International Atomic Energy Agency uses 1970s computers

[AlteredOne]

OK, I know the UN has a tight budget, but my god ***1970s computer systems*** at an agency charged with finding and monitoring nuclear weapons?  Hell, they could probably get geeks to donate a brand-new system with all the bells and whistles...  I mean, who wouldn't give a little volunteer work and free stuff, for the chance not to be nuked by Iran.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/3954061.stm

[Paelos]

Dude, you're getting a Dell.

[Tairnyn]

Hopefully someone can donate them Wordstar 2.0 and rewrite some of that APL code in FORTRAN.

[Roac]

Legacy systems aren't uncommon in government.  Unlike the private sector where there's incentive to migrate forward (increased productivity) that can offset high costs, the public sector doesn't have the same motives.  Generally, there is far more emphasis placed on the executive-level personnel, instead of workers creating a product.  Upgrades occur when systems no longer help the high level people do their jobs.

Or to put it another way; you can spend that million bucks on upgrading your systems, or on travel plans or other "fun" executive activities.  If you don't give two cents about your systems, they don't get upgraded.  Doubling productivity doesn't impress people, but you may impress people if there's a new whiz-bang feature that can make you "cutting edge".

[Mr_PeaCH]

They obviously took that whole John Titor thing pretty seriously.

[HaemishM]

The organisation is aiming to start a system upgrade in November, aiming to provide inspectors in the field with secure online access to previous inspection data, design blueprints of nuclear facilities, even satellite images of the plant.

This scares me. Design blueprints online, on anything other than a pretty closed system, really seems like a target RIPE for information attack. Of course, it depends all on what they use. But would you want blueprints of nuclear plants to be using Microsoft IIS?

[Roac]

This scares me. Design blueprints online, on anything other than a pretty closed system, really seems like a target RIPE for information attack. Of course, it depends all on what they use. But would you want blueprints of nuclear plants to be using Microsoft IIS?

I'm working to build what is, in effect, Big Brother Online.  Or will be, since it's still in the requirements phase (very early).  Under that big umbrella of Homeland Security, we'll get to dump anything of "police interest" into an intel database.  They're not calling it that of course, and the thing is being talked about with much fanfare.

[Ardent]

WOULD YOU LIKE TO PLAY A GAME?

[DarkDryad]

I dunno Hammy our IIS setup here on base is pretty freakin secure. Hell if your IP and domain dont match you never get through the firewall. I've tried. Aint happening.

[eldaec]

From that article I assume what they really mean is that they are running some large database of what countries tell they have in terms of nuclear facilities on some old mainframe the original incarnation of which was installed in the 70s.

Whoo.

This is not a big deal in itself.

Nor is it remotely unusual in large organisations for the key databases to be that old. Either in the public or the private sector.

Computer specialist at the IAEA, Peter Smith, would like to be able to incorporate state of the art visualisation techniques, more familiar to video games players, into the inspector's toolkit.

"The commercials you now see have people are moving around in a virtual world," he said.

"If we could have that on our laptops, we could be walking through the plant seeing, on the laptop, how the plant should look.

"And if there's a door in the wall that is not on our laptop, then we have a problem."

For christ's sake - nobody give this guy any money to commission computer systems.

They might need a new system, it might a bit of a pain to use the current system, but the link looks like a puff piece to me.

[Righ]

I dunno Hammy our IIS setup here on base is pretty freakin secure. Hell if your IP and domain dont match you never get through the firewall. I've tried. Aint happening.

If this is a challenge, give out the address, or another identifier.

[AlteredOne]

From that article I assume what they really mean is that they are running some large database of what countries tell they have in terms of nuclear facilities on some old mainframe the original incarnation of which was installed in the 70s.  Whoo.  This is not a big deal in itself.

Sweet picture Ardent BTW...  As for this being a puff piece, eldaec may be onto something.  The IAEA web site doesn't look hosted on a '70s boxt, and includes this piece: http://www.iaea.org/NewsCenter/News/2004/safeg_computer.html.  The US and the UK have paid over $12 million for the IT overhaul, but a $10 million shortfall remains.  

So the truth may well be that we and the Brits have paid enough to get the database upgraded, and some wonk wants another $10 million for visualization tools...  Then again, if you consider the cost of "Homeland Security", $10 million is chump change for giving inspectors modern tools.

[Righ]

The web server is a Xeon architecture Linux box running Apache/2.0.45, PHP/4.3.3, mod_ssl/2.0.45, OpenSSL/0.9.6g, DAV/2.

[Tairnyn]

"And if there's a door in the wall that is not on our laptop, then we have a problem."

----

"There is a building. Inside this building there is a level where no elevator can go, and no stair can reach. This level is filled with doors. These doors lead to many places. Hidden places. But one door is special. One door leads to the source."