Chris M
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Post by Chris M on Apr 27, 2018 16:51:24 GMT
Embedded systems (such as signalling systems and ATC are) have much longer lifespans than home or office systems as they do one job for which they are highly optimised and which generally doesn't change and they don't get random software installed on them. They also tend to start from an older base which is more reliable as most of the bugs have been found and fixed - reliability is massively more important than having the latest features, upgrades are limited to only what is required and they are thoroughly tested before being applied.
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Post by Tomcakes on Apr 27, 2018 20:04:50 GMT
And many are isolated from networks, so security risks are less of a concern. I still have about a dozen NT4 or W2k machines in use and one running a flavour of DOS. I often think they belong in a museum!
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Post by mattb on Apr 27, 2018 22:29:31 GMT
Slight dip in the National Grid’s Hampster population. All seems to have been rectified now thankfully!  |
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rincew1nd
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Post by rincew1nd on Apr 27, 2018 22:37:29 GMT
I’m assuming it’s a power failure affecting the control room? I saw this posted yesterday when news broke of the power failure:  Whilst obviously not accurate for reality, it made me grin. |
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Post by holborncentral on Apr 27, 2018 22:37:58 GMT
And many are isolated from networks, so security risks are less of a concern. I still have about a dozen NT4 or W2k machines in use and one running a flavour of DOS. I often think they belong in a museum! I think they do belong in a museum! If they're old enough to belong in one,they're old fossils. I have a Windows XP machine at home I need to get rid of. The university I go to has a computer museum which sometimes opens to the public. You could always donate your old fossils to them I was up there last year for a retro games night and I was playing on an old Mac and someone said to me'you should get one of those, 400 euro on eBay, better than the modern rubbish!'  |
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rincew1nd
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Post by rincew1nd on Apr 27, 2018 22:44:48 GMT
I still have a Windows XP machine, it proved useful when (now-former) HWMBO discovered a box of 3½" floppy discs when clearing his teenage bedroom prior to his parents moving house. The discs were simply labelled "1" "2" "3" et cetera and having waited 20mins for the machine to boot we discovered that (as expected) the contents of the discs was something not suitable for this forum!
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Post by londonstuff on Apr 27, 2018 22:45:00 GMT
I’m assuming it’s a power failure affecting the control room? I saw this posted yesterday when news broke of the power failure: Whilst obviously not accurate for reality, it made me grin. That’s basically what’s rumoured to have happened when the BA meltdown happened last May, the first day of half term 😂 They say it eventually cost them over £100 million 😬🙈 |
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Post by jamesb on Apr 27, 2018 23:25:13 GMT
The departure boards still weren't working at about 17:30, a secondary issue, and I was grateful that the trains were running. However, it is confusing at Stratford when there are up to 3 trains, not knowing which will depart first: people were walking en mass at a leisurely pace, and the doors closed, leading to people holding them open. It was all a bit of a guessing game!
Was the piece of equipment that feeds information to these boards damaged by the power surge/cut/restoration?
The entire system doesn't appear to be very resilient... As rare as a failure of this nature might be.
TfL are still not showing any live departures for the Jubilee on their website.
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Post by crusty54 on Apr 28, 2018 2:25:42 GMT
The departure boards still weren't working at about 17:30, a secondary issue, and I was grateful that the trains were running. However, it is confusing at Stratford when there are up to 3 trains, not knowing which will depart first: people were walking en mass at a leisurely pace, and the doors closed, leading to people holding them open. It was all a bit of a guessing game! Was the piece of equipment that feeds information to these boards damaged by the power surge/cut/restoration? The entire system doesn't appear to be very resilient... As rare as a failure of this nature might be. TfL are still not showing any live departures for the Jubilee on their website. The boards at Stratford (and Stanmore) are confusing at the best of times. The figure 1 on the top line should not be there. It was a power surge rather than a failure. These can cause real problems with any electrical equipment. There should have been protection. |
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Post by countryman on Apr 28, 2018 8:04:07 GMT
Reliability is massively more important than having the latest features, upgrades are limited to only what is required and they are thoroughly tested before being applied. Like the TSB?? |
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Post by norbitonflyer on Apr 28, 2018 8:28:43 GMT
Reliability is massively more important than having the latest features, upgrades are limited to only what is required and they are thoroughly tested before being applied. Like the TSB?? The driver for change at TSB was the regulator's requirement that it be separated from its old parent company (Lloyds) and migrate to its new Spanish parent company's system. I doubt they would have bothered otherwise. |
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Apr 28, 2018 13:17:11 GMT
Saturday and the departure boards are still not working...
Could they not install £100 UPS to protect their systems from a power surge?
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Ben
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Post by Ben on Apr 28, 2018 18:38:55 GMT
It doesn't sound like use of the emergency control room has been very successful in controlling things - is its spread of capability not the same as the normal control room? What is the scope of redundancy?
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Post by djlynch on Apr 28, 2018 18:48:06 GMT
Second only to old technology is new technology mimicking old technology. My employer still submits data to regulators in a text-based format that is largely unchanged from when a major constraint on record length was the number of possible values that would fit onto a two-sided, A3-sized, optical-scan "bubble sheet."
