Re: BBC lockup


"Mark Carver" <markcarver@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message news:1137420836.458550.315180@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
.... 
The BBC should roll back the code they are broadcasting *immediately*,
investigate the problem 'off-line', ...>

I have been watching this thread for a while. There are some wonderful assumptions being treated as fact.

My experience of trying to sort out problems like this is that they are never as simple as people make out. (And before you ask I'm not involved in this one.)

Lets try this one from a different direction.

Here is an assumption from me:

There might well be nothing for BBCi to roll back! These old boxes were designed when the platform was a lot smaller. The number of services on the platform has been expanding at quite a rate (MuxA now contains 27 services). STBs cache the PSI and some SI. This takes up memory space and resources. With continuous platform expansion eventually these resources will be overloaded and the result is dependant on how well the box manages these overloads. The errors being reported suggest that something is crashing into the buffer space of the video decoder or control engine dependant on the particular manufacture.

Lets say these old boxes are close to overload. A mux operator, not the BBC, introduces a new service and this consumes some memory in the box and reduces the amount of memory available to other applications. Some BBCi applications that used to work fine now crash the box. Who is to blame? The mux operator that has introduced the new service? The BBC because its their services that are causing the crash? The now defunct supplier of the old boxes? How about the TDN for not managing the platform?

The BBC are getting all the flak and will undoubtedly have to do something about it. They could reduce the memory requirements of their applications, having an impact on all viewers, but that will only work until someone introduces another new services or services. So I believe the only real option is to go down the CH4 blocking route. However I think this causes a problem and things like the multiscreens, and particularly Parliament, are dependant on BBCi functionality. (Just think about the problem of blocking Parliament to one or more of its 650 odd influential viewers at a time when the Beeb is trying to negotiate new funding.)

So I think this implies selective blocking which may or may not work and will need some considerable testing before being released.

Welcome to the world of the open standard, and now competitive, price driven, receiver market.

Glyn 

.

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