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A term used especially by the computer industry to refer to the problems challenges and issues involved in preparing computer systems and applications for transition to and operation in the twenty-first century. For example many computer systems and applications use two digits to represent the year ("97" rather than 1997). When these computer systems and applications encounter the digits "00" for the year 2000 they can misinterpret this to mean the year 1900 and can produce computing errors or fail to function. Although some systems and applications may not be affected until the eve of the new millennium (on 31 December 1999) many systems and applications that use future dates (such as expiration dates for credit cards) have already experienced Year 2000 problems. This problem could also affect such things as elevator controls; household appliances such as VCRs and programmable coffee makers; heating cooling and security systems; telephone calls; driver's licenses; automated teller machines and bank vaults; and airline flight schedules.
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