It would cost $17,000 to replace the non-Y2K-compliant
systems, but that's money Parkland doesn't want to
spend until next year, said facilities manager Ed Paras.

. . .

The solution is fooling the systems by turning
back their timers to 1972, the last year to have
an identical calendar to the year 2000.
TURN BACK THE CLOCK

-- spider (spider0@usa.net), October 13, 1999

Answers

This still doesn't help the computers do calendar math and I doubt most PC systems could be set for, or would correctly keep time for, dates before 1980.

Also, when software upgrades are being installed, the new software checks for the dates and versions of the old files on the system, before installing. I would guess that upgrades might be impossible if a system is not compliant and is used after Y2K. Since I have never seen anything written about potential Y2K upgrade problems after Jan 2000, can one of the programmers please comment on this?

In summary, I would guess the 1972 trick would only be half a fix.

-- John (jh@notreal.ca), October 13, 1999.

This is an interesting approach but one question in my mind is do you wait until the rollover on Jan. 1 to change back to 1972 or is it better to wait until Dec.31 and change the year to 1971? I'm not sure but are you risking a computer crash by waiting until after the rollover?

-- jb (jb40@hotmail.net), October 13, 1999.

Note that this a climate control system.

A few snips:

"The solution may be great for furnaces, but Grover doesn't want to see his bank doing it."

"If your life savings were put back to 1972, all of a sudden you'd lose a lot of interest. Some people might not have been born by then (according to afflicted computers)."

Tick... Tock... <:00=

-- Sysman (y2kboard@yahoo.com), October 13, 1999.

I read this as another failure to become
compliant. Hanford Nuclear Reservation
claimed that they were "Y2K Ready". They
said that they also would put their computers
back to 1972 to avoid problems.
KABOOM!!!!!

-- spider (spider0@usa.net), October 13, 1999.