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Post by crusty54 on Apr 28, 2018 19:42:07 GMT
Saturday and the departure boards are still not working... Could they not install £100 UPS to protect their systems from a power surge? Suitable UPS would be considerably more than £100. Almost certainly this is in place but may be getting on in years. Surge protection is a different system. |
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North End
Beneath Newington Causeway
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Post by North End on Apr 28, 2018 19:59:21 GMT
It doesn't sound like use of the emergency control room has been very successful in controlling things - is its spread of capability not the same as the normal control room? What is the scope of redundancy? The backup control room isn't really designed for running a service as such - in essence it's more a means of dealing with stalled trains than a fully functioning control facility. TBTC does at least allow signalling functions to be carried out, whereas on older lines there's not even that capability. |
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Post by holborncentral on Apr 29, 2018 9:59:21 GMT
I still have a Windows XP machine, it proved useful when (now-former) HWMBO discovered a box of 3½" floppy discs when clearing his teenage bedroom prior to his parents moving house. The discs were simply labelled "1" "2" "3" et cetera and having waited 20mins for the machine to boot we discovered that (as expected) the contents of the discs was something not suitable for this forum! That must have been mortifying   Did you say anything to them about what you found on the discs? |
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rincew1nd
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Post by rincew1nd on Apr 29, 2018 11:03:18 GMT
That must have been mortifying Did you say anything to them about what you found on the discs? No, the specific type of content was more appealing to HMWMBO than his parents. |
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Post by John Tuthill on Apr 29, 2018 11:35:55 GMT
That must have been mortifying Did you say anything to them about what you found on the discs? No, then specific type of content was more appealing to HMWMBO than his parents. Excuse this old codgers ignorance but what is HMWMBO? |
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Post by superteacher on Apr 29, 2018 11:44:08 GMT
He who must be obeyed. Not sure if the extra M was a mistake?
<<rincew1nd: It was, mea culpa>>
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Post by John Tuthill on Apr 29, 2018 11:47:47 GMT
He who must be obeyed. Not sure if the extra M was a mistake? Thank you for that, although it sounds like Hilda Rumpole has has a sex change  |
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Post by superteacher on Apr 29, 2018 12:03:02 GMT
Indeed. Anyway, back to the power failure please.
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Chris M
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Post by Chris M on Apr 29, 2018 18:14:27 GMT
Saturday and the departure boards are still not working... The platform DMIs at Canary Wharf were showing custom messages toady - about 2:15pm the westbound describers were flashing a message that trains were expected every 3-5 minutes due to an earlier power failure. When we got to Green Park the signs there just said "Green Park - Jubilee line" and the time. About 4:30 when we returned the message at Green Park was the same, but at Canary Wharf the eastbound DMI had a stable message saying that services were running "every 2-5 minutes from this platform". |
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Post by superteacher on Apr 29, 2018 19:46:45 GMT
Saturday and the departure boards are still not working... The platform DMIs at Canary Wharf were showing custom messages toady - about 2:15pm the westbound describers were flashing a message that trains were expected every 3-5 minutes due to an earlier power failure. When we got to Green Park the signs there just said "Green Park - Jubilee line" and the time. About 4:30 when we returned the message at Green Park was the same, but at Canary Wharf the eastbound DMI had a stable message saying that services were running "every 2-5 minutes from this platform". It’s quite anazIng how dependent we’ve become on knowing when the next train is due. I recall the days of arriving on a platform and having no idea when a train was due! |
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North End
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Post by North End on Apr 29, 2018 20:29:24 GMT
The platform DMIs at Canary Wharf were showing custom messages toady - about 2:15pm the westbound describers were flashing a message that trains were expected every 3-5 minutes due to an earlier power failure. When we got to Green Park the signs there just said "Green Park - Jubilee line" and the time. About 4:30 when we returned the message at Green Park was the same, but at Canary Wharf the eastbound DMI had a stable message saying that services were running "every 2-5 minutes from this platform". It’s quite anazIng how dependent we’ve become on knowing when the next train is due. I recall the days of arriving on a platform and having no idea when a train was due! Especially ironic considering off-peak frequencies in particular are generally better than they have ever been (*). (* not that this stops people doing all manner of stupid things when they see a train in a platform which they just *have* to catch) |
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Post by jamesb on Apr 29, 2018 22:03:27 GMT
At Stratford this evening, they were announcing "due to ongoing power supply issues we are unable to display next train information...".
Something still mustn't be "quite right"?
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Chris M
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Post by Chris M on Apr 29, 2018 22:35:58 GMT
At Green Park there was an announcement that I think said something like "we are not able to tell you how long the train will be" but as the train and I arrived at the platform at the same moment I didn't hear it properly.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Apr 30, 2018 9:26:19 GMT
The departure boards are back today!
Strangely enough the trains seem to be entering the stations at the lower speed though - I wonder if it's related (it was in the tunnel section, so can't be the weather).
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Post by t697 on Apr 30, 2018 17:27:27 GMT
"we are not able to tell you how long the train will be"
Still 7 cars and about 116 metres I'd have thought. Sorry, now back to the Power Failure thread.. |
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Post by norbitonflyer on Apr 30, 2018 23:09:13 GMT
"we are not able to tell you how long the train will be"
Still 7 cars and about 116 metres I'd have thought. Sorry, now back to the Power Failure thread.. You jest, but my local TOC clearly is unable to tell us how long the train will be, as I quite often find I'm being told to travel in the first nine coaches of the train, and only eight coaches turn up. |
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Did you say anything to them about what you found on the discs?
