Year 2000 Windowing Techniques
Abstract
The DoD Year 2000 Management Plan provided options including windowing for agencies to fix systems affected by year 2000 anomalies. The DoD conversion period for making systems year 2000 compliant ended in March 2000 with few year 2000 failures experienced. The technique of windowing retains a two digit year to fix year 2000 problems by using a range measure in 100-year increments (100-year window) to convert data to the correct century. For example, a two digit date ending in 50 through 99 would be interpreted by the system as l9XX and a date ending in 00 through 49 would be interpreted as 20XX. When managers of information systems use windowing, they must document and communicate their windowing techniques to all interfacing systems. Otherwise, the use of different windowing techniques by interface partners increases the risk of future system failure due to misinterpretation of the correct century when transmitting and receiving data. Our overall objective was to determine the extent to which windowing techniques were used to remedy year 2000 processing issues. Specifically, we reviewed interfacing agreements and other documentation to determine whether managers using windowing disclosed the technique used to interface partners.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Sep 22, 2000
- Accession Number
- ADA382777
Entities
People
- Lisa E. Novis
- Mary L. Ugone
- Raymond A. Spencer
- Thomas F. Gimble
- Thomas S. Bartoszek
Organizations
- Office of the Inspector General, U.S. Department of Defense