10/09/98- Updated 12:09 PM ET
The Nation's Homepage
Y2K not only problem looming
NEW YORK -- If you thought the Year 2000 computer bug was
bad, just wait. Other problems that computers may have with
dates and data could cost even more to fix and promise to extend
well into the next century.
The much-fretted Y2K problem, which arises from the way
computers keep track of dates using two digits instead of four, is
expected to cost the world between $600 billion and $4.6 trillion
to fix.
Less familiar looming concerns include:
The European Union's conversion to the new euro currency
starting in a few months.
The rollover of the date system in Global Positioning
System satellites.
America's surfeit of telephones for home and office, voice
and data, threatening the possibility that the nation could run
out of phone numbers.
Ditto Social Security numbers, which are not used again
when people die.
That's the warning of Capers Jones, chief scientist at Artemis
Management Systems Inc. and founder of Software Productivity
Research, which analyzes software development and planning.
Starting next year, date and data corrections will dominate the
software industry, said Jones, and the repairs will cost $5 trillion
over the years 1999 to 2050. He predicted these problems, along
with Y2K, will damage the software industry for a generation.
''The best we can hope for is a quick recovery,'' he said.
The euro
The European Monetary Union will begin its conversion to the
euro currency Jan. 1, 1999, and union countries are scheduled to
phase out national currencies in 2004.
The euro conversion is the second largest software challenge in the
world behind the Y2K problem, said Jones, and it's more
sophisticated. Instead of changing every date in a computer system
with a single deadline looming, computer systems have to be able
to handle the different ways the 11 union countries change over.
Further complicating the problem are individual companies that
may convert completely to conducting business in euros, or they
may continue to track their national currency while simultaneously
using the euro.
Ed Severs, chief operating officer for ADPAC Inc., one of the
older companies designing mainframe computer systems, said
there aren't enough programmers to finish both the euro
conversion and the Y2K fix.
Jones said about 10 million programs, ranging from Microsoft's
spreadsheet software, Excel, to specialized financial tracking
software, would have to be modified to handle the euro
conversion.
France and Germany, said Gary Fisher, a computer scientist at
Information Technology Laboratory at the U.S. National Institute
of Standards and Technology, are putting all their resources into
converting to the euro instead of Y2K. ''They're in a fix, I think,''
he said. ''They're going to be fighting fires everywhere.''
The euro conversion could cost between $150 billion and $400
billion spread among the 11 union countries, said Severs. Jones
agreed and said 70% of the cost likely would be borne by the
union countries, with the rest falling on companies around the
world that deal with the union and track European currencies.
''If you're a financial institution (doing business in Europe), you're
going to spend between three and five times what you did on
Y2K,'' said Severs.
GPS satellites
In the period between the euro conversion and Jan. 1, 2000, the
belt of 24 satellites making up the Global Positioning System is
programmed to reset its date system. This could cause problems in
navigation and power plants, and even in the calculation of interest
for international financial transactions.
The network, run by the Defense Department, allows anyone with
a GPS receiver to pinpoint their position on the Earth to within
about 330 feet. The satellites keep track of dates by measuring the
number of weeks elapsed since Jan. 5, 1980. Every 1,024 weeks,
the timer resets to zero; that will occur at midnight Aug. 21, 1999.
The satellites use the elapsed week to account for variations in the
earth's orbit and rotation. That's why civilian Earth-based
receivers, not programmed to handle the rollover, could have
problems determining the location, Fisher said.
''The receivers are going to have to become compliant, either
through a new chip or new software,'' said Fisher. ''And the
satellites that have the problems will have to be replaced.''
GPS dates also are used to synchronize some electrical power
plants and large international transfers of funds. Jones worries that
the rollover might cause some plants to quit working, and interest
payments on the transfers could be thrown off.
For instance, if it takes a second to transfer $1 billion between two
banks in different countries, the interest could be a few hundred
dollars. But if one of the banks, relying on the GPS satellites,
hasn't planned for the date rollover, its computers could think the
transfer took 20 years. The interest could be off by trillions of
dollars in that case.
Because of the rollover's timing, computer systems handling large
financial systems will need to be checked for euro, GPS date and
Y2K compliance all at the same time.
''It's in the international standards, so it shouldn't be a surprise,''
said Jones. ''But Year 2000 should have been obvious, too.''
Phone numbers
Last year, Arkansas gained a new area code after decades of a
single code. In January this year, western Massachusetts gained a
new one as well. And new area codes seem to pop up weekly in
the Bay area, ground zero for the use of multiple phone lines in the
home.
Usually, a new area code is a minor annoyance, necessitating
minor costs in reprinting stationery and business cards. But in
about 10 years, the number of phone lines needed will exceed the
capacity of a three-digit area code with a seven digit phone
number. Jones suggests a five digit area code and a nine-digit
phone number to allow for up to a trillion individual phone lines --
enough for several phone numbers for every person on the planet.
Problem solved? Nope. Millions of software applications in the
United States can handle only three-figure area codes and
seven-figure phone numbers. To upgrade them all will be
cumbersome and expensive.
Any lengthening of the phone number probably won't be a
problem for telecommunications and directory companies, Jones
said, but large private and corporate phone lists will have to be
updated. This could be a problem if the program is configured to
accept only the current format.
Jones estimates about 25 million software applications will need to
be fixed.
Social Security
And if all that wasn't enough, the United States might run out of
Social Security numbers.
Numbers assigned to U.S. citizens are not reused once someone
dies. The current nine-digit system provides a maximum of about 1
billion numbers. Since 1936, when the first number was issued,
more than 381 million numbers have been assigned, with about 6
million new ones issued each year.
It's easy to add a digit, but thousands of computer programs that
expect nine-digit numbers will have to be modified. Cost? Equal to
that of the Y2K bug in the United States, Jones figures.
The grandchildren of today's programmers will be solving that one,
when the current numbers run out around 2075.
By The Associated Press
Copyright 1998 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This
material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or
redistributed.
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