reboots, it *won't* bring all your applications back and leave
you in the exact same state that things were in when the power
"glitched". it won't even remember whether you had NumLock and
CapsLock on or off on your keyboard (Gee, how hard would it be to
remember whether two *bits* were 0 or 1?). etc. The "computer"
expects YOU to fix things to your liking.

An appliance, OTOH, is expected to REMEMBER what it was doing and continue
as if nothing had happened!

As appliances have to be able to run 24/7/365, they have to address these
sorts of problems (and others).

When power is applied, the entire circuit must stabilize before the
processor can "come out of reset". There may be several voltages
that have to stabilize in order for it to be able to perform its
intended function. In addition, there are usually very precise
constraints on exactly HOW these voltages stabilize: X must be
"up" to its tolerance before Y by at least Z milliseconds -- but no
more than W!

When power *nominally* goes away, all of these supplies drop to 0
in a predictable manner. And, the process can repeat.

Exceptions to these "textbook" sequences can actually result in
electronic devices "latching" (where nothing the processor will
do CAN undue the effects as it happens IN the semiconductors).

You can design to handle "blackouts" (total loss of power), "brownouts"
(reduced power) and "dimouts" (brief outages). But, you have to do
this deliberately: "how should I react in each of these cases?"

And, in each of these scenarios, there are "I/O's" that must be
treated in specific ways. E.g., you can't just let the compressor
turn on while you "gather your wits" -- thinking that you can turn it
back OFF once you're refocused on the task at hand (what happens
if you never get back to "normal"? Do you let the compressor
stay in that running state? How do you stop it if you've crashed??)

Likewise, you can't just power up and decide: "Oh, refrigerator is
warm, let me turn on the compressor, as intended!" Because you
*don't* know what happened while power was off -- nor how long
it was off (unless someone has deliberately taken extraordinary design
measures to provide this information to you!), you can't know if the
compressor WAS on just a few moments ago. In which case, your turning
it on now will overstress the motor (trying to start into a large load).

On top of all that, you have to hope that the software never encounters
an anomaly that it isn't prepared to handle (in the simplest sense,
this is a "bug". But, might actually be some characteristic of the system
that rarely occurs and the designer wasn't prepared to address
(e.g., an underdamped system "rings") -- "Gee, I never saw that before!
But, yeah, the theory SAYS it can happen...".

Finally, you have to hope the system never glitches due to random failures.
Even "transient" failures. E.g., alpha particle radiation can "flip"
bits in memory as can "cosmic rays". Likewise, "electrical noise" can
cause signals to appear to be other than they truly are. Your PC probably
has ECC memory in it to detect and correct these intermittent errors; most
appliances don't! (cost constraints)

[Most "programmers" are clueless on all of these issues. "I stored a 27
in this memory location, so, there *will* be a 27 there when I go to look
it up, later! Right?"]

On 4/17/2016 7:43 AM, Ralph Mowery wrote:
The good old mechanical devices seem to work for years and not give any
problems. The computers seem to have all kinds of problems if there is
a voltage spike or sometimes just have a problem with them that no one
can find.

The mechanical devices weren't called on to do the same sorts of
things that the electronic things do -- nor at the same price-points!

Look at a simple set-back (programmable) thermostat. No-brainer in terms
of functionality. How would you implement it, with electromechanical
devices? Put 4 thermostats together and have a clockwork mechanism that
connected *one* of the thermostats to the wires that actually talk to the
"plant"?

At work there was a microprocessor that was used to detect the level in
a vessel. It worked like a giger counter for radiation. We had about
30 of them. When they were first installed we found they had a habbit
of locking up at some level. That caused either over flow or running
empty. That could be a $ 50,000 problem. Some point level detectors
were installed to warn us of the problem.

The factory came out with the 'solution' There was a 'watch dog timer'
put in the softwear. Every day at 7 AM the instrument would do a reset.
Seemed to work most of the time. We also had many high dollar
controlers that seemed to hang up and the standard 'cure' was to cut the
power off for a few seconds and restrt.

Are you sure the "watchdog timer" operated in that manner? Most watchdog
timers need to be "fed" periodically by "well behaving" software -- "pet
the watchdog". Failing to do so results in the watchdog unilaterally
resetting the device

(note that this assumes there is a means by which the device can be reliably
reset -- that will handle all possible failure/lockup modes!)

Even the design of the watchdog circuitry itself requires careful consideration
to ensure that it:
- doesn't activate unless actually needed
- can't be falsely placated by software that *appears* to be working
(but, in reality, is stuck in an endless "pet the watchdog" loop)

E.g., I design products that often have to work, reliably, in very hostile
environments; places where the "user" is deliberately trying to subvert
"proper" operation (think: devices that are driven by or control access
to MONEY). If a user (adversary) discovers that glitching the power will
result in obtaining something "for free" that he'd otherwise have to
pay for, then you can BET that folks will be glitching the power -- and
posting YouTube videos about how to do it -- all the time!

Most designers/developers aren't accustomed to working in this sort of
environment. These are the same sorts who leave security holes in
programs because they assumed no one would ever type in a FIRST NAME
that was 395 letters long! (hint: there ARE no first names that are
that long; the user was deliberately trying to BREAK your code!!)

