The Optimistic Pessimist
My system clock is currently reading 12:01 AM, Saturday, January 01, 2000. And guess what, no ExPLosIonS. I didn't really expect anything to happen. I mean, lets look at this "Y2K" / "Millenium Bug" with a little bit of common sense. First of all, we are making references to a clock on a computer. Do you think that your operating system really cares if its 1900 or 2000. No. So if your operating system continues to operate, that's good, right? Secondly, if your system clock, the one residing on your Bios were to revert back to the year 1900, what would that really do.
Well, think about that logically for a minute or two. If your software doesn't make calculations that are dependant upon a date or time, who cares. I once worked in an office, in 1988, where the Bios on one machine refused to go beyond 1984 (maybe it was a Brave New World problem), but the only problem we had was finding the files since they were always at the bottom of the directory list - it was rather irritating but not a disaster.
12:26 AM Saturday, January 01, 2000.
I've been hit by a few system reminders, back up, clean up and so on, but still no explosions. I also checked a number of programs:
AutoCAD® R14.01 / ADT checked out just fine when I typed in "DATE" on the command line; "TIME" was okay too.
OutlookTM checked out too, but wanted to archive my e-mails now that they were a whole year old.
And QuickBooks, probably my most Date and Time dependant program, reported on my first invoice that the date was "01/01/00". Since I was not sure what that meant, exactly - all the newspaper articles suggest that "00" could mean 1900 - I decided to see how profitable my business was by comparing the current year with the last year and it turned out that I had earned exactly the same amount for the years of 1999 and 2000: 0 dollars. I sure hope that's not a projection. QuickBooks checked out okay.
12:34 AM Saturday, January 01, 2000.
With my Millenium fears dwindling, I can address this subject matter in a more serious manner. Y2K is a real problem, but for whom is another matter. If you don't work with ancient legacy type accounting systems/software chances are that you don't have much to worry about in your personal office/network. In the bigger picture of what affects all of our lives, the reluctance of anyone to make any serious predictions suggests that the real danger with this problem is its unknown characteristics. And since there are a lot of unknowns, hyperbole and paranoia run rampant. Take this for example, if you begin to feel secure about Y2K then you can begin to worry about leap year dates in the 21st Century.
12:42 AM Saturday, January 01, 2000.
But there's a good reason for the confusion, I just tested my old 486 DX 2 66Mhz machine with a Bios from 1993 and when I set the system clock for 11:59:59 am and the year to 12/31/99, the roll over turned the year to 01/01/1900. However, when I set the clock to the same date and time inside of Windows 95, the roll over turned the year to 01/01/2000 and consequently the Bios rolled over correctly as well.
12:42 AM Saturday, January 01, 2000.
I am certainly happy that I don't have any legacy software to worry about nor am I in the business of supporting such software.
My point is that if you are affected by all of the "chicken little" stories and beginning to wonder about your own systems and software, don't live with the fear, Get Informed. Here are a couple of places you can visit to "Get Informed":
Autodesk Product Release Year 2000 Compliance Information
NSTL YMARK2000 - this is a link to a free downloadable Y2K compliance testing utility.
Odin Cary