Well, anybody want to share thoughts towards people like me who did the actual remediation on Y2K and knocked the bug out before it bit?

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Hello,

I did lots of the remediation and testing for Y2K where I work. I was wondering what your thoughts are towards people like me who actually fixed the bug -- sacraficing many nights and weekends for testing before 1-1-2000. Are you mad, glad, or a little of both?

Curiously and honestly asking....please share truthfully. I would like to know. Thank you.

-- programmer/analyst (programmer@nalyst.org), January 08, 2000

Answers

Great job you did. God bless you.

-- Marie (pray4peace@compuserve.com), January 08, 2000.

Fabulous job! You guys and gals did way better than even the most optimistic were hoping for. I hope that each and every one of you receieve some sort of bonus.

-- Think It (Through@Pollies.Duh), January 08, 2000.

I'm glad! Thank you very, very much. I thank you. My husband thanks you. My children thank you. (Gee, I always wanted to be a programmer.)

-- Liz (lizpavek@hotmail.com), January 08, 2000.

Wanna be my bunkie??

-- Porky (Porky@in.cellblockD), January 08, 2000.

Our heartfelt thanks. Almost impossible for us to understand what it was like for you.

-- J Wheel (motherof5@wellprepared.noregrets), January 08, 2000.


Glad you fixed it. Been nice if you talked before the CDC. Always was difficult to find information from the fixers.

And the beat goes on.

Martin

-- Martin Thompson (Martin@aol.com), January 08, 2000.


You folks are the real unsung heros! Job well done .... we all owe you a debt of gratitude.

-- Lee Barber (LeeeeeeB@webtv.net), January 08, 2000.

My question is how this task was accomplished with, basically, zero defects. One reason the I was a doomer, was the sheer magnitude of the task, and the certainty that when programmers started remediating, things that were not broken would get broken in the process.

Why did that not happen?

-- don wiley (drw@planetc.com), January 08, 2000.


I work some nights and weekends too, big deal! You got paid! It's called a job!

Find yourself some volunteer work if your current job isn't rewarding enough to make it through life without asking for praise.

-- BiGG (superste@antigopro.net), January 08, 2000.


AS A PREMIER DOOMER, YO! MOST EXCELLENT, AND SO FAR, SO GOOD! I KNOW YOU'LL HAVE MORE *(&%$ LONG NIGHTS (AND OVERTIME!), BUT AT LEAST I'M NOT TERRIBLY SWEATING MY FOLKS AND FRIENDS IN PERILOUS AREAS AND SITUATIONS GOING THROUGH THE MASSIVE GRIEF INFRASTRUCTURE COLLAPSE WOULD HAVE BROUGHT! MUCHO GRACIAS!

ZOGGUS

whoops, sorry, all caps, need to look at monitor once in awhile!

-- zog (zzoggy@yahoo.com), January 08, 2000.



Just a couple of thoughts--One, you were paid, you are a professional and , hopefully did a thorough job and, two, It's January 8 not March 8. I saw a lot of the mess that came back from remediation(about 40- 50% was done in other countries) and KNOW the code is broken. I'm beginning to suspect, as Dale Way sugests, that broken code will work the further away it gets in time from the boundary. In a long conversation I had with him in August he stated that by April/May the unremediated date data formats would lose contact with date calculations on the 20th century side of the boundary and, for want of a better analogy, heal themselves.

-- Blew5M (gaf@mindspring.com), January 08, 2000.

Cobol guys gave us two digit dates

And Unix guys made it four

Now it all remediates

So go, and sin no more.

-- Forrest Covington (theforrest@mindspring.com), January 08, 2000.


I also worked the remediation trail, ropin' them bugies and wrestling their sorry asses to the ground. Much good and satisfying work. Too bad the client (a govt agency) on our last pre-rollover contract never got their specs together. We started late, with not enough money, and poor technical direction from the project manager. It was a 'contingency' though so should not be a problem. Just 'cause their mainframe is dead as of rollover and our 'contingency' program only did the core business functions...say about 25% of all the necessary code. Too bad, started late, too little leadership, too little money, no time. They figured y2k was shaping up as a no problem, so the contract was 'finished' early so they could get some pr benefits. Now they are using the contingeny and spiraling down into hell doing the 'non-critical' work by hand. Should be about two weeks more before reports of the agency meltdown start to hit national news.

-- pliney the younger (pliney@sqlguy.com), January 08, 2000.

My husband was one of your number who spent some weekends, late nights and sleepless hours until his Y2K project worked without a hitch. It wasn't a life or death project, but could have put criminals on the street before they paid their debt to society. I suspect that you, like my husband, were not fully appreciated and, similarly, breathed a sigh of relief when things went so well, attributing most of the success to sheer luck. In reality, it is due to the skills, experience, knowledge and dedication of the programmers, analysts and other computer specialists that we are so far relatively unscathed. From what I see on this board and in the chat rooms, the people on this board are utterly delighted that you all worked as hard and brilliantly Iand luckily?) as you did. Thank you.

-- Old Git (anon@spamproblems.com), January 08, 2000.

Well, first, Down On your Knees, for the knowledge, second, Down on your knees, for the Heaven sent fortitude to carry it out! We Thank your Faith!

-- Damnest Thing I (have@witnessed.com), January 08, 2000.


Yes, thanks for everything you and your peers have done. My parnter's an IT tech, so I know what kind of time, sweat and tears went into remediation. It's been physically and emotionally exhausting for you and your families and your involvement continues on max output levels.

Here's a question: As one of the "front liners", do you believe that the majority of IT consumers have any comprehension of the work that's gone into remediation? The aspect of this situation that concerns me is that it's being far too simplified. Some of us here in Houston that are network dynamic "afficiandos" have touched on this problem in a peripheral way in our communications. The remediation efforts are a part of the whole scenario. And in light of the Durkheimian theory of the the whole differs from the sum of the parts and the assumption that any action within a system affects subsequent output across integrated systems.....the outcome of the butterfly's wing...

