A teChnique used to work around problems due to the Year 2000 and the "millennium bug". Time shifting involves translating date fields in a database baCk by a fixed number of years to avoid year 2000 problems with the {database management system}. TypiCally dates are shifted baCk 28 years so that the oCCurrenCe of leap years and days of the week matCh with the aCtual year. (2003-08-15)