My early 1970's avocado green GE is getting all frosted up again after
6 months or maybe a year.... which is kind of to be expected since it
wasn't a frost free refrigerator to start with.
Along these lines, I've got a fancy arse Samsung big screen smart TV
with a great picture but to use the sleep timer, well I don't because it
takes to many clicks in various places to set the sleep timer with the
remote and it's just to much trouble so I let the damn thing stay on all
night, but I have an older Emerson with a sleep button right on the
remote that I can and do use.

On 4/17/2016 12:18 PM, My 2 Cents wrote:
Along these lines, I've got a fancy arse Samsung big screen smart TV with a
great picture but to use the sleep timer, well I don't because it takes to many
clicks in various places to set the sleep timer with the remote and it's just
to much trouble so I let the damn thing stay on all night, but I have an older
Emerson with a sleep button right on the remote that I can and do use.

SWMBO relies heavily on the sleep timer for her "stereo". But, it
is implemented with ease of use in mind:
- turn on the power
- press button repeatedly until desired time is displayed
She knows that pressing the button 10 times will result in a 2:00
delay. Button has lots of tactile feedback so you *know* when it
has been pressed (not true of all remotes). So, she doesn't even
have to look at the display.

Biggest user interface "FAIL" I've encountered was a MUTE function that
automatically UN-muted when you "did anything"! So, if you muted the
TV to field a phone call (or, allow someone else in the room to do so),
you couldn't channel surf -- without hitting the DOWN VOLUME key,
repeatedly (the first press will unmute the TV!) before you start
flipping channels.

On Sunday, April 17, 2016 at 10:43:25 AM UTC-4, Ralph Mowery wrote:
In article ,
says...

On 04/17/2016 05:48 AM, Art Todesco wrote:
I played the Microsoft game and attempted a reboot. First I pushed the buttons to turn off the unit and it responded with "cooling off" on the display. And then I pushed the buttons to turn it on. Amazingly, it started and ran. After a few hours it
was up and running perfectly.

Seems like every device I own that has any kind of a microcomputer in it, needs to be rebooted at least once per year.

But having to reboot a refrigerator to get it to cool again is absolutely totally unacceptable.

Maybe you can get W to exchange it for a model without a microcomputer control?


The good old mechanical devices seem to work for years and not give any
problems. The computers seem to have all kinds of problems if there is
a voltage spike or sometimes just have a problem with them that no one
can find.

At work there was a microprocessor that was used to detect the level in
a vessel. It worked like a giger counter for radiation. We had about
30 of them. When they were first installed we found they had a habbit
of locking up at some level. That caused either over flow or running
empty. That could be a $ 50,000 problem. Some point level detectors
were installed to warn us of the problem.

The factory came out with the 'solution' There was a 'watch dog timer'
put in the softwear. Every day at 7 AM the instrument would do a reset.
Seemed to work most of the time. We also had many high dollar
controlers that seemed to hang up and the standard 'cure' was to cut the
power off for a few seconds and restrt.

Some microcontrollers have a built-in watchdog timer, for use in
critical apps. Once activated, the software has to write a certain
data value to a certain I/O location to keep it from forcing a reset.
Good chance that kind of feature would have saved Philo's food.

On 4/17/2016 5:14 AM, John G wrote:

The joys of having microprocessors control everything. There may be a
firmware update for your refrigerator. Contact someone who actually works
on these refrigerators to get the real story.

That depends on how the failure manifested itself.

If the processor has "gone off into left field", most MCU's (single-chip
computers found in many appliances) have provisions for a watchdog timer
to reset the device (if not appropriately "stroked").

[Many also have black- and brown-out protection; whether it is used
properly is a different story!]

But, it is relatively easy to write software that fails in such a way
as to keep the watchdog happy! (thereby defeating its purpose).
"Gee, I need to stroke/pet the watchdog regularly. Why don't I put
that code in this timing loop that ALWAYS runs (interrupt routine)
EVEN WHEN THE SOFTWARE HAS CRASHED!"

If, OTOH, the failure is the result of a hardware issue (e.g., improper
sequencing of power supplies, persistent voltages present on I/O pins before
the pins can be programmed for their desired purpose, etc.) then the
fix will be a new revision of the controller board.

[Finding that this is, indeed, the case will be a major hurdle in most
cases! Manufacturers aren't eager to disclose these sorts of DESIGN
errors as that would mean everyone gets a freebie repair. Instead,
they'll gamble that you won't experience the problem until after your
warranty has expired.]

IIRC, Elecrolux had an issue with the location of the temperature sensor
in one (or more?) of their refrigerator models. The sensor would think
it was comfortable at the desired temperature -- but the food was many degrees
warmer than it indicated. (I guess expecting a refrigerator to maintain
a desired temperature wasn't one of their design goals?)

Note that the same sorts of problems existed in The Good Old Days (do you
really think the dial on your oven was "calibrated" to YOUR particular
oven's performance? (hint: remove knob, flip it over and examine back)

Is it possible the power glitch was very short, just long enough that the compressor stopped, and then power came back on while there was still compressed Freon between the compressor and the expansion valve, and the unit turned off to avoid having the compressor try to start against the existing back pressure?

