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

To: John Mansfield who wrote (2118)	7/10/1998 6:32:00 PM
From: John Mansfield	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 9818

' In 1996 when Corporation 2000 first started researching the business continuity implications of the Year 2000 crisis, nearly every organisation contacted stated their Year 2000 project, had the objective of first completing their remediation work by the end 1997, and finalising testing by the end of 1998. This would have given a whole year as a buffer zone. During 1997 every organisation contacted, including those who started in 1997, now had objectives of becoming compliant and fully tested by December 31st 1998. To the best of our knowledge, as of 10th February 1998, not one major company or government agency in Europe or US had attained the first remediation target. At the time there was also a strong realisation that in addition to the individual organisational pursuit, this was very much a team challenge, there was little point in a Police force attaining full operational compliance only to find that basic infra-structure or other criminal and judicial systems failing to complete the necessary activity in time. The UK government had just created a new Cabinet committee, chaired by Margaret Beckett, President of the Board of Trade that would focus on infra-structure and ensuring national contingency plans are in place. The Chairman of the US Software Productivity Reasearch Inc, Capers Jones had stated that there was a strong probability that somewhere between 10% and perhaps 35% of potential year 2000 software problems will still be present at the dawn of the next century. For the UK he predicted that across the board 20% of applications would not be resolved by January 1st 2000. Another leading expert and author Ed Yourdon also wrote on 9th February that, `The inescapable fact is that there's simply too much software, too many embedded systems, too few programmers and engineers, and too little time to fix either the government's or the private sector's critical systems'. At this stage it was clear that although the Home Office's `Dealing with Disaster' document comprehensively dealt with the best practices and integrated plans for emergency management, there were features of the Year 2000 crisis that required special early consideration, namely. The forces, local and health authorities themselves will be impacted by their own non-compliance of systems. The re-introduction of manual processes could mean units operating at only half the normal operational strength The potential for simultaneous incidents over an extended period of at least a month Systemic failure that impacts the whole economy such as vital equipment failure in power transmission units that could be used extensively throughout the network Potential overwhelming of emergency call centres caused by electronic device failures such as security or fire alarms. Then later incident inquiries or missing persons requests Possibility of communications breakdown in mobile and land lines Some Health Authorities may not be in a position to admit casualties due to failures in power generators Criminal element within society may plan or react to the opportunity the night presents Difficulties may be experienced with prison population if there is pro-longed infra-structure breakdown. The Prison Service may also find embedded system in their security systems. Millennium bug could impact chemical or factory processes, gas distribution, necessitating evacuation of an area. Automatic prediction of the size of the evacuation area would not necessary be available without the normal technological forecast instruments. . . . As of February 10th 1998 Low confidence: Urbanville Electricity, Urbanville Water, Aviation industry, local and health authorities Medium confidence : Urbanville Transport, gas, Oil, Central Government, Emergency services. High Confidence: Telecommunications, Nuclear Energy, Railroad. . . . corp2000.com