In an effort to assist customers concerned about how their software will make the transition into the 21st century, Claris Corporation wishes to assure its customers that Claris software running on both Windows and Macintosh operating systems will support them well into the Year 2000 and beyond with no trouble. In short, currently shipping versions of Claris software will:

(a) correctly display both manually entered and calculated dates at least through the year 2019, and in most products, well beyond

(b) correctly handle the leap year in 2000 (it is in fact a leap year)

(c) generally allow users to enter "assumed" date formats and achieve anticipated results (i.e. 8/9/03 is understood to be August 9, 2003)

As Microsoft and Apple make changes to subsequent versions of their respective operating systems (Windows 95, Windows NT, Macintosh OS 7.x) to address these and related issues, Claris products that specifically use their numeric and date algorithms (such as ClarisWorks), will of course utilize those enhancements. This, combined with today's robust support, assures users that they can count on "2000 Ready" software from Claris.

Product Detail Already, Claris software today displays and calculates the next century's dates with great flexibility allowing users to employ assumed (dd/mm/yy) or explicit (dd/mm/yyyy) dates to get the expected result. So, with some minor exceptions (see Notes on FileMaker Pro below), Claris customers no problems surrounding their applications and the Year 2000.

Below is a table showing Claris software products and the application date maximum and minimum data entry date formats used for each one. "Minimum data entry date format" refers to the simplest method by which dates can be entered into the application and be stored and displayed correctly. For example, the mm/dd/yy format means that the application will correctly understand 8/9/03 to be August 9, 2003 (and not August 9, 1903), without the need to explicitly enter all four digits of the year. Also, unless otherwise noted, Claris software products rely on the system supplied date formats. This means that both U.S. and non U.S. users may use the date format standard accepted within their respective country(ies).

Special Notes On FileMaker Pro 2.1 and 3.0 and the year 2000:

For existing data in existing databases: Any two-digit year ALREADY in an existing database (such as a FileMaker Pro 2.1 database) is always treated as 19xx (NOT the current century but actually "19" -- it will do this even after the year 2000 since this is old data).

For newly entered data via Browse mode (FileMaker Pro 3.0): If the current year is among the LAST ten years of the century (as in 1990-1999 or 2090-2099), then any two-digit year in the range 00-09 will be treated as a year in the FOLLOWING century. (For example, if it's 1998, then 03 will be expanded to 2003 but 83 will be considered 1983.)

If the current year is among the FIRST ten years of the century (as in 2000-2009), then any two-digit year in the range 90-99 will be treated as a year in the PREVIOUS century. (For example, if it's 2002, then 97 will be treated as 1997 but 83 will be considered 2083.)

The behavior changes based on what the current year is. Examples:

In the year 1996: 1/1/01 -> 1/1/2001 1/1/10 -> 1/1/1910 1/1/99 -> 1/1/1999

In the year 2001: 1/1/01 -> 1/1/2001 1/1/10 -> 1/1/2010 1/1/99 -> 1/1/1999

In the year 2011: 1/1/01 -> 1/1/2001 1/1/10 -> 1/1/2010 1/1/99 -> 1/1/2099

Lastly, this behavior is NOT adopted if the data is imported via Import Records, scripting or Apple Events or via drag-n-drop to a non-active field or for dates entered in the calculation dialog, etc. Any two digit dates entered into FileMaker this way will be treated as 19xx, NOT the current century but actually "19".

If the entire year is entered then the corresponding date will be reflected.

 

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