🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <E5yKMC.8BA@world.std.com>, Joseph H Allen
<jhallen@world.std.com> writes
>SNIP
>  It's amusing to note that on
>top of everything else, EDI has the year-2000 bug built-in.
>
>HUGE SNIP

Edifact has the capability of specifying an 8 char date by the use of a
date format qualifier (102 in the 91.2 directory, haven't checked the
others yet), but, generally speaking, 6 char date fields are widely
used.

Even if an 8 char date is received, if the application can't handle it
the you're still stuck.

For info, the ANA has just published an algorithm that may help, it goes
as follows:

Subtract the last 2 digits of today's date (X1X2) from the date under
scrutiny (N2N2). As the last two digits of both dates can vary from 00
to 99 over the course of a century, the result can vary from -99 to +99.

The following table shows how to interprete the result.

-99 to -51              -50 to +50              +51 to +99

N1N2 is in the          N1N2 is in the          N1N2 is in the
NEXT century            CURRENT century         PREVIOUS century

This works for any dates from 49 before to 50 years after the current
year.

Of course, if you have to track dates over a very wide span (eg.
Insurance industry) then you'll still have problems.

Have a nice millennium.
-- 
jab