🚀 go-pugleaf

>(Jeff Prothero) writes:
>
>| Is this SOP in the industry?  Do Motorola, AMD, NS ...  follow the
>| same policy?
>
> Brian McMinn writes:
>
>These are my observations from the inside of AMD, not official
>company policy.

>I was the "keeper of the bug list" for the Am29000 a couple of years
>ago.  The list contained both a detailed internal description
>(digestible only by those with intimate knowledge of the part and a
>full set of logic schematics) and a functional description (all known
>ways to observe the bug) as well as any known workarounds.  The
>detailed description was strictly internal, but the remainder of the
>of the list was sent to our marketing group (for distribution to
>customers) on a regular basis.
>
>To my knowledge, our bug list was and still is freely available.
>There was (and probably still is) some deliberate delay in releasing
>new bug reports.  These delays were for engineering reasons, not
>marketing reasons.  We did not tell the world of a new bug until we
>had replicated the bug ourselves, understood its cause, looked for
>as-yet-unreported ways it might manifest itself, and looked diligently
>for a workaround.

AMD would not provide me with a copy of the 29K bug list until AFTER the
branch target cache was fixed. In fact, they got rather upset when I printed
a description of the bugs from another source.  When the chip was nearly
fully functional, they decided to give me the list.  This is typical of how
most companies have behaved -- if the chip is nearly bug-free, then they'll
give me the list.  Intel has NEVER given me a list -- perhaps because their
chips aren't ever nearly bug-free! :-)

So, AMD, how about posting (or sending to me) the bug list for the 29050?

The position of most companies is that their customers get the lists, so there
is no need to give them to the press.  The problem with this attitude is that
many people program the chips, or build hardware but don't have good contacts
with the chip supplier, and thus don't get the lists.  If you aren't ashamed of
your silicon, you shouldn't be afraid to let the bug list be published.

My offer to any chip companies: send me your bug lists, and I'll put you on
our official "good guys" list (and publish a summary of your bug list).

Submissions from chip users are welcome as well, and may be anonymous.  
Because of the difficult of verifying bug reports, however, our interest is
primarily in copies of vendor-supplied bug lists.  And of course, I can't
encourage anyone to violate an NDA.

Michael Slater, Microprocessor Report  mslater@cup.portal.com
874 Gravenstein Hwy. So., Suite 14, Sebastopol, CA 95472
707/823-4004   fax: 707/823-0504