I think you will all agree that Senators Bennett and Dodd have studied y2k more than anyone else in government and more than most of us. They have at least looked into the "Belly of the Beast" If the good Senator Bennett can still hold up the Pamphlet from the UK signed by Tony Blaire in an attempt to shame Clinton, thereby gaining political advantage for the republicans, Y2k can't be so bad. He obviously expects there to be an election in 2000. That means electronic vote counting machines. If they are going to limit liability to big companies, they expect a working court system. You can't have a court system these days without computers. If it were as bad as many of us think, The people in the "Know" wouldn't be jockying for position to better their political parties. They would be stocking up and moving out. I have more faith and confidence in the greed and corruption of man than I do in their honesty. As long as the Washington animals continue to act out their inane power plays I feel more confident that its not going to be an infomagic scenario. I think Ed Yourdon's take on the situation is the most probable. A year of real bad system failures followed by about 10 yrs of economic shortages and depression. Misery, violence, poverty, hunger, death and confusion may be out lot, but thats the way it is in most of the world today. Just read the newspaper. There will still be wealthy and powerful people and lots and lots of poor people. The middle class may be wiped out, unless you can work on computers. A big image of the movie, "Soylent Green" just went through my mind.

Bill in South Carolina

-- Bill Solorzano (notaclue@webtv.net), March 04, 1999

Answers

I don't know whether the Senate report is 100% accurate or not but it's getting pretty clear that if there were going to be some catastrophic events then we would be hearing alot more about it then a couple of segements on the news here and there. The end of the world as we know it is not something you can just "spin" your way out of and I think everyone here reading this forum is smart enough to know that. The truth is coming out and the truth isn't so bad.

Believe it or not "fix on failure" is not the stupid man's way of remediating. I have heard about a few companies in my area that, aside from the most important programs that are being worked on right now, will use this to fix some of the things that come up after the year 2000. The less critical systems are obviously capable of being shut down for a short period without plunging a company into bankruptcy.

And seeing how January 1, 2000 isn't even a great big deal I don't see why everyone around the Yourdon forum has paired TEOTWAWKI with Y2K. I am sure there will be a variety of maladies from a few months before to a few months after 1/1/00. I think some people need to stop looking at the glass as perpetually half empty and have a little faith in the fact that mankind can acheive great things when we put our collective minds to it. And some people also need to stop using obscure analogies to "prove" that Y2K will be doomsday (Clinton scandal, pollution, corruption, lack of morality in the USA). Stop comparing apples to oranges.

The other countries behind in Y2K remediation will pose a problem. But it's change that is inevitable, not the death of millions, rioting, and famine.

For everyone who has ever read good news and posted something like "That's right, sleeeep, sleeeeep little sheeple" on the Y2000 Q & A board, you people need to lighten up just a little bit.

-- (Lancelot @ tavern link.com), March 04, 1999.

"I think some people need to stop looking at the glass as perpetually half empty and have a little faith in the fact that mankind can acheive great things when we put our collective minds to it."

Rah, rah! Go team go! We can win one for the Gipper!

Such is the faith of man in man. We have become our own god. There is nothing that we cannot accomplish. Yadda, yadda...

Thanks for the optimistic outlook, Lancelot, but I believe I'll keep preparing...

-- Nabi Davidson (nabi7@yahoo.com), March 04, 1999.

Hi Lancelot,

You wrote: "I don't know whether the Senate report is 100% accurate or not but it's getting pretty clear that if there were going to be some catastrophic events then we would be hearing a lot more about it then a couple of segements on the news here and there."

Why do you think this? What company or gov't agency is going to admit they're currently having failures?

The failures are going to be a catastrophe for only a few companies or agencies (I hope). It's the cumulative effect of the smaller failures that's the real problem. And these failures won't be reported in the press until quite late this year, IMO -- at a time when everyone will have had first-hand experience with them. And then the failures will be coming at a rate faster than the personnel can fix them (not enough programmers, etc.).

"Believe it or not "fix on failure" is not the stupid man's way of remediating. I have heard about a few companies in my area that, aside from the most important programs that are being worked on right now, will use this to fix some of the things that come up after the year 2000."

Think about this. Fix on failure is the normal mode of operation for most embedded systems today. And it's a reasonable mode of management, because all that's needed is to pull a spare system off the shelf or get one FedEx'd in. No big deal, just a little downtime.

But what happens if an embedded system fails after 1/1/00? The replacement part on the shelf has the same failure mode -- it won't work. Will FedEx be flying with airport traffic cut way back (to zero if the airport isn't compliant)?

What if the same system board fails in 1000 different companies? Will the manufacturer have remediated boards? Is the manufacturer even in business? How many remediated boards will the manufacturer have in stock? How long will it take to get the replacement board?

In addition to that, you're assuming that the company will have electric power enough to notice they have a failure. And you're assuming there will be enough company personnel present to find the failure, instead of being at home making sure their families are all right.

Lots of problems with "fix on failure" after 1/1/00, I'm afraid.

-- Dean -- from (almost) Duh Moines (dtmiller@nevia.com), March 05, 1999.

Bill & Lancelot.. Bill. for your infor, i live in the Upstate. You might well be right and Yourdon might well be right. However say the odds of a catastrophic failure is 1%. That is about the same as the mortality rate following open heart surgery. It's nice to hear the rate is so low unless you make up part of that 1%. We WILL have localized 1-3 week power outages. We WILL have some civil unrest. We WILL have localized food shortages. ....What if it's YOUR localized area....does prep still sound stupid?

-- Lobo (Hiding@woods.com), March 05, 1999.

Lobo:

When I started this thread I was unaware that Koskinen was advocating the same premis as was Rick Cowles (see Cory Hamasaki's last wrap) Yourdon, Cowles and Hamasaki are the three gurus I have the most faith in. They are all close in their estimates. Three or four weeks or two months without power is terrible. Inconsistent power for another year after that is as bad as can be. Then years of depression and joblessness. Grinding poverty, increased deaths and violence are sure to be part of our future. I am prepared for six months. I see that to prepare for what I now anticipate would take a warehouse. I am more worried now than ever before. These new possibilities almost ensure heavy government control and loss of freedom.

Bill Solorzano in Charleston SC (Where nobody has even heard of y2k)

-- Bill Solorzano (notaclue@webtv.net), March 05, 1999.