ASE Y2K Compliance Information Anchor Page
Guidance in determining Y2K Compliance state of ASE products

To comment or request assistance, please email us. Last Updated: 01:07 TUE 10th Jul 2001 GMT
Links to: ASE home page and the SUPPORT section of the ASE web site

A quick summary by product edition...

Recent Y2K-related support events

• 31 Dec 2000: APAR ASZ3194 ABS0C4 in OMCSDBBU
  Abend S0C4 when converting a TOD clock value for date 001231 into a character string.
  ASZ3194 is SUPd by PTF ASP0898
  (Note that by 1993 OMCSDBBU had been superseded by OMCSDBEX as the recommended backup program for OMCS database files, so it's most unlikely that your installation encountered this problem.)
  
  
• 07 Feb 2000: APAR ASZ3133 in AMF reporting
  MSG OMCEC046I ... INVALID DATE EXPRESSION when AMF history records contain invalid data
  ASZ3133 is SUPd by PTF ASP0857
  
  
• 6 Jan 2000: OMCS question: why does &DATE(..) give the wrong day-of-week with 2-digit years?
  The ECL built-in function &DATE(..) accepts 2- or 4- digit years. When 2-digit years are used it assumes 19yy. Y2K remediation of &DATE(..) was limited to providing support for 4-digit year date formats. Programmers can use their own windowing code to convert to 4-digit year format like..
  
  
  • SET YY=&SS(&YYMMDD,1,2)
    IF# &YY<(80,100)
    SET YYYYMMDD=(20&YYMMDD,19&YYMMDD)
    SET DAYOFWEK=&SS(&DATE(&YYYYMMDD),10,3)
  
  
• 1 Jan 2000: OMCS question: Why don't I see December's jobs in the job selection list?
  If you use explicit dates in not before ===> then to see output captured in a year other than this year you must say which year. eg ===> 29dec99 or ===> 19991229
  Most of the time people specify not before ===> -3, to see jobs for the last three days, for example, and so they just never notice this.
  
  
• 17 Dec 1999: PTF ASP0843 for OMCS 2.0.1 - JSF only
  Read the cover letter for this Y2K-related PTF
  
  
• 06 Nov 1999: Y2K compliance statements in Install Buckets.
  Install Buckets contain the latest installation and maintenance information for each product. Applicable PTFs and APAR fixes are listed in order of availability. ASE now includes, after the last sysmod required to maintain Y2K compliance, a specific Y2K Compliance statement.
  
  
• 31 Oct 1999: High-Availability of staff at year end
  High-level ASE technical staff will be on site ready to handle technical support calls during the following important Y2K transition times (Note that times are GMT):
  
  2300 hrs Thu 30th Dec 1999 -> 2300 hrs Tue 4th Jan 2000 (120 hrs)
  2300 hrs Sun 27th Feb 2000 -> 2300 hrs Wed 1st Mar 2000 (72 hrs)
  
  
• 18 Oct 1999: PTF ASP0827 for OMCS 2.0.1
  Read the cover letter for this Y2K-related PTF
  
  
• 07 Sep 1999: PTF ASP0828 for OMCS 2.0.1
  Read the Cover Letter for this Y2K-related PTF
  
  
• Oct 1999: Creation of a SUPPORT section of the ASE web site.
  All customers can now have 24 hour access to all general availability support material.
  
  A Y2K Compliance Statement is located within the Install Bucket for each installable level of each product. Each install bucket is dynamically updated as new PTFs and APAR fixes become available. If any maintenance affects Y2K compliance then the Y2K Compliance Statement is automatically adjusted to reflect this.
  
  
• 06 Mar 1999: Add caveats to the ASE Y2K Compliance definition
  The following caveat has been added to our working definition of 'Y2K Compliance' to emphasise that under the terms of our licence agreements licensees (ie. customers) take responsibility for ensuring that the software they have selected meets their requirements. Our actions toward making selected ASE software products Y2K Compliant must not be seen as an absolute guarantee of defect-free operation.
  
  
  • In ASE's opinion, it is not possible to give an absolute guarantee that software will be defect free under all possible conditions and, by extension, it is not possible to guarantee that our Y2K compliance efforts will be defect free under all possible conditions.
    
    
  • We do state that we have, to the best of our abilities, examined, and where necessary modified, all currently supported ASE products such that each product will satisfy our definition of Y2K compliance.
    
    
  • We do state that we have conducted extensive testing of all currently supported ASE products to establish to the best of our abilities, that these products are Y2K compliant.
    
    
  • We do state that we will do all within our power to correct any deficiency or error within any currently supported ASE product that would impact the Y2K compliant status of that product as a matter of the highest priority.
  
  
• Feb 1999: 3rd Y2K-compliant Service Refresh cut for OMCS.
  This service refresh supersedes 1998232/1998233

  reworkid_	date_cut_	for_customers_using
  1999047	1999/02/16	Code Set A
  1999048	1999/02/17	Code Set B

  
  
• 28 Jan 1999: ASE business process Y2K compliance work completed
  All work required to bring ASE internal business processes to Y2K compliance now complete.
  
  
• Aug 1998: 2nd Y2K-compliant Service Refresh cut for OMCS.
  This service refresh supersedes 1998070/1998071

  reworkid_	date_cut_	for_customers_using
  1998233	1998/08/21	Code Set A
  1998232	1998/08/20	Code Set B

  
  
• May 1998: ASE internal systems Y2K compliance evaluation
  The company surveyed all internal business operations to identify Y2K compliance deficits in any hardware, software, document or process. A schedule of replacements, upgrades and work-arounds was developed. This work was to be complete by Dec 21 1998.
  
  
• Mar 1998: 1st Y2K-compliant Service Refresh cut for OMCS.
  This service refresh simplifies the task of sites who may be unsure of the state of their OMCS SMP/E installation or who may be faced with obtaining and applying a large number of prereqs.

  reworkid_	date_cut_	for_customers_using
  1998070	1998/03/11	Code Set A
  1998071	1998/03/12	Code Set B

  
  
• Nov 1997: Y2K compliance changes completed for LTXF, ISPZIP and OMCS
  Y2K compliance was initially made available to licensees of these products by means of PTFs supplied under the terms of normal support arrangements. For OMCS customers, lists of required PTFs and a description of control control file changes made to achieve Y2K compliance were published in Technical Bulletin TB97-0004
  
  
• Aug 1997: Y2K compliance deficits analysis for ASE products
  All supported products were analysed to determine if they were compliant or not. Detailed descriptions of deficits and their underlying causes were made.
  A decision was made that software for which ASE issues, on or before 1st November 1997, a "Notice of Intention to Withdraw Support", will not be made Y2K compliant. In each case the affected software had already been superseded by a new product.
  
  
• Jul 1997: Develop a working definition of "Y2K Compliant"
  We surveyed literature from IBM especially and also from a number of national and international standards organisations before deciding upon the wording of our own Y2K Compliance criteria:
  
  
  • The sofware will operate correctly insofar as it processes or depends upon the recognition of dates within the 20th and 21st centuries. Such processing includes, but is not limited to: ordering of items in date sequence, calculation of elapsed time intervals, recognition that particular dates and times are in the past, the present or the future and correct interpretation in context of dates which do not have a 4 digit year.

End of ASE Y2K Compliance Information Anchor Page