The United States Congress has given us a nice springtime gift. They passed legislation in July of last year to extend Daylight Savings Time. This is the equivalent to a mini-Y2K. The reason given for the change is to save energy. The belief is that since Americans use the most energy in the evening, if you move it ahead by one hour we will save energy. The new dates for the change are March 11th and November 4 this year. (Here is a chart for dates up to 2040)
The difference between this event and Y2K is that this will happen four times this year. Hopefully you will be able to fix everything just once. I have ran down some common computer operating systems and how they are affected and more importantly, fixed.
Windows Vista – The best news! It shipped with the problem fixed. You are good to go.
Windows XP – Great news! Microsoft has released a patch. Even greater news! It does not appear to break anything*.
Windows 2000 – Bad news! Microsoft has NOT released a patch. Good news! A third-party has created an easy to use patch utility that does not appear to break anything*. You can find the unofficial, third-party patch at Intelliadmin. Microsoft has a procedure, but it is not for the faint of heart.
Microsoft Office – Not so bad! The only patch available is for Outlook. The calendar function needs to be updated to handle future appointments. Microsoft has supplied a repair utility for Office 2003 and 2007.
Other Software – Just about every software vendor that provides mission-critical software has released information about potential problems. Most problems that I have seen are fairly minor. The most significant seem to be when data is moving across time zones. An example would be branch offices feeding data to a central data center. Check with your software vendor for any possible advisories.
*I have tested these patches in my environments, but they may not work with your particular software. Test any way possible before installing into a working system.