zzdust
June 12th, 2007, 01:09 PM
I thought I'd give some insight to what happens at Microsoft when a program or machine crashes and you use "Report to Microsoft"
By default a crash dump known as a "minidump" is sent to Microsoft. If the issue has been flagged by a developer as needing more information, then you will get prompted to ask if you're willing to send more information.
If the problem has previously been diagnosed, the resolution is reported back. This resolution may indicate for example "update such-and-such a driver" or "update BIOS" and means that the team that debugged a previous instance of the issue you reported has already identified the problem, and the instructions given should resolve the issue.
When the minidump is sent to Microsoft, automated tools match it with similar crashes previously reported. This is known as a "bucket".
Buckets are triaged, typically on criticality and the number of occurances. Therefore, the more people who report and issue, the more likely it is for the issue to be fixed.
The collection of crash dumps get matched with a developer or group of developers to diagnose. If the developer needs more information to diagnose the crash dump (e.g. some registry keys) then this gets entered into the analysis system so that the next time the crash is reported, more information is obtained.
If the crash is by a third party application or driver, the company that owns that application or driver is notified. Many video driver related issues have been diagnosed and fixed through this mechanism.
When the problem has been identified, then the resolution or workaround is entered into the analysis system so that the resolution/workaround will be reported back the next time the crash dump is submitted.
This same information is used as feedback into the next version of Windows. For example, it's been determined that people consider an application to have hung within only a few seconds of the application being unresponsive even if, based on the analysis, the application has not really hung.
I personally have been on the sending end and diagnosing end of this analysis system.
By default a crash dump known as a "minidump" is sent to Microsoft. If the issue has been flagged by a developer as needing more information, then you will get prompted to ask if you're willing to send more information.
If the problem has previously been diagnosed, the resolution is reported back. This resolution may indicate for example "update such-and-such a driver" or "update BIOS" and means that the team that debugged a previous instance of the issue you reported has already identified the problem, and the instructions given should resolve the issue.
When the minidump is sent to Microsoft, automated tools match it with similar crashes previously reported. This is known as a "bucket".
Buckets are triaged, typically on criticality and the number of occurances. Therefore, the more people who report and issue, the more likely it is for the issue to be fixed.
The collection of crash dumps get matched with a developer or group of developers to diagnose. If the developer needs more information to diagnose the crash dump (e.g. some registry keys) then this gets entered into the analysis system so that the next time the crash is reported, more information is obtained.
If the crash is by a third party application or driver, the company that owns that application or driver is notified. Many video driver related issues have been diagnosed and fixed through this mechanism.
When the problem has been identified, then the resolution or workaround is entered into the analysis system so that the resolution/workaround will be reported back the next time the crash dump is submitted.
This same information is used as feedback into the next version of Windows. For example, it's been determined that people consider an application to have hung within only a few seconds of the application being unresponsive even if, based on the analysis, the application has not really hung.
I personally have been on the sending end and diagnosing end of this analysis system.