5 ms·

I think the bigger point is that smart devices should gracefully degrade to dumb devices.

• n0us 10y ago
  But then you wouldn't have to buy another one.
• markild 10y ago
  YES! Light switch not online, still switches lights. Smoke detector not connected to wifi, still beep when detecting smoke. The "smart" part is for convenience, not to create unnecessary dependencies. I'm a bit tired of seeing things that obviously only need access to local resources fail when the internet goes out.
• nicktelford 10y ago
  Very good point. It always disappoints me when I encounter systems that seem to ignore the Fallacies of Distributed Computing[1]. 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fallacies_of_distributed_computing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fallacies_of_distributed_compu...
  • JoeAltmaier 10y ago
    I spent 5 years programming around those 8 fallacies for a web-conference company (ok maybe 3 fallacies reworded). Bottlenecks, network topology changes, different rules on different networks. Means you have to measure each connection and code multiple strategies. Probably should open-source that stuff, because its a growing problem and no sign of relief in sight.
• edejong 10y ago
  the thing I keep failing to understand is: why do these devices need to block while updating? Can't they just use two (small) memory-banks and download the image to bank 2 while working from the first one and do one quick switcheroo in a couple of milliseconds? (edit: question marks should mark the end of sentences which are questions)
  • Bartweiss 10y ago
    From the security we've seen in these devices, I'm assuming that would be both a financial and technical no-go. The standard practice appears to be buying a minimum-cost board and loading it up with some stolen open-source software - sensible hot-swapping would be far too demanding for that. (But yes, that really should be the case. It could also support elegant failures back to the previous firmware version.)
    • dom0 10y ago
      IoT devices seem to be the result of putting web people in charge of embedded development. Not to defend emb. devs... some truly horrendous stuff out there as well.
      • krallja 10y ago
        I think it's the opposite; they put the embedded developers, who (rightly) have no sense of the insane challenge of doing security, in charge of talking to the Web.
        • vonmoltke 10y ago
          I disagree with that characterization. Engineers working on connected devices, Web or not, should be cognizant of security issues. That many aren't I see as a problem. For that matter, I don't think most web developers have a proper sense of security challenges, either.
        • dTal 10y ago
          Does it have to be either/or? You need both types of developers, and they have to talk to each other, and you have finite hiring resources. These are very different cultures, and the failure mode is either broken system software, which will get noticed and fixed, or broken security, which likely won't.
  • witty_username 10y ago
    You don't need that. Linux does that without using two separate memory banks. (You only need to reboot for kernel updates, and that can be reduced with kexec) Your idea is pretty similar to having a hypervisor running two VMs and switching from one to the another. There's no need to have two separate memory banks.
• 794CD01 10y ago
  The kettle in the story does do that. The user simply chose to continue to try to get it working as intended, rather than pressing the boil button on the kettle base and going on with his day.
• aaron695 10y ago
  Any examples of devices that don't??