[arg01]

The fix isn't particularly ridiculous. Updating an exisiting databases value from an 8 bit to 32 bit integer would have required quite possibly rebuilding the entire database and any software that was bound to getting an 8 bit integer as a return value (For example messages split by length rather than coupled with a label). Which might have been made harder because the hardware costs involved (say for the extra 20 hardrives to store the 20GB of data) would have been much higher than now. Much easier just to create another table that includes century and a foreign key pointing back to the database entry. Not great but it does the job and you can patch over what look like minor visual or selection errors as they pop up rather than dealing with every custom form that relies on the database throwing exceptions that stop workflow altogether.

As embarrassing as this headline is you can at least say the people who were supposed to get the communications did.

[jzwinck]

Most Y2K issues were not about 8 bits vs. 32 bits, but about storing years as two-character strings. Otherwise we might have seen problems in years like 2028 or 2156.

This story is proof that one cannot "patch over minor [...] errors as they pop up" as you say.