

The US Navy's warfare systems command just paid millions to stay on Windows XP - cyberviewer
http://www.networkworld.com/article/2939254/the-us-navys-warfare-systems-command-just-paid-millions-to-stay-on-windows-xp.html

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MichaelCrawford
USS Yorktown dead in water after divide by zero

[http://catless.ncl.ac.uk/Risks/19.88.html#subj1.1](http://catless.ncl.ac.uk/Risks/19.88.html#subj1.1)

"The Navy's Smart Ship technology is being considered a success, because it
has resulted in reduced manpower, workloads, maintenance and costs for sailors
aboard the Aegis missile cruiser USS Yorktown. However, in September 1997, the
Yorktown suffered a systems failure during maneuvers off the coast of Cape
Charles, VA., apparently as a result of the failure to prevent a divide by
zero in a Windows NT application. The zero seems to have been an erroneous
data item that was manually entered. Atlantic Fleet officials said the ship
was dead in the water for about 2 hours and 45 minutes. A previous loss of
propulsion occurred on 2 May 1997, also due to software. Other system
collapses are also indicated."

I expect this came from Congress' requirement that the military use "Common
Off the Shelf Computers" rather than designing new computers for every
application.

While I support the use of common computers, it is just plain stupid to use a
the kind of computing product that is sold to consumers.

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dozzie
This is exactly what happens when one buys software system _without_ its
source code.

