| Microsoft Year 2000 Readiness Disclosure
& Resource Center |
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| Preparing Office Solutions for the Year
2000 |
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Operating
System and BIOS Issues
The
system that your application runs on is comprised of a computer and
operating system. You must take steps to ensure that there are no
Year 2000 issues in this area before starting with the Access
application itself.
The BIOS
The
original IBM PC was designed back in 1984. The core problem is that
many older personal computers have BIOS systems that won't correctly
interpret the change of the century. On these older systems, the
real-time clock implemented in CMOS (that battery maintained memory
chip that keeps all your BIOS settings, including the date) only has
two digits to store the year in.
This
problem manifests itself as follows: when the year 2000 rolls
around, the clock resets itself to the year 1900. When this happens,
the BIOS interprets the year as invalid, and sets the system clock
to March 1st, 1980, which is the first valid date as far as the BIOS
is concerned.
Modern
personal computers do not have this problem because the BIOS code
applies a "windowing" technique that allows the computer to
correctly assume the century.
So how
do you determine which machines are affected by this "old BIOS"
problem? You can easily check your machine because the steps are
fairly simple.
Warning Setting the clock forward on
your computer may seem to be a harmless action, but it can have
disastrous effects if you aren't aware of all the issues. When
setting the clock forward, even for a brief time, be sure to take
the following into account:
- Beta software usually times out after a certain date. The same
holds for trial software and license-dated software.
- If your clock is set ahead, will your email/newsgroup software
send messages with the incorrect date and time? This can wreak
havoc on your recipient's inbox.
To check your machine (only after heeding the above
warning):
- Close all running programs.
- Use the DOS DATE command to set your date to 12/31/1999.
- Use the DOS Time command to set your time to 11:58:00 PM.
- Wait a few minutes until the clock rolls over to 01/01/2000.
- Check your date and time settings. You should see 01/01/2000.
If not, your BIOS needs to be updated.
- Shut down Windows and turn your computer off.
- Wait a few minutes and turn your computer back on and boot to
a DOS prompt.
- Check the date and time settings. You should see 01/01/2000.
If not, your BIOS need to be updated.
There
are several BIOS checking programs available also. For more
information consult the Year 2000 resource center (http://www.microsoft.com/technet/year2k/tools/tools.htm).
Control Panel Date Settings
The
Windows Control Panel exposes a number of settings under the heading
of "Regional Settings". These settings allow you to customize the
default date and time formats to be used by your applications. Many
Windows applications take these settings into account. Unfortunately
they take their value from the Short Date setting, which by default
is set to a format that only supports a two-digit year. For example,
on U.S. versions of Windows, the default is "m/d/yy", which means
that any part of your application that does not have an explicit
date format enforced will use the Control Panel default of two digit
years.
Because
if this, it is commonly believed that you can solve the Year 2000
problem on the desktop simply by setting the Short Date format to
include four digit years. Unfortunately, this is not a complete
solution for a number of reasons. The first is that most custom
routines in applications do not use the short date setting. Look
through your application's code and see if you can find a single
place where you are actually using routines to check or set the
short date format. Chances are, there are no such occurrencesùwhich
means that fiddling with the Control Panel settings isn't the
solution. Secondly, and perhaps more importantly, there is nothing
to stop your application's users from setting or changing the short
date format on their own. After all, it is easier to type in two
digit years.
Programmatically Detecting and Changing Control Panel
Settings
As an
extra safety net for your application, you may want to have it set
the Short Date format at the start of your program. This ensures
that any place where Access, VB or Excel uses the setting will be
correct. If your application does need to read or set the short date
format, you can use the following code.
Declare
Function GetProfileString Lib "KERNEL" (ByVal strSection As String,
ByVal strKeyName As String, ByVal strDefault As String, ByVal
strReturned As String, ByVal intSize As Integer) As
Integer
Declare Function WriteProfileString Lib "KERNEL"
(ByVal strSection As String, ByVal strKeyName As String, ByVal
strValue As String) As Integer
Function SetCurrentShortDate
(strIn As String) As String
' Comments : Sets
the control panel short date setting
'
Parameters: strIn - format to use, e.g.
