
Skype Outage – I run a supernode and here’s what I think happened - jdupree
http://blogs.voxeo.com/voxeotalks/2010/12/23/skype-outage-i-run-a-supernode-and-heres-what-i-think-happened/
======
cookiecaper
Maybe this will cause Skype to take Linux and Mac more seriously. If you've
used the Windows version, you know almost all development has occurred there,
whereas the Mac and Linux clients have looked the same for the last four or
five years. The Linux client did have a major version bump about a year ago
iirc, and that brought some needed features, but it was mostly the same.

Also, hopefully this will teach Skype to do more with open-source. I really
hope they open the client up. This bug may have been caught, and things would
definitely have turned out differently if Skype ran freely on other platforms.
Maybe someone could even factor out a "Skype server" instead of an exclusive
policy of client supernodes. Even serious torrenters rent a server somewhere
to host their torrents -- P2P doesn't have to be strictly consumer-level
connection, and really shouldn't be.

~~~
anon114
Or, maybe this will cause users to take Jabber/XMPP more seriously and stop
using proprietary technology for corporate IM.

I've worked at places where management is completely gaga over Skype and would
push me to support it despite the fact that I had no ability to block spam,
troubleshoot messaging problems or integrate our IM system into existing
Asterisk, SSO, monitoring and collaboration solutions.

IMHO, Openfire is far more flexible, extensible, secure, reliable and most
importantly - manageable as a service.

<http://www.igniterealtime.org/projects/openfire/>

disclaimer: I do not work for Ignite and have no vested interest in their
business.

~~~
cookiecaper
When an XMPP solution that's as easy to use as Skype comes out I'll be all for
this. As it stands, even Google's video chat is much more difficult for end-
users to install and use.

I used to use Ekiga for video chat and it was much shoddier than Skype,
constantly dropping calls, refusing to release the audio or video device so
that we couldn't call back, and other serious bugs. Skype "just works".

I really hope that someone comes up with a decent free software competitor,
but it doesn't really exist at this point. The fastest way to solve this
problem would be for Skype to become free software.

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buro9
Just checked my Windows event logs... as I also run a supernode and yup, one
Application Error at 2010-12-22 15:51:10 from Skype.

Tech data shows version 5:

    
    
        Faulting application name: Skype.exe, version: 5.0.0.152, time stamp: 0x4cb31516
        Faulting module name: KERNELBASE.dll, version: 6.1.7600.16385, time stamp: 0x4a5bdbdf
        Exception code: 0xe0fafafa
        Fault offset: 0x0000b727
        Faulting process id: 0xd20
        Faulting application start time: 0x01cba1ea3b70b5ef
        Faulting application path: C:\Program Files (x86)\Skype\Phone\Skype.exe
        Faulting module path: C:\Windows\syswow64\KERNELBASE.dll
        Report Id: 4b2781d7-0de3-11e0-bbdc-005056c00008
    

I didn't upgrade voluntarily.

------
jallmann
Nice to see the CEO of a large company that knows how to walk the talk. I've
also seen him post on HN. Does Steve Ballmer know the difference between a
micro and monolithic kernel?

~~~
ra
I was thinking the same thing. What other big company CEO's would even think
of investigating why their Skype was more jittery in some hotels, let alone
actually know how to do it.

~~~
bl4k
probably busy running big companies

~~~
pyre
CEOs have no free time? They don't eat, sleep, or rest. They will not stop
until the stock prices surge?

~~~
neworbit
Wow, Ballmer must be pretty tired by now

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schtono
tl,dr; a forced software upgrade kept crashing all skype windows clients,
taking down supernodes as well.

------
eps
Well, the big question is not if Skype went down becase lots of supernodes
crashed. The question is _why_ they crashed, and if the trigger was external.
There are messages on p2p-hackers list arguing just that:

    
    
      I have evidence that suggests this is being done 
      by a ddos attack on the supernodes' object list 
      cmd parameter.

------
_stephan
I had the same issue: Shortly before Skype went completely offline, my Windows
Skype client suddenly started crashing every few minutes. The Mac client
didn't have that problem.

