Being an aspiring SF delayed-writer I was curious about the usage of memory dump concept in science fiction. Here’s a selection of sentence fragments that give some picture (a few are from fiction not SF) and I plan to analyze it further in another part. Some phrases are funny for me but you decide which of them for yourself (I even ordered one fiction and two SF books from the list below):
A Fire Upon The Deep (Zones of Thought) by Vernor Vinge
“the environment programs will likely have a bizarre crash-atmosphere dump, thermal runaway, anything.”
A Nepenthean Solution by Rod Rogers
“Their computers started misbehaving very badly. Random data dumps, crashes, disk wipes, that type of thing.”
Sex, Drugs, & Rock & Roll! by Charles A Brobst
“it’s possible to dump bios and crash the systems.”
Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom by Cory Doctorow
“Just switch on guest access and I’ll core-dump it to you. It’s wild.”
Interface by Neal Stephenson and J. Frederick George
“We’re going to do a core dump on this whole night. Zeldo said ‘Analyze it’”
Champions of the Force (Star Wars: The Jedi Academy Trilogy, Volume 3) by Kevin J. Anderson
“Complete core dump of all the Maw’s backup computer files.”
The Mandalorian Armor (Star Wars: The Bounty Hunter Wars, Book 1) by K.W. Jeter
“he could do a core dump and take everything back to his own ship”
More Than Honor (Honor Harrington) by David Weber
“Rerouting, cross-connections, garbled text, crossed order-response loops, spontaneous memory core dumps … Nothing working the way it should.”
Futures from Nature by Henry Gee
“My toaster had a core dump and wouldn’t boot up”
Endgame: A Novel (Doom #4) by Dafydd ab Hugh and Brad Linaweaver
“The Data Pastiche did not give us sufficient information. We must study the core-dump.”
Newton’s Wake: A Space Opera by Ken MacLeod
“a big clue, but not definitive. So we took a core dump.”
Mindstar Rising by Peter F. Hamilton
“O’Donal fed the Trojan an activation code keyed to the core’s dump order.”
Worlds in Collision: Star Trek (Star Trek: the Original Series) and Memory Prime (Star Trek, No 42) by Judith Reeves-Stevens and Garfield Reeves-Stevens
“the interface team will commence an unscheduled emergency core dump as an essential test of the system’s backup integrity.”
Spinward Fringe Resurrection And Awakening by Randolph Lalonde
“I’m going to find one of the computer cores and dump you inside.”
Nothing Sacred: A Novel by Tom Flynn
“‘Ship’s thought engines are in core dump,’ Hinsin cried. ‘The Onesie’s probing them aggressively. They’re spewing information’”
X-Universe Volume One by Darren Astles and Steve Miller
“a core-dump and re-write of the Al algorithms”
Nshalain Troubles: The Return (Volume 3) by Bob Horton
“If necessary we could even do a core dump through a transposer link”
Second Chances by Susan Shwartz
“He could do a core dump in his sleep, but never had.”
Soul of the Algorithm by Norbert Weissinger
“By the way, we had a core dump on PIDs Two thirty- eight and Two thirty-nine.”
God Behind the Firewall by Anirban Ray
“The operating system kernel had crashed - it was a core dump. I wondered what kind of an operating system it was”
A Real Boy by Heather Breo
“unit was connected to a large processor so that a core dump could be performed. This would include all accrued memory.”
A Chip Called Wanda by J. L. Kerry
“the system computer until lie could crash it, initiating a core dump, in which the horrified system processor would frantically write important data to several files during its death throes.”
The Enemy Papers by Barry B Longyear
“began setting up the sequence to dump the memory cores.”
Chaos and Rage by Frank Tinsman
“I’m doing a core dump and it won’t even give me a status bar”
Alien Parable by Khezla Durr
“When the information came through it was like the core dump on a computer. It came through so fast”
ANIMA: a novel about Second Life by Dalian Hansen
“You have to go in for another complete core dump.”
Hammerjack by Marc D. Giller
“memory dump was in progress. The core was wiping itself clean”
HeadSpace by Paul Barrows
“eyes staring into the virtual gateway of the RAM dump core, head lolling involuntarily as his fingers worked the mechanism.”
Blood and Fire by David Gerrold
“We’ll dump a copy of the core into one of our transmitters and let them decode it”
Dragon Drive: A Comedia Mundana: Volume 1: The Finger of God by Wayne Richards
“by telephone lines, not yet, but we can send him core dumps via radio, over the comsat links, can’t we?”
The Armies of Memory (Thousand Cultures) by John Barnes
“Shan was dumping my short-term memory into his”
The Ghost Brigades by John Scalzi
“his sudden memory dump”
The Ultimate Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams
“He pulled out a small memory dump module”
Pandora’s Star by Peter F. Hamilton
“You left with him four days after your last memory dump in the Kirova Clinic’s secure store.”
