
Scratch Monkey Story (1987) - andrelaszlo
http://edp.org/monkey.htm
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nathanb
To me, this story has analogues to the analysis of the space shuttle
Challenger disaster. The engineering report indicated the O-rings were a risk,
but the report was not clear enough or strongly-worded enough to effect
change. The mission went forward unmodified with fatal results.

This story is a strong argument for physical access controls. The computer
could have been placed inside even something as low-tech as a locked cabinet,
with only the people who knew what they were doing granted access. While the
DEC Engineer should not have made assumptions, the assumptions he made were
assumptions any reasonable individual might have made.

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GauntletWizard
There's two cautionary lessons here, and I've found (anecdotally) that they
respond to two schools of thought. One is: The signage should have been more
thorough, specifying what domain-expert was required to remove its
restrictions and enable writes. The other is: The DEC Engineer should have
known that while he was a domain expert in tape-drives, he did not have
knowledge of why that sign had been put there in the first place, and should
have done some non-invasive diagnostics before removing it (or just asked). He
made an assumption about why there was a taboo, but did not check it.