In article , lid
says...

On 4/17/2016 7:43 AM, Ralph Mowery wrote:


The factory came out with the 'solution' There was a 'watch dog timer'
put in the softwear. Every day at 7 AM the instrument would do a reset.
Seemed to work most of the time. We also had many high dollar
controlers that seemed to hang up and the standard 'cure' was to cut the
power off for a few seconds and restrt.

Are you sure the "watchdog timer" operated in that manner? Most watchdog
timers need to be "fed" periodically by "well behaving" software -- "pet
the watchdog". Failing to do so results in the watchdog unilaterally
resetting the device


A watchdog timer may be the wrong term for what they did, but that is
the way it worked. The device had 2 memories in it. One was the working
or running memory and there there was another memory EEPROM. Every
morning that thing would cause a blip in the process because it put out
bad data for about 30 seconds while the EEPROM was downloaded back into
the main working memory.

That was that companies solution to the locking up problem. I don't
recall them locking up any more after that 'fix'.
Crappy way of doing things, but changing out the equipment for another
kind was not an option.

On 4/17/2016 8:45 PM, Ralph Mowery wrote:
A watchdog timer may be the wrong term for what they did, but that is
the way it worked. The device had 2 memories in it. One was the working
or running memory and there there was another memory EEPROM. Every
morning that thing would cause a blip in the process because it put out
bad data for about 30 seconds while the EEPROM was downloaded back into
the main working memory.

That was that companies solution to the locking up problem. I don't
recall them locking up any more after that 'fix'.
Crappy way of doing things, but changing out the equipment for another
kind was not an option.

Sad that your Management tolerated that from a vendor/supplier!

If you had a clock that had to be reset each day at 7AM, you'd
have to wonder why the CORRECT time was ONLY important at 7AM
and not at 6:55A.

Or, how could you have confidence that it was even operating properly
at 7:03A?

I don't understand why people tolerate buggy software/systems.
You wouldn't tolerate a (new!) vehicle that "stalled" once a day.
(or even once a week) So, why put up with a (software) product
that is effectively doing the same?

On Sunday, April 17, 2016 at 6:37:17 PM UTC-4, wrote:
Is it possible the power glitch was very short, just long enough that the compressor stopped, and then power came back on while there was still compressed Freon between the compressor and the expansion valve, and the unit turned off to avoid having the compressor try to start against the existing back pressure?

That would explain a 10 min delay in starting, not a permanent one.

"Art Todesco" wrote in message
...
My less than a year old Whirlpool French door fridge locked up in the
off state from an apparent power glitch. There was no indication on the
control panel that it was off. Unfortunately we were away on a one week
vacation. Of course, everything was lost. When we returned home, we
found the unit at about 58 degrees in the fridge and about the same in
the freezer.

Wow. I would try to recreate that issue by putting the unit on a power
strip and varying the times you leave it off for. If you CAN reliably
recreate it, I think you have legal recourse in terms of an implied warranty
and it being unfit when compared to the industry standard.

And you have damages and outright denial on top of it. The rude treatment
in my experience often comes when a company thinks it has potential
exposure. Egghead denied they had been hacked for quite a while before they
fessed up (and went out of business).

Control software written in house is usually pretty sloppy as is evidenced
by how easily hackers get into things like car and even aircraft computer
systems.

You probably have the makings of a national news item on your hands. (-:
Ask not for whom the bell tolls . . .

--
Bobby G.

"Don Y" wrote in message

stuff snipped

These are the same sorts who leave security holes in
programs because they assumed no one would ever type in a FIRST NAME
that was 395 letters long! (hint: there ARE no first names that are
that long; the user was deliberately trying to BREAK your code!!)

Or his cat or dog was sitting on the keyboard. Google just spit out an
error message about such an incident that echoed back the long string of
nonsense characters that says, simply: "Malformed request."

I once had an operator who consistently missed the shift key and hit CTRL.
Took the installation of a keystroke recorder to figure that out because as
you might imagine, CTRL plus any number of other keys can cause real havoc.

--
Bobby G.

"Don Y" wrote in message

stuff snipped

I don't understand why people tolerate buggy software/systems.

$$$ - Bug free SW, if it exists, tends to be very, very expensive because of
all the testing and code reviews it entails.

You wouldn't tolerate a (new!) vehicle that "stalled" once a day.

Compare your choice in vehicles to your choice in OS's and that becomes one
reason people tolerated the Blue Screen of Death and so many other lockup
problems. Sadly I've had to reboot my electronics heavy car more than once
recently and I have no confidence the dealer would be able to fix the
problem (open door buzzer sounds when key is withdrawn).

(or even once a week) So, why put up with a (software) product
that is effectively doing the same?

Lack of choices. My friend switched to a chromebook which locks up at least
once a day. Currently PC systems are way too complex to ever be considered
bug-free. Even Apple, with its notorious tight control of everything, put
out a very buggy Quicktime for Windows that's bad enough to rank as a
national security threat.

--
Bobby G.

