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Less than two years until the year 2000. Two seemingly small digits may turn January 1, 2000 from a worldwide celebration into a universal nightmare. With computers mistaking the year 2000 for 1900, virtually all businesses that use dates will be affected. Not only will the companies be affected, but they are paying millions upon millions of dollars in order for computers to recognize the difference between the years 2000 and 1900. The year 2000 computer bug is a huge problem that our world must face. In order to explain how to solve the millennium bug, it is a good idea to be informed about exactly what the year 2000 problem is.
The year 2000 industry expert, Peter de Jager, described the problem quite well. We programmed computers to store the date in the following format: dd / mm /yy. This only allows 2 digits for the year. January 1, 2000 would be stored as 01 / 01 / 00. But the computer will interpret this as January 1, 1900 - not 2000 (de Jager 1). The 19 is hard-coded into computer hardware and software.
Since there are only 2 physical spaces for the year in this date format, after 99, the only logical choice is to reset the number to 00. The year 2000 problem is unlike any other problem in modern history for several reasons. William Adams points out some of the most important ones. Time is running out- the Year 2000 is inevitable! The problem will occur simultaneously worldwide, time zones withstanding. It affects all languages and platforms, hardware &# 038; software.
The demand for solutions will exceed the supply. Survivors will survive big, losers will lose big. There is no silver bullet that is going to fix things (Adams 2). It is too big and too overwhelming even for [Bill Gates and]Microsoft (Widder 3). Separate, any one of these points makes Y 2 K, a common abbreviation for the year 2000 problem, an addition to the obstacle. Combined, they form what seems more like a hideous monster than an insignificant bug.
The impact of Y 2 K on society is enormous, bringing the largest companies in the world to their knees, pleading for a fix at nearly any cost. The modern world has come to depend on information as much as it has on electricity and running water. Fixing the problem is difficult because there are [less than] two years left to correct 40 years of behavior (de Jager 1). Alan Greenspan has warned that being 99 percent ready isnt enough (Widder 2). Chief Economist Edward Yardeni has said that the chances for a worldwide recession to occur because of Y 2 Kare at 40 % (Widder 3).
Senator Bob Benefit (Republican, Utah) made a good analogy about the potential of the problem. In the 1970 s, oil was the energy that ran our world economy. Today it runs on the energy of information. He later said, To cripple the technological flow of information throughout the world is to bring it toa virtual standstill (Widder 3). The potential of the problem in everyday life is alarming.
Imagine making a loan payment in 1999 for a bill that issue in 2000. The companys computers could interpret the 00 as 1900 and you would then be charged with 99 years of late fees (Moffitt &# 038; Sandler 48). If the year 2000 problem isnt solved, there could be no air traffic, traffic lights, no lights in your company, companies could not produce goods, no goods delivered to the stores, stores could not send you bills, you could not send bills to anyone else. Business [could] come to a halt (de Jager 1). The costs of fixing Y 2 K are staggering. The Gartner Group estimates that costs per line of code to be between$ 1. 50 and $ 2. 00 (Conner 1).
It is not uncommon for a single company to have 100, 000, 000 lines of code (de Jager 6). Capers Jones, an expert who has studied software costs for over ten years, estimates total worldwide costs to be $ 1, 635, 000, 000, 000 (One-trillion, 635 billion dollars) (Jones 58). To put this number into perspective, if five people were to spend $ 100 for every second of every day, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, it would take them about 100 years to finish the task! The year 2000 problem is not only limited to what happens with computers between December 31, 1999 and January 1, 2000. There are several other important dates that are a factor. Last October was considered the last point where a large company could start fixing the problem with any hopes to finish before the deadline (DBA 1).
Also, all fixes should be done by January 1, 1999. There are two major reasons for having the fixes done a year early. The first is that there are many special dates during 1999 that mean special things. For example, September 9, 1999 (09 / 09 / 99) has been commonly used as the expiration date for references and data that have no expiration date (Reid 6). The computer required that a date must be entered in, and in many cases, 9 / 9 / 99 was it. Also, it has been established that an entire years cycle of events should be used to test all of the modifications that have been made to a system.
