9/9/99: News? Nein! 296
SEWilco writes "As Slashdot readers know, today's date abbreviated as 9999 may cause problems in some older computers. So far only one report of a Tandy problem.
9s-day no problem in New Zealand and Hong Kong, Guam OK and USA still has electric power on 9/9/99.
But seriously, folks, today is a big day for numerologists, pagans, and Nostradamus. So far today the NASA Near-Earth Object Program has not seen a comet coming to hit us. But what is so special about the Era of Alexandria 7491 anyway?"
Re:Pagans? (Score:1)
Selena FireSinger
-- Shadowcat
Re:Beware! The Y2K cabal wants us to rest easy. (Score:1)
I agree. If I absolutely had to encode a date as two bytes, I would have not used BCD as that would require three. Instead, I would have done the following:
And end-of-date field marker would thus be all ones in the bit field for a total hex value of $FFFF which would be a date value of 15/31/2029 which is nonsense and thus couldn't be confused with a date. On the other hand, this scheme would have a Y2K-like problem at year 2030, which is why I wouldn't use this scheme unless I absolutely had to such as in a small microcontroller with very limited RAM or something similar.
Re:2038 bug (Score:1)
Re:Dress Rehearsal? (Score:2)
Various conspiracy theorists around here suggested that it was just in case 9/9/99 was a real problem and they could blame it on the drill, but given that we've had no problems with either 9/9/99 or the drill, I'm not overly worried.
Re:Maybe I'm just dumb but... (Score:2)
Re:The media are listening to us (Score:1)
This is why there are things such as the CIAC... They are not trying to make money, they are providing a public service, and are often the best source of information on computer viruses and the like...
Re:Confidence in the electric grid (Score:1)
"The number of suckers born each minute doubles every 18 months."
Re:- (Score:1)
be able to pick up great camping gear for next to
nothing at garage sales!"
That's what I've been counting on. .
"The number of suckers born each minute doubles every 18 months."
Re:Newsflash!!!! (Score:1)
I've already cancelled my flights to Canada, and will drive to my june-twenty-third-two-double-oh-one shelter in Ontario! What do i need to stock for this catastrophy? Already bought my generators and year's worth of canned spam, macaroni and cheeze, and Whoppers! Anythign else i need?
no problem here! NT4 SP5 (Score:1)
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"The number of suckers born each minute doubles every 18 months."
Freaky Old Lady (Score:2)
Re:Power surge? (Score:2)
You only need 30 minute's worth of gold bars.
Re:64bit isn't THAT far away (Score:1)
Just my $.02...
Re:Y2K is a bug in the human brain (Score:2)
Then again, as I've posted before, the only marauding gang I've ever dealt with around here is the one that pushed my car out of a snowdrift for me. I've *seen* how this city pulls together in a crisis (very well), and I also know my way around here. So I'm going to "party like it's 999" with my SCA friends, though I *will* make sure I have a full tank of gas and that I take the same precautions that I do pre-expected-major-snowstorm.
Re:Some cheap GPS units affected (Score:1)
My brother works for a local seaplane company, and about 9 of their GPS units quit working completely. These were all from one manufacturer - other units were fine. It's particularly annoying for them, because (being diligent and careful) they had specifically asked the manufacturer if the units were ok, and had been reassured that they were fine.
It took several weeks to get them all fixed. (An expensive software upgrade was required, and it took days to get through the busy phone lines to the company.) In the meantime, the planes were flying without working GPS, which is apparently ok since the weather was good. If there had been a need for navigation by instruments only, that might have been a worse problem.
Adding to the hassle, the software upgrade caused the units to forget all the named coordinate points that had been programmed into them. This will be hours of work to restore.
They won't be buying from that instrument manufacturer any more.
Don't underestimate the problems that these date issues can cause. Dates and times are the hardest fundamental data type to really handle correctly in software development, and are made worse by unpredictable users dealing with badly designed software.
Bad programming (Score:1)
SET W-TIME = $TIME('HHMMSS')
SET W-DATE = $DATE('YYMMDD')
SET W-TODAYS-DATE = $STRING("19",W-DATE)
Notice adding the string 19 to the 2 digit year to determine todays date. There was no other windowing logic. Ugly ugly ugly.