"trader_4" wrote in message news:ec8abcec-

stuff snipped

Some microcontrollers have a built-in watchdog timer, for use in
critical apps. Once activated, the software has to write a certain
data value to a certain I/O location to keep it from forcing a reset.
Good chance that kind of feature would have saved Philo's food.

Agreed. There are things they should do/could do to work around this
problem and if it happens to enough people to warrant a recall, they
probably will. It depends on how often it occurs and under what conditions.

A simple power blip should not cause a fridge to fail to restart. There
could be compressor protection issues involved, but even those could be
worked around. Even surges could be damped at the device itself.

If it was my refrigerator, I would be trying to duplicate the problem (on
video) and if I could easily do so, I would be making life difficult for
Whirpool until they resolved the matter.

--
Bobby G.

On 4/18/2016 12:12 PM, Robert Green wrote:
"Don Y" wrote in message

stuff snipped

These are the same sorts who leave security holes in
programs because they assumed no one would ever type in a FIRST NAME
that was 395 letters long! (hint: there ARE no first names that are
that long; the user was deliberately trying to BREAK your code!!)

Or his cat or dog was sitting on the keyboard. Google just spit out an
error message about such an incident that echoed back the long string of
nonsense characters that says, simply: "Malformed request."

The point is, you don't let a user decide what *you* will accept.
You make allowances for what you would reasonably expect. Then,
*enforce* those limits -- rather than letting the user exceed them
and wreak havoc on your UNSUSPECTING software.

A colleague was just about finished with a project he'd been working on
for more than a year. I looked over his shoulder, in passing, and asked
what he was working on, at that instant. Then, typed in something
and hit ENTER -- crashing his program instantly! (keep in mind, he thinks
he's pretty much DONE)
"What the hell did you just do???"
"I typed whatever!"
"But, you're not supposed to do that!"
"Then why did your program LET ME?"

A "potential client" flew me out to look at a system they were developing.
Basically, an electronic "lock" (for hotels, etc.). Gave me the grand tour
which ended with a presentation of their prototype.

My host gave me a two or three minute demo of how the system worked. I
asked if I could play with it; "Go right ahead!"

(keep in mind I have never seen this before two or three minutes earlier)

Standing sideways (so my host could see everything that I was doing),
I proceeded to instruct the system to make me a "Grand Master" key
(one that would allow me into any lock). I'm sure my host thought
this was just the sort of thing someone "playing" might want to do...

I went through all the steps, mimicking what he'd shown me a few minutes
earlier. Then, just before actually MAKING the key, I unplugged one
particular connector. My host was
suddenly nervous. I just smiled...

....and made a Grand Master key.

Then, proudcly held it up for him to see.

And kept smiling as I made two more!

Then, plugged in the connector and hit CANCEL. Stood aside for him to
read the message on the screen:
"Operation canceled. 0 keys made"
as I held the three keys out for him.

"You're not supposed to do that!"
"Then why did IT let me?"

People get too focused on trying to make something sort-of work and
ignore how it *should* work. And, because they RARELY sit down and
write a specification that they (and others) could review BEFORE
implementation, they leave these sorts of gaping holes all over!

I once had an operator who consistently missed the shift key and hit CTRL.
Took the installation of a keystroke recorder to figure that out because as
you might imagine, CTRL plus any number of other keys can cause real havoc.

On 4/18/2016 12:19 PM, Robert Green wrote:
"Don Y" wrote in message

I don't understand why people tolerate buggy software/systems.

$$$ - Bug free SW, if it exists, tends to be very, very expensive because of
all the testing and code reviews it entails.

That's not true. The costs are only high because people keep
RE-writing the same software over and over again and never thoroughly
test ANY of it! So, each rewrite reintroduces many of the same bugs
(which incurs many of the same test and repair costs)

Instead, if you write something *for* reuse, you have an incentive to
test it, automate that testing (so you can REtest it to reassure yourself
that it's still working at a later date) AND completely document how
it works and the conditions under which it is GUARANTEED to work.

When I build/design something, I include a clause in my contract that
essentially says: "I'll fix any mistakes, for free". No time limit
or other weasel words. So, any of MY mistakes cut into my profit.
As a result, I don't let mistakes creep into my finished product!

A client might complain that it doesn't do something that they had
HOPED or IMAGINED it would do. In which case, I point to the
specification that WE jointly wrote and agreed to and ask why he
didn't put those requirements into the specification -- if he
truly WANTED those things? How can he expect me to come up with a
price and completion schedule WITHOUT knowing what he wants?
(i.e., the specification DECLARES his needs and my obligations).

Like asking a builder to build you a home -- then complaining because
you'd expected it to have a swimming pool, jacuzzi, 3 car garage
and sunken living room! ("Where does it call out those things
in the contract? Clearly they would increase the cost of building
the house so why would you EXPECT them to be given to you if not
explicitly required??")

But, employers (and clients) either don't know how to specify what
they want ("I'll know what I *don't* want, after you've SHOWN it
to me!"); or are afraid to do so out of fear of what it might cost
or otherwise entail; or want the freedom to be able to change their
mind -- right up until the very last instant (and expect those changes
to have no consequences on the cost, schedule, reliability, etc.)

