Incident: Google Docs Outage: Memory Bug Causes System Crash and Disruption

Published Date: 2011-09-09

Postmortem Analysis
Timeline 1. The software failure incident with Google Docs occurred on Wednesday, as mentioned in the article [7841]. 2. The article was published on 2011-09-09. 3. Estimation: The incident occurred on Wednesday before 2011-09-09, which would be September 7, 2011.
System 1. Google Docs' memory management system [7841]
Responsible Organization 1. Google engineering team - The software failure incident in Google Docs was caused by a previously undetected bug in the memory management system when the engineering team attempted to update the application's collaboration tools [7841].
Impacted Organization 1. Google Docs users, both casual and professional, were impacted by the software failure incident [7841].
Software Causes 1. A previously undetected bug in Google Docs' memory management system caused the outage when the engineering team attempted to update the application's collaboration tools [7841].
Non-software Causes 1. Overloading of lookup machines due to memory shortages [7841] 2. Multiple machines restarting due to the bug in memory management system [7841] 3. Dependence on second-party servers for critical documents [7841]
Impacts 1. The software failure incident led to an hour-long outage of Google Docs, affecting users' ability to access and collaborate on documents [7841]. 2. Professionals relying on Google Docs for company-critical documents were left without access during the outage, highlighting concerns about storing important data on third-party servers [7841]. 3. Local IT professionals were unable to assist their employees in accessing documents during the outage unless they had employed a third-party backup service [7841]. 4. The outage was part of a series of site-wide outages experienced by Google Docs that year, impacting user trust and reliability of the service [7841].
Preventions 1. Implementing thorough testing procedures to detect and address memory management bugs before deploying updates [7841]. 2. Implementing redundancy and failover mechanisms to prevent a single bug from causing a system-wide outage [7841]. 3. Enhancing monitoring and alert systems to quickly identify and respond to memory shortages and restarts before they cascade into a system crash [7841].
Fixes 1. Improving the memory management system to prevent bugs like the one that caused the outage in Google Docs [7841]. 2. Implementing better testing procedures to detect and address bugs before they cause system crashes [7841]. 3. Enhancing the system's redundancy and failover mechanisms to minimize the impact of such incidents on users [7841].
References 1. Engineering director Alan Warren's blog post [7841]

Software Taxonomy of Faults

Category Option Rationale
Recurring one_organization (a) The software failure incident related to Google Docs experiencing an outage due to a previously undetected bug in its memory management system has happened before within the same organization. The article mentions that this outage is only one of a few site-wide outages this year, with the last notable one being on April 21st [7841]. (b) The software failure incident related to Google Docs experiencing an outage is not explicitly mentioned to have happened at other organizations or with their products and services in the provided article.
Phase (Design/Operation) design (a) The software failure incident in Article 7841 was attributed to a design-related issue. The outage in Google Docs was caused by a previously undetected bug in the memory management system when the engineering team attempted to update the application's collaboration tools. This bug led to a cascade of memory shortages, restarts, and machine switching, ultimately causing the entire system to crash and go offline for an hour [7841]. (b) There is no specific information in the articles indicating that the software failure incident was due to operation-related factors.
Boundary (Internal/External) within_system (a) The software failure incident with Google Docs was within the system. The outage was caused by a previously undetected bug in Docs' memory management system when the engineering team attempted to update the application's collaboration tools. This bug led to memory shortages, restarts, and machine switching within Google's infrastructure, ultimately causing the whole system to crash and go offline for an hour [7841].
Nature (Human/Non-human) non-human_actions (a) The software failure incident in Google Docs was due to a previously undetected bug in the memory management system, which caused the system to crash and go offline for an hour. This bug was a non-human action that led to the outage [7841]. (b) The article does not mention any human actions contributing to the software failure incident in Google Docs.
Dimension (Hardware/Software) hardware, software (a) The software failure incident in Google Docs was primarily caused by a previously undetected bug in the memory management system. This bug led to memory shortages and restarts of lookup machines, ultimately causing the entire system to crash and go offline for an hour. The issue originated in the hardware aspect of the system, specifically related to memory management [7841]. (b) The software failure incident in Google Docs was also attributed to a bug in the memory management system, indicating a software-related contributing factor to the outage. The bug was triggered when the engineering team attempted to update the application's collaboration tools, leading to a chain reaction of memory shortages, restarts, and machine switching that resulted in the system crash [7841].
Objective (Malicious/Non-malicious) non-malicious (a) The software failure incident described in Article 7841 was non-malicious. The outage experienced by Google Docs was caused by a previously undetected bug in the memory management system when the engineering team attempted to update the application's collaboration tools. This bug led to a cascade of memory shortages, restarts, and machine switching, ultimately causing the entire system to crash and go offline for an hour. The incident was attributed to a technical issue rather than any malicious intent [7841].
Intent (Poor/Accidental Decisions) unknown (a) The software failure incident in Google Docs was not due to poor decisions but rather a previously undetected bug in the memory management system. The outage occurred when the engineering team attempted to update the application's collaboration tools, which triggered a chain reaction of memory shortages, restarts, and machine switching ultimately causing the system to crash [7841]. (b) The incident was not a result of accidental decisions but rather a technical issue related to the bug in the memory management system during the update process [7841].
Capability (Incompetence/Accidental) accidental (a) The software failure incident in Google Docs was not attributed to development incompetence. The outage was explained as being caused by a previously undetected bug in Docs' memory management system when the engineering team attempted to update the application's collaboration tools [7841]. (b) The software failure incident in Google Docs was classified as accidental. The outage was caused by a bug in the memory management system that led to a quick spiral of memory shortages, restarts, and machine switching, ultimately causing the whole system to crash and go offline for an hour. This was not intentional but a result of the bug triggering a chain reaction of failures [7841].
Duration temporary The software failure incident described in Article 7841 was temporary. The Google Docs outage lasted for an hour, indicating that the system crash was not permanent but rather a temporary disruption in service [7841].
Behaviour other (a) crash: The software failure incident in Article 7841 was a crash. The Google Docs system crashed and went offline for an hour due to a previously undetected bug in the memory management system, causing a quick spiral of memory shortages, restarts, and machine switching, ultimately leading to the system crash and outage [7841].

IoT System Layer

Layer Option Rationale
Perception None None
Communication None None
Application None None

Other Details

Category Option Rationale
Consequence property The consequence of the software failure incident described in the article was mainly related to the impact on users' access to their documents stored in Google Docs due to the hour-long outage. Local IT professionals were unable to help their employees access the documents during the outage unless they had employed a third-party backup service [7841]. This falls under the category of "property" as people's access to their data was impacted due to the software failure.
Domain information (a) The failed system in this incident was Google Docs, a net-based document, spreadsheet, and slideshow management system [7841]. This system is related to the industry of information, specifically the production and distribution of information. The outage of Google Docs impacted users who rely on the platform for managing their documents and collaboration tools.

Sources

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