Also, one should be sure to test to see which day of the week is 01 / 01 / 00. January 1, 1900 was a Monday, but January 1, 2000 will be a Saturday. Other possible failure dates: 1 / 10 / 2000 (1 st 9 character date), 2 / 29 / 2000 (Leap day- the year 2000 is a leap year), 10 / 10 / 2000 (1 st 10 character date), and 12 - 31 - 2000 (Day 366 of the year 2000) (Martin 15) (GTE Appendix A). With the millennium bug coming closer and closer to destroying the crops of the worlds information everyday, experts from around the globe have discovered several ways to deal with or exterminate this menace. Five major solutions to the problem will now be discussed. The most straightforward approach to solving Y 2 K is to simply change the 2 -digit date fields to 4 -digit ones.
This considered to be the only complete solution to the problem, giving businesses a seemingly endless range opiates for the future. This approach also can make it much easier for the company to reformat the display screens with a hard-coded format present (IBM 5. 2). Unfortunately, expanding the date field from 2 to 4 digits has several downsides to it. The most obvious one istat in order to convert the dates, every program and database that references to date data will have to be modified. These modifications are mostly manual labor- not an automatic process. Also, this requires display screens to be reformatted manually, as well as increasing record lengths in databases (IBM 5. 2).
Another common method for swatting the millennium bug involves what is termed date logic, or windowing techniques. This procedure involves having a separate program to determine which millennium certain dates are. For example, the program could determine that if the year ends in numbers between 00 and 20, the date is inthe second millennium. If the year ends in 21 to 99, the date is in the first millennium. This technique avoids some the massive changes and coordination associated with the expansion approach (Martin 5). Date logic routines also have some downsides to them.
The most important one is that the time window canner be more than 100 years, and the length of the time window cannot change in the future. Also, system performance may slow down with this extra step for each date to be processed. On top of that, all of the assumptions and logic must be the same for all of the programs that will use it (IBM 5. 7). If and only if all three of these downsides to windowing techniques are able to be overcome, should a business consider this solution. Another way of getting around 2 -digit dates involves a bridge program.
This type of solution is used to convert data from one record format to another. This allows a system to convert 2 -digit to 4 -digit dates as they are needed. This also allows a business to have very little down time for year 2000 renovations. Instead of converting all of the data at one time, it is instead converted gradually. Also, this technique is very cost effective and fairly easy to do (Moffitt &# 038; Sandler 5. 8). Be aware that a bridge program has the potential to ruin a computer system.
By removing the bridge before all data has been converted, 2 -digit dates may become mixed with 4 -digit dates, creating a larger problem than in the beginning. Replacing the systems is probably the most straightforward method of solving Y 2 K. By simply discarding old, non-compliant systems and purchasing new systems that are year 2000 ready, a business can eliminate the year 2000 problem altogether (Martin 6). This avoids the hassle of coming up with solutions to the problem, but presents the difficulties of starting from scratch. This solution should be considered if a companys systems aretino costly to fix, or if there are not very many systems that need to be fixed.
Another idea that incorporates the replacement idea is for one company to merge with or buy another company that has Y 2 K compliant systems. Then, the old systems can be retired (Martin 6). The last alternative that will be discussed is to do nothing to current computer systems that a business may use. This is not the same as ignoring the millennium bug and hoping that it will go away. Instead, it involves analyzing exactly what will happen to a companys computer systems and determining that the effect it will have is either none or very little (Martin 6). If this would be the case, and employees could work around any damages that maybe caused, this selection could work.
