It's starting. For all the arrogant people in the IT world like Charles P. Reuben (cpr) and his co-horts in the "Polly Lair"--who would deny they had a nose on their face before admitting that they, as a profession, royally screwed up--the Irish Times offers this perspective:

The real Y2K culprits have got away scotfree

Anyone want to venture a guess how many more articles we'll see like this next year? I wonder what Congress will say about such a short-sighted industry? Heh, heh, heh.

-- guesswho (will@be.blamed), November 24, 1999

Answers

There is nothing in this article, and all the other articles that are suddenly exploding in the mainstream press about Y2K, that has not been known for many months if not years. It is interesting that only now that it is effectively too late to do anything at any level other than personal does the press give Y2K this attention. (Of course, the problems being encountered by recently implemented replacement systems that are Y2K compliant certainly help fuel the attention flames.)

37 days.

Y2K CANNOT BE FIXED!

-- Jack (jsprat@eld.~net), November 24, 1999.

Hmmmm. Blaming the programmers. Well, at least it's easy and sells well.

But methinks this guy sure hasn't done his research....

-- Arnie Rimmer (Arnie_Rimmer@usa.net), November 24, 1999.

Those f*ing programmers. Man am I glad I'm just a horse trainer.

-- a (a@a.a), November 24, 1999.

Need to make something clear.

The first computers were made for governments. For a long time the principal customer of the computer industry was governments. Until very recently two digit years was a national standard. NIST just recently changed it. at any rate, if you want to sell computers to the government, you must comply with government standards. Government created this problem.

Then this current administration decided to conduct a stealth campaign hiding it starting in 1995/6 (hm, election years), when we should have been in the full tilt panic fixing it.

Then to add insult to injury, yester day after coming out earlier this month and saying Y2K well be a boon to the economy, the Secretary of Commerce says yesterday we better fix the embedded systems. 38 days left. Better fix the embedded systems. Who does NIST work for? Secretary of Commerce.

They havn't even come up with a standard for compliance. What are we complying with? At least the UK National Standards Institute came up with one for the UK 3-4 years ago.

Am I angry? After putting 8 years of my life into fixing this, to be in sh*&&y shape now?

Government and politicians.

-- ng (cantprovideemail@none.com), November 24, 1999.

Exactly who controlled the purse strings here when the decision was made not to buy more memory???

-- Porky (Porky@in.cellblockD), November 24, 1999.

Wow, the Irish Times? Man, you won the argument with this one. I guess this proves to the doomers that you know your sources and to the pollys, it signals that it's all over but the shoutin'. I don't know why you're wasting time traveling to sites like these, but for my money, mainstream articles have been quite positive recently and casting aspersions upon those at the head of the doom camps. Something about fear and profits.

Oh, that's right....positive news signifies some grand cover-up and spin, right?

regards.

-- Bad Company (johnny@shootingstar.com), November 24, 1999.

Hmmmm----might explain the Dale Way essay-dont blame us--essay!!

-- d----- (dciinc@aol.com), November 24, 1999.

Reville, the author of the article linked to, IS RIGHT ON. But there are various segments, sharing different aspects of the blame.

Blame range: 1 (minor) through 10 (major)

BIOS AND OTHER (EMBEDDED) CHIP MANUFACTURING EXECS -- 10
BIOS AND OTHER (EMBEDDED) CHIP MANUFACTURING CHIP DESIGNERS -- 9
PROCESSOR CHIP MANUFACTURING EXECS -- 10
PROCESSOR CHIP MANUFACTURING CHIP DESIGNERS -- 10
OPERATING SYSTEM COMPANY EXECS -- 10
OPERATING SYSTEM COMPANY PROGRAMMERS -- 9
APPLICATION COMPANY EXECS -- 8
APPLICATION COMPANY PROGRAMMERS -- 1
BUSINESS EXECS (CHOOSING "COOL" RATHER THAN GOOD) -- 8
PROGRAMMERS (CHOOSING "COOL" RATHER THAN GOOD) -- 8
BUSINESS EXECS (SWEPT ALONG) -- 2
PROGRAMMERS (SWEPT ALONG) -- 1

Feel free to add/expand categories and your ratings. :-)

-- A (A@AisA.com), November 24, 1999.

