Xdaliclock Fails Y2k (But Everything Else Seems Fine)

Tracy R Reed writes "Like any real geek I was near my computer and used the xntpd-synchronized time to determine when midnight really struck. As soon as it happened, xdaliclock did something strange!" Besides the terrifying xdaliclock crisis, 2600 had a great page up that seemed to fool quite a number of Slashdot readers. Several other joke websites popped up, and several others had real (minor) glitches. So far I've heard rumors of an ATM system that went down for a few minutes, and some radiation monitors that messed up for a bit. But apparently that was about it. The most overhyped event in years. Enjoy the day off if you get one!

Comments

Best Y2K tracking sites

[jedinite]

Despite the fact that these reside at MSNBC, here are the two sites I've found most usefull in watching and tracking this non-event

Y2K World Dispatches

Y2K Security Tracker

One of my favorites from the World Dispatches was:

LONDON, Jan. 1 -- One of the few Y2K alerts in England was a boy who cut the cables to his PC because he thought bugs were trying to crawl in.

---------
Question: How do I leverage the power of the internet?

For Those of Us that Had to Work Dec 31...

[Diamond Slicer]

For those of us that had to work Dec 31, y2k is real.

In the sense that:
All phones now forward to bosses office.
For somewierd reason random computers had thier bios changed to longer recognize the hard drive.
You now have the best chair in the office.
Various settings on computers are screwed up.
You have uninstalled solitare on bosses computer (going to enjoy him debating wether to ask tech to reinstall just so he play game and look like a fool or just sit there)
Quake III is now what loads if you click on any shortcut (in WinNT)
The clocks are all an hour slow.
People have random meetings scheduled in there planners that they left on the desks.
Backgrounds on monitors show the boss and his secretery... involved in a rare act that his wife would kill to find out.

So bosses out there... the lowly computer programmers you made work Dec 31 - New Years Day... Have gotten thier revenge... muahahhahahhaha
(currently figuring out to change building security code)

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[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

2600 Weirdness

[ka9dgx]

Here's what it looked like at 2600 earlier:

Internal Server Error
The date specified (01-01-1900) is impossible. If you have forced this
error condition, you may be in violation of state, federal, and/or civil
laws. Those outside the United States should check with their respective
governments concerning their country's extradition treaty. Dissemination
of this error is also strictly prohibited.

If you believe you have received this message in error, please reload
the page and try again.

Pretty odd, eh?

--Mike--

A summary . .

[Money__]

I've saved a few pages with date glitches and thought I would post them here for all interested. This has got to be one of the most overhyped non-stories in a long time.
With false american pride I ask . . .Who do I sue? ;)

Here we go:

From the Auckland International Airport Limited we have this little date jem:
Y2K Update
Dated 02:58 1 Jan 100
Auckland Airport Confirms Business as Usual

From the bury-your-head-in-the-sand-till-it-goes-away dept., we have this one from audiusa.com
Sorry, we have temporarily disabled this module. "While Audiusa.com is fully prepared for Y2K and beyond, we wanted to keep our databases clear of the millennium madness everyone seems to be talking about.

From www.tvtoday.de/tv we have this little assending date snafu jem:
Samstag, 01.01.100

Then from the people at pleaseread.com we have another assending date from hell:
Saturday, January 01, 19100
Award-winning text-to-speech software applications utilizing
the best technologies in the world.
(Editors note: Best technology? they can't count to 99 ;)

And from the make-it-stop-make-it-stop dept.
we find AllAdvantage.com thinks the best way to comply is to not partisipate:
Happy Y2K from AllAdvantage.com!
As a precautionary measure, we've disconnected our servers from the Internet and are watching the millennial date change from the sidelines.

Most of these small errors (19100) are caused by one small piece (printf("19%d", tm->tm_year);) of sloppy code (as previously posted on /.). While these little didbits make for a good laugh, I'm happy to see that non of them add up to the 'show stopper' everyone has been hyping. Happy New Year!
_________________________

Countdown error

[OrigamiSlayer]

Anyone else notice the countdown error during the ball drop in times Square? As they started counting down minutes and seconds, it would display 15:01, 14:00, 14:59. It did this all the way to midnight. And Sam Donaldson said nothing was wrong.

peace and quiet

[redtoade]

I'm kind of offended at the tons of posts saying:
"NOTHING HAPPENED!!! See, I told you so."

I'm sure all the IT and CompSCI people out there weren't really worried about any Y2K stuff... but we control systems engineers (level 1 production types) were terrified of it.

Anxious as we were, we tried to get management to fund an inspection of all systems... and since management is usually made up of non-geek types, there was no way to squeeze a penny out of them for what they felt was unneeded computer work.

BUT, thank God for all of the Y2K hype!!! If management hadn't seen Dan Rather explaining (in small terms) what the possibilities for Y2K were, we wouldn't have received time and funding to inspect our systems.

So after 7 or 8 of my clients found 85% of their systems to NOT function after a clock change to Y2K, we spent MILLIONS of dollars this year to fix them PRIOR to the actual event. These weren't Intel based processors mind you... these were Programmable Logic Controllers (PLCs) and older Distributed Control Systems (DCSs), some even based on Z80 and 8080 technology. The industrial/manufacturing world is still decades behind in it's control systems... so while you guys are lounging in your linux alphas... we're still doing machine code.

I guess what I'm saying is Y2K was VERY REAL for us... and you can thank the thousands of engineers, technicians and programmers who fixed the problems BEFORE THEY HAPPENED for a very quiet new year's eve.

Happy New Year everyone.