-Scott__
ComEd, Y2k ... It's the End Of The World (not) (Score:3)
Having said that, I am indeed skeptical of all of the "Y2K readiness" leaflets I receive in the mail. I suspect a good percentage of them are written from the standpoint of "we're not quite ready yet, but we will be, so let's sooth the unwashed masses." Unfortunately, as anyone who has ever written anything more than a trivially simple program realizes, deadlines have a way of slipping real fast in the world of software. I suspect there will be two major dangers resulting from the whole Y2k hoopla:
1) People being stupid and panicky (as many others have mentioned already), cleaning out stores and what have you before Y2K arrives.
2) People having done too little to prepare, trusting deceptive reassurances from those companies and services who weren't able to make their deadlines and be compliant on time, who then do an about face from blase' "it's nothin' to worry about" to full-fledged panic as they discover a whole host of inconveniences which combine to make their lives more than a little difficult.
In both cases the danger will be a result of panicy people, not technology. But to dismiss the notion that one should be planning for contingencies invites a whole host of problems of its own, quite possibly making a touchy situation worse. The best approach IMHO is to take some reasonable precautions:
* Have a little extra cash on hand in case the ATMs are down
* Have a hard copy of your statement from a day or two before the new year on hand
* Have a little extra food on hand (maybe a month's supply, instead of a week's)
* Have a few candles lying around
* Have a warm blanket handy in case the power does fail (thanks ComEd).
* Have a good book or two, for the same reason
* Relax. All those preparations were probably unnecessary, but now you don't have to worry even if things do come unravelled for a little while.
If one has made reasonable contingencies, one won't be one of the idiots consumed by panic when we usher in the new year with a few bumps. Of course, don't go shooting your gun into the air new years eve. Not only could the bullets injure someone when they fall back to earth, but, more importantly, you'll probably need that ammo come January first. (For the humor impaired: the last comment was a joke!)
Re:The two bugs for today (Score:2)
----
Re:Newsflash!!!! (Score:1)
Bob Byte, a computer expert for High Tech Technologies, says that that Fs are used because of an obscure way of representing numbers called "hexidecimal". In the opinion of this reporter it is a short form of an error message consisting of swear words: f**k f**k f**k f**k.
Good news (Score:1)
Does anyone know of any data on how the GPS rollover went ? It can't have been too bad, or I'd have heard, but I heard Tokyo had traffic problems due to failed recievers.
Re:Pagans? Arbitrary dates. (Score:2)
Of course, the Christian calendar-challenged who worry about 2,000 years being significant should learn that Christ was probably born about four years before year 1, so actually 2,000 years of Christianity began three years ago...although others think He was born 33 years before year 1, and wonder whether His birth is as significant as His deaths.
There's too much ambiguity...unless you simply stop counting years when you run out of rope for your Mayan calendar.
Re:Y2K is a bug in the human brain (Score:1)
In the poll there was a question asking
"Will you withdraw all your money from the bank ?"
16% told that they will ! And 31% told that they will "withdraw and set aside a large amount of cash "So i afaraid it can be a LOT MORE people rioting !
The biggest danger to our society isn't from the actual Y2K problem, it's from the Y2K paranoia.
Totally agree here, but.... writing this makes me thing if this what will happen (collapsing financial system due to the money withdrawal from the banks), maybe it's better to pull the money out of the bank before it's happenes ?
Oblom
Help! My calculator stopped working! (Score:2)
Whoops, it's solar and I had the panel covered with my hand.
Merry Meet indeed! (Score:1)
You all beat me to it.
Yes, it's a new moon, so where will I be? At band practice [homepage.com] with our new guitarist and new percussion guy! New beginnings, wee!
Y2K riots will be fun to watch while astrally projecting myself over New York City. LOL
The Divine Creatrix in a Mortal Shell that stays Crunchy in Milk
All of my programs check the date (Score:2)
the date to determine what to do next.
It's very common.
