[LINK] Clouded Vision

[Stilgherrian]

Reading Google's own blog post points out that this wasn't a "data  
loss" problem (i.e. you'd better have had backups) but a "service  
availability" problem.

     An error in one of our systems caused us to direct some of our web
     traffic through Asia, which created a traffic jam. As a result,  
about
     14% of our users experienced slow services or even interruptions.

     http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2009/05/this-is-your-pilot-speaking-now-about.html

And as this handy graph shows, traffic in and out of Google for the  
affected networks flatlined for well under 2 hours.

     http://asert.arbornetworks.com/2009/05/the-great-googlelapse/

Rather than "the sky is fling" (or "the cloud is imploding"?), more  
and more this looks to me like a routine network glitch which was  
resolved reasonably quickly.

(Again, I compare this with a typical business network. In a business  
of 100 people, say, having 14 of them disrupted for a couple of hours,  
an event which happens "every now and then", isn't THAT big a failure  
IMO.)

Computers and networks break. If yo want to continue working during  
the beak, you need a contingency plan. Big deal. Nothing new. Nothing  
to see here. Move along now.

Stil


-- 
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