| Recurring |
one_organization |
(a) The software failure incident related to Twitter's service being down due to a date bug in 2014 is an example of a similar incident happening again within the same organization. This incident was caused by a bug in a line of code that made the service think it was a different date, leading to users being logged out and experiencing visual flaws [56557]. The issue stemmed from a one-character difference in coding languages, highlighting the importance of precise coding to avoid such failures in the future.
(b) The article does not provide information about a similar incident happening at other organizations or with their products and services. |
| Phase (Design/Operation) |
design, operation |
(a) The software failure incident with Twitter was due to a bug in a line of code that caused the service to think it was December 29, 2015, instead of the correct date in 2014. This bug was a result of a design flaw in the system development where the developer had to specify which year the software should consider, leading to the wrong character being used in the code, ultimately causing the outage [56557].
(b) The software failure incident also involved operation factors as users of Twitter's Android app and mobile website were logged out without the ability to log back in until the issue was fixed. This operational failure impacted the users' experience and required intervention to resolve the issue [56557]. |
| Boundary (Internal/External) |
within_system |
(a) The software failure incident with Twitter was within the system. The incident was caused by a bug in a line of code that made the service think it was December 29, 2015, instead of the correct date in 2014. This internal issue led to users being logged out and experiencing visual flaws on the platform [56557]. |
| Nature (Human/Non-human) |
non-human_actions |
(a) The software failure incident occurred due to non-human actions, specifically a bug in a line of code that caused the service to think it was December 29, 2015, instead of the correct date in 2014. This bug led to users being logged out and experiencing visual flaws on the Twitter platform [56557].
(b) The software failure incident was not attributed to human actions but rather to a coding error related to the incorrect interpretation of the year in the software code. There is no indication in the article that the failure was caused by human actions such as intentional sabotage or incorrect manual changes [56557]. |
| Dimension (Hardware/Software) |
software |
(a) The software failure incident reported in Article 56557 was due to a bug in a line of code that caused the service to think it was 29 December, 2015. This bug originated in the software itself, specifically in the code that handled date calculations. The incorrect handling of the date led to users being logged out and experiencing visual flaws on the platform [56557].
(b) The software failure incident in Article 56557 was primarily caused by a software bug related to date calculations. The issue stemmed from the incorrect representation of the year in the code, leading to users being logged out and experiencing visual glitches on the platform. The failure was not attributed to any hardware-related factors but rather to a mistake in the software logic [56557]. |
| Objective (Malicious/Non-malicious) |
non-malicious |
(a) The software failure incident reported in the article was non-malicious. It was caused by a bug in a line of code that made the Twitter service think it was December 29, 2015, instead of the correct date in 2014. This bug led to users being logged out and experiencing visual flaws on the platform. The issue stemmed from a coding error related to specifying the year correctly based on international standards [56557].
Additionally, there were claims of responsibility for the outage by a Twitter user named "KingEbola," but the evidence suggested that the outage was not due to a malicious hack as initially speculated. The user's account was wiped of all but a single tweet after the service was restored, indicating that the incident was not a result of a deliberate attack [56557]. |
| Intent (Poor/Accidental Decisions) |
accidental_decisions |
(a) The software failure incident related to the Twitter outage was not due to poor decisions but rather an accidental decision caused by a bug in the code. The bug in a line of code caused the service to think it was December 29, 2015, leading to users being logged out and experiencing visual flaws. The issue stemmed from a one-letter difference in coding languages, where the wrong character was used to represent the year, causing the confusion between the current year and the year of the week [56557]. |
| Capability (Incompetence/Accidental) |
development_incompetence |
(a) The software failure incident was related to development incompetence. The outage on Twitter was caused by a bug in a line of code that made the service think it was December 29, 2015, instead of the correct date in 2014. This error stemmed from a misunderstanding of how to specify the year in coding languages, where a single character difference led to the issue. The mistake was attributed to the developer not correctly specifying whether to refer to the current year or the year of the week [56557].
(b) The software failure incident was not accidental but rather a result of a specific bug in the code that caused the service disruption on Twitter. The bug was related to how the year was interpreted in the code, leading to users being logged out and experiencing visual flaws on the platform. The incident was not a result of accidental factors but rather a direct consequence of the coding error [56557]. |
| Duration |
temporary |
(a) The software failure incident reported in the article was temporary. The article mentions that Twitter's service was down for many users for over five and a half hours due to a bug in a line of code that caused the service to think it was December 29, 2015. The issue was fixed at 5.25 am, indicating that the failure was not permanent [56557]. |
| Behaviour |
crash, omission, value, other |
(a) crash: The software failure incident in the article can be categorized as a crash. The bug in the line of code caused the Twitter service to be down for many users for over five and a half hours, resulting in users of the network's Android app and mobile website being logged out without the ability to log back in until it was fixed at 5.25 am [56557].
(b) omission: The software failure incident can also be categorized as an omission. Due to the bug in the code, users were logged out of the Twitter service without any ability to log back in until the issue was resolved [56557].
(c) timing: The software failure incident can be categorized as a timing issue. The bug in the code caused the service to think it was December 29, 2015, instead of the correct date, leading to users being affected during a specific time period [56557].
(d) value: The software failure incident can be categorized as a value issue. The bug in the code caused visual flaws, such as showing TweetDeck users that tweets were posted 365 days ago, which is an incorrect representation of the actual data [56557].
(e) byzantine: The software failure incident does not align with a byzantine behavior as there were no mentions of inconsistent responses or interactions in the articles.
(f) other: The software failure incident can be categorized as a crash and omission, as it resulted in the system losing state and not performing its intended functions (crash) and omitting to perform its intended functions by logging users out without the ability to log back in (omission) [56557]. |