Path: chuka.playstation.co.uk!news From: "Alex Herbert" Newsgroups: scee.yaroze.freetalk.english Subject: Y 0 K Problem Date: Sat, 27 Mar 1999 12:58:37 -0000 Organization: PlayStation Net Yaroze (SCEE) Lines: 59 Message-ID: <7dildi$lmc18@chuka.playstation.co.uk> NNTP-Posting-Host: th-usr02-32.ndirect.co.uk X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.72.3110.1 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.72.3110.3 > Dear Cassius, > are you still working on the Y zero K problem? This > change from BC to AD is giving us a lot of headaches and we haven't much > time left. I dont know how people will cope with working the wrong way > round. Having been working happily downwards forever, now we have to start > thinking upwards. You would think that someone would have thought of it > earlier and not left it to us to sort it all at this last minute. > I spoke to Caesar the other evening. He was livid that Julius hadn't done > something about it when he was sorting out the calendar. He said he could > see why Brutus turned nasty. We called in Consultus, but he simply said > that > continuing downwards using minus BC won't work and as usual, charged a > fortune for doing nothing useful. Surely we will not have to throw out all > our old hardware and start again? Macrohard will make yet another fortune > out of this I suppose. The moneylenders are paranoid of course! They have > been told that all usury rates will invert and they will have to pay their > clients to take out loans. Its an ill wind... > As for myself, I just cant see the sand in an hourglass flowing upwards. > We > have heard that there are three wise men in the East who have been working > on the problem, but unfortunately they wont arrive until its all over. I > have heard that there are plans to stable all horses at midnight at the > turn > of the year as there are fears that they will stop and try to run > backwards, > causing immense damage to chariots and possible loss of life. > Some say the world will cease to exist at the moment of transition. Anyway > we are still continuing to work on this blasted Y zero K problem. I will > send a parchment to you if anything further develops. If you have any > ideas > please let me know. > Plutonius. > --------- Dear Plutonius, I have not had much time to fix this little problem. There is another consideration however. The abacus cannot calculate the year OBC or OAD. A zero of anything is nothing.It will be a non year. Two non years actually. Any date calculation in these transition years will simply not work. I fear the total collapse of world order. So it looks very much like we'll have to end the old era on 1BC and start the new era on 1AD, and not on 0AD as you suggest. This will mean of course, many plebians will think that a new millenium will start on 1st January 1000AD or 2000AD instead of 1st January 1001AD or 2001AD respectively. I dare say you and I can have a hearty laugh at this over a pint at the Nazareth Inn when we go to administer the census. Have you booked our room yet? Cassius. P.S. Some bright spark will probably end up putting the AD in front of the year digits to confuse matters even more.