On Wed, 7 Apr 1999, Steve Patt wrote:
> Keith noted about DateTypes:
>
> >It's clearly stored as a 7-bit value, meaning that it
> >can contain anything from 0 to 127 (hmmm...unsigned?). That means it can
> >represent the years from 1904 to 2031.
>
> Which is, of course, not a Y2K bug but a Y2031 bug. For all the things
> Palm engineers did right, designing an operating system in 1996 (or
> thereabouts) with a 35 year life span was, IMHO, unconscionable.
actually... considering the space limitations of the Palm Pilot..
why is this a problem?
do you really think the Palm Pilot will still be operational in
2031? i dont use my XT anymore.. something better is here.. i
assume that the same will happen with the Palm Pilot.
the designers probably wanted to use as little space as possible.
i am sure my Palm III will be of no use in 2000. 2Mb is not enough,
and i am not going to pay for the memory upgrade - so i will
buy another one.
i am sure that when 3COM releases a new Palm Pilot in 2031, it
will have an updated ROM so it will be able to handle the dates
outside the current limitations.
wont you be buying that? maybe it will have a 16bit LCD screen,
brain probes etc.. the old Palm III will mean nothing then.
just my 2c.
maybe now however it should be taken note that one day there
may need to be a change in the way in which we develop software.
the whole problem with Y2K is that people got used to the
two digit representation..
it is up to the programmers NOW to make sure this does not
happen with the palm pilot.
cheers.
az.
--
Aaron Ardiri
Lecturer http://www.hig.se/~ardiri/
University-College i G�vle mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
SE 801 76 G�vle SWEDEN
Tel: +46 26 64 87 38 Fax: +46 26 64 87 88
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