Y2K-AWARENESS - Australian on Y2K
From C.S.Y2K 23/Dec/1997; thanks to Ron Davis.
Brings denial to the point.
John
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'Hi All,No, we're not serious, there are huge pockets of unreality! I'm on a Y2K project, (current activity is trying to write our own tools because we don't have the budget to buy real ones, we're not actually fixing anything), but we've just about shut down for Christmas, Project manager is taking 7 weeks leave, so there must be plenty of time left!!. We are a largish (by Aust standards) Gov't department with the typical hundreds of links to other Govt Dep's, COBOL, IMS/DB/DC plus the usual rag-tag assembly of other languages peddled to management over the years by snake-oil
software salesmen as fixes for App Dev woes, used on a few projects then abandoned (the tools, not the projects, they're still there to haunt us). Hundred of thousands of people depend on us for their incomes and they are likely to suffer badly, I fear. Even if we got our systems fixed, and we probably could if we dropped everything else RIGHT NOW and figured out a way to retain the staff we've got (who are already starting to drift off to contratcing as the rates creep up) we still won't be able to pay the pensioners if the Banks go down. My bank just issued me a new Mastercard with an Apr 1999 Expiry, I used to work for them and I know what the normal period used to be, so they're not compliant. All their dates used to be 3 byte packed dec everywhere (YYDDD, a rigourosly enforced standard (now that showed some forethought!)) and they've got IMS databases so big they can only be re-orged over a 4 day weekend and there's not many of those left. I won't believe we're serious until we're programming in shifts, 24*7, (I expect this to start Q398
I don't think the world will end but I do see real problems ahead... What do we do? First, we keep trying, the situation will be worse if we only fix 80% than if we get to 90%. Second, we make as much money as we can to protect our families and those we love. I'm going to use some of it for major canned food stocks, which, if I'm wrong and there are no food shortages, will be donated to charity.
Third, and this is hard, we try to get people to think about it and act, there is so much talk and so little action I'm in disbelief mode.
Get stuck in, boys and girls, the next few months will tell if we've got a chance, preach the cause, FIX FIX FIX (but only the things that matter), Have a good Christmas if you can, I think this is the last one we'll get for a while.
Ron D
22 yrs Mainframe, PL/I is my love but I flirt with COBOL, I like IMS too. I know enough Assembler to figure out the LIST option listings and I write JCL from scratch.
IEFBR14 is the most useful IBM Utility.' |
