Prior to 1994, IBM software boxes in the U.S. did not have any kind of manufacturing date or batch/production code printed on them. Sometime in '94, they started printing production dates on the boxes that are straightforward to read (in clear MMDDYY format, followed by some other characters).
In 1995, the U.S. boxes removed that style of code. But on the sticker that they started applying to the bottom of the boxes, there is a 6-character code on the left side that I think might be some kind of production code. But I haven't been able to find any information about it, or how to read/decode it. Does anybody here happen to know anything about its format?
It seems to always start with "F0", followed by a single letter, and then 3 digits. As far as I can tell, IBM only ever used this system in the U.S. Here is an example.
(in this case, "F0I066")
I have seen several examples of this "code" across the exact same product/part#, and it does seem that when the letter is higher (e.g. "K" instead of "I"), or if the letter is the same but the numbers are higher (e.g. "I106" instead of "I066"), that the box is from a later production run. For example, if you compare copies of Warp 4 with "F0Ixxx" codes to ones with "F0Kxxx" codes, the "K" copies have updated Application Sampler and Device Driver Pack CDs. But "I" and "K" are not the only letters I have seen on U.S. Warp 4 boxes.
I originally thought that perhaps the letter represented the year of manufacture. I thought this because I saw several examples of Warp Connect that were "F0H", and Warp Connect came out in 1995. Warp 4 came out in 1996, and since originally the oldest copies of Warp 4 that I saw were all "I", I guessed that maybe "H" was 1995 and "I" was 1996. This would make "K" to be 1998, which still fits the theory nicely...IBM was still manufacturing Warp 4 copies then. But I have since seen Warp 4 copies with "F0G" codes on them, and also there are images circulating of a copy of Warp for PowerPC, which came out in limited supply in December 1995, with a "F0A" code on its package.
It also would make sense for the 3 digits to maybe be the day of the year, but that also doesn't fit if you try to make it work. For example, if we say for the sake of argument that "I" is 1996, and "F0I066" is a valid code for a Warp 4 box (it is), and we assume the "066" is the day of year, that would mean this copy was manufactured in early March of 1996. But that's impossible, since Warp 4 was not released until late September.
So does anybody have any idea what this code means, and how it is decoded? It's possible it has nothing whatsoever to do with manufacturing date/batch/production run! That was just my best guess given that it 1) changes frequently (and the letters and numbers go "up"), but also 2) I have seen two copies of the same product with the same code printed on it, which means it can't be a box#, and instead I think has to represent a "batch" somehow. It also just seems very strange that IBM would add a date code in 1994, only to remove it later and not replace it with something else that fulfills the same purpose?
