Y2KNews
11 January 2000 COMPUTERWEEK
The heroes of Y2k
By Judy Backhouse
The truly crazy headed for the hills with fortified bunkers and
ammunition. The more cautious bought water and tinned food. Even
the most optimistic drew some extra cash the week before. Everyone
speculated about the outcome.
But in the IT world, we worked. We checked code. We corrected
code. We tested code. We rolled dates forward and backward and
forward and backward until our nerves were paper-thin. We upgraded
hardware. We upgraded operating systems (to cope with the new
hardware). We upgraded compilers (to cope with the new operating
systems). We modified more code (to cope with the new compilers).
And then we began the cycle again of testing and rolling forward
and testing and rolling backward.
We initiated great, complex Y2k projects. We compiled project
plans. We filled in endless forms about the state of our Y2k
projects. We wrote monthly reports about the progress of the Y2k
projects. We went to meetings where we were told how the future of
the company depended on the Y2k project being completed in time.
We dealt with panicked business people. We soothed troubled nerves
at dinner parties. We were asked to predict the outcome by distant
cousins who knew we were "in IT". We became overnight experts in
the working of diesel generators, photocopiers, motor vehicles and
washing machines.
And, collectively, we averted the disaster. Like superman of old,
the IT professionals of today managed to intercept nothing less
than the end of the world. In an industry where projects run
notoriously over the most pessimistic time estimates, we met the
deadline. The clocks ticked over to the year 2000 with nothing
more than minor hitches.
And were they grateful? Did the world thank us and laud us as the
heroes we quite clearly were? No! They turned around and called it
"all hype". They questioned the money spent. We did our jobs so
damned well that the only question remaining was whether there had
been any need to do the job at all.
So, to all those IT people out there who slaved away at the Y2k
problems over the past few years, who endured the pressure of
fearful but helpless managers; who lost endless sleep testing
things at night because there wasn't a separate test machine; who
canceled their December leave; who couldn't be in exotic places
to welcome the start of the new millennium; who stayed sober on
New Year's eve because they were on standby; who went to work on
the 1st and the 2nd to boot up the machines - I say put your feet
up, pat yourselves and each other on the back and go and get some
much needed sleep with a smug smile on your face. We did it.
The IT people across the planet are heroes - even if unsung ones.
Like housework, what we do is not appreciated unless we don't do
it. But like the housewives of old we go on doing it, knowing that
it is good, honest, necessary work - and that it gives us
inordinate power. So, my fellow programmers, system
administrators, database administrators, operators, analysts and
support staff - congratulations on a job well done. Ours may be
the youngest profession on the planet, but this 21st century
belongs to us.
Judy Backhouse is an IT professional who does freelance writing in
her free time.
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