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appeared 18 February 1999
First UCSF Y2K Milestone Is March 19
Will the sky fall once we reach the year 2000, as some Chicken
Littles have predicted?
Probably not, although there may be some thunder and lightning in the silicon skies.
To avert the potential disaster being forecast from the Year 2000 bug (Y2K), systems administrators
and programmers from companies and institutions around the world are busily identifying
which of their systems have the bug and then fixing or replacing them.
(In a nutshell: the Y2K bug consists of many problems, the primary one being that many
computer programs were written to keep track of dates by using only the last two digits to
represent the year, and so their systems will perceive the year 2000 as the year 1900.)
In order to minimize potential problems on campus, UCSF has been working for several years
on making the campuswide "mission-critical" systems Y2K compliant. The majority
of these systems are already compliant, according to Chancellor Michael Bishop, who will
soon be issuing a letter to systems administrators and others outlining what work remains
to be done.
Although the recently established UCSF Y2K Task Force is working on completing all other
campuswide "mission-critical" systems projects, it's up to individual
departments to address any Y2K issues that might arise within their own organizations.
To facilitate this process, a UCSF Y2K Office has been established that acts as a
clearinghouse of Y2K information and procedures. The number to reach the office is
514-2000 (4-2000) and the email address is y2kinfo@its.ucsf.edu.
A UCSF Y2K website has been created to address the
particular needs of the campus. The site includes answers to common questions and an
update on the campus' Y2K status, as well as a schedule for training sessions.
"Every department is responsible to ensure that the equipment and software they
depend on is either free of these problems or affected in ways that are known and
acceptable," according to Bishop. In his letter to UCSF systems administrators,
Bishop will also highlight the five steps campus departments need to take to ensure Y2K
compliance and assured systems administrators and other key personnel that they will have
all the support they need to get through the next year safely.
The first step is to inventory all assets with potential problems. The milestone date for
completing this initial inventory of all potentially affected departmental
"mission-critical" assets is March 19, according to the UCSF Y2K Office, which
has made the process easier by providing Excel spreadsheets that list the
major types of risk and facilitate the assessment of departmental risk.
The four remaining steps are:
2. Research what needs to be done for each asset;
3. fix or replace the affected equipment or software as appropriate;
4. test;
5. make contingency plans in the event of failure of your important systems.
Links:
UCSF Year 2000 website
Y2K training sessions
Squashing the Millennium Bug
(previous Daybreak article)
UCOP Year 2000 website
Beating the Year 2000 Problem (UCOP)
Year 2000 links
Source: Paula Murphy, Daybreak editor |
