Remember when Europe’s entire Galileo satellite system fell over last summer? No you don’t. The official stats reveal it never happened It was a devastating blow to the credibility of Europe’s Galileo satellite project: the navigation system fell over during an upgrade in July, requiring a reboot that took six days. Now it appears it officially never happened. Billions of organizations, individuals, phones, gizmos, apps, and so on, across the globe simply …
To be fair, the availability target is only 75% during Initial Operational Capability, but rises to the astonishing height of 90% (monthly) once the system reaches Full Operational Capability.
But if you think that’s bad, wait until you find out that they want to provide a safety-of-life emergency beacon service too (for mountain rescue et al), which *also* is allowed to have three days off a month. Yes, really.
I just assumed their SLA was the same as (allegedly) Werner Von Braun's....
.... when asked about the reliability of one of his creations, he didn't have a clue, so turned to some colleagues
"Hans, do you zee any problem vis zis rocket?" "Nein, Mein Fuh... er... Herr Doktor"
"Johann, do you?" "Nein"
Eventually "Sir, ve haf a reliability of five neins"
Icon - hard choices - that, or a beer to Tom Lehrer
Gervais the chef? Who was unable to prepare a calamari salad using the locally sourced, non-farmed seafood delicacy, moustachioed inkfish verdi?
He couldn't bring himself to kill the animal, and neither could the dishwasher.
Yes, Hans that does dishes IS as soft as Gervais, with wild green hairy lipped squid.
's water music was referencing a song by Tom Lehrer, "Wernher von Braun".
I've have thought that even mild surprise was a bit excessive. EU politicians and bureaucrats are past masters of making numbers say what they want, the single currency would never have got off the ground without it. Nothing will be allowed to interfere with the Great Project, certainly not some "fake news" about an systems outage. Cover it up & it'll soon be forgotten.
That said, "a context of temporary limitation of redundancy” is worthy of the BOFH himself! I'm sure I can find somewhere to use it in a report.
I think the article would be much improved if it focused on how unreasonably low a target uptime of 75% is, rather than claiming "high school level stat manipulation". Average uptime over the course of a month is what it is, nothing was manipulated here.
Basically the performance targets were designed so that one week of downtime EVERY month is acceptable, which clearly is not what the end users consider acceptable.
1. We like to think it's obvious to Reg readers that 75% (it's actually 77) is low. Didn't seem worth making too much hay about it.
2. Kieren wrote 3 great articles on Tuesday, and we at the back edited a load more. We're always pushed for time, there are always improvements and extra work that can be done, and we have to ship a product at some point. Sometimes you have to call it and run it, and move onto the next thing that needs covering.
C.
We're always pushed for time, there are always improvements and extra work that can be done, though we have to ship a product at some point. Sometimes you have to call it and run it, and move onto the next thing that needs covering. ..... diodesign/ElReg/C
Quite so, and very commendable too. Such make the pages here so attractive, and some would even venture, excitingly addictive. And there are not many operations that can truthfully say that, methinks. I do have a question though. Does ElReg lead with anything which could be/would be viewed exclusively and uniquely realised and shared as theirs*, or are they always following and reporting on the lead of others.
* :-) That is at least until such times as an offer for source they cannot refuse is received and graciously accepted, for such consistently appears to be the norm in those particular and peculiar circumstances, so it must be fully expected and ideally prepared for. :-)
ElReg does quite abit of its own reporting things like the HP Vs Autonomy, it's ongoing attempts at accessing Apple launches (is it not getting on for time to try again eh lads/lasses/other?) as well as regular columns like Something for the weekend/BOFH and irregular columns like Geeks Guide to Britain (seriously, please keep up with that one as they're fascinating, insightful and well written).
Not everything is piped marketing... And even the ones that do are usually written with enough salt to worry a cardiograph machine.
I do however wish we could find out what the fate of LOHAN is though considering the triumph over Paris /sigh.
2. Kieren wrote 3 great articles on Tuesday, and we at the back edited a load more. We're always pushed for time, there are always improvements and extra work that can be done, and we have to ship a product at some point. Sometimes you have to call it and run it, and move onto the next thing that needs covering.
As long as 78% of them are correct you're doing better than Galileo.
We're always pushed for time, there are always improvements and extra work that can be done, and we have to ship a product at some point. Sometimes you have to call it and run it, and move onto the next thing that needs covering.