Marque and Reprisal (Vatta’s War) by Elizabeth Moon
“It was bad they had to do a memory dump off my implant”
Star Strike (The Inheritance Trilogy, Book 1) by Ian Douglas
“They wouldn’t need to ask her questions or elicit her cooperation; all they’d need to do was pull a full memory dump.”
“‘Sarha, how’s the memory dump coming on?’ ‘No problems, Joshua. The bitek array is accepting’”
Spin State by Chris Moriarty
“a mere memory dump an interactive tutorial triggered by her entry into the memory palace”
Foundation and Chaos: The Second Foundation Trilogy (Foundation Trilogy Series) by Greg Bear
“With Daneel’s frequent memory dumps and adjustments,”
Sphere by Michael Crichton
“It’s got to be a memory dump from somewhere inside our own computer system.”
A Time to Be Born (Star Trek The Next Generation) by John Vornholt
“His memory dump was almost at the present day”
Undertow by Elizabeth Bear
“memory to dump yet and Security will download whatever’s in there”
Kiln People (The Kiln Books) by David Brin
“Irene here has been duplicating so heavily, taking full memory dumps from every ditto she makes, that she’s reached a limit”
Quarantine by Greg Egan
“it isn’t present in any of my stolen memory dumps.”
The Ship Who Searched (The Ship Series) by Anne McCaffrey and Mercedes Lackey
“She triggered memory-dump, and everything came over in compressed mode”
The Callahan Chronicals by Spider Robinson
“file memory dump, sending information in a block rather than bit by bit”
The Wellstone by Wil McCarthy
“And with the Palace Guard’s memory dump you’re the most famous of all”
Whole Wide World by Paul McAuley
“I can reboot and rebuild him from the last memory dump, but it’ll take a little while.”
Pashazade by Jon Courtenay Grimwood
“digiLux so old it had a separate flash unit and came minus a removable memory dump which was where Dr Dee came in”
The Great Book of Amber: The Complete Amber Chronicles, 1-10 (Chronicles of Amber) by Roger Zelazny
“You can’t dump its memory or kill its power from a remote terminal.”
The Best of All Possible Wars by Larry Niven
“they’ll follow it come core-collapse or memory dump;”
The Worthing Saga by Orson Scott Card
“We dump the memories back into your head as soon as you come out”
Playgrounds of the Mind by Larry Niven
“Signal for a memory dump, see what can be retrieved.”
Alien Taste (Ukiah Oregon, Book 1) by Wen Spencer
“To grow that much, the mouse would have to dump its memory storage.”
Firedance by Steven Barnes
“My last memory dump was before the raid”
Worldmakers: SF Adventures in Terraforming by Gardner Dozois
“I’d search memory dumps to find where souls might be kept”
Glasshouse by Charles Stross
“I emigrated to Zemlya right after my previous memory dump.”
Two to the Fifth (Xanth) by Piers Anthony
“It’s a real memory dump.”
Dreaming Down-Under by Jack Dann and Janeen Webb
“That’s what’s inhibiting the near-memory dump.”
Before the Storm (Star Wars: The Black Fleet Crisis, Book 1) by Michael P. Kube-Mcdowell
“Droids will dump their memory data under sensor-torture.”
WebMage (Ravirn, Book 1) by Kelly McCullough
“That’s probably the upload cycle, when it dumps its memory back to the server.”
Midnight at the Well of Souls by Jack L. Chalker
“You forgot to dump the computer memory when you closed up.”
Redrobe by Jon Courtenay Grimwood
“the one who purchased some kid to use as a memory dump”
X-Men - The Last Stand by Chris Claremont
“No sign whatsoever that been wounded If only he could dump the sense memories of those hurts as”
Metaplanetary: A Novel of Interplanetary Civil War by Tony Daniel
“Every day, to dump her memories in the form of a sentence or two”
The Purple Spacebunny (Volume 02) by Clarence E. Shellito II
“In computer terms, he was doing a memory dump and compressing the math in his mind to lock it”
This Place Only by Walter G. Klimczak
“The first stage included a memory splice. The second a partial data purge. A memory dump.”
The Worldwrights by Max Grant
“I was able to pick up some of their history while the memory dump went through me on its way to the manekine.”
Alien Revelation by Tony Ruggiero
“He thought of it as a memory dump and as a form of therapy.”
Genetic Suicide by James Cooper
“Yes, think of it as a selective memory dump.”
A Great Circle: The Mayfield Trilogy by Reynolds Price
“again as if to gouge one more memorial in this memory dump.”
Cross Purposes by Gary C. Gibson
“facsimile clones built in hurry up growth tanks. Electron-scripted memory dumps gave them something to think, A list personality and entertainment”
Shanghai Dream by Sahr Johnny
“The memory dump cuts to the front of the school.”
Elysian Fields by Drew Dale Daniel Bryenton
“which led to a biolab full of clone tanks and memory-dump modules.”
