Bundesbank council member warns of 2000 leap year problem

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-- Linkmeister (link@librarian.edu), September 13, 1999

Answers

Buba's Hartmann warns of 2000 leap year problem

11:33 a.m. Sep 13, 1999 Eastern

MUNICH, Sept 13 (Reuters) - Bundesbank council member Wendelin Hartmann said on Monday that the financial community may face a problem greater than the millennium bug once leap year 2000 arrives.

The year 2000 is not just a change of century for computers but it is also a leap year, in which an extra day is added to February giving the month 29 days.

The unusual combination of the century change and the leap year, which occurs simultaneously only once every 400 years could cause big technical problems for banks, Hartmann said.

``That will be a worse scenario than the Y2K story,'' he said at an international banking conference devoted to settlement and payment systems.

``That's the next big subject,'' he said.

The Year 2000 problem, also called Y2K or the millennium bug, refers to the inability of some older computers to recognise dates beyond the year 1999 because programmers once used only the last two digits to refer to years.

Hartmann said the Bundesbank will keep its Y2K emergency operations running into March of 2000 to deal with possible problems caused by the unusual calendar event.

Hartmann said the leap year 2000 anomaly could trigger problems in banks' interest payment calculations, databases and other computer- related functions.

(Frankfurt Newsroom +49 69 756525, frankfurt.newsroom+reuters.com))

Copyright 1999 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved.

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-- Linkmeister (link@librarian.edu), September 13, 1999.


Double, double, toil and trouble....just now getting it?

-- Shelia (Shelia@active-stream.com), September 13, 1999.

Actually, it isn't a problem if the programmer was using the simple rule of any number evenly divisable by four is a valid leap year...

-- Mad Monk (madmonk@hawaiian.net), September 13, 1999.

In keeping with my past tone, I'm going to go out on a limb and make a prediction.

February 29 problems will be minimal.

Tick... Tock... <:00=

-- Sysman (y2kboard@yahoo.com), September 13, 1999.


How is this leap yr only happening on a century change every 400 yrs as is stated? Am I wrong in thinking that 2000, 1980, 1960, 1940, 1920, and 1900 were all leap yrs? This would make leap yr falling every twenty yrs and every century change, right? Then why is there so much nonsense being raised about 1900, 1800, and 1700 having not been a leap yr?

A very confused lurker!!!!!

-- me (me@me.com), September 13, 1999.



me,

A leap year happens every 4 years, except at the turn of the century, except every 4th one. Got it? I have the official formula here somewhere, but I can't find it. I gotta clean up my hard drive! <:)=

-- Sysman (y2kboard@yahoo.com), September 13, 1999.


The earth rotate around the sun once in slightly more than 365.000 days x 24.000 hours. So to compensate, 1 extra day, February 29th is added every 4th year. But doing that for 25 x 4 years would be about 1 day too much every century. So to compensate every 100 years (1700, 1800, 1900) February 29th is not inserted in the calendar. But missing 1 day every century year for 400 years would be 1 day too much missing days. So every 400 years (1200, 1600, 2000) the February 29th is not missing : i.e., February 29th does occur.

-- Ron Sander (judy_sander@hotmail.com), September 13, 1999.

Me: every century-change date is NOT a leap year... EXCEPT when the date of the year is divisible by 400. Got it? -scott

-- Scott Johnson (scojo@yahoo.com), September 14, 1999.

Yep! I got it. Thanks for straightening me out, guys! :o)

me

-- me (me@me.com), September 14, 1999.


I have searched all the archives, and tried four different search engines, but I have been unable to find any examples of leap year in 1600, or non leap years in 1700, 1800 or 1900 causing any computers to malfunction in those years. ;-)

Malcolm

-- Malcolm Taylor (taylorm@es.co.nz), September 14, 1999.



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