Year 2000 Compliance Statement for Census Bureau Seasonal Adjustment Software
STATEMENT OF COMPLIANCE:
This is to inform you that current versions of the seasonal adjustment programs distributed by the
Census Bureau (X-12-ARIMA, X-11.2, and X-11Q.2) meet the requirements for Year 2000
compliance.
Previous versions of X-11.2 and X-11Q.2 distributed by the Census Bureau are not Year 2000
compliant. Users of these programs should download the latest version of the software from the
Census Bureau FTP site at the following URL:
http://www.census.gov/pub/ts/x11/x11v2.exe
The above URL represents the final revisions of the X-11.2 and X-11Q.2 programs. These
programs are no longer supported by the Census Bureau; only the current version of
X-12-ARIMA will be supported.
The PC version of X-12-ARIMA can be downloaded from the following URL:
http://www.census.gov/srd/www/x12a/x12downv03_pc.html
DETAILS:
PRODUCTS WILL OPERATE INTO THE 21ST CENTURY.
The X-12-ARIMA, X-11.2, and X-11Q.2 seasonal adjustment programs have been tested with
the clock date set beyond January 1, 2000 without any interruptions in operation.
DATE-BASED FUNCTIONALITY WILL BEHAVE CONSISTENTLY FOR DATES
PRIOR TO, DURING AND AFTER YEAR 2000.
All routines related to calendar functionality (trading day and holiday estimation, for example)
have been rewritten to utilize four digit years. These algorithms have been checked to verify that
they will run correctly after the year 2000. These routines also correctly recognize the
year 2000 as a leap year.
FOR PROGRAMS THAT ALLOW THE USER TO ENTER A 2-DIGIT SHORT-CUT
FOR THE YEAR, THE PROGRAM WILL CONVERT THE YEAR TO A 4-DIGIT
YEAR.
- In X-12-ARIMA, all years entered for dates specified in the program input should have a
four-digit format. There are no 2-digit short cuts, so setting start=50.jan specifies that the
series starts in January of 50 AD, not 1950 AD.
The only exception are data files written in the "X-11 formats", as detailed in the
X-12-ARIMA Reference Manual. These data formats use 2-digit short cuts for year
values. To control how these values are converted to four-digit years, the yr2000
argument is provided.
When yr2000=yes in the series spec of X-12-ARIMA, a "century cutoff" for 2-digit years
is set at 1945. That is, years 00-45 are interpreted as 20xx, and years 46-99 are
interpreted as 19xx. This is the default for the X-12-ARIMA program.
If yr2000=no, the program assumes all 2-digit years fall in the 20th century (i.e., 19xx),
and will convert them to 4-digit years accordingly.
- In the X-11.2 and X-11Q.2 programs, a Y2KSET variable has been added to the NLX11
and NLX11Q namelists to provide the same functionality as the yr2000 argument in
X-12-ARIMA. If Y2KSET = 'Y' (the program default), all years 00-45 are interpreted as
20xx, and years 46-99 are interpreted as 19xx. If Y2KSET = 'N', the program assumes all
2-digit years provided to the program fall in the 20th century (i.e., 19xx).
Users can still enter two-digit shortcuts on input in the X-11.2 and X-11Q.2 programs.
These entries will be converted to four digit years in a way that depends on the value of
the Y2KSET vriable as described above.
RANGE FOR HOLIDAY ADJUSTMENT IN X-11.2 HAS INCREASED.
Holiday adjustment can now be performed for series defined between the years 1901 and 2100,
inclusive.
For more information, contact Brian C. Monsell at
brian.c.monsell@census.gov.