Cubicle Farm Fantasy: An Indian IT worker’s dream about escaping the rat race by Ranjit Sankar
“reading memory dumps and providing technical leadership to a bunch of bozos”
Infinity Plus by Keith Brooke and Nick Gevers
“A simula plus full memory dump will tie up most of my processing power.”
Sin’s Doorway and Other Ominous Entrances: The Selected Stories of Manly Wade Wellman (Volume 4) by Manly Wade Wellman
“consciously used me as a dump for his memories.”
ReBody by Clive Warner
“No other solution. EMP damages my network too. I can dump memory into magnetic stores, isolate all processors”
The Light by J Powers
“On the monitor screen flashed dumps of memory, neural net models, machine code, the innermost workings of the supercomputer operating system”
Fools’ Experiments by Edward M. Lerner
“I’m ready to stop reading these damn memory dumps. Let the little imps go back to it.”
Echoes of Earth by Sean Williams and Shane Dix
“to accept her final memory dump if she did.”
Fallen Host by Lyda Morehouse
“I had all my memories ready to dump, and I still couldn’t do it. Then the idea hit me”
LifeQuest: Dozens of Stories about Cryonics, Uploading, and other Transhuman Adventures by Fred Chamberlain, Linda Chamberlain, Thomas Donaldson, and Lee Corbin
“Map their memory centers, dump the data in a neuro-simulator and use artificial intelligence to to index topics”
Redemption Ark (Revelation Space) by Alastair Reynolds
“would make it so much easier if he could just dump his memories directly-but the other Conjoiner ’s neural blockades were secure.”
An Isaac Asimov Robot Mystery: Mirage (Isaac Asimov’s Robot Mystery) by Mark W. Tiedemann
“I want a memory dump set up, too-we need to download the RI for study.”
How Precious Was That While by Piers Anthony
“you don’t want to clutter your memory with them. For example, if that person was your sibling, you can dump that memory right there.”
Tangent by Robert G. Ferrell
“figure out some way of getting at least one full memory dump from her.”
THE FLIGHT of the SOLAR ARCHANGEL by Rod Rogers
“Yeah, yeah, yeah. All right, dump memory and we’ll scan it line by line.”
Death Match by Lincoln Child
“It appears to be a successful memory dump”
Presentations Plus by David A. Peoples
“first two minutes. Then we stand up we go to memory location ‘x,’ open our mouth and do a ‘memory dump’.”
Full Circle by Danielle Steel
“Dump the memory. And move on.”
MindFlossing: 100% Pure From Concentrate by Jakob Wahlberg
“Did you ever do a memory dump and debug?”
Love’s Illusions by Ceria Mackonvitz and Alina Ardeleanu Igna
“I need a brain dump. A memory dump. To clear my head up. Clear my head away.”
Harmonescape by Rick Leinheuser
“my jittery smile masking the memory dump going on behind my probing eyes. The jig was up.”
The Micah Files by Robert Pirie
“It sounds like you’re doing a memory dump. Robert continued assuring her of its relevancy.”
Journey Out From The Mundane Shell by Anthony Doyle
“we recognize a place in time, it has become a memory dump,”
Humour the Computer by Andrew J. Davison
“A memory dump follows.”
No Outward Sign by Bill Neugent
“A memory dump, in case you hit any self-destruct routines.”
Hazard 666: A New Meaning for Terror by Paul Landry
“see if he could preoccupy the robot so it would dump memory and not remember what it did.”
Biotechnology Is Murder: A Ben Candidi Mystery (Ben Candidi Mysteries) by Dirk Wyle
“Careful, you don’t want to dump the memory.”
Omaha by Caoimhghin Ó Catháin
“Let me dump its memory then you can tell me which numbers are drug related.”
Satan’s Touch by Forrest Carlyle
“Just a dump of system memory so I can debug.”
You Have to Be Careful in the Land of the Free by James Kelman
“I had a bus and a plane to catch, and memories to dump; memories to dump.”
The Bug by Ellen Ullman
“unconditional program death, producing no core file, no dump of the program’s memory state.”
Evening Song: Òran Feasgair by Randolph Waugh
“a law that would make a memory dump mandatory, you would have access to history in its entirety”
Storm Killer by Benjamin Blue
“the technician had commanded the computer to freeze its memory and not reuse any memory that had recently been used and released back to the system. The tech had done a copy dump of the entire memory and he’s now manually reviewing the contents of each piece of frozen storage”
remember to BLINK by Jason Heim
“I print out the memory dump, which uses up four reams of paper.”
Bystander by Maksim Gorky and Bernard G. Guerney
“Come, now, Tanya, search a bit in the dump of your memory.”
- Dmitry Vostokov @ DumpAnalysis.org -
. In addition to complex systems modelled in the latter book I apply evolutive systems approach to computer memory. Here is a picture illustrating MemD category of memory dumps (snapshots) as category objects and category arrows as different ways in arriving at the same memory picture:
