Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Technology Stocks : Discuss Year 2000 Issues -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: C.K. Houston who wrote (334)	10/27/1997 7:22:00 PM
From: Quad Sevens	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 9818

Hi Cheryl: Back to the Yourdons and their new book. This book may well garner some mainstream reviews. However, these reviews are likely to be derisive if certain arguments are sloppy, and this will not be good in getting the y2k message out. The VCR example seems just plain dumb to me (set the clock, Ed), and we have already seen that the Yourdons don't understand the utility business very well (thanks to Rick Cowles). These are second drafts already and I'm just surprised by what I've seen. There is so much stuff out there devoted to y2k these days. I can't read it all. So I like to find sources I trust--separate the wheat from the chaff. So far, I'm not sure I trust all that is in this book. Wade PS: It's not a great idea to write a book with your own daughter anyway. Who's going to do the tough editing? PSS: What about this bank vault story? <<< Robin Guenier, the man charged with solving the "single most expensive problem in history", tells a story. "The micro-chip controls when the bank vault can be opened and closed. It allows the jackpot vault to be opened during the working week, but keeps it closed at weekends. For security reasons, it has been buried inside the 20-ton-door of the vault, and can only be inspected by removing the whole door." "The big problem arises because the bank building has been built around the vault, again for security reasons. So to inspect or change the micro-chip requires half the building to be demolished and the door removed. The people who built the chip, the vault and the bank never imagined that the chip would have to be removed in the lifetime of the building," he added. "'But at midnight on December 31, 1999, something they never foresaw will happen. The chip has been programmed to read only the last two digits of the year, and assumes the 19 prefix. So it believes that it is back in 1900. That would make no difference, except that January 1, 2000 falls on a Saturday, while the same date in 1900 was a Monday. The vault will open on Saturday and Sunday, but not on later working days. So, to ensure depositors have access to their deposits, the bank building has to be demolished. That sums up the millennium problem.">>> Does anyone believe this? They thought the microchip would never have to be replaced? Anyone's hard disk ever crash? It seems implausible that anyone would build the door this way. Even if they were this stupid, it hardly "sums up the millennium problem." It has little to do with y2k but a lot to do with the idiocy of the builders.