Re: sick and fucking tired of this Y2k shit

[Sunder <sunder@brainlink.com>]

dana@dtn.com wrote:
> 
> Ehem.  Nice try, but it was caused by 2k computers, 10M harddrives (or no

Bullshit, it was caused by bad planning from bad managers.  Nobody expected to
use this shit so long.  Upgrades were supposed to happen.  Corners were
supposed to be cut, etc.

> Some Insurance Company Inc has a database of customer records.  This
> database contains the date in 4 fields; Date of Birth, Start of Policy, End
> of Policy, and Last transaction date.  By only using 2 digit dates you are
> able save 64 bits per record.

Sorry guy, it's not just a weak example, it's a bullshit example. Even if you
use two bytes, you can encode them as an INT rather than a text field so that
would get rid of the problem and you'd have a Year 65535 issue.  Sorry, better
packing and all that.  So, if they were interested in saving space, they
should have used a single byte to do year tracking.  Some programs did.  For
example DOS/PC Bioses used this and so they're supposedly OK until 2235
(1980+255.)  

Funny that.  Use a single byte to represent a year and avoid Y2K.  Use 2 digit
text fields and WHAM!  Coincidence?  Or perhaps the principle is that if you
do things right the first time, it will work well?

> Now I know my example is kinda weak, but the same was done throughout the
> computer industry.  Maybe you started out on Windows 95 on a Pentium, but
> there was ALOT of computing going on before MS even opened it's doors.

I started on Commodore Pet computers - yes 1MHz, 16Kb of RAM, NO hard drive.
40 colum by 24 row green screens.  And of course the amazing Timex Sinclair
1000 that had a whoopass 1K of RAM and a blazing fast Z80 1MHz cpu.

It wasn't that important to NOT use 2 digit dates back then.  It could have
been done right, and it was when the dates were used to go back to the 1800's
for example. i.e. Art tracking databases, geneology, etc.

> The fact that code that was written 10-30 years ago is still in use is a
> testimony to those who wrote it.  How many programs have you written that
> will still be in use 30 years from now?  How many programs do you OWN that
> you still think you will be using in 30 years?

Um, yeah, I occasionally fire up my old C64 games in an emulator. :) I'll
probably run vMac 30 years from now and get the warm fuzzies, that's about
all.  When I finish it, I may run the Lisa emulator I'm writing and be able to
run those old Lisa 7/7 Office tools from back in 1983. :)  Or perhaps CoPilot,
or Virtual Game Station.

It may be a testimony to the authors, yes, the lack of bugs (other than Y2K
issues) are indeed amazing, but quite obviously we can't ignore them Y2K
issues that prevent them from continued service.

Again, if the designers of the programs held that the couldn't should be used
for more than 5 or 10 years, it's certainly the managers fault for continued
use of it.  If the programmers' manager insisted they use two digit dates so
they could come back and do an upgrade, it was their fault as well.  

I certainly don't blame the programmers when even in today's amosphere, it's
not important to test software, but rather to release it on time or Marketing
will have a hissy fit.  That's the issue.  Give a good programmer time to
think and develop code the right way and it will be done right.  Don't, and
you get Windows 95.

Data is expensive. Storage is always cheap. No matter how much a 20Mb drive
cost back then, the information held is far more valueable.

> P.S.  Feel free to make fun of anyone who has written code for modern
> hardware and "forgot"  the first two digits of the year.  But these new
> programs don't run control towers, utility districts, etc.  They let you
> play solitare.

Indeed, and badly written solitaire at that.

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