Y2K Bug: From Time Bomb to Dud

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Y2K Bug: From Time Bomb to Dud

Updated 6:04 PM ET December 1, 1999

By Neil Winton

LONDON (Reuters) - The millennium computer bug has mutated from a time bomb into a dud.

Former Cassandras are backing away from scenarios that predicted chaos around the world as computers crashed at midnight on Dec. 31 because of the ubiquitous bug. Now these experts say that thanks to their perception in identifying the problem and the effectiveness of their public relations effort, the world can party into the next millennium without fear.

The lights will not go out at midnight. Telephones will work normally, once the traditional New Year phoning frenzy has died down. Jumbo jets will not fall from the sky. Civilized life as we know it will not come to an abrupt halt.

But this hoped-for happy outcome has not come cheaply. U.S. information technology research company Gartner Group said companies around the world would have to spend between $300 billion and $600 billion to fix the problem.

IDC, another U.S. high technology consultancy, estimated in a report last month that by the end of 1999 the world will have spent $250 billion finding, replacing, rewriting, testing and documenting computer code infected by the bug.

And all because lazy computer programmers in the 1980s used two digits, such as 89 or 97, to record dates on software, knowing that this would trip over the two zeros in 2000 and cause computers to crash or spew out corrupt data.

They knew that this shorthand, to conserve what was then precious and scarce memory, would cripple data processing if not rectified before clocks ticked into 2000. But they gambled that the progress of technology would be fast enough to render obsolete this method of using dates.

They lost, setting off this expensive race to fix computer systems before midnight on Dec. 31 to avoid disaster.

SOME DISRUPTION BUT BARELY NOTICEABLE

IDC believes the race has been won, although some disruption may occur if people fear that there will be problems and rush to hoard necessities like cash or food.

"There will be some disruptions, whether from Y2K-related computer glitches, bad weather or aberrant behavior of the populace," IDC said in the report. "But wholesale hysteria is clearly not called for," it added.

Some countries, such as China and Vietnam, are more vulnerable than others, according to IDC. But even there disruption is likely to be minimal.

"Sure, China has a miserable record of Y2K remediation -- yet in a country with little in the way of dependable infrastructure, a little computer downtime will have little impact," the report said.

"Relatively speaking, Latin America and Asia Pacific will feel the most pain -- they are automated economies with lots of pirated software and not a lot of remediation. Eastern Europe and Africa will escape because they aren't automated in the first place. First World countries will be fine because they have worked so hard to fix the problem," IDC said.

It dismissed claims by economists such as Ed Yardeni of Deutsche Banc Alex Brown that Y2K disruption is a threat to the global economy.

"Y2K will have only a minor impact on the global economy," said Tom Oleson, IDC analyst and one of the report's authors. "We estimate that the financial impact of Y2K will be around $25 billion, and out of a total economy of over $100 trillion in revenues that doesn't seem much, just a minor problem."

IMPORTANT INDUSTRIAL SECTORS IN GOOD SHAPE

Research by Reuters correspondents backs up this outlook. Few experts believe airliners will be hit by computer failure, although there may be some problems from ticketing and baggage systems. Air traffic control is expected to work worldwide.

"There are no no-fly areas," said a spokesman for British Airways. "If we had any doubts we would cancel our flights, but there are no reasons to do so."

The world banking system is said to be solid, although some worry that weak links in the system might pose a threat.

"It doesn't matter how good a driver you are because you have to rely on other people not making mistakes, and it's the same with banks and Y2K," one senior banker told Reuters.

Retailers, relying on complicated supply chains heavily dependent on computers, say they are debugged and ready.

World stock markets expect business as usual after the long holiday weekend.

But not everybody is convinced. Professor Gary North publishes a Web site (http://www.garynorth.com) with advice on what he believes is an upcoming Y2k disaster.

North, who has moved his family to northwest Arkansas, says computer crashes will rock the industrialized world. He believes no power generation on Earth is safe from infection.

This, coupled with failing telephone infrastructure, could spell havoc for weeks or even months in the industrialized world, North says. He provides a survival check list including advice on wood stoves, water and food. Of the stock market, he says, "Get out of it. Now." And he recommends acquiring gold coins because banks and automated teller machines will crash.

