Since we are drifting back toward "unofficial", I thought I would
forward the note below, to the list. Unofficial, but useful.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
From:"William L. Hill" <hill(a)star-telegram.com>
To:jlewis@cafes.net
This is from a friend of mine in the Defense Department who has been
submitted to Congress for promotion to Brigadier General. He does not
command a brigade of soldiers, but only about two dozen Electronic PhDs
in uniform. The armed forces chief nerd. This worked on my Windows 95
setup.I hope it will help some of you. Here is the gist of his
instructions:
Most of the computers built in the past 5 years have BIOS chips
that will recognize the year 2000. Some software "time/dates"
certain files so the below "fix" will take care of possible problems.
Check your computer to insure the default is as follows:
fix for a small Y2K problem *almost* everyone should do...
After making this quick little check, much to my
surprise, I learned that all our computers would have
gone "off-date" at 00:00:00:01 hrs on 01/01/2000
because Microsoft "set us up" for a "clock glitch".
Fortunately, a quick fix is provided, should your
computer fail the check.
The Check -- for those using Win95, 98 & NT:
Double click on "My Computer".
Double click on "Control Panel".
Double click on "Regional settings" icon.
Click on the "Date" tab at the top of the page.
Where it says, "Short Date Sample", look and see if it
shows a "two digit" year. Unless you've previously changed
it -- it does. That's because Microsoft made the 2 digits
the default setting for Windows 95, Windows 98 and NT.
This date RIGHT HERE is the date that feeds *ALL*
application software and will not rollover into the
year 2000. It will roll over to the year 00. (*)
Click on the button across from "Short Date Style" and
select the option that shows, "mm/dd/yyyy" or "m/d/yyyy".
(Be sure your selection has four y's showing, not just two).
Then click on "Apply".
Then click on "OK" at the bottom.
Easy enough to fix. However, every "as distributed"
installation of Windows worldwide is defaulted to fail
Y2K rollover... Did the M/SoftHeads do it on purpose??
==========
(*) NOTE: Some application software would (naturally)
expect the year "00" to be the year "1900". Some of
those applications might function (seemingly) OK...
with merely the "day of the week" being "mis-interpreted":
UNTIL: 29 Feb, 2000 -- which the s/ware will think is:
01 Mar, 1900 -- because 1900 was NOT a Leap Year...
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++
--
Jess Lewis >>
http://www.cafes.net/jlewis/ <<