New Jaguar XJ Suffers Blue Screen of Death 301
An anonymous reader writes "CNET UK is reporting that it crashed a £90,000 Jaguar XJ Super Sport — one of the most technologically advanced cars on the planet today. It's not the sort of crash you'd imagine, however — An unforseen glitch somewhere within the car's dozens of separate onboard computers, hundreds of millions of lines of code, or its internal vehicular network, led to the dramatic BSOD, which had to be resolved with the use of a web-connected laptop."
Not a BSOD (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Not a BSOD (Score:5, Informative)
Not only is there no mention of Windows, there was apparently no actual "blue screen". The car simply didn't spring to life and the displays were blank.
Somebody obviously needed to sensationalize by using "blue screen of death" even where it wasn't.
Re:Yay! (Score:4, Informative)
They're not, though. The car didn't BSOD, and TFA makes no mention of them running any Microsoft software. They did, however, mention Linux.
No, you didn't. (Score:1, Informative)
The critical systems - brakes and steering aren't drive-by-wire and I doubt very much that the ECU is connected in any significant way to the ICE bits.
Oh, and Windows wasn't involved either. Besides, failing by not starting the engine when the car is parked seems pretty fail-safe to me...
Re:Not that surprising. (Score:5, Informative)
Three words -- Body Control Module. I don't know a damned thing about Jaguars, but with GM vehicles in general they all have a Body Control Module installed. Anything that isn't directly related to the powertrain is controlled by the BCM (incidentally, the powertrain is controlled by the Powertrain Control Module). In many GM vehicles, the BCM can be communicated with via the radio; this is to set certain user options like how long the headlamps will remain illuminated after exiting the vehicle. In the event that something goes wrong with the BCM, the radio will lock because it gets put into an anti-theft state, and typically the car will not start. All because a single capacitor on a shitty little Motorola board got cooked, for example.
Then, even if you get a used BCM with the same option codes as the one you're replacing, the radio will remain in an anti-theft state because the thinking of the designers (I guess) was that people would start swapping BCMs just to steal radios -- dumb.
GM, of course, has a tool to reprogram BCMs, but even they say there's a 50/50 shot their programming will render the BCM unusable. From my limited research of the boards they use, it seems there is little if any CRC done in any shape or form, so it sounds like the board will happily write bad or invalid data to the PROM.
Again, I don't know how a Jaguar design works, but there are vehicles where the radio does indeed affect other parts of the vehicle, much to the dismay of owners and dealers alike.
Re:Why? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Not a BSOD (Score:4, Informative)
I swear, the next person who tells me they're "Literally on fire" gets sprayed with a fire-extinguisher as an object lesson. Power or CO2, I haven't decided yet. We'll just see what feels right at the time.
Much too lenient. Halon gas.
Re:Why? (Score:5, Informative)
Engine management is a lot more sophisticated than a mechanical carburettor can ever hope to be. Between environmental regulations (cleaner air), diagnostics (cutting down on repair time) and performance (getting more from a smaller, lighter engine without compromising reliability) it's gotten quite complicated. Then there's the chassis, with ABS, ESP and other electronic driver aids. Miles of wiring have been replaced by a lighter, more reliable bus system for all electric functions in the car.
Some of this is down to ever-tighter regulation (emissions, safety). Others are due to the competitive nature of car sales: ever more features get tacked on.
Thanks to electronics, cars have gotten a lot more reliable over time. The last few years, car companies have overstepped, though, offering new features before they were ready, and not doing enough testing for proper integration.
Re:Not a BSOD (Score:5, Informative)
Unfortunately, "literally" can literally mean "metaphorically." It's in the dictionary.
I believe this is a little trick linguists have snuck in, almost as if to say "Language is not mathematics (and this will really piss off the slashdot crowd, who like both and will go nuts trying to reconcile the two!)"
"Literal" meaning "metaphorical" is also a literal irony, which is another thing that excites linguists. I think once you get the joke, it won't be so bothersome.
Re:Not that surprising. (Score:4, Informative)
GM also stopped making the Camaro from 2002-2010, that will help reduce the number stolen.
Re:Why? (Score:1, Informative)
I seriously doubt that your car can change it's Computer Aided Machining (CAM) at any time, much less automatically. I think you're talking about cams, which are the little knobs on a rotating shaft that engage levers.
Re:Not a BSOD (Score:4, Informative)
Which is why, on all for walls in one of our halon-protected DCs, there's a big red mushroom switch that aborts the system.
You'd think that would be the EPO, but that's actually a small button with a glass molly guard (and big steel hammer chained to it) that's next to it. Unexpected, but it seems the right way to go about it :)
Re:"hundreds of millions of lines of code"?! (Score:1, Informative)
It takes dozens of microprocessors running 100 million lines of code to get a premium car out of the driveway, and this software is only going to get more complex
By Robert N. Charette / February 2009
http://spectrum.ieee.org/green-tech/advanced-cars/this-car-runs-on-code
Re:Why? (Score:1, Informative)
Or you could go to a parts shop like Advance, Pep Boys, or NAPA and get a scan for free. Then you can determine whether the code tripped for something like a burnt out light or worn out gas cap that you can fix yourself, or whether it's something more vital (or emissions related) that you'd rather take to a shop for a pro to deal with.
