Reliability Inversion: A Cautionary Tale

Abstract

Computer solicits special issue proposals from lead experts. Proposed themes/issues should address timely, emerging topics that will be of broad interest to Computer's readership. Special issues are an important component of Computer, as they deliver essential research insights and well-developed perspectives on new and established technologies and computing strategies. We encourage submissions of high-quality proposals for the 2021 editorial calendar. Of particular interest are proposals centered on: • offsite educational and business continuity technology challenges, • privacy related to personal location tracking and surveillance (digital and physical), • artificial intelligence and machine learning, • technology's role in disrupted supply chains, • misinformation and disinformation (fake information-malicious or non-malicious), and • cyberwarfare/cyberterrorism

Comparing reliabilities of centralized and distributed switching architectures for reconfigurable 2D arrays

“…Unknowable actual reliabilities force us to make decisions based on lower bounds, leading to the pronouncement that B is more reliable than A at t0. This condition is referred to as reliability inversion [11], in analogy to "priority inversion" in the scheduling of real-time tasks [12], which caused serious trouble during the 1997 Mars Pathfinder mission [13].…”