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Why PCs Are Fragile and What We Can Do About It: A Study of Windows Registry Problems

Why PCs Are Fragile and What We Can Do About It: A Study of Windows Registry Problems. Archana Ganapathi Yi-Min Wang Ni Lao Ji-Rong Wen UC-Berkeley and Microsoft Research. Presented by Chao Liu. Windows Registry.

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Why PCs Are Fragile and What We Can Do About It: A Study of Windows Registry Problems

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  1. Why PCs Are Fragile and What We Can Do About It: A Study of Windows Registry Problems Archana Ganapathi Yi-Min Wang Ni Lao Ji-Rong Wen UC-Berkeley and Microsoft Research Presented by Chao Liu

  2. Windows Registry • A centralhierarchical database … used to store information necessary to configure the system for one or more users, applications and hardware devices.-- MS Computer Dictionary, 5th Ed.

  3. What is inside the Windows Registry • Reference data for Windows operation • profiles for each user • the applications installed on the computer • the types of documents that each application can create • property settings for folders and application icons • what hardware exists on the system • the ports that are being used • …

  4. Why Is Windows Registry Blamed? • Complicated in itself • All-round information of the whole system • Undocumented • Little controlled access • Undisciplined usage • Undisciplined users • Customization or messing things up? • Sharing of configuration data • Broken data dependencies

  5. Motivation • Errors in Windows registry are the major source of user dissatisfaction and frustration. • Before actually trying to eliminate the errors, we need to examine their symptoms in detail. • By categorizing them, we hope each sub-problem can be effectively handled by corresponding approaches.

  6. What’s ahead? • Brief overview of data sets • Categorization of registry problems • What we can do about PC fragility • Discussions

  7. Fragility Data Set • Text-mined Data set (TMDS) from PSS • 100 common registry problems from Product Support Services (PSS) email logs. • Zipf-like distribution is almost expected • like English word frequencies and website popularity. • Strider-Verified Data Set (SVDS) • 100 problems collected from colleagues and web forums. • Use Strider to identify root causes.

  8. Outline • Brief overview of datasets • Categorization of registry problems • What we can do about PC fragility • Discussions

  9. Registry Configuration Problems • Problem Manifestation • Unstable/unusable system • ok, time to re-install. • Cannot perform function • Why can’t I send an email? • Unanticipated response • That’s not what I want! • Unanticipated side-effect • Did I ever set this up? • Cannot locate UI • Where is the menu for *** ? • UI disappear, functionality OK • Unintuitive automation • Changing the leading words to capitals?

  10. Manifestation Breakdown • Major source of user frustration • Sense of losing control

  11. Categorization by Scope of Impact • Mis-configurations tend to affect the entire system, not like *nix. • Call for Efforts from both application and OS parts

  12. Outline • Brief overview of datasets • Categorization of registry problems • What we can do about PC fragility • Discussions

  13. What We Can Do About Fragility • Monitoring techniques • For existing applications running on a released OS platform • Rule-based monitoring • Fault injection approach • For application under development, verify its immunity to known problems • Registry entry insertion, deletion and mutation • Access Protection Mechanisms • For designing a new operating system • OS enforces privileges: locking, rule-checking …

  14. Outline • Brief overview of datasets • Why PCs are fragile • What we can do about PC fragility • Discussions

  15. Discussions • Contributions • Categorization of Windows registry related configuration problems • based on real-world data • from both manifestation and scope of impact two point of view • together with analysis based on breakdown tables • A great number of real configuration problems rooted at Windows registry • Three possible approaches proposed conceptually (applicability?) • More … • Impact of this paper • Can the result go beyond the Windows OS? • How, and to what extent, does the result of this paper help the future research?

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