More from those 2 Y2k CutUPs Paula and Coreeeeee together again

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Sister Catherine would like to know why these two were ever permitted to have use of their keyboards again without Adult Supervision.

http://www.timebomb2000.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=4555

258

Remember RC? The embeddeds in the oil industry doomer?

We got an e-mail from him just last week. He knew of tons of problems after the rollover from various contacts. But we hadn't heard from him in perhaps six months and he says now that from what he's been hearing the embeddeds problems in gas and oil are mostly fixed or patched or worked around.

So is this pretty much behind us now? ( just in time for the ME to blow up?)

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lynnie is offline New Post 08-06-2001 02:09 AM
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Paula_Gordon
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Registered: Jun 2001
Location: Washington, DC
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Thanks, Lynnie, for your interesting post.

Y2K work is unfinished so long as problems have only been temporarily fixed or work arounds are still in place.

It certainly could be that the worst "is over" when it comes to the oil and gas sectors in this country, but there are other high risk sectors with problems that may not be getting as much attention. So, even assuming that problems in the oil and gas sectors have begun to subside, that does not mean that problems in other sectors have similarly begun to subside or that the problems that have occurred in other sectors are being addressed with a similar degree of effectiveness.

I hope you or others will post specifics concerning post rollover problems and the ways that they have been addressed.

Many thanks!

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Paula_Gordon is offline New Post 08-07-2001 04:47 AM
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Cherri
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Ah Paula... you are still at it. How sad. Don't you realize that the "embedded chips" were NEVER a problem?
Why don't you use some of your time to take some courses in how they work?
How can you keep going on about a subject in which you have know practical knowledge?
This is hard science, not debatable, not effected by any social belief or opinion.
Is it beyond your ability to comprehend that you have been wrong all along? Or would it destroy your mind to acknowledge that what you have believed for so long has been incorrect all along?
Where is the physical proof to back up what you say?
Grasping at the opinions of others does not change the physics involved in embedded chips.
Perhaps you do not have the capacity to comprehend how embedded chips work and need to believe what you so publicly predicted...I don't know, but you definatly have a mental disconnect with the reality of the trut

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Cherri is offline New Post 08-09-2001 07:55 AM
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Y2KVet
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"Regarding the form of evidence known as "circumstantial evidence", an example can be given: If you have a doubling of the costs of pipeline explosions in the year 2000 (which was the case) and if an increase in pipeline explosions was expected and/or predicted owing to embedded control system malfunctions or failures (which also was the case), and if you have instances of explosions before or after the rollover that were linked to embedded control system or other Y2K-related problems, then one is on fairly sound ground in assuming that at least some of the pipeline explosions that occurred in the year 2000 were Y2K-related, ..." (emphasis mine)

Honestly!

Note the OFFICE OF PIPELINE SAFETY HAZARDOUS LIQUID PIPELINE OPERATORS ACCIDENT SUMMARY STATISTICS BY YEAR. For 2000, the number of pipeline accidents and injuries was the lowest in 15 years. The number of deaths and the amount of lost material was the second lowest in 15 years.

If Y2K failures had been so common, the NUMBER of accidents would have spiked rather than declining. That WAS, in fact, what you predicted, not an increase in COSTS. However, the cost spike could be explained by a single explosion in a highly populated area or at a major installation. This contradicts the thesis of your entire section on embedded "chips." (Sorry, Cherri. I gotta use lingo they understand.)

The drivel about medical devices is just as spurious. We (large state Y2K project including medical schools and teaching hospitals) found very few medical device failures at all. Most failures occurred in displays or printouts. Occasionally a device could be "worked around" by resetting the date or the entire device.

Outright failures--those things that had to be replaced or fixed were about a dozen out of 250,000 potential devices. Yes, we counted them. Every one that we could find. AND NONE OF THEM CONSTITUTED A THREAT TO PATIENT SAFETY. (Ironically, however, they were some of the most expensive to replace!)

Same thing for RC's "downhole" chips. Petroleum engineers at our state universities guffawed at his theories. I know; I asked them. It was my JOB.

"Chips" don't exist solo, they are assembled into systems. And systems can't exist deep in an oil well. Sensors, maybe, but not computer systems. And this was from experts--people who do this for a living.

Same thing for Cory's supposed catastrophic failures in DeeCee. We have numerous OS/390 installations and none of them had anywhere near the number or kind of problems he claimed to have found or heard about. And some of our systems are quite intricately linked and heavily date-dependant. If we could fix 'em, why couldn't the feds?

Apparently the feds COULD fix them. And I don't recall Cory fleeing to the hills during the rollover. Did he know more than he would admit to? Enquiring minds would like to know!!!!

In fact, enquiring minds would like to know why Ms. Gordon used such careful wording about the COSTS of pipeline failures instead of the statistically more relevant NUMBER of failures. Enquiring minds trained in statistical analysis are eagerly awaiting her (no doubt mathematically rigorous) apologia.

Yes, our state had Y2K failures. We watched carefully for them. We tracked them. We cross-referenced our findings with other states to make sure we weren't missing anything. (There was an active group of state Y2K coordinators that held monthly conference calls to monitor Y2K remediation among all states.)

But of the few failures we did have, one-third to one-half occurred on the trigger dates. (Remember them?) And they were small. Insignificant. So we knew that the BIG DAY would be trivial, too. And the follow-on failures were non-events.

It amazes me that some people are still carrying this torch nearly 2 years after the fact. And after all the pretentious cross-referencing and footnoting has been discredited by reality.