The last resort will be items that can be bartered easily, he said in a recent newsletter. "There are the old favorites: cigarettes, chewing tobacco, bullets, condoms, toilet paper, and other easily recognized items for which there is demand. These are near-money; barter items that have broad appeal."

========================================= End

Ray

-- Ray (ray@totacc.com), December 01, 1999

Answers

It could be that they are right..

Look.. It's December 1st.. NO PANIC.. No failure of the Just In Time system in the final few months as predicted.

When I go to the stores (NorthWest), I see an UNUSUALLY HIGH number of canned foods, batteries, and survival items.

I got cash out of my bank VERY easily.

The 'predictor dates' have come and gone silently. All states and the Federal Government are already operating on FY2000.

I'm still looking for the rollover failures on the 1st of January.

This whole thing could be BS.

Bryce

-- Bryce (Bryce@nospam.com), December 01, 1999.


STARTING in about 30 days, we will all BEGIN to find out what the truth really is, won't we. Probably even when serious problems begin to mount, there are many who will continue the denial. It will be interesting to see how long the denial continues.

Tic-toc-tic-toc-tic-toc.......

-- TA (sea_spur@yahoo.com), December 01, 1999.


As a middle grounder this article is interesting, and out of the two I would beleive the optimists over scary gary. Unfortunately I believe niether.

Health and education are in a bad way and that is alot of paychecks. Just to start with

-- Brian (imager@home.com), December 01, 1999.


"the effectiveness of their public relations effort"

This is great, the best summary of the current Y2K situation that I've seen yet. I dont know if I should laugh or cry.

"And all because lazy computer programmers in the 1980s used two digits, such as 89 or 97, to record dates"

Pure bullshit. The problem goes back to the 60's, when our very own Department of Defense deceided to use a 2 digit standard. IBM, and other computer companies, wanted the DOD business, so they built their hardware/operating systems to support 2 digit years. Programmers used whatever service was available to them. There was no 4 digit year, in the 60's, 70's, 80's or the early 90's.

And the last time I checked, the date is still 1999. Doesn't the Y2K problem have something to do with the year 2000? Maybe, after almost 32 years of programming, I should go take a math 101 class to see if this is true or not...

Tick... Tock... <:00=

-- Sysman (y2kboard@yahoo.com), December 01, 1999.


Let me get this straight:

A reporter does a quick article, making his own set of predictions, without substantiation of any significance, and we're supposed to swallow it like good little children?

Here I go... RANT RANT RANT!

What's the point of trying to convince people anymore!!!!!!!!

-- (Kurt.Borzel@gems8.gov.bc.ca), December 01, 1999.



Gee and Klinton is declaring a national emergency and FEMA is gearing up worried it wont be able to handle the expected number of failures.

Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall. Humpty Dumpty had a great fall. All the great troups and all the great leaders, couldn't put Humpty together again.

-- Susan Barrett (sue59@bellsouth.net), December 01, 1999.


It could be that Neil Winton is full of it. Let's see here.....

...Now these experts say that thanks to their perception in identifying the problem and the effectiveness of their public relations effort, the world can party into the next millennium without fear...

Isn't there supposed to be something like "fixing the code" in there somewhere? As for "public relations," whose "public relations" is he talking about? Kosky's?

...Jumbo jets will not fall from the sky...

Bingo! The one sentence that tells me that the writer doesn't know what the hell he's talking about.

...And all because lazy computer programmers...

What a sweet talker. Insulting, but sweet.

"There will be some disruptions, whether from Y2K-related computer glitches, bad weather or aberrant behavior of the populace," IDC said in the report.

Let's see. Lazy programmers, a populace prone to aberrant behavior... Is this guy and IDC trying to tick off as many people as possible?

...Retailers, relying on complicated supply chains heavily dependent on computers, say they are debugged and ready...

Isn't that special. They're debugged and ready. And, uh, they're guaranteeing that those "complicated supply chains heavily dependent on computers" are debugged and ready, too, right?

I give up. There's too many jerkface comments in this article to deal with in one sitting. I'll give him a "C+" for presentation, "D-" for content. What a putz.

-- The Whistler (I'm Here, I'm There, I'm Everywhere@so.beware), December 01, 1999.


Sysman,

Yes, of course 1999 is not 2000. But FY 2000 has already happened with no major interruptions.. Correct?

There ARE NO bank runs.. Correct?

The Just In Time system is up now on December 1st.. Correct?