Some bug in the new version is probably the likeliest explanation, but if
someone deliberately attacked the Skype network, it would probably look
similar, right?

~~~
Dylan16807
You're not going to get full client crashes without a major bug. Some amount
of attack is possible but I've been getting crashes for a couple weeks now and
skype should have fixed things.

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johndyer
Nice write up, pretty interesting that Skype has not come out and said
anything about WTF happened. Also ironic that their security blog's last
posting it titled "The importance of updating" :) (
<http://blogs.skype.com/garage/> )

-John

------
Groxx
A wonderful reason to have pre-release testers for _every_ piece of software
that communicates with other software, any time you plan to _push_ updates.
With pulls, your early updaters are your test beds; with push, you have to
_create_ your testing groups.

~~~
guelo
The problem with a big adaptive p2p network is that it is close to impossible
to test under real production loads.

~~~
jrockway
My guess is that the average supernode is on something like 6M/1.5M DSL. This
is easy to simulate.

Now, if most of your nodes are on machines directly connected to 10GbE, then
that's a problem. But most Skype nodes aren't. (I do imagine there are a few
connected to 100M+ connections. But only a few.)

~~~
ohashi
I imagine quite a lot in countries like Sweden. I had 100Mbit in my apartment
for cheaper than my shitty comcast which barely breaks 5.

------
bsg75
[http://arstechnica.com/software/news/2010/12/skype-
brought-d...](http://arstechnica.com/software/news/2010/12/skype-brought-down-
by-double-whammy-of-overloaded-servers-client-bugs.ars)

------
billpg
Are Skype relying on third parties with no contractual relationship for an
essential component of the network?

~~~
ars
Yup. But they do mention it when installing. You can also disable it.

If you are not firewalled or NATd you are a supernode automatically - on the
plus side you get better sound quality for voice calls.

Normally the bandwidth used is pretty low since you are mostly forwarding text
messages.

When they said mega-supernodes they meant machines controlled by them that do
nothing else, and are on high bandwidth connections. (My bet is lots of amazon
instances.)

~~~
yellowbkpk
I've looked around for the ability to turn off supernode on Linux and Mac
clients for a while but have come up empty. Do you know which section of the
preferences/settings it's supposed to be in?

~~~
NikkiA
I don't think there's a UI element for it, but you have to add a registry key,
see here:

[https://www.cs.uwaterloo.ca/twiki/view/CF/SkypeConfiguration...](https://www.cs.uwaterloo.ca/twiki/view/CF/SkypeConfiguration#Disable_Supernode)

~~~
pyre
How pray-tell, does a Windows registry entry disable super node functionality
on Linux and/or MacOSX?

~~~
neworbit
Well barring effective virtualization, booting into Windows disables supernode
functionality on Windows and MacOSX in the same sense that a brownout does

------
hackermom
I, too, run a Skype supernode - completely unvoluntarily, barring the
possibility of something hidden behind an asterisk in the EULA. Does anyone
know if there is a way to "opt out" of this? Everytime I start skype up it
makes a million connections to everywhere and without even having a call on
the line my measly 2.5 mbps upstream is permanently choked.

~~~
citricsquid
[https://www.cs.uwaterloo.ca/twiki/view/CF/SkypeConfiguration...](https://www.cs.uwaterloo.ca/twiki/view/CF/SkypeConfiguration#Disable_Supernode)

Found this link lower down :-)

~~~
hackermom
Sorry, I should've mentioned that I'm an OS X user :)

With that said, I've had a look-see in Skype's .plist and its various
Application Support files, but oddly there's nothing "grep'able" to be found
anywhere...

------
st3fan
I seriously doubt the Skype supernodes actually run in regular clients on
people's desktops. I'm pretty sure these are special servers placed
strategically on the net.

If you see thousands of connections on your Skype at home then there probably
is some weird P2P problem going on.

~~~
zb
I'm sorry to be the one who has to point this out, but you have no idea what
you are talking about.

<http://www.skype.com/intl/en-us/security/universities/>