So you're basically saying that your performance chart is currently solid green? :D
"Sometimes you have to call it and run it, and move onto the next thing that needs covering."
Seems fair in general. But if people+coverage (and therefore costs) are the opportunity....
Are there likely to be any ex-Inquirer staff looking for work at the moment, maybe not too fussed about the money, maybe available at short notice?
That lacks direction.
It looks as though for any serious user, they will need the redundancy of the US system rather than rely on the alleged redundancies that Galileo may have.
I still memorise a map before going on a journey with a route that is new to me and obviously take it with me.
I do use Nag Nav, but being a bit of an old fart I look at the route before I set off so I know where I'm going. That way, if there are problems on the route, or the Nag Nav gives up, I have rough idea of what to do.
I've heard several stories of friends who solely relied on Nag Nav and then getting in a panic when its battery dies and they have no idea where they are or how to get to where they're going. And, have you heard, that Nag Navs aren't always right?
Since the planing of Galileo both Russia and China have created their own satellite-based navigation system. Most mobile phones today support all 3 fully operational systems now, and they are all operated by different entities meaning that even if one decides that Europe is evil, there are still 2 other systems.
how poorly (or perhaps with genius artifice) contractual KPIs can be set up by the uninformed and then abused to ensure that a supplier can never, under any circumstances, ever fail to be officially delivering.
It's not a scenario limited to Galileo but I would have thought with such a high value project that the targets may have been, perhaps a tad, more ambitious...
Poorly considered targets can create issues or directly and actively drive improper behaviour in many areas of industry and life - this is just another example.
Now if only I can get paid per line of code again...
You are quite right. I'm not sure who the actual customer (organisation paying for) Galileo is*, but whichever organisation it is, I'm sure it would benefit from better definitions of the SLA/KPIs so that the end users are not mislead into expecting better performance than is actually available.
It may well be that at its current stage of roll-out/development**, the KPIs for the Galileo system are appropriate: but Joe Public (including me) tends to think that if it is 'available', then it should be available all of the time, and not just for a carefully described average amount of time.
The project may well be a technological tour-de-force, but a long and public outage doesn't look good, especially with what looks bureaucratic obfuscation surrounding it.
I have no doubt the service will improve, but the public perceptions need to be managed far, far better.
NN
*Ultimately, it is the European taxpayer, but there is some sort of commissioning organisation.
**When will Galileo reach the Final Operational Capability (FOC)?
Galileo performance will gradually be improved and new services will be introduced as further spacecraft are launched.The full constellation is expected to be available by 2020. When the full constellation is in orbit and usable, the Full Operational Capability stage will be declared.
The actual customer of Galileo, the EU, is very pleased, as the whole point of the vanity project wasn't so much as to end up with a working navigation system, but to ensure that surpluses from the common agricultural policy weren't returned to the member states. This then sets a precedent on misappropriating other funds for whatever new shiny shiny takes their fancy.
A quick googling reveals:-
https://sciencebusiness.net/news/71710/Agriculture-raided-to-fund-Galileo-and-EIT
http://www.defense-aerospace.com/articles-view/release/3/86182/european-commission-to-unveil-galileo-financing-plan.html
https://lloydslist.maritimeintelligence.informa.com/LL098161/Brussels-digs-deep-for-Galileo-cash
Shall I go on?
“ The full constellation is expected to be available by 2020.“
That’s what the Galileo website says, but it’s the most hilarious nonsense.
The facts are: Currently, Galileo has 22 working spacecraft. Full Operational Capability requires 24 satellites *plus 6 orbiting spares, otherwise the next satellite failure loses service until the next launch*. Each orbital plane requires a separate spare (too much fuel required to change orbital plane), and they are sent up as pairs in each launch which have to go to the same orbital plane (fuel again).
Hence, the constellation isn’t reliable until there are 30 up there. We are eight spacecraft short of a full deck at the moment.
Unfortunately, the launch schedule only allows for four satellites per year, and only one launch (two satellites) by end 2020. And by the way, because of satellites already failed in different planes, it will be end of 2021 before there is a proper constellation up there at all. At the planned launch cadence, they won’t be able to declare Full Operational Capability (resilient to failure), until end 2024
Except that it gets much, much worse. By 2024, the first satellites ever launched will be end-of-life (12 year lifetime!) and retired. So we will need the 2025 satellites to replace those.... and then the next satellites will be end-of-life and retiring....so we need to wait until 2026, and.....well I think you get the picture now.
