21 Oct
1998
21 Oct
'98
7:48 a.m.
On Wed, 21 Oct 1998, John Foust wrote:
What I don't believe are these claims that the
heart of the Y2K
problem are thousands of businesses running apps as old as I am,
that haven't had to change, or that can't be changed. How many
serious businesses are still running the same unchanged sourceless
app since 1978, much less 1968 or 1958?
Amazing, isn't it? I'm sure those same sentiments were expressed back in
1978, 1968 and 1958 by the same incredulous programmers who supposed that
perhaps their programs would still be crunching away in 1998.
I don't think the software I've written thats been in the field since 1993
will still be there in 2003, but there's no reason it can't be, and I
would be thrilled (and amazed) to find out that it was.
I'm sure the guys who wrote Sage Professional Editor back in the late 80s
would be amazed that I still use it for all my code writing (in DOS
windows under Win95) and swear by it (best damn text editor ever
developed...yeah, you heard me!)
SO anyway, believe it. Code from the 50s and 60s still churns away,
calculating the taxes you owe, the fines you are assessed and the bank
statements you received.
Sellam Alternate e-mail: dastar(a)siconic.com
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