With the coming of the millennium, there is a serious problem in the computer industry related to recognizing dates where the century is not displayed or stored. For example, there is no implicit indication of whether the date 1-20-10 is January 20, 1910, or January 20, 2010. For a software application to be Year 2000 Compliant, it must store dates with the century included, allow users a means to determine the century when the data is displayed, and correctly handle any and all calculations based on dates regardless of century.

All TeleMagic products make extensive use of dates in records, activities, and reports. TeleMagic supports a variety of date formats, including two-digit formats where the century is not explicitly indicated. The use of two-digit formats has been identified as a potential problem in certain cases. Since TeleMagic internally stores all dates in four-digit format, regardless of display format, these concerns do not apply. TeleMagic correctly identifies the year 2000 as a leap year.

TeleMagic works in your operating environment. Older system BIOS may not accommodate years beyond 1999. If your operating system does not address year 2000 problems, it is possible that TeleMagic will be affected.

Century in dates may be either explicit or implicit. Explicit century requires that date elements in interface and data storage permit specifying and/or displaying the century to avoid ambiguity. Implicit century requires that century in date entry and storage may be inferred without ambiguity wherever the full century is not displayed. Implicit dates may be inferred through the use of an epoch setting which designates that all dates before a specified year are in the twentieth century and all dates beyond that year are in the twenty-first century.

TeleMagic for DOS addressed Year 2000 compliance issues with the version 14.5 release in September of 1996. TeleMagic for DOS V14.5 and later will accurately deal with dates from 01-01-0100 through 12-31- 2999. All date fields have been expanded to accommodate explicit century display. Century has been taken into account where sorting, calculations, and comparisons are made based on date.

TeleMagic for DOS uses an epoch setting of 1950. This is applied when working with dates where century is not explicitly stated. This could be an issue when importing data from an outside source if the source file does not use a four-digit century. It could also be an issue with dates entered by the user for use with TeleMagic date functions. (TeleMagic for DOS provides access to several functions that perform calculations based on date. These date functions can be used in indexes, merge fields, calculated fields, and other areas where users can define how data is selected and displayed.) If TeleMagic encounters a date that does not include the century, it will treat dates from 00–49 as twenty-first century (20xx). Dates from 50– 99 will be treated as twentieth century (19xx). For example, a date entry of 12-31-99 will be interpreted as the last day of 1999. An entry of 01-01-00 will be interpreted as the first day of the year 2000. When the date is stored, the century is appended to the year automatically.

TeleMagic for Windows will accurately deal with dates from 09-14-1752 through 12-31-9999. Including explicit century in date displays has been an option since the original release of the TeleMagic for Windows product. Starting with the TeleMagic Enterprise version 3.5 release in October of 1997, this option is selected as the default for all new installations.

TeleMagic for Windows releases prior to version 4 require that twenty-first century dates be explicitly stated. 1900 will be assumed for any two-digit date entries where century has not been explicitly selected. Using the option to display the century on date fields is encouraged to avoid any ambiguity from two-digit date display. If this setting is ON, there will be no potential for misinterpreting a twenty-first century date as a twentieth century date. In situations where this preference is not used, date fields are provided with calendar tools to allow selection of twenty-first century dates when necessary. In TeleMagic Enterprise, the calendar may be accessed using an optional calendar icon next to the date fields. In TeleMagic Professional, or if the icon is not used in Enterprise, placing your cursor in a date field and pressing F2 will open the calendar.

In TeleMagic Enterprise version 4, a feature called Century Rollover was introduced. Century Rollover allows the user to define the epoch setting used when manually entering or importing two-digit year data. For example, if "40" is entered as the century rollover, whenever "40" is entered as the year, it will be stored as "1940." If "39" were entered as the year, it would be recorded as "2039."

TeleMagic for Windows provides access to several FoxPro functions that perform calculations based on date. For example, the function CTOD( ) is used to convert character strings into date strings. These date functions can be used in filters, indexes, reports, calculated fields, and other areas where users can define how data is selected and displayed. All calculations and conversions, whether they use these functions or not, will correctly account for any date falling between 09-14-1752 and 12-31-9999.

Ongoing testing of TeleMagic is performed by a full time testing team and a network of certified VARs. Each TeleMagic product that is released to the public must adhere to internal quality control standards. TeleMagic is also subjected to an extensive Beta test program prior to release. Testing continues to be performed after product release. Any issues that are discovered are addressed and fixes are made available to the public in a timely fashion.

TeleMagic will address any issues that may arise in the future related to year 2000 compliance. Any necessary changes will be made available on TeleMagic's web site.