Re:Jaguar? (Score:1, Informative)
Can you name any good programs that have come out of India? Because every occasion I know of when work has been sent there has been a disaster.
Well, I'll tell you about a failure instead of a success.
There was this project in which I was the Senior Consultant/Technical Architect, implementing a certain Supply Chain planning software, and there was a huge amount of data integration involved. Now, the sales team (Americans, all) had promised the moon to get the contract, so when I actually sat down with the client, I was horrified with the client's expectations, both in terms of work and timeline. I (and the Project Manager, both of us Indians) started convincing and negotiating the timeline and scope with the client. The client was naturally pissed and we had to take a lot of shit from them during the discussions. The issue was escalated to senior management (Americans again), and we received instructions from them to 'find a middle path' since we couldn't 'afford to lose this client'. In the end, we ended up with requirements that involved just too much customization to the pre-existing product (and a very aggressive timeline too).
Now, when we began building the team, pressure was put on us by some members of senior management (Americans, btw) to keep the number of billable resources to a minimum so that we wouldn't exceed our budget. We got together 10 resources (much less that what I'd have liked), out of which 3 were crap (But hey, that's bound to happen in any project, anywhere). I started asking the client for access to a dump of their data, or at least a subset of it. Now, their data maintenance was outsourced to a third company, and with all the bloody bureaucracy there ('Data security issues', interdepartmental protocol, and so on), it was 3 weeks before we started to get some data. Realize that I had returned to Bangalore now after taking all the shit from the client during the requirement discussions, and was building the technical team and kick-starting the project offshore. So all conversation with the customer was telephonic, not to mention the timezone issues. We had an 'on site coordinator' (American btw), but though he was technically good, he wasn't efficient in getting things done, pushing the client for data, and so on.
When we actually got the data, we found that the code we had written so far (remember, we were working blind all this while, with only the 'documents' to guide us) needed significant changes. And they never gave us a complete consistent dataset - it was all trickling in one by one, and extracted at different points in time. So we got data for salesorders which referred to certain items, while the items dataset had none of those items! Lot of such inconsistencies made life hell for us, and our database.
I won't ramble on and describe all the other shit that we had to face on that project, but the end result was an over-budget, delayed project. Which was implemented in the end, but only after the 'Indian offshore team' was blamed for all the ills of the world. As far as I know, the client is still using the product and is happy with it now - their retarded end users have got a good feel of the product by now, I suppose. But who got blamed for no fault of theirs? The Indians. Who worked their asses out to successfully finish the task inspite of being fucked from all directions? The Indians. And who gets blamed and vilified in the end? Yep, the Indians!
I have heard (and seen) similar things in several (not all) projects.
Re:Doesn't it bother you that ... (Score:3, Informative)
They are the most singularly unhelpful and woefully incomplete design documents ever created.
They should be generated from the design, not the other way around.
Wow. No. Use cases are the single most important design document in a system. They outline a task that the user wants to accomplish, and software that isn't designed around them is always a PITA to use.
Here's an real world example I'm dealing with right now, anonymized somewhat.
We manufacture widgets to client specifications. The specifications include selecting parameters within a set range. However a set of 'easy' parameters is SKU X with one set of pricing, while if they spec outside those easy parameters within a more difficult set, its SKU Y, with a different pricing and warranty.
This is fine.
However the software was designed around the client calling up, identifying the product they want, and then listing the specs. The screens are set up in such a way that you look up the customer, create, and order, add the product, and then fill out the specs.
So far so good.
Unfortunately the people communicating orders to us don't differentiate between X and Y. They just want a 'widget' and then give us parameters. So our order entry people have to essentially take note of the parameters they want, determine which sku it is, and then enter the sku and then enter the parameters.
This is because the designer failed to understand the use-case for playing an order for these widgets.
Were are looking to rectify the system by creating a product 'families' which contain the same parameter inputs. This will allow the order entry person to select the product family (which the customer knows), enter in the parameters - which they know, and the software will determine the final SKU to use at the end, based on the parameters that were entered.
This is a design that follows a use-case. We are modelling the systems behavioral requirements by detailing the actual scenario under which it gets used; in this case the particular order information is 'naturally' passed from client to order entry.
Discounting use-cases results in software that doesn't work in a way that is convenient for the user. It may be more convenient for the developer.
Getting good use cases is difficult, and its frequently done VERY POORLY. Where they often model poor processes that were being done with 'the previous system' or 'by hand'. But use cases that model what actually needs to be accomplished, and reflect the flow of information proplerly, results in elegant and easy to use systems.
Re:Why? (Score:2, Informative)
The diagnostic systems that you plug in are very, very expensive. I once had to do some work on an IBM Thinkpad with an ancient version of SCO OpenServer that was running reverse-engineered BMW/Mini diagnostic software. This unit cost $600. The official unit costs $20,000. That $85 charge seems fairly small in comparison.
Re:Why? (Score:3, Informative)
crash tests?? hey if people can still legaly ride motor cycles then i don't see the problem with not having air bags in my car.
sorry i drive a 70's MG
and if your excuse is emissions - well i pass that too (well did until 2 years ago when they got rid of doing sniffer testing)
I honestly haven't seen any real gains from what they are doing - they say that this and that gives x and y but i just don't see it.
and as for reliability.. i've had more trouble with cars with ECU's than cars with out.. to the point that i don't buy them.