Textbooks have been written on the subject of
date checking.
Don't you just love the media.
And the sheeple they feed.
Not quite correct (Score:1)
Actually, it's based solely on a date system that revolves around when the mother of some Roman emperor or another thought some bloke supposedly born 2000 years ago that pagans don't believe in was born.
Whew.
--
Isn't it obvious? (Score:4)
Re:This isn't Good news (Score:1)
Re:Special day for Pagans??? (Score:1)
i have noticed that the catholic religion as a whole seems to be aimed at the destruction of all other forms of thought though.....
just 1 per cent of people ... (Score:1)
Hrrmmm boing
And getting rid of your social security number is not a brilliant idea which will make you exempt from Federal income tax.
Oh yeh, and those Echelon keywords are a waste of space too.
did I forget anything
jsm
PS sorry and all that.
Maybe I'm just dumb but... (Score:1)
Re:RHAT at 127! (Score:1)
Dentist Office today (Score:1)
Let me share this with you. Today (9/9/99) I went to the dentist, to get a filling. From what I observed:
So there is an example of 9/9/99 at work. Or an example of what happens when the janitorial staff accidently kicks the equipment. Either way.
Richard Frost
It's been a coulpe of hours now, and the Novocaine no longers works, and it hurts to open my mouth. Ow.
Offtopic (Score:1)
Power surge? (Score:1)
Makes you wonder.. hmmm..
An attempt to boost confidence (Score:5)
So confidence-boosting articles are just fine by me! :-)
-----
New E-mail address! If I'm in your address book, please update it.
Re:64bit isn't THAT far away (Score:1)
Whew... (Score:1)
:)
Re:Y2K is a bug in the human brain (Score:1)
As a former SCA person myself (there really isn't much SCA activity in my area - so I basically dropped out when I moved here), I can say that SCA folks are probably best equipped to survive "the armageddon".
They know how to camp - often not using modern equipment. They know how to survive by creating their own civilization out of the wilderness. They're well versed in fighting, and with weapons and techniques they also know how to fabricate, and are likely to have all the equipment they need to do both (fight, and fabricate weapons).
And they know women who not only know how to sew, but LIKE to sew.
"The number of suckers born each minute doubles every 18 months."
Re:Y2K is a bug in the human brain (Score:1)
Ah, but I come from a small town where I have alot of family and friends. Approx. 7,000 people not exactly "the hills". I'm not talking about heading into the country. But a small community where you know everybody around you. Atleast I would feel safer in that type of environment. Even a good suburb where you know all your neighbors, isn't bad.
So I do want to be in *A
--
Official Stamps of Approval(tm) not the answer (Score:1)
1) The MS NSA story was not an assertion, it reported a factual discovery made by a reputable security consultancy. At worst it made some reasonable, if provocative, speculations based on the facts known at the time. Microsoft's later response to the story was painfully emberrassing to any who read it, not to mention profoundly insulting to the reader's intelligence. They have unwittingly given the "NSA back door key theory" a huge boost in credibility, and would have been much better off keeping their mouths shut.
2) A "trusted agency" is a single point of failure, capable of erring just like an individual, or being suborned by third parties for their own purposes. An industry wide consensus, or lack thereof (ie an open, ongoing debate), is a much better indicator of the veracity of a story than a single, offical stamp of approval. Neither approach is perfect, and certainly neither can substitute for a lazy reporter's lack of research, but the latter is much less subject to manipulation and/or outright corruption than the former IMHO.
let me finish my sentence. (Score:1)
So, I do want to be in A city just not a large metropolitan area.
--
Re:RHAT at 127! (Score:1)
slower now.
try being born on this day (Score:1)
Was born in 77
Today I'm turning 22, on 9-9-99.
Heh.
Power went out in Oslo, Norway, @15:13 (3:13pm) (Score:2)
The subways also experience problems.
I sat at the computer lab, as the power went out today, at 15:13, and left a server down.
Probably just a coincidence..?
