HOUSTON — If you are old enough, you probably remember the Y2K hoopla. But if not, here’s a quick refresher.
When we were preparing for the new millennium to arrive, there was a lot of concern that computer systems around the world would go down when the clock struck midnight. Basically, some systems had the year listed as two numbers, so when we hit the year 2000, those computers would think it was 1900. Called the year 2000 problem, it became known simply as Y2K.
As news stories spread some people prepared for the worst, stockpiling food and a survival gear. But in the end, the problem was fixed. Businesses and governments created IT teams to ensure all hardware and software was updated before the big day. While the digital apocalypse never happened, it was a real threat and a lot of hard work was put into fixing it.
But it turns out there is another date issue out there. Called the year 2038 problem, experts predict on March 19, 2038, some computers won’t be able to store and process the date.
It’s pretty complicated, but again comes down to how millions of systems store and calculate dates and times. Experts warn things that could be affected include databases, embedded devices like medical devices, and operating systems for our cell phones.
When it comes to the fix, it will once again fall to IT to fix the bug before the clock runs out.