Once you start formalizing "software components" -- much like any
OTHER components you encounter in life (we all know what to
expect from a #2-56x3/4 inch PHMS!) -- then you can make those
components more reliable. And *prove* their reliability with one-time
testing!

Unlike real-world components, software has the delightful characteristic
that it can be PERFECTLY reproduced in infinite quantities. You don't
have to test every (identical) copy of a program like you would have
to test every SCREW that you produced!

You wouldn't tolerate a (new!) vehicle that "stalled" once a day.

Compare your choice in vehicles to your choice in OS's and that becomes one
reason people tolerated the Blue Screen of Death and so many other lockup
problems. Sadly I've had to reboot my electronics heavy car more than once
recently and I have no confidence the dealer would be able to fix the
problem (open door buzzer sounds when key is withdrawn).

PC's represent a TINY, INSIGNIFCANT portion of the software that is out there.

Think of all the "computerized things" that you interact with, daily.
First, forget the software that's *on* your PC's disk (or in your PC's RAM).
Instead, consider the software INSIDE your:
- keyboard
- mouse
- CD/DVD drive
- hard disk drive
- monitor, etc.

Your microwave oven, refrigerator, washer, dryer, dishwasher, furnace,
thermostat, doorbells, toasters, irrigation timer, swimming pool controller,
stereo, TV, VCR/DVD player, DVR, satellite box, cable converter, cordless
phone, cell phone (forget "apps"), PMP, "home weather station" (or remote
thermometer), garage door opener, clock radio, bathroom scale, water
meter, electric meter, etc.

If you've been in a doctor's office, the temple thermometer, sphygmomanometer,
scale (designed for greater accuracy and reliability than your bathroom scale),
portable EKG, AED, and countless other "specialized" devices, etc.

Your car probably has 30 processors in it -- not counting any aftermarket
devices you may have added/installed. The gas pump where you fill up.
Even the tire inflator, tire balancer, nitrogen generator, OBD reader, etc.
that are used on your behalf!

And, we've not really ventured beyond what a "typical" person encounters
in day to day living! I.e., those of us with bits of electronic test
equipment would include soldering iron, device programmer, oscilloscope/DSO,
frequency counter, waveform generator, LRC meter, DMM, etc.

The thing that all of these appliances have in common (for the most part)
is that they can't be easily/inexpensively/compassionately "updated"!
You can't just "turn on automatic updates" and magically expect bugs
to be patched. So, there needs to be extra care up front to ensure
problems/bugs don't get out "into the wild".

(or even once a week) So, why put up with a (software) product
that is effectively doing the same?

Lack of choices. My friend switched to a chromebook which locks up at least
once a day. Currently PC systems are way too complex to ever be considered
bug-free. Even Apple, with its notorious tight control of everything, put
out a very buggy Quicktime for Windows that's bad enough to rank as a
national security threat.

Again, you're just thinking about desktops/PC's. Not "refrigerators"
(like the OP)

In article ,
says...

"Don Y" wrote in message

stuff snipped

I don't understand why people tolerate buggy software/systems.

$$$ - Bug free SW, if it exists, tends to be very, very expensive because of
all the testing and code reviews it entails.

You wouldn't tolerate a (new!) vehicle that "stalled" once a day.

Compare your choice in vehicles to your choice in OS's and that becomes one
reason people tolerated the Blue Screen of Death and so many other lockup
problems. Sadly I've had to reboot my electronics heavy car more than once
recently and I have no confidence the dealer would be able to fix the
problem (open door buzzer sounds when key is withdrawn).

(or even once a week) So, why put up with a (software) product
that is effectively doing the same?

Lack of choices. My friend switched to a chromebook which locks up at least
once a day. Currently PC systems are way too complex to ever be considered
bug-free. Even Apple, with its notorious tight control of everything, put
out a very buggy Quicktime for Windows that's bad enough to rank as a
national security threat.

As MS had about 15 years to fix the bugs in Win XP and never did seem to
get them all, then mentionthat it was going to quit suporting it and to
go to a new operating system, makes one wonder how bad Win 10 is going
to be.

I remember when the calculator in WFWG or so had a big bug in it. Maybe
it was Dos 6.x instead, long time and I don't recall, but you could put
in something like 6.1 and substract 6.0, whatever the numbers were you
got zero instead of .01 . It stayed that way for a long time.

On 4/18/2016 3:35 PM, Ralph Mowery wrote:
As MS had about 15 years to fix the bugs in Win XP and never did seem to
get them all, then mentionthat it was going to quit suporting it and to
go to a new operating system, makes one wonder how bad Win 10 is going
to be.

Look through the descriptions of each patch ("update"). Dig deeper
to see the actual underlying causes. Invariably, buffer overrun errors
(or something similar).

Jeez, how many times do you have to get bitten by this same problem
before you do *something* to prevent it from happening again? How many
times are you going to get kicked in the nuts before you start wearing a
cup?

I remember when the calculator in WFWG or so had a big bug in it. Maybe
it was Dos 6.x instead, long time and I don't recall, but you could put
in something like 6.1 and substract 6.0, whatever the numbers were you
got zero instead of .01 . It stayed that way for a long time.