Do the Slashdot Timewarp (Score:2)
For the archive readers in the future who look at this after the problem has been corrected, as near as I can figure it this reply will be displayed as having been posted about 7:03 AM CDT. In about an hour and a half Hemos will post the article to which I am replying.
It's not a 9/9/99 problem, but any time problem in this discussion is may be... moderated Funny?
Re:It hasn't happened yet! (Score:1)
Life sucks, then you die.
Re:2038 bug??? what is that? (Score:1)
My Lawrance 100 didn't even hiccup (Score:1)
I did have the GPS go out on me for ten or fifteen minutes one night flying back to Chicago along the Indiana shoreline. A quick look at the satelite page revealed the Satelites in an unusual constellation -- a bunch of them were all lined up in a row! Once the satelites were out of alignment with one another the GPS found itself and continued to work just fine.
This is an example as to why one NEVER relies on a single instrument for navigational and situational awareness (unless it simply can't be helped) -- cross checking your GPS against your LORAN, VORs, and MARK I eyeballs (is that river outside where the GPS and LORAN say it should be?) is the only way to be certain you are where you think you are.
Ob Y2K: If even a fraction of the banks and other firms are even half as dishonest and non-forthright about their Y2K readiness and infrastructure as Commonwealth Eddison has been this summer (not even bothering to tell the proper authorities after their efforts to fix serious problems on the sly failed and resulted in a huge power outage downtown, for example, coupled with numerious, ongoing power outages throughout the city which show no sign of letting up as their neglected infrastructure continues to show its age), then the Y2K issue could well end up being more than just a little hiccup. Armageddon? No. A royal pain in the ass, bigger than most expect? Quite possibly.
Re:Freaky Old Lady (Score:1)
I bet this is even more amazing: Shortly after my 3rd birthday, there was a point when I was exactly pi years old! Now THAT's amazing, especially considering that pi is an irrational number! Maybe that's why I'm an irrational person.
In fact now that I'm 31, some time in January I was exactly 10*pi years old! Wow!!!!!
Did anyone out there celebrate being n*e years old?
Re:Y2K is a bug in the human brain (Score:1)
Rochester, I liked the town when I was there on business. I really like the Empire Brewery. Damn fine stout.
I live in St. Louis, Mo (2.5 million). I've only lived here 2 years, and would feel much safer in the town I grew up in, in Nebraska(pop. 6,639). Still, I will probably be in St. Louis on 12.31.99, and I'm not really worried, but I would feel safer somewhere that I lived for 18 years.
--
Read the previous post, Mr.Moderator (Score:1)
As for the post, its is not the europeans, but the English that are more prone to riot, mostly during soccer games (so we know where the Americans got the idea, right?).
Re:Pagans? (Score:1)
Ummm...related problems possibly? (Score:1)
Re:Get out your White Albums... (Score:1)
Re:I'm goin' to Israel where Y6K is still 250 yrs (Score:1)
Easy way to remember this - the last digit of the gregorian year is the same as the jewish year for most of the year (9-10 months out of 12)
240 years + about 28 hours Eastern time as the time of this post.
Woke up this morning and the lights were out... (Score:1)
Immediately it clicked, "oh man, its 9999, and I'm low on canned goods". Phone still worked, so I called Southern California Edison. The recording said there was a wide-spread blackout in my area. I started having visions of looters and scenes from the movie "The Trigger Effect".
At 7:30, the power came back on. No word from SCE, but I had since fired up my laptop, and discovered all the "9/9/99 came and went" stories, so it wasn't a surprise.
Still spooked me, even though I'm a programmer, and know it SHOULDN'T cause a problem, I was convinced it had.
Re:The two bugs for today (Score:1)
Even so, what I was meaning (hah!) was that if there was no zero stringy thingy, then if you did Year/Month/Day, what day is 1999112 - the 12th of January or the 2nd of November, sort of thing. So it would seem insane to not zero-pad.
I'm absolutely sure I'm missing something though, I just don't know what
"When something seems to easy, it usually is"
Re:I'm goin' to Israel where Y6K is still 250 yrs (Score:1)
** This post has been certified to be Year 5760 Compliant **
"I don't believe that there is one, single, perfect spiritual way and, in realizing that, obviously you become a lot more open."
