Technical guidelines on embedded systems

The article discusses year 2000 compliance problems and how to solve them, focusing on embedded systems. In the circumstances, a more pragmatic approach will be necessary, with the best option being to use classic business continuity management methods. This focuses on those areas within an operation where the service processes and supporting systems are judged to be mission and/or safety critical, and where the consequences of a failure would be dire. The core of this approach is to identify the end-to-end service processes with a severe impact potential on lines of service continuity, assess the probability of Year 2000 compliance failure and its risk potential in ranking order for investigation. All the systems supporting these processes then have to be investigated in depth right down each system build chain and compliance problems resolved or mitigation solutions applied. Where adequate data to assess potential Year 2000 compliance is insufficient and/or inaccessible, risk evaluation assessments are used to determine a confidence rating for the chain concerned. Each process and their support system chains are reviewed and contingency plans established to provide work-around solutions to cover potential failures. Once in place, these plans need to be tested on the same bases as NHS Emergency/Disaster Plans and honed to minimise disruption in the event that they have to be actioned. As this process proceeds down the ranked listing of problem areas to overall threat potential, it is continuously assessed and fed back to the responsible management.