Y2K TIPS - TIME IS SLIPPING AWAY So, you think you've got some time before you need to think about Year 2000 issues? Think again! Many Y2K issues are already popping up. Many systems will experience problems well before the Year 2000 rolls around. The reason for this is that many systems make projections or calculations for one or more years into the future. Two industries that have already experienced this are the insurance and banking industries. For example, programs that calculate long-term loans or life insurance policies, withouth updated code, have failed to calculate dates into the Year 2000, seeing them as falling in this century instead of the next. Another factor is that it can take a great deal of time to identify and resolve issues with some systems. If you start now and it takes 14 months to fix the problems, you're busted. The point is, now is the time to get started if you're still one of those waiting.

Y2K TIPS - IT'S NOT JUST A SOFTWARE PROBLEM Many companies are spending time checking and evaluating their software applications for Year 2000 compliance. That's great! However, don't view the Y2K problem as strictly a software problem. You need to check your hardware as well. Many older systems have built-in chips (such as the BIOS chip) that may not handle the switch to the new millennium. Contact your hardware vendors for Y2K compliance information or download one of the many test utilities available on the Internet. It's your computer. Treat it prudently.

Y2K TIPS - WHILE YOU'RE AT IT So, you've created the plan to get your computer systems Y2K compliant. Fantastic! However, if you're the Y2K expert at your company now, you should charge ahead in other areas of your company. For example, what about your elevators? What about your environmental systems (heating and air controls)? Are your security systems compliant? What about your Point of Sales systems? If these systems are out of your realm of responsibility, you may need to convince the right people that they need to get moving on evaluating these devices for Y2K compliance.

Y2K TIPS - LEAP YEAR CALCULATIONS One potential Y2K problem may be overlooked. While everyone is searching for two-digit dates, many forget to address a potential problem caused by leap years. Leap years are calculated by a simple set of rules. Unfortunately, there are systems and applications that do not recognize the Year 2000 as a leap year. This causes all dates following February 29, 2000, to be offset incorrectly by one day. The rules for leap year calculations are as follows: A year is a leap year if it is divisible by 4. But if it is also divisible by 100, it is NOT a leap year. If, however, it is divisible by 400, it IS a leap year. Thus, the Year 2000 is a special-case leap year that occurs once every 400 years.

Feds set up Y2K toll-free information phone line American consumers fretting about how they will fly come January 2000 or whether their Social Security checks will arrive on time now have a new resource for addressing their millennium woes. THE PRESIDENT’S COUNCIL on Year 2000 announced on 7 January 1999 the creation of the toll-free line, which will be supported by the Federal Trade Commission and the Federal Information Center of the General Services Administration. By dialing 1-888-USA-4-Y2K, consumers can access prerecorded messages seven days a week, 24 hours a day on how personal computers, small business, telephones and other products or services will be affected by the approaching year 2000.

1582 - FIXING THE CALENDAR   ( still confused? ) CALENDARS, perhaps man's most ambitious attempt to control time, are predicated on three astronomical certainties: the earth spinning on its axis (a day); the time it takes for the moon to circle the earth (a month), and the approximate time it takes the earth to revolve around the sun (a year). In 46 B.C., Emperor Julius Caesar borrowed from Egyptian and Jewish calendars by instituting a solar year of a dozen 30-day months, with five days left over and a leap year every four years. But Caesar miscalculated, and over time the 11-minute annual discrepancy between his calendar and the solar year had accumulated a debit of 10 days. By the 16th century, the spring equinox--and Easter, a centerpiece of the Christian religion, which was linked to it--had begun to drift backward from its March mooring into winter. In 1582, Pope Gregory XIII assembled a committee, including the influential Jesuit mathematician Christopher Clavius, and issued a Papal Bull, creating our present-day Christian calendar. New Year's Day was restored to January 1 after more than 1,000 years of being celebrated in late March. There would be no leap years in centesimal years, except those divisible by 400. And, in his most extraordinary move, to anchor Easter, Gregory scissored 10 days off the Julian calendar. On the night of October 4, 1582, people went to bed as usual; they awoke to find it was October 15 -- 11 days later. While Roman Catholic countries adopted the modifications at once, Protestant England and the Colonies only came around in 1752. A footnote: The Gregorian calendar, one of 40 active calendars in the world, is still not entirely accurate. It runs 26 seconds fast a year, leaving a margin of error of six days every 10,000 years. So don't look back -- the next millennium is gaining on us.