Carrying out a solution in any business involves careful planning in order to be successful. Each of the four steps-awareness, planning, implementation, and testing- are crucial for a company to successfully get beyond the year 2000. Though the shortest step, the awareness step can be considered to be the most important step. This involves a detailed description of the problem to CEOs and the other decision makers for the company. Also, the management must be informed of the impact that is likely to occur if Y 2 K is not solved. Without successfully informing the company executives of the millennium bug, there is no hope of getting funding appropriated and fixes underway (Conner 2).
The preparation and planning phase involves finding all applications that use dates and choosing the right combination of solutions to result in a successful endeavor. Also, a business must consider any dependencies on outside systems- other companies, for example. In addition to this, a priority schedule should be created, to determine which systems are absolutely necessary to the operation of the business, and to fix them in accordance to their importance (Conner 2). A standard date interface should be agreed upon both within the company and with all other companies which are relied on. Also, the first estimate of how costly and how prolonged the fixes should be done (Conner 2). The implementation phase is probably the most tedious phase of year 2000 compliance.
This involves taking proposed solutions and incorporating them into a business computer systems. Depending on which solutions are chosen, and how the solutions affect everyday business, a companys commerce could be crippled due to tended for various systems to be down at all times (Moffitt &# 038; Sandler 66). Testing the solutions may be seen as an unimportant phase in the conversion process. The rewards seem few, andthe costs of are high.
However, testing solutions is the only way to ensure that a business will flow smoothly intothe 21 st century. This procedure involves making sample databases and records to verify that the fixes were made correctly, and that all systems work correctly. During this phase, a few glitches will most likely be found, and correcting these will be relatively easy. There are two common approaches to testing the solutions. The first involves making sure the systems work correctly in the 20 th century, testing the computers for the 21 st century, and then putting the systems back into everyday use.
An advantage of this method is that all of the tests are done the same times, allowing quicker feedback. The downside is that the amount of down time will be fairly high. The other approach is the same as the first, except switching the second and third items. The systems are first payback into production, and then they are tested for year 2000 compliance while they are ensuring the flow of business at the same time. The advantage of this method is that down time is much shorter. However, getting results will take a longer time (Pollner 2 - 3).
As the year 2000 comes closer and closer, companies are losing precious time in order to swat the millennium bug. The deadline is fixed. The price of survival is high and the only reward is the hope of continuing to operate inthe worlds of commerce and industry. Businesses that continue into the next millennium will enjoy the happiness of existence. Companies that fail to act now will probably crumble under their own weight. The alternative to addressing the year 2000 will be going out of business (Moffitt &# 038; Sandler 3).
Bibliography: Martin, Robert A. Dealing with Dates: Solutions for the Year 2000. [Online] Available October 1997 Widder, Pat. Scramble to catch year 2000 bug is on. [Online] Available November 20, 1997 Moffitt, John &# 038; Sandler, Robert J. The year 2000 FAQ. [Online] Available January 14, 1997 de Jager, Peter. Youve got to be kidding! [Online] Available January 10, 1997 Conner, Jim. Businesses should get a jump on solving Year 2000 problem. [Online] Available December 8, 1997 GTE Government Systems Corporation.
GTE Proposed Criteria for Century Compliance. [Online] Available December 20, 1996 Reid, Warren S. &# 038; Brower, Stephen. Beyond Awareness: Ten management and ten legal pitfalls regarding the Year 2000 computer problem that you may have not considered, yet! [Online] Available March 17, 1997 Jones, Capers. The Global Economic Impact of the Year 2000 Software Problem. [Online] Available in Adobe Acrobat Format IBM. The Year 2000 &# 038; 2 -digit dates: a guide for planning and implementation. [Online] Available September, 1997 Pollner, Andrew. Testing Year 2000 conversions. [Online] Available January 1998 Copyright (c) 1997 John Muirhead-Gould.
