Y2K wasn't a problem because we spent hundreds of thousands of hours
fixing programs that would have been the problem.
The real problem was discovered and fixed before the calendar rolled
over. Many, or most early programs did not have the ability to handle
the calendar roll over as they didn't have the ability to handle enough
digits. Remember many programs were written in languages to work with
old CPUs.
Even today many areas use customers use custom software when stock
spreadsheets and databases could do the job, including the medical
profession. That is why there are medical organizations as well as
companies still locked into Windows XP. Many of those custom programs
require rewriting to work on newer operating systems.
Some of those medical programs require they integrate with many other
programs as well as integrating across the internet to many other
sites. So after needing to work with numerous programs, they have to
provide security.
The custom programs have to be "fill-in-the-blanks) as many Drs and
Nurses do not know how to use stock spreadsheets and databases
I say this as I was a project manager that worked with laboratory
Information Information Systems (known as LIMS) that required FDA
validation which is far different than the validation for engineering
projects. That validation was a royal PITA that had to be proven for
"every" action of the system by FDA approved validation individuals and
teams. IOW, even with the knowledge we had to hire the validation.
In our case the validation consisted of a stack of operations that
formed a pile of steps that was a bit over an inch thick. Performing
those steps produced a stack that was over 4 feet tall.
So not only did the Y2K require fixing programs, but every program that
was used in the medical field also had to be FDA validated. I would
assume that tower certification/engineerring for government use might be
similar and require a very expensive procedure an expensive paper trail.
OTOH items sold to the government tend to be far more expensive than
those sold on the open market. If the government places a large enough
order, then it's logical the same price will be applied to individuals.
Otherwise the price would cut into the items sold to the government.
Hover if a government contract is not involved, a 3X, or even 2X price
increase4 would seriously decrease their sales.
The ACA program implementation violated the FDA and existing rules.
Every one of those programs was required to pass validation, but that
was skipped allowing for many program implementations to fail, or suffer
from bugs. Private industry would have sufferer great penalties if they
used programs.
Structured programming with flow charts minimizes bugs and side effects
73 Roger (K8RI)
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