mm/dd/yyyy
' Returns : new value or
<error>
Dim fOK As
Integer
fOK =
WinINIWriteSetting_Y2K("intl", "sshortdate",
strIn)
If fOK
Then
SetCurrentShortDate =
strIn
Else
SetCurrentShortDate
= "<error>"
End If
End
Function
Function ShowCurrentShortDate_Y2K () As
String
' Comments : Returns the current control
panel short date setting
' Parameters:
none
' Returns :
string
ShowCurrentShortDate_Y2K =
WinINIGetSetting_Y2K("intl", "sshortdate")
End
Function
Function WinINIGetSetting_Y2K (strSection As String,
strKeyName As String) As String
' Comments :
Returns a string value from the WIN.INI file
'
Parameters: strSection - name of the section to look
in
' strKeyName -
name of the key to look for
' Returns : string
value
'
Dim strBuffer As
String * 256
Dim intSize As
Integer
intSize =
GetProfileString(strSection, strKeyName, "", strBuffer,
256)
WinINIGetSetting_Y2K =
Left$(strBuffer, intSize)
End Function
Function
WinINIWriteSetting_Y2K (strSection As String, strKeyName As String,
strValue As String) As Integer
' Comments :
writes the specified value to WIN.INI
'
Parameters: strSection - section to write
into
' strKeyName
- key to write
into
' strValue -
value to write
' Returns : True if successful,
False otherwise
'
Dim
intStatus As Integer
intStatus =
WriteProfileString(strSection, strKeyName,
strValue)
WinINIWriteSetting_Y2K =
(intStatus <> 0)
End Function
Code Listing 4 16-Bit Code (Access 2 and
VB 3) for Getting/Setting the
The
following code is the VBA (32-bit) version.
Private
Declare Function GetProfileString _
Lib
"kernel32" _
Alias "GetProfileStringA"
_
(ByVal strSection As String,
_
ByVal strKeyName As String,
_
ByVal strDefault As String,
_
ByVal strReturned As String,
_
ByVal intSize As Long)
_
As Long
Private
Declare Function WriteProfileString _
Lib
"kernel32" _
Alias "WriteProfileStringA"
_
(ByVal strSection As String,
_
ByVal strKeyName As String,
_
ByVal strValue As String)
_
As Long
Procedures
Private Function
WinINIWriteSetting( _
strSection As String,
_
strKeyName As String,
_
strValue As String) _
As
Integer
' Comments : Writes the specified value
to WIN.INI
' Parameters: strSection - Section
to write
into
' strKeyName
- Key to write
into
' strValue -
Value to write
' Returns : True if successful,
False otherwise
'
Dim lngStatus As
Long
lngStatus =
WriteProfileString(strSection, strKeyName,
strValue)
WinINIWriteSetting = (lngStatus
<> 0)
PROC_EXIT:
Exit
Function
PROC_ERR:
MsgBox "Error: "
& Err.Number & ". " & Err.Description, ,
_
"WinINIWriteSetting"
Resume
PROC_EXIT
End Function
Private Function
WinINIGetSetting( _
strSection As String,
_
strKeyName As String)
_
As String
' Comments :
Returns a string value from the WIN.INI file
'
Parameters: strSection - Name of the section to look
in
' strKeyName -
Name of the key to look for
' Returns : String
value
'
Dim strBuffer As
String * 256
Dim intSize As
Integer
On Error GoTo
PROC_ERR
intSize = GetProfileString(
_
strSection, strKeyName, "",
strBuffer, 256)
WinINIGetSetting =
Left$(strBuffer,
intSize)
PROC_EXIT:
Exit
Function
PROC_ERR:
MsgBox "Error: "
& Err.Number & ". " & Err.Description, ,
_
"WinINIGetSetting"
Resume
PROC_EXIT
End Function
Public Function
ShowCurrentShortDate() As String
' Comments :
Returns the current control panel short date
setting
' Parameters:
None
' Returns :
String
'
On Error GoTo
PROC_ERR
ShowCurrentShortDate =
WinINIGetSetting("intl",
"sshortdate")
PROC_EXIT:
Exit
Function
PROC_ERR:
MsgBox "Error: "
& Err.Number & ". " & Err.Description, ,
_
"ShowCurrentShortDate"
Resume
PROC_EXIT
End Function
Public Function
SetShortDateFormat(strIn As String) As String
'
Comments : Sets the control panel short date
setting
' Parameters: strIn - Format to use,
e.g. mm/dd/yyyy
' Returns : New value or
<error>
'
Dim fOk As
Integer
On Error GoTo
PROC_ERR
fOk = WinINIWriteSetting("intl",
"sshortdate", strIn)
If fOk
Then
SetShortDateFormat =
strIn
Else
SetShortDateFormat
= "<error>"
End
If
PROC_EXIT:
Exit
Function
PROC_ERR:
MsgBox "Error: "
& Err.Number & ". " & Err.Description, ,
_
"SetShortDateFormat"
Resume
PROC_EXIT
End Function
Code Listing 5 VBA Code for
Getting/Setting the Short Date Format
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