But seriously, I would like an answer, Ms. Gordon. Not generalities; specifics. Why should I believe anything you say when you've spun the facts so carefully to fit your predictions? Nothing you've said fits the reality I've seen. And I think I've been as close to "inside" Y2K as you can get except for Koskinen's office. It's very likely I have better sources than you do.

Show me some reason I should believe RC rather than petroleum engineers at our universities. Why should I believe Cory's anonymous "sources" instead of IT managers at our own state agencies? Why should I trust Frautschi instead of engineers at AMD, Intel, Motorola, Zilog, TI, and a host of other corporations that not only make chips for embedded systems, but actually design and assemble the systems?


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Y2KVet is offline New Post 08-11-2001 09:43 PM
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bigwavedave
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welcome aboard, Y2KVet. i do hope paula and cory will be able to offer a rebuttal, but i've got that feeling we'd only hear more of the same.

(oops, same goes for you, cherri)


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Last edited by bigwavedave on 08-13-2001 at 03:22 AM

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bigwavedave is online now New Post 08-13-2001 12:25 AM
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2x2
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Link from the past!!


http://www.ironic.com/y2k/y2klinks.html

Must be nice to have unlimited public money to waste on ghost chasing.


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2x2 is offline New Post 08-13-2001 01:00 AM
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cory
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Registered: Jun 2001
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We better start another thread.

I'd like to respond but this thread is too long and the 174K in it is a drag to reload.

Maybe we can start a new thread if Paula will promise to be brief.

Mr. Vet has confused a few facts, but hey, that's what makes these discussions fun.

In particular, "Apparently the feds COULD fix them. And I don't recall Cory fleeing to the hills during
the rollover. Did he know more than he would admit to? Enquiring minds would like to know!!!!

Explain what you mean.

Do you mean that no federal agency took a complete several day IT outage in the weeks after the rollover?

Do you mean that I advised running for the hills? (Plan-A meant staying at Ground Zero, 2 blocks from a 7-11. Site-B is a quiet, treed suburban neighborhood, 1/2 mile from a 7-11.)

Seems to be some stray synapses firing there.

What do you mean?

While you're at it, do you know anyone (friend, relative, coworker, someone close) who lost a hundred thousand dollars in the stock market in the last year?

Start another thread if you want to continue. Polly lurkers are encouraged to post cheers for Mr. Vet.


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cory is offline New Post 08-13-2001 04:08 AM
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Brooks
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Y2KVet, EPA's data shows the extreme spike that you say does not exist in the Office of Pipeline Safety's numbers. At any rate, you should be looking at the increase in incidents in the second half of 1999, peaking in Q1 2000, and then receding. It wouldn't surprise me if the costs averaged out somewhat for the year. Afterall, the damage had already occurred.

BTW, the EPA incidents other times incorporate all manners of operations, like bus depot spills. The petroleum industry alone accounted for the increase in incidents. It wasn't reflected across the board in other operations.

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Brooks is offline New Post 08-13-2001 12:31 PM
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Y2KVet
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Brooks,

Y2KVet, EPA's data shows the extreme spike that you say does not exist in the Office of Pipeline Safety's numbers.

Can you give me a reference, please? I can't seem to find that kind of information at EPA. Did you mean to say OSHA?

At any rate, you should be looking at the increase in incidents in the second half of 1999, peaking in Q1 2000,

That assertion has always puzzled me. Since embedded systems don't, as a rule, do look-aheads, why would there be a spike pre-2000? None of the chip/system designers we talked to thought this kind of reasoning made any sense at all.

Cory - Patience, I will get to your, um, assertions in due course. And in any case sooner than Ms. Gordon will ever get to my questions.


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Y2KVet is offline New Post 08-13-2001 11:23 PM
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Brooks
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Y2KVet, you have to request the raw Ascii data from EPA. www.epa.gov. As I recall, the keeper of the database is Merle Miller. He can send it to you by e-mail. He's based in EPA's DC office. There are three databases. (You only get the public info, of course, after the enforcement issues have been resolved.) Criminal (may not be "ripe" yet for distribution), Civil Administrative (EPA handles internally) and Civil Judicial (EPA refers these cases to Department of Justice which takes them to court). It is the Civil Administrative database you want. It goes back to 1972. In particular, look at the Clean Water Act violations involving some kind of oil spill (various names, may say oil or petroleum or crude oil, etc.) There is a bit of a time lag between the event and when the dates show up on the database, but EPA would have swept in pretty quickly. And it is consistent with what we were hearing on the media.

These are the oil spills. I couldn't find anything that would have reflected the state of the refineries themselves, like an air violation.

Early 1999 EPA adopted a Y2K enforcement policy, which generally stated that companies would not be excused from full prosecution for problems following rollover unless they did very careful remediation and testing prior to rollover. The problems during the second half of 1999 would have reflected these testing periods. Certainly after the rollover, noone could afford to admit fix-on-failure problems to EPA.

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Brooks is offline New Post 08-14-2001 12:21 AM
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Paula_Gordon
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Y2KV:

Re question posed concerning why there might be "look-ahead" problems prior to the rollover (and, indeed, involving trigger dates after the rollover):

"Annual Maintenance Scheduling

Annual maintenance scheduling triggers a diagnostic self-check. That entails the recording of a date and time. If the date did not roll over then the PLC can seize and this can result in "functional overflow".

Another problem with annual maintenance scheduling is that the date that the function is activated is the same date every year, but that date is by no means the same in everything that has annual mainenance scheduling."

From the appendices to "John Koskinen's Responses to Questions from Paula Gordon Concerning National and Global Aspects of Y2K"

http://www.gwu.edu/~y2k/keypeople/gordon/Q&A.html

I hope this is helpful.

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Paula_Gordon is offline New Post 08-14-2001 01:20 AM
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