Re:BCD formatted numbering (Score:1)
Minor correction to my previous post. The year would have to be BCD encoded (99), the month would have to be regular hex encoded (1-C) otherwise you'd need a second digit to encode Oct-Dec, and the day could be either, since 09 is 09. It's contorted, either way you look at it.
Re:Ah...Pagans? (Score:1)
The Dutchman took the test (Score:1)
9-9-'99, and the Dutchmen (those guys from Holland, Europe) took an entire day to test there computer systems for year 2k resistant.
The public services were no longer reachable so it seams the test failed,
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Belgium HyperBanner
http://belgium.hyperbanner.net
Re:The Antichrist World Tour (Score:1)
yes, yes,
Re:The Antichrist World Tour (Score:1)
yes, yes,
Some cheap GPS units affected (Score:2)
The technical explanation had something to do with pre-calculating positions based on an almanac of known positions based on picking up the intial time signal from the strongest satellite. If you know which week & day & minute etc, you can make a quick pre-calc of where some satellites are supposed to be, saving you a bunch of time sorting out the signals. But the Carin's have the 1024 bug and the cheap-o GPS receiver eventually times out on the pre-calc and does a full calc of the positions.
A friend reports this as extremely annoying but still usable. He says when he complained his car dealership has asked him to come by for a free retrofit of the main unit in about 8 weeks, since they have been asked to replace all their installed units but to start with people complaining. I think these are made by Phillips in the netherlands or germany, so I don't know if any are in the U.S.
the AC
[obOnTopic: no, I haven't seen any 9/9/99 bugs today, but I'm about to get on an airplane in a blind show of faith
Not representation, but input (Score:2)
More to the point, no computer will represent today's date as 9999 internally. Two digits are needed for month and day, yes? So that would be 090999. And there's no "all 9's" magic quality to this number. This is truly a non-event from the code's point of view.
It's not the representation, but the input pattern that's of concern. I personally worked at one place where we were told -- for accounts that were never supposed to "come due" -- to just put in "9 9 99" for the due date. The software converts this internally to 090999 of course. But the point is, the accounts still (assuming they're still using this system) come due today, regardless of how it's represented internally.
The whole "end-of-file marker" thing was a big bunch of FUD, but accounting "shortcuts" like this could indeed cause headaches.
And don't say "but nobody would be that dumb." I had a boss who drove the accountant nuts one month. We mis-billed a bunch of credit cards (~1000 or so), ran the credits back when we found out, and then re-billed correctly. So my boss "helpfully" deleted the original invoices and credits and replaced them with the corrected invoices and credits. (Accountants in the audience may now proceed to the front for a stiff shot of whiskey. Move slowly to avoid sudden collapse...)
Re:Do some moderators smoke crack? (Score:2)
Re:Maybe I'm just dumb but... (Score:3)
Har! (Score:4)
I think this one is a dud; I don't know how it slipped past the "experts".
Just paranoia.... (Score:3)
He told us that 28,000 cops were deployed last night here in HK. During one of their planning meetings he had mentioned to his supervisors that he thought this was just general paranioa. "Sir, I have never heard of a computer nicking a criminal".
Re:Y2K is a bug in the human brain (Score:2)
Admit that you pulled the "1% of americans will
riot" idea out of your ass.
Now the "withdraw all your money from banks?"
Well, these are Americans we're talking about.
They have $485.17 in the bank. They withdraw
it ALL every two weeks, a day or two before payday.
Way more than your bogus percentage
have less than two weeks reserve of money
in the bank.
If you were trying to come up with some useless
made up statistic for those with more than a certain amount of money in the bank, you should
have said so.
Re:UPDATE! (Score:2)
----------------------------------------------
Hi, You are absolutely right and I should have been careful before speaking
generically about pagans. You are not the only pagan I've heard from today.
