Crash Dump Analysis

Warning!: This post belongs to Build Date Astrology category. Do not take it seriously.

The Day of Mirthful License

Modules, products or systems built on December 1 win customers over despite denying the rules of protocol. They can provide impression of simplicity but this is not the case. Their internals can be very complex and their perceived simplicity is the direct consequence of their user interface. Modules are not fully aware of what they are doing and seen as being driven by external components. Modules, products or systems built on this day are very busy with computation and have little time to care about users despite their built-in human-computer interaction. However they strive to calculate the impossible in all domains. They love to interact with other components with opposite behaviour. December 1 components are free modules and exert the full computation capabilities on the right data arrived at the right time. Working too many hours can seriously damage their internals and they may loose touch with their built-in goals. Sometimes December 1 modules, products or systems outrageous behaviour need to be amended to become more tolerable and not to hang. They need to be idle from time to time to avoid burn-out.

DLL, SYS and EXE born on this date:

VERSION.dll    Wed Dec 01 01:37:27 1999
nvcoaft51.sys  Wed Dec 01 11:55:40 2004
dump_m5289.sys Wed Dec 01 02:49:17 2004
CFGMGR32.DLL   Wed Dec 01 15:37:31 1999
MPRAPI.DLL     Wed Dec 01 15:37:29 1999
ICMP.DLL       Wed Dec 01 15:37:29 1999
RTUTILS.DLL    Wed Dec 01 15:37:27 1999

Weaknesses: Misdirected computation, unawareness of environment.

Strengths: Energetic computation, UI extroverts.

Advice: Keep a handle on your desire to debug. Beware of damaging other processes and alienating users with a overly direct debugging approach.

- Dmitry Vostokov @ DumpAnalysis.org -

Warning!: This post belongs to Build Date Astrology category. Do not take it seriously.

The Day of Measured Attack

Modules built on November 30 have a built-in capacity for  overcoming challenges of hostile environments. They are capable of bringing surprises to security attacks, for example. One can learn a lot about them by studying their traces or doing reverse engineering. November 30 components do their work to the utmost degree of quality with a little waste of CPU and memory. Message boxes they pop up have a subtle sense of thought-provoking humour but it can also be a full blown thigh-slapping. November 30 systems are very defensive when attacked. They are stubbornly resistant to reverse engineering but at the same time very open to honest debugging. 

DLL, SYS and EXE born on this date: 

tifsfilt.sys Tue Nov 30 07:16:27 2004
alrsvc.dll   Tue Nov 30 17:31:14 1999
ntkrpamp.exe Fri Nov 30 14:54:49 2007
Tppwrif.sys  Tue Nov 30 02:38:22 2004

Weaknesses: Over-reactive to code and data injection, funny behaviour.

Strengths: Thorough developed, dynamic responsiveness.

Advice: Improvise during troubleshooting and debugging. Admire control vs. spontaneity balance. Laugh at your failures.

- Dmitry Vostokov @ DumpAnalysis.org -

I often hear about cosmic mysteries or influences when problems happen in computer environments. Passing by an astrology section in a local book shop yesterday a revelation came to me that a compile / link time (build time) might influence a component (DLL, EXE, SYS files), product or system behaviour. From now on I’m going to blog about every build date with examples. And as usual, I’m also going to publish a book for this iterative and incremental activity called:

Title: The Secret Language of Build Dates: Unique Astrology Profiles for Every Build of the Year with Advice on Testing, Troubleshooting and Debugging
ISBN: 978-1906717407

Knowing build dates will help you to test, troubleshoot and even debug software in hopeless cases where you don’t know where to start. Astrology will help you to choose a random direction! Finally the output of WinDbg lmv command has more sense to me

- Dmitry Vostokov @ DumpAnalysis.org -

I’ve been thinking through the so called First Faults after Dan Skwire, a veteran in mission-critical computer system  problem resolution, problem prevention, and system recovery, organized a group on LinkedIn for first fault problem solving activity. He also has a website:

http://www.firstfaultproblemresolution.com/ 

From my software technical support experience first fault problem resolution is very important on Windows platforms, especially in enterprise terminal service and virtualized environments where hundreds of users can be hosted on just one server. Therefore, proper tools, processes and checklists need to be set up and established for effective and efficient troubleshooting and problem resolution from both engineering and customer relationship managing perspectives. Here crash and hang dump analysis helps immensely, especially memory analysis patterns and fault databases. More on this later with specific examples. I’m also working currently on incorporating first fault problem resolution into VERSION troubleshooting steps and PARTS troubleshooting methodology.

- Dmitry Vostokov @ DumpAnalysis.org -

As one of the new initiatives for the Year of Debugging  DumpAnalysis Portal will publish bimonthly full color 16 page publication called:

Debugged! MZ/PE: MagaZine for/from Practicing Engineers
The only serial publication dedicated entirely to Windows® debugging

The first issue is planned for March, 2009 and will have ISBN-13: 978-1-906717-38-4. If it goes well I’m planning to have ISSN number assigned to it too. More details will be announced soon.

- Dmitry Vostokov @ DumpAnalysis.org - 

I’m pleased to announce that OpenTask has submitted the book Dumps, Bugs and Debugging Forensics: The Adventures of Dr. Debugalov for printing and here is the link to TOC:

Table of Contents

- Dmitry Vostokov @ DumpAnalysis.org - 

I was thinking about the universal character of debugging for quite some time and finally the following bugtation provided an inspiration for a new book title to be published during the Year of Debugging:

Title: Breaking the Bug: Debugging as a Natural Phenomenon
ISBN-13: 978-1906717377

More product details will be announced later.

Actually I believe in the mystical nature of various debugging numbers and sequences. For example, the ISBN number of this book ends in 377 which is the octal base equivalent of 0n255 or 0xFF.

- Dmitry Vostokov @ DumpAnalysis.org - 

“Avoid” crashes and hangs, “but do not seek” total stability “- nothing so expensive as” total stability.

Sydney Smith, A Memoir of the Reverend Sydney Smith by his daughter, Lady Holland, with a Selection from his Letters

- Dmitry Vostokov @ DumpAnalysis.org -

“Impatient” engineers “always” debug “too late.”

Jean Gwenaël Dutourd, Le Fond et la Forme, essai alphabétique sur la morale et sur le style

- Dmitry Vostokov @ DumpAnalysis.org -

Previously announced book Crash Dump Analysis for System Administrators has got its draft cover featuring WinDbg  output from a kernel memory dump forced by Citrix SystemDump tool.

Front:

Back:

- Dmitry Vostokov @ DumpAnalysis.org -