Racing the clock

By Ross Kerber, Globe Staff, 01/31/99

o far, Colleen Breitbord's Y2K stockpile includes extra flashlights and bulk macaroni packages. She's also in the market for a wood-burning stove in case, as some fear, blackouts keep her furnace from running on Jan. 1, 2000.

All this has brought some ribbing from neighbors more sanguine about the next new year.

''I used to consider her sensible!'' said James Bennett, a finance professor at the University of Massachusetts at Boston who lives next door to Breitbord in Framingham. When Breitbord offered to buy his pile of firewood recently, Bennett declined, but pledged to share if their lights go out. ''Maybe we'll be over there on New Year's Day, toasting marshmallows,'' he said.

Whose expectation proves more accurate 11 months from now, Bennett's or Breitbord's, will depend on work now underway by an army of computer programmers and systems managers around the region. Their labors will determine whether computerized devices that run everything from power grid substations to celluar phones and traffic lights operate normally next year.

The so-called millennium bug problem can be described simply, but solutions for avoiding computer breakdowns are complex. Essentially, the turnover from 1999 to 2000 may confuse software that uses the last two digits of each year to keep track of the date. That means some systems might interpret next year's ''OO'' as the year 1900, causing them to malfunction or shut down.

The glitch is fixable, but only if technicians find problems in time. Organizations are spending hundreds

of millions of dollars to check the codes and chips that run everything from water-system computers to bank machines.

A Globe survey of large institutions around New England suggests many have made progress tackling the problem. AT&T Corp. says it already has prepared systems considered ''mission-critical'' - meaning those needed to keep its main product, long-distance service, available after the date change. Gillette Co. says it has finished 90 percent of its basic work.

Banks like Fleet Financial Group Inc. and State Street Corp. plan to have their crucial software updated by mid-year. Also, just in case problems arise next New Year's Eve, both banks have already reserved blocks of downtown hotel rooms to keep technical staffers nearby. State Street manager Scott Wellington has apologized in advance to employees for imposing the holiday overtime but said the bank will host parties to maintain morale. ''They'll be non-alcoholic, of course,'' he added.

A few firms like BankBoston Corp. declined to quantify their progress, worrying that such disclosures could expose them to liability if their assessments prove incorrect. Other repondents to the Globe survey, often mid-sized organizations with less money to pay for speedy Y2K reviews, are lagging. The Massachusetts Municipal Wholesale Electric Co., for example, which provides power to 34 small communities, won't complete its reviews until Sept. 1.

Still, even if the bulk of Y2K work lies ahead, public officials appear comfortable with the preparations of critical service providers.

''I'm most worried about things like a storm or a localized power outage on Jan. 1, things we can't control,'' said Val Asbedian, a state information technology officer.

Asbedian has attended meetings at which other planners have discussed the possibility of calling out National Guard units to help keep order at the end of the year, a step several states are formally considering. But Asbedian said Massachusetts officials see no role for troops yet. ''It's something we've talked about; it's part of a normal planning process,'' he said. ''Frankly, if we activated them, I don't know what they would do.''

As recently as last month, much public discussion of Y2K focused on gloomy talk of power blackouts and other disruptions that would send the economy into recession or worse. Utility and banking regulators began pressuring those industries to be more forthcoming about their Y2K preparations.

The attention seems to have accelerated remediation efforts. Earlier this month, Boston Edison and Northeast Utilities said they would miss a June 30 industry deadline for the Y2K fixes. But both have advanced their completion schedules, following concerns raised by US Energy Secretary Bill Richardson. Edison now says a software supplier will complete its work earlier. Northeast Utilities declined to discuss the change.

At a technical level, the painstaking reviews of millions of lines of computer code fall to specialists like David Chang, vice president at Primeon Inc. in Burlington. A software engineer himself, Chang supervises Primeon employees who have audited programs for about 50 banks and other financial services firms. He terms the process ''mathematical and intuitive.''

