The following is a list of all the bugs caught during leap day, February 29th, 2016. Each link below references the issue with supporting details where available.
If you're looking for information of how to avoid leap year bugs, or examples of disasterous leap year bugs from previous years, please read my article on the Microsoft Azure blog.
Please let me know if you have any corrections or additions. Thanks.
Last updated 2017-11-30
Verified / Deferred
Items in this section had an impact on February 29th, but resolved themselves on March 1st without any specific fix or resolution reported. One assumes that the vendor will take appropriate action before the 2020 leap day, but no confirmation has yet been provided.
- Düsseldorf International Airport
- Over 1,200 bags and suitccases didn't board planes on time, reportedly due to a leap day bug in the luggage conveyor system control software.
- Palo Alto firewalls
- Error reportedly occured while upgrading on 3k and 5k series devices.
- Comment thread
- Other reportings: 1 2 3
- Veeam Backup & Replication
- Installation and upgrades error due to certificate generation error.
- Additional reportings
- CouchDB
- Error fetching
/favicon.ico
- Error fetching
- Blade Soho's iOS app
- Couldn't make salon appointments on Feb 29 or Mar 1.
- Perl 5.22.1
- A unit test failed to run on Feb 29.
Verified / Resolved
Items in this section had an impact on February 29th, were verified as bugs, and are now resolved.
- Eldos SecureBlackbox security software for developers
- TElHTTPSClient component crashes in its constructor on Feb 29, leading to HTTPS connectivity errors
- Fixed in version 14.0.289
- cPanel Bandwidth monitoring software
- cPanel Bandwidth page failed to open on Feb 29.
- Fixed in v56
- Zotonic - the Erlang Web Framework and CMS
- Error during static files request
- Fixed in version 0.13.8
- Ace Payroll (New Zealand)
- Access Violation appears when launching program on Feb 29.
- Fixed in version 3.43C
- OSMC - Open Source Media Center
- Setting a date in a scheduler failed on Feb 29.
- Fixed in version 2016.02-3
- eM Client email software
- Fixed in version 6.0.24928.0
- Let's Encrypt Certbot - client for obtaining certificates
- Fixed in version 0.4.1
- parsedatetime library for Python
- Fixed in version 2.0
- OpenStack Dashboard (Horizon)
- Fixed in version 8.0.2
- OpenStack Identity (Keystone)
- Affected unit tests only
- Fixed in version 9.0.0.0b3
- Jekyll - Ruby based static site generator
- Workaround provided in issue
- Rsyslog - Log file processing utility for Unix/Linux systems.
- Fixed in version 8.17.0
Verified / Resolved / Unknown Impact
Items in this section are also verifed and resolved, but the vendor did not supply any supporting details as to what problems they actually had.
- VooFoo Studios - multiple online games
- Unshelved - online comics
- Cooking Mama - Japanese video game
- Plume Plotter - environmental app (UK)
Verified / Unresolved
- micro-strptime.js - date parsing library for JavaScript
- Not in widespread usage, as far as I am aware.
- No response yet from author.
- PHP
- Missing Feb 29 when using
DateTime::createFromFormatwith day of year placed before the year. - Reported in 2012, and never fixed. Reproducable in the current version.
- Workaround: put the year first. May or may not be practical for all users.
- Missing Feb 29 when using
- Money Manager EX - open source personal finance software
- Multiple issues including one that was fixed, one that was deferred, and several others including one that is still occurring after leap day has passed.
Unconfirmed
These items surfaced during my search or were brought to my attention by others, however I have not been able to confirm their validity. They may or may not have been caused by the leap day, or possibly not have happened at all.
- Apple iOS (iPhone / iPad)
- Apple Watch
- Calendar preview issue
- A few reports of receiving a badge early: 1 2
- SunTran Alerts transportation app (Tucson, Arizona)
- Reportedly, app shows no bus route stop times.
- Qantas Airways mobile app
- Reportedly, app didn't allow flight check in on February 29th.
- MatLab R2008a
- Old version. Probably fixed already, but not sure.
- Jeep Automobiles
- SDG&E Utilities (San Diego, California)
- Missing Feb 29 in an energy usage chart on their web site (used with smart meters).
- Intuit Turbotax 2015
- Allegedly not allowing Feb 29 as a date for eFiling signature.
- United States Postal Service
- MYZONE fitness tracker
- Month total reset to zero on Feb 29 instead of Mar 1
- United Airlines
- Flight notification allegedly sent one day too early.
Honorary Mention
- Python (in
time.strptimefunction)- Not really a "bug", but just a commonly misused API.
- Evaluating future change as an enhancement.
- HTC Sync Manager
- Appointments from Jan 1 - Feb 29 were off by a day.
- Affected users for many weeks.
- Fixed in version 3.1.67.0, released in January (before leap day)
- A "We I.D." digital sign
- Mysteriously calculated the date of birth to be 21 years old as 1932.
- (2016 - 1932 = 84 84 / 4 = 21)
- TimeHop iOS/Android app
- Only showed tweets from four years ago, instead of the usual one year.
- It's not a bug, it's a feature!
Looking to avoid leap year bugs next time around? Check out my original post about leap year bugs. And don't forget - December 31st 2016 is another important date!
Also, we're just around the corner for the start or end of daylight saving time (depending on where you live). Be sure to read my post from last year, Five Common Daylight Saving Time Antipatterns of .NET Developers.
