[HN Gopher] Y2K20 Parking Meter Software Glitch Causes Citywide ... ___________________________________________________________________ Y2K20 Parking Meter Software Glitch Causes Citywide Snafu Author : lelf Score : 41 points Date : 2020-01-04 11:46 UTC (11 hours ago) (HTM) web link (gothamist.com) (TXT) w3m dump (gothamist.com) | iforgotpassword wrote: | It should be sufficient if we hot-patch the end date to 2030 - | we'll surely have updated or replaced those systems until then. | | I'm curious what part of the system even required specifically | coding an end date, and not just sanity checks relative to the | current date. | officialchicken wrote: | > I'm curious what part of the system even required | specifically coding an end date, and not just sanity checks | relative to the current date. | | It's working as designed... liability and support was shifted | to the owners (cities) prior to the event. | jiveturkey wrote: | my unsubstantiated guess is that this is a licensing scheme. | | reminds me of the parking garage in hoboken that wouldn't pay | for a new software license. omg was that over a decade ago? i'm | getting old. | | https://www.govtech.com/magazines/gt/Robot-Garage-Hijacks-Ca... | nottorp wrote: | I'm sure that's what they also thought in 1981 when storing | only 2 digits of the year and we all know how that turned out. | coin wrote: | > Y2K20 | | It's 2020. Why use a cryptic abbreviation with _more_ characters? | If they want to use the SI "k" prefix shouldn't it be Y2.02k? | M4v3R wrote: | It's probably just a play on the original "Y2K" name for the | problems in year 2000. | glenngillen wrote: | Might also be actually related to the same problem: https://t | witter.com/jef_poskanzer/status/1213258774938415104... | analog31 wrote: | Perhaps it's a reference to a standard for labeling electronic | components. For instance a resistor with 3300 Ohms will be | labeled "3k3" on a diagram. It eliminates the decimal point, | which might be hard to read or even fall off if it's printed on | a tiny component. | a1369209993 wrote: | That would be "2K02". It's actually a (bad) abbreviation of | "two[2] thousand[K] twenty[20]". | mickotron wrote: | We had to do an emergency patch to the config of a well-known | data analytics platform, because their regex to identify/extract | 2 digit years did not cater for anything beyond 2019... We dodged | that bullet, but shows a lack of foresight by said company. Lucky | we don't have much data that has 2 digit year dates. | megaframe wrote: | This is so funny I just had a similar bug yesterday and named it | our y2k20 bug, just a path name change that someone forgot to map | correctly | ChuckMcM wrote: | One of a number of errors that are showing up. My favorite are | the websites that regex the '20' out of the year to get just the | decade, "Whoops!" | | In many ways I'm glad we didn't bother to fix the bugs this year | like we did for the 1999 - 2000 transition. Way too many people | think that Y2K was just some big 'scare tactic' and nothing ever | happened. It is sad that operations is always like that, you work | your arse off things operate smoothly and the unknowing just say | "I don't see what the big deal was all about." | Unsimplified wrote: | Reliability work is unfortunately under-observed and under- | valued... until its absence triggers an incident. | mxuribe wrote: | I have no experience with parking meters, but surprising that | software updates need to be done at the site/hardware (as opposed | to, say, online or "over the air" or updates). | mannykannot wrote: | If we can judge the vendor's competence from the problem | reported here, then if they had made them updatable wirelessly, | they would likely be easily hacked. | Jamwinner wrote: | Easier to secure and administer I would guess. More and more | orgs are realizing that IOT admin is a bigger burden than a | liberator to those who are responsible for upkeep. | alias_neo wrote: | Who wants to bet that is not a numeric bug, but a certificate | expiry? ___________________________________________________________________ (page generated 2020-01-04 23:01 UTC)