I'm sorry and will do better next time. Michelle
> ----------
> From: The CyberGoddess
> Sent: Thursday, September 09, 1999 8:01 AM
> To: mquinn@sjmercury.com
> Subject: Your article
>
> said Jack Elder, a psychic reader at The Psychic Eye Bookstore in San
> Francisco. ``It's kind of a power moment. A lot of things could
> happen.''>>
>
> As an avid internet user and a staunch fighter for Pagan rights and
> understanding, I feel it necessary to clear up this misconception.
>
> Either this person is not a Pagan or is just trying to give you something
> you can use in your article. Pagans, in general, do not follow the solar
> calendar. The calendar used for basic time telling was developed by
> Christians and revolves around the premise of Christ's birth, an event
> which
> holds no significance in most Pagan faiths. While 9 is indeed a special
> number, only flaky New Agers, wannabes or psychic readers would hold
> 9/9/99
> as a "power date". Pagan holidays are actually lunar in nature. The only
> significance today holds is the New Moon tonight which is a symbol of new
> beginnings. The date does not affect us in the least. The mundane
> calendar
> is just that... mundane.
>
> Remember, one person claiming to be Pagan does not make up the Pagan
> community. Before you post a broad generalization such as the one made,
> please check with several sources to verify the information you've been
> given. It generally will prevent you from a barrage of angry people
> wanting
> to know why you misrepresented them in the public eye.
>
> Selena FireSinger
> National Co-director and Pennsylvania Contact, Pagans in Action Council
> for
> Truth - P.A.C.T.
> PA P.A.C.T. Website - www.cybergoddess.net/pact.html
> Sacred Earth Alliance Representative
> Sponsor, The Witches' Voice - www.witchvox.com
> Webmistress for Witches Against Religious Discrimination - W.A.R.D.
> Member of Witches' Anti-Discrimination League - W.A.D.L.
> Member of Summerland Grove Pagan Church, Memphis, TN
> Member of Sylverwood Circle, Memphis, TN
> http://www.pagans.org/~selena
-- Shadowcat
Pagans? (Score:2)
Few of the pagans I know (including myself :-) would be seen dead having anything to do with numerology. Today has no real pagan significance. I was discussing it with a friend last night -- it's based solely on a date system that revolves around some bloke supposedly born 2000 years ago that pagans don't believe in...
Re:Har! (Score:2)
A program this old may have originally taken it's input from punched cards, and the "input-file" may have been a card reader.
I know there's a *lot* of old COBOL code still in use, that programmers often don't like to learn new ways, and probably aren't given time to clean-up working code, but Please! -- I would just be amazed if this causes any serious problems.
I would be even more amazed if it did and that company told the public.
Re:Maybe I'm just dumb but... (Score:2)
The two bugs for today (Score:2)
Some old systems used the text string "9999" as an end of file marker, and if a program on such a system was written badly enough to not zero pad the day and month, the date would be read as end of file. Any sane programmer would store today at least as "990909", the ANSI recommendation for date storage has for many years been "1999.09.09".
----
Re:Do some moderators smoke crack? (Score:2)
Drivers wrongly came to the conclusion that moderators are just randomly selected, normal users like you and me.
You fail to see my son. Though your small mind, at least compared to my genetically enhanced one, may not grasp the situation, I do. A normal user of Slashdot is a fair (not of complexion mind you), competant (well, competant if they don't try to interact with the outside world), and generally intellegent individual(with some exceptions). When they are picked to be one of the few however, they become evil human beings. They lie, they bitch, some even start using NT in mission critical applications! Their lives become utterly centered around their incredible power, their power to control the great force know as /.
This can happend to anyone. Your best friend could suffer from Moderationous Powrus as we speak. Maybe you mother, your father, or even YOU. Symptoms Include:
Constant and maybe even excessive reading of Slashdot.
The growing of a short goatee, and maniacal laughing.
They're favorite topic of conversation changes to "The many possibilities of being dictator and wordly god of the Earth"
Please, if you notice these symptoms apearing in a family member, a loved one, or an aquatance. You must imediately lock them in a closet devoid of any meens through which they could communicate with the outside world. Including windows, phone jacks, cable lines, power outlets, and musical instruments. People generally recover after 3 days or when ever their moderation points expire. This is a serious problem, and should not be taken lightly.
