Re: Accuracy of Time/Date Stamp on a Metcard

[paul@xenu.ee.mu.oz.au (Paul Dwerryhouse)]

enquiry@translib.com.au writes:

>That expiry date can also be sometime in "2079", considering Metcards
>currently only print 2-digit year!Obviously the problem still exist
>after all those Metcard trials.  This very problem was encountered
>during Stage 1 of Metcard implementation.  I can recall a Metcard
>hanging inside a booking office (sorry I don't want to name the station)
>that has an expiry date earlier than the issued date.

My question is this:

Are they for real??  How hard is it to write a program that prints the
date on the back of a card? 

This is a very basic computer programming exercise, generally given to 
first year university students!

There are simply too many faults, flaws, inconsistencies and idiosyncracies
in this system - it is absolutely ridiculous.

One further point to mull over: somebody in this newsgroup mentioned
that there are around 1200 tickets that are eaten by validators each week,
and not returned. 

If the system is acting like this when newly installed, how is it going
to be two or three years down the track, when the internal mechanical
parts start to wear out, and the assorted goo that people get on their cards
builds up inside the machines?

It's blatantly obvious that the Victorian Government has taken the cheap
path in regard to the system (and they _are_ typically cheap people) -
I don't see the machines remaining in working order for too long.

Are we destined to be battling run down and shoddy validators and barriers
that swallow tickets for the remainder of the Met's life?


...Paul


--
Paul Dwerryhouse                                        paul@xenu.ee.mu.oz.au
"The growing use of e-mail, not to mention Web-page publishing, threatens to 
reverse the trend towards illiteracy among the supposedly educated without at 
the same time improving their spelling". -- Michael Swaine, Dr. Dobb's Journal