All rights reserved. This document may not be reproduced in full or impact without the expressed written permission of John Muirhead-Gould. web An Airport Authority millennium bug expert yesterday declined an invitation to ask executives to fly on January 1 to help dismiss the publics fear of air chaos. Can you ask executives from the Airport Authority to fly on a plane on January 1, 2000, if you are sure there wont be any problems? asked a participant of a symposium on the Y 2 K bug.
Chow Yiu-tong, manager of a co-ordination office for the millennium bug, declined, saying: It would be difficult to arrange the executives [to fly on that day]. Mr Chow was speaking at the opening ceremony of the Symposium on Y 2 K Readiness of Hong Kong. Concerns of whether air traffic would be disrupted by the computer bug have emerged after an international education conference scheduled for January 3 next year was postponed a day because delegates were too frightened to fly into Hong Kong on January 1. Mr Chow said the authority had completed the first three stages of its compliance tests, with another three stages to be finished by July.
Refusing to comment directly on why the new airport system was not Y 2 K compliant, he said his office was cross-checking to ensure the system would run smoothly despite the contractors assurance. Mr Chow said Chek Lap Koks chaotic opening last July which was caused by computer glitches had taught them a valuable lesson. Another speaker at the symposium, Norman Yuen Kee-tong, deputy chief executive of Hongkong Telecom, gave his assurance the network was already Y 2 K compliant. web Y 2 K Alert 1 / 22 / 1999 Clinton calls terrorism attack highly likely CLINTON CALLS TERRORISM ATTACK HIGHLY LIKELY BUT DOESNT MENTION THE Y 2 K TERRORISM LINK [news] Amid charges of fear mongering, independent organizations like Y 2 KNEWSWIRE. COM and DonMcAlvanys Intelligence newsletter have been warning the public for months to get ready for the soon-to-come domestic terrorism attacks on U. S.
soil. Today, President Clinton declared such an attack, Highly likely and warns that a biological terrorist attack could spread from city to city, kind of like, he says, the gift that keeps on giving. Its been a fascinating week of Presidential revelations, and it shows that the President, even though he may have been impeached, can still do some good on the awareness front. Alerting Americans to both the Y 2 K threat andthe biological terrorism threat in the same week takes courage. But actually doing something about it takes money, so President Clinton has proposed $ 2. 8 billion in spending to combat biological and chemical terrorism along with computer viruses.
THINK: NUCLEAR RETALIATION This ABC News story reports, [The President] told the newspaper it is highly likely that a terrorist group would launch or threaten a germ or chemical attack on American soil within the next few years. The president warned that any attack with such would lead to at least a proportionate if not a disproportionate response. Story at: web [commentary] Read between the lines; you cant miss the big picture here. A terrorism attack is highly likely.
A response fromthe United States will be proportionate and perhaps more than proportionate. That means the possibility of nuclear retaliation. WHAT DOES THIS HAVE TO DO WITH Y 2 K? Weve covered this in several previous reports. The Y 2 K link is strong, even though it has not been acknowledged yet by government officials. The potential Y 2 K chaos provides a window of opportunity for terrorists to not only add to the impact of the attack, but also to increase their chances of getting away with it.
If telecommunications, power, banking, or food supplies are affected in a serious way by Y 2 K, it will amplify the terror effect of a bio attack. (Interestingly, it will also give government officials someone to blame if things get bad. It wasnt the Y 2 K problem, it was the terrorism that caused the chaos. ) Based on this realization, weve theorized that if terrorists are planning on striking U. S. cities, theyll do so immediately following the Y 2 K rollover. This provides one more serious reason to consider leaving cities that are potential bio terrorism targets. GROUND ZERO: NEW YORK AND WASHINGTON D.
C. The most likely targets? New York and D. C. , of course. A bio attack on either one would dramatically harm the United States.
Every large city is a potential target, and the more dense the population, the better target it makes for a bio-terrorist. That means Chicago, Seattle, Los Angeles, St. Louis, Dallas, Boston all these cities are potential targets. This, according to the Pentagon, which lists 120 cities. HOW TO SURVIVE A BIO TERRORISM ATTACK? Theres only one way to survive it: be somewhere else.
