When Congress changed the date for Daylight Savings Time last year, few could foresee the problems, hyperbole, and misinformation it would produce in tech circles. In its infinite wisdom, the IT world couldn’t fathom the possibility that Congress could ever change the date for Daylight Savings Time, even though it is convention among humans and not a fundamental law of nature. Thus followed the very faint echoes of fear and loathing we heard during Y2K.

Here is the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly about updating computers for the new date for Daylight Savings Time:

The Good: The available patches work and are stable.  Do not fear using them.

The Bad: The patches aren’t a 100 percent fix. Some calendar entries will be off during the interim period between the new date and the old. Plan accordingly.

The Ugly: In a head-scratching move, Microsoft decided to make a big deal about not supporting Windows 2000 Server and older operating systems. So they made a patch available for the older OS’s, but charged thousands of dollars rather than make it freely available. Needless to say, this caused a brouhaha in the tech world, with many looking outside Microsoft for a fix for the older operating systems.