The media are listening to us (Score:3)
Look at the Microsoft NSA story. Someone sees the NSA symbol in MS code, makes an assumption, and the media buys it hook line and sinker. But almost every media article quotes some "expert" as saying that it's a real - the media guys don't want to say that themselves. That way, when it turns out to be bogus, they're clean.
I think we could use some sort of trusted agency that would verify computer-related or security-related news stories. Actually we have this in the CIAC and similar agencies don't we? If a CNN story quotes the CIAC, and not "Security Expert Bob Fishpond from Funny Creek, Missouri" then I'd be a lot more likely to believe it.
Sittin' on the back porch, drinking red wine... (Score:4)
On 6/6/66, I was little, I didn't know shit, and by
7/7/77, eleven years later still don't know any better
on 8/8/88, it's way too late for me to change
and by 9/9/99, I hope I'm sittin' on the back porch drinking red wine, singing
oooooooooh, french fries with pepper!
-- Mark Sandman, 1963 - 1999
I'm celebrating the way he would have wanted it!
--
Re:Read the previous post, Mr.Moderator (Score:2)
Well there you go again, assuming I'm speaking english. - note: that was supposed to be funny
Re:Maybe I'm just dumb but... (Score:2)
You can use ordinary binary arithemtic to do BCD arithmetic, but you have to add fudge factors to get it right.
Its used in accountancy applications because you know how many digits accuracy you have, and can use decimal rounding conventions etc. I think it probably matters legally.
The first versions of BASIC used BCD, since its less likely to produce 2 + 2 = 3.9999999 in the
way certain BASICS that used floating point sometimes did.
9/9/99 Not Totally Overrated (Score:4)
I've seen quite a bit of discussion about this on the MIDRANGE-L mailing list, and so I thought I'd mention a few things. A lot of people seem to think that 9/9/99 as a special date is mostly myth, largely because the computer would store it as 090999, which doesn't look as special. Surely 99/99/99 would be better. Other people pointed out that this sort of thing tended to crop up when the users wanted to add extra information in a field the programmer thought would only be a date. In such a program, 99/99/99 would fail because it was an invalid date, so creative users might be tempted to use a vaild date, but give it special meaning. Two common dates for things like "no expiration" or "not applicable" were 12/31/99 and 9/9/99. The former would be the highest date that could be entered in a two-digit year field, while the latter was easy to remember, yet still a good ways into the future.
9/9/99 problems are likely to be fairly rare, since the necessary circumstances would be somewhat rare, and, hopefully, many such problems have been caught by now. Where today's date does cause problems will likely not be noticed by the population at large. (i.e. no power outages, no broken ATMs.) At a guess, the most likely candidates for problems will be billing software running on older mainframs and midrange computers, and I'm sure the companies will do their utmost to bill you for anything you might owe them.
--Phil (I know the banks with my loans have been quite diligent.)
Y2K is a bug in the human brain (Score:5)
Oh and we can't forget the inevitable rioting that's going to occur. Americans will use any excuse to riot. Your favorite team lost the world series, riot. Your favorite team won the world series, riot. Y2K aka armagedon is here, riot.
God bless morons one and all...
Newsflash!!!! (Score:4)
Already, several major firms have been created to certify systems an 5-23-01 ready. "People are urged to ensure that their banks, hospitals, and every other business they deal with are ready for this unprecidented event."
Ah...Pagans? (Score:2)
Actually most Pagans don't use numerology...in fact, I would say that more Christians and Jews do so.
As well, Paganism, being a recognized form of religion deserves to be Captialized when mentioned, just like Christianity or Judaism.
Most numerology is based up the Jewish holy books and the Kabbala. Christianity borrowed from the Jews (like they did most things) and created Christian Kabbala. In the late 19th and early 20th century, groups like The Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn did a great deal of research and various members published a number of books that are considered some of the best references today.
One of the formost writers on the subject was Aliester Crowley.
93/93
ttyl
Farrell J. McGovern, Druid
Silver Fox Grove, ADF
Pagan for nearly 20 years.
