United Airlines System-Wide Computer Problem • Hacker News Board

Re: United Airlines System-Wide Computer Problem

#41

Post by sopooneo » Wed, Jul 08, 2015, 1:44 PM UTC

DougWebb wrote: post #27

yAnonymous wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I doubt it. Nobody wants to pay for that.

You might be right, unfortunately. If it's cheaper to buy insurance that will cover the (expected) losses caused by outages, most organizations will choose to do that instead of making the software more failure-resistant. The problem is that insurance only works well for isolated incidents, but a software failure can cause a cascading failure with a huge impact. Insurance companies generally aren't prepared for that…

But aren't the insurance companies smart enough to figure this out and start correcting their rates to be much higher?And if they actually have their acts together, wouldn't those same insurance companies start insisting on basic audits of their client's systems?

I actually don't know about this stuff, so any correction of my thoughts is appreciated.

Re: United Airlines System-Wide Computer Problem

#42

Post by jsingleton » Wed, Jul 08, 2015, 1:44 PM UTC

raus22 wrote: post #13

Off-topic: Please use ISO 8601 format(YYYY-MM-DD) for dates in titles. The US date format hurts my poor logical soul. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_8601

For future proofing please use 5 digit years (YYYYY-MM-DD) e.g. 02015-07-08. :P

Re: United Airlines System-Wide Computer Problem

#43

Post by toong » Wed, Jul 08, 2015, 1:45 PM UTC

DougWebb wrote: post #27

yAnonymous wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I doubt it. Nobody wants to pay for that.

You might be right, unfortunately. If it's cheaper to buy insurance that will cover the (expected) losses caused by outages, most organizations will choose to do that instead of making the software more failure-resistant. The problem is that insurance only works well for isolated incidents, but a software failure can cause a cascading failure with a huge impact. Insurance companies generally aren't prepared for that…

Cascading failure will be covered in the expected loss, so insurance fees go up and up ?

Re: United Airlines System-Wide Computer Problem

#44

Post by smackfu » Wed, Jul 08, 2015, 1:45 PM UTC

imgabe wrote: post #17

United is a mess. I had the misfortune of flying with them a couple months ago. I ended up in a city a 2 hour drive from my actual destination and had to rent a car on my own to get to where I was going. That was the worst of it, but almost every flight I saw on the way (both ones I was on and other flights at nearby gates) was delayed or overbooked or otherwise messed up in some way.

Was there a storm or something? Usually there is some motivating reason why flights are screwed up.

Re: United Airlines System-Wide Computer Problem

#45

Post by ceejayoz » Wed, Jul 08, 2015, 1:46 PM UTC

lectrick wrote: post #11

danso wrote: post #2

Very little news about this on Google News, but heard over the local Chicago ABC affiliate that the FAA attributed this to an "automation error" Edit: And its Twitter account has been relatively inactive, with more than 30 minutes since the last reply-to or general tweet...presumably a lot complaining tweets have come in in the last 30 minutes https://twitter.com/united/with_replies

Just a minute ago they tweeted about it: https://twitter.com/united/status/618769524544942081

Took them until just now to go "oh, we should probably post something that isn't a @reply".

https://twitter.com/united/status/618777538865799168

Re: United Airlines System-Wide Computer Problem

#46

Post by kendallpark » Wed, Jul 08, 2015, 1:48 PM UTC

Was reading this on HN and heard it on NPR simultaneously.

I have a sneaking suspicion that booking systems for most airlines run atop legacyware. It just seems like the type of thing that would've been put in place long ago and then be very expensive to migrate/updgrade.

Re: United Airlines System-Wide Computer Problem

#47

Post by amelius » Wed, Jul 08, 2015, 1:48 PM UTC

raus22 wrote: post #13

Off-topic: Please use ISO 8601 format(YYYY-MM-DD) for dates in titles. The US date format hurts my poor logical soul. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_8601

Or use JSON: {"year": 2015, "month":7, "day":8}

Re: United Airlines System-Wide Computer Problem

#48

Post by exelius » Wed, Jul 08, 2015, 1:48 PM UTC

raus22 wrote: post #13

Off-topic: Please use ISO 8601 format(YYYY-MM-DD) for dates in titles. The US date format hurts my poor logical soul. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_8601

We'll get around to it just as soon as we get around to using the metric system and providing universal health care.

Re: United Airlines System-Wide Computer Problem

#49

Post by Lancey » Wed, Jul 08, 2015, 1:51 PM UTC

snarfy wrote: post #37

raus22 wrote: post #13

Off-topic: Please use ISO 8601 format(YYYY-MM-DD) for dates in titles. The US date format hurts my poor logical soul. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_8601

There's little endian, big endian, and the US date format, which I like to call middle endian.

Wouldn't the PC term be middle Native American?

Re: United Airlines System-Wide Computer Problem

#50

Post by leopoldo » Wed, Jul 08, 2015, 1:51 PM UTC

sk5t wrote: post #22

raus22 wrote: post #13

Off-topic: Please use ISO 8601 format(YYYY-MM-DD) for dates in titles. The US date format hurts my poor logical soul. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_8601

See also: https://xkcd.com/1179/

I love how they write the dates when you hover over the image. XKCD.