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Tell HN: Azure outage

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Re: Tell HN: Azure outage

#561
I was having issues a few hours ago. I'm now able to access the portal, although I get lots of errors in the browser console, and things are loading slowly. I have services in the US-East region.

I have been having issues with GitHub and the winget tool for updates throughout the day as well. I imagine things are pulling from the same locations on Azure for some of the software I needed to update (NPM dependencies, and some .NET tooling).

Re: Tell HN: Azure outage

#562

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In europe, voting typically happens in one day, where everyone physically goes to their designated voting place and puts papers in a transparent box. You can stay there and wait for the count at the end of the day if you want to. Tom Scott has a very good video about why we don't want electronic/mail voting: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w3_0x6oaDmI

Electronic voting and mail voting are very different things though.

They both share the fact that you don't see your vote enter a ballot box.

Re: Tell HN: Azure outage

#564
post #473

It still surprises me how much essential services like public transport are completely reliant on cloud providers, and don't seem to have backups in place. Here in The Netherlands, almost all trains were first delayed significantly, and then cancelled for a few hours because of this, which had real impact because today is also the day we got to vote for the next parlement (I know some who can't get home in time befor…

Wow thats crazy! National transport infrastructure being so fragile. What a great age we live in.

It is a great age to live in where we have transportation infrastructure beyond foot paths.

Re: Tell HN: Azure outage

#565

It still surprises me how much essential services like public transport are completely reliant on cloud providers, and don't seem to have backups in place. Here in The Netherlands, almost all trains were first delayed significantly, and then cancelled for a few hours because of this, which had real impact because today is also the day we got to vote for the next parlement (I know some who can't get home in time befor…

i'm not sure this is an easily solvable problem. i remember reading an article arguing that your cloud provider is part of your tech stack and it's close to impossible/a huge PITA to make a non-trivial service provider-agnostic. they'd have to run their own openstack in different datacenters, which would be costly and have their own points of failure.

Re: Tell HN: Azure outage

#566
post #507

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is voting there a one day only event? If not, I feel the solution to that particular problem is quite clear. There’s a million things that could go wrong causing you to miss something when you try to do it in a narrow time range (today after work before polls close) If it’s a multi day event, it’s probably that way for a reason. Partially the same as the solution to above.

If India can have voters vote and tally all the votes in one day, then so can everyone else. It’s the best way to avoid fraud and people going with whoever is ahead. I am sympathetic with emergency protocols for deadly pandemics, but for all else, in-person on a given day.

> If India can have voters vote and tally all the votes in one day, then so can everyone else.

In most countries, in the elections you vote or the member of parliament you want. Presidential elections, and city council elections are held separately, but are also equally simple. But in one election you cast your vote for one person, and that's it.

With this kind of elections, many countries manage to hold the elections on paper ballots, count them all by hand, and publish results by midnight.

But on an American ballot, you vote for, for example:

    - US president
    - US senator  
    - US member of congress  
    - state governor  
    - state senator  
    - state member of congress  
    - several votes for several different state judge positions  
    - several other state officer positions  
    - several votes for several local county officers  
    - local sheriff  
    - local school board member  
    - several yes/no votes for several proposed laws, whether they should be passed or not
I don't think it would be possible to calculate all these 20 or 40 votes, if calculated by hand. That's why they use voting machines in America.

https://ballotpedia.org/Official_sample_ballots,_2020

Re: Tell HN: Azure outage

#567

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If hospitalized on that specific day: Sign the back of the voting card and give your ID to a family member, they can cast your vote

How is that an acceptable response? Honestly. You’re in the hospital, in pain, likely having a minor surgery, and having someone cast your vote for you is going to be on your mind too? Do you have your voting card in your pocket just in case this were to play out? That’s just ridiculous in my opinion. Makes me wonder how many well intentioned would be voters end up missing out each election cause shit happens and vot…

What percent of the electorate is incapacitated on voting day?

What is the that group's deviation from the general voting population's preferences?

What are the margins of the votes on those ballot questions?

Re: Tell HN: Azure outage

#568

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> CSAM Child Sex-Abuse Material?!? Well, a nice case of acronym collision.

They should rename to Success Customer Account Manager.

>> They should rename to Success Customer Account Manager.

No -- the one referencing crime should NEVER have be turned into an acronym.

Crimes should not be described in euphemistic terms (which is exactly what the acronym is)

Re: Tell HN: Azure outage

#569
post #565

It still surprises me how much essential services like public transport are completely reliant on cloud providers, and don't seem to have backups in place. Here in The Netherlands, almost all trains were first delayed significantly, and then cancelled for a few hours because of this, which had real impact because today is also the day we got to vote for the next parlement (I know some who can't get home in time befor…

i'm not sure this is an easily solvable problem. i remember reading an article arguing that your cloud provider is part of your tech stack and it's close to impossible/a huge PITA to make a non-trivial service provider-agnostic. they'd have to run their own openstack in different datacenters, which would be costly and have their own points of failure.

How ever did buses run before The Cloud™? What a weird world that must have been.

Re: Tell HN: Azure outage

#570

It still surprises me how much essential services like public transport are completely reliant on cloud providers, and don't seem to have backups in place. Here in The Netherlands, almost all trains were first delayed significantly, and then cancelled for a few hours because of this, which had real impact because today is also the day we got to vote for the next parlement (I know some who can't get home in time befor…

> wouldn't put China or Russia above this

Why would you put Microsoft above this?
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