... and a happy couple of New Years to our readers
15 Jan 2000
Some may think it a little early to be wishing everyone a happy New Year for the year 2000, but it's not that far away now. One month ago we seemed to have, well, nearly three years before we needed to start worrying about that computer problem. But that was in 1997; now we have just over 23 months or around 100 weeks to make sure the Millennium celebrations don't go off with the wrong sort of bangs.
As our montage on this month's cover shows, work is already well advanced on the construction of the Millennium Dome at Greenwich, even if we are no nearer knowing what it will eventually house. Assuming it opens on time which will be an achievement in itself, given the prevarications over its birth the New Millennium Experience, to give it its full name, will act as the focal point for the nation's celebrations at midnight on 31 December 1999.
What the hangovers will be like on 1 January 2000 is perhaps best left to the imagination, but there is certainly going to be many a headache before then caused by that 'computer problem'. As we report on page 12, however, the movers and shakers in the worlds of government and industry have at last started to move, if not quite shake, to address the problem.
At the conference at the Institution of Civil Engineers, there were encouraging signs of a partnership emerging between the likes of the Engineering Council, the British Computer Society, and the government's own Action 2000 programme. The mutual aim is to offer help and guidance to those companies that are only just becoming aware that there really is a problem to be faced. No one really knows the scale of the problem, just that there remains an awesome amount of testing and verifying of computers and embedded systems still to be done in every sector of commerce and industry.
Worst-case scenarios are well known by now; ranging from a complete meltdown of the world's financial systems; through 'planes falling out of the sky; to hospitals' life-support systems switching back almost to the century of Burke and Hare.
The reality, of course (well, we hope), is that the 'legacy' systems involved in all the obvious danger areas will have been checked and corrected well before the deadline approaches. But which deadline? According to Rob Wirszycz of the Computing Services and Software Association, the deadline everyone should really be working towards is the end of this year, not next. In his view 1999 is the time for testing and verifying, assuming that by then there will still be sufficient members of his association, or any other qualified programmers, available to take on the mountainous workloads that will be involved.
If ever you have thought about putting your computer skills to better use than just process engineering, now is the time.