The launch cadence schedule simply isn’t expected to catch up with the older dying spacecraft any time during the current so-called “transition” series of Galieo spacecraft up to 2030. The situation is due normal project delays, which have consequences when you are trying to keep up with aging satellites in orbit.There’s another series of 12 spacecraft supposed to go up post 2030 or sometime, but that’s not fully planned or budgeted yet.
Now, that’s the *optimistic version*, where the spacecraft achieve their 12 year planned lifetime. Actually, there are systemic onboard clock problems, which means that we expect two or three of the spacecraft already up there to fail several years earlier than lifetime. And, historically, sometimes satellite launches sometimes fail, as one of them already has, and that’s *also* not included in the plan.
This is why reading and understanding the Service Level Agreement (SLA) for any service you intend to rely upon is a Very Good Idea. As Galileo is still in the "Initial Open Service", it is not intended for 'primetime' use. Despite that, lots of people are using it anyway, assuming that availability now means it will continue to be available in the future. It's very kind of them to act as testing guinea-pigs.
Lots of companies sign up for SLAs with telecomms service providers, cloud services, IT service providers and the like without fully understanding the SLAs buried deep within the contracts.
I have met some 'interesting' SLAs in my time. How about 'guaranteed service restoration within 48 hours of an outage'? So when things failed at 16:00 on Friday, you'd expect service back by 16:00 on Sunday? Well, it turned out that the outage clock only ticked during 'normal working hours', deemed to be 09:00-17:00 Mon-Fr, so 48 hours after 16:00 on Friday was...16:00 on the Monday after the next weekend - a whole working week and a day after the outage actually occurred. Of course, those signing the contract thought they would get service back at latest 48 real-time hours later.
Another fun SLA was an availability SLA which defined how availability would be measured. The contract stated that a particular procedure would be used, which happened to be the same as the procedure used to demonstrate a service was working before acceptance. Which sounds good. There were two problems with this: firstly, the test procedure could only be carried out while the service was not in production use; and secondly the SLA specified an annual availability, which could only be measured (according to the contract) by having the service run the acceptance procedure for a year.
The conclusion is that contractual SLAs should be read very, very carefully, and you should make sure that you and the supplier have a common understanding of the SLA. Which is horribly boring, and means that you should probably give up on assuming 'good faith', because high performance levels usually require lots of money and resources, which suppliers are loath to give away cheaply.
The current (issued in May 2019) Service Description for Galileo is here: EUROPEAN GNSS (GALILEO) : OPEN SERVICE DEFINITION DOCUMENT. Section 3 goes into detail on the Minimum Performance Levels (MPLs) of the service, with section 3.4.4 specifically describing the availability of the Galileo positioning service*: which, summarised, is greater than or equal to 70% calculated over a period of 30 days at the worst user location.
With my jaded experienced eye, I can see that averaging availability over 30 days is the usual trick for making a service provider's life easier. As a service user, you want the averaging period for a service's availability to be as short as possible - so if you are billed monthly, you, as a user, want the availability to exceed the agreed level averaged over (say) a rolling 24 hour period, and if it drops below the target in any 24 hour period during the billing cycle, the target for the cycle is not met. Or if 24 hours is too long, a rolling hourly period. Suppliers really don't like that.
So, yes, the Galileo SLA has been carefully written to mean that Galileo has a very good chance of meeting its targets. Depending on your point of view, this either means that the SLA writers in Galileo were on the ball, or that they are deliberately massaging the figures (in advance, remember, this was published in May 2019) to make themselves look good. Read the next version of the Galileo Open Service Definition document carefully.
*Note, the MPL for the Galileo UTC Time Dissemination service is better than or equal to 87%, calculated over a period of 30 days. It failed to meet its target in July (see pages 12 and 13 of the report), reaching only 81.7%
The MPL of 87%9specified by [OS-SDD] for the long term is therefore not achieved in July, while it is in August and September. This is again a side effect of the occurred incident (ref.:Annex A).
[OSS-SDD] European GNSS (Galileo) Open Service Definition Document (OS-SDD), Issue 1.1, European Union, May 2019.
Issue 1.1 of the [OS-SDD] is in force since May 2019. This version is accessible for download from the European GNSS Service Centre (GSC) website.
The Register 
Biting the hand that feeds IT
Copyright. All rights reserved © 1998–2024
