Talk:Fail-safe

Sources: from Federal Standard 1037C and from the National Information Systems Security Glossary in support of MIL-STD-188 (moved from main page -  Rossami)

Redirect
Regarding redirect. I mean is this article going to be more than just a list of dictionary definitions? Fail-safe as an idea is well discussed and it makes more sense in safety engineering. -- Taku 00:08, Aug 11, 2004 (UTC)

Failsafe and Safe-off
Fail-Safe and Safe-Off are industry terms that should be defined in the Wiki. This is only place that my search engines found for a definitive definition. If any the site whould be cross referenced and provide additional resources to expand the meaning.

Fail secure link
The link to fail-secure points back here. Either that article should be created or the link removed.

I agree, fail-safe and fail-secure are different things. cyberjacob —Preceding unsigned comment added by 91.107.43.158 (talk) 13:37, 25 September 2010 (UTC)

Software Does Not Fail
Software Does Not Fail

The following passage in this entry made me cringe: "The automatic protection of programs and/or processing systems when a hardware or software failure is detected in a computer system." Permit me to refer the editing team to the technical screed at http://niquette.com/paul/issue/softwr02.htm -- and, yes, it is an original work; however, the title and its position, which were controversial back in 1996 when the essay was first published on the web, are now standard fare in technical documents and specifications.Paul Niquette (talk) 15:06, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

Fail Safe Number
The number, in meta-analytic studies, which ensures the accuracy of the meta-analytic analysis....the number of studies used as the population for meta analysis.... — Preceding unsigned comment added by M2m2m2 (talk • contribs) 20:03, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

Defining fail-secure
The introduction to the article goes to great extents of explaining fail-secure.

This leads to confusion and does not provide a clear view of the concept. 88.164.17.243 (talk) 20:20, 7 March 2013 (UTC)

Diving watch bezel
Previously the diving watch unidirectional bezel example stated that underestimating time spent at depth would be bad because it would lead to the diver potentially running out of oxygen. Leaving aside the point that the majority of divers do not breathe oxygen at depth (and certainly none do below about 20ft if they want to survive very long) it is standard diving practice to use a submersible pressure gauge, therefore gas consumption is not estimated solely on the basis of time, and a timing error would not lead to unexpected gas depletion. What it would lead to is an inaccurate calculation of the divers decompression obligation and therefore could lead to decompression sickness if the diver ascended on the basis of this erroneous information (either directly to the surface after accidentally exceeding their no-decompression limit, or after decompression stops which are now too short). I have altered the article to reflect this and added a reference (perhaps not the best reference, but I believe it to be adequate for this as it is fairly non-controversial). Equisetum (talk &#124; contributions) 12:23, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

Non-engineering fail-safes
Can we consider some evolutionary/biology based fail safes? Their must be some - reflexes for example, or the body's natural response to trauma? Isn't the clotting process a fail safe against bleeding out? It would be good to talk about where the body has and hasn't developed biological fail safes and why these have or haven't developed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by J-E-N-O-V-A (talk • contribs) 00:19, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

Definition and examples
First, the article specifically states that a fail-safe is a device in the opening sentence, yet some of the examples, such as carrier-landings being performed with engines at full afterburner, are examples of practices; either they are not examples of a fail-safe, or the definition needs to be changed. I also question whether things like the two dead-man switches are actually "fail-safes"...no part of the device itself is failing. It is protection against operator error only. An airbrake automatically applying when air pressure is lost is, indeed, a fail-safe. Are we going to consider a device protecting against failure of the operator to operate correctly as a "fail-safe"? The practice of calculating the trajectory of the Apollo capsules so they would return to Earth in spite of failure of the insertion motors is another example of "fail-safes" that are not devices. I suppose rather than change the whole article around, I'll simply add "or practice" into the introduction, although I'm not actually sure if that's an accurate definition or not. If not, then someone else can fix it and remove the conflicting examples. AnnaGoFast (talk) 21:54, 2 June 2016 (UTC)

I've had a go at this, and there is no generic fail safe device as such; it is the design which is fail safe, and I have changed the lead accordingly. I have added some other examples, and image, sorted out out various issues and put procedural safety on aircraft carriers where it should be. Still some work to do.Dougsim (talk)

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified 1 one external link on Fail-safe. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20160701133731/http://blog.kmccontrols.com/index.php/2015/10/29/when-failure-is-not-an-option-the-evolution-of-fail-safe-actuators/ to http://blog.kmccontrols.com/index.php/2015/10/29/when-failure-is-not-an-option-the-evolution-of-fail-safe-actuators/
 * Added tag to http://www.environment-agency.gov.uk/static/documents/Leisure/SE_TE2100_briefing.pdf

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

Cheers.— InternetArchiveBot  (Report bug) 05:02, 29 December 2016 (UTC)

Cooling failure in computer system
I don't believe that: In the event of cooling failure, the CPU will throttle Is a fail safe system. The system must detect the failure and respond.

I will delay deleting this example pending community responses. DGerman (talk) 02:47, 14 March 2017 (UTC)

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified one external link on Fail-safe. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20081122103530/http://www.billpetit.com/Papers/Petit017.pdf to http://www.billpetit.com/Papers/Petit017.pdf

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

Cheers.— InternetArchiveBot  (Report bug) 14:54, 27 September 2017 (UTC)