You want to keep in mind that Dell is using UNIX servers on the backend. It's my understanding that they have several Sun E10K's and IBM S70s. (All in Dell black and grey, of course)
Even if eBay had know that patches were available, oftentimes, it doesn't pay to install them without some rigorous testing. I work in a fairly large database shop, and we are very reluctant to install patches unless there is a specific reason. On multiple occassions we've installed patches just to find out some undocumented quirk with it that only shows up in bizarre circumstances (be it a kernel patch that isn't support in an E10K domain or a database patch that breaks an application). To solve these types of issues, you can't rely on JUST a failover system. You need very extensive testing and development systems. Even then, you may not find a bug until after you've gone production. This isn't to say that eBay wasn't preventable. I'm simply stating that because a patch exists doesn't mean that you should always install it.
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You want to keep in mind that Dell is using UNIX servers on the backend. It's my understanding that they have several Sun E10K's and IBM S70s. (All in Dell black and grey, of course)
Even if eBay had know that patches were available, oftentimes, it doesn't pay to install them without some rigorous testing. I work in a fairly large database shop, and we are very reluctant to install patches unless there is a specific reason. On multiple occassions we've installed patches just to find out some undocumented quirk with it that only shows up in bizarre circumstances (be it a kernel patch that isn't support in an E10K domain or a database patch that breaks an application). To solve these types of issues, you can't rely on JUST a failover system. You need very extensive testing and development systems. Even then, you may not find a bug until after you've gone production. This isn't to say that eBay wasn't preventable. I'm simply stating that because a patch exists doesn't mean that you should always install it.