...THE GLOBAL IT INDUSTRY RESEARCH FIRM, THE GARTNER GROUP, EXPECTS THE YEAR 2000 PROBLEM TO CAUSE COMPUTER FAILURES AROUND THE WORLD THROUGHOUT THIS YEAR AND POSSIBLY INTO 2001 AS WELL.

IT HAS FORECAST THAT 50 PER CENT OF Y2K FAILURES WILL BE SPREAD OUT OVER 2000.

THE UNITED NATIONS-SPONSORED Y2K DATA CLEARING HOUSE HAS ALSO WARNED THAT FULL IMPACT OF ANY YEAR 2000 PROBLEMS WILL BE LARGELY HIDDEN UNTIL MID-TO-LATE JANUARY.

THE DIRECTOR OF INTERNATIONAL Y2K COOPERATION CENTER, MR. BRUCE MCCONNELL, SAID Y2K ERRORS WILL BECOME EVIDENT DAYS AND WEEKS AFTER THE ROLLOVER. (end of quote)

This opinion is also shared by IEEE Chairman Dale Way.

-- heads up (@ .), January 05, 2000

Answers

Source please...

-- Ryker (ryker@cvalley.net), January 05, 2000.

The Center for Cooperative Solutions (an analysis group think tank) working group on y2k problems estimates first major problems to cross 'threshold' of internet only reporting and get into mainstream around the Jan 21 to Jan 25 persiod as major payroll - direct deposit systems start to show the failures that have already taken effect. These will be less easy to hide than purely internal stuff like embeddeds. Then some of the embeddeds will start to show as routine maintenance schedules approach the end of the month. The TACE working group estimates second week in Feb for first 'momentum' problems with infrastructure hardware to surface to mainstream press. These have already started (maybe norweigian train wreck was one) but will take some time to percolate through to the press and public.

-- pliney the younger (pliney@edgeofvolcano.waiting), January 05, 2000.

To Pliny -- are we talking solely payroll for work in this month, or simply deposits done this month? I say this only because my own direct deposit for December was officially listed on my salary printout form as being deposited by my employer on 01/01/00, though it did not appear in my account until the 3rd, which has been common practice for my workplace at the year's beginning for some time now. So on that level, at least, no worries. Some more paychecks for other employees appear today; I'm keeping an eye out for those.

-- Ned Raggett (ned@kuci.org), January 05, 2000.

"IT HAS FORECAST THAT 50 PER CENT OF Y2K FAILURES WILL BE SPREAD OUT OVER 2000."

Don't you understand that this is GOOD NEWS? It means that we've had nearly 50% of the Y2K failures--ALREADY.

How many businesses have collapsed?

How many lives lost?

How many governments fallen?

Multiply that by two.

That comes out to the smallest bump in the road anyone could have imagined.

-- Craig Kenneth Bryant (ckbryant@mindspring.com), January 05, 2000.

Don't you understand that this is GOOD NEWS? It means that we've had nearly 50% of the Y2K failures--ALREADY.

How many businesses have collapsed?

How many lives lost?

How many governments fallen?

Multiply that by two.

*g* Craig... in addition to being pretty danged funny, this puts things into perspective more effectively than anything I've read. Thanks for the giggle and the good sense.

*Rochelle. :)

-- Rochelle (rainbowdrop@usa.net), January 05, 2000.

Not quite, guys and gals... Gartner Group predicted quite a number of failures would happen in 2001 -- or is that 19200 for some of us? :-) I don't remember the percentages, but very roughly 20% in 1999 and maybe 30% in 2001. Yes. I know there wasn't much reported in 1999, but how much of the year 2000 has run its course yet? We do seem to be getting a lot of train crashes lately, India, UK and now Finland, where the control systems appear to be at fault. Several incidents in Sydney in the past couple of months. Two trains on the same track and controllers can't stop them or contact them before they crash? I won't be surprised if these are Y2K problems. If so, lots more to come. And what about the stock market right now? Hold on to your preps!

-- David Harvey (vk2dmh@hotmail.com), January 05, 2000.

Whoops. Norway not Finland, and funny date 19101. Keyboard dyslexia?

-- David Harvey (vk2dmh@hotmail.com), January 05, 2000.

We can fairly confidently expect date bugs to continue to crop up until hell freezes over. Don't forget about all that windowing, some of which must be fixed before the window expires (probably not much of it, though). Don't forget about the Unix 2038 bug. The incidence curve for date bugs is only asymptotic to zero, it will never get there. Dates are miserable things to work with, so we'll write new date bugs as we go along.

But don't expect many of these bugs to have much impact. I'm sure there are still hundreds of millions of them out there, and worldwide we've probably fixed less than half of them. They've been striking pretty regularly for the last couple of years, and are peaking right now in the IT world. Some will likely bite pretty hard during the next 3 months. Some already have. Who knows, things might get worse than they are now (shudder), but probably not very much.

-- Flint (flintc@mindspring.com), January 05, 2000.

>> only 5 per cent of difficulties would reveal themselves immediately... Around 80 per cent of all the glitches will probably come in the next three months as payments and transactions fall due. [The Times] <<

Actually, up to 80% have not "happened" yet, which is a very misleading and ambiguous term to describe the net effects of Y2K since: many of these occurences have not officially been reported yet; reported as something other than Y2K; or will happen as a delayed reaction at certain times, such as the end of the month or other crucial dates when they become "activated".

-- Patrick Lastella (Lastella1@aol.com), January 05, 2000.

Yeah, Pat, it's some sort of magic wand thing. The bugs just mysteriously pop up and pow! instant cataclysm for the recipient. Let's get real, huh? Who are you trying to fool?

-- Badco (amazed@thecorn.com), January 05, 2000.