(s.b., 0.1)

Exactly. They'll rewrite the same software (functionality) over (and
over!) again and make the same mistakes over (and over!) again. Quality
never improves. Because they start digging each hole *fresh* instead
of finishing off the one they started, previously!

It's like having a serious illness and switching doctors after he's run
countless tests -- and ruled out many potential problems -- just to
start all over again with a new doctor and the same tests! (and
dumping THAT doctor at the same point that you dumped the previous)

"Don Y" wrote in message
...
On 4/18/2016 12:19 PM, Robert Green wrote:
"Don Y" wrote in message

I don't understand why people tolerate buggy software/systems.

$$$ - Bug free SW, if it exists, tends to be very, very expensive
because of
all the testing and code reviews it entails.

That's not true.

Disagree VERY STRONGLY. Of course something that requires careful planning
and lots of testing will be more expensive unless you live in an alternate
dimension. I am not sure you've ever worked on any truly large coding
projects if you actual believe what you just wrote.

The costs are only high because people keep
RE-writing the same software over and over again and never thoroughly
test ANY of it!

And they do that to keep development costs down. Change that paradigm and
as I said, costs go up. Sometimes way up. We have someone here who
designed fault tolerant systems. They are *always* way more expensive than
COTS because of the increased development and testing time. Besides, you
can't be seriously trying to tell me that starting from scratch is going to
cost the same as reusing (perhaps) buggy code that works "well enough?"

So, each rewrite reintroduces many of the same bugs
(which incurs many of the same test and repair costs)

Instead, if you write something *for* reuse, you have an incentive to
test it, automate that testing (so you can REtest it to reassure yourself
that it's still working at a later date) AND completely document how
it works and the conditions under which it is GUARANTEED to work.

And magic elves that work for free do that kind of work? Not in my
dimension/membrane/universe. (-:

When I build/design something, I include a clause in my contract that
essentially says: "I'll fix any mistakes, for free". No time limit
or other weasel words. So, any of MY mistakes cut into my profit.
As a result, I don't let mistakes creep into my finished product!

"We perfect people", as my old MD friend used to chide me when I said
something like "I don't make mistakes."

Anyone who's ever upgraded their OS to see programs that didn't make the
jump knows that you can control your little corner of the world, but not the
whole thing. I bet I can break any piece of software you've ever written in
some fashion because of all the other people *you* have to rely on to make
your code work. There's always a weak link somewhere. If I recall my CMSC
prof correctly, it's virtually impossible to certify any non-trivial program
as error free. Just too much complexity. Maybe things have changed since
then, but I doubt it.

--
Bobby G.

On 4/19/2016 12:42 AM, Robert Green wrote:
"Don Y" wrote in message
...
On 4/18/2016 12:19 PM, Robert Green wrote:
"Don Y" wrote in message

I don't understand why people tolerate buggy software/systems.

$$$ - Bug free SW, if it exists, tends to be very, very expensive
because of
all the testing and code reviews it entails.

That's not true.

Disagree VERY STRONGLY.

Well, my ~40 years of experience designing high reliability, mission
critical systems says otherwise. No lawsuits, dead patients, bankrupt
casinos, etc. chasing me down!

You seem to have swallowed the "we don't have time to do it right -- but we'll
have time to do it OVER" pill.

On 4/19/2016 4:31 AM, Don Y wrote:


Well, my ~40 years of experience designing high reliability, mission
critical systems says otherwise. No lawsuits, dead patients, bankrupt
casinos, etc. chasing me down!

You seem to have swallowed the "we don't have time to do it right -- but we'll
have time to do it OVER" pill.



Agreed!

Not only does M$ have more holes than Swiss cheese, now they are a bunch of sneaky *******s.


KB3035583 - Just say NO!

"Don Y" wrote in message
...
On 4/19/2016 12:42 AM, Robert Green wrote:
"Don Y" wrote in message
...
On 4/18/2016 12:19 PM, Robert Green wrote:
"Don Y" wrote in message

I don't understand why people tolerate buggy software/systems.

$$$ - Bug free SW, if it exists, tends to be very, very expensive
because of
all the testing and code reviews it entails.

That's not true.

Disagree VERY STRONGLY.

Well, my ~40 years of experience designing high reliability, mission
critical systems says otherwise. No lawsuits, dead patients, bankrupt
casinos, etc. chasing me down!

Sorry to be blunt but the coding experience of a totally anonymous person
has to be evaluated in those terms. I could tell in about five minutes
looking at your code, pseudo-code and design plan what kind of a coder you
are. Not so via self-report data on the web.

What I can do remotely is challenge the assertion that writing totally
bulletproof code is just a matter of caring and not of money. I say it's
almost ALL money and can cite quite a few studies that examine all the
factors that lead into software purchasing decisions.

You sound very much like a lone cowboy programmer. What works on a small
scale often does not work on a large scale. Do you have a colleague that
knows all your projects, contacts, guarantees made and has the ability to
execute repairs in case you're incapacitated? If not, your clients probably
don't have much experience or have never been "keymanned" - i.e. suffered
the loss of a critical, irreplaceable employee.