There ARE NO food shortages.. Correct?

The Stock Market is OK, in fact we are seeing the usual 4th quarter rally.. Correct?

I can't predict what will happen, BUT I CAN READ INDICATORS.

I'm a software engineer as well. As far as that goes, I could give a rats A** if a few hundred application systems from the 60s/70s/80s go down. As long as it's not directly safety related, it's a non-issue.

30 Days.. We will see what happens. I think I'll be eating a lot of Beans and Rice this January though..

Bryce

-- Bryce (Bryce@nospam.com), December 01, 1999.


sysman and whistler............exactly my thoughts!!!!!!!!!!!

-- lazyprogrammers'r'us NOT (karlacalif@aol.com), December 01, 1999.

Bryce:

You MAY be able to read indicators, but this does not mean you CAN understand them.

The president should never rely on intelligence advisors who can read indicators, but not understand what role *each* indicator plays in the entire story.

What any good leader needs are advisors who are steady under pressure, think analytically, and are honest-to-a-fault.

But the responsibility for the final decision lies with the man in command.

Don't jump to conclusions! Think each fact over slowly and carefully.

Think SYSTEMS.

-- (Kurt.Borzel@gems8.gov.bc.ca), December 01, 1999.



Ray:

I have been following this for a long time. I have learned several things: One is that software engineers [or code jockies] are very narrow. I haven't been impressed with their ability to understand the whole problem. Most CIO's [and CEO's] have a different agenda which is unrelated to solving the problem. While the problem is somewhat simple, the systems aren't. I'm not sure that there is a system analyst that understands all of the systems. If there is, I haven't found him/her. Most economists know nothing about technology [He,He; I already knew this]. No journalists know anything about technological subjects. The people dealing with this subject could be called Protestants and Catholics and moved to Northern Ireland of the 20's without skipping a beat. You must think that the world will end or that nothing will happen. Now I know that this is not a problem on BB's but it appears to have permeated the world. There is more, but all is the same. It's not that I haven't found any certain answers; and I haven't. It is that I haven't found any reliable sign posts that point in a useful direction. I think that we are going into this blind. No matter what happens, I will be amazed.

Best

-- Z1X4Y7 (Z1X4Y7@aol.com), December 01, 1999.


Bryce,

First, I know that you've been here for a while, so you should know my opinion. The number of programs, fiscal and other, that do any kind of look ahead processing is only a tiny percentage of the total number of programs that have a date problem. CURRENT-DATE (in COBOL terms) is the real Y2K problem, and the current date is still 1999. We have very few year 2000 dates in the production "world database."

Now let's ignore PCs, and mid-range systems, and embedded systems, and talk about the 50,000 mainframes for a moment. Virtually every Fortune 1000 company has more than one mainframe, that usually runs a critical part of the business. Some of these applicatione were developed on the System/360 in the 60's. When the System/370 was born, these applicatione were moved to the new hardware, and more new applications were developed on that platform. The same is true for the System/390, the old stuff was moved, and more new stuff was developed. Enhancements to the old code was, and is, an ongoing process. All the while, using the 2 digit year offered by the OS. We're not talking about a few hundred "old" applications, we're talking about the vast majority of all software that is in production, today, on the mainframes of this world. This software wasn't born yesterday, it has evolved over the decades. <:)=

-- Sysman (y2kboard@yahoo.com), December 01, 1999.


I will once more be VERY blunt:

Another shit-fer-brains lackey no-mind "reporter"(and doesn't that term say it all? Nothing about independent thought, or investigation, just "report" on the successful spin that has guaranteed there will be no Y2K problemo), COMMENTING on how the war is won, before it has even started!

This clueless turd will also feel the full wrath of Darwinism come the New Year, thanks to his herd mentality.

I wonder if his reading the article dug out by Homer Beanfang today about embedded systems by a certain consultant group would alter his tone? But then he's a reporter--reading is not a requisite, either, for that profession.

Neither is thinking with a real brain.

-- profit of doom (doom@helltopay.ca), December 01, 1999.


Some people keep saying there are no serious problems to date. How does anyone know this? When government agencies or big corporations have problems, they don't report them to the media. Look how long it took for the major problems with hte DOD conputer that tracks security clearances to become known.

-- Danny (dcox@ix.netcom.com), December 02, 1999.

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