You have to start somewhere..................

Union Pacific Railroad is "On Track" for the Year 2000

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

OMAHA, January 25 -- Union Pacific Railroad has certified its mainframe computer systems and all of its critical client-server systems Y2K ready. This includes the railroad's Transportation Control System (TCS), the glue for railroad operations. Union Pacific began early on its Year 2000 project with research in 1994, and expects to spend a total of $46 million on the project. The Y2K effort started in earnest in 1996 and is a number one priority at the railroad, involving every department in the effort to provide normal railroad operations on January 1, 2000. The railroad's mainframe and critical client-server systems contain more than 140,000 programs. Each program was tested for compliance with Y2K standards, updated if needed, re-tested, implemented, and certified as Y2K ready, completing the effort in December, 1998. "1999 will be a year of extensive testing of our certified systems with customers, trading partners, and other railroads," said Al Reinberg, senior director on the Y2K project. "We want to do everything possible to be sure we have a smooth transition into the year 2000." "Union Pacific prefers to use the term 'Y2K ready' instead of 'Y2K compliant,'" Reinberg. "Some vendors may not certify their products to be Y2K compliant, but there are no Year 2000 issues involved in the way that the Union Pacific uses the products. Therefore, Union Pacific can be Y2K ready even though some vendor products may not be compliant." Union Pacific provides public information on its Y2K compliance progress on its web site (www.uprr.com/y2k). That site has links to worldwide Y2K sites which have additional information on the Year 2000 challenge. Moving the world's computer systems to the new millennium has been complicated by the once-standard practice of limiting computer codes to two digits, such as "98," which will be confusing to computers when January 1, 2000 arrives and "00" could be read as 1900 or 2000.

-- Anonymous, January 25, 1999

Answers

A little question here, the term ready verses compliant, if the railroad has tested to the extent they say and every thing is ok including the use of non compliant software from there vendors then how or why do they use the term ready.There answer seems confusing. If there vendors are not compliant thats one thing, but they say there system has been tested so why can they not say there system is compliant.Any one got ideas of what there really saying or why they are saying it?

-- Anonymous, January 25, 1999

I find it hard to believe that the same rail road that was so screwed up in its scheduling and deliveries that it almost caused a national industry crisis could be so "on top" of the Y2K remediation effort. By the same token it would be stupid to issue such a definitive press release if they did not have a handle on the situation. It could be they are ignoring the embedded systems and just focusing on their mainframes. So we wait and see.

-- Anonymous, January 26, 1999

I'm pretty impressed with UP Y2K web site. It addresses a lot of issues including "the switches can be operated manually". In addition, they are hosting monthly meetings that are open to customers and the public. I guess it could be a lot of smoke and mirrors, but the appearance is impressive. Caution - UP is using 1999 for TESTING. This could be big trouble (see the What happened to Implementation thread). Secondly, they never really address the "will the switches work" question.

-- Anonymous, January 26, 1999

David Millard,

Let me give you an example of Y2K ready vs. Y2k complient. Y2k ready generally refers to an application that will function after the rollover, but may have some issue such as logging dates improperly. One example I have experience with is a firewall application. The current patch release I'm running is Y2K ready, meaning that after 1999 the loggging mechanism will show the year as being 100. The application will still function properly, the date will just roll from 99 to 100.

When companies say Y2K ready, these are the types of issues they are referring to. To be quite honest, there is nothing wrong with being just Y2K ready for a period as long as the applications funtion.

-- Anonymous, January 26, 1999

db,

PLEASE use another email address in your postings. Contact me via email if you need further explanation.

-- Anonymous, January 26, 1999

"The switches can be operated manually."

Leaving unanswered the big questions --

Who will throw each switch?

How will that person know when to throw it?

I remember riding streetcars in St. Paul in the thirties. When switching was needed, the motorman stopped the car, positioned it just so, reached down through a hole in the floor with a steel bar, and threw the switch. This worked just fine.

But if every UP train had to stop to let one of the train crew jump out whenever a switch must be thrown, rail traffic would be affected in a major way. In the large marshaling yards, where trains are made up, it's hard to imagine the scene.

-- Anonymous, February 04, 1999