Re: The Great Year-2000 Hoax!

Sam You seem to misunderstand my question. I am not looking for an answer to "What will happen to MY system (ie. what I are using at the moment)." I am writing a white paper for a graduate class on database applications, and am trying to find out if Y2K will have an impact on various specific database uses, databases, and database management. Indivual users can set their computer to 2000, certainly. It is recommended that they give it a shot, in fact. Corporate systems may not wish to use such a test to see if the system will go "face down in the water." It just might. Meanwhile, this is not a question of just local usage and implications w/in the system, but also of the potential for impact to systems on whose information or data you depend, or to whom you provide data. What if they're affected? You can't just take the "screw 'em" attitude, if your business is closely linked with theirs. I'm beginning to get the idea that a lot of people know of Y2K, that for many it is a non-problem for their local system (but they haven't thought about the broader implications of upstream or downstream users), or they just haven't thought about it very much. Maybe I'm wrong...maybe everybody out there is working on software that's so flash that the millenium date change isn't a problem - just a toggle or global default change and presto! the system now can interpret the new century just fine. Of course, there's all that data that, if stored w/a two-digit year, is indistinguishable w/regard to the century. What the hell are folks gonna do about that? Historical, epidemiologic, and other archival data has lots of potential for problems as systems, old or new, go to retrieve data that cannot be deciphered w/regard to the century. If I'm wrong, please tell me, but tell me w/specific examples as to why, since my aim is to gather information and bring the level of my understanding (and that of my classmates) about Y2K as it regards databases and database management up to the highest level I can. Thanks Matt Bovee Univ. Kansas Sam McFadden <rory@itsa.ucsf.edu> wrote: >I know nothing about what will happen but rather than debate how many >angels can dance, why not just set your computer date to 2000+ and find >out what will happen?? >Sam McFadden