Remember, you wont hear a giant bang when a bio weapon is unleashed. The city wont even be aware of it until days later, when people start to get sick. By teatime, of course, its way too late. Weve seen recent reports that the U. S. military is working on bio-weapon detectors, and we would hope that such detectors would soon be put in place in the 120 cities now listed by the Pentagon as likely terrorism targets.
But so far, there have been no news reports mentioning this kind of deployment. DUAL-PURPOSE PREPAREDNESS [commentary] Now you have one more good reason to take basic precautions and to stockpile a common-sense level of emergency supplies. In a bio-terrorism attack, food and water supplies may be limited. A National Emergency will most certainly be declared, and due to the risk of airborne transmission of disease, citizens would likely not allowed out on the streets. And that means, quite simply, you get to live off whatever you have in the cupboard.
Didnt store extra water? Youll go thirsty. Only have food for a week? Too bad. Your city has just been declared a biological disaster area, and nobody gets in or out. Quarantine time.
This isnt an outrageous scenario anymore. Clinton has now spelled it out as highly likely. To most people, that means perhaps an 80 % chance. Do you live in a potential target city? Dont get scared, get prepared. Now you have two good reasons: Y 2 K, and the highly likely threat of bio terrorism.
OLDER FOLKS REMEMBER BANKS IN THE 1930 S [Reader mail] As this reader mail reports, the older folks are going to be the first people to yank their cash when we approach Y 2 K: As a side note, my unscientific survey of older people who are living on retirement income shows that nearly 100 % of them intend to have all of their money out of the banks early in the year. They trust neither the government nor the banks. Age seems to be a common factor they have first-hand awareness of the Depression. [Commentary] The people who are most likely to be financially harmed by Y 2 K are the younger people who have never experienced real hardship. Theyve never seen the stock market crash, never seen bank runs, never seen a war, never seen a government confiscate their gold. All of these things have happened in recent American history, ofcourse, but for most people, history begins the moment they were born. And the younger generation is mired index.
Theyve leveraged high, speculative stock valuations to get into more debt and many are living paycheck to paycheck, even with really big paychecks. The older folks are usually smarter with money. Were talking about the 55 + folks. If they were old enough thane been earning an income (or trying to find a job) during the Great Depression, you can bet theyll have their money out of the banks. Theyve seen what can happen; theyve lived it.
A few still keep cash under their mattresses as a carry-over from the 1930 s. Y 2 K will be a lesson to remember for everybody else: the Boomers, Generation X, and everybody in-between. Should Y 2 K (or other events) actually crash the stock market, theyll be absolutely shocked horrified. Andwhen the initial panic dies down, well all find somebody to blame for it.
Anybody but ourselves. Maybe well blame terrorists. TESTIMONY REVEALS MEDICARE WAS TO BE FINISHED BY 12 / 31 / 1998 [news] On July 23, 1998, HCFA administrator Nancy-Ann Deparle testified that all critical systems were to be completed by December 31, 1998, leaving a full year for correcting any additional glitches. Actual testimony: That is why we are requiring contractors to be in full compliance with Year 2000 requirements, with all code renovated and fully future date tested, by December 31, 1998. Renovations to mission critical internal systems also must be complete by December 31, 1998. We expect to complete end-to-end testing of how claims a reprocessed through our entire network of renovated systems in the Spring, and then have the rest of 1999 to fixing remaining glitches and take any additional corrective action that might be necessary.
Because the testimony was not copyrighted, we have posted it on our own site. This will prevent HCFA from claiming it doesnt exist. Read it at: web [commentary] Weve heard no claims of Y 2 K compliance from Medicare, and weve had virtually no mainstream news reports pointing out the missed deadline. This testimony, which sounded really good back in July of 1998, now seems entirely forgotten. Could that teach us a lesson? Are we now hearing more testimony that sounds good, but will quickly be forgotten when its promises are broken?