Re:Har! (Score:2)
Bill Gates just took over After Y2K (Score:3)
Re:Y2K is a bug in the human brain (Score:2)
Re:Maybe I'm just dumb but... (Score:2)
But as others as pointed out, Sept. 9 is 090999 and should not cause a problem.
Old COBOL programmer
Pagan Numerology (Score:2)
From what I understand, the Mayans were also very big on numerology.
----
Re:Get out your White Albums... (Score:2)
---
"'Is not a quine' is not a quine" is a quine.
9 Ways (Score:4)
9) Antichrist crashed party, demanded blood sacrifices to the Satan-spawn of Baal. :(
8) Panicing day-traders fleeing the inflationary wrath of Alan Greenspan caused a run on the dollar
7) Today's date actually expressed as 090999, thus disappointing a bunch of Y2K nuts hoping for a warm-up
6) Ricky Martin stole the MTV video award from Weird Al Yankovic, thanks to shameless ballot stuffing
5) Stayed at home working on computer to avoid superstitious fanatics, motherboard overheated, magic smoke came out.
4) Spilled hemlock all over myself at the coven swap-meet
3) "friends" is a re-run tonight
2) Couldn't play the new Dreamcast due to nuclear melt-down of national electric grid
1) That darn asteroid!
Odd users and old databases (Score:3)
The users were punished.
Re:Big Deal. 9/9/99 wasn't going to be a problem. (Score:2)
As for the "the date would be stored as 09/09/99" argument: You mean your integer reading functions don't strip the leading 0? That's interesting, and possibly useful, but possibly braindead also.
The "9/9/99" sentinel is NOT that old. They were teching us to use that in school less than 7 years ago.
I think there's a little backlash by younger computer people here. "Those old people" lacked the "vision" needed to plan for their programs to be in active use in 1999 or 2000. Get real. I'm not an old computer programmer, and I was taught that 9/9/99 was a good value to use, and I've seen several programs use it.
Highvalues? (Score:3)
Some variables could only store numerical values, which were defined as a number of numeric digits, presumably using BCD as the internal storage value. It was necessary to use magic numbers to indicate special conditions, such as EOF or no more records. Since most files were indexed sequentially, all 9s was often used as special EOF indicator since it would always be sorted last.
However, by the mid 1980s, COBOL introduced a special value, HIGHVALUES, to which any numerical variable could be assigned, which was always higher than all 9s, and was to be recommended for such magic numbers. I think there was an equivalent LOWVALUES as well.
I do not know when these to keywords were introduced, but it was at least 15 years ago.
If 9/9/99 is a problem with COBOL, it must be using a very old variant of the language.
Re:Ah...Pagans? (Score:2)
John Campbell, Agnostic Discordian
Coaxial Cabal
Sorta kinda pagan for a while now.
Re:Y2K is a bug in the human brain (Score:2)
There are going to be stupid people, sure, but the ones I'm especially worried about are the ones who are doing the whole head-for-the-hills thing. The survivalist nutcases won't be in the cities, and the biggest problem I'm likely to encounter is a bunch of drunks who partied a little too hard. And given that I fully intend to be at my Barony's New Year's party, there will be plenty of candles around, camping gear if there's a REAL problem, and lots of live steel should THAT become necessary.
I'd much rather deal with the drunks than with the sober gun-nuts who will be lining every spare scrap of country on the big day.
Re:Should be wait till 9/10/99 then??? (Score:2)
9999 as the end of file marker. And people are thinking that dates will be stored the same way? Or was EOF 9/9/99, which would just be blindingly stupid (why use a totally unnecessary slash when you can zero-pad the string - at worst you lose nothing, at best you save two bytes)
So surely if it was just 9999 at the end of a file, dates would be handled a different way (consider 99111 - 1st of November or 11th of January?)
I could be totally mistaken here, I just don't get what the problem is supposed to be
-- Andy
(feeling very clueless today)
Re:Should be wait till 9/10/99 then??? (Score:2)
Since that didn't happen, it's safe to say we're okay.
9/9/99 -> 090999 (Score:2)