Structured walk-throughs, code reviews, automated testing, beta testing, bug
hunting all cost money, especially when done at the scale of say Google (who
offers $100,000 to hackers who can break into their browser) all cost money.
Setting aside the time to properly assess the requirements, put project
management into place and then test, test and test cost money, money and
more money. And more importantly time. Big companies don't want to hear
you're still bug hunting when it's time to roll out a new corporate HR
system.

You seem to have swallowed the "we don't have time to do it right -- but
we'll
have time to do it OVER" pill.

I haven't swallowed anything. I just don't think you have much real world
experience in developing large 1000 user software systems. And when we're
talking Windows bugs, that the scale we're discussing. My opinion is also
shaped by the discussion of the rather antique PCs you used for something -
don't recall - I just recall thinking when I read that the further you get
from COTS hardware, the more nervous your client *should* become. I'm old
enough to remember neXT and neXT cube computers. (-:

Without seeing one shred of code, documentation or list of clients or
projects, things are whatever you say they are your qualifications.
It's like judging a photo contest over the radio.

However, your writings speak some things very clearly, especially when you
seem to be claiming that bug free software shouldn't cost any more than
standard "bug here and there" software.

That's just a no-sale based on what it takes to develop plain old "good
enough" Microsoft quality code. I've been through a very fair share of
testing at corporate levels. I know how sausage is made.

Most non-trivial software is too complex to fully test - ever - and release
into the wild means many people will be actively pounding every routine they
can reach.

So what if SW gets patched now and then as long as it does get patched?
That's why I am so confident I could breach your systems or your code if I
could actually access them instead of just taking your word that they're
"Yuge!" (-;

Unlike some others here, I believe the fact that Windows and everything that
runs on it *mostly* works is a miracle of our time and one that's almost
over. Do you know how many different types of motherboards and board
configurations something like XP is expected to run on?

--
Bobby G.

On 4/19/2016 5:24 PM, Speedy wrote:

You seem to have swallowed the "we don't have time to do it right -- but we'll
have time to do it OVER" pill.

Agreed!

Not only does M$ have more holes than Swiss cheese, now they are a bunch of
sneaky *******s.

KB3035583 - Just say NO!

As long as you allow someone to install software (in the guises of
"updates") on your computer, you are entirely at their mercy.
They could choose to install all of the "features" of W10 on your
machine -- and still let it report the name of the OS as YOU
last remember it!

(Hey, you should be thankful! You're getting all this NEW TECHNOLOGY
without having to DO anything to get it! : ]

On 4/19/2016 9:38 PM, Robert Green wrote:
Without seeing one shred of code, documentation or list of clients or
projects, things are whatever you say they are your qualifications.
It's like judging a photo contest over the radio.

So, its obviously not worth a moment of my time to respond, here.

Thanks!

"Don Y" wrote in message
...
On 4/18/2016 3:35 PM, Ralph Mowery wrote:
As MS had about 15 years to fix the bugs in Win XP and never did seem to
get them all, then mentionthat it was going to quit suporting it and to
go to a new operating system, makes one wonder how bad Win 10 is going
to be.

Look through the descriptions of each patch ("update"). Dig deeper
to see the actual underlying causes. Invariably, buffer overrun errors
(or something similar).

Jeez, how many times do you have to get bitten by this same problem
before you do *something* to prevent it from happening again? How many
times are you going to get kicked in the nuts before you start wearing a
cup?

Clearly you've not worked on a large team programming effort. It's easy to
spot because of how you say "I design, I program, I etc." I would NEVER
hire you because of that. If you get sick, who fills in for you?

What you describe keeps happening because folks like MS *have* to reuse
code. To fix some of the problems that have occurred in Windows or Linux
often requires patching because starting from scratch would be prohibitively
expensive. Change something in the kernel and everything dependent on the
old structure could break.

I remember when the calculator in WFWG or so had a big bug in it. Maybe
it was Dos 6.x instead, long time and I don't recall, but you could put
in something like 6.1 and substract 6.0, whatever the numbers were you
got zero instead of .01 . It stayed that way for a long time.

(s.b., 0.1)

Exactly. They'll rewrite the same software (functionality) over (and
over!) again and make the same mistakes over (and over!) again. Quality
never improves.

That's certainly NOT true. Even though code size increases dramatically,
major companies like Google, MS and Oracle keep very close track of the
number of bugs they have to fix. We both know that buffer exploits are
becoming more and more rare as coders learn to pay more attention to parsing
input effectively. They learn that by looking at bug reports and trying to
insure they DON'T make the same mistakes.

https://www.blackhat.com/presentatio...erguson-WP.pdf

claims that "traditional style overflow [have] become more and more rare"
and that tracks with the exploit reports that I see from sites like:

https://www.qualys.com/research/top10/

Remote code execution and privilege elevation seem to be the winners
nowadays because coders have finally learned to parse input correctly.

This article from Wikipedia notes that adding protection, especially via
software, can add significant overhead - translation: there are real costs
associated with armoring programs.

In computer security, executable space protection is the marking of memory
regions as non-executable, such that an attempt to execute machine code in
these regions will cause an exception. It makes use of hardware features
such as the NX bit, or in some cases software emulation of those features.
However technologies that somehow emulate or supply an NX bit will usually
impose a measurable overhead; while using a hardware-supplied NX bit will
impose no measurable overhead.

