Page down to #6 Chronic Y2K Medicine

LINK

-- PJC (paulchri@msn.com), December 17, 1999

Answers

Fair Use, Educational yada yada...

Dan Steele, EE

The following is a list of SYMPTOMS you could see IF your PC is NOT Y2K-COMPLIANT...

1- Unexpected expiration of passwords, licenses, security cards, software etc.

2- Operating system file operations give unexpected time results, e.g., files that are NEW are treated as if they were OLD

3- Operating system asks if you wish to overwrite an "OLD file" that is really a "NEW" file

4- Operating system DOESN'T ASK if you wish to overwrite a file that REALLY IS AN "OLD" file, because system thinks it is "NEW"

5- Incorrect calculations involving time spans or timing intervals

6- Applications that depend on file sorting by date for correct operation suddenly fail or present illogical results

7- Inability to interface with some external applications

8- Software development tools/systems (compilers) that automatically overwrite "old" versions do not perform properly

9- Software Tools or Systems (installers) that automatically copy over older files make "mistakes"

10- A non-compliant application is accidentally downloaded and run on your previously Y2K compliant system!

11- A non-compliant application is accidentally installed and run on your previously Y2K compliant system!

12- Developers: Changes made to compiled programs suddenly disappear and problems that have been fixed suddenly reappear after recompilation of modules

13- Changes made to programs (updates etc.) suddenly disappear and problems that have been fixed (security problems, bugs) suddenly reappear

14- Email is launched with each encounter of specific year 2000 date problems

15- Scheduled processes, Email, or applications, are activated at the wrong time

16- Scheduled processes such as archive or delete functions on files or email are launched at the wrong time

17- System date upon powering up is 1980 or some year in the distant past, or, system date appears normal but file dates are wrong

18- Date display (displayed at the "date" command) is wrong or different from system date

Layer upon layer, the cumulative affect of Y2k problems WILL affect you. Your computer WILL give you problems if IT has a problem.

There WILL be internet sites with problems. Shopping carts, and other CGI-BIN processes WILL FAIL at some sites because the perl scripts weren't checked.

Some hosting firms have inadequate electrical backup... electrical problems and sporadic brownouts will occur, gradually increasing after January 1. That will lead to less reliable server farms... sites can't run on air!

-- semper paratus (always@ready.now), December 17, 1999.

I forgot to label that as a quote from the link above. I'm just the cutter and paster of the source code.

-- semper paratus (always@ready.now), December 17, 1999.