Bad Company: So no one else in the world has anything of value to say? I don't think the U.S. leaders (or public) are any shining light of wisdom.

ng: There IS a standard date format -- ANSI.
dBASE, years ago supported it AND 4 digit years:
SET DATE ANSI: --> YY.MM.DD (e.g., 99.12.31 for 1999 Dec 31)
SET CENTURY ON: --> YYYY.MM.DD (e.g., 1999.12.31 for 1999 Dec 31)

Dot prompt command
? CTOD("1999/12/31")
gives "1999.12.31"
if you look in a dBase file, you will see that date -- in plain text -- as "19991231"

dBase established the PC standard -- did Microsucks adhere to it and firm it up? NO!! Did IBM, for bigf iron, think to at least give the option to support 4 digits even though the government wanted 2 digits? Evidently not. Microsucks and IBM, etc., are a 10 on my scale above.

-- A (A@AisA.com), November 24, 1999.

BTW -- dBase recognizes 2000-02-29 as a valid date (2000 being a leap year). Would that all the "important" applications do the same.

-- A (A@AisA.com), November 24, 1999.

A, you've missed the point here. The entire issue had nothing to do with---and for another month or so---HAS nothing to do with camps themselves. In all honesty, camp mentalities are on the periphery of the entire issue, yet have muddled any worthwhile examination of remediation efforts, or lack thereof. We spend so much time scoffing at each other's reports that the truth can't possibly be known by even the most staunch, cool-headed researcher.

The litmus test of such a belief is this: IT pro #1 has had veritable success and relative ease in remediating code. Alas, he is bound to think the problems are minsicule. IT pro #2 has had nothing but problems. Even his remediated code has bugs and embedded chips? Perish the thought! This individual will see nothing but trouble. And in essence, that's the point: camp mentalities REALLY ARE based upon your own experiences, and who you choose to believe.

I just can't believe the doom, and I've been doing thorough reading for 2 years plus. (That doesn't mean I embrace the polly, either).

Stats are irrelevant now.

Regards.

-- Bad Company (johnny@shootingstar.com), November 24, 1999.

Now Bad Company, tell the nice people about the three months of supplies you have stashed so they know there's *some*thing out there you don't trust.

-- Good Company (Johnny@shiningstar.com), November 24, 1999.

Tis True, GC. I do have a couple of months of food, water...a lot of local woods and a chainsaw. Strange predicament that we can't really get a grip on just what will happen in a few weeks...and over the course of '00. And strange that in reality, '99 saw nothing new under the sun being said.

-- Bad Company (johnny@shootingstar.com), November 24, 1999.

Exactly who controlled the purse strings here when the decision was made not to buy more memory???

BOY DO YOU HAVE THAT RIGHT. ALL THE KNOW-IT-ALLS OF THE FINIANCIAL WORLD WOULD NOT LISTEN TO US PROGRAMMER P-ONS AND GIVE US MORE MEMORY AND MORE RESOURCES AND MORE TIME TO PLAN THE PROCESS OUT RIGHT. ALSO THE ENGINEERING GROUP DID NOT GIVE SOCIETY THE STANDARDS THEY SHOULD HAVE. SO HERE WE SH()&(^(*T.

Justhinkin@y2k com

-- just think (justthinkin@y2k.com), November 24, 1999.

Just think -- that's basically it.
BTW -- the way you spelled peons (p-ons) triggered a flash I never had before. A peon is someone peed upon (by management or TPTB). :-)

-- A (A@AisA.com), November 24, 1999.

Well, well, well.

I happen to think the buck does indeed stop at the top of the food chain, but guilty CEO's will never take the blame, because most of them are retired or dead.

As for a legal "witch hunt" for those in "middle IT management," who joked that they'd all be retired by the time Y2K became a problem, "So don't worry about it, boys," gee they're protected now, are they not, by the the legislation passed and signed by the President this past summer?

Well, maybe, maybe not. Insurance companies can and will be sued, and that will open up a very interesting Pandora's box.

Further, I don't remember any legislation that outlawed the media from reporting stories on the pomposity (past, present and future) of this profession, a conceit routinely displayed by "Y2kPro," and others. This WILL be reported in the mainstream press.

People who read those articles will form an opinion of the entire industry. Translation: This means CUSTOMERS.

The only people I feel sorry for are the programmers on this forum who do not possess this aforementioned "Polly-Psychotic" sense of self-importance.

Yep. It's on the way.

I repeat: Take THAT back to the "Polly lair."

-- guesswho (will@be.blamed), November 24, 1999.

You are all forgetting......Clintoon Camp was told about this way back in 1996.....yet, was too busy frolicking in the frat house to get around to appointing Kosk until March, 1998. I think we would not even be having a y2k discussion if something would have taken place back in 1996!! And they said his "private life" had nothing to do with his ability to run this country???

Karen

-- Karen (barbinst@wcta.net), November 24, 1999.