Y2K-EMBEDDED '...but the big difference is the culture...'
From:
2k-times.com
John
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Gerry Docherty ged@rtel.demon.co.uk
Embedded systems and real-time problems
...
'But the big difference is the culture which surrounds real-time or
embedded systems in production environments. Real-time systems can be very complex, and they are used to control or monitor very high-value processes.
...
Because the production processes are so valuable, production managers
and engineering staff fear the failure of real-time systems. When
real-time systems fail, high-value processes shut down, and the costs
of unexpected shutdowns can be enormous. For oil platforms,
pharmaceutical manufacturers or power stations, the cost of an
unexpected shutdown can be hundreds of thousands of pounds. Even for small manufacturing companies, the costs are crucial, because the production process is their only true source of income. The pressure to keep the production process running is great. As a result, production managers resist changes to embedded systems on the if it ain't broke, don't fix it basis.
This means that when the next version of the operating system comes along, it is not automatically installed. If improved functionality
could be achieved by upgrading bespoke software, it is not acted upon. Hardware which is no longer supported by the manufacturer remains in use. The result is a bunch of ageing systems, based on languages, packages and processors for which the skills are gradually being lost. Because of this culture, fixing the Year2000 problems is more complicated than for banking or a dministrative applications.
...
From what we can see, few manufacturing companies have recognised the scale of the problem yet. Systems are not yet failing, because real-time systems tend to have a lookahead of less than a month. So the failures will come late in 1999. Nonetheless, from our work over the past six months in this area, we know that the likelihood of failure of embedded systems is high. The companies we are working with are in the vanguard. The big organisations might be able to sort themselves out by throwing money at the problem, though resources will be very scarce. The small manufacturers are in trouble - most of them don't know they have a potential problem, and when they find out, they'll find it very difficult to compete with the big boys for decent skilled staff. ' |