-- mike in houston (m.morris@hotmail.com), January 08, 2000.


I would like to hear from anyone who did remediation in Brazil.

-- Earl (eshuholm@worldnet .att.net), January 08, 2000.

You are a good guy. Hope you caught up with your sleep deficiency.

Hope they gave you a bonus too!

-- W (me@home.now), January 08, 2000.


Thank you. And thank you to my two sons who are programmers (one for state of Michigan). Thank you to my best friend who is programmer for company I work for...wouldn't have had a paycheck without him.

-- justme (justme@myhouse.com), January 08, 2000.

I think we need an annual international Techno-Geeks holiday in celebration of all you and your associates were able to accomplish. Truly, thanks.

-- Faith Weaver (suzsolutions@yahoo.com), January 08, 2000.

I would like to know if any remediation work invoved windowing? Any clocks rolled back? Will problems arise down the road?

-- curious (don'twana@say.com), January 08, 2000.

I'm so thankful that the remediation was thorough enough that we didn't get immediate, widespread loss of electricity. That was the scenario that I thought would cause widespread chaos and loss of life. I believe that problems will continue to occur, but at least it won't be everywhere at once.

-- Sylvia (bluebirdms@aol.com), January 08, 2000.

I am very thankful for your efforts. What I wonder is....I did nothing to MY computer and it works just fine. Can you tell me why?

Peace

-- hope (hope@spirit.com), January 08, 2000.


Donuts! Donuts! Hero! Applause! Thanking God and the programmers incessantly 0:-)

-- Ashton & Leska in Cascadia (allaha@earthlink.net), January 08, 2000.

Question: I know you have done a good job and I am thankfull for the job you have done,BUT was it neccessary???? I mean how come that USa spent so much money more than any other country,does it mean that USa is more dependant of computers?

Thank YOU

-- Alex The Italian (alexcapr@yours.com), January 09, 2000.


First, your praise.... Huzzah!!!

Now, a question... If it takes 7 years to remediate the code for Social Security, who's computers had..80 million(?) lines of code, then how can General Motors possibly remediate 1 billion lines of code in less than 3 years?

-- A.P. (grim2k@hotmail.com), January 09, 2000.


I'm a remediator also. It was an interesting project. Many of us did not have lives, especially the last year. It's kind of nice to know we contributed to fixing a problem that some said couldn't be fixed.

Made a lot of new friends working so long on the project. I'll remember the people I worked with who have now gone onto other teams. It was a unique opportunity. Plan to get together with people from other shops that I only know via the net!! Have a lot more options when I take a vacation in terms of where I can stay. Got to know someone from Australia really well. We're planning to get our families together either in the States or in Australia.

Glad I was a part of it. Learned a lot. Laughed a lot. Worried a lot. Was exhausted a lot. This is one project I'll remember for the rest of my life. People I interacted with pulled together and there was a real sense of community.

-- Chris Josephson (chrisj62954@aol.com), January 09, 2000.


Thanks and your work is appreciated.

Do you have any thoughts about why many 1st world countries, such as Germany and Japan, and most 3rd world countries that all did little to nothing to fix their systems are not faring any worse than we are?

-- Interested Spectator (is@the_ring.side), January 09, 2000.


Some real strange comments here, gave me the willies...

================================

programmer/analyst: Thanks for all the sacrifices you and your family had to endure! Hopefully you guys can play "catch-up" here soon, now that you'll have more time.:)

-- Hokie (Hokie_@hotmail.com), January 09, 2000.


I would like to hear from anyone who did remediation in Brazil.

-- Earl (eshuholm@worldnet .att.net), January 08, 2000.

And lets also hear from those who 'remediated' Italy, Venezula, Indonesia, Russia, former Soviet Union, China, Africa, South America, the banking system of greater Europe...

-- ? (?@?.?), January 09, 2000.


Pliney the younger:

You probably can't give a name, but could you at least tell us what industry this company is in? And if what you predict does happen, can you follow up with the details? Thanks.

-EricE

-- EricE (ready@for.anything), January 09, 2000.


Programmer,

I'm very glad that remediation was done and that the rollover has gone so smoothly *so far*. There are too many innocent people who'd have suffered if it wasn't for your (and many others) work!

Thank you very much.

-- Deb M. (vmcclell@columbus.rr.com), January 09, 2000.


Congratulations on your apparent success. It would be useful to know your industry and what kinds of systems you were working on. Were you working on programs 30 years old or something fairly recent? Perhaps 80 per cent of the large US companies were successful, but we still don't know what damage will be done by the ones that weren't successful.

-- Dave (dannco@hotmail.com), January 09, 2000.

Did you do a good job, okay yes. Did you crawl out of the depression or fight the Nazi's and Japanese? If you had been in Korea or Vietnam I doubt you would ask this question. You show how little we have experienced or had to scrifice. Work late nights and weekends. I and many people I know do this on a regular basis. Shortage of people, you have to do this or your department gets outsourced or your company ships your job to some third world sweat shop. Am I angry that the big stuff was fixed, heck no. Am I going to vote you the Mother Theresa of 1999, doubtful.

I doubt you were complaining to loudly when cashing that paycheck. This sounds a little like one of those Hollywood talk shows where the rich actor/actress complains about how her/his stardom is such a weight to bear. Its the job, you did it, now move on the the ERP or E- business upgrade and cash that next paycheck. When you make a real sacrifice come back and I will sing your praises. This isn't meant to be bitter just trying to bring some perspective in your view of where we fit int the world.

-- Squid (ItsDark@down.here), January 09, 2000.


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