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Critical Update, January 25, 1999

This revised update corrects several minor issues associated with generating dates on your computer on or after January 1, 2000 and will automatically install both the Windows 98 Year 2000 Update and the newer Windows 98 Year 2000 Update 2 if your PC does not already have the earlier Year 2000 Update. This component is part of the Windows 98 Customer Service Pack, which includes the following components:

- Windows 98 System Update
- Windows 98 Year 2000 Update 2
- Outlook® Express Year 2000 Update

For best performance and reliability of your Windows-based computer, Microsoft recommends that you download all the components of the Customer Service Pack if you have not done so already.

In an ongoing effort toward Year 2000 compliance, Microsoft has identified minor Year 2000 issues within the Windows 98 operating system. These apply to the original version of Windows 98, and not the Second Edition version, which includes the earlier fixes.

These updates correct several minor issues associated with generating dates on your computer on or after January 1, 2000. The issues addressed in Windows 98 Year 2000 Update include leap year calculations in particular circumstances, entering expiration dates in Microsoft Wallet, handling of some date/time settings, and correct logging of on-line calling. Windows 98 Year 2000 Update 2 includes fixes that address OLE Automation, international date formats, and internal digital certificates as part of the Personal Web Server.

While you may have found that your Windows 98-based computer can sometimes display Year 2000 dates incorrectly, this poses no risk of data loss.

Because system files are being updated, it is important to follow the How To Use instructions. See complete step by step instructions below.

System Requirements
Windows 98

How to use
After downloading, please make a new Emergency Startup Disk that will reflect the changes made.

1. Insert original startup disk in Drive A.
2. Click Start, point to Programs, then click MS-DOS.
3. Type Sys a:. You will receive a message stating system transferred when the process is complete.

If you do not have a startup disk, please do the following:

1. Insert a blank floppy disk into Drive A.
2. Click Start, then click Programs, then click MS-DOS.
3. Type cd \windows\command then press Enter.
4. Type bootdisk and press Enter to create an updated startup disk.

How to uninstall
Uninstall is not available. Windows 98 Year 2000 Update:
Regional Settings Date/Time - If Regional Settings in Control Panel are set to use two-digit years, the date/time function may not return the proper date because only two digits at a time can be accepted.

Microsoft Wallet - When entering credit card information in versions of Wallet before version 2.1.0.1383, you must enter month, day, and year for expiration dates after 2000. Otherwise, information may be read incorrectly. For example, entering a credit card with expiration 5/01 will be interpreted as May 1 of the current year.

Java Virtual Machine - Some Year 2000 issues have been reported in connection with Java virtual machines based on the Sun Microsystems Java Development Kit (versions 1.1.1-1.1.5). For example, if your Web site uses Java and makes use of the java.txt.SimpleDateFormat class library and you enter four digits for the year, the date functions may use only the first two digits.

Dialer.Exe Log - If you make a phone call using the phone dialer, the log file that is created displays the year portion of the call date incorrectly.

Date/Time control - If you open Date/Time in Control Panel and set the date to February 29 of a leap year and then use the up/down buttons to change years, February 29 might be displayed even for non-leap years.

WordPad custom properties - If you select Properties/Custom on a Wordpad or Word document, the custom date setting will not accept the Year 2000 as a valid entry when entered as a two-digit year, or "00." Additionally, since all two digit dates are assumed to be in the 20th century, if the time zone is set to Asia, the date properties will lose a day when you enter the year as 2000.

Date Rollover - If your system boots up at the precise fraction of a second when the date rolls at midnight, the system clock may display an inaccurate time/date. This is an extremely rare occurrence.

Lagging IP Lease dates - If you log on to a LAN after March 1, 2000 and run Winipcfg from the Run command or Ipconfig from the DOS VM, the DHCP client reports the IP lease date as having been obtained on the previous day.

Programming to data access components - Your date may be translated as a time under the following conditions: If you are a programmer and code to ADO or OLE DB, use data access components such as adDate, adDBDate, Dbtype_Filetime, chose to use an international date format with periods as separators, and specify a year less than 60. Microsoft Foundation Class Library - After the Year 2000, programs that use the COleDateTime function may improperly parse a date.

DOS Xcopy - When using xcopy in real mode with the optional parameter /D:date, xcopy does not accept years entered as two digits, except for the years 80 through 99. The message "Invalid date" is displayed. When using xcopy in protected mode (from within Windows) two-digit dates are accepted but are recognized as being within the 20th century (02/05/01 is seen as 02/05/1901).

Windows 98 Year 2000 Update 2:
OLE Automation - The Microsoft Automation library contains routines for interpreting two digit years and provides a convenient way for applications to create unambiguous (serial) dates. In Windows 98 the current two digit year cutoff is 2029. This means that two digit years beginning with 30 will be interpreted as being in the 20th century, for example, 1/1/30 is converted to 1/1/1930, regardless of the user’s century window settings in Control Panel\Regional Settings\Date tab.

DOS Xcopy - For systems using the International date format "yy-mm-dd" 2-digit years are not handled correctly. When a system is configured to use the date format "yy-mm-dd" in Control Panel \ Regional Settings, xcopy will not accept 00 for the year 2000.

MQRT.DLL - Microsoft Message Queue (MSMQ) is installed as part of Personal Web Server and works with two types of digital certificates - external and internal. The internal certificates is a concept supported by MSMQ to allow MSMQ applications to allocate certificates for the purpose of sending authenticated messages. The code creating the requests for internal certificates for MSMQ 1.0 requests to set the validity of the newly created certificates to 10 years. The issue materializes when MSMQ tries to create such a certificate on February 29, 2000 ( or any leap year such as 2004 or 2008).

INTL.CPL - For International versions of Windows 98 where a user can choose between localized and non-localized Gregorian system calendars (in Control Panel/Regional Settings), the century window can be configured individually for each Gregorian calendar. An error occurs when applications that use the Visual Basic® development system, such as Access, convert a date that utilizes the century window settings for the default calendar, while a user would expect instead that the currently selected calendar and settings would be used. This does not affect English versions of Windows 98.

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