4 ms·
How Complex Systems Fail (1998) [pdf]
- sjbase 10y agoIt's worth noting this was published in 2000. Interesting read though, I especially like "Failure free operations require experience with failure" <-- obvious, but easy to lose sight of.
- dang 10y agoMany posts, but one discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8282923 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8282923 https://hn.algolia.com/?query=How%20Complex%20Systems%20Fail%20%5Bpdf%5D&sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=story&storyText=false&prefix&page=0 https://hn.algolia.com/?query=How%20Complex%20Systems%20Fail...
- ryanmarsh 10y agoFantastic discussion. Glad you posted it. I'd hate to have not seen these arguments.
- delias_ 10y agoJohn Allspaw at Etsy talks about these safety culture luminaries all the time.
- sunils34 10y agoRichard Cook's writing and talks on systems have hugely shaped my thinking on systems. For those interested in more, he gave a highly entertaining talk on system resiliency here and introduces a helpful model. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PGLYEDpNu60 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PGLYEDpNu60 I also wrote a post summarizing how I think about Rasmussen’s model in startups and web applications. https://medium.com/@sunils34/managing-systems-ecbf161066cf https://medium.com/@sunils34/managing-systems-ecbf161066cf
- pdkl95 10y ago> a highly entertaining talk on system resiliency Thanks for posting that! It's a great summary and explanation of the fail safe attitude that should be the foundation for all complex systems.
- markc 10y agoThese same principles are explored more completely and systematically by Nancy Leveson in her writings, specifically https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/engineering-safer-world https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/engineering-safer-world (free pdf) and her yearly workshops at MIT (also free!).