The Y2010 Diagnostic application serves two main purposes:
- Gathering information about upcoming alarms
- Clearing alarms in case of infinite alarm popups
The application can be downloaded from SourceForge.
Gathering Information
The application fetches on startup the following information:
- Time base for seconds-based function: Indicates whether the Newton has been patched with a native 2010 fix (not the original Fix2010 patch)
- Contents of the SystemAlarmSoup
- Contents of all other soups which can contain alarms
The data can be copied to the Notes application for further inspection.
For each event which will cause an alarm, the time is shown. Any times after 2009 are problematic: When alarms for events past 2009 are scheduled, the 2010 bug kicks in, and due to the number overflow in some of the alarm functions, an alarm in the past is scheduled. This causes the alarm to go off immediately, and it will also cause the alarm to be rescheduled immediately, and again, this new alarm will be in the past, leading to an infinite alarm loop.
Clearing Alarms
In case of infinite alarms, the application can be used to remove all alarms. Those alarms have to be re-entered if needed, and a restart of the Newton is advised.