The sky is falling! (1-1-2000, fer sure!) - rev 1.0

[Mike Arman <armanmik@n-jcenter.com>]

>Subject: ECU viruses
>
original message snipped, except "do a yahoo search on "y2k problem" for
more info. . ."

Well, I took my own advice (duhhh.) and did it - and did I ever get an
eyeful!!!!!

Seems we're in for a giant silicon meltdown in slow motion. Thank you Audi
gods that my car doesn't know (or care) what the date is! It may be the
only thing I own that still works on 1-1-2000. No, I am not kidding! And I
am about the LAST person you'll find who subscribes to the theory "When in
danger, when in doubt, run in circles, scream and shout."

And we should thank our lucky four rings that there's NO Audi content here.

Problem is that *NO* desktop computers (Mac and some older PS-2s seemingly
excepted) handle the year 2000 rollover properly - not 286, 386, 486, 586,
Pentium, 686, nothing! And they all screw up in different ways. Dell says
"Oh you'll just have to set the date manually - every time you turn it on
or reboot!!!!"

DOS versions 6.0 and up SEEM to work, Win 3.n DOES NOT, Win 95 before
version 400 DOES NOT, and the W95 upgrade from earlier versions won't
either - you have to get the "New Istallation" package for a new computer.

Once your hardware, bios and OS are working (fingers crossed), you get to
check each and every .com and .exe file for y2000 compatibility - there's a
master list at COTS which you get to through www.sbhs.com (in Oz, 'case
you're interested).

THEN you get to see if your data will work - spreadsheets and accounting
programs have the biggest problems - lots of internal references to
comparing different dates.

Unfortunately, there's NO EASY FIX. 

(We're going to let the biggies, banks, insurance companies, etc. fend for
themselves - there are over 500 programming languages in use, and lots of
them are utterly archaic, no documentation, all the programmers long
retired or even died off - we're going to have enough problems of our own .
. .)

Gotta make my Audi PERFECT so I have time to prepare my computer for the
big day - if what I read is even 10% true, I'll need all the time I can
find!!!!!

Scared.

Real Scared

Mike Arman