Apple's developer portal came back to life over the weekend, eight days after it was allegedly taken down by a Turkish bloke. The high-fructose computer company delivered its usual non-deluge of information about just what caused it to pull the site down last week. It's being just as verbose with its news of how it was coaxed …

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Monday 29th July 2013 07:07 GMT Byz

Test the system before you restore the service

I'd rather they took there time, tested it and got it right.

Modern IT management demands that you get it working as fast as possible, which as a rule means that you cut out testing THE MOST IMPORTANT BIT!!!!

I've seen management cut the testing part of the project so that they can meet their deadlines and the resulting mess when it corrupts live data :(

Alan Turing proved with the halting problem that you cannot know if code does what it should without putting data through it (even if you analyse it in your head you still do a dry run).

Carrying out good system tests takes more time than writing the code, as each time you find and fix a bug you should run all the system tests again (to check your fix hasn't introduced another potentially nastier bug).

The Reg seems to be pushing the modern management mantra here that it must be up and running immediately and sacking "the blockers" who advise that the job should be done properly (which is probably why your in the hole in the first place).

If you look at how they are bringing parts of system it looks from the outside that they are testing it first before going live, good to see a big company doing things the right way for once!!

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1. Monday 29th July 2013 07:31 GMT Anonymous Coward
  
  Re: Test the system before you restore the service
  
  @Byz - >"The Reg seems to be pushing the modern management mantra here that it must be up and running immediately and sacking "the blockers" who advise that the job should be done properly (which is probably why your in the hole in the first place)."
  
  Fail.
  
  The Reg is clearly pushing the "mantra" that Apple's core systems shouldn't be open to hacks from Turkish (or any other nationality) attackers. The Reg is also pushing the mantra that companies should be open and honest with their customers about the extent their data has been compromised in security breaches, and about the expected time it will take to return services to normal. Especially when your customers are devs who are relying on the availability of your portal for their income.
  
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  1. Monday 29th July 2013 07:54 GMT Byz
    
    Re: Test the system before you restore the service
    
    Your answer is very naive, no system is un-hackable.
    
    If you want a truly secure system you should have it bricked up in a room with no way of getting in, no power and no network.
    
    You also don't seem to understand the implication of the halting problem which is the same as godel's incompleteness theorem. That if a system is complete then it is inconstant or if the system is consistent then it is incomplete.
    
    If you understand the implications you cannot know you have a fatal flaw until you find it this is why testing is so important.
    
    Also saying that a company should be open and honest only makes sense when all companies do this (otherwise you lose your competitive edge), so if Google, Microsoft , Samsung, Facebook etc... are open and honest then I agree then Apple should be also but just to single out one makes no sense without pointing out that others don't do it either.
    
    Another reason constraining companies from releasing information is various legal rules I have worked in companies where things went wrong but we (at the time) were constrained by legislation as to what we could reveal.
    
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    1. Monday 29th July 2013 16:15 GMT FredBloggsY
      
      Re: Test the system before you restore the service
      
      "You also don't seem to understand the implication of the halting problem which is the same as godel's incompleteness theorem. That if a system is complete then it is inconstant or if the system is consistent then it is incomplete."
      
      Hmmm.
      
      I seem to recall that the theorem[s - two of them] had something to do with only certain systems, which incorporated natural numbers and certain arithmetic operations.
      
      But perhaps they're subject to inflation and now cover the world, the universe and everything.
      
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Monday 29th July 2013 07:13 GMT Robert E A Harvey

Bob Mansfield

Reuters say that Mr Mansfield postponed retirement last year, and is going to be on the Special Projects team.

Are they going to deliver my talking computer soon, then?

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1. Monday 29th July 2013 08:43 GMT Ralph B
  
  Re: Bob Mansfield
  
  > Are they going to deliver my talking computer soon, then?
  
  I'm sorry, Bill, I'm afraid I can't do that.
  
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Monday 29th July 2013 10:24 GMT Anonymous Coward

> allegedly taken down by a Turkish bloke.

No, not "taken down" by the "Turkish bloke". Apple took the site down themselves after the "Turkish bloke" pointed out some huge security holes in it.

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