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

To: Cheeky Kid who wrote (1571)	5/3/1998 1:33:00 AM
From: PitBull	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 9818

In case some haven't noticed, under yahoo current events they have a y2k category where new articles are posted daily, including current experiences with bug problems.

To: Cheeky Kid who wrote (1571)	5/3/1998 1:38:00 AM
From: PitBull	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 9818

IRS braces for year 2000 collapse Wednesday April 29 9:10 PM EDT WASHINGTON, April 29 (UPI) _ The beleaguered Internal Revenue Service has more problems than just this week's hostile Senate oversight hearings. Agency executives warn that the nation's tax network could cease to function in less than two years, when the year 2000 computer crash hits the IRS's massive data network. Come midnight Jan. 1, 2000, computers programmed to read only the last two digits of a four-digit year face meltdown as they try to process 01/01/00. Some may read the date as 1900 _ a particular problem for the IRS, if its computers decide that every taxpayer in America hasn't even been born yet. Other computers may malfunction or shut down entirely. IRS Commissioner Charles Rossotti has warned Congress that it will cost at least $850 million to make the thousands of agency computer systems year-2000 compliant. The IRS boasts one of the largest information systems in the nation, but it operates on computer programs written in the 1960s and 1970s. The agency is also struggling with tax code changes from Congress's Taxpayer Relief Act of 1997. Rossotti estimates the agency will have to change about 800 computer systems this year. In response, Senate Finance Committee chairman William Roth, R-Del., offered to reallocate $50 million in unspent IRS budget funds from previous years for the year 2000 effort. But he waved aside Rossotti's suggestion that Congress delay implementation of the new tax laws until the IRS is up to speed. A Roth spokeswoman said, ''His feeling is that taxpayers can't call the IRS and say, 'Oh, my computer doesn't work, can I have a two-year delay?''' The IRS is hardly alone in its struggle against the immovable millennium deadline. A recent government audit concluded that fewer than half of government agencies will have even their most critical systems upgraded in time. _- Copyright 1998 by United Press International. All rights reserved. _-

To: Cheeky Kid who wrote (1571)	5/4/1998 10:39:00 AM
From: David Eddy	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 9818

Sire - ....products do not use a "date" field for any functions and therefore will have no problems with Year 2000 Compliance I've not been following what specific products you're discussing here, but here's a snip of thought... "date" per se is not the only issue here. The problem is how silicon/software things count time. Date is just one facet of time. The very real possibility exists that when a chip flips over the 12/31/99 to 1/1/00 time line, numbers could go unexpectedly negative or something that is not handled in the logic. At that point, "results will be difficult to predict." You then have to be sensitive to where this particular "device" is situated... a standalone cash register is clearly not as dangerous as a pressure control valve in a continuous process plant... and both of these devices could be using the same embedded chip. Very complex. Impossible to accurately diagnose the level of risk from a distance. - David