[117714] in Cypherpunks
IP: 9/9/99 may be disaster or big goose egg
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Robert Hettinga)
Thu Sep 9 09:50:26 1999
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Date: Thu, 9 Sep 1999 09:21:28 -0400
To: cypherpunks@cyberpass.net
From: Robert Hettinga <rah@shipwright.com>
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Reply-To: Robert Hettinga <rah@shipwright.com>
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From: "Dan S" <ds1999@crosswinds.net>
To: "IP" <ignition-point@precision-d.com>
Subject: IP: 9/9/99 may be disaster or big goose egg
Date: Wed, 8 Sep 1999 22:54:26 -0400
Sender: owner-ignition-point@precision-d.com
Reply-To: "Dan S" <ds1999@crosswinds.net>
>From http://www.azcentral.com/news/0908ninenine.shtml
-
9/9/99 may be disaster or big goose egg
By Jonathan Sidener
The Arizona Republic
Sept. 8, 1999
Pop quiz.
The date 9/9/99 is a critical day in the countdown to the year 2000 because:
A) It's a baby Y2K. The string of 9s will confuse computers, causing crashes
throughout the world.
B) It's a trial run, letting us know whether the consultants have solved the
Y2K problem.
C) It's not a critical day and tells us nothing about what will happen Jan.
1.
D) No one knows for certain, because we've never gone through this before.
Depending on which expert you talk to, you could argue for A, B or C. But
they can't all be right. With all the conflicting expert opinions, D is the
best answer.
The only certainty about Sept. 9 is that it's Thursday.
As computer engineers waded into the Y2K morass over the past few years,
they developed lists of days before and after Jan. 1 likely to be affected
by the rollover from the 1900s to 2000. As they do with any Y2K topic, the
experts disagree on the lists of critical dates.
Some lists include three or four days. Some have dozens. And there are many
variations in between.
Four critical dates that appear on many lists have already passed with no
major trauma. Jan. 1, 1999, was suspected by many of being a source of
trouble. There were predictions that computers would struggle with the 99
date.
Taxis in Sweden undercharged riders that day and there were a handful of
similar glitches around the world. Overall, it was a non-event.
On April 1, Canada, Japan and the state of New York began their fiscal
years, which includes dates in 2000 and beyond. Again no catastrophe.
April 9 was the 99th day of the 99th year. On the Julian calendar, it is
recorded as 99/99. Four 9s was used as "end of code" in many older systems.
The day came and went without event.
And on Aug. 22, the Global Positioning System, GPS, reset its week counter
system for the first time. There were no reports of lost hikers, sailors or
pilots as a result of the rollover.
Because there are no certainties about this whole process, it's dangerous to
draw conclusions about the remaining critical dates based on the unfounded
predictions of the first dates.
Which brings us to Thursday. There are two areas of concern about 9/9/99.
First, there is the issue of the four 9s together, falsely signaling a
computer that it has reached the end of the program.
Some say unrepaired computers will malfunction. Others say it won't be an
issue because the date is stored as 090999.
The second issue involves the use of 9/9/99 as a false date. For years,
computer users have plugged in the series of four nines whenever they wanted
to store a document indefinitely.
When 1999 was far off, it was an effective way of saying "Do not delete" or
"Never process."
Now that the date is at hand, it may signal computers to do the opposite, to
delete or process data.
Most companies that have done Y2K remediation have looked at both of these
issues and made repairs. The danger is from companies that have overlooked
the problem.
***
Jonathan Sidener can be reached at (602) 444-8169 or at jon.sidener@pni.com.
--
Dan S
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-----------------
Robert A. Hettinga <mailto: rah@ibuc.com>
The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation <http://www.ibuc.com/>
44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA
"... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity,
[predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to
experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'
