Hello Ed. Glad to see you around the old neighborhood...

I was wondering if you were following the Rotterdam Report threads. An intriguing issue, but well above my pay grade..

http://www.greenspun.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg.tcl?msg_id=001tkG

Care to chime in with your take on it?

Regards-

-- Lewis (aslanshow@yahoo.com), December 02, 1999

Answers

Lewis,

Thanks for the heads-up on the Rotterdam Report. I saw the thread title, assumed it was something about the status of Rotterdam's port, and skipped right by it.

I don't have time to read the report right now, but it appears that a bunch of fairly competent people have taken a close look at it, and have offered their opinion. Unless Hoffmeister (whose comments are the first in a long line of other comments) grossly misquoted the material in the report, I would have to agree with him ... a rather novel experience, to be sure, but Y2K makes strange bedfellows.

If I get a chance later on, I'll try to take a look at the report (and white paper) itself. Can't make any promises, though; seems like almost every minute of the day is double-booked with other tasks at this point...

Ed

-- Ed Yourdon (ed@yourdon.com), December 02, 1999.

It's a crock.

IF the code is 2 digit (i.e. it's suspect ANYWAY) and IF it takes a text string input and decides to treat it as an arithmetic expression based on the last two digits (WHAT?) and IF the result of the divide by zero escapes from the stack/heap and overwrites instructions elsewhere on the hard drive (WHAT?) then you have Rotterdam, therefore give us money.

Are they seriously suggesting that code like this exists? How would you go about writing this deliberately, let alone accidentally? (atoi() bombs out on the first non-digit).

Show us the source...

-- Colin MacDonald (roborogerborg@yahoo.com), December 03, 1999.

Hi Ed-

Thanks for your comments. I think it might be worth your time.

Or if you just want to review recent discussions here:

http://www.greenspun.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg.tcl?msg_id=001skr

http://www.greenspun.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg.tcl?msg_id=001qFx

http://www.greenspun.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg.tcl?msg_id=001tGA

You're only *double*-booked?!?! slacker... ;-)

Be well-

-- Lewis (aslanshow@yahoo.com), December 03, 1999.