The ugliness of the Year 2000 problem

Leading off a Friday afternoon pre-conference "bonus" session called "Y2K: Boondoggle, Quagmire or No Problem?", the British authority on the computer world's difficulty in storing the year portion of a date detailed why Y2K is more quagmire than boondoggle -- and certainly is a problem. Guenier was followed by representatives from three newspapers who explained the progress each had made in preparing for 2/1/2000, and a consultant who laid out the advantages of calling outside help.

But the afternoon belonged to Guenier, a candid critic of governments worldwide who described British and U.S. leaders as "paralyzed" by the issue. "I don't think there are any real global initiatives, and I think that's a tragedy," he said.

For him, cost is secondary: "The only thing that matters is, can we do it on time?" But he did offer a range of numbers to indicate how expensive it will be for some industries to ensure that 2000 and later years will be stored properly on computers ranging from PCs to mainframes.

The British banking association, he noted, estimated in 1996 ("Notice I use four digits, nineteen ninety six") that its members would spend about $50 million on Y2K. Less than two years later, one bank alone said it would spend $400 million. What "doesn't make any sense" is the Japanese banking industry's estimate that 48 banks collectively would spend $290 million to squash the millennium bug.

Connectivity issues have overtaken the mere date-storage problem posed by legacy systems that record 1998 as "98," meaning that 2000 will be read as 1900 by some systems. "It's not just about my business," Guenier said, "it's about the whole business environment we work in." That environment relies on machines that talk to one another to conduct commerce between suppliers and customers, and to connect everyone with banks. On 1/1/2000, they need to continue to talk or the economy will falter.

Equally pressing has become the matter of embedded chips, microprocessors that drive VCRs and elevators, security systems and ship navigation devices, Guenier said, noting that one North Sea oil platform alone has 10,000 embedded chips. "You've got to look at them all," he said.

The need to beat the Y2K deadline can't be overstated, he said. "If this is late, a lot of ordinary people are going to get hurt," as financial systems may fail, government agencies may not be able to serve their clients, and fundamental services may simply fail. Making some long distance phone calls -- a critical function of the global economy -- may be impossible, he suggested, citing a study by British Telecom.

Now eight weeks old, almost an eternity in the Y2K realm, the telephone company's survey of its 235 partners around the world to check their awareness of and plans to solve the problem showed considerable variety in levels of preparedness. While British Telecom found 80 percent of its in-nation partners were on top of things, the next-best number was North and South America combined, with 49 percent. Only 43 percent of partners in continental Europe were pursuing solutions, while southeast Asia was at 23 percent and companies in the Middle East and Africa collectively topped only 11 percent.

"These figures do suggest this is a big problem," Guenier said. "I promise you, it will arrive on time -- it cannot be negotiated." With a "huge amount of testing" still to be done, Guenier suggested suppliers might let the world down. "The one thing the computer industry does consistently is this: It's always late. Computer jobs are always late."

Guenier painted a grim picture of what's to come as the century winds down, then offered his solution. "It could be nasty, this could be ugly because it's so pervasive, it affects so many people, we don't have any resources, we don't have enough time -- and it's boring."

His "silver bullet"? Treat the problem for what it is, a business issue, and get top executives everywhere to take personal responsibility for the problem "because it's a business survival issue." Company chiefs need to set priorities, and acknowledge that "things are going to go wrong, so start thinking about what to do when they go wrong."

Putting his faith in human ingenuity and the ability of a military-style effort to succeed against Y2K, Guenier said, "If you engage the imagination of ordinary people, you can work miracles."

Following a long round of applause for Guenier, the 250 attendees heard how three newspapers have tackled Y2K.

At THE OREGONIAN in Portland, "we realized that with mature systems, we were particularly vulnerable" to Y2K, said Carol Howard, director of computer services. She communicated this to the company president, who said later he didn't sleep for several nights after hearing this news.

The paper set up working groups to identify problems, work with suppliers and develop plans for upgrades, implementation and testing. So far, several systems have been replaced, others have been upgraded and customized working environments have been preserved. "The most difficult part was getting everybody on board, to put a lot of important projects on hold," Howard said.

John Pourtless, the classified systems support manager for the ORLANDO SENTINEL, detailed the process his Florida paper followed to upgrade his System Integrators Inc. classified production system. "Failure is not an option," Pourtless said. "We can't fail at this because it would have drastic consequences for all of us."

Success was achieved over three weekends in August, Pourtless said, and now the SENTINEL is Y2K compliant in classifieds.

Not as far along is the DAILY HERALD in Arlington Heights, Ill. "It's pretty scary," said Mike Schoepke, assistant vice president for computer operations at Paddock Publications, which owns the third-largest newspaper in Illinois. "Things we were comfortable with six months ago we're revisiting now and saying, maybe this won't work."

Schoepke said his shop was focusing on resolving Y2K problems but also on preparing contingency plans, such as investigating whether cell phones might work if the public phone system failed, and how long a generator could meet the paper's needs in the event the power grid goes down.

The last presentation of the afternoon was made by Kurt Duffy, the director of business development for Data Dimensions Inc., a technology consulting firm based in St. Petersburg, Fla. Duffy ran down a list of things any computer-reliant company faced in confronting Y2K, then offered rationales for hiring a consultant to manage the problem-solving phase.

-- Pete Wetmore