Posted on 03/15/2010 3:54:27 PM PDT by dickmc
While the Toyota portion of the article is informative, the really interesting is the authors remarks on:
As anyone with experience in embedded systems will tell you, there are nasty software bugs that can be extremely difficult to reproduce in a laboratory test environment. To illustrate, I'd like to describe one such bug we encountered at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory while developing the flight software for NASA's Mars Pathfinder spacecraft....
much more experience is detailed in the article here which is quite interesting and well worth reading.
(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...
It’s more of a wetware glitch.
This is the way government competes in the marketplace.
A glitch between the ears of the drivers, a gray matter glitch.
The software is set on Kamikaze OverDrive. It was adapted from WW2 Japanese Zero fighter hardware. It is in the file folder titled “Banzai!”
Seriously folks there is no glitch, Do you actually believe obama? He’s a bold face straight liar and he took over GM. R U kidding me!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!. Toyota has been hijacked by a commie regime
Nasty software bugs in 40 million cars sold on a global basis?
Only incidents are a broke grifiter with a failed porn site, who’s Prius is about to be repossessed and a cop in a Lexus loaner with floor mats that do not fit.
40 million cars with glitchy software would be crashing in every town. This is an Obama, trial lawyer, Goobermint Motors & UAW shakedown to get UAW leaches in transplant non-union factories.
B for Brake pedal
G for Gas pedal
L for headlights
B-B-G-L-G-L-B-B-G-G Will make your car jump to ludicrous speed. Try it, it works.
“Wetware” is the human mind. I more or less called it driver error, but with a play on the words “software glitch” from the headline.
A glitch between the ears of the drivers, a gray matter glitch.Bingo!
In most cases like this, the problem is usually the "nut behind the wheel."
DRIVER error.I don't particularly like Toyota, but I don't like seeing them get SLIMED in the government-owned meda, either.
As a former software engineer, I developed software for motor drives (controls) used in industrial applications. A software bug could literally kill someone. If I had a car that depended on software to control the engine and brakes, I would install a hard-wired kill switch.
Too bad that Toyota mechanics can’t fix stupid drivers.
I would suppose that Toyota would greatly prefer to find out that this is a software bug— and therefore a software fix. Flashing new code into the computer is likely far, far less expensive to fix than a mechanical or design flaw.
But in any case, isolating the root cause(s) of extremely rare failure(s) is harder than it sounds.
Toyota: "Moving Forward"
...whether YOU want to,
or not!
Obama got his facts from that indisputible source of knowledge in the auto industry, the eminent engineer, Ron Givemthefinger of the UAW.
Code ping
YES, OF COURSE!! It was a SOFTWARE GLITCH that gave us teh dreaded Mann Hocky Stick Graph, RIGHT?? You know, like the way the overdraft on your account was due to a computer error when your paycheck was deposited into somebody else’s account...if you wan to talk PROGRAMMING, you can come up with ANYTHING. Ever tried troubleshooting Windows? I did for several versions.
So his POINT is......? IIRC, the Answer is 48.
Also there is a very interesting technical, business, and computer/software risk occurrence and "screw up" reporting site called The Risks Digest that is well worth looking at from time to time if you are interested in monitoring this kind of thing. It also has an RSS feed that you can subscribe to.
So this is Hope and Change?
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