So it's not only coders that have to up their game, it's machine makers,
too.

Because they start digging each hole *fresh* instead
of finishing off the one they started, previously!

Hmmm. Seems like we're talking OS's now and not just refrigerator firmware.
(-: It doesn't really matter for the points I've been trying to make, chief
among them that taking extra care means taking extra time and costs extra
money and corporations and most clients have resource and time constraints.

I've written lots of SW and managed lots of coders. Perfect software isn't
a matter of just trying harder, it's like anything else in the world - a
tradeoff between cost and time that is bound to affect the quality of the
finished project. Did people stop using WFWG because of a calculator bug?
Doubtful.

It's like having a serious illness and switching doctors after he's run
countless tests -- and ruled out many potential problems -- just to
start all over again with a new doctor and the same tests!

Just had this happen to me. The first CAT scan didn't reveal a problem but
the second did. Sometimes a new doctor and the same tests can find a
problem that the old doctor couldn't.

(and
dumping THAT doctor at the same point that you dumped the previous)

Which is why the idea that someone like MS will throw away less than perfect
code to try again for perfection from scratch just doesn't fly. Once an OS
is released, a lot of other programs depend on it being consistent. Every
change or bug fix is likely (and often does) create a host of unexpected
interactions. Who here *hasn't* been hosed by an update at one time or
another?

It doesn't sound like much of the code you create gets exposed to legions of
hackers (or even users) like IOS, Windows and Linux. Code you *think* is
perfect (like the old Army adage about battle plans) rarely survives contact
with the enemy.

That's why I make the claim I can break anything you've written (that's
non-trivial), especially with access to the source code. Especially if it
has to "face" the net. I've never seen a perfect coder. I've seen some
very good ones, and that could be you, but I've also seen far more coders
who *think* they are top-notch. However, a super-smart, super-careful and
super-efficient coder is rare and if he becomes "unavailable" for any
reason, it's hell on wheels to find anyone whose smart enough to understand
it.

--
Bobby G.


--
Bobby G.

On Wednesday, April 20, 2016 at 9:50:22 AM UTC-4, Robert Green wrote:


Exactly. They'll rewrite the same software (functionality) over (and
over!) again and make the same mistakes over (and over!) again. Quality
never improves.

That's certainly NOT true. Even though code size increases dramatically,
major companies like Google, MS and Oracle keep very close track of the
number of bugs they have to fix. We both know that buffer exploits are
becoming more and more rare as coders learn to pay more attention to parsing
input effectively. They learn that by looking at bug reports and trying to
insure they DON'T make the same mistakes.


Never mind MS and Oracle. It's not true even for embedded applications,
like the fridge or a piece of communications gear. Unless the existing
code is a total wreck because it was done by amateurs or there is some
specific need to redo the whole thing, the existing software is typically
what's used as a starting point. Being able to keep, reuse that existing
code is usually the top priority, over anything else. For example, hardware
engineers might want to switch to a different microprocessor based on
performance, cost, power, etc. Software managers, project managers,
engineering management
will overrule them because the cost and investment on new software, starting
from scratch, exceeds those other considerations by an order of magnitude.
Sure, there are exceptions, if it's some simple design, where the software
is no big deal. But even for a fridge, the natural starting point would
likely be the existing code, not start with new code.

On Wed, 20 Apr 2016 00:38:23 -0400, "Robert Green"
wrote:



Unlike some others here, I believe the fact that Windows and everything that
runs on it *mostly* works is a miracle of our time and one that's almost
over. Do you know how many different types of motherboards and board
configurations something like XP is expected to run on?

+1
For all the anti-Windows talk, nobody has come up *their* replacement.
Not even close.

On 4/20/2016 8:02 AM, Vic Smith wrote:
For all the anti-Windows talk, nobody has come up *their* replacement.
Not even close.

Have you heard of iOS and Android? Together, they represent 93% of
the mobile market. "Windows Phone" accounts for all of 2.5% of
that market.

Do you understand that desktop sales are (and have been) in decline?
To the tune of 5-10% annually? And, that in many countries, mobile
devices now exceed the number of desktop devices? I.e., those old
copies of Windows have been dispatched to the bitbucket -- along
with the hardware on which they ran.

http://www.computerworld.com/article/3050931/microsoft-windows/windows-comes-up-third-in-os-clash-two-years-early.html

In Gartner's current forecast, Windows will dip 3.4% in 2016 to
283 million devices shipped while Apple's OS X/iOS will climb 2.1%
to 303 million. By the end of the forecast window -- the calendar
year 2018 -- Windows will be even farther behind, shipping 298
million devices compared to Apple's 334 million.

(Note the use of the units "Million")

"Overall, Gartner's latest forecast continued the trend of pessimism
not only for Windows, but for all device shipments. The researcher now
believes 2.41 billion computing devices will ship in 2016 -- 80.4% of
them smartphones -- compared to a same-year prediction of 2.46 billion
made in the fall of 2015."

(Note the use of the units "Billion")

Sure looks like Windows has long passed it's peak. With the
"replacement" being iOS and Android.