''You cannot just read the code, you have to follow the logic'' of the program, Chang said. ''You could read every line of code every day and still you won't find what might go wrong. You have to look at the whole'' of the program.

For example, one Primeon employee reviewing an insurance-company program found it recorded dates as groups of two digits representing month, date and year. But the program could also read the date in a different order: year, date and month. While meant as a shortcut, the feature could result in the shutdown of the company's billing system on either Jan. 1, 2000 or on Jan. 1, 2001. Primeon is still working on the problem.

''Any professional can find most of the problems when you look at the codes,'' Chang says. ''But the last 5 percent are the code problems that are very idiosyncratic.''

At the other end of the spectrum are the Y2K reviews of basic devices like the digital clocks that control most of the 10,000 traffic lights in Massachusetts.

Most should work fine come Jan. 1, according to distributors like Ocean State Signal Co. of Smithfield, R.I. The clocks used in the firm's traffic lights track only the time and day of the week. That enables the signals to switch from their green-yellow-red sequence to flashing modes on nights and weekends.

But as is often the problem with so-called ''embedded systems,'' agencies like the Massachusetts Highway Department lacked records to see whether every traffic light operated the same way. So last fall the agency sent engineers to open up the control cabinets for each of the 1,052 signals it maintains. Along with several rat nests, they found 32 different control mechanisms from manufacturers who couldn't be located or are no longer in business. With no one to vouch for those lights, they will be replaced.

''I think we're playing it safe,'' said Russ Grant, an information officer for the agency. It expects to spend $7 million on such fixes and on upgrading its central computers. The MBTA expects to spend as much as $15 million.

Private-sector outlays dwarf those figures. Bell Atlantic will spend as much as $550 million by Jan. 1; Raytheon Co. expects to spend about $180 million. Planners say Y2K-related uncertainties justify the costs. Even a brief disruption can cause staggering losses. A two-week strike against United Parcel Service in the summer of 1997 hit many sectors of the economy and resulted in an estimated $2.5 billion in lost wages and salaries.

Even with massive expenditures, most large organizations say there are no guarantees against Y2K breakdowns, mainly because they rely on many smaller suppliers and vendors, each of which must also solve their own Y2K problems.

''We depend on other people,'' said Selena Morris, a spokeswoman for Merrill Lynch & Co.

The lack of assurances troubles consumers like Breitbord, the Framingham resident. She worries how the date change will affect firms she does business with, among them BankBoston and New England Electric. ''I depend on them on a daily basis and yet these things are utterly out of my control,'' she said.

Breitbord goes out of her way to speak with friends about how they might prepare for Y2K disruptions. More formal citizen groups have met in Lowell and other communities to discuss potential problems.

Christopher Mogil, who runs a nonprofit philanthropic group and has organized Y2K meetings in Arlington, said he sees a silver lining in the talk of disaster: the threat will encourage neighbors to get to know each other.

''We're going to need to count on the people around us,'' Mogil says. ''Even if we have the foresight to stock up on generators and it turns out we need them, there won't be enough to go around and people will be coming to visit. So let's get to know each other now.''

Ultimately, what happens may depend on thousands of unsung officials such as Mark Brewer, deputy executive director of the agency that operates T.F. Green airport in Warwick, R.I.

Brewer's task is to oversee the airport's new terminal building and make sure all its systems function together after the date change. He has letters from makers of elevators and fire alarms assuring him the equipment will run as designed.

The letters have not eased his concerns. He said tests have found that ''when you roll the date forward on the fire alarm system and pull the lever, yes it rings. When you push the elevator button, yes it works. But tie the two together, and sometimes they're finding it doesn't work.''

Such is the plight of every organization trying to contain the Y2K bug: There are no quick solutions.

Brewer has already ordered more tests. ''Last week I would have said we're well on our way,'' he said. ''We're still well on our way, but now I recognize there is a new dimension we have to address.''