# Y1.8K.

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/y1-8k/814987>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [May 28, 2018, 6:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/y1-8k/814987 "2018-05-28T18:48:13Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 3

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**Author:** ![Telemark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/telemark/32/372_2.png) [@Telemark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telemark)\
**Post date:** [June 3, 2018, 1:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/y1-8k/814987/41 "2018-06-03T01:31:34Z")

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> [@k9bfriender](#):
>
> A 64 bit counter only pushes the problem back, though. Somewhere around the year 3,000,000,000,000, we will just run into the same problem all over again.

It was discussed, but we slacked off and moved on.

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**Author:** ![edwardcoast](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/cab0a1/32.png) [@edwardcoast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/edwardcoast)\
**Post date:** [June 3, 2018, 3:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/y1-8k/814987/42 "2018-06-03T03:18:40Z")

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> [@Tim\_R.Mortiss](#):
>
> I studied programming way back in the seventies. Even then, we were taught not to use two digits for a year. We were taught to use [Julian Dates](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julian_day) to represent times, dates, and durations, which are number of days since an arbitrary date in pre-history. This makes any sort of Y2K issue irrelevant. I never had a single worry about Y2K because I assumed all programmers were taught this.

The other reason software developers didn’t worry about this while using two digits is because many of them didn’t believe with the technology advancements that their programming code written in the 1960s and 70s would still be in production in the year 2000. Because in those days, every time there was a new platform which usually included a new programming language too, conversions were a big deal so basically everything was re-written.

I do remember seeing programming code written in the 1970s which had a comment in it saying something like, “I wonder if this will still be in use in 2000?”. Well, it wasn’t because the entire mainframe was gone by then.

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**Author:** ![markn\_1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f9ae1b/32.png) [@markn\_1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/markn_1)\
**Post date:** [June 3, 2018, 3:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/y1-8k/814987/43 "2018-06-03T03:24:19Z")

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> [@k9bfriender](#):
>
> A 64 bit counter only pushes the problem back, though. Somewhere around the year 3,000,000,000,000, we will just run into the same problem all over again.

Now don’t try pushing that complacent crap around here. The 64-bit apocalypse happens in the year 584,542,044,120. Faulty reasoning like yours will cause us to think we have trillions of years to solve this problem when we really only have hundreds of billions.

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