Software Diagnostics Library

Memoretics as a science of memory snapshots borrows many ideas from the following disciplines (the list is not exhaustive):

• Troubleshooting and Debugging
• Intelligence Analysis
• Critical Thinking
• Forensics
• Linguistics
• Archaeology
• Psychoanalysis
• History
• Mathematics: Sets and Categories
• Literary Criticism and Narratology

It also contributes many ideas back. The following diagram depicts such an interaction:

- Dmitry Vostokov @ DumpAnalysis.org + TraceAnalysis.org -

I’m pleased to announce that MDAA, Volume 5 is available in PDF format:

www.dumpanalysis.org/Memory+Dump+Analysis+Anthology+Volume+5

It features:

- 25 new crash dump analysis patterns
- 11 new pattern interaction case studies (including software tracing)
- 16 new trace analysis patterns
- 7 structural memory patterns
- 4 modeling case studies for memory dump analysis patterns
- Discussion of 3 common analysis mistakes
- Malware analysis case study
- Computer independent architecture of crash analysis report service
- Expanded coverage of software narratology
- Metaphysical and theological implications of memory dump worldview
- More pictures of memory space and physicalist art
- Classification of memory visualization tools
- Memory visualization case studies
- Close reading of the stories of Sherlock Holmes: Dr. Watson’s observational patterns
- Fully cross-referenced with Volume 1, Volume 2, Volume 3, and Volume 4

Its table of contents is available here:

www.dumpanalysis.org/MDAA/MDA-Anthology-V5-TOC.pdf

Paperback and hardcover versions should be available in a week or two. I also started working on Volume 6 that should be available in November-December.

- Dmitry Vostokov @ DumpAnalysis.org + TraceAnalysis.org -

Pre-analysis - Avoiding crash dump analysis anti-patterns like wrong dump or zippocricy. Sometimes it goes with wild explanation no one asked for. Checking whether a software trace is empty before sending it. 

Examples: He is always doing !locks pre-analysis before sending any dump.

- Dmitry Vostokov @ DumpAnalysis.org + TraceAnalysis.org -

Memory Dump Analysis Services announces the launch of the first Memory Dump Analysis Audit Service:

http://www.dumpanalysis.com/memory-dump-analysis-audit-service

- Dmitry Vostokov @ DumpAnalysis.org + TraceAnalysis.org -

Five volumes of cross-disciplinary Anthology (dubbed by the author “The Summa Memorianica”) lay the foundation of the scientific discipline of Memoretics (study of computer memory snapshots and their evolution in time) that is also called Memory Dump and Software Trace Analysis.ca

The 5th volume contains revised, edited, cross-referenced, and thematically organized selected DumpAnalysis.org blog posts about crash dump, software trace analysis and debugging written in February 2010 - October 2010 for software engineers developing and maintaining products on Windows platforms, quality assurance engineers testing software on Windows platforms, technical support and escalation engineers dealing with complex software issues, and security researchers, malware analysts and reverse engineers. The fifth volume features:

- 25 new crash dump analysis patterns
- 11 new pattern interaction case studies (including software tracing)
- 16 new trace analysis patterns
- 7 structural memory patterns
- 4 modeling case studies for memory dump analysis patterns
- Discussion of 3 common analysis mistakes
- Malware analysis case study
- Computer independent architecture of crash analysis report service
- Expanded coverage of software narratology
- Metaphysical and theological implications of memory dump worldview
- More pictures of memory space and physicalist art
- Classification of memory visualization tools
- Memory visualization case studies
- Close reading of the stories of Sherlock Holmes: Dr. Watson’s observational patterns
- Fully cross-referenced with Volume 1, Volume 2, Volume 3, and Volume 4

Product information:

• Title: Memory Dump Analysis Anthology, Volume 5
• Author: Dmitry Vostokov
• Language: English
• Product Dimensions: 22.86 x 15.24

• Paperback: 400 pages
• Publisher: Opentask (10 December 2010)
• ISBN-13: 978-1-906717-96-4

• Hardcover: 400 pages
• Publisher: Opentask (10 December 2010)
• ISBN-13: 978-1-906717-97-1

Back cover features memory space art image Hot Computation: Memory on Fire.

- Dmitry Vostokov @ DumpAnalysis.org + TraceAnalysis.org -

The choice of webinars below mostly reflects my personal preferences and long time desire to speak on topics like systems thinking, troubleshooting tool design and development. The other topic about BSOD minidump analysis was requested by participants in an ongoing survey. There will be more topics in 2011. All forthcoming webinars will be hosted by Memory Dump Analysis Services. The planning list includes:

Systems Thinking in Memory Dump and Software Trace Analysis

Software Troubleshooting and Debugging Tools: Objects, Components, Patterns and Frameworks with UML

• UML basics
• DebugWare patterns
• Unified Troubleshooting Framework
• RADII software development process
• Hands-on exercise: designing and building a tool

Blue Screen Of Death Analysis Done Right: Minidump Investigation for System Administrators

• Making sense of !analyze –v output
• Get extra troubleshooting information with additional WinDbg commands
• Guessing culprits with raw stack analysis
• Who’s responsible: hardware or software?
• Checklist and patterns
• Including hands-on exercises: send your own minidumps

More detailed information will be available soon. 

