Port80 ThreadMonitor

According to readwriteweb.com, there is a bug in all unix software, similar to the Y2K bug in Windows, that could cause the internet to crash on a worldwide scale.

This bug exists because unix systems store the time as a 32-bit integer in seconds since January 1, 1970. There is a limit to how many seconds can be counted with a 32-bit binary number system. That limit just happens to wind up being the year 2038.

 

“Programs will fail, of course. Since they will see times not as being in 2038 but rather in 1901, erroneous calculations and decisions will occur. (It’s true, I checked Wikipedia!)” - Sarah Perez, readwriteweb.com

Sarah Perez of readwriteweb.com seems convinced and offers a few examples:

“We’ve actually seen fallout from the 2038 bug already, back in May of 2006 when the AOLserver web server software crashed. The software was designed so that database requests would “never” time out. Instead of assigning a “0″ to the timeout, the software specified a timeout date one billion seconds in the future. One billion seconds (just over 31 years 251 days and 12 hours) after 21:27:28 on 12 May 2006 is beyond the 2038 cutoff date. The system calculated a timeout date that was actually in the past, got confused, and crashed.” - readwriteweb.com

Her article has links to more 2038 bug evidence.

 

A reference by wikipedia:

“In May 2006, reports surfaced of an early Y2038 problem in the AOLserver software. The software would specify that a database request should “never” time out by specifying a timeout date one billion seconds in the future. One billion seconds (just over 31 years 251 days and 12 hours) after 21:27:28 on 12 May 2006 is beyond the 2038 cutoff date, so after this date, the timeout calculation overflowed and calculated a timeout date that was actually in the past, causing the software to crash.[2][3]” - wikipedia.com

 

Hmm, thirty years from now? No sweat, plenty of time.

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