Crash Dump Analysis

In July-August Opentask publisher plans to have its own website. In the mean time here is the additional list of books to be published in the next 5-7 years starting from 2009 onwards:

- Memiotics (ISBN-13: 978-1906717087)

- Voice Recognition: Command and Control (ISBN-13: 978-1906717094)

- Memory Analysis: An Interdisciplinary Approach (ISBN-13: 978-1906717117)

- Deep Down C++ (ISBN-13: 978-1906717124)

- Management Bits: An Anthology from Reductionist Manager (ISBN-13: 978-1906717131)

- Classical, Quantum and Nonlinear Memoretics (ISBN-13: 978-1906717186)

- Crash Dump: A Software Engineering Autobiography (ISBN-13: 978-1906717193)

- Memoidealism: A New Kind of Philosophy (ISBN-13: 978-1906717209)

including 10-volume edition of Software Engineering Notebooks (4 volumes are planned for the next 2 years):

- Software Engineering Notebooks, Volume 1 (ISBN-13: 978-1906717148)

- Software Engineering Notebooks, Volume 2 (ISBN-13: 978-1906717155)

- Software Engineering Notebooks, Volume 3 (ISBN-13: 978-1906717162)

- Software Engineering Notebooks, Volume 4 (ISBN-13: 978-1906717179)

Details will be announced later on the publisher’s website.

Note: the book about voice recognition stands apart from the others. This is actually the title of the first book I wanted to write 5 years ago.

- Dmitry Vostokov @ DumpAnalysis.org -

I’m thinking big for a full-color book to celebrate the forthcoming anniversary of Memory Dump Analysis Anthology. Preliminary details:

• Title: Encyclopedia of Crash Dump Analysis Patterns
• Author: Dmitry Vostokov
• Publisher: Opentask (15 April 2009)
• Language: English
• Product Dimensions: 21.6 x 14.0
• ISBN-13: 978-1-906717-21-6
• Paperback: 400 pages

- Dmitry Vostokov @ DumpAnalysis.org -

The work for Memory Dump Analysis Anthology, Volume 2 is underway and it is natural to use the modular structure of a book heap again for its front cover. Now it is the partial reading list for this year (click to enlarge):

In addition to memory dump allegory the picture also symbolizes kernel / user space split of 4Gb virtual address space :-) Of course, this is just the base image and the book title will be put somewhere on it.

- Dmitry Vostokov @ DumpAnalysis.org -

Many people expressed interest in expanding Practical Foundations of Debugging (x64) and merging it with commented version of Practical Foundations of Debugging (x86) and Reading Windows-based Code. I therefore decided to dedicate some time during the next two months for this task and publish a book. Its main purpose is to help technical support and escalation engineers, testers and software developers without the knowledge of assembly language and C to master all necessary prerequisites to understand and start debugging and crash dump analysis on Windows platforms. It doesn’t require any specific knowledge, fills the gap and lowers the learning curve required for Advanced Windows Debugging and for my own books. It will also serve as a hardware complement to my seminars that I give from time to time. More details will be posted later but for now there are preliminary product details:

• Title: Windows® Debugging: Practical Foundations
• Author: Dmitry Vostokov
• Publisher: Opentask (01 September 2008)
• Language: English
• Product Dimensions: 22.86 x 15.24
• ISBN-13: 978-1-906717-10-0
• Paperback: 600 pages

- Dmitry Vostokov @ DumpAnalysis.org -

From “coordinated coping” to “what feels like chaos can feel like a dance - a fast one” - say Francoise Tourniaire and Richard Farrell in their infuential book “The Art of Software Support”. I totally agree and from my observation the most successful (not stressful) people in software support are “dancing” when dealing with everyday and hot customer issues. You see them literally thriving on inherent chaos. Truly multitaskers and even multithreaders!

- Dmitry Vostokov @ DumpAnalysis.org -

This new book will be published later this year:

Concurrent Programming on Windows Vista: Architecture, Principles, and Patterns (Microsoft .NET Development Series)

Although it is featured in Microsoft .NET Development Series I believe that it might be very interesting read for both unmanaged and managed code developers and escalation engineers. Understanding concurrency and having the ability to see its patterns is the crucial skill for crash dump analysis and debugging of complex software issues. I pre-ordered it myself and write a review once it is in print.

- Dmitry Vostokov @ DumpAnalysis.org -

Just discovered that China has its own 1000 page Windows debugging book:

ISBN: 9787121064074 (June, 2008)

Author is Zhang Yinkui (Raymond Zhang).

Google translation is quite impressive:

Automatically translated

Automatically translated Table of Contents

Original

- Dmitry Vostokov @ DumpAnalysis.org -

A. Both have online versions of processor manuals. But Intel also ships them in paper format for free (the paper is worse in the latest revision than 2 years ago but books are a bit lighter now):

Information on how to order them can be found here:

http://www.intel.com/products/processor/manuals/index.htm

AMD docs can be downloaded from here:

http://developer.amd.com/documentation/guides/Pages/default.aspx

Comparing both online manuals I see sometimes that certain concepts are explained better in AMD docs and vice versa, so it is recommended to check both. It is also evident that AMD and Intel had to rephrase instruction descriptions differently when they talk about the same things, for example, BOUND instruction:

AMD:  Check Array Bound
Intel:  Check Array Index Against Bounds

- Dmitry Vostokov @ DumpAnalysis.org -

Crash dump analysis is a support activity. Therefore understanding software support business is important. I recently started abbreviating book titles for my personal book reading accounting purposes and here accidentally emerges the ASS abbreviation that reminds me every time that support guys cover “asses” of software engineers designing and developing software and expose their own “asses” when talking to customers :-)

I’m sorry if I offended someone here…

The Art of Software Support

The book was on my shelf for 4 years and only today I got the message :-) 

- Dmitry Vostokov @ DumpAnalysis.org -

Motivated by The Science of Sherlock Holmes I plan to write a book about the history of debugging with the following preliminary product details and tentative release date (which may come earlier if I have enough time):

• Title: The Science of Dr. Watson: An Illustrated History of Debugging
• Author: Dmitry Vostokov
• Publisher: Opentask (01 September 2010)
• Language: English
• Product Dimensions: 22.86 x 15.24
• ISBN-13: 978-1-906717-07-0
• Paperback: 256 pages

- Dmitry Vostokov @ DumpAnalysis.org -