- Dmitry Vostokov @ DumpAnalysis.org + TraceAnalysis.org -

Our future sponsor has been registered in Ireland and has its own independent website and logo: DumpAnalysis.com

More information will be available later this month.

- Dmitry Vostokov @ DumpAnalysis.org + TraceAnalysis.org -

Adding AI. Analysis Improvement.

After reading earlier today Windows Internals pages about system audit an idea came to my mind in the evening to provide audit services for memory dump and software trace analysis. One mind is good but two are better, especially if the second is a pattern-driven AI. Here are possible problem scenarios:

Problem: You are not satisfied with a crash report.

Problem: Your critical issue is escalated to the VP level. Engineers analyze memory dumps and software traces. No definite conclusion so far. You want to be sure that nothing has been omitted from the analysis.

Problem: You analyze a system dump or a software trace. You need a second pair of eyes but don’t want to send your memory dump due to your company security policies.

Other scenarios (use cases) will be added as soon as I see the service fit to the realities of software technical support.

I plan to make this service operational in July - August, 2010. Prices to be announced soon.

- Dmitry Vostokov @ DumpAnalysis.org + TraceAnalysis.org -

An exercise in de-analysis

This anti-pattern is called Wild Explanation. This is a free floating explanation based on loose associations. Its extreme version uses Gödel incompleteness theorems (undecidable crashes and hangs), quantum mechanics (in small time delta any bug can appear and disappear without being caught) or hydrodynamics (code fluidity, turbulence around processor cores) for abnormal software behaviour explanation (similar to Fashionable Nonsense in philosophy, humanities and social sciences). Its milder version is slightly modified original analysis monologue I found when searching Google for stack traces (I provide my comments below):

“Two hints make me assume this can be a physical memory problem:”

PAGE_FAULT_IN_NONPAGED_AREA (50)
Invalid system memory was referenced.  This cannot be protected by try-except,
it must be protected by a Probe.  Typically the address is just plain bad or it
is pointing at freed memory.
Arguments:
Arg1: e37cc20e, memory referenced.
Arg2: 00000001, value 0 = read operation, 1 = write operation.
Arg3: 8083fe2c, If non-zero, the instruction address which referenced the bad memory
     address.
Arg4: 00000000, (reserved)

EXCEPTION_CODE: (NTSTATUS) 0xc0000005 - The instruction at “0x%08lx” referenced memory at “0x%08lx”. The memory could not be “%s”.

I wouldn’t be so quick. Check Hardware Error pattern post and comments there. So let’s de-analyze the analysis.

“c0000005 is Access Denied where C is virtual memory, meaning usually disk cache”

c is just STATUS_SEVERITY_ERROR (0×3 or 0y11) 11000000000000000000000000000101 and doesn’t have any connection to cache or crash beyond a mere coincidence. See NTSTATUS bit descriptions: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc231200(PROT.10).aspx

“It could be RAM and/or it could be savrt.sys if you’re using something like an antivirus.
Check to see if you need updates for them, Norton, Symantec, McCaffee.”

Of course, it is either RAM or antivirus, what else? What about a virus? All household names.

EXCEPTION_CODE: (NTSTATUS) 0xc0000005 - The instruction at “0x%08lx” referenced memory at “0x%08lx”.  ”The memory could not be “%s”.” means there is something wrong with the debugger itself; those should be addresses, not percent signs and alphanumeric garbage.”

Now even a debugger is corrupt. RAM again? It is not a garbage, they’re format codes (like for printf C function) to print actual addresses.

“8083fe2c” this address called a pointer, that referenced “e37cc20e” again, that “e” has specific meaning, some virtual device or another, probably CD ROM, trying to transfer data to RAM.  This implies either SCSI or PCI buss or DMA buss timing problems.”

RAM again… Evidence mounts stronger and stronger. Its all about timing. A bus buzzes.

“Which is usually caused by a bad driver, not RAM, but sometimes replacing the RAM “masks” out the failure.”

You never know… A bit of doubt?

“This normally happens with 64-bit machines that take advantage of the 64-bit superfast address access and indexing, known as Vector Indirect Addressing, which is, apparently, too fast for even recent Operating System code.”

I always suspected these machines run x64 times faster… I can only imagine horrors when Vector Indirect Addressing hits an old Operating System code. However, the crash under discussion is x86…

“A write to the “e” device; so, is it some kind of CDR or DVDR or other storage device?”

I guess that was a rhetorical question… or let me finish this thread of thought to connect dots, e-devices, virtual memory, disk cache and CD ROM. What if a page file was configured on a DVD-R?

- Dmitry Vostokov @ DumpAnalysis.org + TraceAnalysis.org -