DNS downing clouds is boring: IBM Cloud is experiencing a quantum computer outage

IBM has one-upped AWS and Microsoft by reporting an outage in one of its cloudy quantum computers. Early on Thursday morning, Big Blue advised “The quantum computer, ibm_aachen, is temporarily unavailable within the Qiskit Runtime service.” The advisory says IBM is “actively working to restore this quantum computer to service …

[Pascal Monett]

“The quantum computer [..] is temporarily unavailable"

Did customers notice any difference ?

[phils]

Re: “The quantum computer [..] is temporarily unavailable"

It was noticing the difference that caused it to be unavailable.

[Roland6]

Re: “The quantum computer [..] is temporarily unavailable"

So someone opened the box and discovered the cat had disappeared. Perhaps if they close the box, next time they look it will be back..

[bemusedHorseman]

Re: “The quantum computer [..] is temporarily unavailable"

That's what happens when you compute at 15 miles an hour over the speed of light!

[kmorwath]

Re: “The quantum computer [..] is temporarily unavailable"

They shouldn't have left a mouse nearby.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: “The quantum computer [..] is temporarily unavailable"

But was the cat which wasn't there alive or dead?

[Ken Shabby]

Re: “The quantum computer [..] is temporarily unavailable"

Can you turn a cat off and then on again

[Long John Silver]

Nice one!

"We’re guessing that turning it off and on again won’t help given qubits can be on and off at the same time"

[SVD_NL]

Is anyone even affected?

I thought the usefulness of quantum computers was as ephemeral as the qubits themselves.

[steviesteveo]

Re: Is anyone even affected?

No one's email is down and therefore it cannot be a major incident

[Empire of the Pussycat]

The cause is simultaneously DNS and not DNS

<my quantum cheshire cat told me this>

[SVD_NL]

Who skipped geography class?

..Aachen machine happy at IBM’s European Quantum Data Center near the German city of Stuttgart

Who is in charge of naming these things? Aachen and Stuttgart are like 300-400km apart...

[Korev]

Re: Who skipped geography class?

To many Americans, "Europe" is a country

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Who skipped geography class?

Unlike Canuckistan...

[Roj Blake]

Re: Who skipped geography class?

Calling it Aachen ensures it's the first quantum computing entry in the Yellow Pages.

[Korev]

Re: Who skipped geography class?

Further forward then the well known IT text, Fly Phishing by JR Hartley

[seven of five]

Re: Who skipped geography class?

Only until the danish system in Aabenraa enters the DC...

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Who skipped geography class?

"Calling it Aachen ensures it's the first quantum computing entry in the Yellow Pages."

As I recall yellow pages (NIS) doesn't return entries in sorted order. ;)

_{I think the order was whatever the underlying ndbm(3) dbm_firstkey()/dbm_nextkey() spewed out.}

[Richard Pennington 1]

Re: Who skipped geography class?

Some years ago, I was at IBM. The Pages are Blue.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Who skipped geography class? ... do US schools 'Do' European or ANY non-USA geography !!!???

As American knowledge of European geography goes this is razor-sharp ... it is in the 'right' country !!!

Obviously they had the map upside-down when they 'roughed out' the location.

:)

[PCScreenOnly]

DNS

Could be, May not be

[JimmyPage]

Isn't this exactly how quantum computing works ?

It's both up and down at the same time.

[Korev]

Re: Isn't this exactly how quantum computing works ?

It's a Qubit like that

[JPCavendish]

"A common technique to fix a classical computer is turning it off, then on again. The Register suspects that won’t do the trick for a quantum machine."

Coincidentally this was touched on during a LinuxONE conference I was at yesterday. Apparently while turning it off is a relatively trivial task, turning it back on again requires getting the qubits back to a coherent and synchronized state; which generally requires what amounts to a full system reset.