Of course we are. WHERE DOES YOUR STATE GET ITS ENERGY? [news] This DoE chart allows you to research which resources on which your state depends for electrical power. Check your own state: web Remember, nuclear power generation is largely considered to be at considerable risk of being temporarily shutdown due to Y 2 K-related safety concerns. Coal power generation may be subject to railroad disruptions.
Hydrogeneration is subject to working telecommunications systems, but thermo is reportedly the most reliable as far asY 2 K is concerned. GARY NORTH IS RIGHT ABOUT COMPLIANCE [commentary] Rarely does a Y 2 K commentator nail a concept with such clarity and verbal compactness as Gary North did when talking about Y 2 K compliance. His two quotes: The first summarizes the position of the federal government on Y 2 K: Nothing is compliant, but everything is on schedule. How accurate. This demonstrates the backwards logic of the federal spokespeople who continue to insist everything will be fine even though no federal agency is yet compliant and we are now approaching the third major deadline soon to be missed, of course. The second quote: There can be no compliant industry in which there is not one compliant firm.
How can banks, for example, continue to claim their industry is in fantastic shape when in fact not a single large bank has yet claimed full Y 2 K compliance? How can the power industry say theyre on-schedule when not angle power utility has achieved compliance? It is strange, indeed, what were being told by the NERC report, Koskinens office, the banking industry, another sources. They would have you believe that having the individual businesses compliant is not a prerequisite to claiming compliance by the industry itself. Somehow, the parts do not make the whole. IN FACT, THE REALITY IS THE INVERSE OF THIS ARGUMENT This argument will be shattered, of course, soon after the Y 2 K rollover, when individual businesses begin to failed quickly affect the whole.
The reality is not that none of the businesses need to be compliant in order to claim compliance of the industry, but that nearly all of the businesses need to be compliant to make such a claim. Due the domino effect, a single large failed business can ripple through an entire industry or economic sector, negatively impacting other members of the whole. Thus, the correct and rational argument that must be put forth right now is that every industry is far behind schedule, and the chances that any industry will be fully compliant by 1 / 1 / 2000 are virtually none. This is proven primarily by the missed deadlines and supported even further by the ever-rising cost estimates for compliance. If they had made the correct time and money budgets from the beginning, we wouldnt be seeing unexpected cost escalations. Interestingly, nobody reports time escalations.
No matter how much more the projects cost, they will all be completed by 1 / 1 / 2000. Companies that have promised remediation completion by December of 1998 havent even updated their websites yet. And many that have updated their sites simply changed the target date from 12 / 31 / 1998 to 3 / 31 / 1999. But most of all, the notion that any industry can be on track when not a single member of that industry has achieved full compliance is nothing less than alien. Beyond the hype, the spin, the fear and uncertainty, when willow rational thought to enter the arena, no reasonable person would call an industry on track that has eleven months left to complete a task that should have been completed during the previous calendar year (or earlier). This simply does not stand up to the test of logic.
WE ARE BEHIND SCHEDULE No ifs, and, or buts about it, to quote an FDIC official. We have eleven months to reverse this situation and apart-approaching March 31, 1999 deadline for all federal agencies to achieve full compliance. Unless something dramatic changes in the next eleven months, there is no reason to believe that any industry or any federal agency will achieve full compliance in time. We must face reality: systems will not be done in time. Preparedness is the only available, reasonable option.
We must prepare ourselves, our families and our communities to ride out the disruptions, whether they last a few days a few months. To trust that systems will be ready in time is futile at this point. Prepare, dont despair. ### Learn how to prepare for Y 2 K in the time remaining. We review hundreds of products and suppliers, then pass the results on to you.
Discover the best choices for food, water filtration, long-life flashlights, radios, cooking equipment and tools. We even review gas masks and self-defense items, too. Read about the Y 2 K Preparedness Research Library This p 30 d
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