Y2K Bug :: essays research papers

THE YEAR TWO-THOUSAND BUG   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Is the world going to end at the year, two-thousand because of the Y2K computer virus? Absolutely not. The Y2K bug might cause a little bit of disorder with our digital-life when the clock strikes twelve because we might not have any stock market, electricity, or savings in the bank.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  In every mainframe and super-computer, that most every large business owns, there is a little glitch when it tries to compute the year two-thousand. It simply is unable to do so because it has a two digit year entry. The computer is unable to set the first two numbers in the date because in computer does not need to because the computer code in the software says it is always the twentieth century or 19--. If it is not corrected by the time the year two-thousand rolls around, the computer will read: 01/01/1900.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  So, what does all this mean to me? Well, when the monthly heating bill comes, the computer will think the heat was on for ninety-nine years because it cycles back to 1900. Let me put this way, if the normal bill is $75 for December, then it will be $89,175! The same goes for the electric bill and telephone but only if the phone is being used between 1999 and 2000. In my personal opinion, the Y2K bug will not have any effect because everything will be fixed up and ready to run properly by the deadline. Maybe I’m just a little to dependent and taking these enterprises for granted.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  On the other hand, there are numerous companies making a huge profit on this potential crisis. Software tycoons are making fortunes for selling software that makes people’s personal computers Y2K equipped. The thing is, that PC’s do not use dates as often and are not nearly as important to them as large to corporations because I have already stated in paragraph two and three. An even worse fact, is that most PC’s are already Y2K compliant so the software is totally non-essential for it to adjust! PC’s just need a few â€Å"tweaks† in the settings to make them ready.