But the next in line were not nervous about this. They had rehearsed what they had to do three times already, they knew what to expect. Then they took their place in the job stream and did it. Rehearsals were necessary because the wholesale conversion had to happen over a long weekend around 1 January 1999. Y2K projects can be managed over a longer timescale where it possible to convert systems at different times and use bridges to maintain interfaces.
Some early changes are deceptively easy.
A utility can add a line at the bottom of their monthly consumer bill showing the total in euros with very little effort. But some changes require only agreement among trading partners to avoid redundant work. Mitch Ratcliffe in the PC Week article spoke of the euro birth as a bellwether, or early indicator, of possible Y2K success. This argument will not be resolved until 2000. Managed well, they are carefully estimated and the appropriate amount of change managed.