The analogy video they showed was getting a hydroelectric power station back up and then resynchronizing it with the national power grid; the station can startup and exist in isolation without problems, but then it's effectively useless - it's only useful when synced with the grid. Same with a quantum computer, getting a qubit up and running is more or less trivial but useless, getting them coherent and resynced so they can be used is the complicated part.

tl:dr 'Off' is trivial, 'On' is like untangling a box of tapeworms.

[Roland6]

>” The analogy video they showed was getting a hydroelectric power station back up and then resynchronizing it with the national power grid;”

Can’t be that big a problem Dinorwig achieves this within seconds sometimes multiple times a day.

[JPCavendish]

Part of the reason Dinorwig is so fast syncing is because it doesn't often actually get out of sync - it maintains a spinning load in order to stay synced, then ramps up from there. If a turbine actually does shut down or get out of sync then it can take a minute or more to get it back - and even that is considered exceptionally fast by industry standards; most take from minutes to hours.

[David Hicklin]

> Dinorwig is so fast syncing is because it doesn't often actually get out of sync

If I remember correct;y from my tour there years ago , they leave them spinning driven by the grid with no water in the turbine blade part, when they need output they just open the tap and it goes from a motor to a generator in seconds.

[JPCavendish]

Fascinating tech

[ComicalEngineer]

Black start

I once had the pleasure of assisting with a "black start" i.e. no power from the grid, for a heavy oil fired power station.

Start the Diesel generators from the battery (like a truck).

You now have enough power to wake up the control room instruments and computer controls.

Use the couple of MW from the Diesels to get the two gas turbines up and running (they run on Diesel fuel or Kerosene).

Thus, Diesel fuel pumps, compressed air to start the turbines rotating to ~4,000 rpm, squirt the fuel in and hit the igniters (think big spark plugs)

Once the GTS are self-sustaining you can turn the Diesels off

Using the GTs for power, and LPG for heat you can start warming the fuel oil up so that it can be pumped and will be warm enough to ignite.

You can also start the main fuel pumps, boiler water circulation pumps, coolant fans, cooling tower circulation pumps, combustion air fans and the NOx control scrubbers etc etc

Light off boiler 1 of 4 using LPG and when the primary chamber is warm enough start the oil spray at low rate.

Warm the boiler up gently to operating temperature as they don't like thermal shocks

Whilst boiler 1 is warming light off boilers 2, 3 and 4 in turn.

Once there is enough steam pressure to start the steam turbines you can turn off the GTs and sync the station with the grid.

This is the short version!

On a really good day you can get the first steam turbine on line in 6 - 8 hours but it can take another 6 - 8 hours to sync it.

The station I worked on was used as a "swing station" and could get 80MW into the grid within 30 minutes using the gas turbines.

[JPCavendish]

Re: Black start

Awesome description. A bit like firing up a gas turbine helicopter; at least the first few steps!

[Neil Barnes]

turning it off, then on again

This should work - providing that you can do both at the same time.

The one with the quantum black hole in the pocket --->

[elsergiovolador]

Down

Our cloud is down and is not down.

You will only know once you try to connect to it, guv.

[breakfast]

Novel challenges of the quantum realm

They ran a speed benchmark on it and now nobody can find it.

[Jason Bloomberg]

It was there, then it wasn't. Now it's back again. Maybe.

Never get yourself entangled with distant aliens.

[Anonymous Coward]

Optimistically ...

Under Everett's^† Many Worlds Interpretion there are an infinite number of "worlds" where Aachen is still up (and unrelatedly where Trump's not president.)

Although if this is the best of all possible worlds I shudder to imagine the alternatives.

_{† Hugh not Kenny. ;)}

[mirachu]

Re: Optimistically ...

I'd love to hear Kenny Everett's Many Worlds Interpretation.

[that one in the corner]

Re: Optimistically ...

All done in the best possible taste.

[Dwarf]

Relax

The system was both working and not working at the same time.

You screwed it up when you asked the question, so operator error, definitely not the platform and you are due zero service credits.