Any experts out there? Is the 19100 date seen on web pages limited to, or a function of java script? If not, are embedded chips reading 19100. On a PC a 19100 date produces an Invalid date error.

If embedded chips went to 19100, what happens at 19999

Sorry this is probably a stupid question but just wondering

-- wondering (iwonder@dot.com), January 04, 2000

Answers

i'm not y2k pro, but

a) yes
b) no c) correct, it does d) they don't

-- (4@5.6), January 04, 2000.

geesh... AS a web programmer: it's a SIMPLE error.

the 19 is static text

the 100 is, yep, you guessed it 99 + 1 = 100

It is a y2k bug, but one that won't cause any miscalculations.

100-99 is still 1.

All in all, i'd say it's the most common bug, and is strictly limited to web page layouts. Maybe some Access reports. I say we should all write out the year as 19100 on personal checks that still have a 19 in the date field

-- Mojo Risen (mo@jo.com), January 04, 2000.

Hi,

I've have a LIMITED background in programming - but here goes. In some programs written in C, the 19 in the year (1998, 1997, etc), was used as a constant, and there year was incremented, 98,99. So when 2000 rolls around, it's 19 and 100 or 19100. I've heard that this may not necessarily be a problem in all c programs.

As for emeddeds, I doubt they use C, so I don't think they would be susceptible to this.

Like I said, I have LIMITED programming background. My other posters with more experience could add something.

hope this helps.

-- brent (me@over.here.net), January 04, 2000.

As it has been explained to me, it is the result of faulty coding where the addition of 1 to a date to produce the next year was done only to the last two digits and the 19 was hard coded.

ie: print 19; take 95+1 and print. The result is 1996. But take 99+1 and the result is 19100.

The code needs remediating.

-- Gypsy (GypsiGold@aol.com), January 04, 2000.

As has been explained elsewhere, some web pages accessed by i.e. explorer 4.0 and 5.0 are showing strange dates because they did not change their web page language for (get year). Microsoft did not send out a patch, but instead announced to everybody that they had to change this command. We can make brain surgery out of anything, but there is almost always a simpler explanation. go for simple, first.

-- graymatter (graymatter@findthemiddle.com), January 04, 2000.

much of the web-page bad date stuff seems to be from inexperienced programmers using PERL scripts that don't take into account what type of browser people are using to view the page.
Or people who have downloaded FREE Perl scripts

One such "inexperienced" programmer is Matt's Script Archive

if you click on the Y2K links part, you will see his admission to his misunderstanding of handling the date calculation, and he provides simple code to fix it (hopefully this time it actually works.)

Apparently this problem has been known for a while and This site "appears" to acknowledge this by making ALL references to the year 2000 show up as "19100"

Looking at the source code from this site, the "19100" are part of the TEXT,they are not "generated or updated) they appear to be a joke (at the expense of the bad Perl programmers)

well, I thought it was in good fun.

sorry, I don't have an answer to your embedded question.

-- plonk! (realaddress@hotmail.com), January 04, 2000.

Saw this on USENET:

For some background on how this problem arises, and programmer response to it, check out the following URLs:

Booby Trap Code http://www.y2kinfo.com/journal/features/0499_amona.html

Programmer Denial http://www.y2kinfo.com/journal/features/0599_amon.html

Y2K infests web pages http://www.y2kinfo.com/journal/features/0899_amon.html

-- pr (prog@net.com), January 04, 2000.

Here's what leaves me cold: if simple, stupid fixes like this were missed or ignored, what *else* was missed or ignored? Some people thought that "1900" or "19100" dates were kinda funny, especially those 1900 dates that started showing up before rolloever. It threw a scare into me -- "what else did they miss?"

-- watcher (okerry@mailcity.com), January 04, 2000.